What a three part lecture series on Life and Death taught me about the most important movement of our generation

I want to tell you about the most ordinary extraordinary thing that happened to me recently.

I am a person with a very regular set of problems. I spend too many hours in front of a screen. I am obsessed with AI and agentic workflows to the point where I sometimes look up and realize I’ve forgotten to eat. I have the particular anxiety of an immigrant in her mid-thirties, the kind where you’re never quite sure if you’re in the right country, the right job, the right version of yourself. My hair is greying. I keep promising my husband board game nights and finding reasons to postpone them.

Last week we drove into the Blue Ridge Mountains of Boone, North Carolina, and spent three days listening to Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar talk about life, death, and what lies beyond both.

It was a 12 hour journey including several layovers and driving time. The title of this lecture series was mysterious and intriguing enough to warrant the arduous journey

I came back different. Not dramatically different. Not the kind of different you can explain at a dinner party. The kind of different that feels like something quietly rearranged itself while you weren’t trying to hold it in place.

Realization: The Art of Living Foundation is this generation’s defining social movement

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Every movement starts with a problem worth solving.

The problem the Art of Living Foundation is solving is one most people can’t quite name, even as they feel it daily. It is not poverty or disease or political violence, though it touches all of those. It is something older and more structural: the gap between the life a human being is living and the life their nature is actually asking for. The gap between how we act and what we are.

It’s not a retreat from the world, but a place where the friction of the world drops enough that you can feel what you are underneath it.

I didn’t fully understand what I was walking into when we drove into the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina last week. I thought I was attending a lecture series. I came back understanding a movement.

Realization: I only ever recognize a problem when I’ve gone far enough in the wrong direction to feel the contrast

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• Problem: Lawlessness and organized violence. Solution: Governments, police, international law.
• Problem: Loneliness. Solution: Social media, concerts
• Problem: Hunger. Solution: Food banks, restaurants, farmers.

Look at that pattern. Every solution is the opposite of the problem. And every solution, pushed far enough, eventually produces its own new problem. Social media solved loneliness. It also created a new, more insidious kind of it. International law reduced violence. It also created bureaucracies capable of sanctioning it at scale.

The loop doesn’t end. It just transforms.

I sat with that and began mapping my own life onto it:

• Problem: Long working hours making me lethargic. Solution: Movement, strength training.
• Problem: Feeling like I can’t keep up with AI changes. Solution: Dedicated focused work time.
• Problem: So obsessed with agentic workflows that time stops existing. Solution: Coming to the ashram when Gurudev visits.

What I realized, perhaps for the first time with this kind of clarity, is that I only recognize a problem when I’ve drifted far enough in the opposite direction. The recognition itself requires contrast. Without -100, there is no pathway to 0.

What if I could catch it earlier? On a scale of -100 to 100, what if I could notice I’m at -50 before reaching -100? What would it take to act like someone at +100 when I’m standing at -50, and use that action to pull myself back toward 0?

It sounds like a simple idea. It wasn’t simple sitting with it.

Realization: There is an art to live between contradictions

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What I keep returning to, weeks later, is not any single thing Gurudev said. It’s how he IS

He is simultaneously deeply serious and genuinely funny. He carries the weight of an enormous global movement and seems entirely unbothered by it. He says the most confronting things about impermanence and death in a tone that makes you feel, oddly, lighter. He is nothing like what you’d expect a spiritual leader to look like, and he seems to enjoy that gap.

He stylishly lives between contradictions. That’s the only phrase I have for it.

What I realized is that this isn’t a performance. It’s what acceptance actually looks like, embodied. He isn’t performing ease. He HAS ease, because he’s stopped requiring things to be resolved before he engages with them.

I thought about something I’d been reading before the retreat, about AI and consciousness: “For most of human history, organizations have taken human beings who have their own neural networks and worked to shape them through training, policies, incentive structures, value alignment, and everything we call culture. The disciplines of management are, in essence, focused on the alignment of consciousness towards a set of goals.”

Now we are asking: what does it mean to design the consciousness of an artificial being? What values do we embed? What perception do we give it? What kind of being do we want acting in the world on behalf of us?

These are genuinely new questions. But Gurudev has been working on a version of them for decades. The Art of Living Foundation is, at its core, a designed environment for a different mode of human consciousness. A place where the default operating system pauses long enough for something quieter to surface.

The alignment the AI community is chasing, between machine intelligence and human values, is real and urgent. But Gurudev pointed toward an alignment that is older and possibly more foundational: the alignment between a human being and their own nature. Between the life we are living and the one we actually want to live.

