PODCASTS
Lean Towards Joy with Michael Whyte
Join Michael Whyte as he sits down for a conversation with Gene Baur co-founder of Farm Santuary
Farm Sanctuary, through its rescue, education, and advocacy efforts fights the devastating effects that animal agriculture has on animals, our health, and our environment.
Gene has been hailed as “the conscience of the food movement” by Time magazine.
Join the conversation where Michael and Gene discuss how he turned a passion into not only a successful non-profit but a movement that has inspired millions.
This episode is part of series were Michael chats with heart-centered entrepreneurs that have turned their passions into successful and sustaining businesses.
Even if you don’t share their passion, everyone has a passion, something that brings them joy. This podcast promotes leaning towards that joy as a way to either shift careers into a more fulfilling one or to find ways to spend more time following that passion and shining your light!
Enjoy! Let me know what you think!
More about Gene Baur
Website: https://www.farmsanctuary.org
More about Michael Whyte
Websites: https://LeanTowardsJoy.com, https://ShopJoy.org
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@leantowardsjoy
Twitter: https://twitter.com/leantowardsjoy
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leantowardsjoy https://instagram.com/shopjoyorg
Show Notes*:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael Whyte: Hi, I’m Michael White, the founder of Lean towards Joy, the heart centered company that helps people lean towards joy, follow their passion, and shine their light. I’m excited about this season of the podcast because I’m going to sit down with people that have done just that. And as someone who has helped many entrepreneurs follow their passion, create nonprofits and for profits for people, I wanted to sit down and have conversations with people that have done just that and are making a positive difference in the world. These people had a passion. They didn’t necessarily know where they were headed or how they fully create a sustainable business model, but they took action. They leaned towards their joy, and wow, are they shining their light. And so I hope you enjoy our conversation.
Today, I’m excited to chat with Gene Bauer, co founder of Farm Sanctuary. Farm Sanctuary, through its rescue, education and advocacy efforts, fights the devastating effects that animal agriculture has on animals, our health and our environment. The animal agricultural industry plays a major role in social and economical injustices that we see all around us every day. Their New York and California locations are home to nearly 700 rescued friends. The destiny has been greatly changed for these sentient animals. And over the last 40 years, through the education and advocacy, the dedicated staff and leadership of Farm Sanctuary, they have changed the health and well being of countless two legged folks like myself. I first heard about Farm Sanctuary back in 2011 when I was seeing the documentary Forks over Knives. Gene was interviewed in the movie and just a few months prior, my mother had died of cancer. And I was sitting there just absorbing all of this information about how a whole food plant based diet could prevent and in many cases reverse all of these major diseases that were really affecting families. It was in that moment where my perspective shifted and just how I viewed everything changed. Gene has written two books changing hearts and minds about animals and food. The ultimate guide to eating mindfully living longer and feeling better every day. Gene has been featured on every major TV network across the political spectrum. He’s been a guest on Martha Stewart The Daily Show. He was included as one of Oprah’s Super Soul 100 Soul givers. And I’m deeply honored that he has taken the time to sit down with me today for a conversation about how he turned his passion into not only a successful nonprofit, but a movement that has inspired millions. So thank you, Gene, for taking the time to sit down with me today.
Gene Baur: My pleasure. Thanks for your interest in these issues. It’s great to talk to you.
Michael Whyte: Thank you. So we all have passions, we’re all passionate about something, and fortunately, many people are passionate about helping other people or animals. We have listeners through kind of all different walks of life, and they might be in this place where they’re feeling like, okay, I have this passion. I don’t exactly know what to do with it. I do it on the side, but I’d really like to do it more full time, either as a part time thing or get out of my career completely and focus on this 100%. And so I’d love to hear just a little bit about your story, the early stages of your organization and what led you to start farm sanctuary.
Gene Baur: Yeah, well, when we started farm sanctuary back in 1986, we didn’t have a business plan, we didn’t have a one year plan, we didn’t have a five year plan. We just saw that there were problems that needed attention, basically. And for me, like everybody around me, I grew up eating meat, supporting the factory farming industry without thinking about it. And through high school and college, I started learning more about the abuses of animal agriculture. I went vegan in 1985, but in 1986 still, there was very little awareness about factory farming. And today there’s still not enough awareness about factory farming. So in 1986, we co founded farm sanctuary to document conditions. And we started investigating farms, stockyards and slaughterhouses to show what was happening. And our sort of naive feeling was that if we show people how bad it is and how much these animals are suffering, they’re going to want to immediately stop eating animals and stop supporting the industry. It’s more complex than that. We might have good intentions, but we also need to have infrastructure and systems underneath us to be able to make more compassionate choices. And one of the systems is belief systems. Not only economic systems, but belief systems are really big. But when we started farm sanctuary in 1986, like I mentioned, we didn’t have a long term plan. We were an all volunteer organization. I actually had a part time job teaching. And the way we funded farm sanctuary was by selling vegan hot dogs out of our volkswagen van at grateful dead concerts. So that we did that for the first three years and we sort of leaned into it. And as people heard about what we were doing, thankfully, many people started supporting us. So I think that this mission, the goals that we had, resonated with many people. And I also think that many people, when they did learn about factory farming, were upset by it and felt something had to be done. So thankfully, over the years, we’ve been very lucky to have so many supporters and that’s allowed us to continue doing this work.
Michael Whyte: That’s wonderful. It’s so true about just kind of that perception shift of like you said, you grew up eating meat, as did I. And at the same time we go and visit the local farm or something like that. But they do a really great job of sewing this filter. And that’s the only way I can kind of the words I can put to it is like this filter of like, somehow this thing and we’ll call it different things. We’ll call it ham, we won’t call it pig, we’ll call it beef. We won’t call it a cow. We do all these things. They the collective so that you don’t realize what you’re doing. It’s like you don’t realize no, you’re consuming an animal.
Gene Baur: We’re eating corpses and don’t think about it. Right. And if everybody’s doing it, it is normal. I mean, we are such social animals, we tend to do what those around us do. But this is where critical thinking is so important.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. And I think that being able to start creating awareness, which you have, but getting more people to start losing that filter of, like, no, you have a dog at home. Would you eat your dog? I was listening to a podcast earlier, and I’m not going to mention anything about what it was, but there was someone, I was like, oh, okay, I can get behind that, and I can get behind cold showers or fasting. I can get around some of these health benefits. But then they said, oh, but I raise sheep and cows and I eat them and they’re delicious. Like, oh, turning that one off, how can you say and so there really is, I think, the the more awareness that you create around, you know, knowing what you’re having, like, I I actively started saying, like, you know, because again, it’s it’s a social thing. You go out and people are getting I go to my son’s school and they have pizza and this and that, and it’s like I used to say, like, oh, I don’t eat meat, or I don’t have dairy or whatever, but I’m like, I don’t eat animals. Even just that one word. Stop calling it meat. Call it an animal. I don’t eat animals. Yeah.
Gene Baur: That really makes the fact that it is a dead animal much more obvious. Right, yeah. And then hopefully encourages people to consider the reality of what they’re participating in. But as you say, we have these filters and we don’t look at certain things, and then we start rationalizing them. It’s been said that we’re rational animals. It’s, I think, more accurate to say we’re rationalizing animals. And if we’re doing something we don’t feel good about, we come up with a lot of reasons why we have to do it. And one of the common misperceptions about meat is we need it for protein. Fact is, we do not need meat for protein. We do not need it for our nutritional well being. So when we recognize that we don’t need to do it, then it becomes actually a choice. And then when we have a choice, we are culpable for the choice. A lot of times, I think the biggest obstacles for people is a fear of change, a fear of trying something they haven’t done before, a fear of being different. If everybody’s eating meat and they’re different, a fear of not getting the nutrition they need, because we’ve been bombarded with messages saying you need meat for protein or you need cow’s milk for calcium. Fact is, in this country, in the United States, we drink a lot of cow’s milk and we get a lot of osteoporosis. So this idea that drinking cow’s milk prevents osteoporosis, if you look at it empirically, doesn’t really add up. So a big part of what we do at farm sanctuary is just encourage people to pay attention, to look at empirical reality and evidence, and then to make thoughtful choices that are ultimately aligned with our own interests. So instead of eating food that makes us sick the way we do in this country, we could actually eat food that is nourishing. We could support a food system that’s not destroying the planet the way factory farming is, and we can live in a way without causing unnecessary harm to other animals. And so those are, I think, all in our interests, and they’re also beneficial to our humanity and our ability to empathize with others. Because when you mistreat somebody else, there is this desire to denigrate the victim of our mistreatment. And this has happened in a big way with farm animals. Being called a pig, for example, is a way to denigrate somebody, or being called a turkey is a way to denigrate somebody. But implicit in that, we’re denigrating pigs and turkeys, these individuals who are innocent victims of an abusive system. And then to validate and rationalize it, we say, oh, they’re not very smart, or they don’t deserve better, which really undermines our empathy. And that is another thing that happens, I think, when we’re engaged in this system, and we don’t want to look at it, and we’re afraid to change. So just want to encourage people to be willing to look, to be willing to breathe, to step back, and hopefully be empowered to make changes that are aligned with our values and aligned with our interests.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, that’s great. I think you talked a lot about kind of the fear that so many people have of change, and a lot of it is the social aspect of that, what will my friends think if I want a veggie burger instead of cheeseburger or whatever this time of year? That’s happening. And there is a lot of social pressure around that. And it depends on your circle of people that you have around you too, in terms of where their vibration is, of whether they’ll accept that or they won’t. But that comes to head, like, when you’re actually going to start getting more involved in something that you’re passionate about and advocating, there is that pressure of the people around you. And I would imagine over now in your fourth decade of, like, you’ve hit a lot of resistance, I’m sure along the way. There’s wonderful people out there, and you found a lot of support. But talk up a little bit about, especially now, you can go to the grocery store and you can buy alternatives, plant based alternatives that they manufacture to taste and feel like the same thing you’re using. It’s kind of funny to me. I’ve gone now, I think, twelve years or so. I can’t have the ones that they make taste like the way it is. Because I’m like, no, this doesn’t feel right to me. I want it to taste more like a plant. But a guy looked at me with like he’s like, oh, we have all these wonderful I was like, no, I don’t want any of those. Give me the one over there that looks with black beanburger or something.
Gene Baur: They’re such creatures of habit. Such creatures of habit. And most people are comfortable in a certain way of being without sort of critically analyzing or assessing it. And we grow up eating meat. We assume we need to eat meat. There are very strong economic forces at play that encourage us to eat meat, including government programs that promote cow’s milk in the school lunch program, for instance. And so we are bombarded with narratives about how this is how we’ve always done it, this is the best way to nourish ourselves. Meat gives us strength when in fact we can live very well without it. And so changing is difficult. And I think one of the main ways that we can inspire change is by being positive examples and showing that it is possible. Because as human beings, we learn from those around us. We rub off on those around us. And that’s why growing up, most of us grew up eating meat because everybody around us was doing it. But if there are some vegans, and if those vegans are helpful, supportive, compassionate, accepting, inclusive, that makes it easier for people to make some changes. And usually change happens incrementally. Where somebody gives up eating cows, for example, or gives up eating pigs or gives up drinking cow’s milk, each of these little incremental steps often leads to another step. And so I think that it’s important to nurture those small steps. It’s not an all or nothing situation. And life is all or nothing. I mean, we do the best we can each day and none of us, not even the most vegan vegan is perfect. Just living on this planet, we’re going to inadvertently cause harm to others, but just accepting the reality that we’re on this planet with many other creatures. And we can make choices every day that have profound impacts not only on our own lives, but on the lives of others. And to me that’s part of empathy, which means being able to recognize the pain or feelings or suffering or experience of someone else. And many of us have cats or dogs and we see their expressions, we know when they’re happy and excited, we know when they’re sad. That’s empathy. And cows and pigs and sheep and chickens and turkeys have emotions as well. They have relationships, they have memories. And empathizing with that, I think, brings out the better part of our humanity. Whereas going to a factory farm and a slaughterhouse, people who work in those places really don’t want to and can’t empathize because if they do, what they’re doing is just such an affront to their humanity. And so I feel for those people because in many cases they feel that this is their only opportunity, their only job, and they’re stuck in the system. And I often ask people to consider what it would be like to work in a slaughterhouse, you know, where for 8 hours a day you’re cutting the throats of animals. And when somebody’s engaged in that kind of a practice, there’s a very strong incentive not to see those as living, feeling, emotional beings.
Michael Whyte: You have to compartmentalize that because otherwise you wouldn’t be able to function.
Gene Baur: Exactly. And compartmentalizing, I think, undermines our humanity, right. Undermines our potential for kindness. And humans have done this with other humans also forever, for thousands of years.
Michael Whyte: Right.
Gene Baur: It’s the same sort of process of saying some folks don’t really deserve consideration. And at Farm Sanctuary and in the animal rights movement, we’re basically encouraging people to think about non human animals and about their lived experiences and our impacts on them.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, when you mention about those incremental steps, we have a tendency now, and it could be swinging the other way, but there’s more of like, well, if you’re not 100% for, then you must be against. And so therefore, we’re hitting up against a wall here and we see it in many different things. This is one of them. But to applaud those incremental steps, for me, it wasn’t for six weeks after I watched that movie and I did this and I was like, I put my popcorn down, I was like, I’m 100% vegan. And then like, six weeks went by and I’m like, wow, this is incredibly hard to go for 100% from nothing. And so for me, it changed. I was like, okay. And you start to rationalize and justify and it’s like, okay, well, I’ll do this, not this. So from that moment forward, I never ate another animal, but I was still having consuming dairy products. And then time went by and I was like, it didn’t feel authentic because I’m like, I’m rationalizing and making an excuse as to why I’m going to go get that ice cream rather than like, I wasn’t drinking, but I’m still consuming cheese. I was like, this doesn’t feel authentic to me. And so, like you said, it’s like those incremental, like oh, and then you become more aware of this and then you start to shift that behavior and that part of you. And I think the same is true of like if you are vegan or if you’re a vegetarian or whatever and someone’s like, oh, well, we’re trying Meatless Tuesdays or something. It’s like don’t be like that’s not enough. Be like that’s awesome. You should do that and help them along with that because it is going to be through that incremental process that I think you’re going to change more minds.
Gene Baur: I think that’s very true. And again, we are creatures of habit, right? So if we have a certain habit changing that takes energy. Holding on to the status quo is kind of easy to do. So this is where, like, the Meatless Mondays or one day a week going vegan is, I think, very positive because it allows people to start learning new ways to eat, learning new ways, new foods that are available that they haven’t even thought about. And recognizing that in some cases it’s really easy. You could have marinara sauce, right? So a lot of the things that we’re already eating are vegan or could be made vegan very easily. And today you could even get vegan meatballs. So you can have spaghetti and meatballs all vegan. So it’s easier than ever. But I think that, again, we are creatures of habit and incremental steps help us to start developing new healthier habits. And then that also starts then to build kind of muscle memory and pathways of thinking and being in our brains. There’s a brain expert on, I think, Stephen Colbert, many years ago and he was asked to describe brain function in five words. He said nerve cells fire in patterns. And so we have these patterns. And so shifting from the standard American diet, the sad diet with highly processed foods, too many animal products, to a healthier diet requires we create new patterns of how we look at our food and where we go and buy it and what we eat. But it’s getting easier and it’s really not that difficult. And it also can be very affordable. This is the other thing is because of our subsidy system, hamburgers are way cheaper than they should be. There’s enormous costs associated with raising animals for food. But our government spends literally billions of dollars every year to bolster this industry. There was a study a few years ago that looked at dairy industry income and they found that 73% of dairy industry income came from government programs. So this is a system that is supported by tax dollars despite the fact that this food is making us sick. But it’s cheap and it’s accessible. It’s everywhere. That’s part of the problem. We’re up against the systemic preference towards unhealthy foods. And so we need to make it easier to eat healthier food. So that’s part of the systemic work we’re doing and it makes it harder for individuals just because unhealthy food is so accessible. But vegan food inherently is cheaper. We can feed more people with less land and fewer resources by eating plants instead of animals. In the US. Ten times more land goes to animal agriculture versus plant based agriculture. Recently there were those western states vying for Colorado River water. The Colorado River doesn’t even reach the ocean. Hasn’t for years, but the water supply is dwindling. What wasn’t in the news enough was the fact that most of that Colorado River water that’s being taken by those western states goes to irrigate crops to feed farm animals. So could you imagine if we just stopped taking water and other resources and using that to raise animals for food? We’d have so much more that could be used in much wiser ways. We’d have more wildlife space. The reason the rainforests are being cut down is to raise animals to graze them or to grow crops to feed them. So this is a system that’s inherently inefficient. And so we need to keep working on reforms to government programs to stop incentivizing this factory farming system.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, the fear of change and the fear of that kind of looking different amongst your peers and things like that, it reminds me a lot about just inherent fears that we have. A lot of what I work with with people is getting around those, like, hurdles, you know, it’s like you have this fear of, well, if I put this thing out there and you know, what will people think of me and what if it doesn’t work? And all kind of those fears that are associated with starting anything new. And so I wonder if you can kind of remember back to those days of selling the vegan hot dogs through the van and what kind of kept you going through some I can’t imagine everything was open arms for you. If you were to start that venture now, you would have a more understanding because you’ve built that advocate, you’ve built that education for millions of people. But not a lot of that was there when you started this 40 years ago.
Gene Baur: When we started back in 1986, we were fortunate that a fellow activist had a house, that the house was in rough shape, but he needed somebody to live in it. So we lived in this house. So it was like free rent, which really helped. And we started small. We started slowly, I shouldn’t say slowly because things grew pretty quickly, but we didn’t get out ahead of ourselves. We didn’t rescue too many animals because actually we’re living in a little row house in Wilmington, Delaware, and then a tofu farmer let us use a couple of acres on his farm in Pennsylvania. And then we got the farm in upstate New York a couple of years later. So we didn’t go too fast where we couldn’t manage what we had that was important. But what kept us motivated was just how abusive this system was. Each time we were doing investigation, we would see horrible conditions and we were just driven to do something about it. So we would find animals literally in trash cans who had been discarded or living animals thrown on piles of dead animals. And we then started rescuing them. So our rescues actually grew out of our investigations. And when these animals were rescued and as we watched them heal, in a sense, it also helped to heal us. And so we recognized that we were documenting a problem, we were creating an immediate solution for certain individuals, but we also recognized that it was impossible to rescue billions of animals every year and that we had to work on educating people and advocating for reforms. But we just have, from the beginning, been driven by a desire to end needless suffering and to create a world where kindness is more prevalent and the sanctuaries really embody that. And there were certainly tough days. There are still tough days, but when you keep the goal in mind, you keep sort of the dream alive, you can keep going.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, I think that’s great advice, especially around not trying to save the world all at once. Impossible, because yeah, it is. It’s impossible. I think all of these passions start with a spark, and so you have the spark within you and then it gets fueled by whatever you’re surrounding yourself with, whether it’s doing the investigations and then finding the animals and building upon that compassion for that particular passion. But I think a lot of people kind of have the spark. It gets fueled throughout X period of time and then they show up and they’re a raging fire of passion. And they’re like, but why isn’t everyone else here? And it’s like, well, because they didn’t get the spark yet. Sometimes you have to be that spark for somebody else. And I think that to recognize that to go from here to there is not always going to be easy.
Gene Baur: And sometimes the spark can’t start as a raging fire. Right. Sometimes the spark has to be a little warm flame to attract right? Yeah.
Michael Whyte: You don’t want to run away from the fire.
