Lessons Learned in Portugal: Attending My First Fitness Retreat

I’ve been wanting to go on a fitness or yoga retreat of sorts for a while now.

When my good friend Leah asked if I wanted to sign up to go with her to Portugal with Surf Yoga Beer I eventually said YES… after a little bit of convincing. It’s not a cheap trip. I tend to like to stay put in the summer. And I’m not a big drinker (neither is she) so I wasn’t sure how we’d feel about the beer aspect of Surf Yoga Beer.

But I am so happy I said yes.

Photo Credit: Martin Straschnoy

My mom joked when I got home that she could tell I was having a good time and happy because I wasn’t texting her to complain. I mean… she’s right 😂

Don’t get me wrong, every moment wasn’t pure laughter and Portugal perfection. There were some highs and lows throughout the trip. But ultimately: it was oh so worth it.

Stay tuned for my full recap of all things Portugal and Surf Yoga Beer. But for now, I’ll leave you with these lessons that I learned in Portugal.

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[Full disclosure: I attended the trip not as an influencer/blogger but as a human that paid money to attend. All opinions are my own and I was not asked to write about my trip in any format. But because I do have a blog, I figured I’d share about my experience 💗]

What I Learned in Portugal

You can’t force a revelation.

Traveling with a group of 40 or so strangers in a foreign country brought back a lot of memories of my trip to Israel with Birthright 5 years ago.

My trip on Birthright was really powerful, those 10 days gave me this huge realization of who I am as a person and what I’m capable of. I kept waiting and waiting to have some similar epic revelation on this trip… and it never happened.

The truth is you can’t force a revelation. And sometimes maybe it’s because you don’t need one. On Birthright I needed to prove to myself that I could handle that trip despite my anxieties and phobia I grapple with every day. This trip I didn’t need to prove it to myself. I already knew I could do it.

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You don’t always have to have a perfect plan.

I didn’t do a whole lot of planning for this trip. Yes, I put my deposit down and booked my flights. But other than that I went in totally blind. I didn’t look up things to do in the cities we were visiting, nada.

Photo Credit: Martin Straschnoy

As someone that loves to plan (and dare I say overplan) it was both refreshing and terrifying to go in totally blind. Granted much of our trip was already planned out for us, but even during the days we had a bit more freetime like in Lisbon it was freeing to just go with the flow. We ended up wandering around just taking it all in and then went to a rooftop bar with the most stunning view of the city. Is it the day I would’ve planned had I researched everything out? Nah. But it was the perfect day in its own way.

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Wherever you go, there you are.

I’ve heard the saying “Wherever you go, there you are” and it certainly ringed to be true on this trip for me. You can take the girl outta NYC, but the girl is still going to struggle with anxiety and being awkward.

So going to Portugal with a group of strangers didn’t magically cure me of all the things I grapple with on a daily basis in NYC. Wouldn’t that be nice? But it did challenge me to rethink some of these limiting beliefs I have about myself and my ability to connect with others.

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It’s okay to quit.

Not the advice you’d expect to hear from this fitness blogger, but hear me out.

On the second day of the trip we went on the most insane and challenging bike ride. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it and my god was it hard. I started off confident and then quickly got shaken as the ride became more and more challenging. The up hills were steep and left me breathless. And then I felt totally out of control on the downhills.

After making it about 80% through the bike ride I decided to call it quits and hop in the van that was trailing behind us to pick up anyone that no longer wanted to ride.

At first I felt so defeated. And kind of ashamed that I couldn’t make it through.

In my yoga classes I always talk about listening to your body and your intuition about when it’s time to push, and when it’s time to pull back. While training for my marathon back in the day I had to mentally teach myself how to push even when the thought of running 26.2 miles felt insane. But this bike ride was not my marathon.

I called it quits. And I think it ended up being the right decision for me in the moment.

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The world is not out to get you.

Speaking of that bike ride…

One of the reasons I resisted calling it quits and hopping in the van for so long is because I had created a whole narrative about how everyone in the van must hate me and the fact that they’re creeping along this Portuguese highway because I’m struggling.

But when I got on the van and basically burst into tears in front of a group of strangers, I realized they were rooting for me. They wanted to see me succeed.

It got me thinking about how often I jump to the negative possibility. I assume the worst. Hey Kayla, it’s not always the case. Not everyone is out to get you.

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I miss dancing.

I don’t think I’ve ever been out dancing in NYC. Is that even a thing people actually do here?

One of the nights SYB hired a private DJ for us at the castle we stayed in. I had the most fun dancing around to music that I listened to back in 2003. I kept joking that I felt like I was at a sleepaway camp dance. Let’s be real… that’s probably the last time I danced my heart out to 50 Cent 😂

I forgot how powerful and just plain euphoric dancing can be. Maybe I need to hit up one of my old favorite studios, 305, for a bit more dancing in my life…

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Excpect nothing, receive everything.

On the first day of the trip one of our leaders Katie mentioned to approach the trip with the mindset of expect nothing, receive everything. I didn’t truly believe it until the final night.

The final night of the trip we went on an epic sunset cruise, a truly beautiful end to our trip. On the boat we did a receiving line, we all lined up and one at a time walked down the line to receive compliments.

Before walking down the line I started to panic: What if no one says anything to me? How embarassing would that be? I could feel my own lack of confidence creeping in and by the time it was my turn I felt pretty shaky about the whole thing.

But then I walked down the line. And people did say things to me. I’ve spent a lot of my life feeling awkward. Struggling to connect with new people. It’s something I’m constantly battling and working on. I might not be the bubbliest girl. The most friendly girl persay. But I do have the ability to connect. Even in the span of a short week.

People said some incredibly kind things to me in that receiving line. It got me thinking about how rarely we receive compliments about our true character. Yeah, I receive feedback fairly often from my peers and managers as a fitness instructor. But hearing about me, Kayla, and not just my ability as a teacher? That felt super tender and raw.

That final night walking down the receiving line, I received everything I needed from this trip. Really and truly.

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Thank you SYB Portugal for the magical week. Stay tuned for more about what we did on the trip 🙂

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Your Turn: Have you ever gone on a fitness retreat (or thought about?)