Is Seeking an “Abundance Mindset” Toxic?
Curt and Katie chat about abundance and scarcity mindsets, looking at what the research actually says about these often-used terms. We explore the dangers of how the abundance mindset is often weaponized against entrepreneurs (like private practitioners) in how they think and how much they should pay for coaching services. We also look at the role of privilege in how these mindsets are often talked about. Finally, we explore what might be better to focus on instead: practical or growth mindsets as well as wise mind.
Click here to scroll to the podcast transcript.Transcript
In this podcast episode we talk the dangers of striving for abundance mindset
We’ve heard a lot of people in a lot of different settings talk about the ideas of abundance and scarcity mindsets. We see some problems in how these concepts are used within popular culture.
What does the research say about scarcity and abundance mindsets?
- When you have scarce resources, you will work to protect yourself and avoid death
- There is research done on actual “scarcity” that is being inaccurately applied to people who do not have scarce resources (like some of the coaches and entrepreneurs who use this term)
- People who have more resources think more abundantly (the finding is correlational, not directional)
What are the dangers of the “abundance mindset?”
“A lot of the students and the people entering in the [mental health] field who are just kind of like, I want to have what all of the prosperous therapists have. I want this, it’s just not attainable to me, because I’ve had to take out $100,000 in grad school loans, and to be able to afford rent and to be able to enter into a field where it expects me to work for minimum wage or less for a few years and putting aside everything else. I don’t have the privilege to do this.” – Curt Widhalm, LMFT
- The unrealistic nature of “thinking” your way out of poverty or practical challenges (without the reality of action)
- The blaming the victim that can happen when someone is having trouble reframing their situation more positively
“There is a… weaponization of [abundance mindset]: if you don’t think abundantly then you’re sabotaging yourself. And I think also using it as a sales tool. If you were abundant enough, you’ll sell your kidney to be able to afford this fabulous coaching program that’s going to solve all your problems…At least one of the most egregious pieces of this is that it’s a problem with YOU that you’re not thinking abundantly enough and so that is why you’re not successful in some way. If you’re not thinking abundantly, you must be self-sabotaging. If you don’t set a full fee and hold it no matter what – even if no client will pay that fee – it’s better to have an empty practice and a full abundant heart than a full practice and a slightly less full pocketbook.” – Katie Vernoy, LMFT
- Weaponizing “abundance” to imply that you are sabotaging your practice
- Using “abundance” as a sales tactic
What should therapists do instead of “being abundant?”
- A strategic or problem-solving mindset
- Learning practical strategies to do the work necessary
- Allowing time to grow into the vision of your practice
- Growth versus fixed mindset
Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode:
We’ve pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance!
Against All Odds – Are Abundant Thinkers Really Wealthier? The Cross-Country Analysis on Abundant Thinkers and their Income Scale – ResearchGate
5 Ways To Go From A Scarcity To Abundance Mindset – Forbes
What is an abundance mindset? Discover how to live in a state of gratitude and abundance today – Tony Robbins
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success – Carol Dweck
Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast:
Seeking Purpose Beyond Accomplishment: An Interview with Kasey Compton
Thriving Over Surviving: Growing a Practice without Burn Out, An Interview with Megan Gunnell, LMSW
You Do NOT Have to Be a Thought Leader
Overcoming Your Poverty Mindset, An Interview with Tiffany McLain, LMFT
Who we are:
Curt Widhalm, LMFT
Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making “dad jokes” and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: http://www.curtwidhalm.com
Katie Vernoy, LMFT
Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt’s youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: http://www.katievernoy.com
A Quick Note:
Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We’re working on it.
Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren’t trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don’t want to, but hey.
Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement:
Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy:
Connect with the Modern Therapist Community:
Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group
Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide Creative Credits:
Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/
Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/
Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated):
Transcripts do not include advertisements just a reference to the advertising break (as such timing does not account for advertisements).
