Take the Leap

Sometimes, when I look back at my life’s journey to date, I giggle to myself about how it is anything but linear - hosting retreats was never on my radar! I think it was my ability to think spherically which led to the continual evolutions of not only who I am, but what I do.

I was born in New York City, my career began in the world of finance, and I married my college sweetheart. All very normal… until my wife was diagnosed with cancer aged 30. Her journey - our journey - with cancer changed everything and after my wife passed away, I looked at my life and could no longer deny that Investment Banking was just a means to an end. A fictitious end because I learned there is no safety and that eleven-year journey left me scraping by on meagre savings. Yet, my journey with her to the end of her life revealed a passion to support people achieve their dreams.

Having confronted the worst-case scenario, I asked myself the following question, “what would be an incredible story to come from this life shift?”. My answer was a childhood dream that never left me – to live in Italy, which is where I am writing you from. When I arrived in Italy, I immediately enrolled in a Life Coach Certification Program and soon after became a coach working with people who suffered loss. This then evolved into life transformation work, or what I call Possibility in Action™.

Yet, I had a desire to do something different. You see, my transformation was amplified, or rather it was fuelled by living in Italy. Immersing myself in the amazing history all around me provided metaphors for resilience, grit, impermanence, rebirth, and renewal. It helped me step out of habitual thinking. I wanted people to experience that and that is where my passion for starting my retreat business was born.

I decided to look for locations which represented specific concepts in my personal philosophy of Possibility in Action™. Puglia offered an abundance. This was the easy part. Key takeaways I’ve learnt along the way are:

1. To not overthink or overstress about all the possible scenarios of what could go wrong. To run a retreat business, one needs to surrender to many things being out of one’s control. The pandemic being a prime example. Others include people getting sick, missed flights, cars breaking down, unexpected closures of historical sites, etc. Things will go wrong. It is natural, but keeping calm will help you deal with them.  Takeaway – you can’t account for everything. Give yourself the space to think on the fly.

2. As the organizer, building relationships immediately with guests makes all the difference. Personally, I intentionally keep my retreats limited to a maximum of eight people to ensure a safe place to share. This allows for faster relationship building during the onboarding process which, in turn, creates a level of empathy before the guest even arrive. Takeaway – do everything to build empathy before the guests arrive.

3. My gut was not to spend time on logistics as I know Puglia very well. A great friend advised me that logistics was not only airport transfer or room allocation. He suggested, as all lunches were at locations we visited, that I ask the restaurants about timings for large groups to plan accordingly. This was a golden piece of information. I was surprised at the time differences between restaurants when it came to hosting a larger group. Takeaway – check into everything while planning the itinerary.

4. I was convinced it was possible to put something together with short notice. My immediate thought was, it’s only for eight people, that will be easy. I truly did not account for marketing, or the fact that people like to book things up to a year in advance. The first few months, I just ran a Facebook ad and was baffled I had not found my eight people. Then, a very wise marketing friend reminded me that it requires a great amount of trust for a person to commit to a retreat. That I needed to market more often and more personally for people to know who I am. Puglia was well known, Robert Pardi was not. Takeaway – expect a lead time of one year for a retreat to fill up.

5. Everyone needs rest. My initial desire was to pack every single moment with a tour or coaching life lesson session. I would have been remiss if I forgot about the feelings of jet lag. I live in Italy. So, for me, I am up and ready to go. It is not the same for international guests. Takeaway – schedule down time.

6. The last thing I would point to is “after-care”. The retreat should not end when the people head home. At least not a personal growth retreat. Yes, there were gifts and a tool kit, but when I was conceptualizing this type of transformational travel, I knew there had to be more. Takeaway – plan for continued personal and group follow-up and interactions for a few months after the retreat ends.

This list is by no means exhaustive, but these represented significant “ah-ha” takeaways as I ventured into retreats. If you are thinking about leading retreats, I would urge you to go for it. It is one of the most rewarding things I have done to date. Participants have formed a community and call themselves part of the P.I.A. Family. How wonderful to be part of creating a community. Test your idea with friends first and then take the leap.