Is it time for you to evolve and thrive?

Welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. This episode is all about that stuck on the fence feeling that I think is so familiar to so many of us. That feeling when you know that something needs to change, but you are not sure whether now is the right time to make that change.

Full show notes for this episode are available at The Business of Psychology

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Evolve and Thrive Mastermind

 Have you been listening to this and feeling like the time has come for you to make a change in your practice? Maybe you are ready to grow with passive or semi passive income. Maybe you are ready to gain more time freedom, have that flexibility you always dreamed of, or expand your impact. If any of that sounds like you, you might be a really good fit for my Evolve and Thrive Mastermind.

Our next cohort is starting in January 2026, and it's a small group, six-month coaching experience. The early bird rate finishes mid-December, so if any of that sounds good to you, make sure you check out the details over at psychologybusinessschool.com and book your free call with me now to secure the best price.

Shownotes

Is it time for you to evolve and thrive?

Hello and welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. This episode is all about that stuck on the fence feeling that I think is so familiar to so many of us. That feeling when you know that something needs to change, but you are not sure whether now is the right time to make that change.

I just want to acknowledge that often this happens when my clients are really successful; when they've built exactly what they set out to build, but now something about it just isn't feeling fulfilling or they're struggling with the day-to-day running of their practice, feeling burned out, maybe feeling like they're doing fine, but sort of spinning their wheels in time, and that's how it was for me. On the surface, I had built a really successful private practice. From the outside looking in, people would've seen fully booked, always busy attracting people to my specialism, tick, tick, tick, it all looks great. But in reality, I was really struggling to keep going with that pace of clients because it wasn't giving me the flexibility that I needed in my life, but also it wasn't really allowing me to use my skills as a psychologist in the diverse and interesting ways that I had been able to in my public sector roles. So for a number of reasons, I arrived at this point of feeling like I needed to make a change, but I sat on that fence for quite a while, and it can be quite an uncomfortable place. I've noticed that as I've been doing the calls for our next Evolve and Thrive cohort, which is really exciting, that a lot of people are sitting on that fence. And because the economy is in a challenging place, and I don't think that we're in a really optimistic frame of mind as a generation at the moment, often we might be sitting in that place for a bit longer, really agonising over when's the right time to jump off and do something a bit differently. So I wanted to record an episode to help you think that through. And it's not going to be, “you should always go for it, now is definitely the right time to make a change in your practice”, because actually one of the things that's really important to me as a business coach is that you are respectful of the season of life that you are in, and that you make decisions based on wherever possible, data, good information about the return on the investment that you're going to get. And I don't just mean investment in terms of money, I mean investment in terms of time, your creativity and your emotional wellbeing as well. So, I hope this episode is going to help you. If you are thinking that now might be a good time for you to step into something new, maybe create a new project, something outside the therapy room, or maybe expand and bring on associates, my aim with this episode is to help you think through whether now is the right moment to jump in with both feet and really go for it, or if actually you might be in a season that means that those things are all here for you, they're all going to happen, but they need to happen a little bit later. So I hope you're going to find this useful.

I also hope that this episode will demonstrate to you that that evolution is possible, even if it's not the thing for you right now, I think there's a bit of pessimism out there sometimes that maybe we will miss the boat, that they are one to many offers, online courses, that kind of thing are only really available to people that built their audiences back when it was easier, like in 2016 for example, but actually that's not true. I am supporting day in, day out, I'm supporting psychologists and therapists who are doing it right now in this tricky climate and making it work. So I also hope that this episode is going to give you a little bit of that hopeful optimism that I have the privilege of sitting alongside in my coaching practice regularly.

Signs that you might be ready to evolve your practice

There are some signs that you might be ready to evolve your practice that are worth paying attention to. I got these from my existing participants in Evolve and Thrive.

The first sign is that you start craving one to many. You start craving more scale and more variety in your work. Maybe you are fully booked or well established, but you really miss using the other parts of your brain that one-to-one therapy doesn't always utilise. And this is how Dr Grace Lee-Brindle, who is currently in Evolve and Thrive described it to me. She noted that after leaving the NHS, she missed other parts of her work. She was well established with one-to-one clients, she's got a brilliant specialism, but she felt like she was ready to branch out and use other skills. So I think that's really important. Dr Kelly Young also shared something on this theme. She said that she wanted to move from a one-to-one, to a one-to-many model to increase the revenue in her practice, but also to make more impact for more people while working fewer hours. So, I guess the takeaway from that is if you resonate with those things, if you feel itchy to use your skills in a different way and you're wanting to make more impact with more people, then that could be a sign that you are ready for that recurring income strategy, and to develop a business model that takes you outside the therapy room.

