My Bhutan trip taught me what real luxury looks like

A few weeks ago, I travelled to Bhutan, landing in the valley town of Paro before beginning the long, winding drive to Six Senses Thimphu. The road does most of the work for you—hairpin bends, thinning air, the occasional cow with no regard for your schedule. By the time we reached the capital, I had stopped trying to orient myself and started paying attention instead. Bhutan has a way of recalibrating your internal pace without making a big deal out of it.

Six Senses Thimphu sits high above the valley, framed by apple orchards and pine trees that look like they are growing into themselves. The villas are spaced apart and designed in the traditional Bhutanese style. The food is grown nearby, sourced locally and changes with the seasons. Over time, I noticed how naturally the lodge assimilated into the surrounding community. It was almost like it was aware of being a place that draws from its environment and, in turn, must sustain it. Watching how little was wasted—how much was reused, shared, and tended to—I realised how often we equate abundance with excess. Here, luxury revealed itself as something far simpler: making careful use of what we already have and being accountable to where it comes from.

The next day began with a bowl of Thueb (rice porridge) followed by a walk through the property, which led me to the thermal pool and the spa centre. Taking a dip in the thermal pool followed by a Bhutanese herbal scrub (made from ingredients sourced and grown within the grounds itself) made me realise something I hadn’t acknowledged before: the body has its own rhythm, if you let it show you what it likes. Treatments like the Dotsho (Hot Stone) Bath weren’t rushed, and the pools seemed designed for lingering rather than just streaking through. I noticed how I could move faster than I thought my body would allow me to.

The next afternoon was dedicated to Taa-shing Jha Kang, a quiet immersion into Bhutanese hospitality. Inside a traditional teahouse, I was introduced to suja, the local butter tea. Made with tea leaves, butter, salt and yak milk, it was created to fortify people through long Himalayan winters. I was also guided through the making of tsa-tsa—small votive offerings shaped by hand, believed to remove obstacles and avert misfortune—and the lighting of butter lamps.

In the stillness of those small, deliberate actions, I realised that meaning accumulates in the daily rituals that we otherwise might consider insignificant or take for granted. Luxury doesn’t always come from what we can see—it comes from trusting the process, from believing that small gestures, repeated carefully, ripple out in ways we cannot measure. In that moment, it felt like such a beautiful luxury to have faith in what cannot be seen.

The highlight of my stay at Six Sense Thimpu was the curated food and beverages served on the hotel grounds, accompanied by bonfires. Between all the wonderful meals and the meditative gestures of Taa-shing Jha Kang, I began to understand that the body and the mind have their own rhythms, and they reveal themselves only when we slow down enough to notice.