How to Support Retreat Leaders and Attendees Post-Retreat

Summary
In this episode, Ashley Gibson, a trauma clinician and organizational consultant, discusses the systemic issues behind retreat burnout, the importance of aftercare, trauma-informed practices, and how retreat leaders can better support themselves and their attendees.




Takeaways
Systemic causes of retreat burnout
Importance of aftercare and pre-care
Trauma-informed retreat practices
Supporting retreat leaders' mental health
Systemic diagnosis and organizational change
Relational nature of burnout
The 'empty cup' myth and its dangers
Strategies for retreat leaders facing personal burnout



Chapters
00:00 Introduction and guest introduction
01:15 Ashley Gibson's background and expertise
02:12 Why retreat attendees experience exhaustion post-retreat
03:14 The system designed for output, not sustainability
04:23 The importance of aftercare and ongoing support
04:49 The danger of the 'empty cup' myth
06:33 Rethinking service above self and self-care
08:30 What retreat designers are up against with systemic issues
10:00 Diagnosing systemic burnout for effective intervention
10:17 Questions retreat leaders should ask clients pre-retreat
11:54 How retreat leaders can communicate with organizations
13:27 Ashley Gibson's transition from organizational leadership to trauma work
14:49 What it means for a retreat leader to be trauma-informed
16:21 Handling emotional responses and overwhelm during activities
18:38 Supporting retreat leaders with personal burnout
22:22 The importance of community and peer support for retreat leaders
23:31 Self-care strategies for retreat leaders before, during, and after retreats
24:43 Rapid fire: preferences for boundaries, systems, and practices

🔗 Connect with Ashley Gibson | Meaning in Practice
📧 Email: ashley@meaninginpractice.com
🌐 Website: meaninginpractice.com/speaking
🔗 LinkedIn: Ashley Gibson — www.linkedin.com/in/ashleycbgibson

Bonus resources to mention:

Free Intent-Impact Index (5-min diagnostic): form.typeform.com/to/GSapbp18
Newsletter: ashleycgibson.substack.com


🔗 Connect with Holly Porter | Retreat RNR 
📧 Email: holly@hollyporter.com 
🔗 LinkedIn: Holly Porter | Retreat RNR 
🎵 TikTok: @retreatrnr 
▶️ YouTube: @intlretreatassociation
📸 Instagram: @retreatrnr | @hollyporterinternational 
📘 Facebook: HollyAnnPorter

FREE GIFT: 2026 Retreat Industry Report
https://internationalretreatassociation.org/

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to All Things Retreat Podcast. I'm Holly Porter, your host and CEO of Retreat R and R. With over 25 years of experience in designing transformative retreats. I'm here to share insights and inspiration to help you create extraordinary experience. Whether you're a pro or just starting out, you'll find valuable ideas here. Enjoy the ride. Let's dive in. Hi everyone. Welcome back to the show or welcome to the show. If it's your first time, we're happy that you landed here and found us. We are sponsored by the International Retreat Association, which is a brand new and one and only kind of association to support the whole retreat ecosystem. So, International RetreatAssociation.com, if you haven't checked us out there, maybe you found us there because this podcast is on there. But we are going to be chatting today with Ashley Gibson, and she's a licensed trauma politician and organizational consult who diagnoses why burnout keeps happening after the retreat ends. She's the founder of Meaning in Practice, where she helps organizations map the structural conditions that produce exhaustion. And the leaders who want to stop repairing what they didn't break. She holds an MED from William and Mary, is trained in EMDR and ACT, and spent over a decade in marketing and leadership across arts and healthcare organizations before stepping into clinical practice. Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Thank you so much for having me. I'm happy to be here.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

Hopefully I can butcher, not say those letters right. I'm just like a perfect job.

SPEAKER_01 1:44

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

There's so many acronyms for things I'm like, oh boy.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

I know, especially in the therapy world.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Well, and the International Association or International Retreat Association is R-R-I-R-A and I, IRA, and I don't use it because I just don't love it. You know, I just like that to go to people's minds, but it's such a long name. Sometimes names matter, but I knew it couldn't be global. It needed to be international, uh, even though you know I just felt better. So let's talk about the retreat aftermath problem. I think it's very relevant. Uh, why do you think so many retreat attendees feel the same exhaustion within weeks of coming back from a retreat?

