#78. Healers Deserve a Great Life Too, But 7 Common Fears May Hold You Back

In an obvious nod to Halloween, I thought it was a great time to revisit one of my most popular episodes. 

So today, let’s take another look at the 7 most common fears that healers tend to face in private practice. 

Although we all want what’s best for our clients, we are often shamed or judged when we want what’s best for ourselves. That sets us up for all kinds of internal conflict,  and that can block our success. 

On the other hand, when we find our way through and beyond those fears, real freedom is on the other side. 

So that’s what we’re diving into today. 

Which one (or three) of these do you relate to the most?  

Send me an email at wendy@wendypittsreeves.com and let me know. I promise to respond personally, and I’d love to hear! 

~Wendy   
Xoxo 

P.S. If you’d like to show your support for the show, just write a quick review on the Apple podcast app, or share this episode with a friend. And thank you!    

TIME STAMPS for 7 Fears and 7 Freedoms  

• #1 Lack: 5:23 
• #2 Loss: 5:46
• #3 Judgment: 9:34
• #4 Selfishness: 12:52
• #5 Inadequacy: 16:30
• #6 Complexity: 19:38
• #7 Power:  22:11   

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THIS WEEK’S JOURNAL PROMPT:  Which of the 7 Common Fears resonates with you the most and why? If you could let go of that fear, what could happen if you found your way to the Freedom that waits on the other side?  

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FREE RESOURCE:   Are you cramming client hours into a packed day? Working hard but feel like you're still not making any money? With decades of experience, I’ve found a LOT of ways to boost your bottom line, and I’ve pulled some of my favorites together into a free guide for you. 

Download this today, check out what’s inside, then tell me which one you’ll try first. :)

31 Practical Ways to Increase Cash Flow In Your Private Practice 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

You're listening to Ideal Practice, episode number 78. And because this is going to go live on October 31st, it seemed appropriate to perhaps revisit one of my most popular episodes to date and this is one I did early on y'all when I talked about what happens when we, as healers, as people who are devoted to the well-being of others, want more for ourselves, which, as you know, is a little complicated. So let's revisit that and take another look at the seven most common fears that we healers tend to have. So stay tuned. ["i'm Windy Pitts Reeves"]. Hi, I'm Windy Pitts Reeves and, with over two decades of experience in the private practice world, I've built my six-figure business while learning a lot of lessons the hard way. This is the first podcast that shows you how to apply the principles of energy alignment and strategy to build a practice that is profit-centered but people-forward. This is the Ideal Practice Podcast. ["i'm Windy Pitts Reeves"]. Hey guys, thank you so much for joining me today. I am so glad you're here back with me, because we got something a little important to talk about today, and this one may be a little challenging.

Speaker 1: 1:37

Today, y'all, I wanna talk about the problem with wanting more. You know what I'm talking about here, just like anyone else on the planet, we want more for our families, for our children, for ourselves. We are human right. We want expansion, we want safety, security, financial freedom. But, unlike a lot of other folks and a lot of other kinds of work, we are not always allowed to want more Somehow, because we are healers. We're just not supposed to want anything else. Has anyone ever said to you it's not supposed to be about the money, it's supposed to be about helping people. I don't care about the money anyway, I just want to help people. Kind of happens both ways. Or have you ever had anyone say why do you wanna get paid more? That's not why you have this job anyway. I remember teachers telling me how often they heard that why do you need more money? That's not why you're doing this. If that's what you're doing, then you should have been a lawyer, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah, here's the thing. We've got to make peace with this idea that it doesn't make us a bad person because we wanna make more money or because we want to take better care of our families, or because we want to have more freedom and safety and security in our life. So your practice done well, run well ideally provides you with a healthy income, as well as all the things I said in episode number two about what an ideal practice means. But a healthy income y'all is part of it, and yet there are so many ways that we tend to sabotage and set ourselves back from that right.

