Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Lisa Love, owner of MindfulGuidance - Coaching & Counseling, located in Auburn, ME, USA.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
MindfulGuidance offers heart-centered, transformational support through life coaching, sports performance coaching, and individual therapy, with a specialty in facilitating bottom-up (or somatic-based) body-mind dialogue and approaches to calming the nervous system and reducing the effects of trauma and chronic anxiety. Mindfulness is at the core of how I do what I do and often becomes a resource for my clients.
My ideal clients are busy professionals (often lawyers, teachers, business leaders, and multi-passionate entrepreneurs and creatives) who are psychologically minded, self-aware, overwhelmed, and anxious. They suffer from self-doubt or imposter syndrome and try too hard to please others and want to learn how to be content and at peace and rediscover their confidence and trust in themselves/life/God/the Universe. They are bright, motivated, and puzzled why they feel so stuck. They aren't so interested in prescription medicines or talk-only therapy. They want compassionate guidance, someone to gently challenge them, and are growth-oriented. They don't wait until they hit "bottom" before reaching out for help. They are curious, open, and very often highly sensitive and insightful, as well as creative. Currently, my studies in how cannabis and ketamine can assist certain clients in resolving early developmental attachment wounds and traumas are opening me up to prepare to offer medicine-assisted psychotherapy.
Tell us about yourself
I entered into this profession as a nurse who was fascinated with learning what helps people heal. What initially motivated me to become a psychotherapist was when a young woman came to see me for hands-on-healing work and turned out to be contending with severe trauma, which led to multiple personalities or dissociative identities. Seeing how she could heal from her ordeals, in tandem with highly skilled therapy, woke me up to the possibility of doing this kind of work.
For over four decades, I've studied and practiced many forms of energy healing and learned the power of visualization and intention-setting early in my life. Studying and teaching yoga and meditation for over 25 years has supported me in being more fully present, attuned and empathic in my approach. Being highly intuitive and creative, I get to listen to my inner guidance to assist the process.
As a creative, outside-the-box innovator, I love integrating different modalities and cutting-edge science into my approach. It's fascinating to continually learn, deepen and transform myself so that I can serve others from an authentic place of knowing the territory and allowing my work to evolve. My mission is to find the shortest way to help create lasting change. I model trust, acceptance, patience, and appreciation. Rather than proposing "answers" or giving advice, I love sharing helpful information and methods to see what resonates with each person. The satisfaction of seeing people gain self-awareness, self-compassion, and greater trust in themselves and the unseen helpers available to us is what keeps me energized and motivated. I also love learning - about each person's unique experience and perspective, healing, and neuroscience.
I attended graduate school to become a Psychiatric Clinical Nurse Specialist in 1998 and have found this work to enable me to creatively weave together all my interests and skills into one profession. After graduate school, I worked in a psychiatric hospital setting for a year, then in outpatient psychiatry at a major hospital for 13 years. I'd always wanted to be in private practice, though. So in 2013, when the hospital was cutting the budget and laying off 250 employees, and I got the knock on the door, I recognized it was the nudge I needed to pivot to self-employment. Within three months, MindfulGuidance opened its doors, and I have happily continued to grow and look forward from there.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
My biggest accomplishment as a business owner is creating a livelihood that supports my well-being and fosters greater well-being for others. I've created a sustainable lifestyle and flow to my work life that allows me to bring my best self into each session, avoid burnout and generate joy and appreciation. Now in my 10th year of private practice and in my early 60s, I cannot even imagine wanting to retire for another 20 years!
What's one of the hardest things that comes with being a business owner?
One of the hardest things has been facing my own inner sense of lack - (do I know enough, am I ready, what should I charge, I'm a healer more than a business person, etc.) and finding authentic ways to market my services to attract my ideal clients.
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
Three tips I would offer to anyone wishing to start, run and grow a business today are:
- Dare to start imagining and dreaming big.
- Ask your Helpers (both known/seen and Unseen) for guidance and support.
- Use the principle of resonance to help you decide when an idea is a true YES and when it's not. (The ego likes to be bossy and scare us into trusting others more than ourselves.) Developing trust in your own sense of timing and knowing the next right step is a key to sustainable success.
Where can people find you and your business?
Website: https://www.mindfulguidance4me.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SpiritedGolf
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mindfulguidance4me/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/intentionalhealingcoach/
If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.
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