Sleep is so hot right now. Not a day goes by in which I don’t scroll through a clip of a Silicon Valley visionary or bio-hacking influencer dishing up the earnest life advice to, you know, go to sleep. It’s a performance enhancer, a creative stimulant, the difference between a mindful executive and a lazy dingbat.
There’s something distinctly “now” in taking a blatantly obvious idea and marketing it as a groundbreaking innovation. But—being perpetually sleep-deprived—I am here for it. A full eight hours? Take my money.
That’s how I found myself swinging blindly from a suspended cocoon while someone below scratched my back. SWAY therapy at Conrad Bali is one of the new personal-growth and enrichment treatments the Nusa Dua beachfront hotel debuted last year as part of their relaunched JIWA wellness programme. It’s a 60-minute treatment that promises a deeper, more restful night’s sleep by making you feel like you are back in the womb. One of my therapists told me the goal wasn’t necessarily to fall asleep, just to relax.
We started with a 10-minute meditation led by the resort’s healer. Then, I wiggled my way inside the hammock with the help of my two female therapists and was quickly enveloped into the cocoon under a weighted blanket. They covered my eyes with an eye pillow and placed noise-cancelling headphones on my head.
As one woman gently swung the hammock, the other crawled below the suspended swaddle and performed what they called a tension-dissolving acupressure massage, but what really felt like your mother gently gliding her fingers across your back to lull you to sleep.
I was relaxed, no doubt, but also so hyper-aware of how strange the situation was that I didn’t immediately drift off. But when I finally did… there was drool and snoring (sorry, ladies).
Sooner than I expected, it was over, and I was a little confused. All of that for a little nap? I headed back to my room and scrolled on my phone a bit before passing out.
When I woke up the next morning, I had no clue where I was—the best indicator for a deep, deep rest. I slept like I was dead and was almost too late for breakfast. I’d just had the longest sleep I’d had in years. It used to be that sleeping was the most boring thing you could do while on vacation but, trust me, Bali hits different when you’re running on a full eight hours.
hilton.com; SWAY treatment starting at Rp1,500,000.
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