I applied to attend a 10 day silent meditation retreat at the end of March/beginning of April this year and my application was accepted. My plan is to take those days off as unpaid leave.
For context, I work at a research company with 2800+ employees worldwide, based in the US. The company is pretty good about promoting a healthy work-life balance and usually provides a good deal of flexibility.
Now, my question is: Should I tell HR that I'm going to a meditation retreat? Self-exploration may not be seen as a "good enough" reason for taking time off in corporate America. Would it be better to come up with another excuse?