… 0:00
(Opening Advertisement)
Announcer 0:00
You’re listening to the Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide, where therapists live, breathe, and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm, and Katie Vernoy.
Curt Widhalm 0:15
Welcome back modern therapists, this is the Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide. And this is the podcast for therapists about the things that we do in our practices, the things that we hear about developing our practices, and the ways that sometimes we encourage other people to build their practices. And a lot of times when I’m talking with new people who are coming into the field say, talking about, hey, I want to build a private practice or something like this. And one of the first things that I teach them is the word abundance. And they usually say, Thanks, that means a lot.
Katie Vernoy 0:53
Oh, my goodness, that’s pretty funny. I like it.
Curt Widhalm 0:57
So we are taking on the idea of abundance mindset. I think that I have seen a lot of people use this, I think that it might be misguided, overrated, wrongly used sometimes? While it’s good to think positively. I also think that maybe this is just kind of a whole lot of privilege that is just being thrown out there. And just kind of like, Oh, if you just think abundantly, there’s a never ending growth of everything everywhere. And it’s just your fault if you can’t think that way. Is this also what you experienced?
Katie Vernoy 1:37
I think so. I have mixed feelings about it. I have been in you know, different coaching programs, or different spaces where the idea of abundance does sound very warm and welcoming. And it helps to kind of get past some of the anxiety that I experience as an entrepreneur or as someone who is making my own way in my my business. I’ve had even some of my folks in sales and different stuff in my therapy practice talk about this as well. But, but to me, I do get worried like you do around the level of privilege, around some of the other dangers, I think of abundance, or if we kind of continue out on these ripples; law of attraction, the secret, manifesting, you know, all of these things that…
Curt Widhalm 2:28
Are very woowoo.
Katie Vernoy 2:29
They…you said that not me. But I want to start before we get into that part, I want to start with the reverse, or what people call the reverse, which is scarcity mindset. And I think describing scarcity mindset as our survival brain feels the most accurate to me. It’s what we naturally do. Our brains are designed to help us stay alive. I actually got some of this from an article from Tony Robbins of all people. I wanted to see, like, let’s go to the source of the people that are using this stuff. And, and there’s some definite woo, and a Jack Canfield blog around the law of attraction. But so I’ll put the stuff that I looked at and that we talked about in the show notes over at mtsgpodcast. I think with a scarcity mindset, which I like to describe as like a survival mode. Our brains are designed to help us to stay alive, you know, like the if there’s danger, the first thing we’re going to do is go to how do I protect myself? Let me avoid risk. Let me make sure I have enough. And, you know, studies show people who live in poverty have a scarcity mindset. And that seems legit. There was even a WebMD article that says it like lowers IQ, it limits your brain function, it makes impulse control harder. When we don’t have enough, we behave as though we don’t have enough. And so scarcity mindset is a real thing. When people have scarce resources, there’s a fear of danger, there’s a fear of lack. But I think when we use it colloquially, when someone is an entrepreneur, and worried that if if you get a client, I don’t get a client, you know, those kinds of things. When there’s that kind of zero sum game, there’s only a certain number of pieces of the pie gotta grab mine, very self protective, then it’s seen as a flaw. And it’s seen as something that is dangerous to you, dangerous to your business or your career trajectory. And so it moves from a real thing. You know, someone who was actually dealing with scarce resources to a mental health thing. I can’t think of a better way to describe it, where I fear I don’t have enough resources, so I act as though I don’t have enough resources.
Curt Widhalm 4:55
Having taught in a couple of universities that work with students who come from very different socio economic backgrounds as they enter into the programs; one was a university that is a state school, it was a lot of first generation college students in general, let alone first generation graduate students. A lot of people who their first experiences with mental health themselves might have been through community based agencies, versus the one over the hill that was the private school that catered to a lot higher SES background. And both of the schools taught towards very different career aspects, even just based on kind of who ended up being the faculty there. And so I’ve gotten to see kind of both sides of this and owning my own privilege in this conversation, I went to the school over the hill myself, and ended up in private practice, and…But what I’m getting to here, what I’m trying to get to here is that it’s, it doesn’t have to be dichotomous. It’s really something more simple than just kind of Oh, think and and grow and grow, prosper, you know, go grow wealthy, whatever that, you know. Yeah…
Katie Vernoy 6:24
Think and Grow Rich is the name of the book.
