CHANGE EVERYTHING

Inside the modern wellness retreat boom, where visitors are promised the chance to transform their lives - in 10 days or less

The first time Hana Lang went to a Vipassana retreat, she was 18 and couldn’t cut it. Vipassana is an ancient Indian type of guided meditation, and Lang found the silence — the days locked into her own thoughts while surrounded by people having emotional breakdowns — far too intense. She left the retreat early.

But a few years later, Lang tried again, and this time something clicked. Since then, she has attended 10-day Vipassana retreats in Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia every three to four years. “At some point, this meditation, this technique made sense,” says Lang, now a 34-year-old midwife in a remote community in northwest B.C. “All of the other really fun things that I thought would make me happy wouldn’t.”

These retreats, Lang emphasizes, are not fun. The surroundings are austere, the food basic. Every day, she wakes before dawn, then spends eight to 10 hours working to improve her ability to meditate. Lang got hooked on these retreats not because she enjoys herself in the moment but because, she says, the practice of Vipassana makes her life operate more smoothly.

Lang is far from the only one stepping out of her life for a week or two with the ambition of becoming a better person. An earnest drive for self-improvement is at the centre of a not-sonew but nevertheless growing travel trend, particularly among women: the ubiquitous wellness retreat, available in an increasingly wide array of iterations.

According to data released this summer from Virtuoso, a luxury travel network, 94 per cent of travellers surveyed report incorporating some form of “self-care” (undefined) into their travels. And 59 per cent are embarking on solo wellness getaways.

Modern retreat culture now ranges from “breakup boot camps” for the broken-hearted in upstate New York to “goddess activation” workshops in Costa Rica, “eat, meditate, love” weekends in rural Ontario, and “finding your purpose” in Paris (including ridding yourself of negative self-talk by tossing it into the Seine). Even traditional hotels like the Fairmont are getting into the game, hosting retreats like the upcoming (and sold-out) “Flow, Connect & Restore” at Chateau Lake Louise.

These retreats sit at the cross-section of travel, health and self-care, and they all revolve around empowered self-improvement. They’re almost always aimed at women who are distinctly privileged but still feel a vague sense of emptiness.

Modern retreat goers aren’t trying to take a vacation from their problems; they’re interested in bringing extra emotional baggage in the hopes that a week with crystals on a beach in Bali or learning about essential oils in the Rocky Mountains will provide them with the clarity and direction they’re missing.

High-level emotional impact is both used to sell these experiences and espoused by participants. “Coming to the retreat was a declaration of self-love,” says one blissed-out woman in a video testimonial about her time at a Goddess Retreat in Bali. “It’s like a vow.”

At the end of the trips, of course, most people have to go home to whatever factors drove them there in the first place. But Chelsea Ross, who founded Goddess Retreats, says she tries to cultivate a conscious, internal journey for her clients that will help them long after they’ve left; activities include making flower offerings to Balinese goddesses and sound bath healing. “It’s about filling your cup so you can go back out into the world and continue to serve this beautiful energy.”

According to the Wellness Travel Association (WTA), the majority of travellers who seek out wellness retreats are indeed women. Anne Dimon, president of the WTA, says post-pandemic, many women are looking to exercise greater control over their health. “We’re becoming more proactive, which will drive wellness travel to even greater heights.”

For many women, regaining control and purpose is exactly the point. Diana Stobo blew up her life 20 years ago when she was “the executive wife” with three kids in private school. She wasn’t happy, so she divorced her husband and set out to find meaning in her life. Several years into this journey, she founded the Retreat Costa Rica, hosting programs at a five-star resort set upon a crystal quartz mountain. While more luxurious than Lang’s Vipassana courses, they’re no less emotionally demanding, promising to provide a “renewed sense of life expansion.”

Retreats can serve as an opportunity for women to clear their minds, contemplate life’s bigger questions and focus on their own needs — something that can be hard to do at home. “To have a venue to explore your thoughts and feelings is a dream come true for women,” says Stobo.

Lang says that part of the appeal of her Vipassana retreats is the isolation from everyday life. “You don’t have your phone; you don’t have books. It is an opportunity to just be with yourself,” she says. “It distils your motivations, the things you’re afraid of and that you’re chasing, and you’re just able to sit with them.”

Lang’s Vipassana retreats are spartan and donation-only, but that’s not reflective of the larger trend. Even as the options proliferate, they remain expensive and typically dominated by more affluent, often white consumers. It’s not just the price tag that limits access; the freedom to check out of work and life for any period is a privilege.

Calls to diversify the industry have led to an expansion of offerings, including targeted programming at long-established places like Miraval Arizona, which hosted their inaugural Diverse Women’s Wellness Retreat in 2022, and new, dedicated companies like Black Women Healing Retreats.

For women who can afford these getaways, a big part of the appeal is the camaraderie of other women. Many operators indicate that women typically book solo — but not because they want to be alone. “They want to be completely free to kind of unveil a part of themselves that they don’t really share,” says Grace Cirocco, who hosts retreats for women in Ontario and Sedona.

Her retreats include exercises that promote intense sharing, like asking women to write a letter to someone who hurt them. It’s not uncommon for guests to stay in touch — even attending each other’s weddings.

Even for Lang, whose retreats are mostly silent, there’s an element of deep bonding. On day nine of her 10-day retreats, the “noble silence” ends and participants are encouraged to connect.

“I have friends I made during that 24-hour period and they’re beautiful relationships because you’ve all gone through this intense thing and come to understand yourself in this new way,” says Lang. “It’s really nice to share that with people.”

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You don’t have your phone; you don’t have books. It is an opportunity to just be with yourself.

HANA LANG ON ATTENDING VIPASSANA RETREATS