Gene Baur: Exactly. You don’t want to come in too hot. Right. Otherwise, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. Right. And this is also, I think, part of one of Pharma Sanctuary’s most important values, which is to speak to people where they are on their own journeys, which requires empathy, which requires us to recognize that for some people, they may be afraid. They may not be able to make certain choices, but to empower and support choices that are feasible for different individuals and then build from there. But sometimes for Vegans, it is tough just because we see just how atrocious these animals are being abused and just how harmful this whole system is. And you kind of want to scream and say it’s got to stop yesterday. But the fact is doing that type of screaming is probably going to further entrench it as opposed to creating change. So I think it’s very pragmatic to take incremental steps and to celebrate them while continuously keeping our eye on what we ultimately hope to achieve. I think there can also sometimes be a danger in accepting small changes in thinking we just saved the world. So when it comes to ending some of the worst cruelties of factory farming, we say that less bad is better than more bad when you give animals a little bit more space, for instance. But it’s still not good. And one of our big efforts right now at Farm Sanctuary is to figure out ways to build the good, to create a food system that works for people, for the planet, for other animals. And we believe that is a plant based food system. It’s a more diversified, more democratized food system because in agriculture now we’ve had a lot of consolidation where small farms have been taken over by big farms and where consumers have been further removed and disconnected from the source of their food. And when there’s that disconnection between consumers and the food production process, agribusiness is in a much easier position to mislead consumers and to say things, oh, it’s carbon friendly agriculture or it’s free range animal products. Those labels usually sound a lot better than they are. So that’s another reason why having a more diversified, localized small food structure or a small farmer structure will allow consumers to be closer to the source of their food. So there’s more accountability and more transparency because right now we don’t have enough of that. And that’s one of the big problems.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, no, I think that’s great. I think that there’s a lot of value in kind of understanding the whole picture of what you’re putting in your body and kind of what’s behind it. And it is back to you mentioning about working a slaughterhouse of that compartmentalization. It’s like to get out of bed, everybody has to do it in some variety because if you woke up and just read through the news you’re going to be like no getting back into bed. And so there needs to be some of that. But you’re right, I think the more you kind of do see what’s going and what’s behind some of these both meat products, dairy products, but even some of the other products that you buy at the grocery store and it’s like a marketing label is just one thing. Like my wife and I were just chatting about a particular brand and we’re like, oh yeah, it’s this brand. We use this for our kids. And I’m like, I think they were just bought out by some giant chemical company. It’s like, are we sure we’re still getting what we think we’re getting?
Gene Baur: Yeah, brands. And that has happened where a lot of big corporations have subsumed and taken up friendly brands right. Which then they continue to sell and might start cutting corners with products. And I don’t mean to be overly pessimistic because incremental steps and even buying products that are imperfect is better than buying worse products. But to the extent we can go to local farmers markets. Or even get to know local farmers or even potentially having a garden in our backyard. These are ways where we know where the food comes from, where we can feel really good about eating it. And there’s actually a pretty cool food not lawns movement that’s small. But in this country we have something like 30 million acres of lawns. That’s more land than we use to grow fruits and vegetables in this country. Now, can you imagine if each of those lawns was and the gardeners, in many cases people are hiring gardeners basically to mow the lawn and put down fertilizer. What if those gardeners were actually gardeners? And then there’s job opportunities and farming is a skilled job. And so now you get better income for the workers. You’re producing something more valuable than grass clippings. You then potentially have a neighborhood with a bunch of little farms, and then you have all kinds of different produce. Then you have surplus. Start a farmer’s market, support folks in that area that need food. So these are the kinds of potential solutions around us. And there’s little bits and pieces moving in this direction. But then you also then have obstacles, right? Like homeowners association saying, no, we need to have a manicured grass lawn, which is, again, a belief that is, I think, worth challenging and questioning. And then another thing that’s problematic is that industrial agriculture has preferred preferential access to water and other resources. So, you know, to have a food not lawns movement, there needs to be infrastructure and irrigation in some cases and then other supports. But right now we’re built the system is built for industrial agriculture and it’s incentivized, which is problematic. So we need to work on systems and structural changes to incentivize a healthier food system.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, and that’s obviously done by the education that you’re doing and promoting around those changes. Won’t it’s gotten so far to a point. Now, those changes aren’t going to happen unless people get out and vote and call their representative and things like that. Because if it’s coming from the government down in terms of a lot of these subsidies, then.
Gene Baur: Needs to happen. We’re theoretically in a democracy, in a democracy participatory sport, we have to show up. And I think that changing federal laws is important. Changing state laws is important. But sometimes the laws that are easiest for us to change are local laws and community municipal laws or zoning regulations. And that’s where significant positive progress can happen. And in some cases, it might be individuals who do something that’s theoretically illegal and stand up for it. There’s a farmer in Los Angeles named Ron Finley, and he was growing food in urban areas, and the city said you can’t grow food there. And he said, I’m going to grow food here. And he challenged anyone. And one of his quotes, which I really love, is growing your own food is like printing your own money. So it’s a way to become empowered, in a sense. Right. So challenging certain structures in some instances makes a lot of sense. And when you have individuals that are willing to stand up, they can start making a big difference and then become models for others.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. You have shown, whether it’s this or something else that you’re advocating for, is like, this is something that you can do full time. This is something that it didn’t start off as a full time. As you mentioned, you did some part time teaching on the side. But I think the more you lean into that, the more you’re going to find different creative solutions. Salad veggie dogs out of a van and grateful day concert. It’s like you find these ways of like, okay, well, but it shifts a different way of thinking when it’s not like, well, if I leave this job, then I’m without a paycheck. And for some people, that’s a very hard reality. I have three kids. There is a very real responsibility that you have of like, you need to make money to pay rent or your mortgage or whatever it is. And so it’s like, how can you start getting involved in this passion? Either you like your job and you just want to get involved in whatever you’re passionate about and continue working, or you want to make a shift and start slowly starting to change your world because it really does. How can people best support Farm Sanctuary?
Gene Baur: Well, we have our website, FarmSanctuary.org. We also have our social media accounts. So I encourage people to check out the website, follow us on social media. We also do a newsletter where we let folks know if there’s legislation in their area or federally that they can get involved in supporting. And I think just learning about the issues and making choices every day that we feel good about. If we can live well without causing unnecessary harm, why wouldn’t we? So Farm Sanctuary is here to model a different kind of way of living with farm animals, where they’re our friends, not our food. Our sanctuaries are places where vegan is normal. We also encourage people to come visit the sanctuaries, which is very different than what happens in factory farms, where they’re actually trying to pass laws to keep people away and to prevent us from even talking about factory farming. They’re called AG gag laws. They’ve been introduced in a number of states. We’ve had to go to court to try to fight these, and thankfully, we’ve had some success having these laws declared unconstitutional as violations of our right to free speech. But Farm Sanctuary is open to the public. We encourage people to visit at our farm in Watkins Glenn, New York. We do regular tours. We also have overnight accommodations. We’re in the process right now of building a cafe. So we’ll also have great vegan food at the sanctuary. And at our farm in Acton, California, just outside of Los Angeles. We don’t currently have overnight accommodations, but we do regular tours and events. So both of these sanctuaries are open to the public and we encourage people to check it out@farmsanctuary.org.
Michael Whyte: That’s great. I know your last book that you written the Ultimate Guide to Eating Mindfully living longer and feeling better every day. Do you have anything else in the works that you’re looking to mention here.
Gene Baur: Or is everything still kind of things are constantly evolving. There’s a good chance that at some point I might do a third book. There’s nothing concrete currently underway, but we’re really digging deeply into federal policy right now. We’re also looking at our properties in Watkins Glenn and also in California and figuring out ways to utilize those more effectively. In addition to being animal sanctuaries, I think there’s a lot of opportunity to do more in the hospitality space, which is why we’re doing a cafe, for instance, in Watkins Glenn, New York, and we’re going through a process right now to really identify the opportunities, and there are many at both of these sanctuaries. So rescuing animals is part of it, but then modeling vegan living is another part of it. Potentially growing food, maybe doing farm to table is another part of it. Retreats for people to come out, spend time at the sanctuary to start learning about eating plants instead of animals, maybe start developing skills, cooking skills, maybe even farmer training programs. So what we ultimately want to do is to empower people to live compassionately by eating plants instead of animals and staying away from supporting this horrendous factory farming system.
Michael Whyte: Awesome. Well, if the past is any indication, I think everything you just mentioned is going to come to light for you. So thank you very much. I want to truly thank you for taking the time this morning. It’s an absolute pleasure. I never knew twelve years ago that I’d be having a conversation with the person I’m watching on the screen. Thank you very much.
Gene Baur: No, wonderful, wonderful speaking with you, and I’m grateful for all you’re doing, the optimism you put out there, the sort of inspiration and the encouragement, because I think a lot of us need those things to continue going and to do as well as we can. So thank you for doing that.
Michael Whyte: All right. Thanks, Gene. Be well.
Gene Baur: Yes, you too.
Michael Whyte: That wraps up this episode.
Michael Whyte: Stay tuned for our next episode, where we will continue our conversation with people that have followed their passion and are now making a tremendous difference in the world. If you’d like to learn more about Farm Sanctuary, visit them online@farmsanctuary.org. And I’m excited to say that Farm Sanctuary is one of the organizations that our online store supports. So visit shopjoy.org to learn more about the brand that was built for advocacy.
Michael Whyte: If you’d like to bring more joy into your life and connect with Lean Towards Joy, you can subscribe here or find us on social @LeanTowardsJoy. You can also visit our website site at LeanTowardsJoy.com. Thanks for listening.
More about Michael Whyte
Websites: LeanTowardsJoy.com, ShopJoy.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/leantowardsjoy
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leantowardsjoy
https://instagram.com/shopjoyorg
Show Notes*:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael Whyte: Hi, I’m Michael Whyte. This is the fifth and last episode of the series. S the goal of this series was to discuss the choices newly licensed therapists have when going out on their own. So I invited therapists to sit down with me and have conversations about what it was like for them. What hurdles did they face, and how can we learn from their experiences. We heard insight into what it was like to join an online platform, start an individual private practice, begin working for a group practice, or starting their own group practice. I think what I was the most impressed with was the willingness of each of the guests to sit down with me and chat about some of their most vulnerable times in their career. They all care so deeply about helping others create or strengthen the therapy practice that they want that they just came right away. There wasn’t one person I asked that said no. So that, to me, was just wonderful. And my guess is, if you’ve been subscribing to this series, you very well may be feeling kind of those similar vulnerabilities. After all, it’s a really big deal to start your own business of any kind, even one as heart centered as a therapy practice. What if it doesn’t work out? What if I realize six months from now I made a mistake? What if other people think I made a mistake? Or, wow, I got into this to help people, but I struggle being able to pay rent with what this agency is paying me. Maybe I chose the wrong profession. Those are just some of the number of things that I have heard from consulting with therapists over the years. As I mentioned in the previous episode, I want to focus on some of those hurdles, both real and imagined, that therapists go going into private practice face. Now, when I say imagined, I do not mean to say it in an invalidating way. I say it with the intention of distinguishing the difference between a hurdle of, like, I have a child who has a medical issue, and I can’t afford to lose the agency’s insurance, and that of a hurdle like, well, what if I have trouble getting clients? Those are two very different kind of sized hurdles. Now, of course, client demand will depend on your market and your niche. But in today’s chaotic world, as long as you live in a town with at least like a population of 15 and you have an internet connection, then you’ll probably have no problem bringing in new clients. There’s just such a demand for and a shortage of mental health professionals that you will not have trouble filling up your caseload as large as you want it. The examples of those two hurdles both seem likely to keep someone stuck at an agency that they do not want to work at anymore, yet both should not. There is not one hurdle I can think of that should ever prevent someone from shining their light. Now, that being said, depending on what the hurdle is, you may need to approach them differently. But regardless of how high they may seem, I promise that when you are on the other side of them, in your thriving practice or group practice, or wherever you decide to go, you will struggle to remember back to what it was that prevented you from doing it even sooner. So here are a few of the hurdles that I hear the most often. Now, the first is office space. So a lot of times, if you work in an agency, you work at a clinic, you work at a school, or wherever you may be, you have the space provided for you. And so for some people, that’s a big deal, having an office, getting it furnished, all of these things. But there’s just so many options with that. So the first I want to discuss is online. So obviously, if you go online, you really just need to create a space that looks like this. This isn’t more than a five x five area in your room that’s quiet, and you could do that. And you could have an online practice very successful from a shoebox closet. You could also lease from a friend. So if you have a friend that has an office, doesn’t have to be a therapist, it could be a friend, a realtor, for instance. Just anyone that has an office space that could have two chairs and that is private, you could lease from them. A lot of times you would probably get that friend to even just share it for $10 an hour or free if they know what you’re doing. And you’re just starting out on your own and bringing on one or two clients. So that’s an option you could sublet. So find a realtor, and sometimes that will help going through a real estate agent, if you can find one that deals with subletting. If not, you can just ask around. There’s Facebook groups. There’s Craigslist. Believe it or not, there is still stuff on Craigslist. People still use that as a resource. So there’s lots of different ways that you can find a space to sublet. The other option is to lease your own office space and then you sublet it if you don’t plan on using it all, or if you get a good enough deal, you just lease it and keep it your own. Obviously, something like that, you’d have to furnish it. But between Ikea and thrift stores and extra stuff at your house, you could probably furnish a room or two. And then the other part of it is, if you have a space at home that’s quiet, kind of separate from the rest of your house, then like an office above a garage, something like that, you can create the space in your own home. So office space could seem like a big hurdle because sometimes that could be an expensive monthly bill. But when you break it down, especially if you’re going to just kind of dip your toes in this and only see a few clients, it’s not too bad to kind of figure out something else. And again, if it’s online, that’s the easiest of all the options. The other major hurdle is around community. And we heard a few of our guests kind of talk about this, but the importance of having kind of your peers, supervisors, the agency you might have worked at, might have had a whole legal staff to help with it depends on what your agency was. If you were in a trauma clinic and there was lots of court appearances for Department of Child Services or something like that, then they had a staff that handled that. And if you’re going to continue in that work on your private practice, you may very well need to find legal representation to help you with that. But for a lot of people, it’s really just around the peer supervision. And if you don’t have anyone that you’re currently close to, there’s plenty of resources online, both paid and not paid. There’s Facebook groups that you can connect to people. But going into private practice is kind of on its own. It can be isolating. You’re literally leaving an agency that had several people working for it, or 100 people working for it, and now you’re going out on your own, literally on your own, having to deal with some hard clients possibly, or you just have questions. And so it’s really good to kind of one of the guests said, engineer that for yourself, to create that space weekly, bi weekly, whatever you need to help you so that you don’t feel overwhelmed and that you don’t feel burnt out. That’s an important thing. But again, not anything that should hold you back from doing it. And along those same lines with the agency, there’s lots of things that the agency takes care of for you besides bringing in the clients and the insurance. They might give you health insurance. They have their own accountants or bookkeepers. They have a whole billing practice that you don’t need to be usually involved in beyond just saying, yes, I saw a client, or no, they didn’t show up. And they have the policies around that. And then again, also with HIPAA, and they give you the guidance based off of their agency and their practices of how to operate your therapy with your clients and use this technology. Here’s a phone, here’s this email, computer, whatever it is. And so you don’t have to worry about those things. Now, when you go out on your own, those are things that are important and you do need to consider them. So if we’re talking about HIPAA, yeah, you need to know what you can and can’t put on your mobile phone and what you can and can’t disclose. And there’s lots of resources out there. My company lean towards joy. We offer some. There’s also a whole bunch of other ones. You can find it out there. But it is an important step in building your own private practice that you have that the other part of is billing, bookkeeper and accountant, they’re kind of three separate things. So billing is kind of that depending on if you’re going through an insurance agency, if you’re on an insurance panel, I’m not going to say that complicates it, but it definitely changes. If it was just private pay to being on insurance, you have to reach out to the insurance company, wait for their payment. But all of those kind of issues around billing, a lot of them have been answered. If you sign up to any of the online platforms, I’m not going to start listing them now because, well, I don’t think that’s fair to list some and not all of them because I don’t have a connection with any of them. But in terms of the weekly billing, any of those are okay. And they offer that. You can still do it old school where you write up an invoice. You can do that as well if you’d like, but there are a lot of things that make it a lot easier in terms of the bookkeeper and accountant, the bookkeeper is kind of the day to day making sure you know what expenses are going out, what money is coming in. The accountant is really for the end of the year tax purposes. And depending on what you decide to structure your business as, that is going to significantly decide whether or not you should have an accountant or not. If you’re being a sole proprietor or even an LLC filing as a sole proprietor, then that money is just kind of passing through. It’s all coming into your personal tax. So when you go on to Turbotax, you can fill all that out. It’s easy. If you’re going to have an S corp or a C corp. It becomes a little more complicated and you may decide you want to get an accountant for that. But again, all services that exist out there, some are very inexpensive, some are even free. And so it shouldn’t hold you back from starting your own private practice. Now the biggest one, which I kind of discussed this around, both the real and the imagined hurdles is this idea of no clients. So obviously if you work for an agency, they’re handing you the clients. If you go to be if you start working in a group practice, a lot of times they’re going to be bringing you the clients. If you work and join an online platform, they’re going to be giving you the clients. But you shouldn’t necessarily settle. Not that any one of those is settling, but you shouldn’t be staying with one of those organizations just because they’re giving you clients. Because as I mentioned, there’s such a high demand. There’s so many ways to put yourself out there. Now, the one that’s the most common is Psychology Today. Everyone usually signs up for that one. You pay a small monthly fee. Another great one is Zencare. Now, full disclosure, I’ve done like a blog post for Zencare before. Yuri is absolutely wonderful. She started Zencare. When I met her, I think it was only four states or so that Zencare was available. Now it’s 19. So they keep expanding. But that’s a great way to give yourself a profile, a little video. You can list what your rates are and all of that stuff through it. And that’s a really good thing. And the other thing is, if you decide to take insurance, your insurance directory will put you out there. And when people who have Blue Cross, Tufts, whatever insurance they have, they’ll go on and they’ll say, I want a therapist, and you’ll be on the list. So there’s really this idea of no clients. The block for that is usually just your own mental block of I can’t get any clients. Because the reality is you’ll be able to get some clients pretty easy. And then it’s a matter of, is this client a right fit? For me, that’s a different situation. And that’s why some of these other places where not your insurance company, but somewhere else where you can actually put a full profile of who you are and kind of the individuals that you like to work with, that’s going to help a lot. Now, the other part that I work a lot with is around how to start your business. And so for some people, they don’t quite realize that they are starting their own small business. I know you’re a therapist and you’re very heart centered, but this is a business, so you need to set it up in a proper way, both for tax purposes, but also you want to make sure that it’s successful. And so some of that is around the business structure. Do you start an LLC or just do it as a sole proprietor or a P LLC, or an S Corp or a C Corp or what are those differences? Do I need a DBA? What is my branding going to be? Am I going to be just Michael Whyte therapist or am I going to run a practice called Lean Towards Joy, for instance? There’s a lot of questions around that. I’m obviously happy to help with that. I have resources on my website for that. There are a lot of different resources. We live in an age where so I do a lot of consulting. Obviously I get paid for that consulting. But I also put a lot of content out there for free, like this whole series, for instance. And there’s so many other people that are doing the same and putting so much free stuff out there that you can kind of navigate your way through a lot of these what you’re referring to as a hurdle preventing you I don’t know how to start a business. That’s not my thing. I was never taught that in school. There’s just so much out there. Either you can pay for it, you can read it and do it for free, that it’s not a good excuse to not do it. And then the other thing is not being ready to commit, not being ready to be like 100%. I’m going to leave my agency. I’ve been there for 2310 years. I’m just not ready to leave yet and take the plunge into the deep end to what I say to that, and a lot of our guests have talked about it, is that you don’t have to go and just leave. Some do. Some say, I can’t do it anymore. I’m getting burnt out. I have a family now. I just need to leave. I’m going to take some time off and or not. I’m just going to leave and immediately go do this. But the other part of that is that they might just say, you know what, I’m just going to take two clients. I’ll start with one. Start with two. I have a friend who has her own private practice, or he has his own private practice, and they’re going to let me use the space. They don’t use it on Tuesdays afternoons, and I have a light caseload at the agency on Tuesdays. So I’m going to start seeing two clients Tuesday afternoon. And my friend’s great, he’s going to let me use it for free. And so now you advertise through one of the ways that we talked about, and now all of a sudden, you have two clients. You’re getting paid whatever it is hourly, and you decided to go private pay. So it’s all for you. It’s $150, $75, 200, whatever you decide your scale is. But that could easily bring in an extra $1,200 a month. And you might do that and continue that and say, that’s all I want is I’m going to do that on the side and brings in a little extra money. And I like the agency, but I just wasn’t getting enough money. Or you might do that and be like, wow, this works. I’m going to finish kind of building this or get a different office space or whatever, and I’m going to leave the agency. So it’s really up to you and your comfort level of how ready you are to commit. But it doesn’t mean you have to be 100%. You can just do a couple and just try it out. And then if it doesn’t work for you, you haven’t left the agency, so you can go right back. So it’s really fully up to you. And their options are limitless in terms of how you want to approach that. So I think I want to take time now just to mention that because we’ve talked about a lot about leaving agencies, so agencies provide a valuable service for both clients and new clinicians. There are many among us that utilize the services that an agency has to offer. Sometimes this is because of trauma, poverty, location, lack of other places to go, or just many other reasons. And many clinicians begin their profession in these agencies. They learn from seasoned clinicians. They put in the hours of clinical time and really bolster their confidence and ability to help people in need while they’re at the agency. So though, although I built a profession on helping folks leave agencies, it’s not because I don’t like them. They’re like anything else. Some are good, some are bad. But what I recognize is that most of the schooling and most of the time spent accruing licensing hours does not teach the very valuable lessons about starting your own private practice, if you so choose. And because of that, there are so many clinicians that are just burnt out at their agencies feeling stuck, and I want to help them get unstuck. I have it on my website. But it was Steven Jobs who famously said in one of his commencement speeches, it’s like if you wake up and look in the mirror too many days in a row and you’re not happy with what your day looks like where you’re about to go to work, then you need to do something different. Now, of course, I probably butchered that quote, but I think I put the real one on my website so you can check it out anyway. So there’s a need to help people with this. And again, it’s not because the agencies are bad, it’s just because it’s not for everybody. I’m so happy with all of the great information that my guests were able to provide to help me help you. And so I just want to say a tremendous thank you to everyone that both have listened and then also were on. So if you have any questions about anything you heard through this series, or you want to know more about the guest, or you want to know more about Lean Towards Joy, or how you can reach us to the next steps into building your heart centered career, please visit our website. There you’ll find all the notes from the podcast. And then stay tuned, because the next series of podcast episodes I’m actually pretty excited about. We’re continuing the theme of leaning towards joy. Obviously, that’s the name of the company, but we’re going to chat with people that followed their passion into the advocacy world, and they’re shining their light while saving lives and educating millions of people. So I’m excited about what’s next. Thanks. Joy was created to help heart centered entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. We have helped therapists and entrepreneurs across the country navigate HIPAA, LLCs and removing the hurdles to help them follow their passion. If you’d like to bring more joy into your life and connect with Lean Towards Joy, you can subscribe here or find us on Social @LeanTowardsJoy. You can also visit our website at leantowardsjoy.com. Thanks for listening!