Curt Widhalm 6:24
Yeah. That does start with this very big place of privilege, where it’s like, of course, if I don’t have to worry about where my bills are coming from, or where I’m going to be able to eat or any of that kind of stuff, that makes it easier to do that. And really, I think kind of what fostered us talking about this as a topic in the first place is just like a lot of the students and the people entering in the field who are just kind of like, I want to have what all of the prosperous therapists have. I want this, it’s just not attainable to me, because I’ve had to take out $100,000 in grad school loans, and to be able to afford rent and to be able to enter into a field where it expects me to work for minimum wage or less for a few years and putting aside everything else. I don’t have the privilege to do this. And I’m hearing this, especially from kind of the younger millennials and the older Gen Z’s that are now entering into the field that the last like, I don’t know, 15-20 years has been just like, one major, once in a lifetime crisis after another. And so it’s just kind of like, no matter how much work there is the goalposts just keep getting moved as a field, or as a society that I think that this advice to just like, think better. Like think, think your way out of you know, a once in a lifetime crisis that’s followed by another once in a lifetime crisis, just, you know, always think towards the positive and things will work out for you. While they see that it completely ignores the context of the rest of what seems to be going on in people’s lives.
Curt Widhalm 7:49
But that’s just scarcity, Curt. Right?
Curt Widhalm 8:18
Well, and that’s just kind of where it does get used in this dichotomous way. That…
Katie Vernoy 8:23
Yeah.
Curt Widhalm 8:24
…you know, I see the people who do end up kind of like, okay, I’ve got to get out of grad school, and I’ve got to work the crap job, while I’m also working on building a private practice on the side under somebody else’s supervision. That I see as, as an employer, I see those people who I’m like, you’re the ones who are definitely going to make it because you’re taking kind of the both/and: I’m building a safety net by taking a job that provides for my basics, while putting in some extra efforts to end up being able to set the foundations towards this abundance kind of thing. It’s more in the middle, it’s taking more of a reality or more of a like, okay, and this still takes work mindset.
Katie Vernoy 9:14
And I think that’s I that’s where I want to get to, but before we go there, I just want to I want to make a comment about kind of real scarcity. And the real scarcity mindset is when you don’t have the privilege to work two jobs, even. You’ve got kids at home, or you have you’re disabled, or have other medical conditions where you can’t work 15-20 hours a day, right? I think that there’s an element of scarcity where there’s a reality to it. And then there’s also when you get mired in scarcity, and it’s about survival versus goal setting. And I think there is value to moving from I am stuck, the goalposts keep moving, so I’m just going to survive here. And this is folks that potentially get the crappy job, keep thinking they’re going to start a private practice. They don’t. And they keep going into this thing of like, well, I just when I get time, when I have time, when I have time. You know, like, I just, I have a scarcity of time, I have a scarcity of money, I can’t do anything. I think that is harmful, but it is real. It’s not something that we consciously do. It’s something we can work on through cognitive restructuring, that kind of stuff. But, but there are folks that I think there’s the emotional scarcity that may need to be addressed. And then there’s the actual scarcity, which can’t be thought out of. And so, so let’s, let’s shift then to to kind of what you’re talking about, there’s the opposite, which is kind of this abundance mindset. And, and I went to one of the people who, you know, this is their bread and butter, I went to a Tony Robbins article, and I’ll put you know those things in the show notes. But the idea of abundance is actually not bad, right? It’s being grateful for what you have. It’s making sure, and let’s see what Tony Robbins said, examining your limiting beliefs like self sabotage. It’s adapting more empowering beliefs and embracing change. So, it’s talking about being flexible and positive and all that stuff. And I think in general, it’s, it’s a good coping strategy. But it’s not a way of being that just automatically makes everything better. I don’t know. I mean, maybe maybe that sounds like an anti therapists thing to say. But like, just because I’m thinking about my situation better doesn’t necessarily mean that my situation will continue to get better.