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Yeah, it's a great question. I think retreats are designed to address symptoms, right? They work at that symptom level, usually at the individual level. Sometimes you're working at a team or a larger level, but generally you're looking to restore that individual, you know, rest and clarity and connection. But the system that you're returning to is not necessarily designed for sustainability, it's designed for output speed. So it's not that your retreat attendees didn't uh they failed to hold on to the lessons, it's that they took them, but they walked right back into a system that was designed to metabolize that clarity and turn it right back into stress. So it would be easy for us to see it as, you know, as a retreat leader, it was a follow-through issue. The attendee wasn't able to pick up what they needed or to keep going with it. But really, it's just proof that the system is working just as it was designed to.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Yeah. I think a lot of retreat leaders um really leave, well, they leave money on the table too, if we're talking about financially, by not integrating them into some some kind of a process. If you did, especially if you did a transformational type retreat, um doing the aftercare. I feel like the aftercare, the before care, the at the retreat care, and then the aftercare. I feel like there's so many that aren't realizing uh not just the financial gain, but how how helpful that is to people that that would probably resolve a lot of that happening if if the aftercare was happening.

SPEAKER_01 4:04

I mean, even from a you know a therapeutic standpoint, right? I spent 13 years in executive leadership before I became a therapist. But as a therapist, uh it's not often that people say, Okay, I'm done with therapy forever. Even the people who see amazing gains, which they do, will still be in some kind of maintenance mode because they're still walking back into systems that they personally don't have agency over. So I absolutely see that as aftercare.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

Yeah, I just I think yeah, needs to be happening. We'll be talking about that a lot on this show. We have and we will be because I feel like it's so important. It's not just um a retreat's not just a party, you know. You're you're really there to perform some kind of transformation, even if it's just a girl's trip or whatever. You're still gonna you're leaving for a reason. You want some kind of new atmosphere change, and so you want that some kind of transformation, or you wouldn't be going. Let's talk about the empty cup myth. So you push back on that, you can't afford an empty cup. What's that dangerous?

SPEAKER_01 5:04

I mean, I I listen, like I use it with my therapy clients all the time, but at the same time, we're back to it makes burnout look like a depletion problem, right? You're empty, we need to fill you up, and so it gets useful for organizations or retreat leaders who are able to go, oh well, I filled your cup up. I fixed it, we sent you to a retreat, we did what we needed to do, right? Even if it was just a girls' weekend, it's meant to fill something. But it's back to putting that burden of repair on the individual, and then the burden of performance goes back to walk right back into a team or an environment that did burn them out, right? So it can be a tricky spot for a retreat leader to be in because you feel this pressure to pour perfectly into that cup. But the real issue is that the cup has a hole in the bottom. So I tell leaders, you know, I don't teach individual resilience. Individual resilience is important. We don't want your cup to be empty, but you have to have a greater understanding, a diagnostic capability to understand how the system is functioning because we all live and function inside of these systems.

SPEAKER_00 6:11

Yeah, yeah, so true. It's you know, I've said this before on the show, but it came up a lot while I was writing my near-death shift book about um filling your cup was in there as well. But Rotary International, I was I love that club, that organization, you know, but their motto is service above self. And as I was writing my book, I realized how flawed. I mean, it was it was created in 1911 by men because women were not even allowed in rotary until I don't know, I think I like maybe the 80s or 90s, 1900s or you know, a long time. So I feel like it was like if you can't, if you serve everyone else, you're always gonna have an empty cup because it's putting the oxygen mask on on somebody else before you serve yourself and can't breathe, right? And anyway, I I just yeah, I so I talk about that a lot. And I feel like I probably should take some action on write that, right their their corporation and just say, you know, this is due for an update. It's it you can't you can't serve others at full capacity until you can serve yourself and get yourself where you need to be to help others, then you're serving at full capacity.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

But it's so tricky, right? Because uh no matter I love the idea of service above self, but it again it puts that onus back on you individually. And what ends up happening is the people who burn out think, oh, well, I just didn't try hard enough, right? I didn't care enough. And it means it's a uh snakey tail kind of situation. The people who care more are the more likely to feel depleted because they're pouring and pouring and pouring because they care so much.

SPEAKER_00 7:51

Yeah, yeah, that's true. That is so true. Um, anyway, we could we could have a whole show on that.

SPEAKER_01 7:58

Let's do it.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

But uh the point is fill your cup. Right.

SPEAKER_01 8:05

Um fill your cup and then let's repair the cup too. Let's let's fix that hole.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

That's right, whatever's seeping out. But if your cup runeth over, maybe it won't be seeping out. Yeah, hopefully. Um so if the tree, if okay, what retreat leaders are actually up against? If the retreat works, but the system doesn't, what does that mean for the people designing the retreats?

