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Aflame: Learning from Silence
From the bestselling author of The Art of Stillness, a revelatory exploration of the abiding clarity and calm to be found in quiet retreat
Pico Iyer has made more than one hundred retreats over the past three decades to a small Benedictine hermitage high above the sea in Big Sur, California. He’s not a Christian—or a member of any religious group—but his life has been transformed by these periods of time spent in silence. That silence reminds him of what is essential and awakens a joy that nothing can efface. It’s not just freedom from distraction and noise and it’s a reminder of some deeper truths he misplaced along the way.
In Aflame, Iyer connects with inner stillness and joy in his many seasons at the monastery, even as his life is going through constant a house burns down, a parent dies, a daughter is diagnosed with cancer. He shares the revelations he experiences, alongside wisdom from other nonmonastics who have learned from adversity and inwardness. And most profoundly, he shows how solitude can be a training in community and companionship. In so doing, he offers a unique outsider’s view of monastic life—and of a group of selfless souls who have dedicated their days to ensuring there’s a space for quiet and recollection that’s open to us all.
Radiant, intimate, and gripping, Aflame offers ageless counsel about the power of silence and what it can teach us about how to live, how to love, and, ultimately, how to die.
Pico Iyer has made more than one hundred retreats over the past three decades to a small Benedictine hermitage high above the sea in Big Sur, California. He’s not a Christian—or a member of any religious group—but his life has been transformed by these periods of time spent in silence. That silence reminds him of what is essential and awakens a joy that nothing can efface. It’s not just freedom from distraction and noise and it’s a reminder of some deeper truths he misplaced along the way.
In Aflame, Iyer connects with inner stillness and joy in his many seasons at the monastery, even as his life is going through constant a house burns down, a parent dies, a daughter is diagnosed with cancer. He shares the revelations he experiences, alongside wisdom from other nonmonastics who have learned from adversity and inwardness. And most profoundly, he shows how solitude can be a training in community and companionship. In so doing, he offers a unique outsider’s view of monastic life—and of a group of selfless souls who have dedicated their days to ensuring there’s a space for quiet and recollection that’s open to us all.
Radiant, intimate, and gripping, Aflame offers ageless counsel about the power of silence and what it can teach us about how to live, how to love, and, ultimately, how to die.
234 pages, Kindle Edition
Published January 14, 2025
191 people are currently reading
1,774 people want to read
About the author
Pico Iyer
116books1,048followersPico Iyer is a British-born essayist and novelist of Indian descent. As an acclaimed travel writer, he began his career documenting a neglected aspect of travel -- the sometimes surreal disconnect between local tradition and imported global pop culture. Since then, he has written ten books, exploring also the cultural consequences of isolation, whether writing about the exiled spiritual leaders of Tibet or the embargoed society of Cuba.
Iyer’s latest focus is on yet another overlooked aspect of travel: how can it help us regain our sense of stillness and focus in a world where our devices and digital networks increasing distract us? As he says: "Almost everybody I know has this sense of overdosing on information and getting dizzy living at post-human speeds. Nearly everybody I know does something to try to remove herself to clear her head and to have enough time and space to think. ... All of us instinctively feel that something inside us is crying out for more spaciousness and stillness to offset the exhilarations of this movement and the fun and diversion of the modern world."
Iyer’s latest focus is on yet another overlooked aspect of travel: how can it help us regain our sense of stillness and focus in a world where our devices and digital networks increasing distract us? As he says: "Almost everybody I know has this sense of overdosing on information and getting dizzy living at post-human speeds. Nearly everybody I know does something to try to remove herself to clear her head and to have enough time and space to think. ... All of us instinctively feel that something inside us is crying out for more spaciousness and stillness to offset the exhilarations of this movement and the fun and diversion of the modern world."
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February 7, 2025I’ve read quite a bit of the book slowly, devouring it as fast as I could and as slow as I want to, which is to say–I read the book’s first sixty pages in the coffeeshop inside Bookpeople in Austin for three hours, buying more books, walking around, and writing descriptive notes.
I was touched by it. Moved. I was intrigued at first. I first read of Pico Iyer in some sort of travel writing compilation, and ever since then, the name–how iconic!---Pico Iyer just got stamped in my brain. It’s a funny name. Memorable.
The elevator pitch of this book is that it’s about this guy who goes to live with monks even though he’s not really Buddhist to be silent for days and weeks. He then narrates what it was like and what he has learned about the world, and silence, and being still. Another layer of it was that his house burned down–as per the title–and he realized what material things are worth–which is nonconsequential.
I think in the beginning I was enchanted by the idea of it–you know, living with monks, silently. I have always wanted to live in the forest by myself for a long period of time just to write and read. By the time I get home, and have only limited time to myself and no time to wander, reading the book became laborious to me. Everything felt slow and redundant. I’ve just been longing for it to finish with 60 more pages to go. I was reading it side by side with Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family which is a beautiful memoir of his visits in Sri Lanka in the 1970s and the stark contrast is palpable to me. Ondaatje wrote so many moments where I felt a sense of the world, and by that I meant, I’ve had a lot about insights about my life while Pico Iyer is forcing them to you.
Okay, I figured out the words, I was worried I won’t be able to articulate this but here we go: Ondaatje’s ability to make you think and give insights is in his very skillful “show, don’t tell� writing style while Pico Iyer is more “tell, don’t show�--this is what I’ve learned so take it, here are some cute little anecdotes about silence, here are some random quotes about it, here are some characters that I found. I wish it was a little more subtle.
A lot of things are a product of experience and context. Where I am, how I am each day, what happened before and after the reading experience, what have I been thinking about recently, what media have I been consuming, affect my reading experience. Unfortunately, towards the end of the book, it just felt like meh to me. The thing is I really liked the book, I loved it but I felt a tinge of gladness when I realized I had only ten more pages of the book. So yeah, I don’t think I was the right audience for it. I do think fans of Paulo Coelho will inhale it. Someone said, ‘unusually slow� and I agree. Story could have been cut down more pages but then again, it’s not really a thick book.
Pick the book up if you need some thoughts on silence. Also, I think he’s cute.
EDIT: I'm surprised it's not as well-read as I thought it should be. Saw this in the New Yorker Briefly Noted page.
I was touched by it. Moved. I was intrigued at first. I first read of Pico Iyer in some sort of travel writing compilation, and ever since then, the name–how iconic!---Pico Iyer just got stamped in my brain. It’s a funny name. Memorable.