Curt Widhalm 11:38
Yeah, I think that what you’re talking about is a lot of general just like, you know, taking negative beliefs about what’s out there and being able to use it in a positive way. And I think that there is some good cognitive restructuring that needs to happen in order to be able to find success. But just like, expecting that people are just going to be like, Okay, I’m drastically just going to be like, there’s plenty of things for everything for me all of the time, and that things will work out. But I think that a lot of this stuff just seems to be based on people who were already successful with it, and don’t really take into account a lot of the people who have made all of the mistakes and failed miserably at it. And I mean, because any of these kinds of things that are going to be like, Okay, we’re talking about like, the certainty of a lower paycheck, or the certainty of, you know, having health insurance, or any of that kind of stuff that might be working in a lower paying job or a job that’s in a toxic agency or something like that, versus the much riskier, higher fees outside of insurance panels, and, you know, potential greater rewards that would come with an abundance mindset kind of thing. There is space for both, but we don’t talk a lot about the people who take the big swings and misses and then end up moving either out of the field entirely or back into those agency jobs, because they need that certainty again.
… 13:13
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Katie Vernoy 13:16
For sure, and I actually found a study was un-ironic and was in the North American Journal of Psychology. I don’t even know if that’s really a good one or not, but I found it. You know, I was in my Google Scholar, looking up and it was Yakubova and Salahodjaev. I think I said that, right. But it basically said that abundant thinkers have more wealth. And it was correlational. But it was always described in that direction, we have proved that people who think abundantly have more wealth. And, you know, we controlled for all the different things, demographics, we controlled for all of the other pieces, but people who are abundant thinkers have more wealth. And I was sitting here going like, you’re saying it in a very particular way. And if you say it the other way, it isn’t very mind blowing. People with more wealth think abundantly. I even I was like, Am I crazy here? Like this is in a journal that’s mentioned on Google Scholar with somebody that has like a bazillion citations is one of the authors. The other one has none. But I was like, so I put it, I put it into ChatGPT and I was like, What is this article saying? And it said it the same way. And I said, Could it also mean this? And they’re like, and ChatGPT told me I was very astute. So, I recognized that I have now been given the ChatGPT approval that I was thinking correctly. I was like, Am I crazy? This is correlational. Of course people who have more resources will think more abundantly because they don’t have to worry about it. Right?
Curt Widhalm 14:56
You’re absolutely right. And some people do work from being, you know, forced into kind of a scarcity or survival mindset into building their practices up and being able to take some of these, you know, bigger riskier steps. And eventually, along the way, at least observationally of a lot of the people in our field, or the therapist turned coaches that I see out there that seem to forget their roots. I mean, a lot of the people that you’re talking about, not everybody, are you know, the motivational speakers, the the coaches out there that might not have started out in the therapy world, the Tony Robbins’s and those kinds of people. And I know, I know, Tony is very famous for, like, one of the stories that he tells in virtually every workshop that he’s in is how like, he spent his last $3 buying a coffee for somebody because he just knew that if he was putting good out into the world, or whatever that story ended up being. I know that he used his last dollars on something and uses that as kind of this: But I just knew sort of thing that highlights…
Katie Vernoy 16:06
And it was like, was it like some famous person that gave him his start or something like?
Curt Widhalm 16:06
I don’t…[uninteligable] I’m not a Tony Robbins…
Katie Vernoy 16:13
No, I’m not either.
