Does anyone know of anywhere that I can go in the Himalayas or India so that I can live life free from people? A monastery would be acceptable. Just somewhere that I can have food, clothes, shelter, and freedom from interaction with anyone. Preferably somewhere on a mountain or in a mountain range.

I am serious. It has been my dream to live quietly in the East, alone on a mountain, and now it's my only option to keep me from killing everyone I know.

Well it depends on your religion, now doesn't it? I mean, most of your monasteries are going to be either hindu or buddhist. Can you be a dedicated enough monastic member of either of those religions that you can live happily in temple life?

Otherwise, living off on your own you need to be able to grow/collect/hunt your own food, build your own shelter, treat your own sicknesses and possible injuries. There's also specific survival issues when dealing with places like the himalayas where it's cold the majority of the time, or in india where its sweltering half the time. Then there's wild animals, some of which are predatory and others just poisonous, exotic and deadly insects attracted to your body heat, etc.

These are not excuses, of course, but subjects that should be explored and skills acquired before you make such a commitment, if you don't want to die in the act. I had a friend who moved to the wilds of kuai a couple of years ago with his wife, and they were going to live off the land and live in harmony with nature. They even took a bunch of equipment with them to avoid having to make a shelter, etc., but even with the assistance of modern tech they quickly began to realize that living 'in nature' isn't about living in harmony or peace, it's about survival. They were wet and dirty all the time, hungry all the time, became sick (found out after a month it was a lingering pneumonia from being in the rain all the time), and finally decided that they were not equipped to accomplish this dream.

Living in a monastery is easier, but only physically. You'd be expected to be monastic, take vows, dedicate your life to this religion. Celibacy is a basic common vow, vegetarianism, sometimes silence, etc. And you still interact with people - there are things to do, food to grow, a temple to clean and maintain day in and day out when you aren't praying/meditating. And it isn't about gaining supernatural powers, or a secret magical element that they don't tell outsiders about - its about waiting patiently for enlightenment (or if you're in a catholic monastery its about glorifying God).

Go camping a lot if you want to do this eventually. You certainly can, and there are places where it can be done. But until you can live a month in the mountains/wilderness here, close to home where you can conceivably seek aid if you are gravely ill or injured, you are not at all prepared to go do it in a foreign place under alien conditions that you know next to nothing about.

There's a monastery in Kuai if you wanted to visit, it's a hindu monastery but besides the religion being practiced they're all pretty much similar, although some like this one are a bit more technologically forward, I think they have old computers there. But there are several young american monks who've taken up the sannyasin lifestyle there.

On the other hand, if you're already grizzly adams, go forth and conquer! Kuai is a great place to do it and you don't need a passport to get there, plus you can register as a hunter-gatherer and not be bothered by taxes, etc. Otherwise, pick a spot in the 'east' that isn't populated by a billion people and go there, although I would avoid anywhere in china, anywhere within 300 miles of the india/pakistani border, and japan. Those places don't take kindly to foreign strangers living in their mountains.

peace

Vagrant, you are indeed a font of knowledge.

What is the name of this monastery in Kuai? Is it the only Hindu monastery in Kuai? (I just want to be able to find it once I'm prepared to leave.)

...you're so [pissed off at the world] that you're ready to kill everyone you know? So the solution is to get away from it all?

I'm going to quote some Peter Ralston:

"Notice what you need in order for a Shangri-la type place, a beautiful place, or even a place away from here...Say we get a place up in the mountains... --to go beyond the mediocrity that we live in, and the suffering that we live in, and the pain that we live in that we just put up with from moment to moment-- to go someplace to create an environment where our purpose for living is to experience beyond our present level of experience...

"It wouldn't work. It would always break down. It would break down in a relatively short time. I wouldn't even give it a year."

"Because, you see, you would be there...And haven't you noticed? We don't have the discipline for that. We don't have the nuts, the courage, the persistence...the overwhelming courage it takes for something like that. You don't want to go there and be courageous! You want to go there so you don't have to be courageous. Right? You want to go there so you can get away from this! And have a Shangri-La!"

(From Ancient Wisdom, New Spirit, pg 85-86).

This post has been edited by monkman418: Jan 22 2011, 10:41 PM

This might be a good movie to watch: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0758758/

Also maybe read "Walden" by Henry David Thoreau.

Good luck, I looked into Christian one's and they always looked harder than living a normal life, but that was what I was looking for. If you do want to get into a "cool" monastery there might be a waiting list because people have been wanting to sign up at the spur of the moment instead of through dedication to a god or ideal. About 2-5 years seemed the average when I looked. But I am sure there are ones which do not require the wait, but I wouldn't expect them to be the cool mountain range ones. Also you might want to think about getting some recommendations to go there sort of like you were applying for a job. Maybe learn the language (which would take up your 2-5 years right there).

I hope you find something great. It would be a little easier to just pick a religion and go to their service every week but that's probably not what you're looking for. There is probably a legal side of this to look into as well, such as how long you're legally allowed to stay abroad and stuff like that.

Goodluck

You might also try perfecting the art of being alone in a crowded room, that works very well.

