Contemplative awareness comes to those who unapologetically break into silence, stillness and solitude and discover, beneath the noisy, shiny surface, the original canvas on to which the colours of creation and the music of the universe slowly spread to reveal world. This canvas is woven into the very fabric of our existence. It forms the foundational ground of being bestowed upon us at birth, divine ground from which new horizons continually rise shimmering in fugitive light where mysteries dwell. Contemplative practices, arising from the steadfastness of the listening ear and watchful eye, return us to a pristine canvas, a restored innocence from whence we start afresh as we glide and slide through the pleats and folds of consciousness unfolding unto itself.
What do I mean by ‘Desert Experience’? And why chose this image when I am settled in the rolling green and fertile landscape of Bornholm? With it long winter nights, Scandinavia is the legendary land of the dark populated by the people of the underworld, the Underjordiske who, similar to Celtic spirituality, make up many of the legends and myths that trawl the hallowed darkness. Since arriving on Bornholm, basking in the luminosity of darkness, I have slowly come to realise that we all come from the dark and silence and will, in due time, return to the dark and silence. In-between we learn to live in the noise of a compulsive world and remain centred in our truth and the knowledge of our goodness.
A desert experience is part of the living tradition ignited in the late 4th century by the desert fathers and mothers who retreated to the desert to break free from the social and political domination of post-Constantinian urban Christianity. Their ethos and practices would, in time, infuse the Western monastic tradition.
Responding to the appeal of the leanness and sparseness of the desert, contemplative retreats abide the monastic impulse to step aside from the hustle and bustle of our everyday life and to treat ourselves to a break from the chaos of our unexamined desires. In deep silence, stillness and solitude, we cultivate the courage and strength to divest ourselves of acquisitive habits, distorted understandings and all the biases that cloud our vision of reality. Faithful to the compelling invitation of the poet, we step sideways into the light and disappear into the originality of it all, letting go, as we slip into the oblique crevices, of all the nagging questions that besiege us.
The original canvas is not lost is some forsaken land although, at times, it might feel to be so; it is so much closer to us than our befuddled mind is willing to admit. Once found it cannot be lost again; it becomes a faithful and sincere companion, a true friend.
Regular contemplative retreats provide a salutary, and precious, training ground to keep us centred as we cruise the boisterous waves of our odysseys. This one-day contemplative retreat, inspired by the timeless wisdom of desert retreats, is designed to help retreatants recognise the warp and weft of the canvas that carries them through life and the bespoke practices that return them to their essence, whatever the outer circumstances might be.
Following the footsteps of the desert fathers and mothers we cultivate, in their words, the qualities of agrupnia and apatheia. Agrupnia, in modern terms ‘attentiveness’, is the spiritual discipline of wakefulness. Apatheia, often translated as indifference as in apathy, is the spiritual discipline of ‘detachment’ or ‘dispassion’, the ability to not be carried away by our passions, nor driven by our unexamined desires and compulsive thoughts and to mature emotional sobriety. The desert tradition recognises the difference between false and true indifference, true indifference being the result of disciplined attentiveness and false indifference the consequence of numbness or cynicism. By honing their spiritual practices in the sparseness and spaciousness of the desert, the desert fathers and mothers discovered that the marriage of attentiveness and indifference gives birth to love. The inevitable fruit of agrupnia and apatheia, they say, is the flowering of agape. This image is particularly appealing for someone like myself who seeks to pluck the fruits of Yggdrasil, the tree of life that is contemplative awareness.
In order to harvest these fruits and tend to our emotional sobriety, we need to regularly break away from our habitual environment and give ourselves up, entirely, to the mystery of silence, stillness and solitude flourishing in the desert. This doesn’t necessarily mean spending seven times seven years in a dark cave in absolute isolation somewhere in the Himalayas. One day, well-designed and practiced regularly with sincerity, will yield an abundant harvest. The main point is to regularly dedicate time to solitude, prayer or contemplation and fasting. My current practice is to traverse the ‘Desert’, once a lunar month, around the new moon.
There are no purposes, nor set goals to the experience, only the willingness to open ourselves to the love and presence of whatever wants to speak to us, however we name it. We turn on our full receptive mode and patiently wait to receive what deep silence and hallowed darkness have to gift us.
Another name I give to this practice is ‘Earth Resting’ because a main component of the practice consists in giving ourselves over to the land holding us in our present circumstances. This might not be the land we think of as home and where we imagine laying down our old bones, but nonetheless the practice enables us to realise that, for now, this is the land that knows us best. The land we find ourselves standing, walking and resting on can be just as much a desert as a snow-capped mountain or a busy urban space. The secret is to uncover the sparseness of everything else than the deep silence, stillness and solitude that frame a contemplative retreat, something that can be experienced even in the most wildest and chaotic surroundings.
