How would you approach a situation where your work has become unsustainable, you feel burnt out doing too many things and feel like you can’t show up for your clients in the way you’d like to?
For
Line, a trauma therapist with a business called ROAR Healing Co, this meant reconfiguring the entire way she practised her business, from pricing to social media presence. In our chat, she shares her journey of rediscovering how she wants to present herself as a therapist and what she has changed in order to work sustainably.Here are some of the key themes we discuss:
how Ellen changed her dream of becoming an actor on Broadway to creating a career as a trauma therapist
what it feels like to be a burnt-out therapist
how she finds her clients and what that requires from her
how she deals with the fear of raising her pricing
where money trauma comes from
how she realised Instagram wasn’t the place for her to promote her business
how Ellen deals with the uncertainty of “is this the right path for me?”
What I appreciated about Ellen is how she isn’t afraid to speak from a vulnerable place and share her current ponderings about her career as well as the wisdom she’s already gathered. She openly discusses business tactics that have worked and not worked for her and shares her professional insight on how we can all recognise our money trauma.
Words of Wisdom
Here are a few of my favourite words of wisdom from Ellen from our chat. Dwell on them, watch the video to capture them in context, and share them with anyone who might need them today. Sharing is caring <3
On money trauma [17:16]: “Everybody carries a different story when it comes to money and the stories that we carry related to money are almost always informed by our family of origin or like our childhood like whatever circumstances we grew up in and then also by the system.”
On sustainable pricing [12:35]: “And I also thought about, what is the number of appointments that I can schedule in a day that feels like I can end the day as still myself instead of ending the day as this husk of a person who's completely drained. And it took me a while. I was like, okay, I'm just gonna raise my fee $5. And then I was like, okay, no, it's gonna have to be more than that. And then I was like, okay, no, I think it might have to be even more than that.”
On Instagram [24:06]: “I was on Instagram and I was like, this is going to be my platform. And I started making the daily reels and I was like, oh my gosh, this is so exhausting for me. And it felt really inauthentic for me to take this, these ideas that feel so, big and complex. Like when we're talking about trauma and brains and healing, these aren't things that are easy to distil into 90 seconds of a clip.”
On asking bigger questions [41:09]: “I've lately been trying to give myself permission of what would it look like to try something new? I don't wanna ever be afraid of that question. Like, you've done this and you spent a lot of time and energy being good at this, what if there was something different? What could that look like? I'm like, maybe I want to take a graphic design course and become a graphic designer, you know, or maybe I want to get a Google certification in data analytics and do some data. I probably don't want to do that, but it's like, sometimes I think for me giving myself some freedom to think about other possibilities right now is feeling like, I don't want to say fun, but it's feeling good.”
To show ❤️ for Ellen’s wisdom, follow her newsletter ROAR Healing Relationship Trauma and and check out her website.
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The High on Hope Rebel Series
This series of interviews features people who have taken a big leap of faith without knowing where exactly it will land. They’re also people who are breaking conventional rules about how to succeed in this world and figuring things out for themselves in inspiring ways. They’re the ones who publish a book even if people tell them it’s an impossible sell, leave social media even if it means slower business growth, choose ethical approaches to their work instead of maximising profit, follow a spiritual path rather than societal rules, share their stories even when they’re in the midst of personal turmoil, and open their hearts to talk about the good, the bad and the vulnerable.
They’re the type of rebels that the world needs more of.
They’re the people who create hope.
They’re the people I love to hang out with.
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Thanks for tuning in and giving my newsletter your time and presence. Let me know what kind of thoughts this interview sparked in you via email or comment below.
And when in doubt, focus on becoming the hope you wish to feel in this world.
With kindness,
Aurora
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