Curt Widhalm 16:15
…disciple. So…
Katie Vernoy 16:16
We need to ask somebody what that was.
Curt Widhalm 16:18
But it’s something where, okay, in retrospect, yeah, that that makes a good story. But you’re more of the exception than the rule. Because a lot of people, while they would benefit from being able to say, take good opportunities when you have them, be able to push outside of your limits in a responsible way kind of thing. That ends up being very beneficial when it works. But it’s done with kind of a wise mind towards risk as opposed to, well, if the answer, it hasn’t come to you yet, by just being like, Oh, you’re you’re not abundant-ing hard enough. Like, if you haven’t, you know, if you have not risked everything hard enough, then you’re not successful yet, you should, you should sell that kidney so that way you can afford to take on the next part of your practice, or the next coaching session from somebody that is going to be able to tell you like, hey, you know, you have children that have extra kidneys, too. Like…
Katie Vernoy 17:34
Well, and I think that’s the thing that I think is so problematic is that whether or not there’s positive stuff around thinking positively and abundantly. There is a I don’t even like weaponization of it, that if you don’t think abundantly then you’re sabotaging yourself. And I think also using it as a sales tool. If you were abundant enough, you’ll sell your kidney to be able to afford this fabulous coaching program that’s going to solve all your problems. Like to me, that is, at least one of the most egregious pieces of this; is that it’s a problem with you that you’re not thinking abundantly enough. And so that is why you’re not successful in some way. If you’re not thinking abundantly, you must be self sabotaging. If you don’t set a full fee and hold it no matter what, even if no client will pay that fee, it’s better to have an empty practice and a full abundant heart than a full practice and a slightly less full, you know, pocketbook. And to me, it’s it’s very scary that even people within our field are weaponizing this abundance mindset to try to move people into either paying money or doing something that feels very remote to them, like or egregious to them, like I got in this I you know, it’s kind of the opposite of I got this into this, you know, for the outcomes, not the income. It’s like I must think abundantly and charge so much or else I am failing the therapy profession. Like that’s a specific to us. But I feel like this weaponization of abundance is really dangerous.
Curt Widhalm 19:21
So, what do we do with this? Because, I mean, there’s a lot of reasonable people that I assume that if you’re hanging with us in this podcast that you are amongst those who are reasonable, or you’re gonna fight back against us, so inviting all the fighters to send us message at podcast @ therapyreimagined.com. But I know that this is not representative of everybody who’s out there teaching people how to make these practices. We have good friends who do this, but part of just what we see is there’s enough of these people. And there’s enough of the people who are trying to improve their situation by moving into a private practice or cash pay practice or something like that, that their anxieties of getting into it, make them buy into these courses that are just kind of reinforcing, like the, you’re not good enough, you’re, you’re bypassing all of the work that it takes to build something sustainable. If, you know, I have never personally, I have never taken out lines of credit or loans to run my business. And it always surprises me when I hear people who take out giant giant, you know, loans to be able to build their practices or to fund their practices. And then they’re beholden to yet a another debt space, rather than being able to kind of slowly and methodically work to get there. And so I take, you know, still sometimes sliding scale clients that are well below what I, what I charge as far as a regular fee for new clients. Sometimes I’m very particular about that. But earlier in my career, this was part of having before practice was being able to be like, Okay, it’s not as much, but it’s a lot more than the zero that I would get during that hour.
Katie Vernoy 21:22
Yeah, well, I mean, I think, though, that I want to just acknowledge both of us have privilege of having spouses that work and, and having, you know, money that we can work with. But like, the same, I haven’t taken out lines of credit for starting a practice, but I did invest some money that I had to start a practice. I paid it back almost immediately, and I’m super frugal. So it was like I didn’t buy a comfortable chair to do my therapy in until I’d made enough money to pay for it, you know, those kinds of things. But I think that looking at your actual survival needs, I think is an important one, because to me the selling a kidney or you just believe and it will happen, I think it’s problematic. But before we get too much into the solutions, I really want to go through kind of this list I made of additional problems with this. Are you open to hang with me for that a little bit longer?
