Escaping the modern world and your noisy mind

What It Covers

Three stories explore different forms of escape: author Pico Iyer finds renewal through 34 years of silent retreats at a California monastery, Sarah Edmonson escapes the NXIVM cult after 12 years, and Hawaiian navigator Lehua Kamalu describes traditional ocean voyaging without modern tools.

Key Questions Answered

• •Silent retreat practice: Pico Iyer visits a Big Sur hermitage over 100 times in 34 years, spending time in undistracted silence to escape mental chatter and social self-presentation, finding this more transformative than his external travels across 51 years of global journeying.
• •Cult warning signs: Red flags include assumptions about your brokenness, high financial or time costs, specialized jargon that sounds pretentious, claims to definitive life answers, and shunning members who leave. Situational vulnerability during life transitions increases susceptibility, not personal weakness.
• •Daily silence accessibility: Dedicating just 20 minutes each morning to quiet time without devices represents only 3 percent of waking hours but transforms the remaining 97 percent by setting an intentional tone, offering benefits similar to extended retreats for those without time or resources.
• •Traditional navigation methods: Hawaiian voyaging canoes like the 62-foot Hokulea sail up to four weeks between islands using only natural cues—wave patterns, wind direction, star positions, ocean color changes at sunrise—requiring constant physical discomfort but creating profound psychological and spiritual transformation after five to seven days.