SPEAKER_01 8:28

You know, then it's asking these folks who are designing this retreat to do repair work on a system they were handed. They didn't design that system, they don't control that system. They can't control the disappointment a client might feel after a retreat because it's really not about whether or not the retreat filled the cup. It's about did we fix the hole in the cup? And a retreat by itself can't do that, right? So a retreat leader might absorb post-retreat disappointment, but it's not about what did or didn't happen at the retreat, it's about the return to the system. And again, back to that idea of you're probably working as a leader with uh high performing teams, people who care. So I think what's important for your audience to know is the transformation you're creating inside a retreat environment is very real, right? We've all been there, we've been sitting in a workshop and thought, wow, everybody gets it, and we're all on the same page. And then you get confused, you walk back into the system because you're like, wait, where did that magic go? Where did that reset and rejuvenation and insight go? And it's because the system is very real. You're not failing, you're just working in a narrower lane. So I know we're gonna talk a little bit about, you know, what to do about all of this, but uh my message often when I work with these leaders is having the proper diagnosis, really understanding why this is perpetuating is perhaps the most important thing you can do so that you can frame it appropriately for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 9:55

Right. I like that, yeah, for sure. What's one question retreat leaders should ask their clients before the retreat even starts?

SPEAKER_01 10:04

So generally, I think we would ask, you know, what do you want to get out of this? And I even ask it as a clinician, but I would rather your retreat leaders ask, what are you walking back into? I want them to understand what kind of system you're gonna send all of these folks from your lovely retreat back into. So if that answer is it's a system that expects we get back to them no matter the hour, right? Or um a manager who thinks that rest is a reward for finishing a task. You know, the retreat leader can gently kind of name that early and go, okay, that dynamic, that system you're gonna walk back into is going to exist long after our retreat. So you could use this question of what part of your return environment would be most likely to eat the change that you're hoping to generate in the retreat. What are you trying to get out of the retreat? And then how might it go awry when you get there? So we can you're not coaching necessarily, but you're teaching them to read that system that they're going to re-enter, and then that changes your retreat from a personal restoration to more of a strategic intervention, and it protects you as a retreat leader from having to take personal responsibility for the aftermath because you've taken the whole system into consideration.

SPEAKER_00 11:21

Yeah, I like that.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

Yes, yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 11:23

Well, how do you how do retreat leaders have a better conversation with the companies and teams that they send to them?

SPEAKER_01 11:31

Yeah. I think it actually gives retreat leaders a real permission slip, right? To uh help folks understand you can't buy wellness in a one-off way. You know, you feel it uh regardless of I went to a yoga class, okay, great. Did you make the whole system limber for the future? And so helping retreat leaders kind of understand that if they're talking and they're selling and they're working with these companies and teams, helping them understand, okay, this is an expensive solution for temporary relief. So it's not a complaint, but if you again you offer them this frame, hey, burnout is actually a problem of individuals not getting enough care, right? That's a great thing to do. We want to make sure they have that wellness. I'm not saying there shouldn't be a wellness element. But if you can educate and say it's a structural design problem, that line's actually gonna be useful because then it sounds like expertise, but not blame. And the organizations that hear that clearly are going to be your best referral sources, right? The ones that don't are gonna come back in your retreat and be confused as to why it's not working. But the ones who really get it and who you're able to mesh and meld with are going to uh help you build a narrative that really serves the overall system and lets them kind of level up year to year. And that's where your best work is gonna come from as a retreat leader.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

So Ashley, your your path has taken you from marketing and organizational leadership into trauma and form clinical work. It's broad. Uh, what led you to connect burnout with both individual healing and organizational structure?

SPEAKER_01 13:10

Yeah, I was seeing it from both sides. So for the first few years that I saw clients, I was still in my executive role. And I would do my 40 hours, I worked from home during the day, uh, make all these decisions, triage budgets and projects, and then I would turn around and go sit in the therapist chair in the evening and see those same patterns walk into my room from the other side. So at that point, I was finishing up school and I was understanding, oh, there's actually clinical frameworks for diagnosing why what we would call a maladaptive relational pattern continues because burnout is relational. It's in the definition of burnout, it has to do with interpersonal context, right, in a workplace. And so when you add stressors to that environment, there's this bigger clinical picture. And I went, Oh, I can take what I know as a therapist about the neuroscience and relationships of all of this and apply it to organizational contexts. And so hence structural burnout. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:09

So what do you think it means to truly for a retreat? Let's see, a retreat leader to be trauma informed. What do you think that means?