Curt Widhalm 22:13
Yes.
Katie Vernoy 22:14
Okay. So we talked about the blaming and shaming people that are going through a hard time, right. You know, like, if you’re not abundant enough, like it doesn’t matter that you’ve had, you know, huge financial problems, for whatever reason, or financial instability, it doesn’t matter that you’re going through hard personal times, think abundantly, just think abundantly, right. And it doesn’t honor that there might be some grieving that needs to happen. It doesn’t honor that maybe there’s just some good old problem solving, that is very strategic, and not abundant, and creative, that just needs to happen to get through these situations. But when I was thinking about that I was, you know, when we, before we hit record you were talking about or I guess on our Patreon thing, you were talking about kind of the, the evangelical piece to it, right? That just believe hard enough. I was thinking about Job, you know, Job was tried, this was a Christian thing of tried and tried and tried and was still, you know, a great, faithful person. I know that there are other types of spirituality that kind of falls into this. But even just if we remove, you know, kind of organized religion, I feel like there’s a certain spiritual bypass around abundance. You know, and I guess I’ve kind of talked about that backwards, because it’s like, yes, the grief, the strategy, all those things are not talked about if you just say abundant. But do you see that as well?
Curt Widhalm 23:40
I think so. And I think that this fosters into the way that our field looks at sometimes private practice therapists who charge a lot, is it ends up being kind of even on the outside of like, well, you’re bypassing kind of outside of the outcomes. It’s ignoring, you know, for those of us who have spent years, slowly and methodically building up clients and reputation and only looking at what is happening outside of the context of how people got there. And especially where we’re in this therapeutic renaissance of like, oh, mental health crisis, lots of people can enter into this field very easily at a time when a lot of people are, you know, TikTok influencers who are therapists and, and the like that it’s very easy to portray that influencer mentality. And I would say that the vast majority of us are probably the ones who have taken the steps and taking the hard hits from time to time and also have grown to a place of expertise and wisdom and don’t necessarily need to have all of the flashiness that goes along with this. But some of the ways that I see some of, you know, the coaches, some of the go and do this workshop about how to build your private practice, and we’re gonna visit seven continents on the cruise that this workshop is set up on. And for the low, low price of $12,000, you’ll have everything set up for you, that just is like, okay, those people might have built out their coaching programs to do that step by step, but it’s such a big divide from the those who have, to the those who don’t have yet, if it’s, you know, being in the abundance mindset sort of thing. But in realistically, to the those who have to deal with life, that it just, it’s unattainable. It’s, irresponsible to assume that that’s what everybody can have.
… 26:00
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Katie Vernoy 26:04
And I think it’s not practical, right? I mean, I’m gonna summarize what you said and add a little bit to it. When someone talks about: I got here through my abundance mindset, I got here through manifesting and the law of attraction, and this is what it is. It, it is a typically curated picture of their their journey, and whether it’s I spent my last $3, on a coffee, or whatever it is, it’s always a, a story of triumph, and all of that. And, and potentially, it’s even not a story that tells the truth. Beyond that. I mean, I’ve I’ve talked to a lot of folks, both with coaching programs, as well as who have been in programs or seen behind the scenes and other coaching programs. And there’s a lot of smoke and mirrors, it’s I must show I am successful, so that everyone believes I’m successful. And this is what an abundance mindset gets you or my program gets you or whatever. But then when you really look further, you know, they’re spending way more money than they have trying to get enough, you know, kind of ads going or whatever it is. And I know that there are people who do this well. So this is a broad generalization. But it denies the reality of even someone who is successful can have a bad year, or a bad patch, or whatever. And that doesn’t mean that they’re not being abundant, it means that that’s the reality of things. You know, maybe they didn’t pivot fast enough, or maybe there was something else that happened. And so I think, to me, it is such a curated perspective. And it, and