The elevator pitch of this book is that it’s about this guy who goes to live with monks even though he’s not really Buddhist to be silent for days and weeks. He then narrates what it was like and what he has learned about the world, and silence, and being still. Another layer of it was that his house burned down–as per the title–and he realized what material things are worth–which is nonconsequential.
I think in the beginning I was enchanted by the idea of it–you know, living with monks, silently. I have always wanted to live in the forest by myself for a long period of time just to write and read. By the time I get home, and have only limited time to myself and no time to wander, reading the book became laborious to me. Everything felt slow and redundant. I’ve just been longing for it to finish with 60 more pages to go. I was reading it side by side with Michael Ondaatje’s Running in the Family which is a beautiful memoir of his visits in Sri Lanka in the 1970s and the stark contrast is palpable to me. Ondaatje wrote so many moments where I felt a sense of the world, and by that I meant, I’ve had a lot about insights about my life while Pico Iyer is forcing them to you.
Okay, I figured out the words, I was worried I won’t be able to articulate this but here we go: Ondaatje’s ability to make you think and give insights is in his very skillful “show, don’t tell� writing style while Pico Iyer is more “tell, don’t show�--this is what I’ve learned so take it, here are some cute little anecdotes about silence, here are some random quotes about it, here are some characters that I found. I wish it was a little more subtle.
A lot of things are a product of experience and context. Where I am, how I am each day, what happened before and after the reading experience, what have I been thinking about recently, what media have I been consuming, affect my reading experience. Unfortunately, towards the end of the book, it just felt like meh to me. The thing is I really liked the book, I loved it but I felt a tinge of gladness when I realized I had only ten more pages of the book. So yeah, I don’t think I was the right audience for it. I do think fans of Paulo Coelho will inhale it. Someone said, ‘unusually slow� and I agree. Story could have been cut down more pages but then again, it’s not really a thick book.
Pick the book up if you need some thoughts on silence. Also, I think he’s cute.
EDIT: I'm surprised it's not as well-read as I thought it should be. Saw this in the New Yorker Briefly Noted page.
January 19, 2025
Unusually slow, not particularly profound.
“Eat, Pray, Love�-like if it was just “Silent,� with less engagement.
For this book it seems like Pico Iyer is a person in search of pages written with poor editing rather than providing an interesting story or profoundness.
“It’s more, I suppose, that I’m glad to be away from the self I am when other people are around.�
“Father Robert is washing the feet of his brothers, a reminder that he’s as much their servant as they are his.�
“There’s so much silence you can hear the stars move.�
Liked how the author described flowers as blueberry ice cream.
“Eat, Pray, Love�-like if it was just “Silent,� with less engagement.
For this book it seems like Pico Iyer is a person in search of pages written with poor editing rather than providing an interesting story or profoundness.
“It’s more, I suppose, that I’m glad to be away from the self I am when other people are around.�
“Father Robert is washing the feet of his brothers, a reminder that he’s as much their servant as they are his.�
“There’s so much silence you can hear the stars move.�
Liked how the author described flowers as blueberry ice cream.
January 24, 2025
I’m usually interested in what Pico Iyer has to say. Indeed his 2014 book, The Art of Stillness, is among my most treasured. But Aflame often reads like an incoherent jumble of notes, quotes and anecdotes scribbled on scraps of paper and collected in a shopping bag over many years. I suppose they have been organized into Aflame by Iyer, or an editor, with some intention, but I mostly struggled to crack the code.
For the devoted reader there are threads, in particular about fire and about impermanence, but you have to do some of the author's job to spot them and unravel them from what too often seems like nothing more than a patchwork. No doubt there are many profound insights that leap from the pages. Even a few that left me astonished, shaken awaken and feeling a tiny rush of something that reminded me of the sensation that accompanies the opening of a window onto a stuffy room. But there are far too many impenetrable aphorisms with often ephemeral meanings fading to nonsense on deeper reflection. I even found myself tempted, on rare occasions, to compare some particularly pretentious passages to quotes from SNL's Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey. But Iyer is so deeply sincere that it seemed disrespectful and probably this urge was just an indication of my own insecurities and shallow understanding of the big questions all of us have occasion to reflect on. How to prepare for death? What is happiness? Why are we here? What is community? Who are these people? So, I’m left to conclude it’s probably just me. Please don’t dwell on my comments. Have a look at Aflame for yourself, but by all means read the Art of Stillness.
For the devoted reader there are threads, in particular about fire and about impermanence, but you have to do some of the author's job to spot them and unravel them from what too often seems like nothing more than a patchwork. No doubt there are many profound insights that leap from the pages. Even a few that left me astonished, shaken awaken and feeling a tiny rush of something that reminded me of the sensation that accompanies the opening of a window onto a stuffy room. But there are far too many impenetrable aphorisms with often ephemeral meanings fading to nonsense on deeper reflection. I even found myself tempted, on rare occasions, to compare some particularly pretentious passages to quotes from SNL's Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey. But Iyer is so deeply sincere that it seemed disrespectful and probably this urge was just an indication of my own insecurities and shallow understanding of the big questions all of us have occasion to reflect on. How to prepare for death? What is happiness? Why are we here? What is community? Who are these people? So, I’m left to conclude it’s probably just me. Please don’t dwell on my comments. Have a look at Aflame for yourself, but by all means read the Art of Stillness.
February 21, 2025
First time reading Iyer; likely to be my last. Reading writing like this, I always wonder, “How do these people garner such followings? How and why do people put them on such literary or spiritual pedestals?� It is beyond my understanding, as is the point of Mr. Iyer’s book…so disjointed and so non-linear as to leave me flummoxed from moment-to-moment and sentence-to-sentence. The interjection of random acquaintances—often un-named� whose role or purpose or quips are befuddling as to any relevance to surrounding text. And at other times, Iyer is a name-dropper…to what purpose, one must wonder? To elevate his own status as a cohort among some elite legion?? Example:
What??!! What kind of nebulous fake profundity is that supposed to be?!! “Don’t worry about the answers,� Iyer seems to be inferring. “…Don’t even worry about the questions. Questions are stupid; answers are pointless.�
At another point (p. 57), Iyer casually points out that he’s been visiting the Dalia Lama for more than twenty years, and the dialogue he proffers seems to indicate that he is having rather a private audience with his old-buddy, old-pal.
