Five places that made me: Arianna Huffington, CEO

PARIS

I was 11 years old and it was not only my first trip abroad, it was my first time outside of Athens. It made a huge impression on me. If this is what travelling was, I wanted more of it. Of course, as I later learned, it turns out not every city is a beautiful as Paris, but it certainly told me there was a big world outside of Athens.

INDIA

When I was 17, I was able to go to India and study comparative religion at Visva-Bharati University, outside of Calcutta. In between studies, I'd travel across the country – and fell in love with every part of it. It's a love affair that has continued to this day. It's obviously very different from Greece, but in both countries there's a continuity with thousands of years of culture, which felt exhilarating to me. And as I've become more passionate about how science is validating the benefits of ancient contemplative practices, India has become even more fascinating to me.

RHODES

When my daughters were little we took a holiday in a small village on the island of Rhodes. One day, we went to the nearby Tharri Monastery, a vine-covered 10th-century monastery where we met a monk, Father Christodoulos. I remember he gave a small painted icon to my children and in return, Isabella, then five years old, drew a picture of him, long and thin with a beard down to his waist – artistic licence. She offered it to him at the beach while sitting on his lap – she in her pink bikini, he in his grey monk's habit. He asked if she had slept well the previous night. "No, I had a nightmirror," she said. "A big mosquito in tennis shoes running all over me." The monastery was the sort of place where small memories make an impression.

HAWAII

In 2014, I took a family vacation to Hawaii. And this was special not just because it's Hawaii – which is amazing – but because that was a week I'd decided to do an unplugging challenge with Cindi Leive, the editor of Glamour, and Mika Brzezinski. Our rules were no social media, and a limit on work email check-ins to twice a day. So instead of being constantly chained to my devices, I was able to spend time with my family without snapping shots of beautiful sunsets, or tweeting pictures of our dinner, or just mindlessly checking email for no reason. So it was a totally different experience than we normally have travelling now. I was really present, instead of just half there, and half connected to the rest of the world through my phone. And it turns out Hawaii is really, really beautiful!

ANTIPAROS