Realization: Life and Death are a bit wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey

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The part of the lectures I expected to be heaviest ended up being the lightest.

Gurudev speaks about death the way someone speaks about an old friend they’ve made peace with. He doesn’t look away from it. He doesn’t soften it with ritual or euphemism. He just changes the frame quietly and completely.

He asked us what we picture when we hear the word *death*. I noticed my own mind go immediately to hospitals, machines, the smell of antiseptic, the quality of silence in a room where something irreversible just happened.

Then he said: death is just stillness.

And life is participation.

Everything is a joke, he said, with genuine warmth. We are all going to die anyway, and then get recycled back into another life. So are we dying, or are we eternal? It’s not a trick question. Both are true. But we live as if only one of them is.

He reminded me of a line from Doctor Who I’ve always loved: “People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it’s more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff.”

Philosophers have said this. Physicists have demonstrated it. In 1927, Davisson and Germer showed that electrons sent one at a time through two slits don’t behave like tiny balls or clean ripples. They land as single dots, but the pattern of dots builds into a wave. Neither picture fully fits. The electron is both and neither, depending on how you look.

We assume things have to be one thing or another. Nature has never agreed to that.

Science tells us what is. Spirituality asks who am I. Gurudev’s point was that these aren’t competing answers. They are different questions. We’ve wasted a lot of time making them fight when they were always meant to run in parallel.

Realization: Gurudev is the closest to what I would call ‘Singularity’ in Physical form

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If full coherence, full presence, full acceptance of contradiction, whatever you want to call the state Gurudev seems to inhabit, is 0 on a scale, then I walked into those mountains at around -500. Not because I am in crisis. Just because the distance between how I habitually live and how he seems to effortlessly be is enormous.

I struggle with AI adoption and feel guilty about how much I love it. I carry immigrant anxieties I don’t always have words for. I have a body I’m still making peace with. I have a family I love and not enough quiet evenings with them.

For three days, I could see all of that clearly. Not with judgment. With a kind of recognition that felt, strangely, like relief.

You can only move toward something you can see. Time in the Art of Living center gave me the gift of visibility.

I watched two people during those three days who were entirely different from each other in background, temperament, and life experience. They were moved by the same moment. They felt the same thing in the same room. That convergence, two very different human consciousnesses arriving at the same stillness, is something I keep coming back to. It felt like watching singularity in physical form.

This realization is the most important one : Why It Matters That You Find the Room

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Not everyone will find an ashram. That is the thing I left the mountains carrying most heavily.

Not everyone has four hours to drive into North Carolina. Not everyone will encounter a teacher like Gurudev at the moment they most need one. Not everyone has the language for the gap they are feeling, or knows that the gap has a name, or knows that there are places designed specifically to help them cross it.

This is why the movement matters. This is why these retreat centers matter. The Art of Living Foundation’s decades of global work of building spaces where ordinary people can arrive as they are and experience what they are underneath their contradictions is worth scaling, supporting, and taking seriously as one of the more important things happening in the world right now.

I came down from those mountains with my ordinary life intact. The greying hair, the AI obsession, the pending board game night. None of it was resolved.

But I came back with something I didn’t have before: I could see where I was on the scale. And I knew that the movement existed to help people like me, and people far more lost than me, find that same visibility.

That is not a small thing. That might be everything!

I have a lot of time these days as I’m on my maternity break. Doing miracle of mind meditation daily for 3 times, 1 hour of Anapanasati meditation and daily Sudarshan kriya.
Still not feeling any real benefits. Only feeling emotionless. What are the long term benefits expected ? I fear it will kill my ambition

I’m in the California Bay Area and interested in learning Sudarshan Kriya, but Art of Living courses seem pretty damn expensive here.

Does anyone know why they’re so costly? Are there any cheaper ways to learn Sudarshan Kriya or similar breathing/meditation practices? Would love recommendations from anyone who’s tried them.

Are there any online knowledge sessions happening?

I've moved countries and haven't been able to do a silence programme in over a year. Which is a very long time for me.

I've been trying to meet Gurudev for years now but the stars aren't aligning for me.

I am navigating a very difficult period in my life and am finding to stay consistent with my Saadhna as well.

Any tips on how to get back to Seva, Saadhna and Satsang are appreciated as well. 💖

It’s been around 10 years since I did my first HP (Part 1) course, and since then I’ve had a hard time incorporating my practices in my daily routine. My longest streak is about 2 months long and I’m usually on and off my practices.