Another theme that came up as a sign that you might be ready to make that change in your practice was a feeling that Dr Melita Ash, another one of our evolve and thrivers, put really well, I thought it was a really nice analogy. She said she felt like she was running fast, but standing still. I guess this is about the issue of sustainability, it's that feeling like I have, that you are working incredibly hard, but the business isn't really growing in a way that gives you any more time, flexibility or financial security. So it can feel a bit like you are running on a treadmill. Melita described it as like running fast, not getting anywhere, constantly working hard and feeling really stuck. And she felt like she needed to come on a program that would give her a structure towards getting unstuck because it can be such a difficult place to be when you are running that fast, that you're exhausted and sometimes unable to think outside of that fast pace of work that you're doing every day. That's something that Dr Victoria Wallace talked about too. She really prioritised sustainability and looking to avoid those boom and bust cycles we can often get into when we are relying on just one-to-one therapy and that referral rollercoaster in private practice.

I guess what this tells us is that if taking regular time off or flexibility for family is really important to you, and the business model you have at the moment isn't delivering that, then you really need a plan. Putting more effort into the model you already have is not going to take you somewhere different or more sustainable than where you are right now. So if where you are right now doesn't feel sustainable, if you feel like you're heading for burnout, you have to make a change. Sometimes what I hear from people is that they're sort of waiting to feel better before they make a change. But actually, if we formulate for ourselves in the exact same way that we would for a client, that's like waiting to stop feeling depressed before you go out for a walk. Sometimes we have to put the cart before the horse and get out, make the change that's going to allow us to feel better. So I think that's a really important point. If you're already on the road to burnout, hop off now. Do something different now before you get fully in the pit of it.

So sign number three that the current Evolve and Thrivers talked about was feeling like you kind of get stuck in contemplation mode. So maybe you have ideas, but procrastination, peer fear, or imposter syndrome stop you actually executing them. A lot of people talk about this as like shiny object syndrome, like the magpies or butterflies flitting from one idea to the next and never really committing. And then what makes me really sad is people also often talk about feeling a lot of shame when they see other people doing really well, or perceive other people to be doing really well on Instagram or at networking events, and then they start to think that those people have something magical that they're lacking. Whereas actually the reality is that you can't tell from Instagram or a website or even somebody's podcast what's actually happening in their business. You don't get to see the stuff that we put out there that flops. And one of the biggest things that I try and put across to all of my Evolve and Thrivers and really anyone that will listen to me is that a lot of our ideas don't work out the way we want them to. But it's only by putting things out there and testing them with your client group, that you really get a sense of what's useful, what do they actually want and what works for them, but also what is the market ready for and what language do we need to use to show people that we have something valuable that they're going to need. It just takes trial and error. And often it's the fear of flopping that keeps people stuck in this contemplation, shiny object syndrome flitting from one idea to the next. And what I try and provide in Evolve and thrive is a community that makes it safe to have those flops, because we all have them. I literally could not count, I wouldn't be able to estimate even a number of the things I've put out there that haven't worked. But you’re all probably much more aware of the ones that I put out there that do work because they're the ones that are much more visible and that I keep and talk about for a lot longer. But if you went back, you'd probably find loads of stuff that I'm not offering anymore, and the reason I'm not offering it is that it didn't work. So it happens to us all, and it's a really normal and important part of the journey of doing something entrepreneurial that has not been done before.

One of the comments that Dr Naomi Gibson made about her decision to take that leap, move out of contemplation and try and move through that peer fear was that she felt she needed guidance and community to finally step into that action. And I think that is so normal. Every time that I've made a big decision in my business, it has been because I've been either seeing a business coach that I had a great relationship with, or I've been part of a mastermind where I've been able to go somewhere with those fears and have people to bounce ideas off and know that there's at least one person cheerleading me through that difficult process. I do think that can be really, really important.

Some other interesting things that came out of the discussion that I had with my Evolve and Thrivers was that actually for nearly everybody, we're a group of 12, and nearly everybody was proud of the practice that they built already. So it wasn't the case that they hated their work. Actually, a lot of people, pretty much everyone, talked about finding their therapy work extremely rewarding. It was more that there was another reason that they needed to move away from it. So it could be that there were family responsibilities, caring responsibilities that meant that working those long hours, seeing people one-to-one, doing very intense work was making them basically fray at the seams. Or it could have been that they just felt like they weren't using all of their skills and they wanted to do more as a psychologist than they felt that they were doing. Or for a couple of my current participants, it was really about the client group and feeling that there was this big unserved portion of an audience that they'd already built online who needed something that wasn't therapy, but that also wasn't already out there on the market, and they felt the push coming from that direction.