Speaker 1: 3:27

In particular, in all the coaching that I've done and in my own experience as a practitioner of many years, I have come to recognize that it seems to me that there are a handful of common fears that just seem to pop up over and over and over again all the time for all of us. You may have some of these, not all of these. There may be one or two that resonate especially with you more than others. You may click with all of them, I don't know, but I thought what I would do is I'd like to talk through these a little bit. In my mind there are seven of them. There are at least seven core fears that hold us back as healing arts professionals, as private practice owners. But here's the cool part when we recognize those fears and the way they are impacting our business, the way they are tripping us up, when we find a way to work through those and let them go. When we get to the other side, there's freedom, y'all. On the other side there's freedom, and each of these fears has its own kind of unique little freedom. I think that kind of comes with it when you work this through. So if you don't mind, if you'll just kind of hang with me a little bit, I wanna talk with you quickly about these fears and then I've got a little exercise for you at the end where I wanna help you kind of go somewhere with this. All right, might go a little bit long today, try and not to still experimenting with that part of this whole podcast idea. But I think this is important because I see this so much. I run into it all the time with my clients, my coaching clients. I run into it myself not as much as I used to, but I still do it right. So let's talk these through, all right.

Speaker 1: 5:20

The first one you're gonna get you know this right off the bat and that is the fear of lack. This is what is happening when we have thoughts like I'll never have enough. This is never gonna work. No matter how hard I try, I'm never gonna get ahead. Who am I thinking? I can't make enough money like this to support my family. Ah, that's a fear of lack. But you know what's on the other side of that. When you learn how to let that fear of lack go, what you're gonna discover is that, as a private practice owner, as a business owner, as the CEO of your own show, you have the freedom to create. You get to test ideas, you get to try new ways of doing things and, as you do, some things are gonna work, some things are not. Some things are going to work a lot, some things are going to work a little bit. But you will learn and you will grow and, as you do, your success will too. Fear of lack turns into the freedom to create. Once you learn, what am I worrying about? I got lots of choices here.

Speaker 1: 6:33

Number two the fear of loss. Here's the kicker. We start out going I'm never going to have enough, I'm never going to have enough, I'm never going to have enough. And then we get somewhere. We make some good money. Things are kind of rocking. And then it turns into I'm going to lose what I have. I'm going to lose what I have. This is never going to last. What was I thinking? My success is totally a fluke. This can't possibly be real. Can you relate to that? Because Lord knows I can. I can tell you some stories about that. Actually, and as we talk deeper about money mindset issues, later I'll tell you a few stories of my own where this exact fear is what I know was sabotaging me. That's really a bad grammar, but you know where I'm going with that.

Speaker 1: 7:22

You know what's on the other side of that fear of loss, when you can learn to trust that you're going to be okay. What's on the other side is a freedom of faith and in particular, I mean faith in your abilities. Over time, as you test and try things, as you do a little research and development, as you experiment and find out what works for you, you will learn that you actually are figuring things out and you will learn. You know what. I kind of know what I'm doing here, and when I don't know what I'm doing, it's okay, I figure it out. You will learn to recognize and own and celebrate every single win you have. You'll certainly learn that if you work with me because I pushed that big time with my people you learn that you can always pivot, try something else. You can reinvent yourself anytime you want to or need to Back, when I was beginning to really think hard about shifting my practice away from insurance and looking for alternatives.

Speaker 1: 8:31

What was a better way to make a living that didn't require me to do crazy paperwork and jump through all the hoops for so little? One of the first things I did was explore the concept of mediation and I went through training and I started a mediation practice and I started something new. Now I've done lots of things like that over time, but that was totally me learning to have faith in my ability to learn something new, try something new, offer something new, take my business in a new direction. That's faith. So when you have that fear of loss what if I lose what I've got? I encourage you to let that go and step into the freedom of faith faith in yourself.

Speaker 1: 9:19

The third fear that I seek, that I Lord. I see this in the room when I am speaking to a professional group about this, especially if I'm talking to a group of, for instance, social workers my tribe and that is the fear of judgment. If I run my practice that way I want to, if I charge what I really think this work deserves, if I have these policies that are clear cut and that kind of hold my clients accountable. What will my colleagues think of me? Will they see me as greedy? Am I going to be challenged as being somehow another disloyal to our code of ethics? Am I going to end up with no friends, no colleagues, no referrals? Will I be lonely? Will I be kicked out of the tribe? This is strong. This is real. We care more than we want to about what others think. Right, we worry about what our clients think. We worry about what our clients think.