Iyer, however, and despite his having spiritualist associations and repeated retreats to religious enclaves, claims not to be religious nor to be affiliated with any particular religious belief system. We are, I suppose(?), to take this to mean that perhaps he is “beyond� or “above� the rationalization of common man’s invented religions, and that he is, perhaps, a guru of life itself and its mysteries.
It all seems rather narcissistic.
The first two chapters [or sections] present us with an over-privileged, closet materialist who seems not to understand that his precious “silence� is just another commodity to which he feels a special right�
At halfway through this thirty-dollar, mere 200-page book, I have yet to grasp the importance or relevance of why “silence� is worthy of its 200 pages of bad writing� And please note: I am a former Benedictine monk myself. The final three chapters/sections of the book are slightly more tolerable than the first two chapters. But I still feel like the entire book was misleading (and a disjointed, jumbled mess). Although Iyer is “non-religious� and non-affiliated with any denomination, he is still willing to “steal� the renewing and seclusionary atmosphere and benefits of this Camaldolian/Benedictine retreat center without ever extolling the benefits of the Benedictine Rule or Benedictine contemplative lifestyle. In fact, he seems to take particular joy in pointing-out the syncreticities of the brothers as a mockery of their professed religion rather than focusing on the routine of the Office (prayers) or how Benedictine philosophy is at the core of the brothers� lives ( or how it benefits him …as in, he has enjoyed the freedom of cheap guest retreat accommodations BECAUSE of the Benedictine rule about welcoming the stranger. But does Iyer even know about this rule? …or take it with him out into the world and share it? …The book doesn’t say, so I presume the answer is, “No.�)
There is no deep or inward reflection about “silence� whatsoever anywhere in this book. Perhaps, part of the problem is that—save by means of, perhaps, poetry—that the very concept of the ineffable character of “silence� is not conducive to�words…or to storytelling…or to description. Because words [outside of personal prayer] and storytelling and description all “break� the spirit of and contradict the very ineffable thing one is trying to convey.
In point of fact, this book is a meditation on anything BUT silence. Instead, anything halfway interesting deals with the people and characters that Iyer meets over his 30+ years retreating at the Hermitage. Indeed, “silence� seems to be a misnomer, because no matter how Iyer might think he’s describing it, there is always a cacophony about. In one of the few single paragraphs in which he actually attempts to directly address the topic, he states:
…But listening to Bach is not silence, is it? And neither is the motor-grinding drone or the honking cars of the highway…nor is the effervescent drone of a million murmuring voices and clomping shoes on cement tiles or the HVAC system in overhead ducts or escalators or the persistence of public intercom announcements [even in a quiet corner] of an airport.
I actually think Iyer has mis-identified the very thing he has tried to write an entire book about� And even if he has MIS-IDENTIFIED “SOLITUDE� AS “SILENCE,� he has still failed, because any snippets of wisdom he has garnered have been through recollections of INTERACTIONS with other individuals.
Frankly, I will never understand Iyer’s use of non-linear writing. There was no theme or topic compartmentalization that benefitted from it. It simply served to make things more confusing (and perhaps dis-serviced the author himself by highlighting his inability to outline or better organize his own writing…nor does it shine kindly on the editors� skills since basic editorial assistance might have suggested better organization or flow).
And speaking of poor editorial capacity� Iyer goes out of his way to laud his “faithful and unerring editor”…which is unfortunate because neither author nor editor apparently noticed now many awkward sentence-structural or syntax errors were pervasive throughout this book. I’m going to present one glaring example here to prove my point:
…Oh really? Did Emily Dickinson leave you a book of poems in your room? …Did she autograph the book and write you a personalized note as well?
I mean�COME ON� That’s like an Editing 101 mistake� from an example taken from a grade school grammar class.
“‘Here [at the Hermitage] you find answers,� I suggest to Leonard Cohen shortly before I leave.
“‘Here you find freedom from answers,� he replies in the grave and gravelly baritone beloved by many [in case any philistines reading this book have forgotten how belovèd and celebrated my friend, Leonard Cohen, actually is]…�
What??!! What kind of nebulous fake profundity is that supposed to be?!! “Don’t worry about the answers,� Iyer seems to be inferring. “…Don’t even worry about the questions. Questions are stupid; answers are pointless.�
At another point (p. 57), Iyer casually points out that he’s been visiting the Dalia Lama for more than twenty years, and the dialogue he proffers seems to indicate that he is having rather a private audience with his old-buddy, old-pal.
Iyer, however, and despite his having spiritualist associations and repeated retreats to religious enclaves, claims not to be religious nor to be affiliated with any particular religious belief system. We are, I suppose(?), to take this to mean that perhaps he is “beyond� or “above� the rationalization of common man’s invented religions, and that he is, perhaps, a guru of life itself and its mysteries.
It all seems rather narcissistic.
The first two chapters [or sections] present us with an over-privileged, closet materialist who seems not to understand that his precious “silence� is just another commodity to which he feels a special right�
“When next I settle into the blue-and-gold silence above the sea [at the Hermitage], it’s to hear a bulldozer protesting as it goes back and forth along the slope down the road [presumably widening the road for increased traffic]� Inwardly, I curse. Do the monks really need to make this place more crowded? Might it not imperil the silence that is the Hermitage’s greatest gift? Many of us [rich and privileged folk who have been taking advantage of the monk’s cheap room and board] would happily contribute to their coffers if that might save them from having to build more trailers…�
At halfway through this thirty-dollar, mere 200-page book, I have yet to grasp the importance or relevance of why “silence� is worthy of its 200 pages of bad writing� And please note: I am a former Benedictine monk myself. The final three chapters/sections of the book are slightly more tolerable than the first two chapters. But I still feel like the entire book was misleading (and a disjointed, jumbled mess). Although Iyer is “non-religious� and non-affiliated with any denomination, he is still willing to “steal� the renewing and seclusionary atmosphere and benefits of this Camaldolian/Benedictine retreat center without ever extolling the benefits of the Benedictine Rule or Benedictine contemplative lifestyle. In fact, he seems to take particular joy in pointing-out the syncreticities of the brothers as a mockery of their professed religion rather than focusing on the routine of the Office (prayers) or how Benedictine philosophy is at the core of the brothers� lives ( or how it benefits him …as in, he has enjoyed the freedom of cheap guest retreat accommodations BECAUSE of the Benedictine rule about welcoming the stranger. But does Iyer even know about this rule? …or take it with him out into the world and share it? …The book doesn’t say, so I presume the answer is, “No.�)
There is no deep or inward reflection about “silence� whatsoever anywhere in this book. Perhaps, part of the problem is that—save by means of, perhaps, poetry—that the very concept of the ineffable character of “silence� is not conducive to�words…or to storytelling…or to description. Because words [outside of personal prayer] and storytelling and description all “break� the spirit of and contradict the very ineffable thing one is trying to convey.
