The principle of the digital detox? It’s about taking a digital break: a stay in nature or in the city, where, in exchange for your smartphones and other connected gadgets, you’re offered meditation, massages, board games, and walks.
5 Digital Detox Getaways in France or Abroad
The concept is very trendy in the United States where digital detox retreats – the digital detox retreats – are all the rage, especially in Silicon Valley, the cradle of ultra-connected startups.
And you’re starting to find in France travel professionals offering unplugged getaways.
Château La Gravière: A Wellness Inn with an Oenology Program
For a three-day stay, the hosts hand you a Digital Detox Kit with postcards, paper and pencil, an alarm clock, board games… They offer, in addition to the site’s traditional activities (oenology, massage, pool…), coaching sessions to help you sustainably detox from new technologies.
Relax Océane: Yoga and Meditation in Brittany
Digital detox stays are offered in Brittany, with activities such as yoga, meditation, and hiking, by the sea and in remote spots across Brittany. Providers also offer digital detox programs for businesses.
Spa Hôtel Vichy Célestins: A Luxury Thermal Spa Retreat
The hotel offers a three-day package to learn to temporarily disconnect to prevent work burnout.
Beyond the traditional spa activities, a dedicated program is offered with psycho-behavioral coaching and stress-relieving massages.
Westin Dublin: Irish Walks
The luxury hotel offers a digital detox stay with a detox survival kit: a plan to explore Dublin, a journal, a candle, and a tree-planting kit, plus a safe to hide your connected devices.
Bravofly in Malaga: Discovering the City and Wellness
Some savvy travel agencies also offer their own digital detox deals: to persuade you to ditch your pesky devices, guests receive access to the spa, a massage, a romantic dinner, and an excursion… in exchange for their smartphones and tablets.
How to Take a Digital Break?
These offers are a new way to reach city dwellers craving nature and well-being. Sometimes a bit gadget-y, they can suit people who want some support during their stay, without the temptation to “re plunge” into technology during their vacation.
However, you can plan your own digital detox program alone or with family:
- Surround yourself with: friends, family, board games, magazines, books (non-digital!)…
- Leave an out-of-office message on your email and social networks before you go;
- Do yourself some good: hikes, massages, spa… You quickly realize the futility of our screens and you (re)discover the pleasures of “IRL” (in real life).
- Plan your visits with a paper guide (Routard, Michelin…) without needing to refer to 55 online reviews to choose a restaurant or a museum.
- Radical, but effective: head to a remote countryside location where there’s no Internet connection.
Beyond the simple digital pause, it’s about learning to better manage our relationship with the digital world and social networks in daily life. When we’re hyper-connected, we feel we exist through interactions with our virtual “friends” or colleagues. Yet the relationships formed remain superficial, and a digital detox stay helps to disconnect to reconnect with the people around us and with others.
The psychologist Serge Tisseron analyzes this trend(1) and emphasizes the necessary change in everyday practices, together. “The solution to these excessive practices is not individual, but collective. And the first group involved is obviously the family. It starts with taking the evening meal without television or mobile phone, or by deciding to turn off the family Wi‑Fi in the evening at a certain hour.”
Thus, to avoid radical and infantilizing decisions like smartphones being “confiscated” during vacations, digital breaks are simpler and more effective when taken daily, and in common practice.
You can tuck this friendly little workbook into your suitcase to help you unplug from your screens.
by Isabelle Fontaine
Unplugging is possible! With this playful and practical notebook, you’ll get personalized coaching to lift your eyes from the screens and free yourself from the stress of hyperconnectivity.
To be discovered on Cultura.com
- https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/serge-tisseron/detox-numerique-halte-intox_b_5616246.html
