We’re all a work in progress.
Purpose in Progress
Every room full of leaders is also a room full of people quietly wondering if they're on the right path. The founder questioning if they should scale or start a family. The mission-driven person wondering if they're doing enough. The leader who's been moving so fast they've lost the thread of why they started.
Purpose in Progress was built for that room.
I'm not a stranger to those feelings. This experience came from a decade of building something real while simultaneously losing and finding myself inside it. What I bring to your retreat or event is permission for your people to feel all of it. This isn’t about performing for each other, but having a deeply personal experience while silently connecting with everyone around them.
They arrive as individuals. They leave as something more, and every single person walks out with a piece of art they couldn't have made on their own.
Purpose in Progress is a two-hour experience that moves through storytelling, guided meditation, and massive collaborative painting designed to fit within your retreat or event and leave a lasting impression on everyone in the room.
How it Works
The experience begins with a brief, honest account of how Purpose in Progress came to be. Not a keynote. Just enough of the real story from my one-way ticket to Kenya, to the decade of building and burning out, to the moment I stopped fighting the unfolding. This is about letting the room know they're in safe hands with someone who's been in the mess too.
This isn't about my journey. It's about creating permission for yours.
The Opening
The Purpose Check-In
Before anyone picks up a brush, we get honest about purpose. We let go of the pressure of the “perfect purpose”, and leave the moment with everyone realizing they're not ahead or behind… or even “fallen off”, they're just human.
From there we talk logistics about abstract painting. Why it's the hardest style to master, what makes a great abstract piece, and why it's the perfect medium for what comes next, because abstract art isn't about getting it right. It's about letting go, not overthinking, and learning a new style of communication.
Guided Creative Visualization
Participants make their way to the table and choose a paint color that resonates with them right now. Then we do something a little unexpected. I tell them to close their eyes while they’re still standing.
Most meditations put you in a chair or on a floor. This one keeps you on your feet, because we're not trying to quiet your mind, we're trying to get you out of it entirely. Through a short nervous system reset and a standing breath practice, we move attention below the neck. Into the body. Into feeling.
From there, a guided imaginative journey ties your purpose to your color. By the time the music starts, you're not thinking about purpose. You're feeling it.
Collaborative Creation
Each person keeps their color and their brush for the entire painting session, moving around the canvas every 20 seconds when the lights dim, adding their mark to something that keeps growing and changing with every rotation.
The music does a lot of the work here. A deep house soundtrack that builds and shifts and pulls people further into the experience, until most of the room has completely forgotten where they are and what they were worried about before they walked in.
I move through the space if needed, but honestly? They rarely need me. Something takes over.
By the time the music fades, the canvas stretching across the room looks like something you'd hang in a gallery. Made by people who walked in saying they couldn't paint.
When the final song ends, everyone steps back.
For the first time, the whole room sees what they made together. The full canvas, every color, every mark, the complete picture of what happened in this room.
This is the moment I leave them with the message at the heart of this experience. That each of us is part of something unfolding that is so much bigger than we'll ever fully know. That every color matters… even the ones we don't like. That purpose isn't something you find at the finish line. It's something you're already contributing to, right now, exactly as you are.
Most rooms get quiet. Some people cry. Everyone leaves with a piece of the canvas to take home.
The Big Reveal
The experience closes with an optional group reflection. This is a chance for people to share what came up, what shifted, what surprised them. For larger groups this becomes a open Q&A. For smaller ones it often turns into something much more intimate.
Then we cut the canvas.
Every person leaves with their own piece of the communal painting. A fragment of something that only existed because everyone showed up and painted their purpose into it. People hang it on their walls. Years later, they still remember that day when they look at it.
It's not a party favor. It's a reminder that your purpose was always part of something bigger.
Closing Reflection
What do people get out of this?
A different relationship with purpose. Not something to chase or figure out, but something already unfolding inside them, whether they can see it clearly or not.
A moment of real self-connection. In a world that rewards constant output, this experience asks people to slow down, feel something, and actually listen to themselves. That alone is rare.
Permission to be exactly where they are. Not behind. Not lost. Just in the middle of it, which is exactly where purpose lives.
Genuine connection with the people in the room. Not forced networking, not icebreaker energy. The kind of quiet connection that happens when a group of people make something real together without saying a word.
And a piece of art on their wall that reminds them of all of it, made collaboratively, cut by hand, irreplaceable.
No artistic skill required. Just a willingness to show up and feel something.
Ready to work together?
Purpose in Progress is meant to be part of something bigger. I want to hear about your retreat, event, or transformational gathering.
FAQs
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Purpose in Progress is designed for retreat organizers, conference directors, and leaders who want to give their people an experience that actually moves them.
The participants who get the most out of it are founders, leaders, and mission-driven people who are somewhere in the middle of their purpose journey. Not lost exactly, but questioning. Moving fast but wondering if it's in the right direction. Doing meaningful work but feeling disconnected from why they started.
You don't need to be an artist. You don't need to have your purpose figured out. You just need to be willing to show up and feel something.
This experience works beautifully within both men’s and women's retreats, leadership gatherings, nonprofit convenings, founder events, and any room where the people showing up are building something that matters.
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Pricing is custom based on a few factors: where your event is located, the number of participants, and whether you'd like Purpose in Progress delivered once or multiple times across your retreat or conference.
I price this way because no two rooms are the same, and I want to make sure the experience is right for your specific group before we talk numbers.
The best next step is a quick conversation. Reach out and tell me about your event and I'll put together something that works.
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The sooner the better. Leah is a busy lady and we request that you book at least two weeks in advance.
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Purpose In Progress is meant to be part of a larger retreat, event, or experience. When you reach out to book, we will work together to customize Purpose in Progress to fit your group. We will send you an event contract for both parties to sign. 50% deposit must be made at the time time of booking with the other 50% paid within 7 days of the event date.
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The space where this is delivered must have the ability for the lights to be dimmed. If possible, a projector is helpful for the first part of the experience. Part of the painting experience requires the lights to be dimmed and brightened.
The experience requires a long row of tables. For 50 people, we would need 8 tables.
We do use acrylic paint! We put plastic coverings on the tables and can put them on the floor if there is carpet. Please notify attendees that they will be painting!
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We suggest a minimum of 25 people for the experience. Purpose in Progress can be delivered to large groups based on the size of the room. This works well for breakout sessions for very large groups. This is not a good activity for groups of less than 25 people.
I’ve been building this since 2019.
This wasn’t created over night. In 2018 I attended the Mid-Atlantic Teaching Artist Retreat and experienced facilitator Deb Hanson lead a group painting experience around a giant communal canvas. Something clicked for me. I knew I wanted to make it my own.
The first version was a professional development experience all about learning to communicate through art. I would break them into groups and give each group a feeling. I would have them listen to music to evoke the feeling, and then the room would try to guess what each group was trying to express. It was fun. It was interesting. But it wasn't quite it yet.
Then it became Creative Connection, a conference icebreaker tied to leadership themes. Quicker, lighter, more accessible. I felt awkward delivering it, and it really felt forced in a “conference” setting.
But as my own purpose journey evolved, so did this experience. I kept asking myself what this was really for. And the answer kept getting clearer.
This isn't an icebreaker. It's not professional development. It's not a warmup act for the keynote speaker.
It's for retreats and transformational events. It’s meant to elevate what other incredible people in this space are building. This is meant for people who are ready to feel something real.
It took me six years to find that. And now that I have, I'm not interested in making it anything else.
