Gino Wickman (00:00):
She just... This intuitive nature that she has, it's like she does these surgical strikes where it's like she goes into your soul and something comes so clear for her that she'll just drop these wisdom bombs.
Rob Dube (00:23):
Hello everyone. My name is Rob Dube and I am here with Gino Wickman. Gino, how you doing?
Gino Wickman (00:29):
Always love the question. I'm doing great, Rob. Thanks for asking. How are you>
Rob Dube (00:34):
Great's better than good, I guess.
Gino Wickman (00:36):
Yeah, how are you?
Rob Dube (00:37):
I'm doing very well. Thank you for asking. We're going to have our coffee shop conversation. What does that mean exactly?
Gino Wickman (00:43):
Well, what that means is if you've not heard a coffee shop episode, that is where Rob and I, for the last 20 years, whatever the number is, have been sitting in a coffee shop, a couple three, four times a year, we get together, we'll spend two to four hours and we just talk about whatever comes up. And so what we do on these episodes is that exact same dynamic. So you're now sitting with us in the coffee shop. Neither one of us knows the topic the other one is going to bring up, we take turns going back and forth. Today, I believe it's my turn so I'm going to bring up the first topic. We bring it up, we have a little conversation, and then Rob will then come up with his topic after mine and we get through as many as we can. But truth be told, we get through one or two per episode. So keep your expectations low on how many we'll get through, and that's what the coffee shop conversation is all about.
Rob Dube (01:31):
All right, so let's do it.
Gino Wickman (01:32):
All right. So the topic I'd like to talk to you about is silent retreats. And I want to tee this up and there's a reason I'm asking. So you just got back from your silent retreat, your week of turning the world off. I have always been intrigued by it. I love the fear out there whenever anybody hears about sitting in silence for five straight days, the panic in their face. There are three times I've been scheduled to go do a silent retreat. And all three, for some reason got canceled. I can't remember the first one.
(02:04):
The second one, COVID canceled it. The third one, six months after my brother died, his wife died as we were there in Boulder about to head up the mountain. We had to then drive or fly home at five A.M. The next morning. So for some reason, the universe does not want me to experience a silent retreat just yet. But I would love for you to share. I would love for our audience to hear what does it do for you? Why do you do this every year when most people freak out at the thought of not saying a word for three days, five days, seven days? So, penny for your thoughts.
Rob Dube (02:44):
Well, from my own perspective, one thing that I realized is that almost from the time I was born or any of us really for that matter, we never have had the ability, the chance, the opportunity to be with just our thoughts. We're always busy. And so what's that like? What is it like to be with our own thoughts? There's one of my favorite sayings is from Anne Lamott, and she says, "My mind is like a bad neighborhood. I try to never go there alone." And I think that's why the idea of going away and being in silence for any period of time, even a day for some people is just overwhelming. And 20 years ago, when I first went to a day of silence with somebody who's very important to me, named Jack Kornfield, I was scared to death. I remember telling my wife, "I don't know how I'm going to get through this entire day without speaking." But what I found, and what I find most people experience who have the fear to a degree, is that it is actually not difficult at all.
(03:56):
Once you settle in, it's actually very refreshing and peaceful. And so the way it usually works, if you go for an extended period of time, you mentioned five days, well, let's just use that as an example. The first couple of days, your mind's still very busy. Let's call it all the surface stuff that you've got going on in your life. And it just all comes up. I mean, it just all floods. It's like one thing after another after another, and then it's kind of peaceful for a minute and you're like, oh, that's nice. But then it comes back up and you find yourself ruminating on this, that or the other thing. And what's amazing about it is you'll even ruminate on things that maybe you wouldn't have had time to ruminate on, which I actually think is a good thing.
(04:43):
But then what happens, and for most people, their experience is somewhere around end of day two, day three is it just gets quiet and everything starts to get very vibrant. Sounds, colors, nature, food, taste, all the senses really start to kick in because frankly, in our everyday life, we don't have time to notice it all. We're just going too fast and we're exhausted, many of us. And so we just don't have time, even sleep.
(05:19):
I remember one person who came to the Do Nothing retreat, which is the retreat that I host and I run and I teach at, he said he never experienced brushing his teeth he had on that retreat because he was so aware and present of every sensation of that brushing of the teeth, the feeling, the taste of the toothpaste, the water, the whole experience. And that's remarkable. This is what life is all about. It's so rich and we kind of keep it dull is what we end up doing. When I say dull, I mean like a dull knife. We just kind of keep it too much at the surface and the retreats bring that out. So I guess I'll just stop there.
