REBL Dads Blog

Brian Muller on the legacy letter he committed to writing after a REBL Dads Gathering on Necker Island.

Bill Chambley on the lifelong friendships he didn't expect to find at a REBL Dads Gathering.

Ian Meierdiercks and Gary Jonas explain why bringing their own kids to Necker Island made this REBL Dads Gathering unforgettable.

Brothers Bob and Fritz Brown reflect on why the REBL Dads Gathering felt like a family reunion, and the hundred-year legacy they're building at home.

Blake Brewer on why a REBL Dads Gathering on Necker Island is not a vacation, it's personal growth.

Most entrepreneurial fathers run two separate operating systems: the high-performance business owner and the dad who's trying to show up at home. The problem is, very few communities exist that take both seriously at the same time. That's the gap a dad mastermind group fills — and why, once you've been in one, you don't want to go back. What Makes a Dad Mastermind Different From a Regular Mastermind A standard mastermind is built around business. Revenue, systems, hiring, exi

The fatherhood retreat market has exploded. Weekend getaways, wilderness experiences, men's circles, leadership intensives — the options are growing faster than the quality controls. For entrepreneurial dads who value their time and run high-ROI environments, the wrong retreat is more than a wasted weekend. It can put you off the whole category for years. What Separates a Real Retreat From an Expensive Vacation A vacation removes you from your life temporarily. A real fatherh

The entrepreneurial dads who figure out how to be genuinely present at home — not just physically there, but actually engaged — share a common realization: presence isn't something you feel your way into. It's something you build systems for, exactly like you do in your business. The ones who treat it as a discipline get there. The ones who wait until they "have more time" don't. The Presence Trap: Why You're There But Not There Most entrepreneurial fathers have experienced b

If you're an entrepreneurial father who has tried to achieve work-life balance and found it impossible, you're not failing. You're chasing a concept that was never designed for someone building a company. Balance implies a static equilibrium — equal weight on both sides, held indefinitely. That's not what building a company looks like. And that's not what raising children looks like either. Both are dynamic, seasonal, and constantly shifting. Why Balance Is the Wrong Goal The

There's a principle in entrepreneurship: you become the average of the rooms you're in. Most founder-dads have thought carefully about their business rooms — mastermind groups, investor networks, peer communities. Very few have applied the same rigor to finding a room that takes their fatherhood equally seriously. That gap has real costs. Why Your Current Room Might Be Costing You If your primary community is business-only, the implicit message — reinforced at every meeting —

I had a management consultant tell me once that the best leadership training in the world is wilderness survival — that extreme situations strip away the noise and show you who you really are. He was right. He was also missing something. There's another category of extreme situation that strips away all the noise and shows you who you are: trying to get an 8-year-old to do something they don't want to do. I'm half joking. But only half. What I've realized over years of being

Dad guilt is one of the most common struggles entrepreneurial fathers face — and also one of the most misunderstood. I used to get a knot in my stomach every Sunday night. Not because of the week ahead — I actually love my work. The knot came from a specific thought that would creep in right around dinner: I didn't spend enough time with my kids this weekend. It didn't matter what we actually did. We could've gone to the park Saturday morning, watched a movie Friday night, an

Work-life balance for entrepreneurial dads isn't just difficult — for most of us, it's a myth that's actively making things worse. I used to talk about work-life balance like it was something I was almost achieving. Give me another quarter, I'd tell myself. Once I hire this next person. After this launch. Then I'll figure out the balance. Why is work-life balance such a harmful myth for entrepreneurial dads? Why is work-life balance a myth? Because it treats work and family a

Fatherhood makes you a better entrepreneur — and most entrepreneurial dads I know have eventually figured this out, even if they didn't see it coming. Nobody told me that having kids would make me better at my job. They told me about the sleepless nights. The way your priorities shift. How you'll look at the world differently. All true. But nobody said: "You're about to become a significantly better entrepreneur." How does fatherhood make you a better entrepreneur or CEO? How

Being more present as a dad starts with understanding one thing: presence isn't about time — it's about intention. I've been in the same room as my son while being completely unavailable to him. Physically present, mentally somewhere else. I've also had 20-minute conversations with him that felt like the most connected we'd been in weeks. How do you become more present with your kids? How do you become more present with your kids? The number of hours doesn't determine the qua

My first big business trip after my son was born, I cried in the airport. Not in front of anyone — I found an empty gate area and sat there for a few minutes before my flight. Neary was four months old. I was going to be gone four days. Rationally I knew it was fine. Emotionally it didn't feel that way. That was over a decade ago. I've done a lot of traveling since then, and I've gotten a lot better at it — not because the leaving gets easier, but because I've built intention

If you want to know how to stop checking your phone around your kids, start by being honest about why you're actually checking it — because for most entrepreneurial dads, it's not just about work. My daughter told me something a couple of years ago that I still think about. We were watching a movie together — her choice, which meant it was animated and I was only partially interested. I had my phone in my hand, not doing anything urgent, just scrolling. She reached over, took

The real struggle of being an entrepreneur dad isn't work-life balance — it's the identity collision nobody warns you about, and that most dads carry in silence. Everyone talks about scheduling, delegation, carving out time, building systems to protect family hours. All useful, all real. But nobody talks about the identity piece. And that's actually the hardest part. When you're an entrepreneur and a father, you're trying to maintain two extremely demanding identities simulta

For a long time, my business was basically invisible to my kids. They knew I went to work. They knew I came home. They knew I sometimes had to take calls or travel. Beyond that, what I actually did all day was a mystery to them — and I thought that was fine. Normal, even. You don't drag work home. You compartmentalize. You protect your family from the stress of the business. But a few years ago, my son asked me a question that reframed all of it. We were at dinner and he aske

Writing a legacy letter to your children is one of the most important and most neglected things a father can do — and yet most entrepreneurial dads I know have never started one. I have a will. It's organized, updated, handled by a good attorney. It specifies what happens to my assets, my business interests, various legal and financial matters. I'm proud of it as a document. It protects my family in the practical sense. What is a legacy letter and how is it different from a w