My Journey into the Dark

How two weeks of Taoist inner alchemy in complete darkness left me feeling reborn

I want to share my experience of spending two weeks in a Darkroom retreat at Tao Garden.

Before entering the retreat, I had already spent two months there practising Qigong and deepening my work with the Fusion of the Five Elements meditations, preparing for my evaluation as a practitioner.

During those months, something inside me began to surface.

Although my daily practices helped me balance my emotions and restore harmony within my body, I could feel a subtle anxiety rising. It felt as if my nervous system was under pressure. What I needed most was deep rest—silence, stillness, and a way to calm my senses completely.

Yet there was also something deeper that my usual practices were not fully transforming.

Certain encounters with people triggered reactions in me that were stronger than I expected. They touched old emotional buttons, revealing patterns that seemed older than the present moment.

Over time I have learned that what happens to us is rarely random. Life often communicates through mirrors. What others do matters less than how we respond.

What I was experiencing felt like something ancient emerging from my subconscious—something wild, emotional, and difficult to control.

At one point I felt a strong wave of anger towards someone. The intensity of that emotion surprised me. It didn’t feel aligned with who I wanted to be, and yet it was there.

Eventually I understood that the problem was not about the other person at all.

That person had simply helped me see an old fear that had been living within me since childhood. This hidden pattern had created cycles of tension within my body and organs, influencing many areas of my life—relationships, work, and even the way I related to the world.

When I realised this, I felt a strong inner call to return to the Darkroom retreat for a second time.

This time I applied for the third and fourth weeks of the retreat, where the practices focus on the advanced Taoist inner alchemy meditations known as the Greater and Greatest Kan & Li.

These practices work with the transformation of energy into spirit.

In the practice of Greater Kan & Li, the practitioner combines internal energies with cosmic forces—the Sun, Moon, Earth, and stars—to nourish what Taoist tradition calls the “immortal fetus” or spirit body. Emotional and sexual energy are refined and transformed into spiritual vitality.

In Greatest Kan & Li, this process expands even further. The emerging spirit body connects with cosmic light and the greater universe, particularly through the heart centre and the energies associated with the Pole Star and the Big Dipper.

The aim is union with the Tao.

When the day finally arrived to enter the Darkroom, I was both excited and nervous.

A guide led me to my room using night-vision goggles. These goggles use infrared light to convert what cannot normally be seen into a visible image, allowing you to move through complete darkness.

The first sensation was overwhelming.

For a moment I wanted to run away.

Everything in my body reacted to the unfamiliar environment—the silence, the darkness, and the strange sensation of navigating through space without natural vision.

But I stayed.

And it turned out to be one of the best decisions of my life.

That evening we gathered in the meditation hall for the introduction to the third week of the retreat.

Although we could not see each other, I recognised the familiar voice of one of my teachers. Hearing that voice immediately brought me a sense of calm and safety.

Soon after, another teacher introduced himself and began guiding us through the practices we would be doing during the retreat.

The meditation that followed was incredibly powerful.

At that moment I realised I had stepped into a very advanced stage of Taoist meditation practice.

Instead of fear, I felt joy.

Something in me knew that I was ready to move forward.

Encounters in the Dark

Although we were not allowed to speak during the retreat, there were a few moments of human connection that felt anything but random.

On my first days, I struggled to find my way to the stairs that led to my room. Twice I accidentally bumped into the same person, who gently asked if I had just entered the retreat.

Laughing softly, he held my hand and guided me to the stairs.

In the following days, while I wandered through the darkness like a ghost with my arms stretched out in front of me, trying not to collide with anyone, the Thai woman who brought food to my room sometimes found me in the hallway.

“Room 506?” she would ask, laughing.

Then she would guide me safely back.

These small encounters felt meaningful to me.

Even without seeing faces, I could sense a certain presence and kindness in those brief interactions.

The World of Dreams

From the very first night, I began working consciously with my dreams.

Before sleeping, I asked my Hun soul to guide me.

In Taoist understanding, the Hun is the ethereal soul associated with the liver. It is connected with dreams, intuition, and vision. During sleep, it is said to travel beyond ordinary consciousness and bring insight back to the waking mind.

Something interesting began to happen almost immediately.

I started recalling every dream, night after night, with unusual clarity. Each morning I would mentally create small “bullets” in my mind—little markers that helped me remember the key moments of the dream.

I had the feeling that each dream was a piece of a larger story unfolding throughout the retreat. By holding these pieces in my memory, I hoped that by the end of the journey I would be able to understand the deeper narrative that my inner world was revealing.

The rhythm of life in the Darkroom was marked by sound rather than light.

A gong and cymbals announced when food was arriving or when it was time to go down to the hall for meditation.