More about Michael Whyte
Websites: LeanTowardsJoy.com, ShopJoy.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/leantowardsjoy
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leantowardsjoy
https://instagram.com/shopjoyorg
Show Notes*:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael Whyte: Hi, I’m Michael White from Lean Towards Joy. This is the podcast that talks about just that, how leaning towards joy can change every part of your life. In this five part series, we will be chatting with therapists that have made the transition from an agency setting to their own private practice. Some have thriving private practices, some have opened up their own agencies, and some have joined online platforms. The one thing that they all have in common is that they, too, were once newly licensed and faced with the decision to go out on their own. This series will discuss what helped them make that transition to private practice and what tips or lessons they can share with the rest of us. So if you’re a newly licensed therapist or looking to move in your career, then this episode’s for you. Even if you’re not a therapist, these stories transfer across multiple industries. These are people that lean towards their joy, followed their passion, and are shining their light.
Michael Whyte: Today, I’m excited for my conversation with Dawn Delgado. Dawn has two decades of clinical experience and has been certified in EMDR therapy for almost ten years. She has been trained in trauma informed yoga and holds a certificate in traumatic stress studies. Not only does Dawn run her own private practice in California, but she also supports clinicians across the nation. She works with clients to help let go of what has been blocking their happiness, success, self love, and joy, which makes her a perfect fit for today’s podcast. So welcome.
Dawn Delgado: Thank you so much, Michael. I’m really grateful to be here, and I’m grateful that we connected.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. Let’s start by just kind of sharing a little early stages of your career and kind of like, what led you to both private practice and then your group practice.
Dawn Delgado: Sure. The nutshell version is I’ve been working in mental health for over 20 years, getting my early experience during my undergraduate and graduate training and education, and I’ve worked in a variety of settings, a lot of them volunteer early on and then just gaining clinical experience, everything from community clinics, domestic violence shelters. I used to take suicide hotline calls at night from my dorm. I have worked in psych hospitals. I’ve worked with adult male sex offenders. I’ve been an advocate for children in domestic violence situations. And then I found myself specializing kind of early on on accident when I started working in the eating disorder recovery treatment realm. And from there, I was so fascinated with what I was learning and the clientele and the multitude of mental health comorbidities that were going along along with the eating disorder behaviors, that I just kind of stuck with that. For a number of years and really kind of specialized in trauma, which I had been seeing and working with in all the other settings. And then also the eating disorder specialty. So I started in that while I was finishing up my graduate school, getting my licensure and worked across all levels of care with that population. Finally starting my private practice which for many, many years was just a small side practice side hustle for me while I was working through the ranks of those treatment centers. And I started that private practice in 2007 so it’s been there for quite some time. It was just very small, a couple of clients. And in my training in the eating disorder and mental health treatment realm, I kind of worked through the ranks, gaining a lot of business experience, working into clinical development roles and business development roles. And that really shaped and formed my career, which was a launching point for what I’m doing now. And the rest has been like an organic evolution of just like you. I think this is why I’m so grateful to be doing this podcast with you. I love just leading, supporting other clinicians and really helping to change and shift the paradigm of what we can do in our careers. It is a high burnout career and there are ways that we can make it balanced, sustainable, profitable, enjoyable and completely enriching. And so my group practice and a lot of my consultation with other therapists has moved in that direction of supporting people to create these joyful I love how you say heart centered and joyful businesses that can be sustainable and reduce the burnout rates. So that was kind of a longer than a nutshell version.
Michael Whyte: No, I think that was great and I think it really kind of helped shape how you got to where you were. Especially I read in the beginning of just, like, trained in trauma. And it’s like you were self trained in so much you had so much experience with that trauma. And so that kind of leads into there’s a whole group of people listening and some of them either aren’t therapist or could be therapist or can you explain for someone that either isn’t as familiar because they’ve been doing it for a while and or just it’s not in their world yet of, like exactly. Kind of why EMDR. Because I know that obviously there’s quite a link to that and trauma.
Dawn Delgado: Yeah, absolutely. I was working with trauma for a long time before I found the EMDR training. And when I found and became basic trained in EMDR, it really changed my whole mentality and my whole clinical paradigm of how I was looking at trauma and looking at treating trauma. And the structure, the eight phase process and structure of EMDR just helps to organize and put structure and containment to something that’s so very difficult for us to understand and explain. So that eight phase process one, I had a complete AHA, breakthrough moment in my clinical training in practice work with another clinician. Sometimes in professional presentations I tell that story but it was a complete eye opening like AHA moment. And then two, I saw the effects, I saw the changes that were happening really more efficiently and in a more structured manner than talk therapy. So for me, it completely changed the way that I look at clinically assessing trauma, both like small t and large tea. It puts structure to it. It helps clients to organize it in their mind and in their psyche. And then all other treatment modalities fit within that. So sometimes there’s a little bit of a competition mentality with different types of training modalities, but everything fits into those eight phases. So I have trauma informed Yoga Act, CBT and CBT. Everything that I’ve learned, I’m trained in Hypnosis reiki, I’m trained in a whole lot of things. They all fit within that eight phase structure, but it just allows us to be able to assess where we’re going, where the roadmap is, how the clients can safely approach reprogramming their brain. We don’t want to take them too quick or too slow into that. And then it creates a future template for clients, how to integrate this work and then how to move forward in their day to day life with this new kind of reprogrammed mindset. So for me, it’s been just a structure that’s invaluable. I wish and I believe that every clinician should get this framework as part of their clinical training. And the research is tremendous. And it doesn’t have to be either or. It’s something that I use in conjunction, integrated with other modalities as well.
Michael Whyte: That’s great. And I think from my understanding and again, this is from someone who just helps therapist who isn’t trained in therapy in any way, but I do talk to a lot of therapists and they’re like well, specifically even like eating disorders. I can tell as a therapist that this is linked to their trauma, but they aren’t ready to talk or deal with that trauma yet. But from my understanding is EMDR. Even if your client is not ready to talk about that trauma, they can still do EMDR successfully. Is that correct?
Dawn Delgado: Absolutely. There’s a variety of different ways that you can, as a clinician, help the client, again, in their safety to do restricted reprocessing, keeping them safe, and keeping it’s kind of like bumper bowling where you have the bumpers moving down the lane and you just keep them in a safe place so they’re not going off rails. So we’re able to guide and direct our clients in that way. Or for someone who’s more functional, higher functioning, and has more adaptive, positive adaptive memory networks, we can let them go and their minds will just clear out all kinds of old limiting beliefs, negative beliefs and traumas. So we have the tools to direct the reprocessing in a way in a manner that’s safe for them. So I’ve supported clinicians with doing EMDR with clients who speak a different language. So that’s been interesting where we came up with some hand gestures, and it’s interesting that the clinician doesn’t even have to know necessarily what’s being reprocessed, as long as they have enough information to guide them safely, we don’t have to know what trauma they’re reprocessing if they really don’t feel comfortable. Again, as long as we have enough information to keep them safe, and then we can help them stay focused on just the food or just the pizza if it’s a disordered eating client, and maybe not go back to all of the trauma at the root that started that particular disorder. So there’s a lot of freedom within that. And part of what I do in my consultation with EMDR therapists is to help them learn the structure and then to integrate it with their intuition, their clinical instincts, and their creativity. To really, if they’re feeling an instinct, to go with that and to guide the client in a way that feels good to them within the structure.
Michael Whyte: That’s awesome. Thank you. Thanks for kind of elaborating a little bit more on that because obviously you’ve definitely found your niche of, like, this is definitely going to be my focus and building because we talked just briefly of that. You have a group practice. Can you get into a little more detail of kind of what that looks like? And then I just kind of want to touch upon kind of the early stages of that, but just kind of explain a little bit of a little bit about the EMDR Collective as it exists today.
Dawn Delgado: Yeah, absolutely. As it exists today. EMDR Collective is kind of a baby group practice. It’s a small, intimate team of us. They’re all licensed clinicians. We’re currently in the states of California and Oregon, likely expanding in 2023, likely by Coastal, and bringing together other small practices under the EMDR Collective umbrella. But right now, we’re in California and Oregon, all virtual, which EMDR has been quite effective virtual. And we are all licensed clinicians, EMDR Basic trained. Many of my clinicians are working towards their EMDR certification as well as other specialties. So I have an eating disorder recovery team because of my decades of experience in that realm. And everybody has some trauma training and the EMDR Basic training. So it’s a highly specialized group, and I still meet with all the clients, talk with all the clients, and kind of matchmake and pair them up with the clinician that I believe would best suit their needs someday. I may not do that part, but I still like to have hands on and to meet everyone that’s coming into the collective.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, I think it helps keep it a successful group practice. You know, that organically, everyone kind of fits together. And it also kind of defines, I think, the difference between a group practice like yours and someone that’s just about kind of the bottom line, which those exist out there.
Dawn Delgado: Yeah.
Michael Whyte: Because I know that you said while you were still working within the agency, you started just a few private pay clients on the side or private practice. I’m not sure if they were private pay through insurance. But what made you take the step to group practice? Was it like, okay, I’m going to go start my leave the agency and start a group practice? Or did you start kind of your private practice first and then expand when the demand just got too much?
Dawn Delgado: Yeah, great question. I left the larger behavioral health agencies in 2020. So it was kind of around the time our whole world was changing. And I really felt like my contribution and my legacy was complete at that time in what I had grown, developed and been a part of the leadership of. So I stepped away and went back into just private practice. So I built that up. The pandemic was a whole experience for mental health clinicians. So I was pretty busy, pretty full. A lot of us were just trying to facilitate the number of clients that were reaching out for help and doing our very best to accommodate the need. And it wasn’t until last year, 2022, I launched EMDR Collective. And that was really out of the intersection of my experience with leadership and wanting to support other clinicians in again, creating sustainable, balanced businesses. And people were asking, eventually clinicians want to leave the more structured agencies, eventually they want to branch out. They have some confidence under their belts. They want to branch out and experience private practice, which can be intimidating and can be a little isolating for a lot of people. And I think because of the years of experience leading in that realm, a lot of the clinicians felt safe and comfortable with me to kind of guide them. And at whatever stage of independence or handholding, they wanted to help them start to build a caseload and get a taste of that private practice with mitigated risk. Because there’s a group and because there’s consultation available and certifications available. It was kind of organic in that realm. And then people want to join and we’re organically starting to grow and expand out those services.
Michael Whyte: That’s great. And when you talk about kind of that isolation piece and you definitely feel that especially coming from an agency where you have this giant behemoth behind you sometimes of support and attorneys and hospital beds maybe, depending on the type of clinic you’re in. How did you because I would imagine with the MDR work, you’re still working with quite a few trauma clients. And with that there comes more just people in crisis. And so I guess were you still seeing those people in private practice and then went to group practice or I guess one of the things that I’m trying to get at is the fear that some therapists have going out on their own and being like, well, I don’t have that support. If my client goes into crisis, I can’t be there at 03:00 A.m. To answer the phone call. I’m home with my kids or whatever it is, or I don’t know if I have hospital beds around me to send them to or kind of how do you approach that?
Dawn Delgado: Yeah, that’s a good question. And that can be quite intimidating. I think it’s really important in any form of private practice to have some kind of support network and peer consultation. So I’ve offered those for EMDR consultation and at times for the Certified Eating Disorder Specialist certification, which often requires a lot of, like, assessing safety, assessing need for hospitalization, working with medical, stepping up to higher levels of care, sometimes 51, 50, emergency psychiatric holds, all of that. So a lot of that people learn in working with agencies. I think that is one of the benefits of getting that experience under your belt for a year or a couple of years or much longer. And then it’s just vital for us to have those people that we can peer consult with. And part of what I’ve built in the group practice is some clinicians may require very little consultation or may want very little consultation and others know that they can text me if they have a client that’s in crisis and they need some support with getting a hospital bed or working on the boundary with crisis management in an outpatient setting. So I think that’s something that just takes a little confidence building, knowing the resources that are around you, knowing how to initiate those processes, learning the boundaries of what you can and can’t do to support clients in an outpatient practice. And then we all after 20 years, I still have a therapist friend that all text and be like, do you have two minutes? Like, I got to balance this off you. Am I out of line? Is this right? And we have to have that because we’re only as good and effective as we are resourced ourselves.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. And I think also, too, one of the keywords I picked up there was boundaries of kind of knowing your own limitations. And not that it’s something limiting within you, but it’s like, no, this is a clear boundary I’m going to set because you don’t want to get back into the old burnout habits of being when you were in the clinic, wherever you came from before. Do you take insurance in your group practice?
Dawn Delgado: I don’t take insurance.
Michael Whyte: Okay, so you’ve opted to not. And I know there’s many I’ve chatted with many people that do and many people that don’t, and I can understand the pros and cons. Can you share a little bit of why you chose not to?
Dawn Delgado: Sure, yeah. I’m really grateful to one of my early mentors who, like you do for so many, kind of helped me to get the confidence to start my private practice. And the advice to me at that time I was still working in the agencies was just do straight out of pocket. You can slide your scale if you choose to but you’re in control of collections. You’re not chasing the insurance companies. And I think with my 20 years of working in agencies and working with insurance companies and managed care, which is so valuable to so many people, I just made the decision that my private practice would be different. And the way I conceptualize it is, especially now with my group practice, we can slide our scales. We can pro bono. I’ve done a lot of pro bono work over the years. We can adjust that based on need and people’s ability to pay. However, the amount of time exerted, in my opinion, in collecting from insurance companies and working through their systems inhibits our ability to provide more access to clients. So I’d rather have the hours be directed to direct client care and make our own decisions about a sliding scale versus maybe like adjusting paperwork and going back and forth to try to collect from an insurance company. So it’s a personal decision, and I honor people who do choose to get panels and who do accept insurance.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, no, that’s a great explanation, because there’s a lot to consider, and I think it’s important to try to get to a place of coming from, like, okay, here are the pros and cons. Not from a place of fear of like, well, if I’m not paneled, there’s not going to be enough people to pay me, or I lose that marketing piece of being on that particular Insurer’s website or directory or whatever it may be. So that’s kind of good to hear that perspective on it with the sliding scale piece and everything.
Dawn Delgado: Yeah. And I would just add to that that is one of the benefits of potentially joining an already existing reputable group practice is there’s typically somebody in charge of that practice running that practice. With longevity in the field, a bit of a reputation, some marketing pull, and often as newer clinicians or newer to private practice clinicians, that’s the intimidating piece is building up word of mouth referrals, a reputation, distinguishing yourself from all of the other clinicians out there on Psychology Today and some of the other advertising sites. So a big part of the pull into EMDR Collective is from I did professional presentations for two years on trauma and on eating disorders and EMDR. And so there’s some weight behind that, that clinicians get to kind of slide right into and start building a reputation with that group practice.
Michael Whyte: I know that from a previous conversation we had about kind of like a past life of helping kind of build up these practices within the agency that you worked at. So you had a little bit more experience coming in, a little bit more of the confidence coming into your own private practice. But can you think of any obstacles that either that you didn’t anticipate that you kind of weren’t quite ready for or still any kind of hurdles that you still had to kind of overcome or are still working on to try to go out on your own?
Dawn Delgado: Yeah, I think that’s a really good question, and it really comes back to the clinician and their skill set and their interests. I happen to have a very balanced, like, left right brain, and I like building my own websites and doing search engine optimization and Google Analytics and I love all that stuff. I think that can often be intimidating. And when I first started my private practice, I didn’t have any of that knowledge or understanding. So the marketing end beyond face to face lunches and meet and greets, kind of the whole digital realm of the marketing and advertising was a big question mark to me. So that was a challenge that I leaned into and I learned that I really like that. I like looking at the analytics. I like seeing what search terms people are putting in. And I see all of that as some people may see that as separate from client care. I see all of that as what are your clients looking for, how can they reach you and how can we bridge that? So when they’re in crisis at night and they’re typing desperately words into Google, how can we help them find us? And for some people, when they see that it’s not just the back end, it’s how do you help someone in crisis and how do you throw them a rope when they’re really trying to get out of the quicksand? So I kind of trained myself to like that, but I think that is a challenge for a lot of people coming into private practice and managing the budget side of things. How much are you spending in advertising per month? How much are you outputting to your website and these different avenues? I like that numbers piece as well, but I think services like yours are so valuable in helping people to take that leap and helping them to understand what they don’t understand yet and empowering them to be able to run the business side. I hear time and time again that people are intimidated by that business side and the administrative side.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, well, because you go through all look at all of your training and nowhere in that training did I hear business. And it’s like, unfortunately, whether you like it or not, you’re an entrepreneur, you’re a small business. Like when you go out on your own and you start a private practice, this is something that marketing does matter, budgeting does matter, and it doesn’t have to be scary. Have you found because you started your private practice in 2007, have you seen because we haven’t really touched much upon or heard from other people talk about the marketing piece of it, but obviously it’s critical, especially if you have a niche, like in a smaller, just individual private practice. But especially if you decide to do group work and have this organization that specializes in X. Have you found a major change with just social media since obviously it’s changed dramatically since 2007, or is it still kind of kind of that search engine optimization of when they one of the nice things I like about Google is, like, you type in one thing and then it gives you a whole list of questions underneath. And it’s like those questions didn’t come out of nowhere. Those questions came from everyone typing those questions in. And so you can use that as a resource towards what you put on your website and things like that. But have you noticed a big shift with are you trying to do anything more on social? Or how does that kind of translate for you?
