Rising Tide Leaders Retreat San Francisco

San Francisco is such a dear place in our hearts. Last week, we gathered with over 100 leaders who are a part of The Rising Tide Society for a week of brainstorming and encouraging one another!

This isn't the first and wont be the last time we've shared about Rising Tide Society!

A little over two years ago, both Stephen and I had a huge desire to build and see more community among creatives happen in Chico. Being a self-employed creative entrepreneur is such a unique profession and at the time not many of the people in our circle really understood. We knew other locals in the same industry, but we never met up regularly or had much community within that group. We began dreaming about what next steps we should take and where we were being lead. As months went by, this desire for community in our industry only grew bigger. It was at this time that RTS came into our life! We started hearing about Rising Tide Society and what is stands for online.Rising Tide Society is a free group to join that believes in community over competition and encouraging those around us. From this idea, Tuesdays Together was born, monthly RTS meet-ups that happen in over 350 cities across the world! During these monthly meet-ups, there are different topics we discuss and every year we raise money for various charities. The purpose of Rising Tide is to not only "make waves" in the creative industry, but also all around the world. We applied to be the city of Chico's leaders and soon after had our first Chico Tuesdays Together. We are deeply honored to lead this amazing group of people in Chico and it's been so fun to see it grow and true community and friendships being built. Spending part of our week in San Francisco with leaders from all over the country was truly amazing and inspiring! There are big things in store for the Rising Tide Society and we can't wait to share more soon!

p.s. We've had lots of people ask us about the meet-ups so if you're a creative in Chico and have a hope for a community like this, please please don't ever hesitate to reach out if you want to join or have questions :D

Stephen and I also had the huge honor of filming the event and will soon be sharing a video about the heart of Rising Tide! We felt like we had front row seats as we interviewed different leaders from all over the country. They poured their hearts out to us and inspired us to continue to see change in this industry!

This was the second Rising Tide Leader's Retreat and lucky for us, it was only a few hours away in San Francisco! There was over 100 leaders from all over that gathered together at the Honeybook Headquarters. Honeybook is a client management system we use and love and they have partnered with RTS to help us continue to grow! Below are a few points that resonated with us during the week!

1. We Are So Much Stronger Together – Being a leader is not always easy. Whether you're leading in your business, ministry, or family, leadership can be draining. For us, this was a good reminder that in all areas of our lives we're never alone. Sometimes it just takes being brave to step out of your comfort zone to find others to band together with..
2. Everyone Needs Community – Ever since we started attending conferences and being willing to step out and meet others, we've seen so much growth in our business. Knowing people who you can relate with, that are cheering you on and that you can bounce ideas back and forth with is an incredible thing! I think if I could go back in time, I would start attending conferences sooner!
3. Abundance vs. Scarcity Mindset – Jenna Kutcher was the keynote speaker and she talked about living out of abundance instead of being afraid to share with others your "secrets". This is where Rising Tide really stands out from just another "networking mixer" type meet-up. This can be really hard for me personally, but each year God continues to be faithful and break down these lies that so many creatives believe. This lie that says "there isn't enough to go around" which is so not true! Hustling, marketing and running your business well is still good, but at the end of the day, we all need to realize there is always enough to go around! Sharing your tips and tricks with others only strengthens the community and builds us all up.
4. To Grow, We Need Help – One of the biggest questions people had was about how Honeybook is actually partnering with RTS and why? Natalie, the founder of Rising Tide Society had a heart to heart with the whole group and explained it so beautifully. We can't do her justice here, but we'll try! Rising Tide Society started with a group of friends over coffee. In a little over a year it had grown tremendously and became a full time job for the founders (who were also trying to run their own businesses). It was at this point where they needed help, they needed to decide if RTS should fizzle out, or if they should continue nurturing this massive movement. This is when Honeybook stepped in. Honeybook has given the RTS team the resources to manage and grow and continues to do so. They have taken the power of a silicon valley startup and invested in this community. The reason, they have the same heart as us. They desire to see entrepreneurs and creatives succeed. They believe in this same mindset of community over competition so much so that the CEO of Honeybook wears his Rising Tide Society shirt to all his investor meetings so he can share about RTS and their heart! At the retreat we were able to personally meet lots of the Honeybook staff and they're basically the nicest people ever! As leaders, we were able to all sit down and collaborate with their development team to help plan and build a new tool that will support Rising Tide Society and Tuesdays Together meet-ups! We can't wait to see what they build for us, it's truly going to be such an awesome tool for this community (and maybe others too)!

As you can tell, we could go on and on! We'll wait and let the RTS video we're making do more of that! In the meantime though, you NEED to see Honeybook's amazing office where we met. It's gorgeous!

Group photo credit to our friends Laura&Rachel :D