Speaker 1: 10:09

Many of you are experts in understanding that emotion, that perception, that way of experiencing that kind of feeling, that kind of feeling, and I think that's the most important thing that we need to do, and I think that's the most important thing that we need to do. Well, here's the thing y'all. I don't have to talk to you about judgment. Y'all know where that comes from. Many of you are experts in understanding that emotion, that perception, that way of experiencing those around us. And when you can let the fear of judgment drop as you become more, as you develop more faith in yourself, as you learn to that, you have the ability to create your practice the way you want to, you can step into a freedom from that guilt. Because that's what happens. I'm afraid people are going to judge me and then I feel guilty for wanting more. What's wrong with me? I'm not supposed to want more. That's guilt. Here's what happens when you can allow others just to feel what they feel. You know what, if somebody else is being a little judgey of you, you know where that comes from. It isn't about you, honey. It's never about you, not really Not that. That judgment comes.

Speaker 1: 11:31

Their reaction comes from their own fear, their own fear, and it says a lot more about them than it does about you. I know that there have been times in my own life when I looked at colleagues and thought how is she doing that? Good Lord, that must be nice. You know what that was. That was just me being afraid to do the same thing. How are they charging so much? How are they setting those policies like that? How are they turning away that business? Oh, because they can't, because their practice works for them. Right, I encourage you to drop that fear of judgment. Let people feel what they feel. Let them do their own work. Let them work through their own process. Let them travel their own path. They have to find their own way. That's theirs, not yours. Step away from that, drop that and step into freedom from guilt, because, my sweet friend, you have the right to design your practice the way that works for you. So much I want to say about that.

Speaker 1: 12:39

The next fear, another big. It's so funny. These, this kind of these, are almost like mirror images of each other. We go from being afraid that others judge us to essentially judging ourselves, and that is with a fear of being selfish. Oh my gosh, what if? What if success changes me? What if a higher level of income changes me? What if I start thinking that I'm better than other people? What if I become exactly that thing that I'm afraid other people are judging me for? Isn't it crazy how we twist ourselves into a pretzel around this stuff. It just makes me, oh my gosh, it just gets me even thinking about it.

Speaker 1: 13:21

But here's the thing y'all, you know what happens when you stop worrying about being selfish and start being self-nurturing, self-honoring, you step into the freedom of self-respect. And oh my gosh, that's a powerful place to be. When you have self-respect, you really are free from the judgment of others because you know who you are, you know your intentions, you know your motivation. You know your truth self. You know what's in your heart and you don't have to explain that to anybody. You don't owe anybody an explanation. You don't have to justify. You are who you are doing, what you do, the way you want to do, and that is just fine. This is what you get as well.

Speaker 1: 14:14

I honestly I want to say, just as a human being, but especially when you have the courage to start a business, it's easy for other people to look at you in a different way. It's easy for you to judge yourself. But, sweetheart, don't do that to yourself. My southern is really coming out today. I want you to make peace with your own path. Give yourself permission to walk your own walk, hike your own hike and allow other people to travel theirs.

Speaker 1: 14:41

Now here is one thing that will happen. I will say this just a little bit of a note of caution. I want to prepare you for this. It is true that, as Listen to me here, this is important as you grow, evolve, become stronger, as you develop more self-respect, as you drop that guilt, as you develop more faith in your abilities, as your success grows because it will. As that happens, you will find that sometimes people fall away in your life. You may very well find that you are drawn to or drift away from different peer groups, different tribes, not because you suddenly think you're better than other people. That is so not what it is but what you will find is that you need to be around other people who are growing like you are. You need to be around other people who are also on a path of expansion. I'll say that Right, and sometimes it gets harder to be around those who aren't as self-aware, who aren't really growing in the same way you are, and that and I mean no judgment by that Again, we all have to hike our own hike, but it is true that things may change, relationships may change as you grow, but that's not because you are selfish, it's because you respect yourself enough that you began to learn that you just need something different, and that's absolutely okay. Just wanted to drop that in there while I was thinking about it. All right, what number is this? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Number five? Hmm, these next two also kind of go together, and that is a.

