October 8, 2024
Episode 85:
Creating an Abundance Mindset with EMDR Intensives with JaCarie Owens
In this episode, JaCarie discusses how to create an abundance mindset with EMDR intensives.
Show Notes
Kayla: Welcome back to the Designer Practice Podcast and I’m your host Kayla Das.
In today’s episode, JaCarie Owens, licensed clinical mental health counselor and mindset coach for therapists and coaches, will discuss how to create an abundance mindset with EMDR intensives.
Hi, JaCarie welcome to the show. I’m so glad to have you here.
JaCarie: Hi, Kayla. Thank you so much for having me today. I’m super excited to be here.
Kayla: It’s so great to have you. Before we dive in, please introduce yourself, where you’re from, and a little bit about your practice journey, as well as being a mindset coach.
JaCarie: Absolutely. So everyone, my name is JaCarie Owens. I am from Des Moines, Iowa in the United States. I’m a group practice owner, an EMDR consultant and coach, and a business and mindset coach for therapists. I help therapists launch and scale their private practice by adding private pay therapy and EMDR intensives so they can earn back their flexibility, financial stability, and freedom.
Me, personally, I came from being a burnt-out therapist working nine to five, doing agency work, making maybe 20 an hour, but working long hours, not having very much time for my family. To now I make over 10 K months doing therapy and EMBR intensives, seeing like 10 to 20 clients per week. So in my coaching program, I wanted to create something for therapists that allowed them to know that they don’t have to work that hamster wheel. And that they can have an abundance of wealth, and time, and energy, and not get burnt out in this field of therapy. So, in my coaching program I teach people how to work smarter, not harder.
Kayla: Here on the podcast, we love being able to work smarter, not harder. Because that’s one of the reasons I created the Designer Practice Podcast so that we can design a practice that you love. It doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the same for everyone. And it doesn’t mean that someone doesn’t love one to one therapy. But when we think of being able to diversify and be able to put additional income streams into your business. I love that you can do that with EMDR intensives. So I’m super excited for today’s episode.
So, before we go into EMDR and how we can diversify our income that way. What is an abundance mindset?
JaCarie: Ooh, I love that you asked that. So, I think though, before we get into abundance, I think we need to talk about scarcity mindset. Or, in our therapist world, it’s called the therapist hamster wheel mentality. So, I think that many therapists feel stuck and running from session to session with no time for a bathroom break or food or anything, let alone the ability to be able to deep dive into client care and to be able to take care of themself and have that balance.
And so, when we talk about scarcity, that is the belief that there’s not enough time for everyone. There’s not enough of something, right? And that causes us to believe that we don’t have enough time. There’s not enough clients. I don’t know enough. It is this thing of like, there is this limitation on us and we don’t have the capacity to have anything bigger than what we already have.
So, when we talk about abundance, I like to say that abundance is your VIP pass to infinite possibilities. And I think that that just means like there’s like enough of everything. There’s like unlimited potential to what we can bring to ourselves, to our practice. And so, I think like when we talk about abundance, it is the importance of the overflowing of opportunity and being able to allow yourself to think outside of the traditional therapy practices and gain wealth past the one-on-one clientele without sacrificing more.
Kayla: I love that and I know as a social worker, something that I’ve noticed, there’s almost this unwritten rule that you’re supposed to under charge, because otherwise you’re a capitalist or you’re greedy or you’re not helping others. And I think a really important piece when we think about abundance mindset, it doesn’t mean that you have to charge $2,000. But it’s about that there are ways that you can grow in different ways, without sacrificing your own income. Because what’s going to happen is, like you mentioned, it was feeling burnt out, working very limited pay. Trying to make more money to support our families, but also getting paid less, right? And a lot of people go into private practice because they are feeling burnt out.
But I’ve also heard people go into private practice and also feel some shame, some worry that their colleagues will think less of them because of that. However, that’s that scarcity mindset. Whether it’s colleagues thinking that, or whether it’s you thinking that your colleagues are thinking that. But it doesn’t mean that you have to sacrifice your life, your income, your family in order to help your clients.
