I Ran My First Women's Leadership Retreat. Here's What Almost Stopped Me.
Updated: Sep 16
by Hetal Joshi Gordon
In March, my sister told me something that changed the trajectory of my year. She'd been to a few of these kinds of retreats herself, and she knew my leadership background, my coaching work, the way I show up for people. She said, “You should be doing this — you’d be amazing, and you could really help people.”
My eyes lit up. I didn't have to think about it. I already knew, because I'd lived it from the other side. Back in my corporate life, I went to retreats like this myself. Every single one changed something in me. I came back different, not just as a leader, but as a human. I never forgot that feeling, and I never stopped wanting to build it for other people.
Here's what I believe, down to my bones. Getting away from your day-to-day, creating real space, putting yourself somewhere beautiful and still, that isn't a nice-to-have. It's the thing that makes the deep work possible. Combine that with content built from real leadership experience and real coaching practice, and you have something that can actually change someone.
So by the end of March, I'd decided. I picked the dates, September 14th through 16th, that brief period after summer and before the Q4 chaos most leaders know too well. I booked the property. I walked the rooms myself. And I started reaching out, one person at a time, to people I believed in my heart could benefit from this.
It wasn't an easy yes for anyone. This kind of experience is a real investment, and I knew that going in. One person said yes almost the moment I sent the first invite. I took it as a sign.
By late May, the rest of the room wasn't filling the way I'd hoped. And I had a decision to make.
I decided that even if it stayed at one, I was doing this anyway.
That decision changed everything. Once I let go of the number, I stopped worrying. I went into flow and focused on the content. The program got sharper. More personal. More real. I was excited.
The people who committed were deeply committed. And this week, we finally met in person.
We had two transformational days.
We came together somewhere still, away from the noise. And we made space to do the kind of work that's almost impossible to do in the middle of a normal week, understanding that so many leaders right now are operating in a state of chaos, with no real norm to hold onto anymore. We worked with real coaching tools for real complexity. We gave our nervous systems room to actually settle, some time out of fight-or-flight, and from that place, the work went deep.
I delivered on something I was completely passionate about. Something I put my whole heart into, on nothing but my own belief that it mattered. And it happened. And I'm still in awe of it.
When I left my corporate job, I dreamed of creating unique, meaningful, and authentic ways for humans to heal, grow, and dream. After six months of real ups and real downs, it happened, and it was beautiful, every little detail of it.
I'm writing this fresh off the retreat, still processing, still full. Grateful for my sister, who saw this in me before I fully saw it myself. Grateful for the leaders who said yes and trusted me with their time. And grateful that I persevered. I will rest well this week.
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