Time dissolved.

Days and nights blended into one continuous experience.

Facing the Inner Darkness

During my time in the Darkroom, I confronted some of my deepest fears.

There were moments when I felt overwhelmed and wanted to escape.

But there were also moments of extraordinary peace.

One of the most challenging experiences occurred when I woke up from sleep and opened my eyes—only to realise there was absolutely no light at all.

The mind can easily react to that with panic.

I quickly understood that if I didn’t learn to calm my mind, the darkness itself could become disturbing.

During the first week I slept a great deal.

Gradually, as my body adapted, I began practising the meditations more deeply.

Facing my fears in the darkness and learning to calm my mind had a profound effect on me.

I began to feel more resilient inside.

As someone who is naturally very sensitive—sometimes too sensitive—I often felt strongly affected by emotions.

Through this experience I discovered a new inner stability.

I now feel stronger, as if I can navigate life with more clarity and without being overwhelmed by intense emotional waves.

Entering the Universe Within

The meditations gradually opened an extraordinary inner experience.

Through the practices I connected with the energies of the stars, the planets, and the vast universe.

Yin and Yang energies began to move and unite within the internal cauldrons of the body.

As I entered deeper states of meditation, my anxieties slowly dissolved.

I began to feel waves of blissful energy moving through my body as the inner forces of Yin and Yang came into harmony.

At times it felt as if my organs were being cleansed from within.

In my inner vision, dense emotional residues appeared to dissolve and transform, as if being refined again and again inside the alchemical cauldrons.

Eventually I perceived my organs as clear, vibrant, and alive with energy.

The connection with the stars—the Big Dipper, the Pole Star, and other constellations—felt deeply moving.

The true Yin and true Yang began to reveal themselves as the false layers of tension and conditioning gradually dissolved.

During some meditations I felt my body expand beyond its physical boundaries, merging with the vastness of the universe.

A violet light seemed to enter through the crown of my head, flowing down through my spine and into my entire body.

At the same time I felt a powerful current descending from the cosmos through what Taoist practice calls the Great Thoroughfare channel, connecting heaven and earth within the body.

Yang energy descended from the stars and through the heavens.

Yin energy rose from the depths of the earth—from the oceans, rivers, and underground waters.

When these two forces met within the body, they created what Taoist tradition calls the Macrocosmic Orbit.

It was a profoundly beautiful experience.

Returning to the Light

By the end of the retreat, I had become comfortable in the darkness.

In fact, I felt almost reluctant to leave it.

But I was also ready to return to the world with what I had learned.

When I finally stepped outside, it was already evening.

Even the soft light of the moon felt incredibly bright after so many days in total darkness.

I was wearing sunglasses, but the light still shocked my eyes.

For a moment I could barely see.

My vision struggled to adjust and my body felt disoriented.

I walked slowly and unsteadily, almost as if I were drunk, trying to adapt again to the presence of light.

Eventually I joined the others in the dining hall for our first meal together.

It was there that I finally recognised the Thai woman who had been bringing me food each day.

Soon after, I also met the man who had helped guide me to the stairs during my first days.

Even though we had never seen each other in the Darkroom, I immediately knew who they were.

During those encounters in the darkness I had felt their presence and their energy, and when I finally saw them I recognised them through that feeling.

During those moments I realised how much my sensitivity had increased.

I could feel connections with people directly through my heart.

What the Darkness Revealed

I entered the Darkroom because I felt a deep call for transformation and a need to deeply relax my whole nervous system.

For several years I had been longing for a new life — a true inner rebirth.

During the retreat, the emotional tension that had surfaced before it simply disappeared.

The resentment and resistance I had once felt towards the person who had triggered something within me dissolved completely.

What remained was understanding.

What we bring into the world reflects what we carry within ourselves.

When we transform our inner landscape, the world around us begins to change as well.

At its essence, the world is beautiful.

There is an immense field of love and intelligence in the universe.

When we connect with it, we realise that separation is largely a creation of the mind.

The purpose of these practices, at least at the stage where I am now, is not to escape life but to become a better human being.

More balanced.

More compassionate.

More present.

Perhaps in the future I will continue exploring even deeper levels of Taoist meditation—journeys into the void and other dimensions of consciousness.

But for now, what I brought back from the Darkroom already feels incredibly precious.

For more than two years I had felt the call to begin a new chapter of my life—to release old patterns and step into something new.

The Darkroom helped me do exactly that.

Life is a process, and transformation requires patience.

We cannot skip steps on the spiritual path.

We must face and refine our inner energies, including the darker ones.

But we do have the power to change.

And that journey begins within.

May the Chi be with all of you.

Ambika Bosna