SPEAKER_01 14:19

So, like a therapist, I would tell you that being trauma-informed is less about trying to um uh make sure that you mitigate every possible thing that could go wrong or that could be activating for somebody because the reality is we don't know what's gonna be activating for somebody. Right. Being trauma-informed is more walking into it with this lens of understanding there is the potential for someone to be activated by X, Y, and Z and being able to navigate that in a way that feels appropriate to the situation. So I always use the example of I work with trauma. Uh if you've got folks who, you know, are veterans, perhaps they are sensitive to loud noises or feeling cornered or backed into a wall, right? Um same thing. If you're working with neurodivergent folks, a lot of people have issues with various uh sensory inputs or may want an alternative to big group activities or one-on-one interactions. So being trauma-informed does not mean you have to build a retreat that serves every single iteration of every potential problem, but it does mean that you've kind of pre-thought that those things might come up and that you provide a gentle opening for someone to voice accessibility concerns when and if it's needed.

SPEAKER_00 15:36

Yeah. Okay, so what do you think a retreat leader should do when a participant has a strong emotional response or becomes overwhelmed during an activity? Because a lot of retreat leaders do these kinds of activities. What do you think they should do?

SPEAKER_01 15:50

Yeah. So I bet that retreat leaders are already doing a lot of what I'm gonna share, but um uh co-regulation is the first thing that comes to mind for me, right? The way that I handle myself in a situation is going to help depend on how you're going to be able to re-regulate or not. So if I start talking really fast like this and moving around really fast and this and that, the other, oh my gosh, we have to get you out of here, it's gonna keep you activated and elevated. So perhaps another element of being trauma-informed is to have probably already do, a quiet space or area that you are able to share with folks at top when you're doing, you know, your housekeeping. Hey, if you need a moment to step away, this area exists for you. And that way you already have bookmarked in your brain that you're kind of able to come over, you're able to co-regulate with your nervous system, keeping your breathing, your tone nice and low. I hate to say like you're approaching a scared animal, but think of the way you would kind of get down on um, get down on a kid's level, right? Hey, you're having a really hard time. Totally get that. We would love for you to join us when you need a minute, right? And so being able to escort them or direct them to an area that you've already pre-identified for them is what I would recommend. And then you can also have resources ready to go. If you have a retreat, um, if you have a co-leader or a partner there who could attend to them, if you're not able to in that moment, attend to them on the next break and check in with them. Um because folks may feel a little embarrassed, right? If they have a big reaction, and you're gonna want to make sure that um they know, hey, that was welcome. It comes up a lot, and I'm here for you, and I'm happy to offer resources if you need more.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Yeah, that's a good, good one. Okay, let's talk about the leader who's personally burned out, or maybe they have their own trauma that's a recent, like you know, a lot of times retreat leaders plan their retreats six, 12, 18 months out. Okay. Between that time, life happens and a lot of things can happen, even to a retreat leader. So let's just say, without, you know, obviously canceling is not the answer. What what kind of let's talk to just the retreat leader right now, and that leader that has this retreat, you've you've had some major life shift, whether it be a death or a divorce or something traumatic's happened, some kind of major, major thing. But what yeah, what would you suggest to them? They're responsible for everyone else.

unknown 18:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:13

How would you give them some practical ways they can handle themselves or what maybe they could do prior, during, mostly, and after a retreat?

SPEAKER_01 18:23

I think that's a great question. Um, the first thing that came to mind for me is community, and that would be something I'd want them to tap into their folks before a retreat would start, right? So if you're coming up on a retreat and you're already feeling like, wow, I'm not gonna be able to give 100% as leading this retreat, before the retreat starts is the time to tap in and ask, okay, I was planning on personally facilitating activities A through Z. Who can I bring in to help me with activities A and B? Or somebody to help me with C and D. Even if it's just another body in the room to hand you a bottle of water or um warm up the crowd for you while you take a breather, leaning on your network, and people are always delighted to help. The other thing that came to mind for me was being open with folks takes a lot, you know? Being able to say, hey, I'm not quite at my top game today, and how much you want to share is up to you. But kind of owning, like I appreciate your um rolling with me. Again, people want to help and it actually gets them right on your side immediately.