Gino Wickman (06:10):
No, that's good. And then so that you've answered, what does it do for you? Now, I very specifically would love to know what did this one last week do for you? What's one big takeaway or one thing you got out of it, or one or two or three, whatever comes to mind, but what did you get out of this one specifically?
Rob Dube (06:28):
So people ask me that all the time, and I mentioned a couple podcasts ago, I realize-
Gino Wickman (06:34):
And how will you get an ROI on that, Rob? And so walk us through how-
Rob Dube (06:37):
You knew where I was going. Exactly. Wherever you are at in your life, if something's going to come up, I've had people come and they'll say, I'm so disappointed. I didn't have any big ahas. And it was just like, no, don't be disappointed. That means you had expectations. There's no expectations needed for a retreat. There's no intentionality needed. Just come and sit and be in silence and observe and see what comes up. There's nothing to do. There's nothing to solve. There's nothing to fix. So what came up for me on this one, it was actually really peaceful. It was really peaceful. I'd done some energy work before. I went to Boulder the day before. I did some very deep work, and I was actually kind of anxious that a lot of stuff might come up, but it was just the opposite. I was just really present in the moment. It was really beautiful.
Gino Wickman (07:37):
And there was definitely a noticeable difference in you when you got back compared to when you left, for what that's worth.
Rob Dube (07:43):
That's great.
Gino Wickman (07:44):
Yeah. Oh, I want to say one more thing on that. So I do want to give a shout out. So Rob does a Do Nothing retreat, silent retreat. It has nothing to do with Shine or this 10 Disciplines business and he does it out of the kindness of his heart. So if you have interest, Rob hosts it, Google it, you'll find it on there. The Do Nothing Retreat, Rob Dube. But for what that's worth, I just wanted to give you a shout out.
Rob Dube (08:06):
Yeah, I appreciate that. It's an honor actually, that I've had in my life and hope I will continue to. Okay, so now interestingly enough, when I went to go to the retreat, I stopped off in Boulder, like I mentioned a minute ago, and once you know it, I'm under the same roof with you.
Gino Wickman (08:27):
That was so funny. So crazy.
Rob Dube (08:29):
We're at the same hotel, we're texting each other. We never connected. But you were there. You were doing your annual trip with your buddies, and you guys go deep. So would you be willing to share how it was? What you guys were up to?
Gino Wickman (08:43):
Sure. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. That is funny though. So I had no idea we were going to be in the same hotel at the same time in Boulder, Colorado. It was Kristin, our assistant operations person who said, "Hey, just a heads up, you're going to be in the same hotel with Rob next week." So with that said, so give a little context. For 25 plus years now, I've been going to Boulder with two friends, and we just go very deep. That's where the concept of shedding layers, where I first said it actually, it was in the poem I wrote at 29 is when I first said it. But I would always talk about how I go to Boulder to shed layers, and every time I shed layers, there will be tears. And so that's where that all comes from. And so every year that we do that, almost every year, we engage someone to kind of take us deep, someone to work with us, help us shed a layer.
(09:33):
And so this year, we worked with a woman by the name of Krisi Woolley, who's just a very, very special person, connected beyond, connected with all there is. And so she just has this incredible intuition and it's almost like she can see inside your soul. And she just took us through a few experiences throughout a 24-hour period that was just incredibly profound and so... Similar to you, there's not these huge specifics, but man, I just felt as connected as I've ever felt. I want to say maybe more connected than ever, just some great clarity and insight.
(10:19):
I feel like there's this kind of next message brewing for me. I feel like 2026 is the year that I'm going to have kind of a new message to deliver or a refined message. And some clarity came around that, and it wasn't so much clarity as to the message, but a clarity around just be patient. Right now, I'm just kind of in this liminal space, I believe is the way it's pronounced, this holding pattern, this next phase of readiness. And it was a profound experience for all three of us. And I won't speak to the other two gentleman's experiences, but those were really heavy. One was just super heavy and cool, so you can dig deeper. But that's-
Rob Dube (11:06):
Yeah, first of all, about the patience, was that something that came out for you during your time with this person or-
Gino Wickman (11:14):
Yes. Yeah, yeah. Just a big clarity around that in terms of just patience, presence, just be, just kind of be in love. So yeah, it came really clear there.
Rob Dube (11:32):
And how does that feel? Are you a patient person in general?
