Sadhana forest

A commune in Auroville aimed at

It's a fantastic place. I stayed there for 10 days in August of 2024. But there were some major difficulties with it in my experience and some things I will try to learn from it in future Communal living experiences. It was also a stellar example of Alternative Living and many clever circular economies using natural products to reduce our reliance on the global manufacturing economy and its environmental destruction.

Difficulties

Hold up, Whining Willy!

I want to give a heads up, in case this seems all too negative. In favour of making this somewhat concise, and (edit: it's totally not concise) giving this some semblance of structure, I'm going to first exclusively talk about problems, and second talk about takeaways and solutions.

For the record, in case this big writeup makes it seem like I disprove of the place, I believe Sadhana Forest is a truly wonderful place. If you stay there as a short term volunteer, odds are you'll have a fantastic time, meet wonderful people, and learn so much about yourself. Likewise, you'll also probably have some minor or major emotional moments, be pushed to your limits, and perhaps feel alone at times. I'm sharing my experience because when I learned that (many!) other people had shared my experience, it made me feel seen and emotionally validated instead of feeling alone in my struggles.

Finally, do not deprive yourself from visiting Sadhana Forest because of my writeup. If you're not going to read this entire page, then just skip to the takeaways section. It's worth noting that the average experience in Communal living is largely determined by the collective energy of people; just because I experienced difficulties while I was there, it doesn't mean that will be your experience. As always, Fuck around and find out, and then Take what resonates, leave what doesn't. If you read this and decide Sadhana Forest is not a fit for your energy right now, great. If you decide that you'd like to try a Friday-night visit or a short term stay, great. If you're gung ho for a year long stay to push you out of your comfort zone because you feel The city is killing us, great.

My goal in sharing this is to allow you and me to be mindful of unnecessary energy drains in our future commune experiences.

With that out of the way, here's what I learned in 10 days of volunteering at Sadhana Forest.

Lack of social energy

The social vibes were pretty off, both for myself and many others I spoke to. At first, I thought this was because I hadn't been there for long enough to be integrated. I experienced a feeling of isolation, with brief moments of respite in nice conversations over lunch or during work. But after ten days there, I feel that it's difficult (not impossible) to connect properly with people at Sadhana Forest because it's hard to have energy leftover for quality social connections after the intensive workload each day.

The mid and long term volunteers I spoke to said this was normal, and that they felt both acclimatised to the workload and supported by a community after a couple months there. However, I also observed that between the work, many people seemed very tired, choosing to vegetate on their phones in the common areas. In the evening social events (which were on five out of seven nights), there was a lingering tiredness, though there were certainly moments of high energy and some solid memories.

I had a breakdown on the second day because while I felt like there were people around me who were willing to help me out, I didn't feel like I was part of a community. When I tried to put in energy to start conversations with people, they often didn't take off, which is unusual for me; often I have high social energy and am able to socially facilitate group conversations, have a few deep chats, etc. In spaces about Alternative Living away from busy city living, I usually find people that are conscious of this too, and it's easier to connect with people in these spaces. To my surprise, this was not the case during my stay.

There were also moments that topped my energy right up. My afternoon trips to the mud pool would restore life to my sore feet, and even on the late nights where we went out to drum circles and enjoyed the gelato factory's air-conditioning privilege until closing time, I would survive the following day feeling invigorated by the adventures. This seems like a natural consequence of the low average social energy, and so those scarce moments of quality connection were high-octane fuel for me. I also found it much easier to connect with people I met in Sadhana once we had finished volunteering there and moved onto hostels.

All this feels like evidence that there is not enough energy leftover in the average volunteer to sustain a vibrant atmosphere in the community. Where is the energy drain coming from?

The workload is highly intense, and feels "unfair"

The workload was tiring and erratic, in that it was either very hectic or slow and meditative. It was six hours of scheduled work a day, but if I did a kitchen shift, this would often end up being seven or eight hours because of bottlenecks in the work; chopping blocks cooking blocks serving blocks cleaning, and the kitchen workers were expected to do all of these things before sitting down to join everyone for the meal. Meanwhile, some shifts were ridiculously lightweight by comparison.

It's natural that each shift would require different qualities, and so perhaps "fair" does not mean "equal work for all shifts" but instead means "equitable work available to everyone"; perhaps some people prefer moving around more like in firewood and forest, others prefer the intense pace and high task load of kitchen, others prefer the high social energy interacting with local villagers in the tea hut, and others prefer the creative patience of zero waste up-cycling. As long as you can choose your work, and all the essential work is completed, it's no harm no foul, right?