JaCarie: Or in order to be successful. I think that, as you were talking Kayla, the one thing that came to my mind is that sometimes we have like this really black and white thinking. And it means that if you’re I have to be this or that. I have to either be accessible and charge less, or I am like this greedy person who only wants to have money. And I think two things can be true at the same time. I can be accessible and live an abundance lifestyle.
Kayla: I agree 100%. So how can having an abundance mindset help listeners in their private practices?
JaCarie: Absolutely. So, I think when I think of abundance, I think of it in all aspects of running the private practice. It can be when we’re talking about like our client base, right? So having an abundance mindset, we believe that there’s enough clients to go around. I can specialize in a unique approach and there’s still going to be people there that’s going to walk through my door. That allows listeners to focus on value, not scarcity. I like to tell a lot of people like if you niche down, that actually makes you more marketable
Kayla: I agree 100 percent. If we think of the agencies that we work in as therapists, very seldom will you work in an agency that hasn’t niched in some way. Even if you work in a hospital setting, you typically work in a department or a program that niches in a certain way. So, when we think to ourselves that we have to work with everyone, that’s not always true, because even the places that we are employees at, niche. And the clients who need to be at those agencies or programs they know where to go. They know that if they’re experiencing x issue, they’re going to go here. And there’s going to be therapists there.
So, thinking from that perspective, that we’re already niched working in agencies, why wouldn’t we niche working in our private practice?
JaCarie: Absolutely. I also think of abundance when we’re talking about opportunity and that aspect of business. But abundance also means that you are open to trying new marketing techniques, that you’re open to collaborating. It’s the thought that there’s enough to go around for everyone. I don’t have to gatekeep. I can expand on different things and diversify my income and my expertise. And still be solid and confident in how I show up in the community and in my practice.
Kayla: I love it. I agree completely. So, when we think of abundance, say from an income perspective, I know we’ve talked about that, but how does abundance help us improve or increase our income?
JaCarie: Oh, I love that question. So, abundance when it comes to income, I think of it as more of an investment mindset. You have to be willing to invest in yourself to be able to grow. It’s a small investment for a bigger payback. So, when I say invest in yourself, it may be that you’re invested in a coach. It may be that you’re invested in a training or a specialized modality. Maybe you are investing in marketing. Maybe that is a thing. And so, when you’re thinking of abundance, it’s like, what small things can I invest in now that can give me two times in return, like an ROI in return.
And I know that, when talking about even abundance in income, when we’re talking about the intensives, I know that there’s a lot of therapists that have this belief of, can clients afford intensives? Or how do they manage it to intensives? Or who am I to charge this amount for an intensive?
And so, a lot of the work, when you’re talking about abundance and the mindset, is like I have expertise and I have value. And we do great work in the healing process for the client and for the clients that prioritize that will make that happen. There’s different ways that they can make that happen for you. And it’s not for everyone. And we just have to also understand that as well, that it may not be for everyone. It’s just an option to diversify your income.
Kayla: I love that you highlighted that. Abundance isn’t just doing one thing. It’s about how can I diversify? How can I add additional income streams? So, if you feel that one particular way of working works a certain subsection of clients, but you know that another way of working helps another subsection of clients, you can do both. Let’s go to EMDR intensives, you can do individual EMDR, but you can also do EMDR intensives as well.
Let’s get into this. So, for anyone who might not know what EMDR intensives are. What are they?
JaCarie: Oh, well, let’s just start off because I guess I can’t assume that everyone knows what EMDR means. So EMDR means eye movement desynthetization and reprocessing. And it’s an approach for us to integrate bilateral stimulation to process like traumatic memories associated with negative emotions and experiences. It’s based off of what we call the AIP modality and that is the adaptive information reprocessing. So, it rewires the brain to have more adaptive thinking about the experiences, instead of more of the negative belief systems.