In point of fact, this book is a meditation on anything BUT silence. Instead, anything halfway interesting deals with the people and characters that Iyer meets over his 30+ years retreating at the Hermitage. Indeed, “silence� seems to be a misnomer, because no matter how Iyer might think he’s describing it, there is always a cacophony about. In one of the few single paragraphs in which he actually attempts to directly address the topic, he states:
“Sometimes I wonder—and friends keep asking—how spending all this time in silence has changed me. I can hardly count the ways [yet he does not], now that joy seems the opposite of pleasure and freedom arises out of an embrace of limits; it’s impossible to take so seriously the self that huffs and puffs along the highway. When I find myself in a crowded airport terminal, I’m drawn, as if magnetically now, to a quiet corner in the sun; as I wait for [my partner] to come back from work—will it be twenty minutes or ninety?—I turn off the lights and listen to Bach.�
…But listening to Bach is not silence, is it? And neither is the motor-grinding drone or the honking cars of the highway…nor is the effervescent drone of a million murmuring voices and clomping shoes on cement tiles or the HVAC system in overhead ducts or escalators or the persistence of public intercom announcements [even in a quiet corner] of an airport.
I actually think Iyer has mis-identified the very thing he has tried to write an entire book about� And even if he has MIS-IDENTIFIED “SOLITUDE� AS “SILENCE,� he has still failed, because any snippets of wisdom he has garnered have been through recollections of INTERACTIONS with other individuals.
Frankly, I will never understand Iyer’s use of non-linear writing. There was no theme or topic compartmentalization that benefitted from it. It simply served to make things more confusing (and perhaps dis-serviced the author himself by highlighting his inability to outline or better organize his own writing…nor does it shine kindly on the editors� skills since basic editorial assistance might have suggested better organization or flow).
And speaking of poor editorial capacity� Iyer goes out of his way to laud his “faithful and unerring editor”…which is unfortunate because neither author nor editor apparently noticed now many awkward sentence-structural or syntax errors were pervasive throughout this book. I’m going to present one glaring example here to prove my point:
“In my cell, by the light of my table lamp—my face reflected back to me in the window as if it were hers—I page, very slowly, through the huge book of poems left behind by Emily Dickinson.� (p. 156)
…Oh really? Did Emily Dickinson leave you a book of poems in your room? …Did she autograph the book and write you a personalized note as well?
I mean�COME ON� That’s like an Editing 101 mistake� from an example taken from a grade school grammar class.
January 19, 2025
Here's what I wrote in the newspaper:
February 10, 2025
maybe it's just not for me, but this felt like one of those books that talks a lot without ever actually saying anything?
February 11, 2025
Perhaps too deep for me but I still enjoyed it. Just a stream of consciousness narrative for sure. Iyer has been returning to the New Camaldoli Hermitage in Big Sur, California for 32 years to seek silence. "Retreat, I’m coming to find, is not so much about escape as redirection and recollection." Just the usual introspective book from Iyer that has you questioning your life.
January 23, 2025
3.5 Read this for a program at work author was a very chill man also now I want to become a monk
March 21, 2025
I listened to this because another writer whose work I enjoy recommended it.
I did not enjoy it. It's self-indulgent and self-focused, two traits that I really cannot abide. It is also rather superficial. I really expected something quite different, based on the author who recommended it. If this had been by a female rather than a male author, I am not sure it would even have gotten published.
I did not enjoy it. It's self-indulgent and self-focused, two traits that I really cannot abide. It is also rather superficial. I really expected something quite different, based on the author who recommended it. If this had been by a female rather than a male author, I am not sure it would even have gotten published.
January 15, 2025
ARC review� I'm grateful to Riverhead books for the gifted ARC of the book.
Aflame: Learning from Silence is Pico Iyer's experiences living at a Hermitage weaved into a beautiful book.
He explores the paradoxes of human existence, and how they can be aligned with sustainability of the human consciousness. He focuses on the point that change is constant, and we mostly learn to accept it in adverse or unfavorable circumstances.
He has woven personal experiences of loss, spirituality, and healing via the medium of examination of dialogues he had with the members of the Hermitage, his friends, and above all, Dalai Lama.
He has put examples from real life, one being his friend's divorce and reconciliation after a break - for looking at same things with different perspectives.
It's a quick read, the language is easy, and is quite evocative and brings a retrospective aura along with it.
Aflame: Learning from Silence is Pico Iyer's experiences living at a Hermitage weaved into a beautiful book.
He explores the paradoxes of human existence, and how they can be aligned with sustainability of the human consciousness. He focuses on the point that change is constant, and we mostly learn to accept it in adverse or unfavorable circumstances.
He has woven personal experiences of loss, spirituality, and healing via the medium of examination of dialogues he had with the members of the Hermitage, his friends, and above all, Dalai Lama.
He has put examples from real life, one being his friend's divorce and reconciliation after a break - for looking at same things with different perspectives.
It's a quick read, the language is easy, and is quite evocative and brings a retrospective aura along with it.
April 11, 2025
Listened to this on audio - for now, incredible. 5 stars, hope to write a full review shortly.
February 8, 2025
A moving treatise on the power of silence and what it teaches us. How to live, how to find joy in this confounding world, and finally how to die.
March 9, 2025
I felt at peace.
April 5, 2025
Pico Iyer is a travel writer also with a desire for solitude.
March 16, 2025
A pleasure, a respite, and so informative.
February 23, 2025
Yesterday I thought myself at the center of the world. Now the world seems to sit at the center of me.
And contemplation, I come to see, does not in any case mean closing your eyes so much as opening them, to the glory of everything around you.
Even a community of contemplatives needs an infirmarian, a treasurer and a cellarer (to do the shopping).