I would say this doesn't hold water; I believe consent requires having free choice and being informed. You don't always get to choose your shift, it's your luck whether the manager comes around and asks you first or not. Also, you don't start with enough information about all the shifts; you learn by trying them and seeing ones take all your energy and which ones don't. Few people seemed to return to the kitchen, meaning it was always filled with short-termers going in blind and coming out going "hmm, the kitchen is a lot of work". Nobody tells you which shifts are lighter or helps you to choose a seva that matches your energy levels. In this way, I think the work division at Sadhana sets people up for burnout and a feeling of unfairness.

And still, I found the work burned me out for the afternoon regardless of which shift I did. Many other volunteers related to having little energy left over for quality socialising after their shifts. My aspirations to journal, meditate, do yoga for myself or even run yoga classes for others were often trumped by my body's need for sleep. My Sex drive was practically nonexistent during my stay (often a sign that I'm exhausted), and I tossed and turned in my sleep (often a sign that I'm stressed). I believe that the time taken up by work in the commune is too high and not conducive to creating vibrant social connections.

There is more evidence that the workload is too intensive.

I'll talk about how to resolve the intense workload in takeaways below. But first, there is a lingering question that many people have asked me...

Is Sadhana Forest a cult?

In a word, no. Does it have cult-like elements? In a word, yes! Should you let that stop you from trying it out? Not at all.

Let's go by Wikipedia's current definition to evaluate whether it's a cult.

A cult is a group requiring unwavering devotion to a set of beliefs and practices which are considered deviant outside the norms of society, which is typically led by a charismatic and self-appointed leader who tightly controls its members.[1] It is in some contexts a pejorative term, also used for new religious movements and other social groups which are defined by their unusual religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals,[2] or their common interest in a particular person, object, or goal. This sense of the term is weakly defined – having divergent definitions both in popular culture and academia – and has also been an ongoing source of contention among scholars across several fields of study.

So it's hard to even pin down what we mean by "cult". Sadhana has many beliefs and rules which are almost entirely unwavering. But are these "considered deviant outside the norms of society"? Does "deviant" necessarily mean "harmful"? Let's define cult-like to mean both deviant and harmful, and go through the beliefs and rules.

  1. At Sadhana, we do not eat until everyone has been served a plate. You do not ever serve yourself. If you're late, you serve seconds and wait until the third server has finished their plate before they serve you. I can see that this practice was created to encourage people to be on time for meals and incentivise more quality social time. However, given the current lack of social energy, most meals were pretty silent and felt quite isolating. Every new person I saw (including me) had the awkward experience of coming late for food and sitting in a tired state of hunger while everyone else ate. This practice is certainly deviant, I think currently more harmful than good. If the social energy was higher, I think it would not be so harmful. This is cult-like.
  2. If you smoke, drink or consume mind-altering substances inside or outside the community, you have to leave for six months. A one-strike policy and restricting your behaviour outside the physical grounds is certainly deviant. Is it harmful? I have heard that in other communities, sobriety inside the community is the least harmful option. Given the rotating community and consequent dice rolls on a stranger's mind-altered behaviours, I think this is not very harmful. This is not cult-like.
  3. You shower by carrying a bucket of water 50 metres to a shower block. This is done to increase awareness of water consumption, and subsequently limit it. It's certainly deviant, but extremely non-harmful. This is not cult-like.
  4. You poop in a hole into sawdust and pee into a pan which you tip into a ceramic squat basin. You scrub your ass and poop with one hand while you pour water with the other. This is a common practice in India, but is a huge departure if you've grown up sitting on white porcelain. Open defecation does contribute to food poisoning, and some people at Sadhana experienced diarrhoea and odd indigestion for a few days. I'd say that this is possibly harmful, and if you're a westerner, certainly deviant. This is cult-like if you're a westerner.
  5. When I say "shift" or "work", people at Sadhana would say "seva", which is a karma yoga concept that means "selfless service that is performed without any expectation of reward for performing it". Compared to modern day Capitalism, where few people tend to work without remuneration, this is certainly deviant. Whether this is harmful and subsequently cult-like depends on whether you adopt the seva mindset.
    1. The long term volunteers who seemed to be thriving at Sadhana said that once they understood that their energy was serving a broader community that seemed to give so generously to them, it no longer felt like an energy drain; the work ceased to feel like "work" once you adopted the mindset of seva. Working without the expectation of reward frees you from feelings of indignation and the need to calculate an exchange rate from cooking to laundry to toilet cleaning to tree planting. This is non-harmful, and in fact, seems pretty freeing! Many long termers said they felt more highly spiritual than ever before during their stay at Sadhana.
    2. However, for short-term volunteers such as myself, it was difficult to feel connected to the community from the lack of social energy, and subsequently, difficult to adopt the seva mindset. Further, the seemingly unfair division of work and people's attempts to shirk it (like not volunteering for kitchen shifts, and sneakily taking extra helpings) contributed to further feelings of unfair effort exchange. I feel like this was harmful, and sometimes made me feel like even the long termers' efforts were being taken advantage of. I would say this is mildly cult-like.
  6. The energy drain, lack of energy to feel like myself, and difficulty in making quality connections was certainly a little harmful for me and others; it was the main reason I decided to shorten my stay. I wouldn't say this is deviant though, given that I have observed the stressful city life tends to squeeze a lot of people's energy from each other. Sadhana seems like it could benefit from reducing the workload to make it more healing and appealing to stressed-out city goers, who make up a high proportion of its short term volunteers. So this is not cult-like, but only because the city life is also working us too hard.

