Earn 32 ICF Core Competency Units in Just 5 Days
The Empowerment Coaching Retreat
The Empowerment retreat is an immersive and transformative professional and personal development program based on a rites of passage model of human development and coaching. It runs over the Labor Day weekend at Elohee, a stunning nature retreat center nestled deep within 220 acres of wild forest.
5 Days (August 30 - September 3, 2024) | Location: Elohee, North Georgia, USA
Stand still. The trees ahead and the bushes beside you are not lost. Wherever you are is called here. And you must treat it as a powerful stranger, must ask permission to know it and be known. The forest breathes. Listen. It answers.
— David Wagoner, Lost
How would it be to spend some real downtime and emerge deeply enriched as a person and as a coach?
The Empowerment Retreat offers participants an extraordinary opportunity to develop, grow and more fully embody their true capacities as coaches and as humans. For them to reconnect with and radically deepen their abilities for deep listening, powerful conversations and living aligned with their deepest sense of purpose, while learning new skills and ways of being to take to their client facing work.
Based on a rites of passage coaching model, the program powerfully integrates ancient wisdom traditions with cutting-edge coaching and developmental skills, offering a unique opportunity to radically deepen one’s learning and development in supportive community and in an extraordinary wilderness setting. Participants emerge renewed from their own Hero's Journey, revitalized and with a radically enhanced perspective on their role as coach and as a being who can live with greater purpose and make a real difference in their own life and in society at large.
What happens?
There are so many skills and activities we engage in over the retreat that it's certainly too many to cover in a few paragraphs, but here's a few headlines below:
Nature-Based Coaching Skills
We teach you how to engage environment, particularly the natural environment, in many surprising ways to enhance the coaching conversation, shift mindset and to significantly deepen your listening skills and coaching presence.
Mindfulness, Somatic & Embodiment Practices
Mindfulness, Presence and the body are central resources in our coaching model for many reasons, most notably for their potential in working with our deepest cognitive and creative processes.
Community, Council and Fun
Our modern fragmented lives are often bereft of community and real connection. We make this central to the process. Whether at mealtimes or at evening fire council, sharing, laughing, connecting, and fun is at the heart of the retreat as is downtime and relaxation.
The retreat is based on a rites of passage model and we're quite sure what you'll experience here is pretty unique. Rites of passage possibly forms the oldest model of human development and life transition management and incorporates ancient traditional wisdoms into the transformational process. Over the retreat you'll experience the power of it personally, and learn how to embody it professionally.
Reconnect, Revitalize & Renew
While much of the retreat is dedicated to professional learning and growing as a coach, it is equally about one's personal growth and development. Truly effective coaches must commit to ongoing work at their own developmental edges. This is the Hero's Journey as a learning experience, and retreat participants are both engaging in their own inner work while also learning more impactful ways to engage with their clients. We've also had many non-coaches participate and gain enormously from the process.
Alongside all this deep work, we've made sure there's plenty of space for fun, play, relaxation and connection. Each evening we have dedicated community time around the beautiful fire with story, song and plenty of laughter, as we watch the moon chase the sun to the west, the stars emerge and we're all embraced by the warm summer night and the sweet serenade of crickets and tree frogs.
Did we mention the food? Elohee's food has to be experienced as well. As locally-sourced as possible and made fresh for us each meal they also are not to be missed. You will emerge in ways which may very well surprise you.
Meet The Team
Rod Francis
Sherry Trebes
Info & Discounts
Please note!
- You must enroll in the training section of the program before reserving your accommodation with Elohee.
- All meals are included in the accommodation. Travel is not. Elohee is approximately 2 hours from Atlanta International Airport. Participants are helped to manage transport including ride shares to the venue.
Special Offers
- You can currently get an additional $200 off of the regular tuition cost (use the code - retreatearlybird on checkout). Offer ends on November 30th 2023.
- We also have special discounts if you want to come as a pair or more. Please contact us directly for details using the contact page.