Author Pico Iyer chronicles his 100+ retreats to a remote Benedictine hermitage in Big Sur, Northern California; exploring ...

Time in quiet solitude can be invaluable in nurturing our relationship with ourselves as well as replenishing us. It’s undoubtedly an investment worth making.

This post is part one of a series. We all need solitude and silence, and we all need social connection. We are vastly connected to everything in the universe, and we forget it, most of the time.

The roar of the highway was far below, and for most of the day, even amid birdsong and tolling bells, the main sound was of living silence. I’d stumbled, in short, into the realm of contemplation.