Dawn Delgado: Good questions. Again, I’ll be very transparent. I’m not great at the social game. I don’t think I’ve generated any leads for my social media. I had a wonderful person running it for me for a while, and I just don’t do that well, so maybe I will someday what I prefer. And early on in my private practice, it was all just word of mouth, people who knew me and referrals or step downs from treatment centers. So I kind of had that mentality back then in a very sweet, naive way of just build it and they’ll come field of dreams, right? I’m a great clinician, so here’s my website and find me. But now it’s really mostly like analytics driven with, as I explained earlier, helping clients to find us, and helping clients to understand what is EMDR? Is it right for me? What can I do? I’ve tried to go through my website and I’ve pulled other people and put together like, a Q and A that I can absolutely improve on, but just answering some of the questions that people want to know. A lot of people still think that EMDR is just for trauma. And my main bulk of my own client base is like, peak performance. I work with artists, CEOs, entrepreneurs, athletes in using EMDR for peak performance, removing writer’s block or removing creative blocks, as well as working with war veterans who have significant PTSD and complex PTSD. In my website, I’ve tried to break down what is EMDR applicable to, and to break down some of the myths around it’s just for trauma, because a lot of people still will say, oh, I don’t need that. And my personal opinion is, we all need that.
Michael Whyte: When you understand what it is exactly.
Dawn Delgado: Hold on to things that a teacher said in the second grade or that your parents said when you were four years old, like, when you understand how that’s programmed into your brain, we all need that.
Michael Whyte: Yeah.
Dawn Delgado: It has changed, and it’s continuing to change. And some pieces I do really well, and some pieces I don’t do that well.
Michael Whyte: Sure. And I guess it also depends on the demographic of who you’re bringing in, depending on your practice. And obviously there’s a certain demographic that just lives just on social. But I like what you’re doing of just putting more information out, whether it’s on your website or if you have a social, just like content, content, content. Because the more you give someone, I think the more you’re going to get back. And so it’s kind of the thing that I do. I give so much away. I don’t think there’s anything that I speak in individual consultations that you probably can’t find that I’ve said somewhere for free. I still love the face to face confrontations and that’s how I can afford to do what I do because that’s how it works. But I just try to put so much out there for free. And it feels like the information that you’re putting out through your website and the Q and A, it’s like it’s really getting people to understand the more information people have, the better decisions they can make based off of is it for them? Is this the group practice I might be interested in working at and things like that?
Dawn Delgado: Yeah. And I think just to add to that, I think with the mindset of marketing and advertising, just having an abundance mindset that there are so many people that need help in this profession, it doesn’t have to be competitive. It doesn’t have to be I’m always, as you said, giving away information. Every call, every client that comes in, I generally recommend two books, EMDR support books that if they can’t afford therapy, hey, get these two books. And one is written as a self help and one is a workbook where they can track their progress. So every call is, hey, here’s this, we’re full or we’re not right for you. Continue on with your journey if you need to. If you’re on a budget, like, read through this book and walk into your therapist with a list of what you want to work on to help expedite the process. So I would rather treat more people, even for shorter periods of time, more effectively, partially because we have that abundance mindset that we’re here for whoever is coming through. We don’t need to keep people in our practice for a year. We don’t need to compete with other practices to help people. We just need to be accessible and give people bridges and resources. And that’s all we can do at the end of the day.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, well, I think you speak to those blockages that some people have of that lack mentality comes usually from those blocks. So it’s helpful once you kind of can help let go of that and be like, oh, there is enough for me, and there’s a space for me to fit in here. And that’s wonderful. I think you’ve given us a ton of information. Before I wrap up, I’d love to take some time and plug anything you’re developing or looking to share. This will go on social. So this podcast is. Social.
Dawn Delgado: So here’s your excellent. Thanks for the help there. Well, EMDR Collective is hiring in the state of California. We’re looking for licensed therapists. We are looking for EMDR basic trained therapists. I am in 2023 open to clinicians who don’t yet have their EMDR training, but are maybe specialized in trauma informed yoga or somatic awareness or another adjacent type trauma focused modality. And, yeah, we’re looking to expand that out. I have a lot of things in development. I have a company called Global Wellness, Inc. And I’m in the process of developing a more integrative wellness concierge with different branches. So at one time, we did have dietitians and a nutritionist on our team. I will again move into hiring and bringing on, like, a nutrition department, as well as I am involved in some psychedelic assisted psychotherapies. And as the regulations and the laws are changing and it’s becoming decriminalized and various states are starting to legalize for therapeutic purposes, that is another branch that we will be that’s in the works to build out. So those are kind of future things. Right now, we’re hiring licensed clinicians. It’s virtual work. It’s a great group practice. I offer consultations, group consultation for EMDR certification. And I’m a certified eating disorder specialist through the International Association of Eating Disorder Professionals. So we have a really rich group of clinicians that meets on a monthly basis to consult with specialties in those arenas. So, as I said, I always have lots of things in the works. I also live in Costa Rica, and we’ll be doing retreats. I used to run a retreat company in Bali. I will again be doing therapeutic retreats in Costa Rica. So that’s in, like, a stay tuned on my website. Just all things like organic co creation. So this year, my word for the year was co creation. So I’m very happy and satisfied in where my career is, and I want to collaborate with others and help other people reach their business goals and life goals. So co creating across the board.
Michael Whyte: That sounds awesome. Many plates. So there’s a lot of stay tuned. Where can people find you online to kind of keep up to what’s happening next?
Dawn Delgado: Sure. EMDRcollective is our group practice. I always have new information on Dawn Delgado.com as well that has some of the Costa Rica retreats, and things will be popping up on there as well. We are on Instagram, Facebook, I think that’s where and LinkedIn, I think that’s where I drew the line for now as EMDR Collective, so they can reach us through any of those avenues.
Michael Whyte: That’s awesome. Well, this has been really informative, really inspirational, I think, for anyone that’s going out to start anything like this. So I want to thank Dawn Delgado once more for coming on, and I really enjoyed the conversation.
Dawn Delgado: Absolutely. Thank you. Michael. Thanks for everything that you do for clinicians.
Michael Whyte: Thank you.
Dawn Delgado: Love your positive vibes.
Michael Whyte: Thanks. All right, Dawn, take care. Thank you.
Dawn Delgado: You too. Bye bye.
Michael Whyte: That wraps up this episode. Stay tuned for our next episode where we will discuss some of the hurdles, both real and imagined, that block therapists from creating a successful practice.
Michael Whyte: Lean Towards Joy was created to help heart centered entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. We have helped therapists and entrepreneurs across the country navigate HIPAA, LLCs and removing the hurdles to help them follow their passion. If you’d like to bring more joy into your life, and connect with Lean Towards Joy, you can subscribe here or find us on social @LeanTowardsJoy. You can also visit our website at leantowardsjoy.com. Thanks for listening!
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Show Notes*:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael Whyte: Hi, I’m Michael White from Lean Towards Joy. This is the podcast that talks about just that, how leaning towards joy can change every part of your life. In this five part series, we will be chatting with therapists that have made the transition from an agency setting to their own private practice. Some have thriving private practices, some have opened up their own agencies, and some have joined online platforms. The one thing that they all have in common is that they too were once newly licensed and faced with the decision to go out on their own. This series will discuss what helped them make that transition to private practice and what tips or lessons they can share with the rest of us. So if you’re a newly licensed therapist or looking to move in your career, then this episode’s for you. Even if you’re not a therapist, these stories transfer across multiple industries. These are people that lean towards their joy, followed their passion, and are shining their light.
Michael Whyte: Today I’m excited to dive right into a conversation with Dr. Bedford Palmer. Dr. Palmer founded Deeper Than Color in Oakland, California, where he provides psychotherapy and diversity, equity and inclusion consulting to a diverse clientele of both individuals and organizations. He has served on the board of directors for the association of Black Psychologists. He is the past president of the Alameda psychological association. He is the producer and co host of the podcast Naming It. Even with all of this, he has found time to author two fantastic books black Joy a Healthy Conversation about Race and Daddy, Why Am I Brown? A healthy conversation about skin color and family. When I decided to do this podcast, I set out to find someone who was a beacon of light and leaving a great impact on the world around them. And I was immediately led to you. So thank you for taking the time to chat with me today.
Dr Bedford Palmer: I don’t think I’ve ever been described as a beacon of light before, so I’m taking aback and trying to be with it and go with it. But thank you. That’s really flat thing to say, trying to do some stuff.
Michael Whyte: Well, the stuff you’re doing is impactful. So you are a light. I’ll be the first then, I hope not the last, but I’ll be the first. So I want to begin today by saying just that we have listeners from all different walks of life in all stages of their careers. But if we can just start by sharing your earlier stages of your career and kind of what led you to create Deeper Than Color?
Dr Bedford Palmer: So thinking in terms of it’s funny when you get to a certain age, like thinking about what is the beginning and what was like the early stages and all that stuff. So I’ll skip the early early because you don’t need to know about me mowing lawns and flipping burgers at McDonald’s, but going, I think as a psychologist, I got my doctorate at Southern Illinois University of Carbondale, and I went and I have already gotten my master’s from Long Beach State. And I have to say UC Irvine as my undergrad because otherwise people get mad at me and Zach all day. But let’s see. I think that I could really say that the trajectory of my career started, actually. You see Irvine, where I studied anthropology and minor in African American studies. The simple way of putting it is that I was able to learn a lot about how to understand culture and I learned about my own culture and my own history kind of at the same time. And in that moment, I was also doing peer advising and I was active in the African Student Union and student government stuff. And so, basically, the little seeds of who I am right now were really starting to germinate at that point. As I moved through my educational career, it became more and more clear that the way that I differentiated myself was that understanding of culture and that understanding of kind of how to step out of yourself and how to see someone else’s context and do it without feeling like yours is better, theirs is better. Or that you need to go in and change them. And that’s, like, a big deal for psychology, too. Like anthropologies. You’re supposed to stay away from stuff and just watch. In psychology, we’re in there working with people, but you’re not supposed to be trying to change their values. You’re not supposed to be trying to change the central pieces of them. You’re trying to help them make changes that they want to make. And you’d be surprised how many people have a hard time with that little piece of understanding there. So if I fast forward, I got to the Bay Area in 2010. I was doing my pre doctoral internship, which is like the last step of a doctoral program in counseling psychology. I was over at Cal, so I was in the Tang Center at Cal, which is like their counseling center. And there I was finishing my professional training, and I ended up getting hired. Instead of doing a postdoc that’s traditional, I was hired directly on the staff at UC Davis and I coordinated services to students of African descent. And so in that I basically was able to do the things I do as a clinician, as a therapist, but I was also able to do the other pieces around focusing in on my personal ethnic culture and the community at UC Davis in a way that I wasn’t able to do anywhere else. And so I had, like, a black men’s group. I did a lot of outreach. I saw mostly African American students. And in doing that, there was, like, this learning curve and gaining this identity around this idea that we could do very specific services for specific communities. And it’s good. It’s good for them. It’s good for the communities around. When I was doing the stuff at davis, they modeled the outreach to other communities based on some of the stuff that I was doing with the groups that we were doing with stuff with black students. And so every time we did something, other people were able to kind of model off of that and be able to build in their spaces as well. And I’ve seen that kind of progress. So even as a professor now, I started our black history celebration at st. Mary’s, and from there we were able to start to celebrate other folks and build other whole apparati to build on stuff. So that’s kind of the beginning setting. So to get to deeper than color first, I had BFP consulting, which was like my personal, private practice, like the one where it’s just me. And I did that for some years. And I tended to find that because of my branding and my reputation that I was building and the public intellectual stuff that I was trying to promote, people started to understand me as a person who was in the know about culture, wasn’t the know about social justice, wasn’t the know about diversity, inclusion, all this stuff around that and particularly that I was someone who might be a safer person to go to. If you’re a person of color, if you’re a person coming from a marginalized community, queer, if you’re black, specifically. If you’re a black man, specifically. Specifically. So I would get clients that come from those communities, and they come from across different walks. And what I started to hear a lot about was that I wasn’t usually the first therapist they were seeing. I would be the second or even the third, maybe the fourth. And they were coming to me specifically because they had a bad experience with the past therapist who was someone who was not part of their cultural group. Generally, and I don’t like to mince words there was a lot of folks who came because they went to white or male or white male therapists who just completely invalidated their experiences, who made them believe that racism wasn’t happening for them or sexism wasn’t happening for them or homophobia wasn’t happening for them and that whatever was going on in their environment was just a matter of them thinking their way out of it, which isn’t best practices in any way. But when you have this kind of unaddressed cultural bias, at best and at worst actually, like people who are doing harm on purpose, then you end up with a group of folks who not only are they having a hard time with their general life, which is what a lot of people come to clinicians for. But now they’re having a hard time even asking for help because help is dangerous. Help can hurt more. And so a lot of my practice became a healing space for folks who were dealing with this kind of I want to try this one more time. A lot of my work started building in that, and again, I started to learn that, okay, this is an important piece. It’s an important area to focus in. And so a lot of my practice has focused in that space. You fast forward. So I started BFP in 2016, fast forward to 2021, and I brought on another therapist as a psych assistant, psychological associate, which is a pre licensed person who has a degree in psychology. Doctoral degree in psychology. And they’re on their way to get their hours and do all that stuff. Now, when I did that, I had not had in my head the concept of really doing a group practice. It was something that seemed like something would be cool, maybe, but I just didn’t think it was something I could have the bandwidth to do as I’m a professor. And this is like kind of my side gig in certain ways because my full time job is being a professor. But when I brought her on, it became clear that in bringing her on, the infrastructure started getting built. And if I could do onboarding with one person, I could do another onboarding with the other person. It’s going to be the same. And so that’s when the concept of deeper than color, which had been, like, rattling around in my head for a while, started to pull itself out. And it really comes down to so when I think about deeper than colors, this idea that culture, it trumps race. Culture is the way that we describe ourselves. Culture is the way we understand and make meaning of the world. Race is a caste system that was built in order to subjugate people. Right? Now, it doesn’t mean that the salience of race isn’t there, right? I’m a black man. I live a life of a black man. There’s culture that’s connected to being black. But culture doesn’t come from blackness. It comes from my African ancestors and my ancestors who lived in the United States and were enslaved and dealt with that, and my ancestors dealt with all the other stuff that came before that. All of us have culture. White people got culture. Black people got culture, brown people got everybody got culture. But there’s specific ones that we all have for ourselves, and it’s important. So the deeper than color pieces is acknowledging that color is important, but we can go deeper than that. And that is where the brand kind of lives. And the idea is that we’re going to do liberatory, affirming, and culturally responsive work with folks, which is the way that we’re describing social justice. So people say social justice all the time. This is how we operationalize it. And so what I’ve been able to do is recruit a group of clinicians and admin who all have a similar belief, set, a similar philosophy that they put into their work that is about liberating our clients it’s about seeing and identifying with our clients. And when I say seeing, it’s like a very specific kind of cultural meaning to that, like seeing a person’s whole self. So when I’m with you and we’re talking or one of the clinicians with Deeper Than Color is talking to one of our clients, the client doesn’t have to hide anything about themselves. The client doesn’t have to edit themselves. For us. We work to make sure that they can learn how they need to protect themselves in the world, how they need to protect their peace, how they need to protect their minds, whether that means changing a thought process or if it means changing an environment, it means changing a person out of the environment, which I think is one of the big criticisms of psychology and counseling, is that people think, oh, well, we’re going to tell people to think their way out of stuff. And that’s a fairly simplistic technical thing that some clinicians do, is just focus on the mind or just focus on past experiences or just focus on whatever theory they’re coming with and not thinking about. There’s a person in front of me who has a whole context and a whole understanding of life and a whole pantheon of ancestors that they’re coming from, right? And they live within a society that we all live within. And if they think really hard, that does not mean a loaf of bread is going to show up on their table. But if we talk about all the things around what it takes to get that loaf of bread on the table and we think about who’s getting in the way of them getting that loaf of bread so that they can actually counter that versus just kind of move blindly while someone is harming them. And more than anything, if we’re just not gaslighting them as therapists pretending as if things that we feel uncomfortable with don’t exist. You know what I’m saying? So, like, as a man, it’s uncomfortable to be reminded that misogyny exists. It’s uncomfortable to feel that. It’s uncomfortable to feel that I have a part in that. That like when a woman tells me that they had this bad experience with a man, that I hold some responsibility, right? And I might have done that same thing at some point. I went to the clubs when I was younger. When I was a young dude, I did all kinds of stupid stuff, right? And as an older dude, you ask my wife, she’ll probably tell you, I’d still do a bunch of stupid stuff. But owning that and holding that while also helping someone else to kind of process their stuff, that’s a skill set that takes more than just a training. You have to dedicate time and energy in your career. This is years of work that people go through and focus in on to get better at doing this. And I think that that’s the differentiator between what we do at deeper than color and what a lot of other folks do, and especially what a lot of these app based and all that other stuff does. We’re intentional, to be absolutely honest. I won’t let anybody on to the team who doesn’t hold these same values because I can’t have people hurting people.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, no, obviously that makes a lot of sense. And in terms of understanding your part of it here, clearly white male, hearing what you’re saying, it’s absolutely true. And trying to understand my role and my culture of the history of it. I guess it must be really is it a challenge to for lack of a better word, I guess, filter. Who comes in and who leaves, you know, like, how do you find the clinicians that kind of fit with the philosophy of the whole of who we are and the intersection of all of these different marginalized groups? How do you, as the founder, try to see like, okay, this person seems like they’re going to be a good clinician. This person seems good, but then they may not be. So as someone who’s a new therapist coming in and they already have kind of a group of either coworkers or peers that are all kind of of a similar mindset, and they decide, okay, I’m going to start a group practice. How do you kind of figure out who’s a good fit and how do you let someone go if they’re not a good fit? Do you kind of have a way to go about that? Do you have like a trial thing? Do you just an interview? Is it just an intuition? How do you go about that? And if you have any examples, like, have you had to let someone go? Like, have you any hurdles of actually this person? Not necessarily. I’m sure you’ve picked up if they’re like a detriment, but just someone that this isn’t a good fit for us.