it puts false hope for what the actual reality is. So there’s that. And that’s, I think, what you’re talking about. The other thing is that it then can, at times, posit so strongly, that it’s about mindset work, that it doesn’t get into the practical realities that you’re talking about in building a practice; about how you over time, raise your fee, you don’t start with a super high fee, most folks don’t anyway. Because you don’t have a track record, you don’t have a network. If you do, great, start super high. But there’s folks that come in and say I’m gonna charge this amount. And what they don’t know is that a lot of people say my fee is $350 an hour, but they’re charging that maybe to one person and have slid everybody else down just to have a have a practice. And so I think it’s the realities of how do I market? How do I network? How do I actually build the infrastructure of a practice that will support me to be able to command that kind of a fee? Those things are gone, because we just have to manifest abundance. And I know that that’s not everyone. And it may hopefully, it’s not even most people. But when there’s not that, that practical reality that that ties you back to the real world, I get very concerned. And so so I think we’re starting to get into the what to do instead. And I think some of it is actually looking at a strategic mind, a goal setting problem solving mind versus scarcity, I just gotta protect everything, I gotta be safe or abundat. If I build it, they will come it’ll be amazing and wonderful. But but actually getting more strategic and doing the realistic things that you’re talking about.
Curt Widhalm 29:20
I think you and I both operate on kind of this strategic or this more realistic mindset, I guess.
Katie Vernoy 29:30
Neutral, do the cognitive restructuring, get more objective? Maybe.
Curt Widhalm 29:33
I mean, I remember starting my practice with, Okay, here’s my monthly expenses. And as long as I don’t lose money, I am going to be successful. And that was the definition over the first like three months.
Katie Vernoy 29:47
Yeah.
Curt Widhalm 29:47
And that was partially like you having some savings in place to be able to pay my life in…
Katie Vernoy 29:56
Yeah
Curt Widhalm 29:57
…during that timeframe. And as I learned things along the way to be able to, oh, maybe I should have my office location in a different part of the city, or I should market things differently, or I should network differently, that those were things that I think in any of the coaching programs are still just kind of like, you still have to go and do those things anyway.
Katie Vernoy 30:23
Yeah. Yeah. I think. I think that, you know, instead of making this a practice building, podcast, let’s let’s go to the kind of the scarcity versus abundance. I think, learn how to do it and do the work is kind of what we’re saying.
Curt Widhalm 30:36
I mean, that’s, yeah, thank you. That’s where I was trying to get to is that the, the people who I see trying to make these kinds of jumps, the difference that I see and what I hear from other educators, supervisors, group practice owners is, there’s the people who are willing to put in the work and kind of accept that there is a growth stage that you have to go through, and you have to put in your dues, no matter where you’re at in your career, that you have to do. And there’s no, you mentioned, bypass, there’s no bypass that you can just like skip to the front of the line without doing some of that work.
Katie Vernoy 31:18
Well, and I want, I like the word growth, because there’s another set of kind of pair of mindsets that I think are actually more accurate. And it’s growth versus fixed mindset. And I think it’s Carol Dweck’s work that that kind of started this out. But a growth mindset is: I can learn, I can grow, I can attain things through my efforts. Whereas a fixed mindset is I’m either smart, or I am, or I am, I’m stupid; I’m, I’m successful, or I’m a failure. It’s not like ooh, failure in this particular incident is a educational leap forward for me, I get to learn from this. It’s with a fixed mindset, it’s like, well, I failed, I’m a failure, this is not going to work. And I think that if we go too far down that wrote, it does sound like scarcity mindset, right? Like, it’s just, there’s nothing for me here. I just, I’m a failure. I don’t have anything, I can’t do it. Right. And so really moving more towards a growth mindset that focuses on effort and resilience and, and potentially even, you know, kind of staying the course. I think that’s much better than kind of the abundant mindset: there’s enough for everyone. Well, I think that’s true. But if it’s if you have a growth mindset, it doesn’t mean you’re not even comparing yourself to anybody else. So, it doesn’t, it doesn’t really, it’s not required, I guess, is kind of where I’m going.
