Retreat yo self

A friend of mine recently went on a retreat. It wasn’t just a few days on some island, it was a 10-day meditation retreat. I had another friend who went before, he said it changed his life. Every decision we make changes our life; but I think he meant it in the traditional sense.

I spoke to him about it and he described quite an intense scene. Each day you wake up and meditate for 10-12 hours, you’re not allowed to read, they take your phone away on day one, you’re not even allowed to talk to anyone the whole time. It sounds very peaceful and there is a part of me that yearns for that no-screen time, so I considered signing up.

But then I thought about how much I’d fucking hate it. 10 days without talking to people? What? I can barely go an hour without talking to myself, I love silence but only when it is silence on my own terms. Sitting for 10 hours a day? Man I’m almost in my 30’s now no fucking way can I sit down for that long without feeling it. I refuse to believe anyone can comfortably sit with their back straight for more than 12 minutes.

I’m not allowed to workout but what about mobility? Can I stretch my hams while focussing on my breath or something? At least in solitary confinement I could channel my inner Edmond Dantès and get jacked.

This next part might sound pretentious, but that’s a freedom-of-expression-risk I’m willing to take. Because what about the food? The retreat is completely free and runs on donations, previous participants sign-up and volunteer to cook and clean.

As much as this sounds lovely, it also sounds like they’re going to serve me something vegan. 10 days on volunteer-chef vegan food? I pause for a moment to ponder whether such sacrifice is worth the reward of sitting silently in a group of (presumably) stinky people for an extended period of time. Vipassana? More like VipassaNAH am I right?

I am of course being dramatic, this retreat usually changes people for the better and teaches them to introduce meditation into their lives. Many leave with new routines and a better balance with technology, at least a temporary one. This is all great, but it sure as shit isn’t for me. Different horses, different courses.

I was curious though. I looked around on the internet and started getting annoyed at the available options. I wanted something that resonated with me without the weird shit that didn’t. I wanted to get off tech and go somewhere peaceful, I could even be sold on some meditation.

I was yearning for a retreat that got me off screens but didn’t try to shove cacao or ayahuasca down my throat. Why does weird pseudoscience have such a heavy presence in science-backed activities like meditation, yoga and retreats? These are things that everyone can benefit from, there are lots of people who want to get off screens and do peaceful shit without having to hold hands with strangers.

I wanted the quiet time without the sound healing. I wanted a cup of tea without the tantric dance. I wanted to read books without needing to connect with my inner child. Maybe make a friend without needing to exchange our divine energy, you know?

If you want to reach some form of secular enlightenment then based on my research, you can either apply for a free meditation retreat that is minimum 10 days and probably serves vegan food, or you can go to some $1000/night wellness hotel that will inject Joe Rogan flavoured stem cells in your eyebrows.

Business idea: start a retreat that resembles the ‘stoic experience’. It’s basically just a shitty hostel with the bare minimum but you market it to rich crypto kids that want to get off screens. If you consider starting this, please let me know, sincerely, rich(ish) crypto kid wanting to get off screens.

Honestly I think there is potential for someone to set up a Greco-maxxing retreat. You provide very basic accommodation and (not vegan) food, then you just get the occupants to give up their tech, you provide a comfy reading space, secular lectures on philosophy, a gym, maybe a garden or farm for people to work on. You could even have meditation time that is less than 23 hours a day.

I started to map this out in my brain and I thought damn, I could absolutely make this happen somewhere in Southern Europe and have the perfect audience to market it to. Then something happened that happens a lot in my overactive brain, I realise I have a business idea with a lot of potential but I absolutely do not want to execute on it. I don’t want to buy land and have to be tied, I couldn’t be bothered looking into the tax implications of owning a hostel-esque farm thing.

Do I need licensing to take someone’s phone off them? What if a guest is really annoying and wants to talk to me about Tony Robbins or something? What if I emailed a guest a bunch of questions and they responded to only one of those questions and made me want to delete their entire existence?

It all sounded a bit much for me, so I parked it in my Google-Doc-Graveyard of great business ideas that never were. Right next to my NFT sports memorabilia market place where I would light famous jerseys on fire for free marketing and mint them as an NFT. Messi fans can thank me for never feeling inspired enough for this one.

