Hey Fabulous Health Professionals,

It’s time to get something straight. And that something is MINDSET.

I know you’ve heard this word so, so many times. You’ve heard it bandied about, you’ve heard it used to manipulate, and you’ve heard it used in superficial ways as well. But when push comes to shove, mindset is really important.

Do many of us actually know what mindset really is and how it impacts us? I know many clinicians here have studied psychology and we’re supposed to know about mindset, what it is, where it comes from and how big of an impact it has. And that’s great when we’re talking about our clients… We’re all very good at seeing, hearing and observing the attitudes and behaviours that we know make up the mindset of our clients.

What we’re not so great at, however, is understanding how our own mindset is throwing up it’s own attitudes and barriers to our success.

B.F. Skinner said that thoughts are behaviours we haven’t learned to observe yet.

So let’s just keep this really simple: a mindset is a way of thinking… a mental inclinication or a way of thought. It’s a way of thinking about something.

Your mindset is a collection of all those thoughts, all those beliefs and all those attitudes that you have throughout any period of time. And then these thoughts create habits, and these habits create the way that you interact with the world and what you get in return.

If your mindset tells you that you cannot be a success, you will be automatically tune into the information that confirms this hypothesis. And your behaviour will begin to reflect this belief. If you have a belief that clients won’t pay your full fee in private practice, then your mindset will be set on looking for the evidence that supports you devaluing yourself.

How about when you went to university – did you go in with the mindset of “I’m going to be a fabulous success at this?” I don’t know about you but I thought I was doing OK until graduation. Then I went out into the world and realised how much I didn’t know. My mindset became confused, I became unsure of myself. All that theory, all of those 300 hours of practicum that I had done kinda meant diddly-squat out there in the real world.

But what attitude does it take to be a success? Well, just like we’ve learned how to become successful, competent clinicians, effectively moving clients through the therapeutic process (regardless of modality), we are in tune with the mindset of how to help a client. We have attitudes and beliefs around that. We know that if a client does A B and C then they’re going to get to the result that they want. So as clinicians, we are really tuned into how we can develop growth and encourage progress for our clients.

But for a lot of clinicians, there is a disconnect. The growth mindset that they help their clients develop can clash with the way they view themselves. 

So it is incredibly important that we check in on our mindset around success to ensure that our attitudes, beliefs and our behaviour supports all supporting our dreams about being successful in private practice.

All the marketing and practice building strategies and techniques in the world won’t make a difference until you wrap your heard around your mindset and how it plays out in your habits and behaviour. 

Success, on your terms

It’s all well and good to have a success-driven mindset but you can’t do this on someone ELSE’s definition of success. You will never be a success if you’re trying to live up to someone else’s expectations or living from a place of comparison-itis.

Your mindset about your success is what will drive and propel you forward.

So I challenge you right now: what is your mindset? Are you set, in your mind, to become a success in private practice and what does that success look like for you?

Because you know as well as I do that that a million dollar turnover practice isn’t that exciting to every clinician out there. But I do know that making a massive contribution and having enough wealth to look after ourselves and our families both now and into the future is a great definition of success (well – for me, anyway. Your mileage may vary but that’s the point!)

So I challenge you again: What is your mindset?

What is it set on?

What are the things that you can do to improve, change and tweak your mindset to help it propel you towards the goals, feelings and emotions that you want to experience?

If you want to talk more about how your mindset is getting in the way of your success in private practice, then you know what to do: click here to connect with me.

Here’s to your success,