A therapist said to me recently:
“I want to grow my practice—but I don’t want to be one of those therapists who is constantly promoting.”
She was caught in a paradox–the desire to grow her business but also stay authentic. Most therapists and coaches don’t go into this work because they are entrepreneurs, bad ass at business, or self-promoters. We are good at cheering others on (not ourselves).
And at the same time, we need a touch of that to get our business out there. No one is going to know about what you do, if you don’t promote your genius. At the same time, your fears are right: if you self-promote too much, you can lose their trust.
Exhibit A: See my product placement below? That’s very intentional.
Many therapists and coaches try and “resolve” the paradox by treating it like a branding problem. Here’s what I hear:
I just need the right platform (YouTube or Substack?).
I need to fix my messaging (oh Chat can say it so much better than me).
I need to hire a marketer ($1500 a month and they can do it for me)
Yet, these don’t really address the underlying issue. The tension–your authenticity and you getting yourself out there—is a source of energy. And if you engage in unwise effort with it, you’ll oscillate between:
holding back and feeling invisible
pushing forward and feeling inauthentic
pulling back again and losing momentum
I have felt this tension too. I struggled for years between playing small, and then, when trying to play big, feeling like it was not really me.
And I have worked with thousands of therapists at this point who are stuck in the same paradox.
The solution is not to throw more energy at it. It’s more nuanced than that.
You need to reframe your question and re-think your outcome.
When I interviewed Marianne W. Lewis about her book Both/And Thinking, I was struck by the overlap between her work with organizations, and my work coaching therapists.
Marianne defines paradoxes as: persistent, interdependent contradictions that cannot be resolved.
For example take this line:
I want to grow my work and I want to stay true to how I want to show up.
Let’s break that down:
Persistent → this tension never goes away, it keeps cycling back
Interdependent → both sides matter, and they depend on each other
Contradictory → growing your work and staying authentic pull you in different directions simultaneously
The key here is that your attempts to resolve this paradox not only weaken your energy, it blunts your outcome.
If you over-index on authenticity, you will spend too much time making everything perfectly you…and you never get anything out there. If you spend too much energy on getting yourself out there, you lose your voice in the process.
You can’t remove one side without weakening the other. You need both growth and authenticity to be successful as a therapist and coach.
Are you over-focusing on authenticity at the cost of growth?
Are you over-focusing on growth at the cost of authenticity?
If you can work with this paradox and move inside of it (yes, stop trying to get rid of it!) you will discover a new source of energy that is more powerful than you could imagine. That is what I live in now, and what I train the therapists I work with to do. Here’s how…
Get out a piece of paper, your phone, or walk and talk with a colleague and have them interview you.
Where does this tension between authenticity and promotion show up for you?
avoiding posting or outreach
overthinking what to say
bursts of posting, networking, newsletters followed by long silence
discomfort saying anything that is not original
over quoting everyone else
Say it directly. I’m always a fan of saying it OUT LOUD.
I want to grow my business and I want to stay authentic.
Not one or the other. Both.
Remember that a paradox is not something to be resolved. It’s a tension between two poles that needs to be worked with. It’s actually the tension, and your ability to hold both, that gives you the most power as a therapist or coach. Note for you DBT buffs: this is similar to Marsha Linehan’s dialectic…but the key here is we never come to a synthesis or solution.
Your authenticity is what makes your growth sustainable
Your promotion is what allows your authenticity to reach anyone
Without visibility, your work stays small, you play small. Without authenticity, people will lose trust in you—and you will lose trust in yourself.
How are they mutually reinforcing for you? How does your authenticity support your growth and vice versa?
In Wise Effort, I talk about three ways that we engage in unwise efforts:
What story are you stuck in that is holding you back?
What are you holding too tight to?
What are you afraid of feeling?
And what happens when you engage in these unwise efforts?
waiting until something is “fully formed” before sharing
avoiding language that feels promotional
relying on word-of-mouth
putting stuff out there that sounds too much like AI
You don’t solve this by choosing authenticity over growth. You solve it by building a system that allows both. In Maryanne Lewis’s work, she recommends we allow time for each side of the paradox. Give yourself space to free write, explore who you are, offer random posts of learning how to ride a bike! And time block working on your practice–blog posts, newsletters, learning about how AI can help you market, joining my Business of Therapy and Coaching program. Keep your voice intact and get your genius out there. We need it. And if you want to stay relevant in the time of AI, you are going to know how to stay authentic, while using it (another paradox!)
Being visible—authentically visible—will bring up feelings of vulnerability, fear of being misunderstood, and probably some real criticism and negative feedback. As my book coach, Jennie Nash, taught me, if you are pissing people off you are on to something!
That doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. It means you’re no longer hiding behind either pole. The work is to feel that—and continue with wise effort.
When you work this paradox well, your growth will be less forced. Your voice will become clearer and less diluted, and you will start building something that reflects you. Don’t you want that?
Uncover your unique gifts and get them out to the people that need you, in a big way.
That is what I have done for the past 20 years, and what I am helping therapists do now with my Wise Effort Business of Therapy and Coaching program. I hope you enter the paradox of authenticity and growth with me!
So, at the end of the day, the question isn’t
How do I grow without promoting myself?
It’s
How do I let my work be seen in a way that stays true to how I want to live and practice?
And once you redesign that, growth and authenticity stop competing—and start reinforcing each other. That is Wise Effort in the Business of Therapy and Coaching.
Apply to join my next cohort of the Wise Effort: Business of Therapy and Coaching program.
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