Speaker 1: 16:29

Lot of us will have a fear of inadequacy or another way of saying that, a fear of not enoughness. My, I mean as a therapist. I've seen this my entire career, especially among some of the women that I've worked with. But I also see this as a business coach and that is this feeling that I want more but I don't deserve more. What right do I have to want a six-figure practice? I'm not good enough yet, or at all. I'm not smart enough, I'm not trained enough, I'm not skilled enough. I haven't been at this long enough. I don't have enough experience. I'm not helping people enough. I'm not making a big enough difference. You know what this other provider is so much better than I am. What right do I have to want more? Who do who am I?

Speaker 1: 17:13

This is kind of another variation on thinking that you're selfish, but it's not what it is. You are enough, honey. You are enough just because you, you exist right. You would never say this to a client of yours. You would never say to a client you don't deserve to feel better because you know what You're. You're not always nice to your kids. Or you don't deserve to make more money because you know what. You don't have the right degree. Or you don't deserve to want a better partner or a better loving relationship with your partner because you know who do you think you are Like? You would never say that to a client, right? It's just funny to even think about it. It's interesting what a double standard we have about this. Don't you think we are much kinder to our clients than we are to ourselves? So here's the freedom that's waiting for you when you can let go of that sense of not being enough.

Speaker 1: 18:14

It is the freedom that comes with compassion. I know you guys. You are full of compassion for your clients. They beat themselves up all the time, you see it, and it just breaks your heart, doesn't it? Aren't you constantly challenging that self view that your clients have, whether it's about their body, whether it's about their parenting skills, whether it's about their speaking ability, whatever it is, it doesn't matter. Aren't you constantly encouraging your clients to be more compassionate to themselves? Well, that's what I'm doing with you. I want you to step into the freedom that comes when you treat yourself with compassion. I want you to have the same compassion for yourself that you have for your clients. I want you to know that being enough is not something that we earn by what we do. It's something we have by being period. You are enough already. Period Enough. That's it. That's all I'm gonna say about that. So quit worrying about that. Drop the fear of inadequacy and step into the freedom. Of compassion Makes you want to get out and give you all a hug, all right.

Speaker 1: 19:34

The next one, which sort of goes along with that, is a fear of complexity. I have this sometimes myself, a fear that you know more money just means more problems. Why would I want that? It's just more to manage. It's just, you know, more taxes I have to pay. Why would I want to grow this business? Why would I want to scale? Why would I want to take on a team? Oh my gosh, I can barely manage myself. I sure can't manage anybody else. I'm already busy, I'm already stressed to the max. I've already got enough of my plate. Why would I want more? More is just harder.

Speaker 1: 20:10

Well, y'all, that's a bit of a story, because the truth is who we are goes with us as we grow. Whatever we have problems with as a startup business, we're gonna have problems at every stage of growth after that. That's part of it. You take yourself with you as you develop habits, systems, boundaries, policies, as you develop ways of working at different phases of your business. You also take that with you. So the complexity will grow only at the rate that you are ready to keep up with it. It's fine If I talked to a second grader and told them someday they would be reading what they were going to be reading in 12th grade.

Speaker 1: 20:56

That would probably freak them out, but it's funny. By the time you get to 12th grade, you can actually read what you read in 12th grade. Right, your skills will grow with your business, with your success. Here's what happens. When you can drop that theory oh, it's a little scary if I take on more. It's a little scary when I'm successful. What if I can't keep up with all of these things? What you will find is that you have the freedom of competency. I love that because, guys, put in a nutshell, your skills will grow as your business grows, just like it happens with our kids. So quit worrying about it. Go back to what I said earlier about having faith in yourself and just trust that you will learn what you need to learn when you need to learn it and not a moment before. That's fine, it's all good, and now let's go to the last one. The last one, guys, is a bit of a doozy.