Dr Bedford Palmer: I think a lot of it’s the normal stuff. One thing you have to do when you’re doing private practice work is you have to kind of look at what are the official things that you’ve been experiencing through institutions and what are the things that you’re going to do in your own business practice. And some of the things you’re like, okay, this stuff is for a place that has 15 lawyers. And all the other stuff, I can’t do that. But some things you might skimp on because you don’t think it’s that important. And so I can say I’ve had to learn that. For instance, the formalization of an interview process. You need to be formal when you do interviews. You can’t just have conversations. And at a certain point, it was like, oh, I’m just going to have a conversation with the person. We’re going to rap about it. And it’s like, no, you need to be vetted by our admin first. So you put in an application, you structure an application so that you get the information that you need. So like, for instance, I’m asking for a letter of intent that talks about their demonstrated experience with multicultural work, right? Demonstrate is a big important piece. It’s not how you feel. It’s not your commitment. I love that people have commitment, but what work have you done? What have you actually put on the line for this? Because a lot of times doing this kind of work isn’t going to pay you very well. It might not lead you to the most prestigious thing, but if you stuck with a community that says something. So going through looking at how they do the application process, making sure that for instance, I use an application that tells them a lot about us on the front end. And so I’m absolutely sure. In fact, I can see the statistics on people who start the application and don’t finish it, right? And so I’m like, okay. And I look at that and I say, yeah, they read it and they said, this isn’t for me and that’s great. I don’t want to argue with anybody. I’m not here to try to control people. It’s just not a good look. It’s not useful use of time. What I am here to do is make sure that people we believe in informed consent and autonomy and all that stuff, that goes for clients. It also goes for people who are going to work with you. So they should know, this is how I’m hardlined about this. It’s like you’re going to take care of folks you’re not going to like, obviously we’re not going to have someone in here who’s going to tell someone who’s gay that they shouldn’t be gay anymore or something like that. Or that a person of color, that there’s no racism, or that those people can’t come to the door. And if they try to sneak through the door, it’s going to be easy to tell. So go through the regular application and then I have my administrative team, they vet based on different information I give them to look for. And it’s like, do they have experience? Have they done these things? And they go through it and make sure before it even comes to my desk, whether this is a person who’s hirable, right? And then once we establish that they’re hirable, then I’ll do an interview. And in the interview, I ask all the regular questions. I also ask I do complicated vignettes. I ask them to tell me what they would do in real life. I’m looking to see how they interact, how they interact with me, how they’ve interacted with our admin staff. All that stuff is going into how because there is a leap of faith you have to make when someone’s going to work with a client. I don’t know, especially if you’re a person who’s licensed, then I’m not going to be watching your sessions. I’m not going to be involved at that level and so I have to be able to trust that the person is going to work autonomously and be ethical. That’s another thing. I’m an ethics professor, so I do mix in kind of ethical questions and stuff as we kind of talk, and I’m just trying to see where people stand on that. Because if people stick to ethics, a lot of times if you actually do the ethical thing, a lot of times that aligns with the social just thing to do. So the vetting process is not short and it’s to make sure that we have people who want to do what I’m asking and who I think can do it right. And both of those things have to happen at the same time because if they don’t want to, if they don’t value it, if they don’t want, then it becomes a fight. And again, I just don’t feel like it’s my role to fight with clinicians and make them do anything that they don’t want to do. It’s more of, hey, we’re not working well together. It’s cool. You’re going to be fine out in there and I’m going to be fine over here and we don’t have to have any static about that kind of thing. And I think that that’s what it comes down to in terms of if someone leaves or the way I look at Deeper Than Color in some ways is kind of like an incubator for folks who want to do social justice oriented psychotherapy in the world. And they come in, they hang out with us for a while, I help them learn the business. In a lot of ways they don’t have to deal with certain stuff like how do you make sure all the phone calls get answered? How do you make sure that you pay all these bills on time and get all the overhead taken care of? What do you do to do all these things? Well, we take care of that because I’ve gotten good at that and I have administrative support to help with that. And if someone wants to kind of finish with us and maybe step off and do their own practice a lot of times that’s wonderful. We just want to give you referrals. And if it doesn’t work out, I think that what it comes down to is being honest about it in the front end like, hey, this isn’t working and it’s fine, it’s not working. I don’t believe in recrimination and going after people. Obviously it’s illegal to even have real non competes that they talk about having. We do say please don’t work in another practice while you’re working with us because we’re doing all this advertising for you. But once you leave, you just go do your thing. So separating from us is pretty easy because we’re not going to put any impediments. If you have clients, we’re going to send them with you because they’re with you already. A lot of root practices. They do kind of predatory stuff. And that’s another side of what we one of one of the reasons I wanted to do Deeper Than Color was to also address the fact that I saw so many people who are in group practice who are coming. Into group practices, having really horrible experiences, feeling trapped, feeling overworked, feeling like they couldn’t make decisions about their life. Because this person who came in and said they were going to help them end up trapping them. And so I don’t want any kind of sense of that in our practice. Everyone’s here because they want to be. If they don’t want to be, it’s not hard to kind of step away. And if we have a difference of opinion, again, I’m not looking for power and control. I’m also not looking to recriminate or go after people. It’s just like, oh, this is what our values are. This is what my expectations are. If we can’t come to agreement on that, hey, you’re grown up. You’re grown up with a whole *** doctorate or a whole *** master’s degree. Maybe I’m wrong, but in this space with us, we’re going to do it this way.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, well, and I think to that point, are you wrong? I think no. You hear so many obviously, you run a supportive group practice, but you just hear horror stories of, I think maybe people that maybe start out with the right idea, but then they just lose focus. And it kind of does become more about the clients, hours build, all of that, and less about the original purpose of why you got started. And so you already kind of touched upon it, but just around just how you support the growth of those clinicians that kind of come in and then spread their wings and go and do their own thing, whether they’re leaving the area or just wanting to start their own. I guess he’s kind of already answered it, but just have you had any experience of people kind of coming through and now they’re out doing their own thing and it’s still a positive relationship like you mentioned, you’re now referring people to past clinicians that worked with you.
Dr Bedford Palmer: Yeah, I’m only trying to think, do they want me to talk about and stuff like that? Yeah, but we’ve had multiple clinicians who have kind of come in and they spent time with us six months to a year or so, and then they feel comfortable to kind of step out and do their own thing. I think that one of the things that I try to help people with is to feel autonomous as they kind of step away. I don’t want people to feel like they’ve done anything wrong. I don’t want the material interfere. I also don’t want to emotionally or professionally interfere with folks. The hope is that folks have a good experience and then they can go out and they can kind of take what we’ve done here and we play with the idea of calling folks deeper than color alumni or whatnot. We want people to kind of take this model and build on it and use it in other spaces. Because in the end, in this type of work, people get in this weird space where they start feeling like they’re competitive, but we’re not. There’s enough pain for everybody to have a lot of work as healers. Do you know what I’m saying? The issue isn’t whether you’re going to get clients or not, it’s whether you have enough space to serve everybody who needs it. And so when I see folks doing this kind of competing stuff and being weird, I don’t get it. I do get it, but I don’t get it. I understand it up here for the people on voice. I’m pointing at my heart and then I’m pointing at my head. But it really seems silly to me that you would ever want to get in the way of another clinician doing their work. If they’re going to do work and you agree with what they’re doing, I’m happy to send a referral to someone if they’re the better fit. And I think that that’s something that is missing. And that’s also one of the reasons that there’s scarcity is because people hoard. They’ll hoard clients, they’ll hoard referrals they don’t want to give. And it gets weird. Not everyone, I think there’s some really cool communities. I’m on a bunch of Facebook groups where people are constantly asking, hey, I got a referral, can you pick this person up? I have a really nice group of fellow founders in the bay area, black founders who kind of all have different therapy practices and we’ve begun to kind of talk and interact with each other. So there are some really cool communities of folks, but then there’s also kind of this other thing out there. And I think that when we talk about the scarcity piece and the overwork piece, we have to talk about insurance and what insurance does to our industry in terms of reducing access and making it so that therapists, because they don’t pay at a rate that is commensurate with our training and our level of expertise. And by that I mean, just to be really clear with folks who don’t really know, if you think about a physician who gets very similar amount of training as a PhD clinical or counseling psychologist, the payers will pay for a 15 minutes meeting and pay at a level that is like twice as much as ours. But similar investment, similar amount of loans, similar amount of time in pre work and professional practice and all that stuff. It’s not exactly the same, but I’m talking about like a 200% difference based on what they’re valuing and what people don’t get when we talk about this because they think, oh well, you’re being greedy if you feel that way, okay. But no one’s arguing that the physician shouldn’t be able to go do the golf course and do all that stuff. What we’re saying is we need to be paid at a fair level, which would make it so that clients can access us better. Because as it is, the lower rate makes clinicians take more clients than they should. Generally best practices is that you should only take maybe 20 people a week. Because if you think about what that means, you’re spending 45 minutes to an hour with someone who may be dealing with some very intense issues going on. And as a human being, everyone if you ever sat with a friend or you sat with like a student, or you sat with somebody who was having a really hard time, that will touch you. They don’t just have it and they’re in the little boxing and you can see it and observe it, but it doesn’t affect you. It’s like every time if you see someone cry, it makes you want to cry. If you see someone angry, it makes you angry. If you see someone mistreated, you feel outraged. And imagine doing that all day, every day. You know it’s going to have an impact. And we talk about that in terms of burnout and the way that paying happens so that folks can get an actual living wage. Folks end up seeing more clients than they should, which means that client one through ten, great. Client ten through 20, good. Client 21 through 30, suddenly we’re wondering whether they’re getting the same service. They’re probably almost surely not getting the same service as client one through five. And so that’s also why some people have these bad experience, because their therapists can’t even feel for them anymore because they’re so burned out. And this goes on. It’s not just that one week. This is years. People just burn at both ends. And I don’t think that that’s in the conversation enough that this is created by an industry that just doesn’t want to value mental health care for people who they are supposedly serving and who are paying them. And I’m talking about insurance companies because they’re getting paid by their clients and then they’re not getting the value back.
Michael Whyte: Well, I think that’s what ends up happening with so many of the clients being therapists that I work with is that they’re working in these agencies, these clinic settings, where that’s just a huge problem and one of the biggest reasons why they’re looking to go out in private practice. Yeah, some of it’s a money thing. There is a money difference, but it’s just burnout. You just get so burned out by 20 plus clients a week, and everyone has their own experience. I guess with that, it rewinds way back to kind of when you started your own thing, but I didn’t want to not touch upon kind of like the plunge you took to start this practice. It’s like there’s something there’s comfort in, regardless of the other drawbacks, there’s comfort in that paycheck every week you’re getting from that agency, that school, wherever it is that you are. Do you have any recommendations and or, like, your experience taking that plunge to be like, I’m going to just poke my feet in just a little bit and just do, like a little bit part time and get one. Or two or I’m just diving headfirst. And I know the clients are out there and I’m going to start my own private practice, and I’m done with the clinic. So I didn’t know if you had some thoughts on that because there are so many people that are so resistant to step outside of that for the fear of, well, what if there’s no one out there if I can’t get the clients that I need?
Dr Bedford Palmer: Yeah. So I didn’t take a plunge. I got to be real with you. There was no plunging for me. I’m the chair of a counseling department. I’m a tenured professor. That is my primary employment. And what I was taught as a student of mentored into is the idea that as an academic, you can build a practice in a much safer way. It’s not just for academics, but if you can find as a psychologist, right. And speaking specifically to doctoral level folks, there’s a lot of options for things you can do that will tolerate a practice. Whether you’re talking about working academia, you can work in corporate spaces, you can work in a lot of places because if you have your own company, it’s different than working for another employer. It’s a different kind of dynamic that happens. So very few places will bar you from creating your own space. And all you have to do at that point is figure out how to manage time and do it in a way that’s not going to hurt your primary employment space. So for me, it was about keeping within a ten hour framework, right? So that was what was given to me by the school. They say you can do 10 hours of outside stuff. So I made sure I kept things within 10 hours and I was able to do a practice. And the thing that I would tell people is a lot of it is about being planful and deciding, okay, these are the things I need. I need to be able to see people. I need to be able to keep my records in a way that is HIPAA compliant, and I need to have the time and space to kind of be able to think through that stuff. It’s also great to have a community around you, but that doesn’t always happen. It’s kind of hard. It’s nice to sometimes be part of networks that can help you, but a lot of times these insurance networks are not going to pay you at the level that you need to be. And so figuring out all those things can kind of feel daunting for folks. But what I think that they need to remember is like, hey, what have you already accomplished in life? This is not the most complex task that you had to do, you know what I’m saying? It’s like, did you do comprehensive exams? Because I could have swore that’s, like, a five hour exam that you had to do from memory with citations. I don’t think that sitting down and figuring out simple practice is going to be quite as hard as that and just remembering where you’re coming from. Remember that you do have a community. When I first started, I asked, for instance, I talked to a number of friends who were actually in the field already doing stuff. I said, hey, can I see your paperwork? Can I use that? And I thought I was just going to use it to inspire me. They’re like, Just take it. So if you even look at right now, my intake form, I actually cite the people who I got to work from on the form, and it’s like almost ten years later. But that was their form. I modified it. I think the big piece is you don’t have to jump into kind of a full time practice piece because especially if you’re not going to conform to being paid very little for your time, if you’re getting paid $60 for a session, which some people might feel like is a lot, but you got to also remember that there’s overhead. We’re talking about a business here. So when someone says they’re looking at therapist and they’re like, oh, you’re making $100 an hour, you’re making $300 an hour, what people need to understand is that this is not salary. This is the income from your small business for that hour. If I was a running inconvenience store and I’m making $300 an hour, that may or may not make it so that I could either continue or not. The lights have to be kept on. There’s a certain proportion of that that goes away. The government takes a certain proportion of that. And so if you’re working at $60 an hour for a session because insurance is paying whatever and you got to do whatever, then you might be taking $10 an hour home if you’re not careful. And why would I get a doctorate in psychology? Why would I spend all the money it takes to do that to make $10 an hour, which can be less than minimum wage? And so it’s a complicated thing, but if you think about kind of how you’re going to approach it and you trust and you also make sure that you have these secondary things going. So, like, for instance, you might say, I feel like I’m jumping around, but I’m going to get there. You might say, okay, look, it’s really privileged to say that you have a tenure track job, and that’s why you can do it, because it’s hard to get teenager track jobs. That’s true. But when I first started, I was adjunct professoring, so I had multiple gigs, right? So there’s gigs teaching a class here and there and doing my therapy stuff here and there. You can also be doing consulting work. You can also be working part time. You could be working less than full time in a counseling center, for instance, or a clinic, because 34 hours is full time. You can get your benefits from that space, and then you can go ahead and start working on your practice, and that can be sustainable forever, or you can move over and just do the practice itself. One of the things that I think a lot of people don’t think about is they think about the risk. They don’t think about the freedom that comes with it. The back of my head in every decision I make is the knowledge that I can always just do this practice if everything else falls apart, whatever I can do, you know, Lucy on the peanuts. I can have my shingle. I can set psychology for five cents, and I’m going to keep going. It’s just a matter of scaling and expanding. So if I put instead of putting 10 hours a week into this, if I put 20 or 40 hours, what does that look like? And so people I would say to the folks out there who are thinking about starting a private practice, who are really worried about, okay, do I have the money to invest? Do I have all that stuff? Think about doing a five hour part time practice first. Don’t go out there. And I need to rent an office for a week. Why? You’re not going to use it for like, months, potentially for a year. It takes a while. So how about renting half a day and fill up that half a day, then rent a full day, fill up that day, and then you scale the same way you scale any other business. You have to think of it like a business because it is a business. You have to decide, like, hey, you know what, if someone takes my time and they don’t show up, then I have to still charge them. And you know why plumbers do that too. Everybody does that.
Michael Whyte: If you don’t show up to your doctors, you’re going to get your cancellation fee. I remember back to obviously how I got started with consulting was helping my wife and set up her private practice and then helping others do the same. And I remember when my wife started her, she was at a clinic and kind of getting to the burnout, but not so much, I think, because of the number of clients, but just the work. It was a trauma clinic. There was a lot. We had a new baby at home. And like you said, you don’t just close the folder and then you’re done, and it stays in the folder, you internalize all that. But to your point about like a network, you may not have a large network, but through Facebook and through other places where you can go, it’s like, hey, can I borrow your intake form, for example? But also, hey, you have a private practice. Can I rent an hour’s worth of space? Like, when my wife did it, she had someone that was established, had her own private practice. I think she also worked at the clinic, if I remember correctly, and was kind of doing both. And she’s like, yeah, I have this space, I’m not using it these afternoons. You’re not working these afternoons. And I think she rented it for like I think she gave it to her for a little while and then even just started being like, okay, give me $10 an hour when you use it. So if you’re charging 60 or 75 or whatever you’re getting from when she first did it, she was going through insurance. Now she’s private pay. And it is a calculation, it is a business. That’s why people like me and my company exists, is to help through that process because they don’t teach you a lot of the business stuff through schooling. But yeah, to your point, you don’t need to take the plunge. Some people, if they’re so fed up, they might want to, or if they have a partner at home that can support them, so they can do that. But yeah, to just dip your feet. I wanted to just mention because there’s so much that you get with a group practice or in a clinical space that one of them is kind of the relationships you build up with either other clinicians, like a referral network or local hospitals that might have like open beds for in cases of emergency or things like that. Did you have that kind of established already when you went into your private practice or your group? Or was it more of a general, we have a local hospital and if someone’s in need, I’m going to send them there, or do you have an open relationship with anyone? Because depending on your work and the clients that you see, sometimes that is more apparent than other times. So I just didn’t know, as someone who started a group practice, kind of how you cope with emergency situations.
Dr Bedford Palmer: Because our group private practice is virtual only. We don’t see people in person. We do a lot of vetting making sure that clients, we screen clients to make sure that they are more appropriate for our practice. We don’t take folks who are severely mentally ill, and we tend to not take folks who are, for instance, just recovering from a suicide attempt or anything where they’re coming out of the hospital or something like that. So for the most part, finding beds and stuff isn’t one of our primary pieces. We kind of use the infrastructure that’s around us because we’re also statewide. Right. So we’re not, like, centralized. I’m in Oakland. I have a clinician in San Diego. I have another clinician in one part of La. I got a clinician in another part of La. It’s really big, so they ain’t necessarily near each other. And so we don’t have relationships in all these different spaces, but what we all kind of follow our basic protocols of using nine, eight, eight now and being able to know the location of our clients. We want to know where they are, when they’re seeing us, if we need to send someone out there, if they get to a point where they need more intensive services, then we refer to someone local, and we help them get to that space. So we’re not trying to hold on to people who would be better served by someone else. So that’s kind of what we do around that. Because, again, it would be pretty impractical to try to make enough connections with enough hospitals to do that.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. Especially with how wide of an area your coverage is. All right. Obviously, I could keep going. And you have a wealth of information. Any obstacles that you didn’t anticipate? I know that you mentioned kind of the hiring process as one of them to the actual having a formal interview process. Anything else that you can think of? For someone who’s new to either joining group practice or starting their own, that like, hey, watch out for this. It blindsided me, or do you feel like it was all pretty cut and dry when you started building it?
Dr Bedford Palmer: I don’t know if anything, like, necessarily blindsided me. I think the thing is less of something bad happening and more of just like you’re going through payroll and you’re signing stuff and then you’re clicking to run the payroll and you see how much money is coming out of an account with your name to other people and you realize that folks are dependent upon that and you and that’s a thing. It’s not something that I was never prepared for, that I hadn’t even thought about how that would make me feel and how responsible I felt for the people who work with me. It’s sobering in a lot of ways. It’s also exciting where you’re just like, wow, I can do that. I can I can facilitate this. You know? Yeah. Because I don’t know how, you know, like, depending on where you come from and what you thought your options were, in my head, as a kid, I might have thought about making 70,000, whatever, dollars a year. I wasn’t thinking about paying people. That what that means. And so I think that that was kind of one of the pieces that was surprising for me. I think the amount of just administrative work that goes along with it, it didn’t surprise me. I kind of built my way up. But now looking at the apparatus where I have two administrative workers, you have to have infrastructure. You have to have apparatus around you. You can’t just do this off of vibes. You have to learn stuff. You have to learn about tax law. You have to have an accountant. You have to engage with attorneys and do these different things to make sure that you’re following the laws and the guidelines and all these other things. So there is a big component about this and we’ve said this before, but it’s not just that it’s a business. You have to become a business person doing it. And if you’re not willing to make that leap, if you’re like, if you have a philosophical thing that says you can’t do that, then this isn’t the space because you’ll be uncomfortable and make people uncomfortable.
Michael Whyte: Yeah.
Dr Bedford Palmer: And so I think because for me, as I was doing all the site training and all the other stuff, I was also trying to make ends meet. And I had my little side businesses. I was a photographer for a while. I made websites for people. I did all these different things and all those skill sets ended up helping me with this business. So I don’t have to hire a web designer. I don’t have to do different things because I can do it myself. So I think also reminding yourself about all those things that made it up you before you became holistically a clinician or something like that, because you were doing all of us in grad school, we were doing stuff. One of my good friends, she would throw these parties that were really just really kind of I don’t know what the right word is. They’re stylish. We were in Carbondale, Illinois, like this really small town, middle bunch of woods and cornfields and stuff and she would do these really chic parties and stuff, right? Her style was just always impeccable about the way she did that stuff. Now she has a practice that is branded on luxury and it’s about making black women feel like bosses and luxurious and that they deserve that high level of and so she took that skill set that’s like part of her identity and she turned it into the identity of this practice and it’s successful as hell. And that’s kind of what I’ve tried to do. And I think that’s what other people have to do is look at who they really are, what they can stand behind, what’s going to keep them interested. And then infuse that into the work you’re doing and into the business you’re building because it is an extension of you. It’s not just this widget that you’re throwing around. You breathe life into it and you want it to kind of go and at the same time remember you’re just a business. It’s just a business. It’s not more important people it’s not more important than people’s health. It’s not more important than people’s welfare. And you making a buck is not the best thing in the world. It’s the thing that you want. But if you’re a good clinician, you should know that just because you want it don’t mean it’s the best thing.
Michael Whyte: I think so many people come into it’s funny when I talk to therapists and explain it’s like, well, you’re starting a small business. You’re an entrepreneur. When you go out in private practice and that idea of like, wait, I’m a small business or an entrepreneur, that’s not what I set out for. Like, I set out to help people, but they both need to exist for it to be successful. And to your point, I think if you find something that you are passionate about, whether it’s luxury for your friend’s sake, it’s going to help you get through some of the hurdles that I think you find along the way of, like, this is hard. And so I think if you’re still being able to kind of remember why you started it, I think is a good way to get through. All right, so before we wrap up, I’d love for you to take some time and plug anything you’re developing or looking to share.
