Temenos - A Place Where Monks Retreat

by Nancy Mehegan

"It's a place where monks go to retreat",

my friend Lenore, told me.  That revelation startled me, yet I agreed to go on a retreat to Temenos.  It was for "regular" people too.

Lenore had been a caretaker of Temenos, a small retreat and conference center located on 78 acres on a small mountain in Massachusetts.  4 cabins & a larger lodge, it is 25 minutes from Amherst, Massachusetts. Founded by Quaker/Buddhists Joe and Teresina Havens, Amherst professors who wanted to provide a place of retreat -- Temenos is a living exemplar of simple living, close to nature.

You leave your car at the bottom of the mountain, and walk up the fir tree lined path, leaving civilization behind.  The quiet at first is unnerving.  

All of your food is carried on your back:  we carried some dried lentils, and rice.  Temenos has no running water, nor electricity.  You will drink from their well and heat with wood.  It's just a few cabins and a larger cabin for meetings.  We arrived at nighttime an I gingerly followed Lenore up the mountain in the forested darkness.

A New York Times reporter said about her stay at Temenos:  "It's my first night in the cabin, and I can't sleep. The quiet is too loud, as if I were holding a conch shell tight over each ear, and any sounds that do seep through — a wet bulge of snow sliding off a fir tree, the pop of a log in our blazing wood stove — send me tossing and turning, a skittish city mouse in the country." (2/26/08)

The monks Lenore described were actual Buddhist monks who do stay at Temenos in the winter.

My first night was an actual hell.  I had memories, regrets, unresolved yearnings bubble to the surface.  There was no where to run.  I sat in the quiet darkness and peered into an excruciating mirror.  What saved me - was reading Mahatma Gandhi's autobiography - someone had left a book in the cabin.  I sort of "rode" his words and fell into a deep sleep at last.

 

And in the dark dawn the first ray of sunlight was markedly noticeable and welcome.  Birds I never heard before, chirped joyfully. 

Ancient visitors

There were others mediating on this mountain.  A stone-lined cave lies adjacent to the path up the mountain.  The native american tribes told the early settlers "they" had not built these caves.  Also an eerie, carved stone found at the bottom of a deep well which shows a seated meditating figure.

What you will meet at Temenos is yourself.

I went with a list of questions for God -- and on the mountain I discarded the list, discovering it to be meaningless.  I experienced some true agony on the mountain -- internal demons emerging for examining and release.

Photograph of Thrush Cabin by Barbara Olson

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There was a journal for retreatants to share thoughts in the cabin.  On my last day, I turned the pages and found some "light" observations:  "I saw a pretty sparrow".   "The trees are interesting".  

Gosh, was my strong experience weird?? Then I found a kindred soul's writings.  "Stay close to the center... let your spirit guide you...hang on... the pain is merely a pathway".  

I then realized it was okay to be intense -- another lesson  learned at Temenos... to accept who I am.

Temenos address:  65 Mount Mineral Rd Shutesbury, MA 01072
Phone:  (413) 367-9779

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Comments

[Laura Young]

Ooooh! What a wonderful find! Thank you for posting about this (and letting us know about it over at my blog.)
Do you think you will return there? (to Temenos, not my blog, silly!)

[Phoebe]

Thanks for commenting on my blog. Your retreat sounds interesting. What kind of retreating did you do exactly? Was it a meditation retreat?

[Phoebe]

Thanks for commenting on my blog. Your retreat sounds interesting. What kind of retreating did you do exactly? Was it a meditation retreat?