The world isn't erased here; only returned to its proper proportions. It's not a matter of finding or acquiring any thing, only of letting everything extraneous fall away. There's no such thing as dead time when everything is alive with possibility.
I'm reminded that the best in us lies deeper than our words.
... now I can see how luxury is defined by all yo udon't need to long for. "Anyone can sit in a Zendo," a monk down the road has written. "The trick is to sit in the world."
"We all need the experience of forgetting who we are. I think that's what love is: forgetting who you are."
... words are needless scratches on the clarity of what lies beyond.
"Be thou my vision, oh Lord of my heart ..." from Be Thou My Vision by Van Morrison
I might be a sunlit river overflowing its banks.
It pains him, I hear the Dalai Lama say, to see an animal killed on TV. But it's going to get killed anyway, and maybe by watching he can learn something.
Traditionally, the historian R.H. Tawney reminds me, human were spiritual beings who, for prudence's sake, took care of their material needs; nowadays more and more of us are material beings who, for the sake of prudence, attend to our spiritual needs.
Two days later, I can't remember quibbling like a spoiled child. The bulldozer, the shouts, that cabin coming up down the dirty road from where I sit; they're all as much a part of the silence as the birdsong.
A plague can awaken heroism and compassion precisely because we're no longer sleepwalking through life.
There's so much silence, you can hear the stars move. That's how I feel here; last night, I heard the stars move.
I realize that my bank account, my resume, my business card would none of them be of very much help at all. The only thing that could sustain him - or me - would be whatever I'd gather in stillness.
Like someone who plays the radio all the time and claims never to hear the sea.
"Once you have been turned around," Ludwig Wittgenstein reminded himself near the end of his life, "you must stay turned round."
I've read that the most common phrase in the Bible is "Be not afraid."
How can you stay calm amidst the flames?
"We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness."
Look at the suffering you're causing, too, in yourself and others 0 always more important than the suffering you're enduring.
When the news comes in that he's okay, Robert writes that he's been through a "good fire drill." But it's not exactly a reprieve, he knows, only a postponement. He can't say that God has spared him, since none of us gets spared in the end.
"Don't they say that acedia, the noonday demon, is the monk's biggest threat?"
Really, I just want to commune with God, which is myself by another name.
"Bernard of Clairvaux," he says, barely pausing for breath, "wrote forth-three sermons about the Song of Songs."
"Thomas Merton said that it's less important to find God than to open yourself up enough so you can be found by him."
It makes many of us rethink our lives and realize that maybe we don't want - or need - to go back to the blind and dizzy rush we've known before.
"God will take care of it"
"It's almost as if, the more challenges you face, the more optimistic you become!" "Everything will be all right in the end," says Cyprian, steering the car away from the precipice. "I fully believe that. If it's not all right, it's not the end."
"The soul evolves not by addition but by subtraction." - Meister Eckhart
And contemplation, I come to see, does not in any case mean closing your eyes so much as opening them, to the glory of everything around you.
Even a community of contemplatives needs an infirmarian, a treasurer and a cellarer (to do the shopping).
The world isn't erased here; only returned to its proper proportions. It's not a matter of finding or acquiring any thing, only of letting everything extraneous fall away. There's no such thing as dead time when everything is alive with possibility.
I'm reminded that the best in us lies deeper than our words.
... now I can see how luxury is defined by all yo udon't need to long for. "Anyone can sit in a Zendo," a monk down the road has written. "The trick is to sit in the world."
"We all need the experience of forgetting who we are. I think that's what love is: forgetting who you are."
... words are needless scratches on the clarity of what lies beyond.
"Be thou my vision, oh Lord of my heart ..." from Be Thou My Vision by Van Morrison
I might be a sunlit river overflowing its banks.
It pains him, I hear the Dalai Lama say, to see an animal killed on TV. But it's going to get killed anyway, and maybe by watching he can learn something.
Traditionally, the historian R.H. Tawney reminds me, human were spiritual beings who, for prudence's sake, took care of their material needs; nowadays more and more of us are material beings who, for the sake of prudence, attend to our spiritual needs.
Two days later, I can't remember quibbling like a spoiled child. The bulldozer, the shouts, that cabin coming up down the dirty road from where I sit; they're all as much a part of the silence as the birdsong.
A plague can awaken heroism and compassion precisely because we're no longer sleepwalking through life.
There's so much silence, you can hear the stars move. That's how I feel here; last night, I heard the stars move.
I realize that my bank account, my resume, my business card would none of them be of very much help at all. The only thing that could sustain him - or me - would be whatever I'd gather in stillness.
Like someone who plays the radio all the time and claims never to hear the sea.
"Once you have been turned around," Ludwig Wittgenstein reminded himself near the end of his life, "you must stay turned round."
I've read that the most common phrase in the Bible is "Be not afraid."
How can you stay calm amidst the flames?
"We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness."
Look at the suffering you're causing, too, in yourself and others 0 always more important than the suffering you're enduring.
When the news comes in that he's okay, Robert writes that he's been through a "good fire drill." But it's not exactly a reprieve, he knows, only a postponement. He can't say that God has spared him, since none of us gets spared in the end.
"Don't they say that acedia, the noonday demon, is the monk's biggest threat?"
Really, I just want to commune with God, which is myself by another name.
"Bernard of Clairvaux," he says, barely pausing for breath, "wrote forth-three sermons about the Song of Songs."
"Thomas Merton said that it's less important to find God than to open yourself up enough so you can be found by him."
It makes many of us rethink our lives and realize that maybe we don't want - or need - to go back to the blind and dizzy rush we've known before.
"God will take care of it"
"It's almost as if, the more challenges you face, the more optimistic you become!" "Everything will be all right in the end," says Cyprian, steering the car away from the precipice. "I fully believe that. If it's not all right, it's not the end."
"The soul evolves not by addition but by subtraction." - Meister Eckhart
March 30, 2025
Some books you read. Others you absorb in silence. Aflame: Learning from Silence by Pico Iyer belongs squarely in the latter category. This is not merely a book about silence—it is silence rendered in prose. At once a meditation, a personal essay, and a spiritual travelogue, Aflame traces Iyer’s recurring stays at a remote Catholic hermitage in Big Sur, California, and through them, his search for what remains when noise, identity, and ambition fall away.
