The guru looked troubled. A spry 75-year-old, who could have passed for 60, he usually wore an expression as pure as his ivory robe. Peering into my cell, he watched as I wept harder than I could remember, for a reason my mind could not fathom. Then he beamed. \u201cYou are very lucky,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is a very big sankara leaving your body \u2013 perhaps it was an illness that even a doctor could not cure.\u201d Perplexing as his words sounded, their meaning would become clear later. All I could grasp then was that the Indian meditation master believed that my mysterious meltdown had taken me a step closer to enlightenment.<\/p>\n
Smiling monks sporting off-the-shoulder purple habits scurry past temples swathed in incense, while earnest-faced Europeans, Japanese and Israelis zigzag along paths of self-discovery.<\/p>\n
Late-night singalongs of Bob Marley classics with guitar-playing strangers are virtually compulsory; Vipassana is optional. Just as well: it is the closest thing on offer to a Buddhist boot camp.<\/p>\n
The deal seems simple: you agree not to talk for 10 days, promise to invest 100 hours of arduous mental effort \u2013 starting each day at 4am \u2013 and forswear alcohol, email and mobiles. In return, you acquire a 2,500-year-old technique that, in theory, can end all suffering. There is no fee: you donate what you wish at the end. You just have to learn to sit still.<\/p>\n
The promise appealed. Charging around Afghanistan with US Marines the previous summer, as well as brushes with suicide bombers in Helmand and Kabul, had left a residue of unease I could not shake. Then a painful break-up triggered a recurrence of the depression that had stalked me several times since my late teens.
\n<\/div>\n
I had heard about Vipassana from a friend who had emerged uplifted from a course near Hereford in the UK. Over the years I had dabbled with meditation with the help of a shelf full of books, but I had been wary of the cult-like Vipassana regimen. Libya had taught me it was time to try something new. After returning to Islamabad, I looked up the nearest school on the web.<\/p>\n
The centre near McLeod Ganj looks like a low-security prison. Monkeys clatter over the roofs of dreary bunkhouses divided into individual cells. Beds are hard, the bedding grubby. Yet the location is stunning: snowfall gleams on a ridgeline visible through surrounding pines.<\/p>\n
Signs, embellished with petals and smiley faces, say: \u201cYou are bound to be successful\u201d and \u201cBe happy\u201d.<\/p>\n
I surveyed fellow inmates warily, envious of the profusion of loose-fitting clothing that is de rigueur on the backpacker trail. Almost all the participants at McLeod Ganj are on weeks-long tours of India but people from all walks of life attend more accessible centres in Europe and North America.
\n<\/div>\n