The Bigger the Risk, the Bigger the Reward

Here is how a joke works.

The setup builds tension. The punchline breaks it. And the result is laughter. Relief. Release. The bigger the risk the fool takes, the more exposed they make themselves, the harder we laugh when the punchline lands.

I have been thinking about this in relation to my own life. I am that fool, and the same principle applies to everything. The bigger the risk, the bigger the reward. And if you know me at all by now, you know I am quite good at jumping into the abyss and hoping the net will appear.

This retreat was no different.

I decided late last year to put on a retreat. We found a beautiful retreat centre that had one week left and said yes after the first conversation, which to me is flow. It just so happened to be wildly, lavishly expensive. What followed was a nail-biting, ego-bashing few months of hoping I wasn't going to end up paying for people to go on retreat. I had fear-filled sleepless nights. But underneath all of it, I trusted.

So. The reward.

Sixteen souls chose to leap empty-handed into the void with Indra and me for a week. What followed was the deep, sometimes uncomfortable, necessary work. With raucous belly laughing woven throughout. Not manufactured. A natural by-product of the release from tension that comes when people risk that much authenticity and vulnerability in a room together. We had fires, swam in the lake, ate chef-cooked food from the land, danced on tables, moon-bathed, and watched for UFOs. A woman who had never been witnessed felt herself for the first time ever. Everyone married themselves. Yes, you heard that correctly. And my sweet mother came and healed her relationship with ageing. She is now officially embracing her Crone era.

Just to let you know I didn't have to pay for people to go on retreat with me. We just managed to cover our costs with not one penny of profit.

And I would do it all again tomorrow. Well, not tomorrow. I'm exhausted.

But get this, my friends. I discovered something about myself.

I am a great retreat leader.

Not because everything was easy. It wasn't. But because I know how to hold a room when things get real. I know how to find the humour in the darkness without using it to escape the darkness. I know how to be with people in their most tender places and make them feel safe enough to go further.

The punchline after months of tension and risk and sleepless nights?

I am doing more of this. And next time I'm getting paid lol.

Watch this space.

I love you.
I love you.
I love you.

Lizzie x