On the surface, this is a chronicle of retreat: ocean views, monastic rhythms, spartan rooms. But underneath runs a more urgent question: What happens when the self is stilled? “Strange, how rich it feels to be cleansed of all chatter,� Iyer writes. “If you so wish,� he quotes from a desert father, “you can become aflame.� The real fire here is internal—and it burns quietly, insistently, transforming everything in its glow.
Iyer’s style is deceptively simple, but exquisitely controlled. His language breathes. The rhythm is meditative, the tone both lyrical and grounded. His observations have the clarity of haiku: “The sun is sending fireflies scattering across the sea.� References—from Dickinson to Kafka, Thoreau to the Vedas—surface like shared breaths rather than namedrops. Each quote lands like a bell in an empty chapel. And yet, the book never drifts into the abstract. It remains rooted in the body, the elements, the rawness of grief and the grace of everyday gestures.
This is not a book for those seeking quick wisdom or practical takeaways. It’s not “self-help�; it’s self-emptying. Iyer assumes a reader willing to slow down, to pause mid-sentence, to follow digressions like footpaths through fog. In that way, Aflame is itself a retreat. Especially now—in a world always shouting, scrolling, scheming—its quiet is thunderous.
There are fires throughout Aflame—both literal and metaphorical. The wildfire that destroyed Iyer’s home. The internal combustion of memory. The slow burn of mourning his father. “The only thing that saved me was a Good Samaritan,� he writes about surviving the flames, “poking a hose from a water truck he’d driven up, to try to be of help.� But also: the fire of devotion, of attention, of stripped-down presence. In stillness, he discovers not numbness but fierce aliveness: “It’s not a feeling but a knowing; in the emptiness I can be filled by everything around me.�
Some of the most memorable moments come from encounters—with Buddhist monks, Hindu nuns, dying friends, and even Leonard Cohen, who tells Iyer: “Forgetting who you are is such a delicious experience. And so frightening.� Iyer’s gift lies in letting these voices resonate without overtaking his own. He walks in step with his sources, not behind them.
The book has an open, spiral structure: no argument, no climax—just a return to silence, each time from a different place. This might frustrate some readers. At times, the lyricism verges on precious. And gender is rarely examined; women appear mostly as muses or emotional mirrors. One may also wish for a more explicit reckoning with privilege—the ability to withdraw, after all, is not available to everyone. But these critiques emerge from the very moral questions Iyer invites us to sit with.
“Every day in silence is an incarnation.�
Aflame is not a book that hands you insight. It’s a book that burns away everything that keeps you from seeing it for yourself. For readers who see stillness not as a luxury but as a necessity, Iyer offers no answers—just the conditions in which better questions might arise. This is a book that lingers. Quietly. Fiercely. Like flame.
On the surface, this is a chronicle of retreat: ocean views, monastic rhythms, spartan rooms. But underneath runs a more urgent question: What happens when the self is stilled? “Strange, how rich it feels to be cleansed of all chatter,� Iyer writes. “If you so wish,� he quotes from a desert father, “you can become aflame.� The real fire here is internal—and it burns quietly, insistently, transforming everything in its glow.
Iyer’s style is deceptively simple, but exquisitely controlled. His language breathes. The rhythm is meditative, the tone both lyrical and grounded. His observations have the clarity of haiku: “The sun is sending fireflies scattering across the sea.� References—from Dickinson to Kafka, Thoreau to the Vedas—surface like shared breaths rather than namedrops. Each quote lands like a bell in an empty chapel. And yet, the book never drifts into the abstract. It remains rooted in the body, the elements, the rawness of grief and the grace of everyday gestures.
This is not a book for those seeking quick wisdom or practical takeaways. It’s not “self-help�; it’s self-emptying. Iyer assumes a reader willing to slow down, to pause mid-sentence, to follow digressions like footpaths through fog. In that way, Aflame is itself a retreat. Especially now—in a world always shouting, scrolling, scheming—its quiet is thunderous.
There are fires throughout Aflame—both literal and metaphorical. The wildfire that destroyed Iyer’s home. The internal combustion of memory. The slow burn of mourning his father. “The only thing that saved me was a Good Samaritan,� he writes about surviving the flames, “poking a hose from a water truck he’d driven up, to try to be of help.� But also: the fire of devotion, of attention, of stripped-down presence. In stillness, he discovers not numbness but fierce aliveness: “It’s not a feeling but a knowing; in the emptiness I can be filled by everything around me.�
Some of the most memorable moments come from encounters—with Buddhist monks, Hindu nuns, dying friends, and even Leonard Cohen, who tells Iyer: “Forgetting who you are is such a delicious experience. And so frightening.� Iyer’s gift lies in letting these voices resonate without overtaking his own. He walks in step with his sources, not behind them.
The book has an open, spiral structure: no argument, no climax—just a return to silence, each time from a different place. This might frustrate some readers. At times, the lyricism verges on precious. And gender is rarely examined; women appear mostly as muses or emotional mirrors. One may also wish for a more explicit reckoning with privilege—the ability to withdraw, after all, is not available to everyone. But these critiques emerge from the very moral questions Iyer invites us to sit with.
“Every day in silence is an incarnation.�
Aflame is not a book that hands you insight. It’s a book that burns away everything that keeps you from seeing it for yourself. For readers who see stillness not as a luxury but as a necessity, Iyer offers no answers—just the conditions in which better questions might arise. This is a book that lingers. Quietly. Fiercely. Like flame.
April 12, 2025
This is just a beautiful book! Reading it makes me want to do as Pico Iyer has done - stay for long periods of time in silence at a monastery on the banks of the California coast. Iyer has spent more than 30 years taking time in this special place, a place of respite, depth, solitude, where time is not constrained and the soul can be rejuvenated, where one can learn the lessons from silence, that deepened community in the world is the fruits of solitude (a lesson from this book!). In this spiritual memoir, one also gets a glimpse of the lives of the monks and friends of the monks who call this monastery home - that even though Iyer is there for silence and space and solitude, he very much is embedded in community with people who over the years become friends and comrades. The writing is beautiful, like soft kisses and warm embraces. I am especially enamored with the double meaning of the title, AFLAME. Literally, the place has been in danger of burning with the spread of California wildfires. Once part of the monastery (and his mother's house in California) succumbed to the flames. Years later, another fire almost engulfed the property. Death is there in the space and the yogi retreatant encounters that -- not only in the wildfires, the potential mountain lion attacks but also the deaths over time of long time monks and keepers of the place. So there is danger and death in "aflame" but aflame also connotates passion, wildness, life. My mind was aflame... passions aflame and though Iyer doesn't fully explore this meaning, I see how the heart and soul is lit and burns brightly in the place where it is allowed to be simply in silence and solitude. "Aflaming" is possible to live a life of passion and on fire. I loved, loved this book!
