Where can I meditate overseas ascetic style?

September 20, 2016 1:26 AM

The American grind is wearing out this ENFP seer and I am looking for the slowest, mellowest place to go meditate, push a broom, eat, and sleep. Does anybody have any recommendations for overseas? In the USA here. (Please read the explanation below)

I am not doing so well. I am an ENFP feeler who sees vibrations. I had a peak experience about four years ago and since then I've seen a lot of interesting things on vibrations not on our frequency. Odd I know. See Jonas Elrod's documentary Wake Up.

I have a bachelor's degree and I work in higher education but I am so tired of all of this. The egoic rat race, the repetition, spending the majority of my waking hours at or doing something for my job. I've recently been accepted to a master's program but I just don't have it in me at the moment.

I want to know if anyone has any recommendations or know any place or anyone where I can go live overseas, eat the blandest food, push a broom, sleep on a cot, and spend most my days meditating. I'm no trustafarian, I don't have any money, bookoo student debt (thank god for the IBR), I'm just looking for a place to Be. Something slower, mellower.

Any and all advice are welcome. Where should I go? Do you know anybody I can crash with? I'm on Facebook and Couchsurfing if further connections are made. Cheers!

Also, travel wisdom is needed. Never been overseas. Easiest tourist visas, cheapest areas, etc.

posted by AdjectivePanda to Travel & Transportation (11 answers total)

Mod note: As a quick note, recommendations for places to chill / how to go about it are fine, but personal "anybody I can crash with" info is against guidelines, and shouldn't be a part of the answers here.
posted by taz (staff) at 1:40 AM on September 20, 2016

Response by poster: Oh crud! Sorry about that. I'll take care not to do it again.
posted by AdjectivePanda at 1:48 AM on September 20, 2016

Here in Cameroon, people who are tired of the grind and need to recharge their batteries usually book themselves into Monasteries (mostly of the Catholic variety) for a tiny fee.

Back in the day, I think Kathmandu was THE place to go, to be away from it all.

Look up spiritual retreat in Google. I'm sure there are plenty of offers near you. Or does it have to be overseas?
posted by Kwadeng at 2:02 AM on September 20, 2016

https://www.dhamma.org/en/about/vipassana

You really want to do this? This is it.
posted by finding.perdita at 3:02 AM on September 20, 2016 [3 favorites]

Thailand, baby, Thailand. A bit costly to get there, but once there, quite cheap. Buddhist-country, of course. Can't give you specific places, but drink a liter of Kenya gold, hit Google and search for all sorts of possible suspects. I favor the north (Chiang Mai area) or northeast, Isaan province. Not only monasteries, but other fellow traveler groups who espouse like beliefs, lifestyles.
posted by lometogo at 4:01 AM on September 20, 2016 [1 favorite]

If you're in the US, you can find plenty of places like this locally or not too far away--the Vipassana retreats that finding.perdita mentioned are located all over the country and all food and lodging is covered.

If you really do want to travel, you can go to any country with a large Buddhist population or history and find many places like this. India is a standard suggestion, I suppose--Bodh Gaya, the city where Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment, has many such retreat centers and is accessible by train. Also consider Dharamsala, the capital of the Tibetan government in exile.
posted by armadillo1224 at 6:38 AM on September 20, 2016

Yes oh yes Thailand, vipassana etc and if you're looking for something in the US, the town of Ojai in California is suuuuper slow paced and very hippie. Searching for "meditation Ojai" reveals a number of hits.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 6:54 AM on September 20, 2016

Yogaville in Virginia? I think they have options where you can exchange volunteering there for room and board.
posted by bessiemae at 9:06 AM on September 20, 2016

You're going to have a wonderful time here and you'll fit in just perfectly:

https://breitenbush.com/
posted by humboldt32 at 9:33 AM on September 20, 2016

WOOF
posted by at at 10:16 AM on September 20, 2016

Paying back those loans will be tough (and not doing so might be, um, worse), but yeah, vipassana sounds like a good call.
posted by Joseph Gurl at 8:40 PM on September 20, 2016