I need the secular equivalent of a monastery or something, where you go and you meditate and write and do some chores, and they feed you and give you a spot to sleep. The problem is of course, if you're not doing it for the glory of some god, funding becomes an immediate issue.
A vow of mostly silence wouldn't hurt either.
Thinking and writing and looking at stuff. That's when I'm happiest.
Buddhist retreats aren't exactly nonreligious. But I found the three-day silent retreat I did at Cloud Mountain amazingly useful.
I've always wanted to go to Hedgebrook.
Then again-- "In exchange for room and board, each resident is asked to be the best writer she can be while she is with us." If by some bizarre chance I got in, I would probably go out of my gourd trying to be the best writer I could be.
This is probably a dumb question, but what's the necessary difference between life now and a secular monastery? Is it the silence? Or being expected to write and meditate? Being part of a community devoted to meditating and writing? Do you need time? Or a firm schedule? Or is it something else?
I'm leaning on the traditional notion where the organization sees after basic life and shelter needs, thus freeing me from having to have a job. I would expect to be expected to help maintain the infrastructure by doing chores of one sort or another, but not for 1/3rd of each day, half my waking life. In a religious setting, this works because of donations and how it's all for the higher glory. Without a higher glory, though, I'm suddenly back to "you can't eat a glide" (which in spite of all the ascension and allegory was the only thing I took away from Jonathan Livingston Seagull when I read it as a child: his father's ultra-practical chastisement).
Dionysus has my heart, but Apollo has my pocketbook, apparently.
Funny this comes up, btw; I've been keeping the Hermit card in mind lately.
Does anyone still live in communes? I've always wanted to live on one and card wool or something.