February 22, 2025
On its face, fire seems to be an unusual metaphor for quiet contemplation. Yet Iyer finds so much to reflect on there that he uses it as the title of his memoir. Both are difficult to control. Nirvana, one goal of meditation, literally means “blowing out� or “becoming extinguished.� Both promise renewal. And flames threaten both of Iyer’s California refuges—a Benedictine monastery he has visited for 30 years and his family homes.
His principal setting is in the Big Sur hills overlooking the Pacific. This is a place of quiet but also one that is prone to wildfires. Iyer manages to make his story interesting by including details of his life. Iyer’s life is not just silence, reading and meditation. In addition to concerns about fire and the threat of fire, he spends time with the resident monks. These men are dedicated to prayer, contemplation and service. Yet they find time to watch Monty Python and read secular books, which they keep in a library separate from the sacred. Iyer also converses with fellow travelers including an erudite prior, an elderly female French-Canadian, his wife in Japan, his aged mother, the singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen and even the Dalai Lama.
His narrative style is more meditative than conventional. It is timeless. There is no past or future, only the now. It is mindful, “…letting everything extraneous fall away.� And it is non-judgmental. There are no tips for a successful life. Instead, he accepts that life is mysterious and not easily resolved into goods and bads or a few aphorisms. This memoir is for anyone interested in the benefits of a meditative lifestyle.
His principal setting is in the Big Sur hills overlooking the Pacific. This is a place of quiet but also one that is prone to wildfires. Iyer manages to make his story interesting by including details of his life. Iyer’s life is not just silence, reading and meditation. In addition to concerns about fire and the threat of fire, he spends time with the resident monks. These men are dedicated to prayer, contemplation and service. Yet they find time to watch Monty Python and read secular books, which they keep in a library separate from the sacred. Iyer also converses with fellow travelers including an erudite prior, an elderly female French-Canadian, his wife in Japan, his aged mother, the singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen and even the Dalai Lama.
His narrative style is more meditative than conventional. It is timeless. There is no past or future, only the now. It is mindful, “…letting everything extraneous fall away.� And it is non-judgmental. There are no tips for a successful life. Instead, he accepts that life is mysterious and not easily resolved into goods and bads or a few aphorisms. This memoir is for anyone interested in the benefits of a meditative lifestyle.
March 15, 2025
I read a positive review of Aflame in the NYT and thought this would be a book I’d appreciate. Pico Iyer is a writer who has made more than a hundred retreats to a Benedictine hermitage in Northern California. He says that his life has been transformed by his time there, that the silence of the place “awakens a joy that nothing can efface.� Boy, my frenetic monkey brain could use that quiet!
There were quotable passages:
.
In the end, I did not gain much from the book. A review by Riley Davis says: “maybe it's just not for me, but this felt like one of those books that talks a lot without ever actually saying anything.�
And that pretty much says it all. I read on and on, hoping for insight or wisdom, but found mostly pleasant deep-sounding passages, nothing really profound. I kept thinking, “Who is this guy, how does he afford all his trips from Japan to California and back and forth, all these weeks at the Hermitage? What is he offering?�
You might like this book; if it appeals, give it a read. Maybe I was just not in a receptive mood.
There were quotable passages:
“I feel like a sea anemone.... A little creature of the sea. You know how sensitive and tender they are. If they trust where they’re been placed, they open up. Put them in a harsh environment and they close very quickly.�
.
“Where are such people in my daily life?, I wonder. Everywhere, comes the answer, but I can’t see or stop to hear them. I’m too caught up in my own schedule, my seeming busyness. Like someone who plays the radio all the time and claims never to hear the sea.�
In the end, I did not gain much from the book. A review by Riley Davis says: “maybe it's just not for me, but this felt like one of those books that talks a lot without ever actually saying anything.�
And that pretty much says it all. I read on and on, hoping for insight or wisdom, but found mostly pleasant deep-sounding passages, nothing really profound. I kept thinking, “Who is this guy, how does he afford all his trips from Japan to California and back and forth, all these weeks at the Hermitage? What is he offering?�
You might like this book; if it appeals, give it a read. Maybe I was just not in a receptive mood.
March 8, 2025
Reading the book put me in a mellow and contemplative mood, but I did not gain any special insight on how to prepare for death.
I was amused by the author recounting how he picked up a dying wasp thrashing about on his back and taking it outside to die in the sunlight. That act would probably be something that I would do if I have not done something similar already. also. You never know who may have reincarnated into that wasp.
I sympathize with the author's efforts to take care of his mom who was in failing physical and mental health. Been there. Done that. I don't want to burden anyone when my decline becomes prominent.
"Contemplation isn't a cure for anxiety, the wise and uplifting Benedictine father Thomas Keating says; it just lets you look at life a little differently. The dark places don't go away when you step into silence; if anything, they rise to the surface. But here you can see them clearly as you never could when barreling along the freeway� page 136.
Book was a bit of a downer. A lot of dying and sick people. Sad stories.
Not the kind of book that I would recommend to anyone.
I was amused by the author recounting how he picked up a dying wasp thrashing about on his back and taking it outside to die in the sunlight. That act would probably be something that I would do if I have not done something similar already. also. You never know who may have reincarnated into that wasp.
I sympathize with the author's efforts to take care of his mom who was in failing physical and mental health. Been there. Done that. I don't want to burden anyone when my decline becomes prominent.
"Contemplation isn't a cure for anxiety, the wise and uplifting Benedictine father Thomas Keating says; it just lets you look at life a little differently. The dark places don't go away when you step into silence; if anything, they rise to the surface. But here you can see them clearly as you never could when barreling along the freeway� page 136.
Book was a bit of a downer. A lot of dying and sick people. Sad stories.
Not the kind of book that I would recommend to anyone.
March 20, 2025
Pico Iyer comes across as a well meaning, pleasant guy, but this book did nothing for me. Basically a collection of aphorisms that initially seem profound but upon further reflection are of little import. Think Gwyneth Paltrow. He wants to impart something to the reader about his experience in various monasteries that practice contemplative silence. Perhaps silence is best not explained with words.
