The Concept Of Mindfulness

Banyan Tree is putting the well into wellness and breathing new life into the concept of mindfulness.

- Andrew Leci

I must confess to having undergone a minor operation before my departure for Koh Samui. At the prospect of being a guest for Banyan Tree’s Wellness Sanctuary programme, I felt that I needed to have the pathway between my brain and my cynicism glands cauterised in case the ‘new age speak’, mysticism and psychobabble rendered me inoperative.

I don’t enjoy yoga – forget the lotus position, I can’t even manage the Renault – and massages make me tense – who wants their inner thighs touched by a stranger without the proper introductions? Meditation is another ball game, as I can’t imagine ways in which to make my mind any emptier than it already is. I breathe pretty well (all things considered) and have been doing so for years. Those kinds of exercises are almost guaranteed to leave me high/dry, shaking my head and panting.

It was, therefore, with a degree of trepidation that I entered the sanctuary that is probably one of the most picturesque resorts in Southeast Asia with the expectation that I would emerge purified, detoxified and with a Zen-like demeanour and beatific outlook on the world. Could the experience actually change my life?

The people responsible for the assignment must have recognised the challenge on their essentially oiled hands and figured; if we can do anything (anything at all) to help this guy, then we must be on to a good thing with the programme. Happily, they were not, and are not wrong.

Travelling these days is a pain in the flabby (non-yoga-honed) butt. We’re all aware of this. Going online to apply for a Thailand Pass (without which you can’t even enter the country) is four and a half hours of my life that I’ll never get back, but I do appreciate that those who don’t work with steam-driven computers may be quicker.