The retreat is also designed to follow the turning of the seasons throughout the day and to (re-)connect to the natural rhythms and tides that ferry us through inner and outer voyages. Drawing on the wisdom of the Celtic calendar and the Oriental day clock, we learn to reset, and finetune, our internal clocks so as to nurture a slow and gentle maturation of the stages of awareness that yield mature mindfulness.
The structure of the day is simple. It consists of eight 20-minute sits, in silence, stillness and solitude every two hours starting at 7.00 and finishing at 21.00.
The whole experience is book-ended with two nights in Yggdrasil Guest Lodge. You will have your own room, one of the bigger rooms.
You choose when you want to do your Desert Experience and I look after the logistics. You might like to do it on your own or join me on a day when I do my monthly practice. I am happy to provide you with the dates set for 2026. By nature, this is a solitary practice that requires that we go deep down within to touch the rawness and nakedness of who we are in essence. Couples or close friends who chose to do it together are most likely to uncover covert and well-concealed forms of co-dependency. That is another journey.
You arrive the day before and we take time to discuss the specifics of your Desert Experience and how I should assist you on your solitary crossing of the desert. We share a light evening meal at 18.00. At 19.00 we enter the great silence and retire to our rooms to prepare for the following day of silence, stillness and solitude. There is a celebratory breakfast on the morning after at 10.00. We slowly break the fast and quietly come out of the silence. We are mindful not to jump too quickly into sharing and we keep the silence on whatever arose during the day allowing the experience to flow on until the time is ripe to speak up.
This is essentially an immersive and imaginative experience. Therefore, there are no online options.
Radical simplification is the guiding principle that supports a fruitful experience.
A Simplicity of Structure
Eight 20-minute sits in silence, stillness and solitude every two hours starting at 7.00 and finishing at 21.00.
We sit wherever feels appropriate. In the name of the solitude of the soul and the Earth, this can be in solitary confinement or in the collective space of the Abbey. It may vary over the day but I recommend sitting in the same place and, if in the Abbey, to sit in the Zen way facing a wall or window so as to curb the distraction of interpersonal relationality. A single soft gong marks the beginning and end of each sit at the set time.
For each sit, there is a short prayer/poem gathering a few words nested in a place of deep silence. These are not read aloud but can be uttered in the stillness of the heart or quietly read in preparation of the session. The prayers usher us along the transformative path of purgation, illumination and union or, in my terms, through the waves of the odyssey with the stages of material purification, psychological integration, imaginal purification and spiritual growth.
In the name of silence, womb of the word, silence is kept throughout the day: no talking, no teaching, no guided meditations, no listening to music or watching videos. We open our hearts to the nakedness of desert.
There is a resource guide containing the detailed schedule and the eight prayers.
A Simplicity of Being
Immersed in deep silence, in rhythm with eternal breath, we follow the turning of the seasons, listen to the music of the universe and let the imagination of the Earth guide us.
A Simplicity of Doing
We direct our mind and heart to reading poetry, the language of silence. Poetry is the doorway of the imagination. The leanness and spaciousness of the words gracefully laid down on the page echo the desert; this breaks down our biases and cracks open our heart.
We work with one book of poetry only, something that appeals to us both in its form and content. The book is, in itself, a work of art, love’s labour. We put aside eBooks to ensure fullness of experience in receiving the art form. If you want to immerse yourself in the Christian contemplative tradition, these are the texts in the Bible that I work with: Song of Salomon, the Psalms and the Book of Revelation.
In the name of stillness, we slow down and are mindful of all our actions and gestures, be it eating, walking, moving around in the space and tending to our daily needs.
Between the sessions, we indulge in periods of deep rest, doing absolutely nothing, noticing any temptation to resort to distractions and entertainment. These periods of deep rest are essential for cultivating the necessary detachment involved in emotional sobriety. They can be interspersed with contemplative practices that persuade love’s presence: slow walking, handicraft, self-care, all activities that encourage the emptying of the besieged mind. However tempting it might be, we refrain from journalling and writing as this can sweep us away into mental activities and the ruts of compulsive thoughts.
A Simplicity of Sustenance
We draw on the benefits of intermittent fasting. This involves a 14-hour fast between the last meal of the day and the first intake of food the next day. We do this the night before and the night after the Desert Experience.
Throughout the day, between each session, we drink plenty of organic herbal teas following a seasonal pattern and partake of light collations of freshly baked bread made from wheat grown on the island and vegetable bouillon.
A Simplicity of Space
We tend to all the spaces we sit, rest, eat and walk in, celebrating the harmony and beauty that undergirds all creation.
All electronic devices are turned off. They are switched off the evening before and turned back on the day after.
We put aside all our usual working materials and tools: journals, sketch books, musical instruments, etc.
The cost of a one-day Desert Experience is 1’500,00 kr.
This includes