It seems like whether Sadhana is a cult depends on how much you align with its values. If you stay there for longer, you'll probably align more with the values, and discover which things are truly harmful. Given that Sadhana forest has existed for over twenty years, and is thriving in three other locations around the world, my vote is that it's not a cult! I think that most people would benefit from a short stay there. If you're worried that some place is a cult, as long as you have an exit date and some people to hold you accountable to leaving before you decide to stay longer, you're safe (much like the protocol for safe hitch-hiking).

Takeaways

My main takeaways from Sadhana go like this:

  1. Improve the social energy and feeling of community in communal living by
    1. removing the energy drain induced from the intense work, especially in the kitchen.
    2. ensuring that every shift allows you to work mindfully and meditatively, with energy left over to enjoy (or run your own) workshops and events.
  2. Replicate Sadhana's amazing minimal-waste processes and economies for cooking, cleaning and building.
  3. In the context of Permaculture, see Sadhana Forest as strong evidence that you can't grow food if the land is dry, and one way to help it hold water is with trees.
  4. I don't need a lot to feel nourished in terms of food, toilet and bathing facilities. Moreover, if you choose your home location well, nature can do half the work for you.

Improving the social energy by reducing the work intensity

We can make the community socially healthier by saving people's energy from being taken up by the work. If they have this energy, Sadhana should thrive automatically; there is already a culture and schedule of wonderful events like sharing circles, non-talent shows and movie nights that will take people's social energy and amplify them.

How do we save energy in the work?

  1. Improve the workload division by maximising parallelism in time-sensitive workloads like the kitchen.
  2. Cut expectations of work pace and output yield, especially when people are tired.
  3. Keep better tabs on people's energy by routinely encouraging people to talk about what's draining them.

I want to focus on the efficiency optimisations for the Cooking in Communal living. A bottleneck that results in the kitchen shifts taking too long is: cutting veggies blocks cooking blocks serving the food blocks cleaning the pots and pans. To improve this workflow, you could:

  1. Cut the veggies faster by having more people, chopping boards and good knives at the beginning of cooking shifts. Make sure the knives are sharp, because blunt knives increase cutting risk. Teach people to chop correctly but slowly, so that they can improve over time. Afterwards, many of the choppers can switch to other less intensive shifts.
  2. Leave the cleaning of the pots and pans to the kitchen clean-up shift. This has the added benefit of allowing the pots to cool naturally rather than dumping cold water on a hot pan, which tends to stress metal and crack them; I saw the most cracked pan in my life at Sadhana which had certainly been washed too quickly too often, and it made me sad. Ideally, if the cooking team is running early and isn't out of energy, they can do some more "seva" and clean it themselves.
    As a metric, with any kitchen manager (aka "chef"), they should not finish the shift late even if all their choppers are new; you should not rely on chopping efficiency from your volunteers, otherwise you're expecting them to work faster than they are comfortable.

We can also save time in the kitchen by saving time in other shifts to create extra time to help with chopping. Use pans when sweeping, please - it's such a cheap investment for much faster cleaning. Invest in radios for each shift's leaders so that, if the kitchen (or another shift) is struggling to finish on time, you can dynamically redistribute workers to remove the stress.

To reduce hours of work, we could also reduce our expectations of how much "surplus" is created from the work. There's no point expecting the community to plant trees if the kitchen is struggling to produce food or the toilets are struggling to stay clean and functional. Improve the efficiency of the "baseline work" which keeps the people healthy in the commune, and then let the leftover energy flow into "surplus work" like reforestation and education.

