{"id":208,"date":"2008-08-20T10:54:24","date_gmt":"2008-08-20T10:54:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html"},"modified":"2008-08-20T10:54:24","modified_gmt":"2008-08-20T10:54:24","slug":"vacation-vs-retreat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html","title":{"rendered":"Vacation vs. Retreat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>cassmaster P muses&#8230;<br \/>\n<strong>Leisure vs. Contemplation&#8230;<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong>Coupled vs. Alone&#8230;<\/strong><br \/>\n(Yes, I do realize the polarized nature of this post&#8230; please indulge me anyway)<br \/>\nI went to Cape Cod for 10 days last week on a real, legitimate VACATION. My first one, really.<br \/>\nAnd here is my report:<br \/>\nVacation to me has always felt so decadent and frivolous &#8212; a desperate grab at empty pleasure seeking. Aggressive relaxation. An artificially constructed mind state. I\u2019ve never been a pleasure seeker in this particular\u00a0way \u2013 vacation is too passive, too contrived feeling for me. But I tried it anyway\u00a0&#8212; the beach; swimming, biking, resting (a lot of resting!) eating lobster rolls, reading, sunbathing, and hanging out with my boo a\u00a0lot\u00a0(she\u2019s so cute.)<!--more--><br \/>\nNow, I\u2019ve traveled before and taken plenty of trips, but there has always been some other agenda or purpose. I have never excused myself from my everyday routine for the sheer sake of R &amp; R. As soon as a little bit of time and space opens up to me, I usually spend my time away on retreat (formally and informally). I will leave town by myself to meditate or write or to spend some time being\u00a0unbelievably quiet\u00a0&#8212; a time for reflection, introspection and contemplation. A time to sift through old grief and new desires. And usually alone.<br \/>\nWhen I lived in San Francisco, I used to drive up north on Highway 1 and spend some quiet time with the redwoods under the moon. To re-center, re-calibrate, and reassess my life&#8217;s direction. I went to India for a year by myself, lived in monastaries, and\u00a0would go days without even talking to anyone&#8230; this kind of underlying rigor has always informed my &#8220;vacations&#8221;. I do not know how to a) go on vacation and\/or b) go on vacation WITH someone else. Time away = quiet, pensive time by myself. I am curious how to share &#8220;away&#8221; space\u00a0<em>with<\/em> someone and how to sink into it, be present for it (drink a beer on the beach in the afternoon; sleep in the sun for hours on end; read a trashy novel) without having this nagging feeling that I am squandering my time \u201coff\u201d. I must say, I did a pretty good job just letting it all hang out on the Cape, but I couldn&#8217;t quite escape the feeling that I was fooling myself. How do we strike a balance? We talk so much (and I think so much) about happiness and the causes of happiness. I know on a deep, fundamental level that lobster rolls and sex and beach breezes do not necessarily or directly correlate with happiness &#8212; yet we behave as if all vacation-ey accoutrement will directly translate into feeling better rested, more connected and well, happier&#8230;. I wish I could buy it. I really wish I could. But I am ultra-wary of that American trend to work hard and play hard&#8230; that &#8220;I deserve to do nothing (or I&#8217;m entitled to everything)\u00a0because I bust my ass all the time&#8221; mentality. I do not think it&#8217;s helpful or particularly healthy.<br \/>\nYes, I am sun kissed and salty. I am moving slower, chewing my food more, breathing deeper&#8230;. but I can&#8217;t help but feel that I have deluded myself into thinking that these things are lasting or actual solutions to mundane suffering. I know its partly a childhood thing &#8212; all my &#8220;vacations&#8221; growing up in Wyoming were tests of endurance: hunting trips, boating\/fishing trips, horse packing trips&#8230;. vacation meant hard labor. Time away from work meant, well&#8230; it meant more work.\u00a0It meant seeking sustenance. It meant callused hands and feet. Being cold at night. Frostbitten fingers.\u00a0Waking up at dawn to get an early start&#8230;. (an early start to <em>what<\/em> exactly?)\u00a0So the idea of leisurely making my way to the beach to lie in the sun all day is completely alien and\u00a0overwhelmingly bougie\/libertine to me.