SPEAKER_00 19:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

But the other thing I would say is you ask for during. I would continue to regulate for yourself, and whether that's something like breath work or visualization, if you have outside um topics coming in, look, like I got a divorce while I was first starting to see clients, and so every day I would do this visualization for myself before I started where I would bracket and see myself putting all of the crap from my personal life into a box away before I started with my clients for the day. And I still do that even now. If something comes up on session and it's activating for me, I see in a corner of my mind myself putting those things away so I can remain present with what I need to do. So it's being proactive in those ways, using those tools throughout the day and managing your own expectations for yourself. Um, because as a leader, as a retreat leader, you want it to go perfectly. You want it to hit every beat, you want everyone to feel so energized and so transformed. And that's so noble. And if that's the expectation you're walking into the room with and you're also pouring from your own empty cup, right, you're gonna do more damage to yourself psychologically from holding that expectation than you would from saying, okay, let's be honest about what I'm working with today. I'm probably not going to be hitting a hundred percent. What would the minimum viable product of success for me personally look like? Manage your own expectations for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

Yeah, yeah. Such a such a great conversation because I I feel like we talk about like a lot of what the retreat leaders can do for their people coming and their attendees, but sometimes where's that support for the retreat leaders? Which I'm really hoping the association will help give that to so many that don't don't know where to go. I mean, we we offer right now we're doing a 12-week universal law, but it's a very short little class they can come to, and then it's networking and talking and meeting peers. And I I just I always want to bring that aspect to the association because I people want to network, they want to know, oh, they've gone through this, or or how would you handle this? And and um yeah, we need that.

SPEAKER_01 21:30

Yeah, I mean, look, you are the host of the party, right? When you're a retreat leader, and so uh the host is also not the whole party. The people at the party are the whole party, and the structure that you've set up and the food and all these other things. So uh managing your own expectation for a hostess can throw a great party, and a hostess can also be having a bad hair day. I know you said you're in hair, and still throw a really good party.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

So Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean. But if you if you've been through my biggest takeaway is get the help first before the retreat. If you know you've you know been involved in something, figure out how, I think find figuring out solutions to before you go that might trigger you and and just to doing some self-care around that.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

Yeah. And I would if you can, right? And I'd imagine a lot of retreat leaders are already planning for themselves like some time off after a retreat. You know, give yourself even more recovery time knowing that you're working with um less and make sure you're eating and watering yourself and moving and doing all of those things appropriately to an even greater extent.

SPEAKER_00 22:41

Absolutely. Okay, I'm gonna ask you just a couple of our rapid fire because we're out of time, but um all right, boundaries or better systems.

SPEAKER_01 22:49

Better systems, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_00 22:51

Rest or resilience, rest, retreat breakthrough, or daily practice? Daily practice, a big red flag in the workplace culture.

SPEAKER_01 23:00

We're all family here.

SPEAKER_00 23:03

And journaling or conversation?

SPEAKER_01 23:06

I can pick both. I can't pick both.

SPEAKER_00 23:08

You can pick both, but it's okay.

SPEAKER_01 23:10

I'm gonna pick both because as a clinician who works both in individual and organizational spaces, I want both. Yeah. Um, there's there's but I will say I had to pick. I'd probably pick conversation because we are at our core relational creatures, right? It's why these maladaptive dynamics are relationally perpetuated. It's why we're doing systems-level thinking. So communication.

SPEAKER_00 23:34

Yeah, there you go. Yeah, I love that. Well, okay, Ashley, this has been a great conversation, and I I I feel it to my core that somebody needed to hear this today, especially our retreat leaders who also need so much support, and that's okay. We all we all do. Admitting it is the hard part sometimes. But um, thanks for coming. And you will be able to get Ashley's information from our show notes. So if you want to continue a conversation with her, all her information will be there that you can connect to her, send her uh email or go to her website and see, and um, hopefully we can talk her and coming and joining us at the association because she would be a great one in the room when we have some of our master classes and stuff. So just putting that out there live and I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 24:19

And you know, if you're working with anybody who uh you would like a speaker to come and talk about some of these things, I'm I'm actively booking for 2027 and beyond. So let's get beyond that. Refill your cup and give you all the tools to bring that diagnostic framework. And I'd love to absolutely, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

Okay, well, everybody, I will see you next time, I hope, on the show. And please like and subscribe us so that helps our channel out, and we appreciate you and we want to be here to support you. Till next time, bye for now. Thank you. Thank you for joining us on this episode of All Things Retreat. We hope you're leaving with new ideas, fresh inspiration, and the motivation to take your retreats to the next level. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review. It helps us grow and reach more retreat leaders like you. And if you have any questions, topics you'd like us to cover, or just want to say hello, send us an email at infoweretreatrnr.com. Follow us on social media to stay connected and catch all the latest updates. Until next time. Remember, great retreats start with great intentions. Let's make them extraordinary one step at a time. Thinking about hosting a retreat? Before you dive in, let's make sure you're really ready. Grab your free Are You Retreat Ready checklist and find out if you've got everything in place from your purpose, pricing to your audience, and agenda. Don't guess, get clear. This quick checklist will show you exactly where you stand and what you need to make your retreat a success. Click the link below in the show notes to grab your gift and take the first step toward hosting this conference.