A New Kind Of Wellness

At 10:45 on a Saturday morning, I was preparing to climb into what looked suspiciously like a small spacecraft.

The white capsule in front of me had a thick transparent door, a bed that disappeared into its belly and just enough clinical paraphernalia around it to make the comparison feel reasonable. I removed my shoes, climbed in and lay down. The door shut. Someone outside could still speak to me through an intercom.

For the next hour, I would remain inside while the pressure around me gradually changed.

If you are thinking I was about to be launched into space, which for a moment I did too, you are wrong.

This was Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy, or HBOT, a treatment in which you breathe oxygen inside a pressurised chamber. And my spaceship was parked inside The Wellness Co. Retreat at Karma Lakelands, where I had come to spend two days finding out what a “longevity retreat” actually involves. The retreat lists HBOT among a much wider suite of interventions that range from technology-led therapies to Ayurveda, naturopathy, movement, nutrition and meditation.

Once the novelty of being sealed inside the chamber wore off, there was surprisingly little to do. My ears reacted to the changing pressure much as they would during a flight, and then I simply lay there.

For a category of wellness that often sounds futuristic, that became one of the recurring ironies of my stay. Many of its most intimidating-looking interventions ultimately require the guest to do very little.

And yet HBOT was only one entry in a schedule that had begun almost four hours earlier and would continue until dinner.

The Interrogation

My stay had actually started the previous day, without a machine in sight.

Before I was allowed anywhere near a massage table, two doctors wanted to know my life story.

For more than two hours, Dr Srishti, an Internal Medicine Consultant and Aesthetic Physician, and Dr Abhilasha, an Ayurveda Physician, worked their way through my physical, mental and emotional wellbeing. Sleep came up. So did digestion, diet, exercise, stress, energy, health history, daily routines and lifestyle.

It began to feel, rather amusingly, like an interrogation conducted by two very nice people.

There was a reason for having doctors from two different systems in the room. The Wellness Co.'s larger philosophy is built around integrating modern medicine and diagnostics with Ayurveda and other traditional practices, taking what it considers useful from each rather than positioning one against the other. Its retreat material similarly describes programmes that combine modern longevity science with Ayurveda, naturopathy and mental wellbeing.

What I appreciated most was how accessible the conversation remained. Neither doctor tried to impress me with jargon or overwhelm me with information. They explained what they were observing and why it mattered in language that made sense outside a consultation room.

This attention to personalisation is, according to Rishabh Jain, Co-Founder of The Wellness Co., central to the retreat.

“People can experience similar symptoms for entirely different reasons,” he told me. “Two people arriving with fatigue, for instance, might be dealing with entirely different combinations of poor sleep, stress, nutrition or recovery. The idea, therefore, is to understand the person before deciding what goes on their itinerary.”

I also met a nutritionist during the consultation, who created a meal plan specifically for my stay.

Only after this marathon assessment did things begin to resemble my previous understanding of a wellness retreat. I was sent for Potli therapy, an Ayurvedic massage in which heated cloth bundles filled with medicinal herbs are rhythmically pressed and worked across the body. It was warm, deeply relaxing and, after two hours of answering questions about myself, extremely welcome.

Dinner followed. There was no choosing between pizza, pasta and a club sandwich.

My meals were treated as another part of the programme, with the nutrition consultation determining what I would eat during the stay.

The dinner began with broccoli almond soup, followed by what the retreat called a Metabolic Bowl: foxtail millet, seasonal vegetables and my choice of paneer, tofu or lentils, finished with an olive-oil dressing. Even the post-meal drink was to be selected according to my wellness plan.

It was simple food, and intentionally so. At least from what I was served, the emphasis was on grains, vegetables, protein and portioned meals rather than turning “healthy food” into an elaborate fine-dining performance.

That approach is consistent with the retreat’s broader promise that nutrition is not separate from its programmes but built into them. Its guest journey begins with health assessments and diagnostics, after which therapies, movement and nutrition are intended to be selected around the individual.

Room To Switch Off

The Wellness Co. Retreat operates from within Karma Lakelands, the 270-acre green estate in Gurugram that gives the experience much of its sense of escape.

Karma Lakelands has water bodies, meadows and gardens alongside a nine-hole golf course, swimming pools, a gym, padel, pickleball and several dining spaces. Its sustainability initiatives include rainwater harvesting and solar-energy integration, while the estate says it is home to more than five lakh trees.

For someone arriving from Delhi NCR, that transition is part of the appeal. You do not have to travel into the mountains to suddenly find yourself surrounded by trees, open lawns and considerably less traffic noise.

I stayed in one of the Karma Villas, a large, self-contained space looking out towards the green surroundings. Mine came with multiple bedrooms and a separate living room, along with complimentary Wi-Fi and breakfast, a Smart TV, air-conditioning, mini-fridge, RO water, tea and coffee facilities, an in-room safe and a work desk.

The work desk felt slightly ironic considering the purpose of the trip.

By the following night, my schedule would explicitly recommend that I stay away from screens after 9:30 pm.

From Sound Bowls To Mud

Day Two began at 7 am, with the treatment I expected least to enjoy and ended up liking most.

Nisha Melkani, a yoga and movement guide at The Wellness Co. Retreat at Karma Lakelands, led an hour of sound healing and meditation.

The session used resonant sounds alongside guided stillness and meditation. Unlike most of what would come later, there were no readings to interpret, devices to understand or physical sensations to analyse. I simply lay down and listened.

There is a temptation when writing about wellness to turn every quiet moment into some profound spiritual revelation. Mine was less dramatic. I just felt unusually calm.

And that was enough.

From there, things got considerably messier.