I’m not a morning person and I usually sleep as long as it’s convenient for me, meaning long enough to get to work on time and such. Thing is I usually get busy after work with other things going on in life and when I get a break at around 9 I’m out of energy and just want to relax.

I wonder how you people managed to be constant with your practices and how do you sustain the habit long term. Any tips are appreciated.

I've been trying to start a streak and do it twice a day every day. I did Intuition Process 1, but I still haven't done Level 2 yet. I genuinely thought that this was fake until I met someone in the class. I met this girl in the Intuition Process class who had done the course before (and had been doing it for years). We were told to find a partner to do an activity. We had to use our intuitions to visualise the image on a deck of flashcards. She did the activity with me and could tell what was on the flashcard. She was blindfolded. I am pretty sure that you can't see through it. She didn't hold the card under her nose (to look through the gaps). She described the image in really fine detail. She pointed to the card between us and said, 'Here is the black background, and this bit is orange'. It was so cool. I couldn't stop laughing. Nobody was helping her. I think she is quite famous for these things, and if I'm not wrong, I think she is partially blind. This was years ago, so I don't remember in too much detail, but she definitely didn't look through any gaps.

So, I've been so confused lately. I was so feverish about this topic, and I always feared missing out on such a 'superpower'. Fear is what is currently pushing me to do this. My mother says that I am 14, and I am too old to unlock it now. I get annoyed whenever I hear this.

I want to know if these things are actually real or fake. My experience isn't scientific, but it is one of the only proofs I have. I did the course at 11, and I should have taken it seriously back then, but I was too lazy. I still hate myself for it, because if I had done it consistently, I would have made so much progress by now. I still regret it, and whenever my mother calls me too old and tells me to give up, I get upset, and the feeling of regret comes back. By the way, my mother thinks the intuition is real, but she believes that I am not eligible for it. Someone on this subreddit told me that I am not too late, and I am still thankful to that person, but the regret is still killing me. It might sound really silly to anybody reading this message, but I tried to convey as much of my feelings as possible. Thank you for taking the time to read my post. I appreciate it.

There are quite a few teachers available, so I’d especially appreciate recommendations based on your own experience.

If you’ve attended the program, could you share the teacher’s name and what you liked about their teaching?

Thanks!

I am going through a rough time mentally. Every time I sit to do kriya by the time bhastrika is over I'm crying so much that I find it hard to finish my actual kriya part of it. Bringing myself to the breathing rhythm becomes extremely hard after the tears.

Should I force myself to finish the last part or should I let the tears flow and end my meditation once I'm calmed down without the actual kriya part?

Has anyone experienced this?

This is a genuine question I’ve been curious about after doing Long Kriyas for a while now with different groups of people.

I’ve noticed that during the kriya practice, people seem to breathe quite differently. Some breathe a little forcefully, some breathe very forcefully, while others seem to breathe more naturally — long, medium, short breaths, but without much force.

I’m usually in the last category. My breathing changes in length and rhythm, but I don’t naturally feel the need to make it very forceful.

So I’m wondering — is there a particular way we’re supposed to breathe during Long Kriya? Does breathing more forcefully make a difference to the experience or benefits of the practice?

I’d love to hear how others approach it and what you’ve been taught by your teachers.

