Escaping to Lake Shrine

Lake Shrine has been on my to visit place for a good amount of time. Fortunately for me, I was able to finally visit Lake Shrine upon successfully reserving a spot for myself. While the reservation process is easy, it’s not exactly guaranteed that you’ll receive a reservation.

When Lake Shrine opens their reservation process on Saturday, at 10 am on the dot, you’re competing with other people that also want to visit Lake Shrine. My advice, as is mentioned on their website, is to visit their reservation page a little before 10 am, refresh that page right after 10 am and quickly make the reservation. Since I hadn’t done this during my first reservation attempt, I wasn’t successful at getting a reservation for any of the days. I was bummed but I learned my lesson and came prepared the following week, where I was successful in obtaining a reservation for the day and time frame of my choice. It felt good to be able to get that reservation!

Lake Shrine is free to enter, although there is a donation box you can put cash into. No pressure to do so and the box wasn’t obnoxiously in your face either. Because of this, I ended up deciding to donate a small amount, in hopes that it’ll come in handy towards the maintenance of their grounds and whatnot.

Lake Shrine is a beautiful place. It’s near the beach but you don’t exactly see the beach from here, unless you climb up to the temple. (I didn’t climb the stairs to the temple but I’m pretty sure you’d have a view of the beach up there.)

I found the sunken garden hidden, peaceful and otherworldly. If it weren’t for my fear of potential insects lurking around the many plants that make the sunken garden, I would have probably spent a good amount of time here.

Time seems to stand still on the grounds. You can walk in a circular fashion as many times as you want. You can find a bench and still your mind. You can also go inside the windmill chapel and meditate.

I was amazed at how many people could concentrate on meditating. Of course, I don’t really know what goes on inside someone’s mind when their eyes are closed but I am going to be honest and say that I had trouble with my meditation attempts. My mind just couldn’t be still. It dawned on me that I’d need more attempts before I could meditate successfully. It also dawned on me that it was ok that I couldn’t meditate. And that it was ok for me to just sit in silence, enjoy nature or do something that would give me peace and healing.

Inside Lake Shrine, you can forget that you’re in Los Angeles county. Seriously, you can escape the hustle and bustle of city life here. If it weren’t for the congested freeways, I’d consider coming to Lake Shrine more often.

While most visitors are quiet and respectful, I did encounter a few that were a bit absorbed with themselves. (What’s new about that, right?) One particular lady was busy taking an infinite amount of selfies near me. It was distracting. While I knew I wouldn’t be all that visible if I somehow ended up in her photos, I didn’t appreciate her going selfie crazy near me. I also found it strange because she originally wasn’t sitting near me and wasn’t even doing any type of photography at the time. For whatever reason, she decided to relocate herself to the bench next to me and go into major selfie mode. I didn’t mind her moving near me as the bench is for everyone. However, it was strange, regardless of how stunning she was. Another girl looked like she could be a famous instagrammer and I was cool with her because unlike the stunning lady, the “instagrammer” did not take selfies in people’s space. I get that the present culture is all about social media but in some places, like Lake Shrine, social media just feels wrong. You don’t have to always be “on”, people. You can do you first. Social media can wait.

Other than that and a few people walking counterclockwise instead, Lake Shrine is a nice escape from the craziness that exists in city life, as well as this ongoing pandemic era.

Staff (or volunteers) were also welcoming, which I appreciated. I admit that I was afraid of what type of staff would be representing Lake Shrine, but I received a lot of peaceful vibes from them. One lady gave me an introduction on Lake Shrine and was quite hospitable. I could see kindness in her and really liked how she mentioned I could read their books, if I wanted to yet never really pushing me to buy books from their temporary gift shop.

I’m thankful I had the opportunity to visit Lake Shrine. Hopefully, I can plan another visit when I know I’ll be in the Santa Monica area.