Over the years I have read many articles about the power of the outdoors, nature (creation), and/or fly fishing from prominent papers and magazines like Harvard Business Review, Wall Street Journal, and most recently, Fast Company. I am always surprised by the impact these articles have on people when I thought the information was common knowledge. It was like when Oprah had health experts on her show who said eating healthy with moderate exercise was the key to weight loss. Really? Who didn’t know that? Yet people ate it up (pun intended). 

Then I chose to apply a line from Ted Lasso, “Be curious, not judgmental.” So I talked to people–friends, people who forward these kinds of articles to me, and those who have attended Altar Fly Fishing Retreats and my curiosity revealed something. Altar has a secret sauce we took for granted.

Retreats, camps, pilgrimages, and the like have a way of impacting the soul of a person. At Altar we call this devoted time away. When combined with intentional teaching, time for reflection, throw in adventure, great food and even greater people to share the experience with, it is a powerful cocktail for impact. This I knew, but perhaps knew too well. I took the combination of all these things for granted until I reread an article titled How a centuries-old practice can stop leaders from quitting, in Fast Company’s Oct 5, 2022 edition.

Perhaps you will think of one or more of your devoted times away as I share the secret sauce of what happens when we retreat and what Altar has learned to harness in a life-changing way in our retreats.

Several things can happen when we retreat (and often when we spend extended time outdoors). First, retreats have proven to move people from autopilot to awareness. When the RPMs come down, we find ourselves more in-tune and often more intentional than when we are in the fast-paced, automated days we live in–which we call normal. Second, retreats move us from distraction to focus. Isn’t amazing how a change of location, away from everyday distractions brings fresh thinking, problem-solving or the ability to the mind to rest. Last, retreats take us from fragmentation to clarity. In one of Altar’s videos (watch here), I talk about the sense of hurriedness, frustration and fragmentation people live with–and don’t like. Over and over, I find a longing within people for the dust to settle and/or for something to change in or around them. What about you?

Does the invitation to let the RPMs slow down, to rediscover depth of awareness, focus, and clarity, to find adventure, friends, fresh air, good food, meaningful teaching that connects to the things that matter in life, and time to simply exhale, reflect, and channel all of these things to plot some personal next steps toward a better life and life-giving rhythms sound appealing to you?

Then maybe it is time for you to discover the secret sauce and retreat with Altar. See Altar’s 2024 retreats or consider building a retreat for 2025 or 2026 for your team, organization or group. Simply reach out to the Altar Team. We’d love to dream with you. Contact the Altar Team.

Eric Camfield | November 2022