Gino Wickman (11:35):
That's a loaded quer... You know the answer to that. No, I'm not. So I have these two sides to me in anything I do, this very patient side and this very impatient side. And the impatient side is the monster that shows up quite often. So yeah, I can be very impatient with things. And so with this topic, I have been a bit impatient, while I have a knowing that it's really important to be patient with this right now, the monster, the impatient monster creeps up. So it just really was a helpful validation and embodiment of that patience. And I'm just very comfortably sitting in that now.
Rob Dube (12:13):
And what type of work would she do with you to bring out to bring to the surface of whatever it is?
Gino Wickman (12:23):
I would say two things. It's hard to... The experience, we've done this so many times, it's hard to remember all of it, but I would say there were two pieces to it throughout the 24 hours. One is a lot of visualization. So she would take us through this meditative visualization work, and she did it about four different times, and all four were profound. What came up in those visualizations? It's obviously customized for every person. So the things that come up, we then discuss it as a group. That's part one.
(13:01):
Part two is she just this intuitive nature that she has. It's like she does these surgical strikes where it's like she goes into your soul and something comes so clear for her that she'll just drop these wisdom bombs. And so it's a combination of doing the visualization exercises and what would come out of that, and then just very robust, intuitive, connected conversations that were just like-
Rob Dube (13:27):
One-to-one or as a group?
Gino Wickman (13:28):
As a group. No, we were all, the four of us were together the entire time.
Rob Dube (13:32):
Oh, really?
Gino Wickman (13:32):
Yeah. And she actually went into it thinking that she was actually going to work with us one-on-one a little bit, and then I'm so glad she didn't do that. She didn't realize how close and connected the three of us are. There's nothing that we don't know about each other. We know everything about each other, good, bad, and ugly. So thank God her intuition was correct. So no, we were together the whole time.
Rob Dube (13:54):
And so you said over a 24-hour period of time?
Gino Wickman (13:56):
Yeah, so we started, we did three hours the night before, and then that went all the way through the next day. So obviously, we wrapped up at whatever it was, seven, eight o'clock at night. That first day we went to sleep, we woke up the next day and went back, got back at it at eight a.m, and then we wrapped up at maybe four. It was like four o'clock the day before to four o'clock the next day, and we slept in between.
Rob Dube (14:20):
This may be my last question, but how do you do with visualizations?
Gino Wickman (14:24):
How do I do?
Rob Dube (14:24):
Yeah. Are you good at visualizing or...?
Gino Wickman (14:27):
I think so, but for me, a lot of times it's feelings and words come up. I shouldn't say that. I guess as I think about it's always different, but I think I do pretty good with it is the short answer.
Rob Dube (14:37):
Yeah. I'm excited for you because you are going to impact 70 million people coming up here and the patience and allowing the things to unfold naturally, the magic that comes from that, it's going to be pretty amazing.
Gino Wickman (14:55):
It still hits me in a heavy way when you say that out loud. That is another visualization that came to me for what that's worth.
Rob Dube (15:02):
Oh yeah, yeah. What was it?
Gino Wickman (15:05):
What was the visual?
Rob Dube (15:06):
Yeah, you say that was another-
Gino Wickman (15:07):
Just the number.
Rob Dube (15:08):
The number, or did you see-
Gino Wickman (15:09):
It's a number, yes. Because I see words a lot.
Rob Dube (15:12):
Okay, I get you. Yeah, so that's good because the visualization doesn't have to be like, I'm in front of all these people. It's just a number. It's just a word.
Gino Wickman (15:21):
That's why I was going to explain that. But then I realized it's all different forms, so sometimes it'll come up as a word, and it's literally the letters. I mean, it's big block letters. Sometimes I'll hear the word and sometimes I do see things. But yeah, all forms.
Rob Dube (15:35):
Yeah, there's amazing people out there to work with. I love that you did that. Very cool. Thank you for sharing. Anything else coming up for you?
Gino Wickman (15:43):
I think that's it. I think two topics was enough for today.
Rob Dube (15:46):
Yeah, there we go. So as always, thank you so much for joining us and we'll see you next time. Stay focused and much love.
Gino Wickman (15:54):
Thank you for listening in today. We truly appreciate you taking the time to spend with us, and please tune in for the next episode. Until then, if you'd like to see where you are on your True Self journey, go to shedandshinepodcast.com to take the True Self assessment and receive personalized guidance. If you're all ready to begin your inner world journey with Robin, myself, please join us for the next round of the 10 Disciplines group coaching program. We wish you all the best in freeing your True Self, stay focused and much love.
