Kickstarting an ongoing process — A three-day retreat full of self-discovery for Lauranne.
"It is an ongoing process even after the end of the retreat... I would recommend it to people that want to move forward and that are ready to show up and play a little bit with the process."
Industry: Coaching and Consulting
Job title: Leadership and Management Coach
Our colleague Lauranne Vera experienced a Surdek three-day retreat as a participant to better understand the journey people go through when they join one of our events. She recorded a series of videos to share her thoughts throughout the retreat.
Day 1 recap - Settling in
I arrived here a bit apprehensive, wondering: Where am I going with this? Where will this lead me? I realize that tonight was mainly about creating a safe space for people to speak. In any case, I can say that I felt safe.
I had the impression I had some pre-built ideas and judgments at the start about the experience, maybe about certain participants and how things were going to go. At the end of this first night, I found that a lot of these melted away because we got to know each person.
I also got to see how Steffan was coaching us through this. It really created something with a shared feeling of well-being and intimacy between participants which allowed us to understand each other better. Oh… the other thing that stuck with me is that the food here is really amazing!
Listen to the video for the full breakdown. Video is in French with English subtitles.
Day 2 recap - Getting personal
Today we spoke about a lot of topics that I had already heard before because I work with Steffan every day. I realized that even if I knew about these topics, when asking ourselves questions like: What does this represent for us? In which situations can this be applied to in our life in general? It is totally different because we don’t ask ourselves these kinds of questions.
Tonight, right after supper, everything started to change for me a bit. I connected a lot more with the exercises that we did with Steffan. It even touched my emotional side. I am fundamentally a very emotional person and I think that since the start of the retreat I saw this more like personal reflection questions and really taking a look at ourselves and our lives.
One small takeaway for me today is something I shared as feedback about my day. I found it weird because I was feeling a lot more grounded. I had such a strong feeling of presence.
In the evening session, I felt my emotions kicking in and I really learned some much deeper things about myself through exercises that are really not so scary. So a really interesting second day and a lot more emotional for me.
I feel this is important for me and that it will help me. So I am super enthusiastic to see the third and final day but also to see what this will provoke for me in a week, two weeks, a month, two months. I think that I have some work to do for this and just like for everyone else, this will keep stirring inside me.
Listen to the video for the full breakdown. Video is in French with English subtitles.
Day 3 recap - Moving forward
The last day of the retreat and the retreat in general was full of emotions. Let’s just say that the intensity of the retreat increases as it goes along from day to day.
The first day is about self-discovery. It’s about asking ourselves questions about where we are right now and sometimes it can go fairly deep. We do not always realize how many things we pick up that we kind of know unconsciously. You know those things we never told ourselves or admitted to ourselves. The last day is really about how we move forward and what we want to be in our lives.
Right now, I think it is more of an increased awareness about myself. I was a bit fascinated by the process too. By doing one of the exercises, I discovered something about myself that I did not know that I knew. And what I discovered really defines me as a human being. If you take that thing away from me, I’m no longer me. I found inspiration in what I wrote in that exercise. And basically I realized that this is who and what I want to be in the world.
Leadership is as much in our professional lives as our personal lives. I don’t think you can really be a leader and develop your leadership without developing it in both sides of your life. The retreat really taught me many things.
My overall experience at the retreat
The retreat was a bit weird for me sometimes. Let’s just say you need to play the game. Because there are exercises that may seem strange at first but by the end of it, we realize why we did it and that it was good for us and it brought something to us.
Steffan talks about the retreat as a journey, as a path we are following and that really describes it. Everyone lives it differently. Everyone arrives with a different baggage and leaves with something different. But essentially, everyone learned something and everyone is happy to have done it.
What happens is not even describable. I could not tell you exactly what I did during those two and a half days and I am still asking myself how I will talk about it with my boyfriend. It’s just kind of mystical. It gives us a different view and a different perspective of ourselves. It gives us inspiration, the desire to move forward, it remotivates us although I did not think that I needed motivation at the start of it.
I am leaving with a feeling of well-being and with the feeling that I took a pause in my life to take a closer look at myself and see where I want to go. I think the best gift we take with us when we leave is a sense of direction, and being inspired and motivated.
Listen to the video for the full breakdown. Video is in French with English subtitles.
