The Happy Lawyer Happy Life
End of Year Retreat
Close well. Choose well. Begin well.
Friday 6 November to Sunday 8 November 2026 |
Ardour Lilianfels, Blue Mountains | Limited to 30 people
There comes a point towards the end of every year when we begin telling ourselves that next year will be different.
Next year, we will be more organised.
We will make better use of our time.
We will fix that thing in the business that has been irritating us since February.
We will exercise, read more books, develop healthier boundaries and become the sort of person who meal-plans on Sundays.
And then January arrives and, before we know it, we are back inside the noise doing many of the same things in a diary with a different year printed on the front.
The Happy Lawyer Happy Life End of Year Retreat is an opportunity to interrupt that pattern.
From Friday 6 November to Sunday 8 November, we are escaping to Ardour Lilianfels in the beautiful Blue Mountains for two days of thinking, talking, planning, walking, eating, resting and deciding what we want the next year to look like.
Not what it should look like.
Not what everyone else’s LinkedIn posts suggest it should look like.
What you actually want it to look like.
I’d love you to join us.
The details
Where: Ardour Lilanfels in the beautiful Blue Mountains
Who: Just 30 boutique law firm owners and leaders
What: Two days to reflect on the year, make clear decisions and plan what comes next
Expect: Thoughtful conversations, practical planning, beautiful food, fresh air and genuine time to think
The goal: To head home feeling clearer, lighter and ready to begin 2027 with a plan that feels like yours.
This is NOT a conference
There will be no endless stream of speakers, no racing from session to session and no requirement to exchange business cards before you are permitted to drink your coffee.
This is a carefully facilitated Retreat designed to give you something most of us rarely have: enough distance from ordinary life to think clearly.
We will look back at the year you have lived—not simply the targets you reached or the things that remain unfinished, but the decisions you made, the hard things you navigated, the moments that mattered and the things you learned about yourself along the way.
We will identify what is already working before we rush to fix everything that isn’t.
We will revisit your values and ask whether they are genuinely visible in your calendar, your business and the way you are using your energy.
We will work through the questions and decisions you have been carrying.
And then we will turn all of that thinking into a simple, practical plan for the first 90 days of 2027.
Because clarity is lovely.
But clarity with a plan is considerably more useful.
Before you arrive
The Retreat begins before we reach the Blue Mountains.
You will receive a guided End of Year Retreat Check-In exploring:
- your energy and wellbeing;
- business and financial confidence;
- time and capacity;
- team and leadership;
- relationships and support;
- what is working;
- what feels heavy;
- what you do not want to carry into 2027; and
- the one question you most want the weekend to help you answer.
Your responses will help me shape the Retreat around the people in the room, the challenges you are facing and the conversations you most need to have.
The Retreat itinerary
Friday: Arrive, exhale and take stock
From lunch
- Arrive, check in and settle into the beautiful Blue Mountains
- Welcome lunch and opening session
- Reflect on the moments that mattered, the decisions you made and what the year taught you
- Recognise what is already working and what you want to do more of
- Time to unpack, walk, talk, think or simply sit somewhere beautiful
- Dinner together at Miss Lilian
Saturday: Choose what comes next
Morning
- A slow start with the choice to swim, walk, enjoy a quiet coffee or sleep
- Revisit what matters to you now and the values you want guiding your decisions, time and energy
- Identify something you want to protect, something you want to change and something you want to create
- Explore the space between where you are and where you want to be
The Owners’ Table
- Bring one real issue, question or decision to a small-group conversation
- Work through what is really happening, what you have already tried and what may be keeping you stuck
- Leave with clarity about your next useful move
Afternoon
- Genuine space to walk, swim, explore Katoomba, continue a conversation, work quietly in your Retreat book or rest
- Come back together to identify one thing to stop carrying, one thing to begin and one thing worth keeping exactly as it is
Evening: Things Worth Celebrating
- A beautiful celebration dinner at Darley’s
- An opportunity to acknowledge the obvious achievements and the quieter things that mattered just as much
Sunday: Make it real
Morning
- Bring the weekend’s thinking together
- Identify the three outcomes that matter most for the first 90 days of 2027
- Decide what you will begin, what you will deliberately not do and what support you will need
- Choose the weekly practices and monthly checkpoints that will keep things moving
- Finish the Retreat clear about what matters and what comes next
What you'll leave with
You will leave with a practical, one-page First 90 Days Plan.