I think that's really important to highlight that wanting to evolve your practice doesn't mean that you're not grateful for the business that you have right now, or that you did the wrong thing by building the business that you've built right now, or even that you don't enjoy your one-to-one work with clients. It's just about examining your values and thinking about what the next chapter of your career needs to look like in order to live life according to those values. And for me, certainly one of those core values has to be flexibility. I just need a lot of that in order to meet my kids as the parent that I want to be right now. And for most Evolve and Thrivers and certainly for me, there's a driving value behind wanting to change what you're doing. And I think it's best if that can come from a positive place. So rather than just thinking about what you want to get away from, it's thinking about what you want to be able to do, what you want to move towards. I think that's a really good way of thinking about it, if you are contemplating is this the right time to evolve or not.

Another thing that people mentioned a lot in our discussions about what helped them make that decision to make the change this time was that sense of stepping into a program that has a structure and a community behind it. People talked a lot about words like scaffolding, and I feel like any structured program, it does help you keep moving one foot in front of the other so that even on the difficult days, you have a really clear map to follow, where even if I can only do 10 minutes, there's 10 minute video or a 10 minute worksheet that you can do that is going to move you one step further towards your goal. I think that's something that I've really tried hard to do in Evolve and Thrive, to give you that forward motion, even on the tough days. Because I know that there will be, there's always tough days. I was really pleased to hear that people had found that really useful and that that was a big reason that people felt safe to make the leap now. But also the community, having that group, knowing that you've got people to talk about those ethical decisions that always come up with a new business model, that you've got people to test out your ideas with and then to collaborate, pool audiences and cheerlead each other through it; that seemed like something that was really valuable to the current evolving thrivers as well. So, I just wanted to highlight those positive things that people talked about.

Are you in a season of life where you are able to make the most of the opportunity to evolve your practice?

I also think it is important to ask yourself whether you are in a season of life right now, where you are going to be able to make the most of the opportunity that you have to evolve your practice.

One way of thinking about this is to think, if I invest this much money in a coaching program, do I believe that I'm going to commit enough time and effort to doing the work to make that investment back, either by the end of the program or setting yourself an arbitrary date that feels comfortable to you in the future? When people have calls with me, often, I'm trying to suss that out. Because there are times in life where realistically you are not able to put enough work in to get a return on the investment that you put into a program like Evolve and Thrive. And if that's where you are at, at this moment, like I had one person for a discovery call who had just given birth to twins, and my advice was, I would love you on this program, everything we've talked about today she had in spades; she had such a positive mission, she knew exactly why she wanted to evolve her practice, all the values were there, they were all aligning with what we do in Psychology Business School, she's going to be great, and I can't wait to support her. But I had to say, I don't think that this is the right time because actually investing in a program like this is for when you are ready to make the change because it is a big investment, I'm not shy of that, but I'm confident that it's an investment worth making because I know that you can quite quickly make that money back so long as you are in a position to put the work in, do the marketing, do the thinking, create an offer, and put it out there. So if you are ready to do that and you know that you are going to commit to it, then that's the right time to commit to a program like Evolve and Thrive. Or even if you are doing it with a different program, this advice applies to any kind of coaching program or mastermind that you might be thinking of, don't invest in a program or a coach thinking that it'll be the magic bullet that transports you where you want to go, because actually the, the program and the coach is there to support you while you do the creative work to get where you want to be. So you do need to be in a place where you are able to not only show up for the program, but do that thinking, be that creative person, and commit to it enough that you can get your return on your investment. And like I said, I'm really confident that if you go in with that mindset, knowing I'm going to make my money back, I'm going to put the work in and make sure I've made the money back by the end of this program, then you will do it, because it is all about have you really moved out of that contemplation stage? And if you have, if you've decided something has to change, something has to be different, I'm not living my values and I want to be, and say 2026 is the year that I'm going to do it, then you will do it. And we've got everything in Evolve and Thrive to help you get there.

So if you have made that decision and you are ready for the change, then I would really love to support you in Evolve and Thrive. I've still got a few slots left for free discovery calls so that we can have a chat and see if Evolve and Thrive is the right fit for you. I'll put the link in the show notes so that you can book one of those last few slots to have a chat with...