So, when we’re doing that and we’re integrating intensives with it, intensive just means that it’s very concentrated and it may be over an extended period of time. So, it could be over three to five days, but it’s extended sessions. Some of my sessions are maybe four hours. Some of them are two hours. But it’s allowing the client to be in the healing process for a longer period of time than the traditional one on one 50-to-60-minute sessions.
Kayla: That makes sense. So, let’s add abundance mindset and EMDRs together. So how can therapists build an abundance mindset when it comes to incorporating EMDR intensives into their practice?
JaCarie: I would say challenging limited beliefs. So, we all have this internal narrative that holds us back and having the self-awareness to identify those limited beliefs related to your abundance practice. For an example, there aren’t enough clients to go around, or I don’t have time for intensive sessions. Challenge those beliefs with evidence or reframe them into more empowering statements. There’s plenty of clients that go around. Or intensive can help me see fewer clients with greater impact. So, learning how to challenge those limiting belief systems will be beneficial.
I think one other thing is speak from a space of gratitude opposed to scarcity. So, starting daily with your gratitude practices, like list three things that you are grateful for, small or big. Like I’m grateful that I am able to see two clients and still make three days worth of income. I am grateful that I have clients that are walking through the door that wants therapy intensives. Showing that shift of mindset is going to be very helpful.
And I think lastly, having a support system that’s going to root you on. It’s going to be essential. I have two good colleagues that I know that if I am posting something on social media. Or if I have a win, I can shoot them something, they are right there on the spot to give me that validation and to pour into me what I need to keep going.
Kayla: Private practice is quite isolating. So, it’s even more important to have those cheerleaders in your corner, whether it’s a clinical supervisor, whether it’s a colleague, whether it’s someone you went to school with, really just somebody who can be there to help cheer you on.
JaCarie: Absolutely. Absolutely. That is one of the main things that I teach is like creating a family around you of people that are going to not only support you, but also help you to cultivate that abundance mindset. So even when things are not going well, because we know that private practice and just therapy field in general can ebb and flow. When things are not going well, who do we have in our corner to support us and to help us move through that journey and still pour into us?
Kayla: Yeah. I totally agree. So, from your experience, what are some common mindset blocks that therapists go through when trying to incorporate EMDR intensives into the practice?
JaCarie: The number one negative belief is I can’t charge what I’m worth because people won’t be able to afford me. That is the number one thing that I hear is that fear of setting their rates. I talk a lot about you have value, you have worth, and people will find ways to pay for that value and that worth. And I think it goes back to me saying two things can be true. I can be accessible and I can make money.
I think another one is that imposter syndrome. It’s an imposter syndrome not only as a therapist, but then also as a business owner. I did not go to school to run a business. I don’t know how to do that. And I’m still learning myself in the field. So, that is the other one is like that imposter syndrome of, am I even good enough? Am I qualified? Like what makes me even qualified to run as not only a successful primary practice, but also to do therapy intensives? What is that? Right?
I think another one is the work life balance woes of things of like, if I’m building a prior practice and/or from a therapist, that means I have to sacrifice my personal life. And I think one thing that stood out to me the most, and even building my coaching business was I am a mommy, I’m a mommy of four. And I wanted to have time to hang out with my kiddos and not be irritated. I wanted to be able to go to their events. I just wanted to be in their spaces with them and enjoy life with them. And so, a lot of the way that we’re talking about intensive and abundance, to me, abundance means like flexibility. It means freedom. And so, that is something that we talk about. It’s like, what does work life balance mean for you? We’re not on that hamster wheel no more. I get it. That’s what we was taught in school, but that’s just not sustainable.
And I like to say this one phrase, that therapy is meant to be a marathon, not a sprint. So how can we stay on this marathon?
Kayla: I love it. And something that you said made me think about imposter syndrome and how sometimes we feel like, who am I to be able to do EMDR intensives. And there’s really a difference between competence and confidence. Our confidence is often shadowed by what we think is competence. And let me give an example, you can take all the trainings in the world, right? You can spend every day doing a training. But it does not mean it’s going to make you feel more confident. If anything, sometimes it does the opposite because there’s just so much information that your brain is working overtime trying to sift through it.
