Why exhausted young people pay to lock phones away

HostIt feels like our phones have become a part of our bodies. We wake up with them, we eat with them, and most of us probably feel a bit of panic if we realize we left the house without one. But lately, a lot of people are actually paying good money to go to places where they're forced to give them up. Cleo, why are these silent monastery retreats suddenly so popular with people who usually spend all day online?

GuestIt's all about the wall. Most of us feel like we should be able to just put the phone down, but the truth is that our brains aren't really built to fight back against the way these apps are made. These retreats are growing because they offer a way to get out of that fight. You travel to a place like a quiet monastery in the mountains, and the first thing you do is hand over your phone. They often put it in a locked bag or a wooden box. Some places even have a ceremony for it. You're paying for someone else to be the boss of your time because you have run out of the strength to do it yourself. It sounds a bit extreme, but for a lot of young people who feel burned out, that lock on the box is the only way they can finally breathe.

HostBut I can just turn my phone off right now for free. Is there really a big difference between doing that and going to a monastery?

GuestThere's a huge difference in how your brain handles it. When your phone is in your pocket, even if it's off, your brain is still doing work. It's thinking about the messages you might be getting or the news you're missing. It takes a lot of mental energy to keep yourself from reaching for it. Hmm, it's kind of like trying to ignore a bowl of candy on your desk while you're on a diet. You might not eat it, but you're thinking about it all day. In a monastery, the candy isn't just in another room, it's in a different building. Once the choice is gone, your brain stops looking for the reward. You start to feel this shift where you're not just sitting in silence, you're actually present in the room. You notice the way the light hits the floor or the sound of the wind. Those small things usually get drowned out by the noise on our screens.

HostSo it's not just about the screen being gone. It's about the specific kind of quiet you find in a place like that.

GuestRight, and it's also about the rules. In these monasteries, there's often a schedule that has been the same for hundreds of years. You wake up when the bell rings, you eat in silence, and you might spend hours just walking or sitting. For someone who's used to checking their email every five minutes, this is a total shock to the system. At first, it can actually feel pretty bad. People talk about feeling itchy or anxious for the first day or two. They call it a detox because it really is like a drug leaving your body. But after that phase passes, something else happens. You start to get your own thoughts back. You're not just reacting to what some app wants you to see. You're actually following a thought from the start all the way to the end. That's a rare thing for most people today.

HostI wonder if this is just a luxury for people who can afford to disappear for a week. Does it actually change anything once they go back to their normal, loud lives?

GuestThat's the big test. Many people find that once they have felt what real silence is like, they can't go back to how they were living before. They might start setting strict rules, like leaving the phone in a different room at night or having a no screen day once a week. The monastery acts like a reset button. It proves to you that you can survive without knowing what's happening on the internet for a few days. And for some, the draw isn't even about the phone. It's about the silence itself. We live in a world that's always asking for our attention. Every sign, every noise, every ping is a demand. In a silent retreat, no one is asking you for anything. You don't have to be smart, or funny, or fast. You just have to be there. For a generation that has been told they have to be on all the time, that's a massive relief.

HostIt sounds like we're losing the ability to just be bored, and we're starting to realize how much we need it.

GuestBeing bored is actually where the best parts of our brain come alive. When we're not busy taking in new stuff, our minds start to put things together in new ways. We solve problems we didn't even know we had. But we have filled every gap in our day with scrolling. Waiting for the bus, standing in line for coffee, even the few seconds it takes for a door to open. We never let our minds just wander anymore. These retreats are like a gym for that skill. You're training yourself to be okay with nothing happening. Some of these places in Korea and Europe are booked out for months because the demand is so high. People are realizing that silence is becoming one of the most expensive and rare things in the world.

HostThe big question now is whether we can learn to find that same quiet in a city full of noise or if we'll always have to pay someone to lock us in a room to get it.

HostThe phone in my pocket usually feels as natural as my own skin, but the thought of locking it in a wooden box makes me wonder what I'm actually missing while I'm busy looking at it.