5
MEA 5-Day Immersion

Evolving Your LGBTQ+ Identity & Purpose as You Age

Jul 6 - 11, 2026 Baja, Mexico
Enroll Now Book A Call

💡Extend Your Stay: After this retreat ends, LGBTQ+ Camp Days kicks off July 12. Stay on for four more days of connection, creativity, and celebration.

Greg Louganis

Four-time Olympic Gold Medalist, U.S. Diving Team | Considered the Greatest Diver in History | Author and LGBTQ+ Advocate

Chip Conley

MEA Founder, Hotelier + Hospitality Entrepreneur, Bestselling Author

The LGBTQ+ community never gave us a roadmap for aging. 

Let's create one together.

You’ve spent a lifetime making your own way – coming out, building chosen family, carving space in a world that didn’t always make room for you.

But there's no blueprint for what comes next.

Queer culture prizes youth, beauty, visibility. Rarely does it show us what it means to grow older. Few elders hold the door open. Few stories show how to keep belonging. Most of us are left to improvise.

So we keep doing what we’ve always done – quietly adapting, trying to stay visible in spaces that used to feel like home.

And the cost of that silence adds up:

  • Nearly half of LGBTQ+ adults over 55 say they feel socially isolated – twice as likely to live alone as straight peers, half as likely to have kids to lean on.
  • The bars, apps, and scenes that once felt like community can now feel like rooms we’ve aged out of.
  • Watching younger generations take the spotlight can leave you wondering where you fit in the story you helped start.

The real risk isn’t aging – it’s feeling like you’re disappearing. Spending the next 20 or 30 years feeling unseen and disconnected from the very community you helped build.

Imagine if the years ahead brought more clarity, connection, and joy than you expected.

Imagine:

  • Waking up each day with a sense of direction and purpose
  • Walking into rooms where your age makes you magnetic, not invisible
  • Connecting with others who’ve lived through the same turns and understand the quiet parts
  • Finally having language for what you’ve been feeling and tools to move through it
  • Feeling grounded in who you are now, not mourning who you used to be
  • Belonging to a community that celebrates the full arc of queer life

Meet your guides

Greg Louganis – four-time Olympic gold medalist, who came out publicly in 1994 and shared his HIV-positive status a year later – has spent decades rebuilding identity when the world’s gaze moved on. He knows what it means to stay vital in a culture that worships youth.

He’ll be joined by Chip Conley – MEA’s founder, NYT bestselling author, and a proud member of the LGBTQ+ community – for a week that centers the lived experiences of older queer adults.

Together, they’ll share practices and frameworks designed through a queer lens. Real tools for redefining identity, purpose, and belonging as you age.

This isn’t a generic midlife workshop with a rainbow sticker on top. It’s a week built for you.

The experience.

Join Greg and Chip at our breathtaking oceanfront campus in Baja, Mexico. Wake to Pacific views, fall asleep to waves, and spend five days among peers who’ve lived the same questions you’re asking now.

You’ll:

  • Sit across from an Olympic icon as he talks honestly about relevance, identity, and reinvention
  • Reclaim aging as expansion through fire rituals, Hero’s Journey hikes, and meaningful conversation
  • Learn pro-aging practices designed for queer lives – practical, tested, and deeply human
  • Share meals, laughter, and insight in a space where every conversation deepens connection

In five days, you’ll gain a lifetime of empowering perspective and the confidence to stop fading and start becoming.

This Workshop Is For You If…

  • LGBTQ+ adults in your 40s, 50s, 60s, and older who are done pretending you're fine with feeling invisible in the community you helped create.
  • Gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans, and queer people who stayed home last weekend – not because you wanted to, but because showing up felt harder than it used to.
  • Those without kids, partners, or traditional safety nets, looking ahead and quietly wondering who’ll be there when you need them.
  • Anyone who helped build queer culture and now wants to know where you fit in its next chapter – still contributing, still connected, still seen.
  • People facing body changes, health shifts, or simply the mirror of time in a culture still obsessed with youth and perfection.
  • And anyone ready to stop figuring this out alone – to build real community, meaningful practices, and a renewed sense of purpose for what comes next.

Meet Your Faculty

In order to grow, we must step out of our comfort zones.

~ Greg Louganis ~

Greg Louganis

Four-time Olympic Gold Medalist, U.S. Diving Team | Considered the Greatest Diver in History | Author | LGBTQ+ Advocate

Greg Louganis knows what it means to be celebrated, and what it takes to rebuild when the spotlight fades. Widely regarded as the greatest diver in history, he won gold on both springboard and platform in consecutive Olympics (1984, 1988), mesmerizing the world with dives that looked like flight.

Then came even braver leaps: coming out in 1994, and publicly sharing his HIV-positive status a year later. Each act required a kind of courage no medal could measure.

