The curvy white-knuckle drive deep into Malibu Canyon had me on edge. Surely, I had already passed the retreat that was supposed to bring me inner peace as I cringed through another blind curve precariously close to a cliff. I was taking a trek into the middle of nowhere to Aja Malibu—a seven-day rebalancing and detoxing garden oasis to disconnect, but the harrowing drive wasn’t the only thing that had me worried.
As a busy travel and food writer, my idea of detoxing had been walking to my neighborhood Whole Foods in Brentwood to buy pre-packaged sushi and wine (organic, of course), then play a stream of Bravo reality shows (like background music) from my sofa while I wrote. I am always “connected” and always working—most of it requiring nights out at rich multicourse dinners with wine pairings while I chronicle it all on various social media apps on my phone. But now I was about to face the ultimate modern-day challenge: to truly disconnect for seven days, so I could reconnect as enlightened, balanced soul and, hopefully, as a thinner, calmer and more spiritual version of my former self.
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