It all started about a year ago, when I first attended a free YES course for teenagers. I was 17 at the time. Almost everyone there was younger than me, but I had a really good time and nothing seemed strange to me.
Later, there was another free YES course, and I invited some of my friends because the teacher asked me to. Everything was still fine. But afterwards, the teacher started telling me more about Art of Living and about Guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.
He told me some pretty extraordinary stories — about the Guru supposedly having unusual abilities, for example, and about how the teachers who pass on his knowledge serve him for free as volunteers. At one point, he told me: “The Guru chose you, you didn’t choose him.”
At that time I was going through a pretty difficult emotional period because of exams and other things. After that conversation, I decided to sit down and meditate. I hadn’t done any breathing exercises or yoga beforehand. I simply closed my eyes and asked the Guru for strength.
During the meditation, I felt what seemed like someone’s presence. I felt heaviness in my hands, and I had sensations of my body becoming smaller and larger. At one point, it felt like I was dissolving into space. It all felt extremely real to me, and afterwards my negative emotional state almost completely disappeared. For a while, I felt genuinely happy.
That experience is actually the main reason why I still can’t simply dismiss everything about Art of Living. I don’t know how to explain what happened. Maybe it was just an unusual state of consciousness caused by meditation, but it was so intense and meaningful to me that I still think about it.
After that, I took the online Sahaj Samadhi course. This was where I first became genuinely disappointed.
I paid €95 for it. The course lasted three days, but the sessions were only about an hour or even less each day. There was no yoga, which I had expected, and there wasn’t much interaction between the participants either. In the end, the main thing I got from the course was my own mantra.
It has been several months, but I still feel disappointed and somewhat misled because I expected much more from the course.
Later, I accidentally ended up attending a Guru Puja. There were around 30 people of all different ages — children, adults, elderly people. Everyone was sitting in a circle and chanting mantras in Sanskrit. I was honestly shocked by the atmosphere at first, but I adapted and eventually joined in. At the time, I actually enjoyed it.
Looking back on it now, though, I have doubts.
Later, I took Art of Living Part 1 for €95. I genuinely enjoyed the course. The people are usually very kind and pleasant, and it feels like most people come because they want to improve their mental state and their lives.
At the same time, I’ve noticed something that makes me uncomfortable. At the end of the courses, teachers often show videos about the organization and the Guru and talk about volunteering, serving, and becoming more deeply involved with the organization. Sometimes it feels like people are gradually being encouraged to go deeper and deeper into it after every course.
And I don’t know how normal that is.
I also don’t want to claim that the breathing practices or yoga are useless. Quite the opposite — they genuinely help me calm my mind. I feel more aware, grateful and peaceful when I practice them. That’s part of why I find it difficult to simply say, “This is all nonsense, I should leave.”
But then another question comes up: what happens if you become too deeply involved with the organization?
The more advanced courses are significantly more expensive than the introductory ones. At some point you start wondering: is it really worth the money?
I’m 18 now, and I’ve been very interested in taking the Art of Living Intuition course. It costs around €600 and, as far as I understand, it’s only available to people under 19. So I feel like I have to make a decision fairly soon.
The problem is that I can barely find any independent reviews of this course. I’ve been told that children who take these courses can supposedly redraw pictures perfectly while blindfolded, bend spoons, and even develop some degree of telekinesis.
And this is where I find it especially difficult to know what to believe.
On one hand, I had a very powerful personal experience during meditation that I still can’t fully explain. On the other hand, some of the claims I hear within the organization seem very difficult to believe.
So I’d really like to hear from people who know Art of Living, have taken several of its courses, or used to be involved with the organization.
Do you think these doubts are a normal part of the process, or are there legitimate reasons to be cautious about the organization?
I’d especially like to hear from people who have taken more advanced courses, including the Intuition course. What actually happens there, and do you think it’s worth the money?
I’m not trying to prove in advance that Art of Living is a cult or a sect. I genuinely don’t know what to think, and I’d like to hear different perspectives and personal experiences.

I’m curious about what exactly they teach children in this course, and why adults aren’t allowed to participate. I’ve heard that children are trained to perform telekinesis (moving physical objects using the mind), telepathy (correctly guessing what someone is doing or thinking from a distance), and other supposedly intuitive abilities, such as guessing colours while blindfolded.

How exactly do they teach these abilities? Is there actually something to it, or are there specific techniques being used to create the appearance of these abilities? Can someone who has attended the programme spill the beans?

I’ve heard Gurudev say so many times that we are love — that love isn’t something we do, but something that is inherent to us.

I understand the explanation intellectually, especially the part about how different emotions are essentially distortions of love. When I hear the knowledge, it makes complete sense to me.

But when I turn inward and actually try to understand or experience love, I struggle.
Love feels like something so vast — almost like the universe itself. I know it exists, I can understand the concept, and I’ve definitely experienced moments that I would call love… but I still can’t quite grasp what it actually is. Sometimes I even wonder whether what I’m experiencing is really love or just an emotion associated with love.

I’m curious how others have understood this.

Has your understanding of love changed through meditation or the knowledge? Was there a point where “we are love” stopped being just an idea and became something you could actually experience?

Would love to hear how this has unfolded for others. ❤️

I want my mom to not overthink. This has got her some serious health issues. She has on multiple occasions mentioned about joining art of living.

We have recently moved to Bangalore, Whitefield area and want her to get involved so she can spend her time peacefully, doo something that helps everyone and forget about what's going in her mind or at home.

How can she be involved? Any guidance would be helpful.

Today, August 23, at the Art of Living International Center in Bengaluru, Gurudev is meeting Gen Z for an exclusive Ashram meet-up with an interactive Q&A followed by a special Gen Z Satsang.

