Image from Microsoft
GOODFORTUNE TRAVEL
Sleep, Pray, Love Need to de-stress? Get thee to a monastery, says Penny Fray. R&R. What a joke. May as well stand for rushed and raging. By the time you get from your morning meditation class to work, you’ve built up enough road rage to render all that om-ing ineffectual. Feeling calm in an increasingly speed and stress driven society is difficult. That’s why finding a place where the world won’t intrude is becoming increasingly popular. Whatever your religious beliefs, retreats have become modern sanctuaries for harassed professionals. “Most of us have lives that are rushed, confusing, too challenging and with too many responsibilities and relationships to balance. Time has become an enemy to conquer,” says Stafford Whitaker, author
18
of The Good Retreat Guide. “Going on retreat gives you a break from all that. Suddenly, there are no radios, televisions, friends, children, pets and the constant background of human activity. There is no gossip, no grumbling, no meetings, no decisions, no interference with where you are inside yourself. At last you have some space.” And the benefits are obvious. Once you get the chance to slip into a lower gear, you relax. Your body starts to heal, your mind finds clarity and your spirit starts to soar. “Human beings aren’t just flesh and blood - there’s also the spirit, which we often neglect,” says Canon Olivier Meney from SS Peter & Paul in New