Nobody needs to come home from a Retreat with another substantial document they are too overwhelmed to open. This plan will be clear, useful and designed to keep working once ordinary life begins again.
Before we finish, you will also write a letter to the version of yourself who is about to begin again. We will send it back to you in late January, just as the year starts gathering speed.
After the Retreat
In February, we will come back together for a 60-minute online reunion.
We will revisit the commitments made in the Blue Mountains, celebrate what has moved and work through anything that has become stuck.
Because the value of a Retreat is not simply how you feel while you are there.
It is what changes after you go home.
Your Retreat ticket includes
- your pre-Retreat End of Year Check-In
- a beautiful Retreat workbook
- the complete facilitated program from Friday to Sunday
- Friday lunch and afternoon tea
- dinner at Miss Lilian on Friday
- Saturday morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea
- our Things Worth Celebrating dinner at Darley’s
- reflective walking, planning and small-group activities
- the Owners’ Table experience
- your completed First 90 Days Plan
- your commitment card and future-self letter returned in January
- our 60-minute online reunion in February
- Accommodation and travel are additional.
- Accommodation will be booked and paid for directly with Ardour Lilianfels using the HLHL Retreat booking code, allowing you to choose the room that suits you.
Investment
Clubmate ticket: $1,997 (GST incl)
- Payable upfront or in two payments of $999.
- The first payment is made when you book. The second payment is due 4 weeks later, or by 6 October 2026.
Standard ticket: $2,497 (GST incl)
- Payable upfront or in two payments of $1,149.
- The first payment is made when you book. The second payment is due 4 weeks later, or by 6 October 2026.
Ardour Lilianfels Blue Mountains Room rate starting from $1,241 (2 nights, 1 guest)
Is this Retreat for you?
This Retreat is for you if:
- you have spent so much time dealing with what is urgent that you have had very little space to consider what is important
- you want to finish the year with perspective rather than simply collapsing over the December finish line
- parts of your life or business are working, but other parts feel heavier than they should
- you are carrying a question or decision that would benefit from clear thinking and thoughtful conversation
- you want 2027 to feel deliberate rather than accidental
- you value practical planning, honest conversation, beautiful surroundings and people who understand
- or you simply know that two days away from the noise would do you a world of good.
You do not need to arrive with a perfectly articulated goal.
You do not need to have had a terrible year.
You do not need to be planning a dramatic reinvention of yourself or your business.
You only need to be willing to pause, think honestly and decide what comes next.
Thirty places only
This Retreat is intentionally limited to 30 people.
That gives us enough different voices, experiences and perspectives to create rich conversation while keeping the experience personal, connected and genuinely useful.
You will not disappear into a conference crowd.
You will be part of the room.
Kind Words About Our Retreat Experience
Close well. Choose well. Begin well.
You have spent the year thinking about clients, employees, family members, deadlines, problems, plans and all the other people and things that require something from you.
This is your opportunity to step out of the noise long enough to hear yourself think.
To understand what the year has taught you.
To recognise what is already working.
To decide what deserves your energy next.
And to begin 2027 with a plan that feels like yours.
The Practical Bits
Friday 6 November - Sunday 8 November
Ardour Lilianfels, Blue Mountains
Maximum of 30 participants
Investment: $1,997 including GST for Clubmates or $2,297 including GST for standard tickets
Included: The full Retreat program and meals, with accommodation and travel booked separately
Ready to join us? Click below to reserve your place.
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