After this mental exercise of mapping out what would interest me in a retreat, an idea sparked in my brain. I thought hey, I’m a guy with free time, what if I just made my own retreat? And just like an inept office worker realising that you can workout without a personal trainer, I realised that I am capable of sitting in silence at my house without being on a 10-day retreat.

So I decided fuck it, I’m going to do my own damn retreat and there is no one that can stop me. I got to planning. I thought about all the things I wanted to do—no rules. Number one on my list: I wanted to turn my phone off for the whole time. I also wanted to read a lot, uninterrupted reading is a dream. I remember hearing that Bill Gates goes once per year to some small cabin and just reads for two days. Sounds great to me.

Other things on my list were writing, walking, working out, chess puzzles—it was a day to do whatever the fuck I wanted and those were the things I wanted to do. Chess puzzles and writing were done on the computer but I had the discipline to not start scrolling afterwards.

I did a minute-by-minute (more like activity-by-activity) account of my retreat day. Jords retreat. I had a plan of what I wanted to do, so I thought it would be interesting to record what I actually ended up doing. To be honest it doesn’t really matter what I did, the key message I want to write about is that it felt great and I think everyone should do their own version of it.

don’t worry i can also barely read my handwriting

For me at the time I was living alone, so I didn’t actually need to do anything to set myself up for success except to decide that I was going to do it and turn my phone off. A bit of planning was also helpful, but it wasn’t much. Maybe if you live with family or a partner it is a bit more complex, but it is your own version and it can be whatever you want it to be.

Maybe you only have a few hours free on every second Sunday, but how often do you prepare to use those hours to do exactly what you want to do? I would recommend to take a somewhat mindful approach with it, turn your phone off and try to walk, meditate, journal, stretch. We know all of these things are good for us but it’s easy to forget them.

It could be a combo of those peaceful things thrown in with other things you just want to do. You could cook that really inconvenient recipe you’ve been putting off for years. You could play Playstation for 5 hours. The most important thing is to put your phone away and stick to your plan, be aware and mindful of the activities you are doing.

I’m ashamed to say the first Jords retreat was in November last year and I am yet to do it again. When my (36 hour) retreat was over, I told myself wow that was really nice, I should do that every month. Then I went ahead and didn’t do it again. I hate when that happens, I really do.

That’s why productive slop is so damaging, people pay $1000 to see Tony Robbins speak then feel empowered to take on the world but they haven’t actually formed any habits or learned anything. They just get a dopamine hit of energy and someone pseudo-believing in them in exchange for money.

It’s also not personalised, it’s generic speech and talking points. It’s like this article, I’m writing about points that everyone can (hopefully) relate to but the most useful part is the recommendation to do things in your own way. I wrote about Baselines, another concept I have that relies on you defining your own rules.

There is no retreat waiting for you that will be just right, there is no personal trainer that will slap your hand when you reach for your third piece of cake at the office party. At the end of the day we need to find the discipline to do the things in a way that is sustainable.

That’s where I think the self-retreat does wonders. It is rest but in a structured way. We almost never have structured rest. If you’re one of the lucky ones then you might have a morning or an evening routine, but it is very rare to have rest in your calendar.

So let’s make a promise, you (yes, you), and me baby. We’re in this world together and I won’t let you down. You wouldn’t let me down, would you? Knowing that my word is good and my heart is true? Okay, good.

I’m going to organise a Jords Retreat #2 and this time the sequel is going to be better than the first, like Batman (imy Heath). I’m going to make the time for structured rest. My screen time has been building and it is time for me to take a day of doing exactly as I wish.

My end of the promise is that I will do this within the next 30 days, with dreams of doing it more than once. Your end of the promise? Do the same. Figure out when you can find the time, you have a whole month. It doesn’t need to be an entire day, maybe it’s only a few hours, but it must be structured rest.

Listen to jazz, go for a hike, bust out a puzzle, or just sit in a quiet room and read for a while without your phone. Whatever your personalised version of a banging (but mindful) time is, do it. Start scheduling so you don’t fuck it up. Rest and work are both important—and neither will happen if we don’t roll up our sleeves (or pillows) and get it done.