At 8 am came a mud bath, a naturopathy treatment centred around mineral-rich therapeutic mud. The retreat includes it among its traditional therapies, alongside Ayurveda treatments such as Shirodhara and Abhyanga.

Being covered in mud early in the morning is difficult to take entirely seriously. Perhaps that is part of the fun. It was tactile, cooling and probably the treatment during which I thought least about the larger longevity industry surrounding me.

Breakfast followed, and then came HBOT, after which, my itinerary began moving quickly.

At noon I tried PEMF and Negative Ion Therapy. PEMF stands for Pulsed Electromagnetic Field therapy and uses gentle electromagnetic pulses; the accompanying negative-ion component involves exposure to negatively charged air ions. This was another largely passive, device-led session rather than something I had to actively perform.

There was lunch, mercifully followed by an hour marked simply as “Me Time.”

Then came a far-infrared sauna, which uses infrared wavelengths to generate heat rather than relying solely on the hot air of a conventional sauna.

At 3 pm, things became more physical.

Cupping therapy involves placing cups on the skin and creating suction inside them. Mine stayed in place long enough to leave the familiar circular marks associated with the treatment.

The sensation alternated between firm pulling and mild discomfort. It was also strangely satisfying. Of everything I tried, cupping provided by far the most visible evidence that something had happened.

A tour of Karma Lakelands gave me a break from treatment rooms before I returned at 5:30 pm for IV therapy, where a formulation of fluids and nutrients is administered directly into the bloodstream through an intravenous line. The formulation, the company says, is selected following consultation rather than being identical for every guest.

Sitting with a drip attached to my arm was probably the moment at which the changing definition of a “wellness holiday” became clearest.

Twenty years ago, the mental image might have been cucumber slices and massages.

Now it can apparently include an IV cannula.

Jain is aware of how easily this world can veer into the language of miracle fixes.

“Biohacking has definitely helped make conversations about performance and longevity more accessible, but it can also create the impression that the body can be rapidly optimised through a device, IV drip or isolated intervention,” he said.

His own view is considerably more cautious: “Innovation should be approached with curiosity, but also discipline. Credibility does not come from making the biggest promise.”

Back To Ayurveda

My final treatment of the evening felt almost deliberately old-fashioned after everything that had preceded it.

Abhyanga is an Ayurvedic full-body massage using warm medicated oils selected around the individual’s constitution.

I loved it.

Along with the Potli massage the previous evening, sound healing and the mud bath, it ranked among my favourite parts of the stay. After electromagnetic fields, suction cups, a robotic massage system, infrared heat, an oxygen chamber and an IV line, having another person simply work warm oil into tired muscles felt wonderfully straightforward.

This juxtaposition is arguably the retreat’s most interesting feature.

It would be easy to build an Ayurvedic retreat. It would also be easy to create a clinic filled with longevity devices. The Wellness Co. is trying to put the two in conversation with each other.

“We don’t see traditional wisdom and modern wellness technologies or principles as opposing philosophies,” Jain told me. “They can and do address different dimensions of personal well-being when integrated thoughtfully.”

His definition of longevity is similarly less sci-fi than the word might suggest.

“Longevity, in its most meaningful form, is not at all about living forever,” he said. “It’s about improving and extending your healthspan,” or the years during which we remain active, independent and able to enjoy life.

The Paradox Of Slowing Down

There is an interesting tension at the centre of this kind of experience.

The retreat is built partly around slowing down, yet my main day ran from 7 am until dinner. For travellers who imagine wellness as doing very little, the structure may come as a surprise. But that is also what separates it from a conventional spa break. You are not checking in to do nothing. You are checking in to follow a programme shaped around your health and habits.

After two days, it would be impossible to draw conclusions about something as long-term as longevity. What I can say is that the retreat made me pay closer attention to things everyday life makes easy to ignore: how well I sleep, how much stress I normalise, and how rarely I truly switch off.

On my final morning, I met the doctor again for a post-therapy consultation and feedback session before checking out.

The machines were interesting, the mud bath was fun and the massages were excellent. But the most useful part of the experience may have happened before any of them, during that two-hour “interrogation.”

Because beneath all the technology and talk of longevity was a decidedly unfuturistic proposition: someone asking you, in considerable detail, how you are actually doing.

The Information

Where: The Wellness Co. Retreat at Karma Lakelands, Gurugram, Haryana

Stay programmes: The retreat offers 3-day, 5-day, 7-day and 14-day formats, with programmes built around goals including longevity, stress management, weight management, sleep and restoration, detoxification, athletic performance and vitality.

What to expect: A health consultation and diagnostics precede a personalised schedule that can combine modern wellness technologies, Ayurveda, naturopathy, nutrition, meditation, movement and recovery treatments.

Accommodation: Karma Villas and other accommodation within Karma Lakelands. My villa included multiple bedrooms, a separate living area, Wi-Fi, breakfast, Smart TV, air-conditioning, mini-fridge, RO water, tea/coffee facilities, an in-room safe and work desk.

For more info, visit thewellnessco.in/retreats

FAQs

1. Where is The Wellness Co. Retreat located?
The Wellness Co. Retreat is located at Karma Lakelands in Gurugram, Haryana.

2. What treatments are offered at The Wellness Co. Retreat?
The retreat combines modern wellness technologies with Ayurveda, naturopathy, nutrition, meditation, movement and recovery treatments.

3. What is a longevity retreat?
A longevity retreat focuses on improving healthspan, or the years during which a person remains active, independent and healthy, through a combination of personalised wellness practices and interventions.

4. How long are the wellness programmes?
The Wellness Co. Retreat offers three-, five-, seven- and 14-day programmes.

5. Is The Wellness Co. Retreat suitable for a short wellness break?
Yes. The retreat offers a three-day programme alongside longer five-, seven- and 14-day formats.