This retreat has been really wonderful.

I was teasing Amanda, because she said this was a vacation.

“You think this is a vacation? I haven’t worked this hard in three weeks!”

We’re both right, though, aren’t we?

There’s no time for client work — at all — so how can this not be a vacation since we’re not getting paid by others?

But also, we’re all working on our businesses up here, not in them. And none of us have ever spent this many days in a row doing the 30,000 foot view.

Last night, we were sitting around the fire (though we didn’t light a fire since yesterday was a warm day). We were discussing questions that had come up over the last two days that we’d written and dropped into the “fireside chat” bucket.

Things like:

• What do you wish you’d known when you were first starting your business?
• How do you balance building your business when you have a full client load?
• What are some ways to outsource without spending money?
• How do you get the attention of brands if you have a small social media following?

We’d talk about a topic for a bit, then move onto the next one.

It was great.

After we ran out of fireside chat questions, someone had a great idea (I can’t remember who it was, but I think it was probably Emma).

Which famous person does this person remind us of?

We went around the circle discussing the business model and/or brand personality the group assigned to each person. The idea was to think of someone several steps ahead (or one step ahead) and see who you personally should emulate in order to get where they are.

This is a fantastic and ambitious crowd. We said Oprah, Gary Vee, Marie Forleo, Amy Porterfield, Suze Orman, and more.

I was nearly last, which isn’t always bad, but for an exercise that took hours and ended at 12:30am, it was.

Since my business is so new, I was curious to see what the group thought.

They said “Clients on Demand,” which I thought was really interesting, because I get their emails, and I’m interested in doing what they’re doing.

Which means, I’m already emulating them.

That made me feel like I am on the right track, which is always a good feeling to have.