Threads of Grace: Reflections from a Laddership Retreat (December 14–17, 2024)

In the quiet embrace of the retreat, we found ourselves gathered, more than sixty of us, each carrying a tender question—questions we could not dare speak in the hurried cacophony of the outside world. Here, time slowed, and silence wrapped around us like a companion we had long forgotten. Over four days, we did not come to solve but to listen, to let the soft weight of one another’s stories shape the tapestry of something larger than ourselves. Each thread, however uneven or fragile, found its place.

The mornings greeted us with the crisp sharpness of December, the air outside biting yet alive, brushing the verdant campus of the Environmental Sanitation Institute in Sughad, just beyond Ahmedabad. Layers of warmth wrapped around us, and in the early hours, our breaths rose visibly—small clouds tethered to life’s pulse. It was winter’s reminder of quiet austerity, of what is essential.

One among us spoke of a quilt—how we each carried a patch, bright or worn, bold or frayed, yet all necessary. And as the days unfolded, the truth of that metaphor stitched itself through our hearts. We were the mosaic of human longing and care, bound not by perfection but by the quiet thread of belonging.

Hands

The first day—Hands Immersion—began not with words but with deeds. We scattered into smaller groups, setting out on acts of kindness. Some served chai to strangers on buses; others gave haircuts and nail trims to students in an Ashram school. There were meals prepared with reverence, heart pins shaped with care, and pilgrimages made by foot into the old city. My own group walked to clean a crematorium near the Ashram. It was a place heavy with the stories of endings, and yet as we arrived, Jayeshbhai guided us inward, offering reflections on his father, the late Shri Ishwarbhai Patel.

“A life in service leaves no room for fear when death approaches,” Ishwarbhai had told him when asked about his final days. As we swept the pathways along Dandi Bridge, the truth of that sentiment grew in the rhythm of our hands. Around the crematorium, amidst the litter of gutkha packets, an older man lingered near a pyre. He connected with us briefly, and then, in a striking gesture, shared a selfie he had taken—lying on a funeral pyre after cremating a dear one, as a reminder of life’s finiteness.

The evening deepened, and Raghu Anna brought up the Guru Dutt song, “Ye Duniya Agar Mil Bhi Jaaye To Kya Hai,” which we hummed in silence grounding ourselves in reflection as a family wheeled in their loved one for the last rites. We stood in quiet respect, then turned to leave. Looking up, we saw the full moon cresting over the horizon, and in that stillness, a poem began to stir inside me:

Crematorium

The air carries ash

like a mother holds

a child too light, too quiet,

hands trembling, unsure

of what to let go.

 

The fire

spits and hums its verdict,

a language older

than grief.

I try to speak to it,

but my tongue folds

like paper before the flame.

 

Here, names vanish

into smoke

a final baptism,

a clearing of ledger books

where nothing owed

is ever paid back.

 

I thought life

was a staircase,

but it’s this:

a plume of grey

dissolving into sky,

and all we are,

a handprint pressed

against time’s glass

fading even as it forms.

 

There is no silence here,

only the crackle of endings,

the cough of mourning,

and beneath it all,

the earth’s quiet hunger,

taking what was always hers.

 

And yet in the warmth of the pyre,

I feel the hum

of what’s left.

A spark refusing to dim,

a memory that cannot

be carried away by wind.

 

I walk away,

my shadow following

like a mourner,

small and finite.

The world feels louder now—

a clock

that never stops ticking,

even when

you’ve stopped

counting the hours.

 

The morning after Hands Immersion Day, we gathered to share reflections. Compassion broke open among us, rising like laughter and tears in equal measure. Humorous anecdotes met the tender sharings of loss and discovery, weaving us closer than words alone could manage. Loan shared how, when an elderly person allowed her to cut their nails, she was reminded of her father—the only person who had ever allowed her to do the same for him. She was surprised at the trust a complete stranger had placed in her. When she finished and the elderly person said thank you, Loan realized that she had not performed an act of kindness but had been bestowed with one. In their allowing, the elder had gifted her a quiet healing of something long held within.

Saanvi’s voice lingered like a question: Who is holding the compassion in me? Is it something to cultivate, or is it always graced to me? The room held its breath, not for an answer but for the unspoken truth that grew between us. Compassion, we realized, was not a thing to hold but a river we step into—flowing only when we dared to open.

Head

On the second day, ideas began to provoke us. Nipunbhai ignited the morning as the provocateur, followed by the steady warmth of Dr. Jayanti Ravi, whose breadth of experience—in education, administration, and health—anchored us in service. Her words carried the weight of one who has walked long roads. Raghu Anna followed; his teachings drawn from years of immersion in the Yoga shastras. Each voice added a patch to the quilt of understanding.

Nipunbhai began with Vimala Thakar’s words—Ahimsa as creative love—a melody that hummed through the day. To love without harm, not as absence but as presence, was to step into courage, to stretch beyond the borders of fear. “We design for who we are,” he reminded us. How do we carry coherence into spaces where it doesn’t yet exist? How do we lead not through accumulation but through circulation?

Dr. Ravi offered a metaphor of cleaning toilets—a governance of the inner world rippling outward. Then, with a grace that stilled us, she sang Meera Bhajans, leaving the room awash with reverence. Raghu Anna took us deeper, guiding us through the path of coherence—from Avidyaksetra (entropy) to Dharmakshetra (growth), to Dhyana (deeper stillness), and finally to Shunya (emptiness). Generosity, he reminded us, is no luxury—it is a necessity, a balm against the fire of greed.

Heart

By the third day, the retreat turned inward. We asked not how to do but how to be. Relationships, we realized, are not here to make us happy but conscious. Vasudha spoke of the courage to ask for touch—a need so human and grounding. Hemakshi reflected on the practice of partnership, one that deepened her relationship with herself rather than completing her. Thu’s story of a janitor’s embrace wove dignity into the smallest gestures, and Khuyen’s reflection on the silent dinner reminded us: Love never says, ‘This is the last time.’ 

Anurag’s quest took us deeper, as he spoke of moving from wrong answers to right questions—galat jawaab se sahi sawaal tak ka safar. This journey, he shared, was less about arriving and more about the courage to sit with the unknown, letting the questions themselves shape us into who we need to become.

Adding to this, the group from Vietnam, dressed in colorful Indian sarees, sang with a refrain that echoed in our hearts: Love is still the answer. Their voices, layered with the beauty of their presence, reminded us of the timeless truth that love holds us, even in our search for clarity.

In the stillness, we returned to the essence of it all: Cure happens alone. Healing happens in the community. We were not seeking solutions but asking better questions: Who must we become to play the infinite game of love and regeneration? The retreat left us with no answers, only an invitation—to lead with the grace of an open hand, to live as if every moment is a patch in the quilt of something greater.

Once, we tallied moments

your time for mine,

your love for silence.

Now, the air softens,

space held not as debt

but belonging.

 

It begins here:

a smile asking nothing,

a kindness that stays

unseen.

 

The world tilts gently,

its scorecard erased,

leaving only

the bloom of connection,

open to the sun.

***

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