Dr Bedford Palmer: Sure. So you mentioned I’m an author, so I’ve been able to do a couple of really cool children’s books that they’re part of what I call the Healthy Conversation series. One is. Daddy, why am I brown? Which is that book there. And then the other one is Black Joy. And they’re both about a little multi ethnic black girl who asks her parents about different ideas around race. So at first, it’s like the color of my skin. Why are you one color of brown? Why is Mommy another color brown? Why am I a different color of brown? And, like, having a candid conversation about that and in the process of going through that story, helping kids to learn how to talk about skin color, and parents how to learn how to talk about skin color and teachers, because kids learn this stuff early, and there can be some really nasty things that happen, like in terms of how people describe skin. Does your skin look like terracotta or does it look like something that doesn’t sound nice? And so giving that kind of language, blackjoy is a continuation with the same family. But she asks basically, we talked about being brown, but now you’re saying that you’re black. And so it’s really exploring what race is at an age appropriate level for kids to think about race as a story. Not a concept, but a story. And how that story was created by people for a specific reason that we can track through time and history and how it affects people and then how race can be the concept of it can be shifted from the kind of racist intents to a black joy, a blackness that is about resilience and about taking care of each other and about pride and dignity and things like that. Those are the two children’s books that I’ve come out with. And then most recently, this book is a book I edited. It’s called Practical Social Justice and it’s about the diversity, equity, and inclusion strategies based on legacy of Dr. Joseph White. So I edited this book. I have one chapter in it, but there’s a whole bunch of other contributors, and we’re all mentees to Dr. Joseph L. White, who basically was one of the founders of Black psychology, one of the first black psychologists in the country. And over the course of over 50 years, he mentored psychologists. Not just black psychologists, but psychologists and counselors and educators from all kinds of different spaces and walks of life and different races and ethnicities and all that stuff to help to change the infrastructure of our country from one. That was very white to one that was much more diverse, so that more diverse people can be served and more diverse people can come through. So he would talk about the browning of America, and he did that from starting Eop, which is Educational Opportunity Program in California, to helping start Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State, to helping start the association of Black Psychologists and moving forward. So there’s all these people who dedicate their lives to serving others, to social justice, to working with people who came from his lineage. And we talk about how we all took lessons he taught us and navigated difficult situations related to diversity, inclusion, social justice and educational settings, governmental settings, business settings, personal settings and stuff. So it’s a really cool book because there’s like a university president and then there’s a person who I literally had to tell the publishers, hey, they finished their doctorate, so change that Ma. To a PhD. Please, at the last print. And so you have this whole spectrum of people who’ve had these experiences over a long period of time, and it’s meant for folks who want to potentially be mentors, who want to help develop leaders, who want to develop themselves as leaders, and for diversity inclusion professionals and counselors. Anybody who wants to kind of gain some of the really cool stuff that we got from Dr. White. It’s almost like I would joke about the book being as if he was still alive. And we were at the Marriott at one of the conferences and you got to walk by and he just kind of pulled you over and said, hey, come here. And the book is like him hooking you up and talking to you. So those are my projects that I’ve been kind of focused on lately.
Michael Whyte: That’s great. I’ll definitely pick up a copy of that one there. I did want to mention I mentioned it before when we were caught talking, before we started recording this, that I did pick up a few copies of your other two books, and I got it for my children and for their schools. Obviously, we need more books like these in schools not less counter to what’s been happening in some places, but I was reading one of them with my daughter last week, and the first takeaway, for me anyway, was just how natural the book presents the conversation around race as a parent and as a white parent. It gave me the words to talk about skin color and just the social rationale for creating race that I stumbled with and still do sometimes. Anyway, I really appreciated that part of it, and my daughter especially loved using the color chart at the back of the book to choose her skin tone. Anyway is deeper than color hiring.
Dr Bedford Palmer: We’re always open right now.
Michael Whyte: We’re not a listener in California. Interested. You’ve certainly sold your practice.
Dr Bedford Palmer: Well, if they’re licensed in California and they believe in this, in our mission, and they want to work with a group of really cool therapists who are going to like we have our consult group and stuff that we do, and we kind of work off each other. People get to know each other. Yeah, if they go to the website. So www dot deeper thancolor.com they can go. And there’s a tab that says we’re hiring, and they can definitely go there. We’re definitely taking new clients. We actually just brought on a new clinician. I feel like I can’t say one person’s name and not say everybody’s name, so I’m not going to do that. But we have hired recently, so we have some openings, and we’re really looking to be a service to the community. We focus on working with folks who live on the margins, like folks who are coming from, you know, black and brown spaces. Any other Plc folks, people LGBTQI plus communities, immigrants, anybody who’s kind of coming from that space. And white folks. It’s like white male CIS Clark can’t do. You can come too. As long as you want to work on something. I think it’s easy to kind of look and say, oh, they don’t want to work with we want to work with everybody, but we want to work in a very specific way that’s going to help people to kind of live their lives in a way that’s healthy for them and also that’s healthy for other people. That’s kind of what we’re doing, we’re also doing. So I guess if I’m going to keep plugging because we are talking business.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, keep plugging. Also mention where we can find you online, too. Besides, if it’s just your website, if that’s the best resource, or if you’re social or whatever.
Dr Bedford Palmer: So we’re on Instagram at Deeper Than Color. Or you can find me at Dr. BF. Palmer. So dr BF. Palmer, you can find me on Twitter. With that, you can also find Deeper Than Color and myself on Facebook. We have a Facebook page. You can find the books. If you go to blackjoybook.com, you can find or you just go to the Deeper Than Color. You can find the books. All of them. You can find links to Amazon or direct sales from US or from Rutledge, which is where the practical social justice book was. Yeah. We’ve got some contracts recently with some nonprofit groups, and we’re serving them. And so if you’re a nonprofit or community organization or any organization that wants to have a group of clinicians who focus on this type of work, serve your employees, we have space, and we’re looking to grow in that area. So, yeah, we’re trying to do big things. I dream and I try to make things cool happen. And then when I have all these other clinicians with all their ideas, it’s like, whatever folks want that can work, we’re going to go with it. I’m just really excited to see how we continue because we’ve only been doing this for a year and a half, so we’ll see what it looks like the next year and a half.
Michael Whyte: Well, that’s awesome. Obviously, I wish you tremendous success because what you’re doing is really great. I want to thank Dr. Bedford Palmer once more for coming on. I really enjoyed this conversation, so I want to thank you. And it went way more than I thought it would, but I’m happy that it did. So I appreciate all the time.
Dr Bedford Palmer: Oh, man, this is great. I appreciate you giving me some time. I always joke. It’s like, well, my primary title is professor, so if you give me talking, I’m a go. But it was fun. It was good talking, and I really appreciate you inviting me to be on. I know this is how you talked about how you’re developing this, and I know as a former podcaster, too, who you allow into your space is an important piece. So thank you.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, thank you. All right, take care. Thanks. Be well.
Dr Bedford Palmer: You too. Bye.
Michael Whyte: That wraps up this episode. Stay tuned for our next episode, where we will be having a conversation with a therapist who runs a successful online emdr group practice.
Michael Whyte: Lean Towards Joy was created to help heart centered entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. We have helped therapists and entrepreneurs across the country navigate HIPAA, LLCs and removing the hurdles to help them follow their passion.
Michael Whyte: If you’d like to bring more joy into your life and connect with Lean Towards Joy, you can subscribe here or find us on social @LeanTowardsJoy. You can also visit our website at leantowardsjoy.com. Thanks for listening!
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
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Show Notes*:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael Whyte: Hi, I’m Michael White from Lean Towards Joy. This is the podcast that talks about just that, how leaning towards joy can change part of your life. In this five part series, we will be chatting with therapists that have made the transition from an agency setting to their own private practice. Some have thriving private practices, some have opened up their own agencies, and some have joined online platforms. The one thing that they all have in common is that they too, were once newly licensed and faced with the decision to go out on their own. This series will discuss what helped them make that transition to private practice and what tips or lessons they can share with the rest of us. So if you’re a newly licensed therapist or looking to move in your career, then this episode’s for you. Even if you’re not a therapist, these stories transfer across multiple industries. These are people that lean towards their joy, followed their passion, and are shining their light. Today, I’m excited to have a conversation with Katie Lobel. She created Healing Journey Counseling, a private practice in some vill mass. Katie is an LMHC with a background in yoga, psychotherapy, and neuroscience of trauma. She works with a wide range of clients exploring the relationship between our minds and our bodies. Her unique approach helps empower people to change the outcome of their experience by recognizing the thoughts and responses to those experiences. I was fortunate to have met Katie five years ago when she started building her practice, and I’m really excited to have her on today, discussing how her practice has grown and hear her story of how she got from a newly licensed therapist to having a thriving private practice. So, Katie, thank you for taking the time to sit down with me today.
Katie Lobel: Thanks for having me. Look forward to speaking with you.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, I want to get started because we have a lot of listeners that are either newly licensed or have had some sort of life event that wants to and they want to shift into private practice or change how they run their private practice. So I just love to hear a little bit about your early stages of getting into your private practice and kind of the catalyst for starting that.
Katie Lobel: That’s a good question. Right out of graduate school, I started at an agency as an in home therapist. So in agencies, generally, you’re there for about two years. So I was there for about three and a half years, and when I hit the three year mark, I was like, okay, it’s time to move on. I think there was one lifer, but generally it’s not something that’s sustainable, especially if you have more expenses, if you decide to buy a house or have children or whatever your next step in life is. There wasn’t particularly a catalyst per se. It was more like, I have always wanted to go into private practice. It was just a matter of when and then how do you do it. But ultimately the push agency life is tricky, the hours are tough and you have to go by the model of whatever the agency is going for. Mine particularly was Arc, so the Attachment, regulation and competency model, it’s a trauma model that’s based in adolescents primarily and children. So there was a lot of family work, which is definitely a tough thing, a lot of tough cases with they were mass health primarily. So department of Children families was involved. There was just a lot of team, which was really nice because you were connected to a lot of people. And when you go into private practice, it’s you and you have to find that community very actively. You’re not going into work and building friendships and that’s just a much more active thing that you need to do or not do. It kind of depends who you are and what you need. So ultimately there was also a huge for me, there was a huge driving component as well. So you’re just on the road constantly.
Michael Whyte: Was that to the agency or was that to each of the clients homes?
Katie Lobel: To the clients homes, yeah, so it would be the clients homes and to the agency. A lot of back and forth. What was great is you would have a support staff with you, so it would be the two of you. So that was really nice to collaborate. And again, you don’t have that as much. You have to engineer that if in your private practice, if you want to have groups and have a co leader or you create a supervision group or just individually, so there is a huge difference. And then the compensation piece is very different. So there are definitely give and takes. But going from there to private practice was big. So I started exploring group practices, but the compensation for that was low as well and you wouldn’t get health insurance. So it seemed one of those, okay, if I’m not going to get health insurance, which is a huge expense, why don’t I just start my own thing and figure it out? Yeah, so it was more a gradual kind of thing where it was like, all right, it’s time I’m not growing the way I want to. It just was more of a feeling.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. With the kind of that transition and the compensation piece being part of it. Did you kind of go out already paneled through the insurance companies and say, I’m going to keep taking insurance? Was there any a time where you thought like, oh, maybe I’ll do private pay someday, or how did that kind of work with because I know you’re on panels now. Correct. You take insurance.
Katie Lobel: Yes. So that’s a good question. So that’s definitely something to think about. I feel like a lot right now. There’s a push towards going off panels because navigating it is so tricky. And you often don’t get paid or get paid or have to challenge them, or they can all of a sudden, three years later, decide, you know what? You didn’t give the services you were supposed to and then ask for the money back. So it doesn’t happen often, but I’ve heard of it. Some companies will audit more than others, and it’s just a tricky business. But the good part about being on panels is that I feel like my services are accessible to more people and I can help more people. I’m an LMHC, so I can’t get on Medicare or Medicaid. So for whatever reason, that’s a systemic thing that hasn’t changed. But lacsws can. So that’s a bummer. But certain thing, there are certain panels that are easier to work with than others. Their compensation is different. And the decision to do that was, one, to be able primarily to be accessible to others, and then two, it just felt somehow it’s probably a completely psychological but it felt more pressure on myself when it was private pay.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, definitely. I’ve chatted with people who have gone the exclusively private pay route, and you do lose the accessibility component to it depending on your insurance. If you can get a super bill from that therapist and you can still put it through your insurance, but there’s not a lot of people that depending on your insurance. Not everyone can do that. So I definitely can understand that. But yeah, those claw backs when they come back to you like three years later, and they’re like, actually, we’re going to need that $700 back.
Katie Lobel: That hasn’t personally happened to me, luckily. But those are chances you’re taking. But also it’s free marketing on some level because your name is listed on these insurance panels. And I’ll have clients call up and be like, I found you from Blue Cross Blue Shield from their website. I found you from the Tufts website.
Michael Whyte: Yeah.
Katie Lobel: So that from a marketing standpoint, it does it for you.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. And there is nice, too, if there are certain restrictions to being able to if someone has, say, Blue Cross Blue Shield or something, you can’t say, like, I’m only going to take you as private pay. Obviously, if they have the insurance, you take the insurance. But if there is within your practice some that are private pay and some that are not, because even with insurance, ultimately they do still dictate what your wage is. I remember being surprised when my wife, she doesn’t take insurance now, but she did when I was like, you just they just took $0.70. Like this year they decided you were worth $0.70 less an hour. I’m like, who decides these things? I would imagine you have one more year experience. You should be more than that. So it’s still way more than agency life, but there is still that component to it.
Katie Lobel: It adds up.
Michael Whyte: Yeah.
Katie Lobel: And what they value is it’s like with the couples and families, they significantly pay you so much less. When clinicians, I would say on the whole argue it’s harder work because you’re trying to balance and get it right. You got a lot of personalities in the realm with a lot of opinions, a lot of big feelings, and you’re trying to navigate, how do I help?
Michael Whyte: When you went on, when you decided, okay, I’ve had enough, all these things are kind of stacking up, it’s time to go out on my own. Did you take a giant leap and say, like, I’m leaving the agency and I’m going to go into private practice and let’s see what happens? Or did you start by taking one or two clients on and just kind of do it a little bit at a time?
Katie Lobel: I personally couldn’t do that. Just my energy level. I’m on more of the lower energy level side, and I needed time to recharge because agency life is very emotionally draining. And so when you’re present with people and really putting your best foot forward, it takes a lot out of you. So me personally, I couldn’t say take one or two clients on the weekend, on Sunday, or have the time to build a business then. So what I was more doing when I was at the agency, I was building the business part versus meeting with clients because that was within what felt okay for me. So I could still serve clients the way I want to and be able to start moving it forward. And then I did just jump eventually, but I felt like I felt set up. So it wasn’t like, okay, I don’t have an in between.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, that probably must have felt good.
Katie Lobel: I got myself stuff like that.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, that must have felt good. Just like even still having to go to the agency, even though you’ve made the decision like, okay, I’m going to leave at some point, still being able to mentally be like, but I’m moving on to this other thing. So it must have made those last days or months or whatever, there a lot easier to kind of, okay, this isn’t permanent. There’s light at the end of the tunnel. Yeah, sorry, go ahead.
Katie Lobel: No, I completely agree with you, absolutely.
Michael Whyte: So for the people that do usually see like one or two on the side or something like that, usually they’re like subletting a space or they know someone else that’s already starting a private practice. Their afternoons are free, so they use their space in the afternoon, whatever it is, because you kind of built the business part of it first and then said, okay, I’m going to take on clients. Did you get your space first? Did you decide, I’m going to go lease a space, I’m going to work, do it from home, I’m going to sublet? Because I would imagine this is pre COVID, pre everything telehealth. I imagine a lot of it was in person. How did you kind of figure out the office part of it.
Katie Lobel: I looked on Craigslist. What I found is there’s a real gap in that? There really isn’t. I wish there was more of a directory of where you could go or people you could talk to. Same thing with group practices. They don’t advertise jobs in the traditional sense. It’s like you’re networking through your university or your job for that matter, but more through, I’d say, your university. And that’s what I did. Or therapists that you know, that you’ve built relationships with. But I went on craigslist. I know other people who cold called therapists they found in directories and were just like, do you want a sublet? Do you know if there’s an opening in your building? So I started out by subleasing from a woman part time. I’m so lucky. It was very near my home, so it’s walking distance. But a lot of therapists wouldn’t be okay with that either because you do sometimes see your clients in the community and so there’s that choice as well. But to answer your question, I chose this sublease.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, I would imagine coming from an agency specifically working with a lot of trauma case and things like that, did you continue that line of work in your private practice or did you shift to kind of having a different demographic of clients? It sparked the question when you’re seeing people out on the street of like, okay, well, there’s different levels of functionality here with different clients and what they’re going through. And so I can imagine that can be a little tricky. So I’m just kind of curious where you ended up with the clients you see now.
Katie Lobel: So I started out with more of the trauma piece, but then I kind of transitioned to I generally more see people who come in for anxiety and depression. And then as you work with them, it turns out there’s been a lot of difficult experiences in their lives that have kind of compounded that have led them to these. So if you’re going from a diagnosis standpoint, they would they had a lot of what one could argue as traumatic experiences or that they identified as really difficult. So you kind of trip into the trauma now. But in terms of people who come see me, I work more with anxiety and depression. And my experience has been with children, adolescents and parents and now with a lot of adults because you also get connected to universities. And what I’ve noticed is they’re all the same ultimately. It’s a feeling. It’s a feeling of feeling sad, it’s a feeling of feeling anxious. The reasoning why is different. But across the board, people are experiencing muscle tension, people are experiencing racing thoughts, people are having difficulty getting out of bed. Doesn’t matter what age, it’s the same symptoms. And it just kind of comes down to who feels comfortable with me because it’s about the relationship. And that’s what I realized too. I’ve been asked like, what is the population you work with? Or what do you prefer? Who do you prefer to work with? I’ve always found that tricky because ultimately you want to work with people that you build a strong relationship with because those are the ones you can really help and really help them. Ultimately, it’s to find peace within themselves. When I first started in this profession, it’s like, oh, I want your life to be better. Like, I want it to be you have more life satisfaction. And yes, I want that for them. And realistically, what we do is more like at peace with yourself, like you being okay. And when you’re okay, then you can build a more satisfying life.
Michael Whyte: So some of this on your website, I can see you have a lot of information about just the mindfulness component of this. And I’m kind of wondering when that developed along the way in your private practice of the yoga psychotherapy and kind of being aware of like, okay, your mindset creates a lot of these experiences. And is that something that kind of developed throughout the years in private practice or did you go in already with that sort of philosophy?
Katie Lobel: Well, I went into it with that philosophy and it gave kind of as you’re getting trained in that, it gave a name to it. So to give a little background, like I got certified as a yoga teacher. And with that there’s the asanas the movement and the breath and being mindful of you’re holding these postures or you’re sitting with yourself and you’re pulling your mind. Your mind can go in so many places and you’re challenging yourself to experience what you’re experiencing in that moment. So that would be really helpful in grounding because a lot of what the nature of psychotherapy historically has been talking. It’s a very cognitive exercise. And then this brings in a different element. There’s now more as I said, it’s been named, but there is a much more push towards the reality of our experience, which is it’s very much we experience motions in our bodies. And if you can relax your body, your mind relaxes too. The racing thoughts slow down. You’re able to talk to someone and be present and be able to hear them, versus being so anxious that your mind is somewhere else and you don’t have the attention to do your work or have a conversation with another person, have a relationship and be present and see what actually is happening. So it feels like you can’t do one without the other. But what’s interesting is there’s the element of dissociation, the kind of separating the mind body piece, because we’re taught to do that very early on and that is valuable on some level to be able to do that. If you’re an athlete, for example, and you’re say at a track race and you have to dissociate to push over that finish line, because if you’re present, you’re going to just give up because you’re like, this hurts, man. I don’t want to do this. Or if you have these really difficult experiences, you’re like, I don’t want to be here. I need to go somewhere else. So it’s tricky. It’s interesting trying to find that balance. There’s a mindfulness piece, which is definitely a scale that one can develop through repetitions, but it’s also important to recognize, okay, this is something you developed early on because it was not a bad thing. You needed that. That was your survival skill until yeah.
