Keisha hadn't taken a real vacation in four years. Not a long weekend where she checked email from the hotel. Not a "working remotely from somewhere pretty" situation. A real, genuine, phone-on-airplane-mode vacation. Four years.
She's a VP of Operations at a Fortune 500 company. She manages a team of forty-five people. She's the person everyone calls when things go wrong, which means she's always on. Even at 2 AM. Even on holidays. Even during her niece's ballet recital, when she spent the second act in the lobby handling a supply chain crisis.
When she booked our Bali trip, her assistant asked if she wanted to block the time on her work calendar as "tentative."
"Unavailable," Keisha said. "Mark it as unavailable."
That was the first victory.
The Arrival: Still in Work Mode
I clocked Keisha immediately at the welcome dinner. She was warm, funny, engaged with the group—but her phone was face-up on the table, and her eyes flicked to it every few minutes. I've seen this pattern hundreds of times. The body arrives in paradise; the brain is still in the office.
I didn't say anything. I never do on day one. Bali handles it.
Day Three: The Crack in the Armor
It happened during the rice terrace walk. Our group was winding through the Jatiluwih paddies, and the guide was explaining how the subak irrigation system operates on a principle of collective responsibility—every farmer gives and receives water, and the system only works when everyone participates.
Keisha stopped walking. Just stood there, looking at the terraces cascading down the hillside.
"That's what I wanted my team to be," she said quietly. "But somewhere along the way, I stopped trusting anyone else to carry the water."
The group gave her space. Nobody rushed in with advice or platitudes. They just stood with her in that rice paddy and let the moment breathe. That's what happens when you travel with women who understand the weight of leadership.
Day Four: The Purification
Keisha chose to participate in the purification ritual at Tirta Empul temple. She told me later that she almost didn't—that standing in a fountain in front of strangers felt vulnerable in a way she doesn't normally allow.
But she did it. Stepped into the water, let it pour over her head, and felt something release. Not dramatically. Not like the movies. More like setting down a bag you didn't realize you'd been carrying up a hill.
"I've spent my entire career proving that I belong in rooms that weren't built for me," she said at dinner that night. "Somewhere along the way, I forgot that I also need to belong to myself."
Day Six: The Shift
By Seminyak, Keisha was unrecognizable—in the best way. The woman who'd arrived with her phone as a security blanket was now the one suggesting the group put their phones away at dinner. She'd slept through an entire morning for the first time in memory. She'd laughed—not the professional chuckle she deploys in boardrooms, but the full-body, head-back, tears-in-her-eyes laugh that she told me she'd forgotten she had.
The beach club day was her favorite. She sat on a daybed at Potato Head, ordered a cocktail, and stared at the ocean for two solid hours. No phone. No book. No conversation. Just... existing.
"I haven't done this since college," she said. "Just sat somewhere and had no agenda."
The Farewell: A Different Woman
At our farewell dinner, Keisha stood up—unprompted—and addressed the group:
"I came to Bali because my body was physically failing from stress. My doctor told me I needed to take a break or my blood pressure was going to make the decision for me. So I booked this trip like it was a medical appointment.
"But this wasn't a break. This was a reckoning. I've been so busy being indispensable that I forgot to be alive. These nine days—these women—this island—reminded me that I'm allowed to just be a person. Not a VP. Not a problem-solver. Not the one everyone calls. Just Keisha.
"I don't know what changes I'm going to make when I go home. But I know something has shifted, and I know it's not going back."
The table was silent for a moment. Then someone raised a glass. Then everyone was crying. Then someone ordered another bottle of wine. That's how it goes.
Six Months Later
I followed up with Keisha six months after Bali. She'd made three changes:
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She hired a deputy. Someone to share the on-call burden, to attend the meetings she didn't need to be in, to carry some of the water.
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She blocked one week per quarter as non-negotiable personal time. Not tentative. Unavailable.
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She booked our South Africa Experience. "I'm not going back to who I was before Bali," she said. "And the best way to make sure of that is to keep doing the thing that saved me."
Is Bali Calling You?
If you recognized yourself in Keisha's story—the four years without a real vacation, the phone as a security blanket, the slow erosion of everything that isn't work—Bali is waiting for you.
Our Bali Experience isn't a vacation. It's an intervention. The kind you'll thank yourself for.
Claire B. Soares is a 5X Condé Nast Top Travel Specialist and the founder of Caviar in the Air.