Finally, we should expect that every person has access to mindfulness and is not burned out by any shift. You should talk about this regularly, perhaps once a week, or if the shift leaders have the energy, they should Encourage feedback. This should be the main metric for any commune that relies on short-term volunteers.

Minimal waste and circular economies at Sadhana Forest

Sadhana Forest has many examples of how to minimise waste with circular economies and natural products. A circular economy is "is a model of resource production and consumption in any economy that involves sharing, leasing, reusing, repairing, refurbishing, and recycling existing materials and products for as long as possible".

Some examples of circular economies at Sadhana are:

  1. Coconuts
    1. Flesh and water used in cooking
    2. Exocarp (hairy bits) used as scrubbers for dishes
    3. Husks with leftover flesh is used to lure stray dogs and cats away from the kitchen so they don't bother us while cooking (but still feed them nonetheless)
    4. Empty husks are allowed to dry and combusted
  2. Combustibles like wood, rope and coconut husks are used to fuel the kitchen's rocket stoves
  3. Human and cow manure alike is used in the compost. Notably, the human poop did not smell harsh at all, and it seems like a great example of humanure.
    1. The pooping protocol at Sadhana is to squat over a barrel, drop the kids off (aka "take a poop"), and put 1-2 large coffee milk jugs of sawdust on top. The nitrogen in the poop and the carbon in the sawdust facilitates the composting process.
  4. Human pee is occasionally added to ash to make extra fertilizer
  5. Food waste is collected into a "cow food" bin (non-citrus fruit and peels) and compost bin (everything else).
  6. The dish washing setup is a fantastic example of water conservation, and shows how little water you need to rinse dishes for 40 peoples' crockery for three meals a day (aka 120 washes for cutlery, a plate and a bowl).
    1. There are three rinsing buckets and two massive clean disinfectant buckets.
    2. The first rinsing bucket's water is the oldest. After a meal or cooking, you first dunk your dish in here, scrub off the gunk with a coconut brush, and then scrub once more with ash to disinfect it.
    3. You then rinse your dish in the three buckets in order from oldest to newest water.
    4. Finally, you dump your now clean dish in a disinfectant bucket, which is filled with clean water and vinegar. The dish sits here until someone from the clean-up team pulls them all out to dry.
    5. Once a day, we dump the oldest cleaning bucket and pull water sequentially from the newer buckets; disinfectant bucket water goes into bucket 1, bucket 1 becomes bucket 2, bucket 2 becomes bucket 3, and bucket 3 is dumped.
    6. In the ten days I was there, I pulled out perhaps one or two dirty plates from the clean pile, and they were hardly worth fussing about. This dishwashing setup is amazing!
  7. Hessian "gunny sack" bags are sent to the cows area and used to hold hay and other goods.

I would highly recommend staying for at least one day at Sadhana Forest to simply observe these circular economies for yourself. You will observe even more if you stay long enough to do each shift at least once. These are practices I will look to replicate in other communes and places out in the bush. The coconut synergy is so nice, and feels like extra justification to incorporate the satisfying ritual of coconut cracking into my life too. 🥥

Water conservation and permaculture

As a heads up, I currently know so little about Permaculture that I would keep a salt shaker handy whenever I talk about it. But I can parrot some things I've heard from people at Sadhana Forest that seem cool and resonate with the ideas talked about in permaculture's Wikipedia article.

The founders of Sadhana Forest originally wanted to grow some food in a sustainable way, among other things. But they quickly realised that this wouldn't scale well; the ground had little water deep within it, and retaining the water in the largely hot dry climate is super difficult. So they started using water conservation techniques to trap rain water in the ground and stop it from running off. They changed their focus to reforestation because "Trees can help reduce water runoff by decreasing water flow and evaporation and thereby allowing for increased soil infiltration".

Sadhana Forest doesn't currently grow any of its own food; all the food is purchased from local farms instead. However, Sadhana still supports local agriculture throug its reforestation:

The main aim of (Sadhana's) ecological project is to support the local rural villages: By retaining water and filling the aquifer, Sadhana Forest India allows the villagers to cultivate their food and prevents exodus towards nearby city slums.

You don't need much to be nourished

Before living at Sadhana, I would feel uncomfortable if I got sand on the bed or had the grimy kitchen crumbs on my feet. And to be fair, I would be much more comfortable without these things.

But living at Sadhana taught me that I can feel nourished and comfortable...