I ran off and did live in the woods for two weeks up in the bottom end of the north east territories. I had hoped to live there for six months but wanted to see what it was like first. I learned two things: first living in a lean-to is a crap way to live and if you want any time for spiritual refinement you need to build some civilization. I looked in to what it would take to make a small 10 X 10 hut worth livening in, and found it would take a major undertaking. Hauling tools and supplies up there would not be fun. Mind you I still intend to do it again but it will be better planed and supplied next time.

There is a Taoist monastery in CA, one in the back woods of Arkansas and a few more scattered about. Out here in Hawaii there is a harikrishna temple that will put your up for free without regard to religion provided you help with the cooking and cleaning as you search for awakening. I think some of the bigger churches will do the same. Japanese Shugendo "warrior cults" will take anyone provided they speak Japanese and the government lets you live there for an extended time; they live mostly alone from what I remember.

Before you try running away from your demons I suggest you look athttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoicism , read some of the writings and see if you can apply them.

You can perhaps find the monastery of your dreams, but I'm not sure that your problems won't find another way of plaguing you. It may be that you are suffering from depression or something of that sort. I'm not a mental healthcare professional but it concerns me that you are afraid that you are going to kill everyone you know. Perhaps instead you can talk to someone or see about being assessed. You can't always run away from your problems and anyhow eventually sometime you have to come down from the mountaintop. It may open up more possibilities.

It's interesting, I was just talking with someone who had disappeared for four or five months, I asked where she had gone and she said the phillipines, I said "Family?" her reply was "Backpacking, finding myself." This is something I feel you should take into serious consideration, often it's not society we hate, but it's living in society non-stop for so many days and nights.

I think before going east and joining something like monastery you have to be very careful, yes it could work, but it could also be totally disillusioning and leave you feeling worse for the wear. One solution is as stated earlier, travel to a far away place, it doesn't even have to be eastern, and just start living alone, hiking every day into the woods, spending time in solitude. Another solution would be go out and find a group of people living around you who feel the same way, more than likely they already exist and form a community. There are many different ways to travel, if this is your dream, if it really is all you want, there's no other way you want to go, choose very, very carefully.

This post has been edited by Bb3: Jan 27 2011, 01:24 AM

I believe that you may need to seek support and understanding before you seek avoidance, but of course, it is your own choice.

VitalWinds, if it isn't rude to ask - what is it that is making you loathe society so much that you have reached this low? Maybe someone here can empathize and help. Just a thought.

Meh. At this point it doesn't even matter. I've already decided to stay here and just overcome things, but try as I might, I cannot get a job. So..... even if I again decided I wanted to leave, I wouldn't be able to. Isn't the state of our economy just.... AWESOME? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/badmood.gif)

Ah. Have you tried a temp agency?

Or Magic?

Tin is cheap, and jupiter talisman can bring surprising opportunities into your lap. A mercury talisman on brass might help you get the interview and do well. The economy may suck, but I'm opening the doors of my own clinic on may 1st, and have been able to do it with virtually no personal resources, bad credit, and no experience starting a small business. Clients are already lined up. And it really started the day that I made the jupiter talisman.

I hate hearing about magicians with these sorts of problems. It's okay to use magic to improve your life. It may be more moral to try and do this in a way that somehow benefits others as well, but whatever the case, what use is magical power if it can't bring you some degree of stability?

peace

I see that a lot though, people trying to get by and never thinking about how magick can help. It seems worst with ones who have some attainment, myself included, they seem to forget this is more than an academic exorcise. The blame, such as it is, I place soundly on the influence of new-age religion and eastern philosophy. My apologies to anyone who practices them, but they have a resounding dislike of anything "selfish", and their first answer to problems is "look within". It is hard to assert yourself when people keep telling you to be introspective about what is causing the problem. The same introspection is forwarded as a good and proper way to learn magick. You don't hear too many people suggesting that you command a spirit to help you.

This post has been edited by fatherjhon: Mar 30 2011, 06:00 PM

On the other hand, reaching for magical solutions for every problem seems less than advisable, no matter what your religious or philosophical bent. We are given many tools to interact with the world.

Well, define every problem. My house is dirty - do I perform a magical ritual and create a talisman to appropriate the best maid in town and ensure this maid will not steal my belongings and work for cheap? No. I clean my house, it is less time consuming.

I need a job and am soon not going to be able to pay bills, the economy is weak and there isn't a lot of work. Shall I waste several weeks running around town turning in applications at every place I can, apply to jobs over the internet (without the money to travel to most of these places to interview), etc.? Or shall I create a helpful magical tool to direct that current of effort in such a way that it will actually bear fruit. One major use of practical magic is to overcome obstacles. So many seem caught up with making the wind blow, shielding against psychic vampires, and moving needles, while in the meantime they go penniless and hungry, stuck in a bad situation while clinging to the meager power such things represent. And we'll disdain the use of magic to improve one's life?

Magic is not it's own thing, that you do separate from everything else. Magic is best applied when it is integrated into your way of thinking and problem-solving. Magical thinking can even help solve problems without magic - many of the same rules apply to simple psychology, social dynamics, and so on, such that understanding the interactions and resonance of different sets of archetypal symbols (not just shapes and letters, but people and their activities as expressions of those archetypes) lends itself to navigating this world successfully. And that application is, in a certain sense, magic of it's own. Entirely isolated, magic is not very useful.

Unless you can think of a very productive way to make the wind blow and improve your life thereby.

Peace