Considers the unexpected adventure of staying put and reveals a counterintuitive truth: The more ways we have to connect, the more we seem desperate to unplug. Why would a man who seems able to go everywhere and do anything--like the international heartthrob and Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Famer Leonard Cohen--choose to spend years sitting still and going nowhere? What can Nowhere offer that no Anywhere can match? And why might a lifelong traveler like Pico Iyer, who has journeyed from Easter Island to Ethiopia, Cuba to Kathmandu, think that sitting quietly in a room and getting to know the seasons and landscapes of Nowhere might be the ultimate adventure? In The Art of Stillness, Iyer draws on the lives of well-known wanderer-monks like Cohen--as well as from his own experiences as a travel writer who chooses to spend most of his time in rural Japan--to explore why advances in technology are making us more likely to retreat. Iyer reflects that this is perhaps the reason why many people--even those with no religious commitment--seem to be turning to yoga, or meditation, or tai chi.