Today, Greg teaches what he’s learned about identity, purpose, and renewal in a culture that celebrates youth but forgets what comes after. Through his work as a speaker, author, and meditation teacher, he helps LGBTQ+ adults find flow and meaning in the chapters no one prepared them for – when relevance fades, but life still asks more of you..

  • Flow Master: Teaches visualization and mindset practices honed through Olympic competition, and applied to everyday life.
  • Identity Navigator: Helps you evolve who you are when what once defined you no longer does.
  • Advocate & Community Builder: Creates spaces where older LGBTQ+ adults are seen, heard, and supported – no explanation required.

Aging is an extraordinary process whereby you become the person you always should have been.

~ Chip Conley ~

Chip Conley

World-Renowned Hospitality Entrepreneur | Strategic Advisor, Airbnb | MEA Founder

Chip Conley knows what midlife reinvention looks like – especially for those of us navigating aging, identity, and belonging outside the mainstream narrative.

As a gay man who built a hospitality empire and mentored the next generation, he understands what it takes to stay grounded in purpose when old identities stop fitting and new ones haven’t taken shape.

At 26, he founded Joie de Vivre Hospitality, growing it into the second-largest boutique hotel company in the U.S. Later, he joined Airbnb as Head of Global Hospitality & Strategy during the company's hypergrowth years. In 2018, he founded MEA – the world's first midlife wisdom school – dedicated to reframing what it means to grow older and step fully into your next chapter.

Chip draws on decades of reinvention, helping LGBTQ+ adults who've spent years forging their own path find the community, practices, and sense of purpose that fit this next chapter.

  • Bridge Builder: Shows you how to translate your life experience into wisdom that lands with real impact.
  • Meaning Maker: Guides you past the "what's next?" panic into clarity about what you're building toward.
  • Culture Shifter: Proves that rooms full of LGBTQ+ midlifers are where the most interesting conversations happen.

Supported By the MEA Team

Daniel Booz

MEA's Head of Advisors & Certified Enneagram Practitioner

Daniel is a former Tech-Sector sales leader with expertise in high-growth startups. After years thriving in the corporate world with particular acumen for change management, human capital development, and sales process workflow, Daniel (in true MEA fashion) made a major shift to ...

View Bio

Our Agenda at a Glance

Monday:

4:00 PM: Check-In / Welcome

5:30 PM: Welcome Reception & Dinner

7:00 PM: Orientation Session

Tuesday:

7:00 AM: Mind + Body

8:30 AM: Breakfast

10:00 AM: Classroom Time

1:15 PM: Lunch

2:00 PM: Free Time

3:00 PM: Classroom Time

5:30 PM: Free Time

6:30 PM: Dinner

6:30 PM: Evening Gathering

Wednesday:

7:00 AM: Mind + Body

8:30 AM: Breakfast

10:00 AM: Classroom Time

1:15 PM: Lunch

2:00 PM: Free Time

3:00 PM: Classroom Time

5:30 PM: Free Time

6:30 PM: Dinner

6:30 PM: Evening Gathering

Thursday:

7:00 AM: Mind + Body

8:30 AM: Breakfast

10:00 AM: Classroom Time

1:15 PM: Lunch

2:00 PM: Free Time

3:00 PM: Classroom Time

5:30 PM: Free Time

6:30 PM: Dinner

6:30 PM: Evening Gathering

Friday:

7:00 AM: Mind + Body

8:30 AM: Breakfast

10:00 AM: Classroom Time

1:15 PM: Lunch

2:00 PM: Free Time

3:00 PM: Classroom Time

5:30 PM: Graduation

6:00 PM: Celebration Dinner

Saturday:

7:00 AM: Breakfast

9:30 AM: Checkout / Departure

Sunday:

*Please note all times are estimates as some activities go longer or shorter depending on the group. This agenda is meant to give you an idea of the general flow of activities.

Step into Transformation on Baja’s Sun-Soaked Shores

El Pescadero Resort | Baja, Mexico

A stunning oceanfront property offering all of the luxuries and amenities of a luxury hotel with beautiful beaches perfect for swimming or surfing. Located on the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula, just a short drive from Todos Santos, the Pueblo Magico.

PLUS: Gourmet from-scratch meals, snacks, and drinks featuring locally sourced ingredients from our organic garden, made by our in-house chefs.

  • Beach walks
  • Poolside lounging
  • Warm ocean waves
  • Fire pits
  • Magical sunsets

Your workshop also includes:

  • 5 nights of lodging at our world-class retreat center in Baja with all of your meals, snacks, drinks and other amenities included
  • Daily sessions and experiential activities to help you connect with your inner self, envision your desired experience, and release what no longer serves you
  • Mindfulness practices to soothe your nervous system and help you cultivate greater mindfulness and presence in the moment
  • Movement to get the energy flowing and build your strength and agility as you chart your course forward to the life you want to live
  • Incredible bonding experiences with the most amazing humans you’ll ever meet
  • Intimate gatherings to cultivate connection and celebrate the joy and beauty of life

Find purpose, flow, and your people – for the chapter no one warned you about

Queer culture doesn’t talk about aging.