Speaker 1: 21:55

This is the one, honestly, that I actually think is the biggest. It's the one that holds us back the most. I think it is in a way, sort of the secret fear that almost every healer I know has at his or her core, and that is a fear of power, especially personal power. The word power gets kind of a bad rap. I had a colleague one time who said to me that most people are afraid that we think of the word power as being power over instead of power to. I think that was brilliant. She was absolutely right of that. But when we have a fear of our own power, we're afraid of finding out what we can really do. I think we're afraid of facing our own power, owning our worth, seeing ourselves as we can be and, honestly, sometimes just seeing ourselves as others see us. We talked earlier about worrying about other people judging us, but honestly, it's when other people think we're awesome that we have more trouble. Oh my Lord.

Speaker 1: 23:01

I still remember, if I can just tell you a quick story, I was at a mastermind group. It was a meeting of a big coaching gathering of about I don't know 75 to 100 people, with a coach that I adored, that I admire, who was up on a pedestal in my mind for real. And someone else in the room came up to me and said I think I'd like to talk to you about your coaching. And this was a woman that I was instantly intimidated by. She was very successful already. She had a business that was making mid six figures. She wasn't a healer, she was doing. She did something different, but it didn't matter. She was somebody that I saw as already like way out there, way ahead of me, and she came to me and said I think I might want to work with you and I'm like, really why? Which is where I go with that? And my first thought was you don't wanna work with me, Like you're so far beyond where I am. And then we started talking and she started telling me where she was getting stuck and what she was running into and where she needed help and by golly, you know what she was right. I could help her. In fact, I probably would have been one of the best ones to help her, because it was right up my alley what she was needing help with. So we had a good conversation and agreed to set up a phone call later to kind of follow through with it, and then she went back to her seat and the day went on.

Speaker 1: 24:25

The meeting continued but, oh my gosh, that blew my mind and you know what happened I completely fell apart. I absolutely fell apart. I had to leave the room. I got so upset I had to leave the room and I started. I got super emotional and I had to ask one of the team of this coach that I was working with. I said I need to talk to somebody and they went and found one of the associate coaches for me to spend some time with the mindset coach. How about that? Because that's who I needed in that moment. Because what happened in that moment was I suddenly got a glimpse of what I really could do, how much I really do have to offer, what I was capable of and how others might see me, and it freaked me out big time.

Speaker 1: 25:27

Now, that's not a story I've shared actually ever, I don't think publicly. I've talked about it among friends. I've talked about it with coaching clients one-on-one, but I've never shared that publicly. I was a wreck. Here's why my own power was scaring me to death. Oh my gosh, what if I really am this person? What if I really can do this? What if I am what others seem to think I am, and I had to learn to let go of that, step into it, claim it, own it, be okay with it.

Speaker 1: 26:00

And you know what's on the other side of that one Freedom of expansion? It's learning, it's becoming to, it's knowing that claiming my own power power to provide, power to serve, power to teach, power to inspire, power to encourage enables me to serve even more people to the highest good. And, my friend, you are no different. I'm coaching someone now, a group of providers right now, who are building a clinic, and they ran into this themselves as soon as they started having some success under their belt, this exact this is the fear that started coming up. I get it. I so get it. So here's where I want you to go with this.

Speaker 1: 26:48

Which one of these fears, as I've talked to them through, do you really resonate with? Let's make this a little exercise, a little writing exercise. Which one of these seven core fears resonates the most with you, and why? That's my first question. My second question is how do you think it might be impacting your success or impacting your practice? Can you think of ways that it could be getting in the way, holding you back, maybe tripping you up a little bit. And then my third question is what would happen if you could find your way to the freedom that waits on the other side when you let that fear go? Just let it go. If you need to go back and listen to this again, all right.

Speaker 1: 27:38

If you need to go back and listen to each one of these, which one do you resonate with? How is it impacting your success, your life as a business owner, and what would happen if you could find your way to the freedom that lies on the other side, when you can let it go? This is a tough one, y'all, but I think it is so important because these unconscious fears are often they're driving the bus in our business, and I think it's time to ask them to step aside so that you can do the driving. Don't you think? Yeah, me too, and y'all. If this episode makes you a little squirmy, that might just mean you need to listen to it Again. Just saying, seriously have some fun with this, think about this, play with these fears, see where this resonates for you, learn from this and grow. All right, all right, that's what I got for you today. Y'all, have a great week and I will see you next time right here on the Ideal Practice Podcast. Bye now, we'll see you next time.