Going on a Retreat Alone: What Actually Happens on a Solo Retreat

Almost every retreat we run, there's a moment in the first hour where I can spot the people who've come on their own. They arrive a little quieter. They hover near their bags a beat longer than everyone else. They keep their coat on, even indoors, as if it might still be an option to leave.

By day two, you can't tell who came alone and who came with a friend. Something shifts. And it's worth saying clearly, because I think it stops a lot of people from ever booking a solo retreat: going alone is not the hard version of the experience. For most people, it turns out to be the better one.

Why People Hesitate Before Booking a Yoga Retreat Alone

The question I get most often, from people who are clearly interested but haven't booked yet, isn't about the yoga or the walking. It's some version of: will I be the only one who's come alone?

The honest answer is no — on most of our retreats, solo guests are the majority, not the exception. People come off the back of a divorce, a bereavement, a burnout, a big birthday, or just a quiet sense that they need a few days that belong entirely to them. Coming with a partner or a friend is lovely, but it's not the norm you might be picturing.

The deeper hesitation, I think, isn't really about being the only one. It's about spending several days with strangers, with nowhere to hide, and no one to retreat into a private joke with when it gets a bit much. That's a real thing to feel nervous about. I'd feel it too.

What Actually Happens on a Solo Yoga Retreat

What tends to happen is that the absence of a familiar person is exactly what allows something else to happen faster. When you come with someone you already know, you default to them — you sit together at meals, you process the walk together, you have your two-person unit and you don't especially need anyone else. There's nothing wrong with that. But it does mean the wider group takes longer to become a group.

Come alone, and there's no default. You sit where there's space. You end up next to someone at breakfast on day one who, by day three, you're having one of those conversations you don't usually get to have — the kind that skips the small talk because you both know you're only here for a few days and there's no reason to waste them.

I've watched this happen at nearly every retreat we've run since 2017. The walking helps enormously — there's something about moving through a landscape side by side, rather than facing each other across a table, that makes people talk more honestly, and worry less about silences. Nobody's performing. You're just two people looking at the same hills.

Why Travelling to a Retreat Alone Is Genuinely Easier in Some Ways

There's also a simpler, less romantic reason solo works well: nobody's watching your process.

If you want to skip the second yoga session and sit by the window instead, you can, without a conversation about it. If today's walk brings something up and you want to be quiet at lunch, that's fine — nobody who knows you well is sitting across from you clocking it. You get to have whatever experience you're actually having, rather than the one that's convenient to explain to a companion afterwards.

A few things that tend to surprise first-time solo guests:

• You will not be seated alone at meals unless you want to be. Someone will ask if the chair next to them is free.

• Evenings are unstructured on purpose — there's no pressure to perform sociability, but people usually drift into the same room anyway.

• The friendships that form are often more direct than the ones you make at home, simply because everyone's there for similar reasons and nobody's pretending otherwise.

Still Deciding Whether to Book a Solo Retreat?

If you're weighing this up, the question worth asking yourself isn't "will I be okay on my own?" — you almost certainly will be. It's closer to: what am I actually hoping a few days away might give me, and would that be easier or harder to get to with someone else's needs to manage alongside my own?

For most people who've asked me that question honestly, the answer points toward going alone.

We'd love to have you — whichever way you decide to come.