Read to Lead Workshop: Rest Rituals
Read to Lead Workshops are built around a practice, not a book report. Each session takes a single theme, anchors it to a great book, and gives you the space, ideas, and guidance to actually put it into practice.
This session is about rest and the quietly radical idea that our fallow, difficult, slowed-down seasons aren't failures to fix, but a necessary part of a whole life.
We treat winter — both the season on the calendar and the personal ones — as something to push through: grit your teeth, keep producing, wait for spring. But everything in nature knows that growth depends on dormancy. What if the tired, in-between chapter you're in isn't a detour from your real life, but part of how you're meant to live it?
We'll draw on Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times by Katherine May, the beloved bestseller that reframes winter, in weather and in life, as a season to be tended rather than endured. May makes the case that learning to "winter" well — to rest, retreat, and replenish — is a skill, and one most of us were never taught. That's our spark for a warm, restorative morning built for you.
Laura Guzman, a seasoned executive, founder of Book Society, and certified holistic yoga instructor, will guide you through it. Together we'll look honestly at where rest has quietly slipped out of your life, why that matters for how you lead and live, and how to build small rituals of rest you'll actually keep. We'll try several simple practices right there in the room — ways to slow down, warm up, and nourish yourself through the darkest months — so you leave knowing what genuinely restores you, not just what sounds good on paper.
And if you're thinking "I don't have time to rest," or "sitting still makes me restless" — you're exactly who this morning is for. Nothing to prepare, nothing to prove. Just come as you are, on a quiet winter Sunday, and let yourself slow down.
You'll leave with renewed permission to treat rest as essential rather than indulgent, a handful of simple practices to carry you through winter, and a take-home toolkit to keep them going.
Your ticket includes:
A hands-on, facilitated workshop with Laura Guzman
All the materials and supplies you'll need for the morning
A take-home "wintering" toolkit to put the practice into action
A cozy season drink and a light bite
The shop to ourselves, before we open for the day
Reading Wintering beforehand will deepen the morning, but it's not required.