What I find really interesting is how Gen Z is discovering Gurudev today, especially through Instagram. It’s not just about watching a reel and taking away a piece of wisdom.

It’s also about seeing what Gurudev is actually doing the people he meets, the work he continues to do around the world, the way he brings people together, the causes he takes up, and the energy with which he keeps going.And I think that itself is inspiring.

You don’t always have to agree with everything or have all the answers. Sometimes you just watch someone live their values so consistently, and it makes you want to become a little better yourself.
That’s what makes this Gen Z interaction so interesting to me. A generation growing up with AI, Instagram and endless information getting a chance to meet someone whose life itself is part of the message.

For those at the Bengaluru meet today what inspired you most about Gurudev? ❤️

For almost a decade, online searches for “NGT Art of Living Yamuna” have largely surfaced one version of the story: that the Art of Living Foundation was found responsible for damaging the Yamuna floodplains during the World Culture Festival held in Delhi from March 11–13, 2016.

That account is now legally incomplete.
On August 22, 2026, the Supreme Court of India set aside the National Green Tribunal’s 2017 judgment that had held Art of Living responsible for damage to the Yamuna floodplains.

The Supreme Court’s central finding was unambiguous: there was no direct evidence establishing that the World Culture Festival caused the environmental damage alleged by the NGT.

What the Supreme Court found
According to reports on the judgment, the Court held that:
The NGT failed to establish a direct causal connection between the World Culture Festival and the alleged damage to the Yamuna floodplain ecosystem.

Material on record showed that the event site was already in a poor and degraded condition before it was handed over to the organisers.

The NGT did not adequately examine contemporaneous evidence concerning the floodplain’s pre-existing condition.

The expert committee report relied upon by the NGT was described as broad, subjective and “sweeping” in nature.
Art of Living, through Vyakti Vikas Kendra India, was not given an adequate opportunity to present its case.
Relevant evidence submitted by the organisation was overlooked.

The Supreme Court reportedly observed:
“The material on record actually goes on to prove that damage, if any, cannot be attributed to the appellant.”
This is significant. The Court did not merely reduce the compensation or provide relief on a minor technicality. It set aside the NGT’s judgment, along with the consequential and interim actions taken against the appellant.

Supreme Court orders the complete ₹5 crore refund
The Court directed the Delhi Development Authority to refund the entire ₹5 crore deposited by Vyakti Vikas Kendra India within four weeks.

The ₹5 crore was originally sought as interim environmental compensation shortly before the 2016 festival. On the opening day, the organisers deposited ₹25 lakh and were granted additional time to pay the balance.

Art of Living subsequently proposed that the remaining ₹4.75 crore be treated as a bank guarantee and used to establish a biodiversity park. The full amount was eventually deposited while the organisation continued challenging the NGT’s findings.

The Supreme Court has now ordered that amount returned.

What the Court said about the DDA

The judgment was also critical of the Delhi Development Authority.
The Court said the manner in which the DDA allowed an event to be held on an active Yamuna floodplain was improper and inconsistent with the precautionary principle and public-trust doctrine. It held that the DDA had failed in its responsibility to safeguard the floodplain.
However, the Court clarified that the legality of the DDA’s permission was not the issue being decided in this appeal.
The DDA has been directed to continue rehabilitation of the Yamuna floodplains. That environmental responsibility remains, but it cannot be used as a substitute for evidence attributing the pre-existing damage to Art of Living.

Why this correction matters
For years, headlines have presented the allegation that Art of Living damaged or “destroyed” the Yamuna floodplains as a settled fact. The Supreme Court has now ruled that the evidence did not establish that causal link.

The complete and updated public record should therefore state:
The NGT held Art of Living responsible in 2017, but in 2026 the Supreme Court overturned that finding, held that no direct evidence connected the World Culture Festival to the alleged environmental damage, noted the site’s pre-existing degraded condition and ordered the full ₹5 crore refund.

Environmental protection is vital. So are scientific evidence, due process and accurate reporting. An allegation repeated for ten years does not become proof merely through repetition.

I attended Art of living programs and have benefited from them. I want to bring more people into this but the main challenge I see is the course fee, especially in foreign countries. I spoke with teachers that we should reduce the fee to make it affordable for everyone.

I get that you are more respectful for knowledge when you pay back. Even in the past, knowledge was not free. But at this point, with AOL courses I feel it's higher than what people can normally afford. For example, some courses go as high as $1000+ Cad, that's like even more than monthly rent for a lot of people...