On second thought, Pico may not be such a great guy. Conveniently all these monasteries are in drop dead gorgeous locations. Tough duty. He's also quite a name dropper. Apparently he's chums with the singer Leonard Cohen as well as the Dalai Lama, among others.
Somehow passing conversations he has with people instantly produce deep, meaningful conversation. I've had no more than a handful of these in my lifetime but this seems to happen to him all the time. Must be quite a guy.
Last but not least, by extolling the virtues of his favorite monastery in Big Sur he has undoubtedly ruined it as it will now be overrun by failed seekers, grifters, and spiritual wannabees.
On second thought, Pico may not be such a great guy. Conveniently all these monasteries are in drop dead gorgeous locations. Tough duty. He's also quite a name dropper. Apparently he's chums with the singer Leonard Cohen as well as the Dalai Lama, among others.
Somehow passing conversations he has with people instantly produce deep, meaningful conversation. I've had no more than a handful of these in my lifetime but this seems to happen to him all the time. Must be quite a guy.
Last but not least, by extolling the virtues of his favorite monastery in Big Sur he has undoubtedly ruined it as it will now be overrun by failed seekers, grifters, and spiritual wannabees.
January 28, 2025
I was looking forward to this new book from Pico Iyer but it left me a bit dissatisfied. The book lacked structure (which may well have been intentional) but I found it hard to follow the narrative. Maybe I just wanted the book to be something that is wasn't meant to be? For me, the reflective paragraphs often lacked connection, as if they were meant to be stand alone ideas. I had a hard time catching a meaningful thread to tie thoughts together. I will admit that I am terribly distracted by the politics of January 2025 so really? It might just be that I can't focus on a nonfiction book right now.
If you're a fan of Pico Iyer, go ahead and give this book a try. I may just have to read it over again when I am not so outraged by the White House actions this week.
If you're a fan of Pico Iyer, go ahead and give this book a try. I may just have to read it over again when I am not so outraged by the White House actions this week.
March 19, 2025
If you were drawn to the passion of the title and cover art, beware. There isn’t much heat in this book. It’s a charming series of episodes from the author’s visit to a particular retreat center, where he finds peace in silence and solitude, despite filling pages with people and dialogue.
”Once the self is gone, the world can come flooding in, in all its wild immediacy.�
I wished for more wisdom like this � more burning truths to light up a dark life � but instead most pages were mundane reports of everyday conversations. They are crafted to point the reader somewhere: there is artistry here of course. But it simply wasn’t for me.
I don’t want to read about fires burning down expensive real estate. I want to kindle my soul to flame.
”Once the self is gone, the world can come flooding in, in all its wild immediacy.�
I wished for more wisdom like this � more burning truths to light up a dark life � but instead most pages were mundane reports of everyday conversations. They are crafted to point the reader somewhere: there is artistry here of course. But it simply wasn’t for me.
I don’t want to read about fires burning down expensive real estate. I want to kindle my soul to flame.
January 27, 2025
This book is a wonderful antidote to the craziness happening in our world these days. Iyer takes us with him into the peace and silence of a monks� retreat above Big Sur in California. When he first went there, he had just lost his home to a wildfire and needed somewhere to go. Although he travels all over the world on writing assignments, The Hermitage has become his second home. The chapters here are gleaned from thousands of journal pages written there. For those who long to escape the chaos of everyday life, this book offers respite as Iyer takes us on retreat with him to gaze at the ocean, sit in the candlelit chapel, and chat with monks who spend more time listening than speaking.
January 29, 2025
Pico Iyer charms with his mellifluous prose. He evokes a place, the Hermitage in Big Sur, that may be at the end of its life-span while constantly being literally threatened by fires. But the flame is inside, internal, the consequence of silence. Iyer makes life-long friends through his annual visits to this sanctuary. His book takes us on a journey as it evolves and changes but stays the same. A place most of us can never visit. I highly recommend this book. Read it as a meditation.
February 3, 2025
A beautiful book about Pico Iyer’s many years spent in retreats and quietude with the monks at The Hermitage monastery in the wild and stunning landscape of Big Sur, California. It’s a much needed read in these stressful times. It delves into his personal life and the relationships he developed with some of the monks and the other regular visitors to the monastery. I love how it spans several decades, allowing us to witness the evolution of his way of being present in this world. The monastery is clearly a rock and fortress for a man whose passion is international travel. A must read for anyone interested in more peace, calm and grounding.
March 19, 2025
I had met Pico back in 2015 at an intimate gathering and discussed his book Art of Stillness. His intellect, wisdom and quiet reflections shone through in the talk he delivered. This book ranks as one of my favourite reading materials.
Aflame, on the other hand, is a hodge podge regurgitation. It borrows (and paraphrases, if I can recall correctly) from earlier reminiscences of his house burning down in the California fires some 30 years ago. Disjointed, repetitive writing that could not hold this reader's attention or provide insights - new or old. Most disappointing effort from someone whom I hold in very high esteem.
Aflame, on the other hand, is a hodge podge regurgitation. It borrows (and paraphrases, if I can recall correctly) from earlier reminiscences of his house burning down in the California fires some 30 years ago. Disjointed, repetitive writing that could not hold this reader's attention or provide insights - new or old. Most disappointing effort from someone whom I hold in very high esteem.
January 30, 2025
Non-fiction is not my usual wheelhouse and I thank @riverheadbooks for the ARC. A writer who quotes Meister Eckhart, the subject of my degree dissertation, is always going to stand out to me. Wouldn’t we all like the time and space to be able to extract ourselves from the world when it all becomes too much…I wish this book gave some insight in to how to find learning, how to find silence, how to grow when you don’t have access to a hermitage in the Californian hills; sadly it does not. What it does, is gives a beautiful memoir of 30 years in silence.
February 15, 2025
As I embark on my own challenge of becoming a yoga teacher, the art of meditation has once again shown itself to me. The last time I really sat at all was during the pandemic, trying to empty my head of the awful images and stupid words of our politicians. Now those awful politicians are back in multiples, bird flu is looming and I'm given this gift of a book. To read about this person's time spent in silence, his eloquence draws me to the California coast in my mind. I plan to go back to it many times in my journey.
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