Seven Practical Ways To Use Tech Mindfully
October 26, 2026 · 33 min
Podcast episode
Darkness Retreat Basics
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Mindfulness Exercises Podcast
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About this episode
Darkness changes what the mind does. When the lights go out and the usual distractions fall away, attention turns loud and insistent. Scott Berman, founder of Sky Cave Retreats, spends days in complete darkness inside earth-sheltered cabins in southern Oregon, places built to be fully blacked out and almost totally soundproof. The solitude that results can feel nurturing, confronting, or both at once.
Berman declines to present darkness retreats as a heroic endurance test or a guaranteed healing experience. His attention goes to the quality of the container: how a retreat is framed, how safety is supported, and how much permission people have to be exactly as they are. Losing the normal cues of time and place can be disorienting even when a person is physically safe, and Berman describes how the autonomic nervous system can read being alone in the dark as a survival threat.
Fear, sadness, anger, and restlessness get normalized here rather than transcended. Berman also names a quieter force at work — belonging often feels more urgent than authenticity, which leads people to hide the parts of an experience that do not fit the story they expected to tell.
Key takeaways
- The quality of the container shapes a darkness retreat more than any claim of healing.
- Losing normal cues of time and place can feel unsettling even in physical safety.
- The autonomic nervous system can read darkness and solitude as a survival threat.
- Naming fear, sadness, and restlessness tends to help more than trying to rise above them.
- The pull toward belonging can quietly override the willingness to be authentic.
Reflection questions
- What usually fills the space that silence and darkness would otherwise open?
- Where does the wish to do a practice correctly keep certain feelings hidden from view?
- What would permission to be exactly as you are change about how you meet discomfort?
- When does belonging feel more urgent than telling the truth about your experience?
- What might integration look like in the ordinary days after a period of intense stillness?
Show notes
Turn off the lights and the mind gets loud fast. Sean Fargo sits down with Scott Berman, founder of Sky Cave Retreats, to explore what happens when you spend days in complete darkness with no phone, no screens, no books, and none of the usual ways we keep ourselves busy. Sky Cave’s earth-sheltered cabins in southern Oregon are built to be fully blacked out and almost totally soundproof, creating a rare form of solitude that can feel nurturing, confronting, or both.
Scott shares why he does not frame darkness retreats as a heroic endurance test or a guaranteed “healing experience.” Instead, he focuses on the quality of the container: how the retreat is presented, how safety is supported, and how much permission people have to be exactly as they are. We dig into disorientation and why losing normal time and place cues can be unsettling, even when you are physically safe. Scott also breaks down how the autonomic nervous system can interpret being alone in the dark as a survival threat, and why normalizing fear, sadness, anger, or restlessness can be more helpful than trying to transcend them.
We also explore a subtle but powerful idea: belonging often feels more urgent than authenticity. When we expect to do a retreat “the right way,” we can unconsciously hide the parts of our experience that do not match the story. This conversation is for anyone curious about darkness retreats, sensory deprivation, mindfulness practice, somatic awareness, nervous system regulation, and what real integration can look like after intense stillness.
If this resonates, subscribe to the podcast, share it with a friend who’s retreat-curious, and leave a review so more people can find these conversations.
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