Michael Whyte: This conversation is a nice reminder of how this even just what you just shared is so helpful to so many people on so many different levels. I’m like, oh, yeah, I can see how that relates with my experience with things, the, you know, with it with any, you know, you know, new thing, but especially like a like a scary new thing of starting a private practice or leaving a job that you’ve been at for three and a half years. How how did you, like, were there, like, hurdles that you kind of weren’t anticipating or were anticipating and kind of how did you navigate some of those things? I guess first, initially, oh, I didn’t think that this was going to be an issue, and it is. Or I’m afraid to go this part of setting up my private practice versus throughout the years, how has anything else come up? Because either with a client or with a supervisor or just anything along the way that you can think of, that was a hurdle that you either overcame or something you still kind of grapple with.
Katie Lobel: That’s interesting, because when you start a private practice, you’re leaving a business structure, right? Like, however the business is being run, say, an agency or a clinic or say, a group practice, it’s about you. Ultimately, it’s you’re like, this doesn’t feel right anymore. This does not work for me. And so you’re then jumping into something that helps others. So it’s like, okay, I need to build a business that works for me, and I want to figure out how to balance that with helping others. And I found that was kind of tricky to navigate because you are you’re trying to make a living, and you’re doing something that you care about others, and you really want to help. I guess a hurdle was trying to find that balance between the two, which I think is very ongoing because there are such individual relationships with each client. So I don’t know if it’s something you necessarily can truly overcome. It’s something you’re constantly navigating, but it’s just interesting because I would do my research. I’d watch, I’d listen and try to figure out and I talk to people to try to figure out what do other people do? How do they navigate cancellation or rescheduling or what are other things you run into? If people aren’t able to pay or the initial consultation, what does that look like? If you have a free 15 minutes consultation, what does that look like? What is your goals? What are you hoping for? Do you even have that at all? Or do you have people just show up? What is retention rates? There’s just all these hurdles that just show up that you don’t expect, but it’s also how large it is to you, and then how much are where are you? Because you also want to be consistent too, because there is for people, oftentimes one comes to therapy because they’re like, my life feels chaotic. I can’t manage it. My emotions are really big because it just feels too much. And so by offering you’re trying a hurdle, it’s like trying to figure out boundaries. Like, okay, I have a cancellation policy. If you don’t show up, do I charge you? Do I not charge you? Because there are life things that happen, but at the same time, you also are presenting something and want to follow through because the rest of their life is pretty chaotic, and things feel calmer when you ultimately, in a sense, have rules. I don’t know another word to use that, but it’s kind of like, okay, when I go see Katie, this is what I expect.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, it’s the structure, right?
Katie Lobel: And that is, I think, comforting for people. Sure. It’s annoying. I’m sure at times you’re like, hey, I had this meeting I forgot about, and I can’t cancel it at work. And then as a therapist, you’re like, okay, this other client who is a healthcare worker who I said, no today, but their day off is today. They could have filled that spot, and I could have supported them because they really had this really difficult experience, especially around COVID. So it’s just tricky because you also want to help people be more mindful of their time, or how do you do it? Do you navigate discussion around, hey, my job has pop up meetings. It’s interesting trying to sort through what that all looks like.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. And there’s your own personal work life balance as well. If you’re someone that the client example you gave of that, you know, had a work meeting, it’s like, well, you know, you wanted to go pick up your kids from school, or you wanted to go do this, and it’s like they were your only client that afternoon, and you canceled what you had to do, and then they canceled on you. It’s different if they’re sick or something like that. But yeah, it’s about kind of establishing a lot of those policies ahead of time. Did you feel? Because one of the things with moving, not even just from the agency, from even just your schooling, there’s a lot of professions where they teach you within the schooling all the things that you’ll have to know when you go out. And one of the things that ultimately made me establish my business of helping people with the business side of it is that they teach you to go into an agency. They don’t teach you what’s next. And depending on the agency, usually the agency isn’t teaching you what’s next either, because they want you to stay in the agency. Like, so they have all these systems in place, like the policies and procedures that you mentioned, but they also have like, if someone’s in crisis, this is our response. You get supervision through this person. These are the technologies we use and here’s how we stay within the guidelines of HIPAA. Like all of these things that when you go out on your own, you don’t have that. So have you kind of ever felt that there was one of these things that was a little tricky to navigate? Or did you kind of comes to mind about the clients that might be in crisis? Because it sounds like you still worked with people with some trauma and things, especially when you left, that can show up a little bit more than some other demographics.
Katie Lobel: That’s one of the reasons I have pivoted from advertising myself as a trauma therapist. And I think because as a private practitioner, I can’t offer that. And I say that at the beginning, if you’re in crisis and you need me in that moment, it’s 03:00 a.m., I’m probably not going to pick up the phone. Like, I will get back to you in the morning. So I don’t have the ability to be on call. And so I just don’t have the structure in place because it’s just me. And so that’s the reality of what it is. I’ve run into where a client has gone to an Iop program and so when you fill out the paperwork, they want someone to have an emergency contact in terms of a therapist. And I’m like, reality is I can’t be that person, but I am their individual therapist. How do you want me to work with that? So it is tricky because people do get in crisis and I do get concerned. I mean, there are always you can call the police and get a wellness check, but then that’s a tricky like, one would do that in agency, but as a private practitioner, that’s a tricky one to navigate because people could be angry with you. You’re violating my privacy. But it depends on your relationship with them because other times a reaction could be, I’m really grateful. You really care about me. Yeah, and it’s true. It’s like, you don’t have to do that as a practitioner. That’s outside. But it’s like, hey, I care about you. I’m worried about you. So it’s really you’re taking chances, but you make the rules of what you’re able to do and what you’re not able to do. But as a mom especially, I can’t do that now. So it’s just if there is a real concern that I feel like the person needs more support than I’m able to offer, I’ll name that. And I’m happy to help them to try to find something that is a.
Michael Whyte: Better fit and to kind of to your point of like that initial, you know, that like initial, you know? Do you do a 15 minutes intake on the phone first to kind of navigate or actually set up a meeting with them? Part of that. I think it’s important to make sure the chemistry is there between you and your client, but also to make sure that, oh, this person looks like they’re going to need more support than what I can offer in terms of either suicidal thoughts or things like that. That come up, I guess, in that initial interview process. That’s definitely something to consider.
Katie Lobel: It’s also like I feel like you can’t always tell right away, but oftentimes with a conversation, I notice that you can tell more whether I can help this person, whether we’re going to have a relationship, because some people do. They’ll specialize and say like, men. And then it’s like, okay, oftentimes this sounds kind of biased and whatnot, but it’s been anecdotal and also there is an element of I don’t want to talk about it yet. I’m here in a psychotherapy room where the nature of it is talking. So some therapists have an approach of more supportive therapy where they’re more listeners. But that’s not going to work for someone who is not practiced in talking about feelings and talking about their experiences. So it really is getting a sense of like, is this person going to can I build a relationship with them where they feel safe enough? And if they are practicing something, it’s kind of a skill building exercise on some level. It’s like everything you got to get the reps in. Yeah, so there’s an element of that too, because they could have this really difficult experience that happened to them. And if they’re not comfortable with you, they’re not going to share it. And then they’re going to suffer in silence. And then all of a sudden there’s a real crisis there and they’re not comfortable enough. And you’re their therapist. It’s just all tricky to navigate. You do your best. You’re in there just plug in.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, well, it’s one of the reasons why I’m doing a podcast like this. There’s like there’s a certain amount of, you know, that I can bring to help people. It’s like, you know, you want to start an LLC or sole prior work with HIPAA. Like, there are certain things that I can do and help, but I’m not in it every day. When helping a therapist leave an agency and go into private practice, there’s only one piece that I can do. And it’s like, how can I help therapists try to you’re never going to figure it all out all at once, but these are some real things that you do have to kind of. Work through at least like, okay, how would I approach that if something was to happen, what would my procedure be if a client went into crisis? So that’s why it’s so important for you to share all that. So I really appreciate that.
Katie Lobel: There’s going to be a lot of flavors with that, obviously.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. It depends on kind of what you’re in private practice and you’re on your own. If you decide to do a group practice or something like that, then if you’re building something, you can build it differently depending on what clients you decide you’re going to work with. I know, too. It also depends a lot on the area in terms of is there a local hospital nearby that has kind of open beds that if you need to call them, they answer, or are you in a very populated area? And that’s tricky to find because I know that especially in our we’re in a similar area that can be harder to find, is, like, open beds for people that might need them, but for most people, it doesn’t consume all of their private practice. It may come up once, it may never come up at all, but it is something that you have to kind of stop and think about.
Katie Lobel: No, it is. Yeah. And they’re different flavors, and you’re constantly trying to navigate that, but it’s also balancing cases. Like, how many of those cases can I take on, too?
Michael Whyte: Yeah. So as someone who left the agency five ish years ago, is that right? Happy you did it.
Katie Lobel: Happy I did it. That was a good decision for me. Yeah, it definitely it’s not conducive to family life. Like, you know, you have young kids, you have a routine, a bedtime thing, you have morning. It’s just sometimes when you’re an agency, you could work to eight or nine, and that would be every night, but it’s very inconsistent hours. So for many, many different reasons, it was a good decision for me, but at that time, it was valuable. You learn from other people, and it’s a good thing.
Michael Whyte: That’s great. Well, thank you. Before we kind of wrap up, where can people find you? Are you website, social, either as another therapist wanting to reach out or maybe a potential client that might be listening? Do you have a place where people can find you online?
Katie Lobel: I think the best is my website@healingjourneycounseling.org. So reach out. I love to help. Definitely. I feel like it’s like the paying it forward type thing. I definitely got a lot of help and there’s a lot of endless questions that we all have, and we’re always going to have questions and we’re always need to consult. So if I can be helpful, I’d love to be helpful. Don’t hesitate to reach out. Thank you, Michael.
Michael Whyte: Well, thank you. I want to thank Katie Lobel, once more for coming on and I really enjoyed this conversation.
Katie Lobel: All right. I enjoyed it. As well. All right.
Michael Whyte: Thanks, Katie. All right. You too. Bye bye. That wraps up this episode. Stay tuned for our next episode, where we’ll be having a conversation with a therapist who created a group practice in an environment that supports him, his clients, and the therapists that work in the practice. If you’d like to bring more joy into your life and connect with Lean Towards Joy, you can subscribe here or find us on social at lean towards Joy. You can also visit our website at leanlowardsjoy.com.
Michael Whyte: Thanks for listening!
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
More about Michael Whyte
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Show Notes*:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael Whyte: Hi, I’m Michael White from Lean Towards Joy. This is the podcast that talks about just that, how leaning towards joy can change every part of your life. In this five part series, we will be chatting with therapists that have made the transition from an agency setting to their own private practice. Some have thriving private practices, some have opened up their own agencies, and some have joined online platforms. The one thing that they all have in common is that they too, were once newly licensed and faced with the decision to go out on their own. This series will discuss what helped them make that transition to private practice and what tips or lessons they can share with the rest of us. So if you’re a newly licensed therapist or looking to move in your career, then this episode’s for you. Even if you’re not a therapist, these stories transfer across multiple industries. These are people that lean towards their joy, followed their passion, and are shining their lights.
Michael Whyte: Hi. Today I’m excited to have a conversation with Janet Weber. She created a private practice in the Bay Area of California. Her practice is called Delve Therapy, which is aptly named because she helps clients delve within to their stuck place through a deep exploration of self. I was fortunate to have met Janet several years ago when she started building her practice, and I’m really excited to have her on today discussing that process. So, Janet, thanks for taking the time to sit down with me today.
Janet Weber: Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Michael Whyte: All right, so we have kind of listeners that are either newly licensed, that have been working for an agency for a longer time, looking for a shift, really just kind of through all the different stages. And the idea of this podcast is to kind of give them kind of an opening into what different worlds look like, whether you open your own private practice, go into group practice, go into an online platform. So I’d really love to kind of hear your background a little bit of did you come from an agency? Did you go through how did you build your hours? And then what led to your private practice?
Janet Weber: Okay, let’s see. In my twenty s, I actually lived abroad in Asia and came back to the States and got a job at a college near a local college. And I really liked working at the college and being a part of the campus community and decided to become a college counselor. And I really have loved doing that. I’ve done that since the early aughts. And then at one point, I got my lPCC license and started thinking about doing a private practice on. I’m a counselor at a California community college, and we’re lucky enough to be tenured faculty, which means that the full time position is 30 hours. So I always felt like I wanted to do I have always wanted to do both the college counseling and having a private I had to have a private practice because I’ve had a passion for both. I decided to start that, and I wanted to do it online. And that was before the pandemic and.
Michael Whyte: Very unique that’s way before telehealth was like a mainstream operation.
Janet Weber: Yes. And I really had to find information from people that were doing it. There was a few people that were doing it and really loving their lifestyle doing that. And I remember having to explain to people what telehealth was. I had a big section on my website about telehealth, and now I don’t have to explain it anymore.
Michael Whyte: Now you have to explain why you’re doing in office visits. What do you mean? I have to get out of my house?
Janet Weber: Yes. And then Better help came betterhelp and talkspace. That was when they just started, or at least when I was just hearing about them.
Michael Whyte: About 2017, you said. Was that right around yeah, 2016, maybe a couple of years before the telehealth shift.
Michael Whyte: Okay.
Janet Weber: Yeah. I was interested in those two companies because I saw that, oh, they’re doing what I’ve wanted to do, and I wonder how they do it. I decided to join them as a therapist because I only had one day to do the therapy, and I wanted to see how they were doing it and how it worked and if I liked it and to see how they were doing it. I was trying to figure out, now we have all these great platforms to use. So I was trying to figure out there was some companies that had the video and some companies that had you had to kind of piece it all together, and I wanted to see how they were doing that. So I joined and I remembered and I opened myself up for clients, and I woke up the next morning and I had like 40 clients.
Michael Whyte: Wow. Yeah.
Janet Weber: And so I had to spend and they had me set up an automated message that I didn’t realize was going out to everyone, and it was this automated message about how let me know what’s going on. And so I woke up to all these emails, people telling me about what was happening. So I just sat down that day and went through all of them and got back to everyone and just kept about five clients, which ended up I ended up keeping only about three of them. And Better Help worked for me in that way because I wasn’t very involved with the company. I just had my three clients. It provided me with the platform. I didn’t get paid very much at all. It was more of like I kind of felt like I was getting paid so little through betterhelp, but I was also learning a lot about how to build my practice.
Michael Whyte: Like the kiddie pool or shallow end of the you’re getting your toes wet in that space.
Janet Weber: Exactly. And I had these three clients that stayed with me for a couple of years. At one point, I even took an interim dean position at the college. So it was, you know, rather than building my practice at the time, it was just kind of something I was able to do on the side and still enjoy and learn from. And then at the same time, during those two years, I was also building my practice, figuring out how I was doing it. Now I use the platform simple practice, which I really like. Some people I have heard a lot of people that don’t like it as much as I do, but I really like it. It just provides everything you need. It’s pretty seamless for me. And that was wonderful to have that rather than having to piece it together. Yeah, and I have been doing that probably since 20, 18, 19, probably 2019. And now I have about ten clients a week. Probably about ten clients a week.
Michael Whyte: Busy schedule for someone who’s also doing another 30 hours gig.
Janet Weber: Yeah, well, I’m actually not doing 30 hours now at the college. So what I’ve done is I’ve reduced my schedule at the college to 80%. So I have about 20 hours at the college and about ten clients a week. And then each year I’m going to kind of reduce my hours at the college and increase my private practice and kind of slowly move more and more towards the practice.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, well, I love that you’re able to kind of fulfill both needs, wanting to still stay because it doesn’t always have to be an all or nothing, especially sometimes with certain agency settings, especially if it’s like a trauma clinic or something like that. There’s a high turnover for a reason. There’s a lot of burnout. But some people still are so passionate about trying to do that work. It does show that you can do one time on one thing, like a part time basis or a few clients through the agency, and then continue your private practice, which helps pay the bills to help offset some of those other agency jobs, which usually they don’t pay as much because that’s just how they’re designed.
Janet Weber: I definitely recommend this path to people that do working with college students because it has been great when I was younger and I was really passionate about being at the college and helping the students there and building programs, and now I’m much more passionate about the private practice and therapeutic approaches I’m learning. So it’s been a nice way to shift through the years.
Michael Whyte: That’s great. With not coming from an agency background. When you come from an agency, you have certain like systems in place that you’re, you know, you’re used to, which you, you have at the, at the college. Of course, you know, if students in crisis or something, you kind of know how to respond and you have a network of people to contact. How did you find going into private practice? How much of that could you learn and carry into your private practice? Because especially with both an online platform but then also your own specific private practice of, like, did you decide to take insurance? Obviously you would have a supervisor, but did you have a network of people that if someone you were working with went into crisis, how did you kind of deal with that in terms of your support?
Janet Weber: That’s a good question. I I one of the hurdles that one of the challenges for me was I have a lot of friends that went to grad school together and became therapists together. They were new therapists together, and they have a really good community, and they were definitely there for me if I needed advice on any clients that were having a crisis and anytime I needed advice. And it was great to have these friends that have been doing it for 20 plus years. What I was missing, though, was like, that community of people that becoming therapists together. So I really have valued being part of consultation groups, and also I’ve been doing some training programs and have met people in those programs that are at the same level of starting their practices as me, and that has been really helpful.
Michael Whyte: Good. Yeah, I know they can be definitely kind of isolating. Like, you go out on your own, and especially you’ve chosen the path of online, which obviously you’re deeply connecting with your clients, but you’re by yourself. There’s nothing more literal about being by yourself than an online practice where it’s like, okay, well, I got to talk to someone. So it’s good to know that even if you don’t have a support system of people that live near you or you moved away, it sounds like there’s still opportunities to connect to different groups, either through training or that consultation group. Is that something that you had to research? Did you kind of stumble upon it? How did you find that?
Janet Weber: One of the consultation groups I’m with is through Calpcc, which is the California group for the LPCCs, and one of the groups I started myself, I gathered some of the therapists that I really thought were aligned with me and were really good therapists, and I valued their opinions. And also, I have always done consultation with someone, so I do that every other week, which I think is really important for me. It’s really important that if I’m doing therapy, I’m working with someone that has a lot more experience than me, and I can be mentored.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, that’s good. How did you navigate the insurance question? Because I know there’s pros and cons to both. I know some people take it, some people don’t. Some of the pros to people taking it is that I know that it makes it a little bit easier sometimes of getting that client list because the network is providing they’re either on your own directory or they’re giving your information to somebody. But then there’s also kind of the limitations around that of extra auditing. They can claw back the money, they dictate the terms of how much you make, things like that. So I definitely know that there’s pros and cons to both. How did you kind of navigate that? Did you take it? Do you still take it?
Janet Weber: Yeah, I feel like I was in a position where I didn’t have to because I had the position at the college, and I had the luxury of starting my practice slowly and building it slowly, and so I didn’t feel the need to take insurance. And also, I think I kind of used better help as that jumping off point where a lot of people will, you know, in the beginning of the when they start their private practice, they start with insurance, taking insurance. I had heard from so many therapists about the hassles and getting paid less, so I always knew it was something I didn’t want to do. I’m not great with paperwork and all those details and the diagnoses. I just knew it wasn’t something for me. I think for the biggest benefit, the reason I regret not taking insurance is that I do believe that people should be able to see therapy without having to pay $200 a session.
Michael Whyte: Sure.
Janet Weber: The way I’ve compensated for that is I always have some low fee spots in my practice.
Michael Whyte: So you keep some sliding scale spots just kind of open for I can take some at this price and some at this price. And that completes my week. Yeah, I think, too. If I remember correctly, you would have had a I don’t know about in California, but some places they had a harder time. Even the insurance company kind of wrapping their head around telehealth in the beginning of yes. Oh, that’s not in person. We’re not paying for that. It’s a much different ballgame now since COVID But yes, that’s true. Kind of pre 2020. I know that that was tricky, especially when you started your yes, I remember.
Janet Weber: In the beginning of the pandemic, there was a lot of discussion around that.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, when you were building well, I guess let me speak to a little bit to the online. You chose to go online only before it was cool. Kind of what made you choose that path instead of the in person? Because it’s relevant now, this topic, because there’s so many people that have spent the last couple of years or got newly licensed in the last few years when it has all been telehealth. And now they’re like, do I go back in person or do I stay online? And now you have a different clientele that are used to being online, where you don’t have to necessarily put the whole thing on your website of why telehealth works still as an option, because people kind of get that. But there’s still a lot of people asking it’s like, do I go out and rent that office space and start seeing people in person and do all of that or continue online? So I’m curious kind of what made you decide the online versus in person?