Curt Widhalm 32:41
And I’m not even sure that that’s entirely true. I don’t necessarily even agree with you on this. Because if I mean, just even taking on like the okay, there’s enough for everyone sort of thing…
Katie Vernoy 32:55
Which is the abundance mindset.
Curt Widhalm 32:57
Right. There still has to be a lot of context that you take into account in things, like…
Katie Vernoy 33:02
Yeah.
Curt Widhalm 33:03
But I think that there’s still a lot of context there. If your practice is in the middle of rural America, like there’s no amount of mindset that is going to get you outside of the, okay, I can build a practice, but there is still going to be an upper limit on what you’re able to do. If that means that you’re driving six or seven hours, most days out of the week to do round trip, because you’re having to hit you know, different little towns along the way to see your Medicaid clients, that your reimbursement is going to be, you know, fixed by the government kinds of responses, or the government kinds of reimbursement rates, there’s still going to be a limit to the amount of success that you can have in that context. If the mindset shift is alright, here’s how I have to redefine success. Okay, I can agree with that. But if it’s really just kind of like, how do I do this to the, you know, make my dreams happen? It also might just not be possible for everybody.
Katie Vernoy 34:12
I don’t know that I see growth mindset as anything’s possible if you just try hard enough. I do feel like it’s more: I am, I see it able to be in conjunction with this kind of reality based perception and strategy. It’s I’m going to do my effort towards my best strategy and if that’s a failure, I learned from it and then I design a new strategy. That’s how I see growth mindset. Okay, whereas fixed mindset is, I do my best efforts towards a strategy it doesn’t work. I am a failure. That’s it. I’m done. So, so that I think it’s slightly different but I I do believe that no mindset shift can take away the fact that you are in a place where you can only serve folks who who can only pay a certain amount. Like you have to design your practice your life with that stuff in mind. Like you can’t mindset yourself into something else, you can strategize and get licensed in another place and do a telehealth practice and have access to potentially higher income, you know, clients, but but it’s not something that you’re going to abundantly just create out of thin air. But you know, we’re getting pretty long on time. So I just want one more, I think, real kind of idea around this is, and I think you started saying this earlier. So this is maybe more of a summary. If we take care of our basic survival needs, we get to a place of comfort, maybe not a place of luxury, but a place of comfort, I can comfortably comfortably cover my bills I can, I can do the things I need to do, I’ve set my life up good enough that I can survive this. I think from that point, whether it’s a growth mindset, or if you really love abundance, you can do an abundance mindset. But from that point, once you get to a base level of security, I think then you can go into and access more creativity, access, more goal setting those kinds of things. And you can, if you don’t have, if you are truly in scarcity. And so to me, being able to balance that and recognize what is what is my real level of scarcity, abundance, whatever it is, and not listening to all the messages that just being abundant is going to get you somewhere. But taking care of the things that are scarce and making them less scarce, I think is the strongest way to move out of scarcity versus believing that abundance is real, and all of that. I think it is. I think that you know, like there are things that I believe that people can have and some people don’t believe that. But I don’t think that just saying, by and large, have an abundance mindset and your life will be better is is really accurate and is terribly privileged and terribly short sighted. And, you know, all of the things we’ve said.
Curt Widhalm 37:01
We believe that you want to follow us on our social media, and…
Katie Vernoy 37:06
We’re manifesting it.
Curt Widhalm 37:07
We’re manifesting it.
Katie Vernoy 37:08
…additional likes and follows…
Curt Widhalm 37:10
…and comments and also that you would want to join our Facebook group, the Modern Therapists Group, and you can check out our show notes over at mtsgpodcast.com. And until next time, I’m Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy.
… 37:24
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