The White Lotus and the art of letting go
My verdict on Series 3, announcement on a speaking event, and the all-female space flight
Warning: This contains spoilers of season 3 of The White Lotus.
Well I finally got around to watching the finale of White Lotus. And… what a let down that was. Seven episodes of illusion, a lot of atmosphere and not a lot of action (minus the weird incest sex scene) until the eighth and final episode.
Sure, we got the dead bodies, as is customary in each season. But it ended not so much with a bang than a whimper.
Anyway, I don’t wish to dissect the entire series. But one thing I took away from White Lotus was the theme of letting go.
Ratliff family patriarch Timothy (played by the handsome Jason Isaacs) is agonising over how to tell his wife and children that he is being investigated and faces financial ruin. No more luxury retreats for them in the future!
After planning a deranged murder-suicide plan, backing out at the last minute, and then almost killing his youngest son thanks to his utter carelessness, Timothy eventually learns to let go of his status and everyone else’s expectations. He realises that having his family safe and sound is more important than anything else. Even having a vast fortune.
His eldest son Saxon (Patrick Schwarzenegger) lets go of his arrogant playboy persona — spurred on in part by Chelsea who calls him soulless — and is now trying to find meaning in life.
As for Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood), perhaps she should have let go of the one-sided relationship with her older and irritable boyfriend Rick — he of the reclining hairline. Had he got over his childhood anger and grief, they wouldn’t have been killed in a shootout.
Before the tragedy, Chelsea tells him over breakfast: “Stop worrying about the love you didn’t get, think about the love you have now. I love you. It’s right here.”
That, ladies and gentlemen, has to be the wisest thing said in the whole series.
Letting go is not easy, especially if you’re a perfectionist like I am. It’s only recently that I’ve realised striving for perfection only gets in the way of being good — or good enough.
“Perfectionism stays alive when you look for other people to give you worth, relying on their opinions to give you a sense of your value,” says psychotherapist and professor Dr. Ilene Strauss Cohen. But a real sense of worth doesn’t come from others, it can only come from ourselves.
Which is why I embarked on my own White Lotus-style retreat in Thailand last month.
Whether it’s in the form of silent retreats, physically demanding boot camps, or digital detoxes, wellness tourism is booming.
According to Virtuose, a luxury travel network, 59 percent of travellers are in the market for a wellness retreat, leading to the industry being valued at a whopping $180.5 billion in 2022.
My adventure in Phuket started in March when I joined seven other open-minded women (strangers then, friends now) between the ages of 37 and 53 at Stay Wellbeing & Lifestyle Resort in southern Phuket. It was organised by Urvashi Lad, or Ush, whom I met through a friend.
(I promise she’s not asked me to promote her business! BUT… if you’re curious about her work you can find more information here)
With views of the mountains on the horizon and the palm tree leaves swaying in the gentle breeze, the retreat immediately made me feel at ease. Our schedule was well-organised with a lot of activities, but left plenty of room for personal reflection and connections.
There were no poisoned piña coladas, nor any crazy shootouts like in White Lotus. Instead, the trip was one of many firsts: sweating bucket loads in a gruelling Muay Thai session; starting the morning with Vinyasa yoga; feeding and bathing elephants; a sunrise hike to the Big Buddha statue; going for a dip in the middle of Andaman Sea, even though I can’t bloody swim! Okay I was wearing a life jacket, BUT STILL! It was a huge achievement for someone who is extremely nervous around water.
I got massaged almost every day — they were so cheap it would have been rude not to. With each massage I felt the knots being pressed and kneaded out of my body, particularly my neck and shoulders, probably related to all that desk work.
Throughout the week we gathered for regular meditation circles for a bit of self-reflection and shared how we were feeling.
Now I’m normally sceptical about what some (okay, me) would dub ‘woo woo’ science. But wellness activities apparently improve your physical health.
Research published in the American Journal of Cardiology revealed that people who meditated had lower rates of high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, stroke, and coronary artery disease than those who did not.
As for those who suffer from anxiety, just eight weeks of meditation helped reduce symptoms, increase positive self-statements and improve coping with stress.
I’ve tried meditating in the past, but I’m a chronic overthinker and my mind is constantly racing with thoughts. By the final meditation session I made a bit of a breakthrough; I almost fell asleep! Maybe this meditation malarky actually works after all...
