Recent Blog Entries

Check out this quick video of a bunch of stills from the building progress and some general carrying on in the kitchen yurt.  

I have taken a break to help others with their projects and to raise some funds, but am looking to do the drywall soon and hope to be done in a few months.  I will let y'all know when the house warming party is...

I haven't written about my personal retreat plans for some time now, as I didn't know quite what to say. The strong determination to do retreat remained but up until two weeks ago, it was looking very unlikely that I'd be able to do it. My friends Mark and Oda had generously donated $500 for my site, but that's all the money I had.

My design for a strawbale cabin raised concerns with the DM planning committee as they thought it would require 'massive excavation,' which I'm not interested in. And then there was the 'little' issue of the lack of enough funds to carry out.

I turned my attention to creating an inexpensive proposal to turn the Ani Gompa - a three-bedroom double-wide trailer inside the Retreat Valley - into a two-person retreat space. That wasn't well-received as that space is intended for use by the caretakers as a staging area for food & goods delivery to the 50 retreatants.

To be honest, while I held out hope that a miracle could occur, I thought I didn't have the karma necessary to do retreat.

And then during a break at class two weeks ago, Lama Christie made an announcement that completely floored me. An anonymous donor had offered $10,000 for my retreat cabin - if it would be matched by other donors. I tell you, I nearly collapsed into a pool of gratitude on hearing her words. And then I listened in awe as person after person spoke out to offer money, the total of which ended up exceeding the challenge. $13,000 was pledged that night and in a matter of 5 minutes, the miracle occurred.

And the help keeps pouring in.

Ven. Jigme is a stalwart supporter of my being in retreat - she's always encouraging me and helping me think of different options.

Andrea offered to help me with planning and fundraising ideas, as she thinks I'm being overly optimistic that I can build a suitable place for $23,500. She's an incredibly well-organized, savvy planner, not to mention a master of putting worldview into practice. I can think of no better person to have in my corner.

Brian O'Flynn has offered to come help build. He's a skilled fine woodworker and builder, and recently built a lovely retreat cabin for Winston in Oregon. His support is invaluable!

Tassy has also offered to come and help build - bless her!

Ven. Gyelse walked to my retreat site with me last week, and with her keen eye found a spot that is relatively flat and much better positioned than the spot I had previously thought to build. She also strongly encouraged me to rethink an idea I had to build with earthbags. While this is an inexpensive way to go, it's very labor-intensive and slow-going.

Kevin walked the site with me the other day, and gave me a referral for another contractor as Kevin's retreat-building dance card is now full. He advised me on how to ask for bids, and suggested I get estimates for: 1) what the contractor could build complete for $23,000, 2) a shell for $23,000, 3) the design I previously created, and 4) a new much smaller design. He also suggested I rethink my idea to build with strawbale - while not as labor-intensive as earthbags, he was concerned that there isn't enough time to start one from scratch at this point.

So last night I created a design for a 221 sq. ft. cabin with a 10x6 screened porch and a 10x6 'vaulted privy' (composting toilet shed). If Kevin's rough estimate of $100/sq. ft. holds, this might be the one.

I met with Ray, a contractor from Tucson, this morning - he just completed Will Duncan's cabin and is starting on Bliss' tomorrow. He gave me some positive feedback about using super-insulated wood frame which can reach R-60 and provide good sound insulation. He thinks he and his crew can complete a cabin in 2-3 weeks! He doesn't do earth floors, so I'd still need to find help with that. I should hear back from him tonight with the estimates Kevin suggested I get.

And then I just heard from Amie the suggestion that using the basic design for creating soundproof walls could also serve for exterior wood walls, which is what folks do in Davis, CA.

Kat is working on a design for a small earth-based hut design, which may be what I could build in addition to the tiny cabin and where I could do my meditations.

There's a lot to do in a short amount of time - but things are looking so promising.

To all of you who've helped and offered help and expressed faith in support of me doing retreat - thank you with all of my heart for your incredible generosity!

Had some very special guests the past few weeks.  

Firstly, my folks made the trip down from Canada for our family weekend at the beginning of term.  They survived the heat, assassin bugs, lack of amenities, and the drive out to the site - all with style.  Everyone tells me how cool (agreed) and relaxed (?) they are.  It was amazing to have them here, to meet everyone, and to have them visit my cabin.  It was very meaningful and good to connect with them about three year retreat at DM.  It will be hard but I feel they understand a bit more about what it is all about and why I am embarking on this adventure.

Then, Swami Swaroopananda and Krshnam Namboodri came out from the Sivananda Ashram in the Bahamas.  I went there last year and had an amazing experience.  I asked Krshnam Namboodri to come to my retreat cabin and to do his thing.  He is from a line of Brahmin priests that goes back 100's of years and was performing 3 days of consecration ceremonies at Diamond Mountain.  Being in his presence is like being by someone that you know is seeing the world differently, seeing stuff that I cant see, relating to forces that I cant really acknowledge or effect - so it was amazing to have him bless my cabin and perform ceremony.

Hello again from the Retreat For Peace webmaster!

Although I've studied at Diamond Mountain for the last six years with the three-year retreatants, I'm not going to be participating directly in the group retreat.  Instead, my husband Ted and I are moving to Vermont (near Ted's parents) and building a house where we can serve others and do our own long retreats.

Those plans hit a bit of a speed bump today when we got our estimate for insulation... yowza!  Normally insulation is not a huge expense, but we are building a next-generation super-insulated house, plus we are using environmentally-friendly materials, so the estimate was way higher than I was expecting.

My first instinct was to think, "How do we get more money?"  It's a reasonable thought, but I was very selfish in my approach.  It basically boiled down to "How do I get more money from someone else?", which is not exactly the height of Buddhist worldview!

Fortunately, it was time for yoga class at the DM temple.  At the beginning of class I was still thinking solely in terms of my needs (I fool myself that I'm mostly taking care of Ted, but who am I kidding?).  But as the class continued, my thoughts shifted nicely.  By the end of class I resolved to help my DM classmates pay for their future homes by improving the Retreat For Peace website, and also to help über-volunteer Nicole Davis with her own strawbale house.

So I made a date to help Nicole and Cortney tomorrow and Friday, and I spent the afternoon making changes to this website, including a major change in our overall message.  While it's true we are committed to bringing about world peace, our real motivation runs much deeper than that.  We want to use the microscope of meditation to examine the nature of reality itself, to see if there is more to life than the way it appears and whether enlightenment—ultimate lasting happiness for all beings—is possible.

Anyway, I'm sure Ted and I will figure out a solution to our rapidly-escalating building costs, and I find the best way to distract myself from obsessive number-crunching is to help my Diamond Mountain comrades glide smoothly into their deep retreat.