$5,250 for eternal bliss?

Can money buy happiness? Ananda, a bohemian-glam retreat in the Himalayas, wants you to believe it can.

At this holistic center occupying the 100-acre estate of the maharajah of Tehri Garhwal, bliss-chasing guests -- celebrities, kings and queens -- have been known to check in (or out, depending on how you look at it) for up to a month of learning yoga, meditation and ayurvedic medical advice. (The price tag of a week of such rejuvenation: around $5,250.)

Look inside the palace

At night, guests attend seminars led by a guru of Vedanta philosophy, the ancient Indian science that offers lessons on how to better control one's mind and lead a less stressful life. By day, guests follow an exhaustive regimen of spa therapies, macro-nutritious meals, private yoga classes and poolside naps.

The goal: detoxing, de-stressing and, ultimately, trying to become happier.

Money making you unhappy?

It all sounds good to me. If a little Eastern philosophy could help me lead a better life and I could get a few good massages along the way, why not?

I arrive by train in the town of Haridwar -- accompanied by Abby Ellin, a writer friend -- and am greeted by a Sikh chauffeur in a red silk turban. "Welcome," he says in a proper British accent, handing us two bottles of chilled water and ushering us into a silver air-conditioned SUV. (If this doesn't do it for you, it's possible to charter a helicopter from New Delhi for $5,000 and land on the resort's private pad.)

Map: Where in the world is Ananda?

In less than an hour, we arrive at what feels like a fairy-tale destination. A private guard opens the automatic iron gates, and we cruise into the circular driveway of a building decorated with Italian Renaissance columns and Rajasthani jharokha, a type of overhanging balcony. Most guests stay in deluxe rooms with private terraces overlooking the Ganges River and the valley of Rishikesh, but for $1,600 a night, it's possible to upgrade to the castle's Vice Regal suite, which has a marble bathroom, three fireplaces (including one in the bathroom), a private terrace, an elevator and its own butler.

White and red flower petals are strewn over the marble floor of the reception area. Two young Indian women in silk saris greet us by placing mala necklaces over our heads and blessing our foreheads with red powdered tilaks, or markings. We are led through the reception hall into an art deco sitting room with 14-foot ceilings and Venetian crystal chandeliers. The walls are adorned with photographs of kings, queens and viceroys who have visited the palace for retreats. A waiter delivers two cups of steaming ginger lemon tea.

Over the next week, I live a life that is part Hindu princess and part monk. Every morning, I wake up in my deluxe room to a butler delivering tea. I walk through the grounds, past monkeys frolicking in a fountain and peacocks parading their plumes, up to the palace for a group yoga class in the grand ballroom.

The guests include Russian princesses in Chanel glasses, Indian heads of state, spaced-out honeymooners and Euro-Buddhists. Everyone walks around in white pajamas with austere expressions. The guests seem vaguely stressed out over the heavy schedule of therapeutic treatments.

"It's quite a lot of programs to fit into the day," says Jane Brown, a fast-talking lawyer from London who is on the $3,000, five-night de-stress program. "This morning I had personal training followed by a yoga session, followed immediately by a breathing session. And then in the afternoon there's aromatherapy, reflexology and some sort of luxury pampering treatment."

Ananda's 21,000-square-foot spa includes private steam rooms, hot baths, a fitness center and a relaxation lounge where you can listen through headphones to New Age chanting or mountain sounds. Therapies range from Swedish massage to aromatherapy facials, but the prime focus is ayurveda, the Indian system of medicine that incorporates the use of herbal oils, massage therapies and a diet based on an individual's body type.

My week starts with a private consultation with Sunil Kumar, an ayurvedic doctor who asks me a range of questions. What type of dreams do I have? Do I prefer sweet food or savory? Do I consider my mind active or calm?

Once I admit that I'm a hyperactive thinker who loves spicy food and tends toward anxiety dreams, he determines my ayurvedic body type as pitta-kapha. My doshas, or dominant body elements, are fire, water and earth. Kumar then prescribes for me a course of body therapies, lifestyle and diet adjustments to better balance these elements. To calm my fiery thoughts, for example, I'm supposed to eat less spicy food, avoid excessive heat and exercise at night.

He also prescribes a body therapy called shirodhara. I am ushered into a treatment room and lie down on a massage table while two women ring chimes, sing prayers and slowly drip hot herbal oil through a copper pot over my third eye in order to relax my knowledge chakra -- or, as the doctor explains in Western terms, to signal my pituitary gland to chill. Within minutes, I'm rocked into a trance that feels like I'm swaying in a sailboat.

Watch Rachel's shirodhara treatment

After the session, I stagger up to the fitness center to meet up with Abby. She is in a trance of her own, watching TV on an elliptical trainer. "You do yoga, have hot oil dripped on your third eye, and at the same time they serve Diet Coke," she says, bouncing up and down on the machine. "And you can watch Oprah! It's a spa-shram!"

At night, a visiting professor from India's Vedanta Academy is teaching classes on topics that range from love to anger control to ego management. The first night's lecture happens to be called "The Concept of Happiness."

"The mathematical equation for happiness is the number of desires fulfilled, accomplished or achieved, divided by the number of desires entertained," professor Sree says. "So the question is: How do you increase happiness?"

"Work harder," a guest from Los Angeles says.

"Have fewer desires," Abby adds.

"Yes. By fulfilling one desire, so many other desires crop up," Sree says. "So in that way your happiness is not increasing. . . . The way to increase your happiness is to reach for a higher goal, which will help you to eradicate your lower desires."

The next day I book a private session with the professor. Sitting on a lawn in front of the castle, he explains what guests at Ananda are looking for. "People in places like the U.S. seem to have lost peace of mind," he says. "It appears that the more money they have, the more unhappy they become.

"Vedanta says the ideal life is where you have all the wealth and at the same time the contentment of the more simple life of an Indian villager, not one at the cost of the other. The test of this evolution is that at the end of the day, when you hit the pillow, you should fall asleep right away."

Sree spends much of his time at the world's top business schools, explaining how people can make more money by managing their lives better. But at Ananda, guests spend a lot of money (and time) talking to him about how to sleep better at night.

"Having a management education doesn't help you to handle your life," he says. "You may have weaknesses that may show in the way you handle people you work with. Vedanta is a technique of self-management that as a result will help people become far more productive at work and at the same time have more peace."

"And then make more money?" I ask.

"Yes," he says, smiling. "Make much more money with less stress."

"Then they can spend that money to come to a place like Ananda, to talk about why they're so unhappy," I say.

"Yes," he says. "They spend money to learn that you have to find bliss in yourself."

After a week at Ananda, I am a little too blissed out. I've been massaged, oiled down with herbs and stretched to the max. I've philosophized and been blessed. My third eye is sore. And I officially feel like a Hindu princess.

I still don't know if I believe that money can't make you happier. But I do know that it can buy a great week in the Himalayas learning why it might not.

Published Aug. 20, 2008

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