Admittedly, I have an entrepreneurial streak, which made that first year of starting the clinic absolutely thrilling. And, I completely neglected to take care of myself. By the end of that year I was suffering major burnout. Measure for measure, my practice was a success. I was making a living, always busy, and genuinely enjoying the sensory overload of putting all of the book learning into clinical practice. However, I learned the hard way that passion is not enough and started to slow way down to get to know who I was as a practitioner and find the right work / entrepreneurial / life balance.
Building a satisfying and engaging career is a complicated thing to do! Trusting that hundreds of hours of unpaid work when I was starting out and thousands of spent dollars on school would result in a steady paying job was an uncomfortable leap of faith to make. You've heard of the 10,000 hours rule right? The theory is that if you practice something for 10,000 hours you become an expert. I don’t buy it. You could spend 10,000 hours doing anything and be able to do it better, but to be an expert requires more focus than clocking hours. The 10,000 hours rule is about deliberate focus and intention.
One of the reasons I was drawn to this profession is it's not a punch in and punch out kind of job. I knew that I could never claim boredom in my work, and if I am bored, then something in how I am practicing needs to shift. Of course, there are always peaks and lows, periods of stagnation and plateaus. That is the nature of this long term relationship. Growing with my work and putting in the hours of deliberate focus and intention is the hardest and most satisfying thing I have ever done.
And as this podcast airs, I’m about to make another leap. After 5 years of running a busy practice in Northern California, a new chapter is about to begin. I’ll be moving to Washington state to work with a dream team of practitioners and really look forward to seeing what comes from the collaboration.
Listen into this podcast with Renee about the opportunities that arise when you engage the process of business