<br \/>\nI didn&#8217;t get any writing done on the Cape. I meditated, but dreamily&#8230; not in any kind of sustained way. I spent a lot of time with my\u00a0girl &#8212; good intimate time, but still&#8230; I think\u00a0I have this internal fear of even first admitting to myself and others that I actually <em>need<\/em>\u00a0 to have contemplative time, especially in the context of <em>vacation<\/em>. (My boo is very supportive of my practice,\u00a0but I still have\u00a0a hard time\u00a0taking the space that my practice deserves and craves when in ANY kind of mixed company.)\u00a0I\u00a0fear being percieved as the Debbie Downer or the\u00a0wierd, dark, brooding outcast. The anti-fun guy. Too serious&#8230; Unless you are dating a monk, how can you enjoy vacation time together whilst still maintaining\u00a0some\u00a0kind of meditative\u00a0shape? Discipline? How to relax without being uppity about practice? I get uppity about my practices &#8212; how is that for an oxymoron? (Panicking about\u00a0not having enough time\u00a0to practice, rushing to yoga, etc&#8230;.)<br \/>\nI&#8217;m also reading <a href=\"http:\/\/www.elizabethgilbert.com\/eatpraylove.htm\">Elizabeth Gilbert&#8217;s, Eat Pray Love<\/a> (that is a whole other blog post &#8212; coming soon!)&#8230; where she discusses pleasure vs. devotion and her desire to discover and\u00a0integrate the two. This search feels all to familiar to me&#8230; pleasure has no impact, no currency\u00a0in my life\u00a0without a devotional foundation. I crave some kind of fusion, where both are honored equally&#8230; where there is perpetual interplay between the two.<br \/>\nDo you have any suggestions? Any ideas about how to balance these two aspects of &#8220;time away&#8221;&#8230; Let me know your thoughts\u2026<br \/>\nMuch love.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>cassmaster P muses&#8230; Leisure vs. Contemplation&#8230; Coupled vs. Alone&#8230; (Yes, I do realize the polarized nature of this post&#8230; please indulge me anyway) I went to Cape Cod for 10 days last week on a real, legitimate VACATION. My first one, really. And here is my report: Vacation to me has always felt so decadent&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":333,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-and-media"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Vacation vs. Retreat - One City<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Vacation vs. Retreat - One City\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"cassmaster P muses&#8230; Leisure vs. Contemplation&#8230; Coupled vs. Alone&#8230; (Yes, I do realize the polarized nature of this post&#8230; please indulge me anyway) I went to Cape Cod for 10 days last week on a real, legitimate VACATION. My first one, really. And here is my report: Vacation to me has always felt so decadent&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"One City\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-08-20T10:54:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"eva\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Vacation vs. Retreat - One City","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Vacation vs. Retreat - One City","og_description":"cassmaster P muses&#8230; Leisure vs. Contemplation&#8230; Coupled vs. Alone&#8230; (Yes, I do realize the polarized nature of this post&#8230; please indulge me anyway) I went to Cape Cod for 10 days last week on a real, legitimate VACATION. My first one, really. And here is my report: Vacation to me has always felt so decadent&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html","og_site_name":"One City","article_published_time":"2008-08-20T10:54:24+00:00","author":"eva","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html","name":"Vacation vs. Retreat - One City","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-08-20T10:54:24+00:00","dateModified":"2008-08-20T10:54:24+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/#\/schema\/person\/5e5d6801549ef309c16debe139b80e3f"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/2008\/08\/vacation-vs-retreat.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Vacation vs. Retreat"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/","name":"One City","description":"The Interdependence Project","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/#\/schema\/person\/5e5d6801549ef309c16debe139b80e3f","name":"eva","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"eva"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/author\/eva"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/333"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/208\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/onecity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}