Nyepi - The Day of Silence + The Balinese New Year

I'm sitting here — in this beautiful room on this magnificent property — honoring the islandwide day of total silence. Stillness. Quiet reflection observed by over 4 million people. 

It is a rare, breathtaking moment of total alignment. While Nyepi is a Hindu holy day, its observance transcends religion here; the island’s non-Hindu residents and travelers alike—nearly 15% of the population—willingly step into the stillness together. As a collective. There is no debate, no "opt-out," and no friction. Even the most bustling tourist hubs surrender to the mandate of silence, proving that when a culture prioritizes the spirit, everyone finds a way to get on the same page.

Chantress Seba is playing quietly in the background as I type this.

No scooters drumming. No movement on the property. Just stillness. Peace.

There's an occasional dog barking in the distance.

A baby crying before being consoled by a family member.

The crickets are singing their nightly song, creating a magical symphony on a particularly quiet night. It reminds me of my babies' sound machine.

The frogs are croaking just outside in their natural habitat of tropical foliage.

I've never experienced anything like this.

I've never known that a people could come together in humble and dutiful observance of a day where no one works. Businesses are closed. Even the airport. Everyone stays inside. Lights dimmed at night. No fire. No TV. Everyone goes within — through meditation, through reflection on the year they've left behind and the new year that has finally arrived.

24 hours ahead of the Spring Equinox.

It's powerful beyond words.

I was going to be in Thailand around this time. But there was political tension between Thailand and Cambodia that compromised my ability to ensure my retreat Queens' safety, so I made an executive decision and cancelled it. That was hard. It was a blessing in disguise, but at the time, I felt terrible. Soon after, the tables turned. My partner mentioned Nyepi — a time in March (my favorite month) that is the most sacred holiday on one of the most spiritually attuned islands in the world. It was a no-brainer.

So I built an entire retreat around this day.

To offer my Queens — all Black women, but diverse in their backgrounds, their careers, their responsibilities — a sacred opportunity to do absolutely nothing. And after all of the wellness workshops for their spirits, the cultural experiences for their minds, the tours, and the fun, today our group chat has been quiet. Our joyful, daily banter has ceased for 24 hours. I'm proud of them for leaning into this, however uncomfortable it may be.

Because that's it.

For all of us — who are constantly pouring, constantly giving and offering our time, space and physical access — silence can be hard. We come from a world where stillness equates to laziness. Productivity is glorified because it means you're being contributive. Not to ourselves but to everyone else. Our bosses, our partners, spouses, children, friends and family. And then there's nothing left for ourselves. Except fatigue, burnout and an undeniable lack of reciprocity. I hate that for us. I hate that the American system destroys our nervous systems by neglecting the importance — the necessity — for stillness and quiet reflection. We often have to request a "mental health day" and get it approved by someone who could care less about our mental health, just to settle into stillness. And even then, our minds are still swirling about all the things that still need to be done. Because there's always something that needs to be done. People who still need tending to.

I think about COVID.

When we were all asked to stay indoors during the worldwide shutdown, people were upset. Angry. Furious. And because we are protected by our First Amendment right, we protested. We fought the regulations. We went outside — risking our lives, risking our safety, and subsequently compromising the lives of those who obeyed — just because we don't like being told what to do.

And perhaps Americans' inability to adhere to those rules during a nationwide pandemic was rooted in something much deeper than simple defiance. For the African-American collective, a state-mandated order to "stay put" isn't just a suggestion. It was a trigger. It was a cellular memory of being told where we could stand, where we could sit, and when we could move, usually at the cost of our own agency. I reflect briefly on America's history of imposing certain mandates on specific groups of people — not to keep people safe, but to keep people apart. To push certain agendas at the cost of others' livelihoods.

I consider the decades of Jim Crow, where similar "distancing" mandates limited Black people's access to basic necessities. Though Jim Crow ended many years ago, we can still feel the same injustices and inequities that plague the very nation we built. And in being so deeply controlled, manipulated and ostracized merely because of the skin of our containers, our spirit remembers — and intuitively resists.

This isn't to say that Black people didn't adhere to — or even enjoy, to an extent — the "stay indoors" mandate. It's just something I've noticed: that layers of social, cultural and racial trauma can live in the body and cause us to resist the very thing our spirit sometimes craves. 

A frog is croaking outside.

And I'm thankful for the reminder to come back to my body. 

A reminder that I'm grateful.

Grateful to be on the other side of the world from my home country — divided in our sentiments about the ongoing issues in Iran, divided in politics, in spiritual and religious beliefs, divided in race, in community. The list goes on.

But not here. Not in Bali.

Everyone is on the same page.

Everyone is in observance of the necessity for a spiritual reset.

I think about what this day would have looked like if I had stayed home — with my husband and my two angels. There wouldn't have been silence. Anything but. A small villa with two toddlers? No fucking way. There wouldn't have been rest. And this reflection may not have been possible, not in the moment at least.

I'm glad that Spirit aligned my path to experience this alone.

And as a wife and mother, I recognize that's a brave statement.

A brave sentiment. But it wasn't always like this.

I remember when silence was deafening. My body remembers when I resisted stillness by any means necessary — because the internal spiral of my twenty-something year old mind was reckless and wreaking havoc on my body. It was so bad that my hair fell out. My immune system started destroying itself because I wasn't there to nourish it. I was outside, in every sense of the word. I drank. I partied. I smoked my worries away. Slept. Worked. And did it all over again.

I matured over the years — that's for sure. But silence didn't become comfortable until I was forced into it a decade ago, after finally walking away from both my ex and my mother at the same time. That time was rough. In the months leading up to meeting CB, I couldn't run from silence anymore. Rather, it became a powerful tool — a chance to sit with the things I'd been running from for too long. It gave me a chance to do Shadow Work, to hold myself accountable for the role I was playing in my own suffering. It offered me grace — not over anyone else, but over myself. Forgiveness. Love. A quiet chance to pour into the cracks of my broken heart in a radical act of healing and self-preservation. Sure, I resisted it at first. It was a habit that had allowed me to survive. But when it was time to bloom, to blossom and create space for the things my soul craved, silence was no longer something I could run from. It was something I had to welcome and embrace.

And when I did, everything shifted. Everything transformed.

That's why I welcomed this group here — my most intimate container. There were originally 15 ladies confirmed for the trip, but with the geopolitical issues, there are now only 9. My Divine 9. And they're leaning in. They're doing the work. They're opening their hands, hearts and minds to the magic of slowing down, of limiting access to honor their own essence. They spent the days ahead of Nyepi deepening their knowledge and understanding of Bali's rich culture — and it was perfect preparation for today.

I'm proud of them.

And I'm proud of myself. Because ordinarily, I wouldn't have been here.

I would have chosen my family over my own needs.

I would have prioritized them over me — a practice learned by the generations of women who came before me.

But it stops with me.

And as is written in the very name of this experience — Let Everything Align Perfectly — that's precisely what is happening. For me and my retreat Queens.

So Spirit, I thank you. 

Bali, I thank you.

Happy Nyepi, everyone.

With love, 

A well-rested, Black woman