There’s no roadmap for evolving identity when visibility fades, no language for what it means to still matter in a community that celebrates youth. Just a quiet sense that you’re supposed to figure it out alone.

This workshop changes that.

In five immersive days with Greg Louganis and Chip Conley, you’ll get the tools, perspective, and support to reclaim purpose in this stage of life – on your terms, and through a lens that reflects your lived experience.
You’ll leave with:

  • Practices for aging well that reflect LGBTQ+ realities, not heteronormative models
  • Clarity about who you're becoming and how you want to live, love, and lead in the years ahead
  • Community that gets it – peers who’ve lived through the same realities and are ready to speak the truth together
  • Five days in Baja where healing ocean air, movement, and ritual give you space to hear yourself again

You've built a life outside the mainstream. This is your chance to pause, reflect, and consciously shape what comes next with people who understand the journey.

Join us in Baja. Step into the life that's been waiting.

Book your spot today

Evolving Your LGBTQ+ Identity & Purpose as You Age

Jul 6 - 11, 2026 Baja, Mexico
Starting at
$4,000 per person
Enroll Now Book A Call

💡Extend Your Stay: After this retreat ends, LGBTQ+ Camp Days kicks off July 12. Stay on for four more days of connection, creativity, and celebration.

This was a beautiful journey that has come to an end, unfortunately.

The program was spectacular. It really surpassed my expectations. I was really surprised about how the course was curated. There was such a warm intensity and personal touch to it.

March Posch
Brand Consultant
MEA is for anyone who wants to live with greater purpose and gratitude.

I experienced MEA as a newly diagnosed multiple myeloma cancer patient, and as a result of the things I’ve learned - I’ve banished the anxiety of being a cancer victim, am in remission, and living with a newfound energy and purpose.

Bruce Deyle
Engineer, IT Architect Verizon
Attending Margie’s workshop changed my life and that of my colleagues. I am quite confident you will walk away from her session agreeing that they were some of the best hours you have spent on yourself in a long, long time. A worthwhile investment for all leaders, both emerging and established.
Elizabeth Faber
Deloitte Global Chief People and Purpose Officer
Eternally grateful for everyone and everything MEA!!

Just know how grateful I am for the joy fuel you all put in my rocket ship. When I want to feel loved or just need a good smile I can think of my time at MEA, which came at the perfect time to encourage me on my journey. Thank you!

Alejandro Cano
Co-Head of Opportunities Funds Oaktree Capital

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is this workshop for?

This experience is for LGBTQ+ adults in midlife and beyond – roughly 40s and older – who are asking new questions about identity, relevance, and belonging. You don’t have to feel “old,” you just have to be curious about what’s next.

I’m coming alone. Will I feel out of place?

Not at all. Most participants come solo, and the community forms fast. Meals, group sessions, and shared experiences make connection easy and natural. By day two, you’ll feel like you’ve known people for years.

What makes this different from other retreats or workshops?

This isn’t a generic midlife program with rainbow branding. Every session, story, and practice is shaped through a queer lens. Greg and Chip lead from lived experience, creating space for honesty about aging, invisibility, and renewal that you won’t find anywhere else.

Do I need to be physically fit or outgoing to participate?

No. All activities, from the Hero’s Journey hike to movement sessions, are optional and adaptable. You choose your pace and level of participation. There’s no performance pressure here, just an invitation to be real.

What’s included in the tuition?

Your five-day immersion covers everything once you arrive: oceanfront lodging, chef-prepared meals, snacks and drinks, daily workshops, guided practices, and group activities. The only extras are travel to Baja and optional spa services.

I’ve spent years feeling disconnected from the LGBTQ+ community. Will I belong here?

Yes. That’s exactly why this week exists. You’ll be among people who’ve lived similar stories – navigating aging, identity, and visibility in a culture that rarely talks about it. This isn’t about fitting back in; it’s about finding your place now.

How do I know if I qualify for financial aid?

We offer financial assistance on a needs-aware basis. Our goal is to make MEA accessible to those who may face financial barriers to attending. If you’re experiencing financial stress that could prevent your participation, we encourage you to apply for assistance.

What if I’m not sure if this workshop is right for me?

We’re happy to help you make the decision. Book a free call with our advisor team, and we can help you decide based on your current life situation, goals, and timing.

Still deciding or have questions?
Connect with our helpful team of Advisors

Our Advisors are all MEA alumni who can offer genuine insights into our programs. They’re passionate about helping you finding the right fit to make your next chapter the best one.

BOOK a cAlL

Daniel Booz

Lucas Erie

Leslie Bartlett