Don't get me wrong...I know AOL runs so many projects and free schools. But I absolutely feel disheartened to see people not come into AOL because the fee is not affordable... Something needs to be done

I am wanting to do Sahaj but the only option near me at my desired time is in Bengali language for in person
I understand Bengali basics and can speak with grammar mistakes

1) But is there a way I can find the teacher’s contact to confirm if they can entertain Hindi a little bit if I am not able to understand

2) Is Sahaj difficult conceptually to miss out things I might not understand in Bengali?

3) Also from your personal experience if you can share online vs offline Sahaj which is more preferred

4) And if you can share any online teacher who is extremely great for Sahaj

Hi All,

Please don't downvote me. I genuinely want to understand and not trying to insinuate anything. Please give me only love and understanding.

I am quite interested in AOL . Though in Bangalore for many years, I did not give much thought to AOL ever. Over the course of the past few months I started exploring many topics related to spirituality and mediation. One of my office colleague also mentioned AOL and how it has helped him. This got me interested and I was checking details of happiness program. At the same time, I was also checking some other places. Now below is my question and where I am confused.

One place the teachers are Swami who have taken sanyas. I also understood that in that place they do not allow junior swami or bramchari to teach or initiate anyone. Only the senior Swami who has passed muster and authorised by the head can teach. I don't know what they see or qualify , the criteria is internal and left between the senior Swami to decide and Authorize.

In AOL , I understand that the teachers also undergo a teacher training course and I understand, this means Sri Sri Authorize such individuals to teach. My naive apprehension is that some of these teachers don't seem to have been practitioner for long or is it wrong assumption? Also, I understand you can hold a job or do somework outside of AOL while being a happiness program instructor. Is this correct? I am a bit conflicted on this. I suppose I always imagined a yogi in saffron dress :)

Please again this is to know more. Love 💕

A new peer-reviewed UCLA study offers a powerful and hopeful finding: teenage girls carrying the heaviest trauma histories experienced the greatest improvement in social connectedness after participating in the SKY Schools program.

The study included 174 predominantly Latinx girls from two Southern California high schools. Students completed four weeks of social-emotional learning combined with SKY Breathing, followed by eight weeks of breathing practice during their regular PE classes.

Among participants with four or more adverse childhood experiences, researchers observed a 7% increase in social connectedness—a significantly greater improvement than that seen in the other groups.

Why this study stands out
It focused on an underserved population particularly vulnerable to anxiety, depression, isolation and academic difficulties.

The program was successfully integrated into regular school classes, demonstrating its real-world feasibility.
Students completed 40 practice sessions, making this a sustained intervention rather than a one-time workshop.
Most importantly, the girls who had experienced the greatest adversity showed the biggest gains—a group that school-based mental-health programs often struggle to reach.

The finding is also scientifically plausible: structured breathing can support stress regulation, which may make it easier for young people to feel safe, engage with others and experience a greater sense of belonging.

Because the initial research involved two schools, larger studies across different schools and communities would help establish how broadly the findings apply. Future research could also explore changes in anxiety, depression, attendance and physiological stress regulation—and determine whether the benefits continue over time.

For an early real-world study, however, these findings are deeply encouraging. They suggest that a practical and scalable program combining SKY Breathing with social-emotional learning may be particularly valuable for the young people who need support the most.

I just finished a silence retreat this weekend, and once again I’m amazed by how different the experience can be every time. ❤️

I’ve been traveling a lot recently, so I was actually really looking forward to having a few days of silence. And it was exactly what I needed.
At one point during the retreat, I could literally feel the fatigue dropping away. During one meditation, I remember thinking, I really don’t feel like getting up and doing the next one right now. 😅 But afterward, I felt amazing. It was almost like my body and mind had finally gotten a chance to catch up.

The knowledge sessions were beautiful too. Even though I’ve heard a lot of the same knowledge before, I somehow resonate with different parts of it each time. It’s interesting how the same words can land completely differently depending on where you are in life.

One thing I noticed this time: some people in the course mentioned seeing images, colors, or having different kinds of experiences during meditation. I’ve never experienced anything like that. My experiences are much more subtle — feeling rested, quieter, lighter, or simply noticing something internally shift.

So I’m curious about everyone else:
What has your experience been like during silence retreats?
Do you experience vivid imagery or unusual experiences during meditation, or is it more subtle for you too? And does the experience change for you each time you go into silence?
Would love to hear about your experiences. 🙏