We were also asked to pick tarot cards after coming up with a question that we wanted the universe to answer. Again, I’m really sceptical of such things. Yet I noticed that each time I picked the cards, they had one theme. And that was about letting go of anything that was bringing me down, how I needed to stop complaining and stop putting energy into things that were draining me.
One card was titled ‘Forgiveness’. Not just forgiving others but myself, and to “let go of any guilt you are holding on to regarding past mistakes… give yourself credit for having tried your best even if the results weren’t what you would have liked.”
And that really hit me.
Part of the reason why I went was because I’d just been made redundant. I’d gone from working full-time and having my days mapped out, to losing a steady income and not sure what I’d be doing the following week.
I was ruminating over a breakup that I kept telling myself that I should be over.
I kept comparing myself to all those wonderful women in the group and how they seemed to have their shit together.
But it’s never that straightforward. As each of them took turns in sharing their thoughts with the group, I realised that everyone was going through one thing or another.
Someone else had been made redundant and is now navigating the path of self-employment.
Another was dipping her toes in the dating world now that she is separated from her husband.
Others spoke about how they’d been taken for granted as wives and mothers for years, and learning to not feel guilty for putting themselves first for a change.
Part of the allure of these retreats is in finding a tribe, finding that connection, crucial now with more of us living atomised lives and feeling lonely.
And in Phuket, I found a community in the form of seven wonderful women who have my back.
So did my time in Thailand make a difference?
Like Rick in White Lotus, I’d kept focusing on what I didn’t have and who didn’t value me — which made me feel really resentful a lot of the time — instead of focusing on what I did have, and the people who DO give me lots of love and attention.
I’d let go of the shame I was feeling in being made redundant, as though I’d done something wrong, like I’d failed in life.
I’m ruminating less. Who cares what I could have/should have done or said in the past? What’s done is done and it’s because greater things are coming my way.
I’m sleeping way better than before. According to my Fitbit, I’m getting at least eight hours each night, which is remarkable for me.
Vinyasa/flow yoga is great for helping to quieten a racing mind. Believe me. Your ex/ shitty manager/bratty children (or whatever it is that’s bothering you) are the last things you want to be distracted by when you need to get into the warrior pose or downward facing dog, otherwise you’ll fall flat on your face! It’s certainly something I will look into doing regularly.
My 10 days in Thailand made me realise that I want to travel a bit more, and I want to do it while I have the time and money to do so.
As for what my future holds, my perfectionist self is trying not to dwell too much on what will or won’t happen.
As Doris Day once sang: “Que Sera, Sera. Whatever will be, will be.”
What a load of bakwas!
Is this the most pointless and self-indulgent trip into space?
Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket made a suborbital flight to the edge of space and back. Not something I’d normally pay any attention to but this was particularly noteworthy as the rocket took off with all-female passengers.
Singer Katy Perry blasted off to the edge of space alongside Lauren Sanchez, the soon-to-be-wife of Blue Origin owner and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, journalist and TV presenter Gayle King, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, former rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, and filmmaker Kerianne Flynn.
Only two of them had anything to do with astronauting, and one of them certainly wasn’t Katy Perry.
When asked about her transformative, 11-minute trip, Sanchez said: “I can’t put it into words but I looked out the window and we got to see the moon.” Insightful.
Perry, meanwhile, gushed that she “hopes her journey encourages her daughter and others to reach for the stars, literally and figuratively”.
Erm, Earth calling to Katy — what a load of bakwas! Rich people going on a jolly to outer space is hardly inspiring. And a bunch of women doing it doesn’t make it more “feminist”.
The only message this sends to women everywhere is that you can do whatever you like, even fly out to space — so long as you’re a millionaire. A giant leap for feminism this was not.
Behold! I’m speaking
How can we address the very real challenge of rising anti-Muslim bigotry alongside concerns over segregation and extremism?
That's one of the themes that will be addressed at a talk organised by the Equinao Project next week.
Islam, Muslims, and Liberal Democracies will explore identity and integration, and yours truly is speaking on the panel alongside some fantastic voices on this subject: Oberver columnist Kenan Malik, renowned theologian Dr Timothy Winter (Abdul Hakim Murad), and Turkish writer and author Mustafa Akyol.
Hope to see as many of you there!