Janet Weber: Yeah. Yes, it is interesting. It’s interesting watching that transition in the beginning of the pandemic and then watching it now and hearing from my friends that have always had in person offices to going online during the pandemic. And now I’ve seen talking to my friends, and some are really excited to get back to the office and be in person. And some have really loved doing it online and have decided to stay in line. When I started, the idea I had when I first started my private practice was that I wanted to work with people internationally. And I actually did a lot of research on who you can work with, which countries you’re legally allowed to work with. I have had a couple of international clients, but it didn’t really pan out that way. I have had a couple of international clients, but most of them have been in California. So it depends on where the client is located. So in certain countries, they don’t regulate the therapy. And so you can, you know, like, I cannot work with someone in Michigan, but I can work with someone in England. So I put a lot of time into studying that and marketing towards that and then ended up with most of my clients in California. So that was why I originally was doing it online. But then once I started, I really loved it. And then I started my own therapy online and really loved that. I really loved not having to drive into the office and being someone else. I loved doing my own therapy, like, in my house, on my sofa with my blanket, my tea, and I just felt safer and more comfortable. I saw how much I liked it as a client, and I like it for some of the same reasons as a therapist, just being able to be at home. And I find that it can be just as intimate as in person. There’s a different way, it’s a different container. But I do feel like you can have that same, um, rapport with your clients.
Michael Whyte: Yeah, let’s imagine that you’d be comfortable in any space as the clinician. That’s what you worked on and become comfortable with over the years. But as a client, I would imagine there’s probably some more comfort with them being in their safe space as well when it comes to that rapport. So obviously, you hit a lot of kind of hurdles along the way from starting an online practice before, again, before, there was, like, a platform built for an online practice, really. But if you can think of any kind of hurdles that you didn’t think of or kind of hit you along the way, or like, oh, I didn’t think of that. Whether it was like cancellation policy stuff or setting up your business or again, like the international piece, I’m just kind of curious. There might be someone listening that that’s the reason why they haven’t gone into private practice. The whole goal of this is to try to just kind of show that those hurdles, if they can’t be kind of beaten down from yourself and your own information, it’s like someone else is out there that could help you with that. So I’m just kind of curious if there’s anything that you could share in your years of being in private practice.
Janet Weber: Yes, I do. I mean, I do have a lot of friends that are piecing everything together, and I keep trying to explain to them how great it is to have a platform like Simple Practice or one of the other therapy notes or whichever one it is. I think it makes my life so much better. You have all your intake forms there? I still have friends that are mailing their intake forms to their clients and then doing FaceTime for their appointments, which isn’t really even legal. And just to have it all in one place where you’re sending your intake forms, your billing, your notes, your video, your appointment, everything is right there. Yeah. One thing that I am often still surprised about is a lot of times the consultation groups, we will end up talking about our practices and what do you do for your cancellation policy and what do you do in this? How do you manage your time or how do you take your notes? A lot of times we end up having those discussions rather than talking about client issues. And so I think that’s one thing I’ve realized is that is as important in the consultation groups as having time to discuss clients. Because like you said, we are kind of all isolated, doing our own things.
Michael Whyte: You’re running your own small business in a sense, because that’s what it is. You have to make sure you build that business to survive. Otherwise you won’t be able to follow through with or you’ll be surprised that I saw these 20 clients a week and why am I making the same money as I did with the agency or not much more.
Janet Weber: Yes, that brings up a good point. That would be another thing I would say is that I hired someone to do my bookkeeping. I probably am paying too much because I don’t really have that much bookkeeping to do, but it just saves my brain energy so much. And meeting with you a couple of times to just talk about my practice and the bigger picture. Yeah, I definitely am a fan of hiring people that know what they’re doing in their specialty more than I do.
Michael Whyte: Well, and I think that you bring up a good point because sure, whether it’s me and my company or a platform that you’re paying monthly for or a bookkeeper that you’re paying. The thing is, these are things that, again, some people love to do that stuff themselves, and they like to kind of get their hands dirty in it or learn it or whatever. But if it’s preventing you from bringing in ten X what you were making, it’s like that few hundred dollars in the beginning or that monthly 75 or whatever it might be. That’s kind of small potatoes when you talk about how much more your practice is going to bring in and you’ll just be happier about it. But there’s a lot of that kind of that fear in the very beginning of, like, I’m going out on my own. I don’t have any clients. How can I spend this money?
Janet Weber: Yes, that’s a really good point.
Michael Whyte: I think a lot of that happens.
Janet Weber: I agree. That’s a good point. It doesn’t only free up your stress and your brain energy, but it can also bring in a lot more clients and end up making more money than you are spending on.
Michael Whyte: Yeah. If you’re not spending all the time trying to figure out this piece of it, it’s like, that’s another client a week, that’s another 400, 800 a month. It’s like, oh, yeah, that’s a lot easier to justify that expense. I do want to be speaking of time management, I want to be mindful of your time. Where can people find you? Is your website best? Do you have social media? How can people reach out?
Janet Weber: Yeah, my practice is called Delve, as you said, and the website is Delftherapy.com, and that is where you can find me. Yeah.
Michael Whyte: Well, that’s great. I feel like you really touched a lot upon a lot of issues that newly licensed therapists face, and even someone who’s not newly licensed that’s just been someplace for a while and kind of has this urge to try something new. And so you really helped shed some light on a couple of different things, starting your own, but also the online platform. So I really want to thank you once more for coming on. I really enjoyed this conversation.
Janet Weber: Thank you.
Michael Whyte: All right, thanks. Take care. That wraps up this episode. Stay tuned for our next episode, where we’ll be having a conversation with a therapist who walks us through how she grew her practice and family at the same time, and how to strike that delicate balance. So many professionals facebook Lean Towards Joy.
Michael Whyte: Was created to help heart centered entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses. We have helped therapists and entrepreneurs across the country navigate HIPAA, LLCs and removing the hurdles to help them follow their passion. If you’d like to bring more joy into your life and connect with Lean Towards Joy, you can subscribe here or find us on Social at Lean Towards Joy. You can also visit our website at lean towardsjoy.com. Thanks for listening.
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Today’s episode of Lean Towards Joy with Michael Whyte is a special one. It is the first podcast ever created! That’s right I came out of my shell today and stopped hiding behind the blogospheres to create an audio experience! Join me as I interview myself about my background, what lead me to create a company based on how I wanted to feel, and how I wanted to help others shine their light. Enjoy! Let me know what you think!
More about Michael Whyte
Websites: LeanTowardsJoy.com, ShopJoy.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/leantowardsjoy
Instagram: https://instagram.com/leantowardsjoy
https://instagram.com/shopjoyorg
SHOW NOTES:
*These notes were automatically transcribed. And have not been reviewed for 100% accuracy.
Michael: (Intro) Hi! This is Michael from Lean Towards Joy! This is a podcast about just that! How Leaning Towards Joy can change every part of your life. Today is probably one of my most important podcasts because, it’s my first! And I don’t have a guest, so I’ll be interviewing myself!
Michael: (Question) So, first off, just give a quick opening of what you do, and I want all of it. If you start a fantastic company and you’re excited about it, that’s awesome. If you’re still bagging groceries, that’s awesome too. I want to hear all about the groceries as well.
Michael: (Answer) Hi. I started a company called Lean Towards Troy, and the goal of the company was to help people start their own companies. And so my first focus was really helping therapists start their own private practices because I had previously done that with my wife. I had helped her start her own private practice and just kind of navigating the ins and outs of starting a company, both from a structural level, but also with what to do with business finances and marketing and all the things that you don’t necessarily have to worry about when you’re working for another company. And since then, I’ve grown Lean Towards Joy to also start an online retail store. So shopjoy.org sells products, and 22% of the purchase price of those products go towards certain causes. And the reason why I was so specific around that 22% is because there are a lot of organizations that say they give back a certain percentage of profits or things like that to the cause. But I wanted to be more specific so that people could know the exact dollar amount. Because when they say 10% of profits or 50% of profits or all the profits, what does that mean? What are their expenses? Do they pay themselves more than half of it first and then give it away? Or are they giving away almost all of it and living on very low margins? So anyway, that’s kind of how that company got started. And then in between all of those, I’m still not bagging groceries, but I still do what I was doing 20 years ago, which is helping people with home projects, installing windows or doors or even small things like that. It’s something that’s allowed me both with the consulting through Lean Towards Joy and watching my kids. It’s allowed me to help balance all of that, help get an extra paycheck in every week. And that’s been great too, because I really do like being creative and working with my hands and just seeing that end product. It’s almost the same feeling I get when I finish someone’s website or help them launch their business. It gives you that same satisfaction of an end product, and that’s something to be proud of. So, it’s just something that I still like to do, even though it’s totally different from the consulting I do with Lean Towards Joy or the products that I develop for shopjoy.org. So anyway, it’s all good.
Michael: (Question) Okay, next question. Try to remember back to that first idea or knowing you had when you were going to take a chance and do this next thing.
Michael: (Answer) I remember it very well. March 27, 2018. It was four days before my birthday. I had just quit a job that I had for about 18 years, and I had absolutely no idea what I was going to do next. I just knew that I had to get out of that job. And the idea of lean towards joy really came from the self-development I was doing. I was doing a lot of just my own work, dealing with stuff from childhood and finding my self-worth and confidence and all of these things. But at the same time, six months earlier or so, my wife had decided to leave her agency. She’s a therapist and she decided to leave her agency. And I helped her with that process, starting her LLC and just helping navigating her, finding an office to lease, and just all the things that you do when you have to go start a private practice. When it came time for me to leave that job that I had done for 18 years, I was the general manager of a retail store. I had done other things. I had been a fund accountant at a major bank. I had done equity analysis. I graduated with economics. It was more of a financial background to go in that neighborhood.
But I decided that really wasn’t for me at that particular time. And one of the things I had just done was help her. And through that, in her network of friends and peers in that industry, I kind of discovered a little niche that, hey, here’s this industry that they are taught from school how to go into an agency setting, and they were never taught the next step. When you get all the accreditations and all the hours and to go get your license and go do it on your own, those things weren’t taught. And so I said, hey, I guess I can do that for now. It’s working. It can help fill in the gap for some money in the meantime, while I decide what to do. And I find just so much joy in being able to help people basically through the conversations of, “hey, these hurdles that you think are huge and going into your own private practice or venturing out and doing your own thing really relatively small.” There are tools out there to help you. Whether it’s me starting their corporation for them, or whether it’s signing up to a bookkeeping service online or, you know, whatever it is that that particular person has for their hurdle of what kind of their fear is of going out on their own, a lot of that is pretty relatively small. And so kind of through a conversation, even if there’s just a small piece that lights up and they say, okay, I’m going to go take that next step. It’s huge! And so it was very rewarding. I was able to make up for the lost income of my other job and it really set me on the course of what I’ve done for the last four years, four and a half years.
Michael: (Question) A lot of folks on social media and mainstream media, although social media really is the mainstream media these days, they focus on the success, whether it’s real or whether it’s a “fake it till you make it” sort of success. Where the funniest thing that I’ve seen is the holding up a toilet seat in front of a picture of the clouds and pretending you’re on a private jet. But whatever it is, well I know that’s important to reach people and show them that, “hey, you can make it” and show that success story. I feel like it’s really important to meet people where they’re at. And for many, this is either the beginning stages of entrepreneurship or still trying to figure out the next step for them to grow their business or just build something more. And so to remind people of that, it didn’t always look this way. What is your biggest struggle and where are you in that process? Are you still trying to overcome that? Or is it something that you’ve already overcome and you have some lessons learned from it? What does that look like to you?
Michael: (Answer) Well, the first thing that comes to mind is this podcast. Really. I think the biggest struggle for me has been finding my voice. And I think it goes back to kind of that self-worth, self-confidence, imposter syndrome. Who am I to share my story? Is it meaningful to other people, this perception, an incorrect perception, but a perception that it won’t matter to anybody? That. Who am I? My story isn’t the same as somebody else’s. But then I’ve realized over the years that there’s different pieces of people’s story that do leave an impact and everyone kind of comes at it from a different perspective. So there might be something that you share that one part of it resonates with one group of people and another part resonates with another group of people. So anyway, there is that I would say still continuing struggle of me feeling like what I have to say is important enough to share it beyond just the kind of closed off walls of my computer in written word. So as anyone who’s been to my website, you’ll see that I’ve written plenty where I get behind the keyboard, I can write something, I can delete it, it’s not quite as scary to actually post it. I don’t hear my voice, I’m reading it, all those things. And I think that one of the things that I’ve been trying to work on really, is to do that thing that is scary just once and to see, hey, was it as scary as you thought it was?
So by me doing this, even this first podcast and putting it out there, (if I actually hit submit and put it out there, we’ll see!) that is me working through that process, through that struggle. And I think whatever the struggle is, I think if you take that first action step, stop reading about it, stop listening to different motivational speakers about it, and just actually do it, just that first step, even if it’s a small one, even if it’s interviewing yourself, for instance, that is going to be huge, because that builds on itself. And that’s how you end up overcoming that fear or whatever it is that you’re struggling with. I’ve heard of people say that they struggle with making phone calls or reaching out to these certain businesses. But once you make that first phone call or you send that first direct message, even if your response is, hey, no thank you or not interested or no response at all, you’ve made that first step. And it makes it that much easier to make the second phone call or send a second DM or make the second podcast.
Michael: (Question) All right, well, the next question is something we all experience, which is what resources mentally helped you through this process? Was it motivational speakers? Was it family support? The alternative to that, was were their naysayers? If so, how did you tune them out and kind of continue on your path?
Michael: (Answer) Well, my process really started well before I actually started my company. And that process for me, as I had mentioned in the beginning, was really around kind of fixing that inner child in me that said I wasn’t worth much. And I think a lot of us have that inner child that formed between the ages of three and eight from whatever circumstances we grew up with, whether it was trauma or absent parents or whatever the issue is, we kind of focus or spend the rest of our lives kind of searching for something to fix that, to fix that kind of hurt inner child. And so my process for that, it really kind of went in overdrive several months leading up to when I had left my other job. And that process, for me and everyone’s process is obviously going to be different. But for me, I actually went through a six-month short-term childhood trauma therapy group, and I worked through that. In addition, I go to see a regular therapist weekly anyway. I feel like even if you don’t have something specific for the therapy part of it, everyone has stuff. And it’s nice to have kind of that space, whether it’s weekly or bi-weekly or monthly, where you can feel supported and to know that, no, you’re not a crazy person or hey, the way that this was taught to you was like, totally not right and not serving you anyway.
So a lot of it was that process of getting through the kind of the therapy and getting to the other side of that healing of my inner child, but through that process, more like the day to day stuff was a lot of reading books and yes, watching different motivational videos. There’s so much stuff online or listening to podcasts and kind of a rediscovery of like, hey, the way this universe works is so full of abundance and not so full of lack that there’s so much that you can do depending on what your focus is. And so for me, again, a lot of motivational stuff. I’m a huge listener of any of the Law of attraction and I’m not going to get into specifics. You can search that out there. I’m not sure quite if I want to plug someone or not. This is the first podcast, I’m not quite sure how I want to handle that. So I’m going to just leave names out of it for now. But lots of stuff out there. But I’m a full believer of the universe and Laws of Attraction and all of that. So it’s a lot of that, a lot of listening to that. It really can help you get through struggling days when you’re miserable at the job that you’re in or in the family situation you’re in.
Which I guess brings me to the naysayers, speaking of family situation. So yes, I definitely had naysayers and some were within the family. Fortunately, my wife was super supportive, so that was awesome. But there were other people that were close to me that were not. Either outwardly, that were not, saying things like, “that’s not going to work, what are you doing?” Or just kind of in their attitude. And it would be one of those things where I just wouldn’t tell certain people what I was up to. And I’d spend 10 hours working on this particular blog post or my website or something, and they’d say, “how was your day”? And I’d be like, “Good”, and just not mention anything about it. Because that to me is how I was able to ignore the naysayers. Some of them. You can cut people out. A little harder to do that for people closer to home or closer friends. So it really is just more about like limiting your exposure to them and to that negativity. And that was really how I was able to kind of get past what people thought. Because if you stop it every time you hear kind of a negative feedback, then you wouldn’t get anywhere. And I think it’s important to know too, that just anyone that has a negative feedback, it’s usually coming from their own place of hurt and knowing that they’re just kind of putting you down because they don’t feel good about themselves. And to know that it’s not personal and remember the reason why you set out to start doing this thing and just keep doing it.
Michael: (Question) And so this question is going to be a little bit different because I’m answering it for myself and considering what my business is, but I’ll still kind of work through it. So from a business standpoint, how do you navigate the back end stuff like managing your business finances and your taxes? Did you set up a corporation? Did you decide to start as a sole proprietor? Did you have someone do it? Did you do it yourself? How did you manage that? The business side of things when you are starting this new endeavor?
Michael: (Answer) Well, as you can imagine, setting up the business comes pretty natural to me. And so when it came to starting the business for Lean Towards Joy, I opened an LLC in my state of Massachusetts and I trademarked Lean Towards Joy. I opened some business accounts, I set up my own website. So all that stuff I did on my own. Some of it became a question of where I wanted to focus my energy. We all have a limited amount of bandwidth and so for me it became questions of do I want to focus on marketing or reaching out to these particular people or do I want to spend my time doing my accounting? And so I do have an online accounting service that I use. It makes my life a lot easier come the end of the quarter or the end of the year just to do some of those accounting things. I also use an online payment processing company. This helps me with my invoicing as well as accepting credit cards, which to me organizationally, it makes it easier than also dealing with checks and other things. So it really has to do with how much time you want to focus on your craft and how much time you want to focus on kind of some of those back end things. Some things you’ll find that it’s easier to hire out, other things you might find that you want to do yourself because you either really enjoy doing it or you don’t want to spend that extra money or whatever the reason is. Fortunately, there’s an answer for everybody. If there is something that you’re struggling with in any aspects of the business side of it, you can find someone else out there or a company out there that can do it for you. So it’s important to never let that be the hurdle of you enjoying your craft.
Michael: (Question) So for my last question, what’s next?
Michael: (Answer) What’s next for me really is to branch out and try to reach more people. So whether that’s through podcasts or social media, I really want to try to meet people where they are at now and help them there. So whether it’s starting their business, whether it’s leaving that company that isn’t working out for them, whether in this economy they just got laid off and now they’re wondering what do I do next? It’s about reaching people where they’re at and trying to find ways to help them get to the next place, but get to it in a place of leaning towards joy. You don’t have to go to the next thing because there’s a paycheck there. It’s not this “or” that it can be about “and”. For me, I just want to focus on trying to reach as many people and finding different avenues to do that. That could mean having other people come on to this podcast and share kind of where they’re at and how they got there and what struggles they had to hopefully influence other people that might be going through the same thing. It could be providing more resources or more guides or free content through blogs. It’s really just my working through the process with people. And the more people that can focus on that, leaning towards joy and shining their light, I think the better off we are all going to feel.
With everything that’s happening in the world around us, I think it’s just so important to focus on those positive aspects in each other and from what we do to the day to day, it really can change people’s lives. Just a simple redirection of where their focus is and if I can help in that and reach more people, then that’s what I’m going to keep trying to do.
Michael: (Wrap-Up) Well, that was great! It was my first podcast for myself. I’ve done podcasts for other people, but really the first time I’ve interviewed myself and I thought it came out pretty well, organically without a script. The questions were scripted but then the answers were just off-the-cuff and organic and genuine. And I feel like there’s way more that you can pull out of kind of an interview like that than if the script was read and the flow is better. There’s probably a ton of “umms” in there, but don’t take those out. If you were to try to recreate this yourself, don’t take those out because that’s part of the process that’s you and that’s awesome. So don’t change that. I think I would definitely do this again! Even if no one listens to it or one person listens to it or whatever. I hope people find value in it, but if they don’t, I found value in doing it for myself so I would definitely do it again. I look forward to that! So until then, lean towards your joy and follow your passion and through doing that you’re going to shine your light and that’s awesome and will create a better world if more people did that. Until next time, thanks for listening!