I'm writing this from the tail end of my 48hr self retreat. Known as a weekend to most. This is a short story about defining a retreating practice.
Please note: I yearn for solitude and solo travel, two things I have not given myself since early 2018. I need a retreat. Not the kind of retreat you do with like-minded people with a shared desire. No, I need to pull back and away from everyone and everything and discover what awaits me in that space.Â
About two months ago, I penciled two weeks out from work in April and bought myself a 10-stop train pass. As the weeks crept towards the days I had penciled off the calendar, an all too familiar feeling began creeping over my chest, a constriction of responsibility to others, to work, to unexpected and emergent needs. I did not feel encouraged to go but rather to stay and care for the gardens I've planted in my life. Suddenly the two weeks were becoming four days, and those last four days were meant to be shared with a beloved on an adventure. I could feel my throat close as we discussed ideas for the four days. As I was looking at places for us to stay, I saw the term self-retreat.Â
That is what I needed. A self-retreat. I drew a declaration: RETREAT and shared it with my beloved and colleagues.Â
I decided I didn't need to go far away to go far. I packed an overnight bag to stay in my studio 5 minutes away from my home. I made a list of what I would like to do and bring, and in the process, I was transported to childhood. It was like I was going on a sleepover with a best friend, and I was the friend! Framing my weekend as a retreat invited a new experience to form with the materials of my everyday life. Namely, everything became special. What I loved became special. I became special.
My studio was a physical disaster, as it has been a catch-all for the miscellaneous mementos that were moved out of our main house last month. Boxes and bags littered the floor, including my grandmother's photos, drawings, odds and ends, my son's childhood drawings, boxes of my old journals, and my sister's collection of journals. My first work during this retreat was to make order and space for myself. In creating order, I opened portals to histories and saw desires I held twenty years ago that I share now. I felt familial echoes reverberate in my being.Â
Eerily I found little wishes and prayers from twenty years ago in my 'God Box' that said:
"If it weren't so selfish, I would love to travel alone, take more art classes, and spend more time alone."
"If it weren't so frivolous, I'd like to buy loads of art supplies, a sewing machine, and digital media and printing materials."
I say eerily because those yearnings are pressing this year. Even the word 'frivolous' was a strange encounter as that word popped into my head for my 2023 manifestation. Which I initially balked at. Why would I want to be frivolous? But as the year continues to unspool, I am learning the unique value of this words meaning in my life. These wishes echoed what I packed and desired for my retreat.
In 2019 I built an artist's studio. I designed it to have privacy, a library, a small bedroom, and a bathroom. It looks more like a mini house or jewel box than an art studio. When I built it, I wanted it to be a quiet place. I was still determining what type of studio practice I would embark on here. After its completion, I moved away and it’s been a catch all of everything but my habituating here.Â
When I was gearing up for this retreat, I had to slay all the dragons that showed up to say this idea was stupid, that I was foolish playing retreat. This was when I recognized that RETREAT is a word commanded during battle to fall back. I imagined that my declaration of a retreat was not only for me to pull back and away from the ordinary but was a war cry to others to RETREAT from my gates and leave me the F alone.
As I stayed with this experience of wrestling retreat demons and potential work texts, I thought I may need a practice of retreating. Perhaps my art studio is there to support my artistic practice of retreating. The word retreating slipped around my mind, and I began to see it separately, knowing that RE means to turn again or do anew. So, I thought about the word TREAT. What would an artistic practice of TREATING myself be?Â
The practice of self retreating by definition means
To pull away from and drawback toÂ
Provide an event, experience, or item that is out of the ordinary and gives great pleasure
To give care or attention to try to heal or cure
To behave towards one in a particular kind way
To give to oneself freely
To act upon oneself, especially to improve or alter
To present or represent oneself artistically
Etymology is poetry to me. Reading long linguistic explanations, tracks, and hypotheses is my manna. I've often imagined wanting to be an archeologist hunting for dinosaur bones, but I have recognized that digging through syllables and synonyms is my insatiable hunt. The above definition of self retreating is compiled through such measures during my 48hr retreat.Â
I want to leave this story where I am leaving my retreat; at a new beginning. A beginning that is taking form and incubating in a nest of familial fragments in my artist studio. I have a small project waiting for my return for my next self-retreat. I also want to give you a gift. Please download my drawing of a retreat flag and use as a declaration of a self-retreat when needed.