I recently returned from a 10-day yoga retreat, which included a colon cleanse - I somehow hadn’t read the small print and seen this was basically the core of the retreat. On day 3 we did the cleanse, which involved fasting for a day, drinking 16 glasses of salt water and performing a set of stretches between each glass, after glass 7 going to the toilet is also part of the routine...
Lively sitar music played in every room of the house, as we circled between the dining hall where the salt water was served, the toilet and the yoga studio, notching our glass count on the blackboard.
The teachers somehow managed to guide 24 of us through a potentially harrowing and uncomfortable experience, in a way that was light - perhaps even delightful. After the process we rested, then went downstairs to the kitchen room for kitchiri and ghee/coconut oil, accompanied again with sitar.
That evening it was as though we were lighter – of course we were – but we had also shed some of our guardedness. We were easier with each other, as we sat by the fireplace in the warm red tones of the living room. This tends to happen around day 3 of a retreat, but this had an extra quality, a physical rootedness that could perhaps be attributed to our newly cleansed colons. (Perhaps also a bonding through the strangeness of it all).
For the rest of the retreat, we had very simple vegan food; grain, boiled veg with lentil/pulse with no oil, salt or spice until around day 4/5 when a very small amount was added. Again, I hadn’t read the small print on this retreat; usually retreat mealtimes are the one guaranteed pleasure as we go through the ups and downs of our individual process. It was a surprise not to be catered for in this way – so ingrained it is in retreat culture that the food must be pretty amazing - it was wholesome, but unabashedly plain.
So, this was the start of the new year for me, at Haa retreat centre in snowy Sweden. I found myself reflecting on what years ago on silent retreat, I had named (for myself) the touch of food. For the first time I had noticed what is quite obvious, that food has a touch which goes beyond taste – food touches us for much longer than we experience taste, so why don’t we think more about it?
This sense of the touch of food I unexpectedly re-membered is one I don’t want to lose touch with as life speeds up again. Thinking about how the food is going to land in my stomach; the wholesome warmth of the just-right amount of heaviness, the ease in which the food starts to be digested is a subtle pleasure, but outside of a retreat its often trumped by our need for tastes and convenience.
Grain, lightly cooked vegetables and a lentil or pulse lands in my stomach in an easy way, throw in a little spice and oil or ghee and its super tasty. It may be different ingredients for each individual; my sense is that tuning into the touch of food can lead us to more compatible food choices and ultimately better health - even if we make more wholesome choices some of the time.
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On an end note, I found this retreat had the quality of stepping into a work of art – at least for me – there was a sense of orchestration; it had the impeccable timing of a great conductor. The teachers have a strong practice, and there is potential for deep exploration in what is being offered, I was impressed. It wasn’t without its flaws, of course, wherever there are humans there is stuff to work through, and the possibility for growth and evolution.
Kitcharee is the ultimate in food touch for me.
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