After a retreat, keep the first weeks plain and gentle: sleep, regular meals, a slow return to work and people, and big decisions given time unless your health or safety needs them now. A flat patch is common, and it isn't failure. If you feel low, unreal or sleepless, and it lasts or worries you, see a doctor.
Ruxandra eats lunch at her desk in Media City on Wednesday and can't remember tasting any of it.
Last week every meal was eaten sitting down, slowly, in a dining room where nobody spoke and nobody had a phone. Six days in the hills, at a retreat a long drive from the city. She came back on Saturday rested and unhurried, with the car windows down most of the way.
On Monday a colleague leaned over the partition. "So, are you enlightened now?" She laughed, and so did he, and by mid-morning she was three meetings behind.
By Wednesday the unhurried feeling has gone somewhere she can't find. She hasn't slept well since she got back. The afternoon is flat and grey, and she can't think of a reason for it.
That evening the retreat's group chat fills with photos of the last sunrise and messages that say "still floating" and "miss you all". She types "Same here", reads it back, deletes it, and starts on dinner.
What should you do after a retreat?
Treat the first month home as part of the retreat. Keep sleep, meals and movement ordinary, go back to work and people at a gentle pace, and give big decisions time unless your health or safety needs them now. A few flat days are common. If you feel worse rather than flat, see a doctor.
Expect questions, too. Colleagues and friends will ask how it was, sometimes as a joke, and nobody's owed a full account. A short, true answer will do for most of them, and the longer version belongs with someone you trust, at a time of your choosing.
If you haven't left yet, start with getting ready for a retreat.
Looking further ahead, to a later month when several days away might suit you? Ours is the 5-Day RS Method Experience, and the end of this piece covers when it might fit. Or read on.
Is it normal to feel low after a retreat?
Often, yes. A retreat puts a great deal on hold at once: the inbox, the errands, the noise, nearly everyone who needs something from you. Coming home hands it all back in a day. Plenty of people come home tired, flat or close to tears, and some of them wonder whether anything happened at all. A flat week after a full one is common, and it doesn't mean you did anything wrong.
The group chat can make it harder. Photos of other people's sunrises arrive while you're eating at your desk, and it's easy to decide that everyone else is coming home better than you. You haven't seen their Wednesdays.
Some people come home feeling worse, not flat. They're low for days on end, or they feel unreal and detached, as if they're watching their own life from a step away. Some can't sleep. For some, memories they hadn't thought about in years come back up. If anything like that lasts, or worries you at all, see a doctor or a mental health professional, and tell them you've just been on a retreat. If you're in crisis, contact your local emergency services.
If you're in treatment already, keep it going. Let your doctor or therapist know about the retreat at your next appointment, or sooner if something is troubling you.
Why do old habits return once you're home?
Because home is where they live.
Your ordinary life doesn't come on retreat with you. It stays behind, and many habits simply sit idle while you're gone. On the first morning back the inbox, the commute and the usual chair are all there, and you slip into them much as you did before.
The people around you hand some of it back too, quite innocently. They know the self that's been running things, and that's the one they greet, because it's the one they know.
Many of us carry a few selves like that: the one with a joke for every meeting, the one who's never off the phone, the one who eats lunch at the desk. They've been running our weeks for years, and home is where they know their jobs best. So when an old habit turns up in your second week back, what's usually going on is simple: one of those selves has picked up where it left off. Why change can feel so hard looks at that pull more closely.
You are not broken. You are buried. Whatever has picked up again has been on top for years, and it doesn't call for a scolding.
What could your first month home look like?
If what's come back since the retreat is alcohol, drug use, self-harm, or someone who's hurting you, this plan isn't the tool for it. A specialist service or your GP is the place for that, and if you're in recovery, keep your programme and the people in it close, this month as always. If you're in danger or in crisis, contact your local emergency services.
Sit down once with your calendar open, on paper or on your phone.
- Make the first two days back light. Ordinary meals, an early night, and as few early meetings as you can manage. If those days have already gone, mark the next two.
- Take one thing off the next four weeks. A standing meeting you can drop, an errand someone else can run, a late night you can skip. One is plenty. Medical appointments, support groups and recovery meetings stay.
- Let the hour it frees stay free. Resist filling it with something just as heavy.
- Book a conversation as well. Some time in the second week, sit down with someone you trust and tell them how it's going: a friend, a colleague, or a professional who's already looking after you. Say whatever you like, at whatever length, and go back to them as often as you want.
- On a rough day, look after yourself first. Feeling low, unreal or unable to sleep goes to your doctor, as above, ahead of any step here. If it's only an old habit turning up on an otherwise fine day, notice it, and let the day continue.
Skip whichever of these doesn't suit your weeks. Whatever the list says, ringing your doctor, or sitting down with someone you trust, comes first.
It's a small plan on purpose: one thing fewer, and one person who hears how it's going.
When is it time to think about another retreat?
Not in the first month home. After that, I'd want three things settled before booking any retreat of several days, including ours.
- The month home has had its due. Your sleep has settled. Any low patch that hung on has been seen by a doctor, not waited out. And the fee wouldn't leave your month tight. If any of that isn't so yet, the retreat can wait.
- The people treating you agree. Ask your doctor or therapist whether the timing is right before you commit, and take their answer as final. Our team needs to hear of any treatment before you take a seat, too. The five days hold no therapy and no medical care, so the care you already get goes on as your doctor directs.
- Days with breaks in them. Several full days back to back ask a lot of anyone. Our page gives the daily hours and adds: "Daily, with proper breaks."
That's the 5-Day RS Method Experience. When all three hold, its page is the one to read before you book.
Every good week I've had has needed an ordinary Thursday in it.
Huda put her five days into a Google review. "I came to the 5-Day RS Method Experience not really knowing what to expect. Five days later, I walked away feeling that something inside me had shifted."
Robert Simic, guiding the remembering.
P.S. If you're reading this in your first week home, let this month be an ordinary one. When it's done, and only if several days away still appeal, Choose Your Seat is where ours is described.