5 Reasons You Need a Wellness Retreat

A yoga retreat is not a vacation. Or at least it’s not only a vacation. It’s not a standard vacation. Rather, participating in a yoga retreat means carving intentional space in time to return to yourself by reframing, reworking and rebuilding.

Here are a handful of reasons why a retreat should get marked on your vacation calendar, either spontaneously or planned way in advance:

I remember my first yoga retreat. After a broken engagement, I had thrown myself into hot yoga classes, where my sweaty mess saw a flyer advertising a yoga retreat in India. So, I flung myself towards Goa. Something pulled at me to chart unknown territory. I remember asking the voice in my head if I could handle two classes a day. I recall asking myself there if I could honor the silence in the morning, the crying at night. I needed to get away so that I could release. It was therapy in motion.

2. You get to pause your mind

3. You have space to be alone

… with your thoughts. When you’re driving up, going for an on-site meditative hike, and practicing on the mat, you get to go inwards. It may be a more expensive-at-once form of self-care, but the transformative investment is worth it. To feel at peace is priceless. At Bali Silent Retreat, we honored silence in the morning so we could meditate and be alone with our spaced out selves.

4. You meet beautiful strangers, too.

Eating, living and breathing together in a contained environment for a short, intense period creates a bond. Your way of thinking, connecting and being evolves by expanding your circle of friends with different perspectives. I have made so many life-long connections with other lovely humans in varying fields and backgrounds. With the connection of the retreat as catalyst, we’ve gone on to collaborate creatively, follow each other on social media and found peace knowing there’s someone else out there who shared something profound or witnessed that within you. We’re all healing, going through something and hold something to offer.

5. You need new experiences

Don’t get me wrong — routine is awesome. But, for the same reason you wouldn’t do the same workout everyday or eat the same meal everyday, it’s good to mix things up, at least temporarily. You see what sticks or what needs to change. Experiencing transition, heartbreak, fear? Get to the edge of your comfort zone and imprint something new into your soul. Don’t miss the opportunity to change your view, and expand your emotional and cultural intelligence. I was once a yoga guide on an Italian tour with Travel Italian Style, where I learned how to “hurry up slowly” myself, between cups of great, local wine and beautifully made pasta.

Take care xx

Related posts:

A friend asked me whether I think some people are naturally more predisposed to be spiritual, in other words, whether spirituality is a matter of personality or something you come to through life…

When a pair of thugs stole Lady Gaga’s French bulldogs, the world came to a stop. I thought it was coming to an end. In fact, it was a preview of a coming thing and it’s going to be big. On a…

It is a good practice to have test cases covering major portion of actual code base. The idea was same to add new test cases in Loklak Server to increase its test coverage. The results were quite…