Whereas competence is something that you gain through trainings, right? The confidence is when you do it over and over and you start building that repertoire of tools or you’ve been through it so many times that it begins to be easier. I will say when I first started my private practice, I was not confident. I thought to myself who am I to be doing this? But as I started doing my consults, as I started doing my sessions, I built my tools. I became confident in what I was doing because I did it over and over.
And if you’re stopping yourself from not doing something like incorporating EMDR intensives into your practice, so that you can wait until you’re confident. It’s never going to happen because you’re not confident until you do it.
JaCarie: Oh, I love that.
Kayla: Something else you said too, and I really appreciate this now as being a new mom. So, I had my daughter in January and I never appreciated how much I wanted to be with her. Although I always speak about how I wanted work life balance and how I wanted my own time and how I wanted to be able to diversify and have passive income, it’s really not until I had her that I was, like, Okay, I want to be there for her as she grows, whether she’s in dance recitals, whether she’s in piano practice, whatever it is that she chooses to be involved in. I want to be there. So, with that diversifying my life and my business is important.
And I think a lot of listeners can relate to that, whether you have children or whether you don’t. I mean, I didn’t have a child until January. But it was always in my mind that I want to be able to have work life balance. I want to be able to spend time with my family. I want to be able to go on trips. And now that I have a child, I want to be there for her. So, I think a lot of listeners can relate to that.
JaCarie: Yeah, I will tell you, Kayla, that was my number one goal in even building my practice was, how do I manage this and still be able to make money and still be present for my kiddos? They are like all the things you said, they’re in theater, they’re in sports, they’re in all the things. What I love about my flexibility is I don’t have to miss a beat. I don’t have to miss it. That’s why I love integrating not only EMDR intensives. But however you want to diversify your income, whatever that looks like for you, so that you don’t get the burnout of the one-on-one traditional sessions. And again, you have that flexibility.
Kayla: So, when we think of EMDR intensives specifically, I know there’s probably some listeners thinking, okay, this is great, we need an abundance mindset. I want to incorporate EMDR intensives, but how do I start feeling like I’m ready to incorporate this?
JaCarie: Okay, Kayla, that’s a very good question. I would say that if you’re finding yourself feeling really drained out by the one-on-one sessions. If you’re finding yourself kind of running back into those hamster wheel ways like you did when you was at an agency or wherever you were at. If you’re finding yourself running back into those. And feeling really burnt out by the end of the day and wanting to isolate, you may want to look into intensives.
And I’m saying EMDR Intensive because that is my specialty. I am a consultant and coach. However, you can do that with any modality. And it’s just allowing the clients to have a deeper connection. And I would think though too, like, if you’re conceptualizing some of your clients, and they seem to take a little bit longer to get into their feels, or a little bit longer to get into the therapy. And it’s one of those ones where you’re like “Oh, we’re just now getting to the meat of it” and now it’s time to go. As you’re conceptualizing your clients Those ones might be the ones that may benefit from a little extended session. So, it’s not only about what you feel but as you look at your clients, what do your clients need? What does it look like for you? Are they able to do extended sessions? I know for me, it was a lot of clients that’s like, I really need you more than once a week. I just really think that I would benefit more than once a week. It wasn’t even on the top of my mind as a diversified income. It was more so of my clients telling me, this is what I need. Like, I feel like we’re doing good work and then it’s over. Or I feel like I’m doing good work and right when I’m really getting into the deeper work that I really need, I feel like now I have the whole week to sit with it and I feel like I revert back. So for me, it was more so looking at my clients and seeing what they needed and that’s what got me into even trying it.
Kayla: I love that it wasn’t just about income, but it’s about filling a therapeutic need. And when we think of any of the services you want to diversify, that’s really what it is. We’re filling some need that isn’t being met. I know we’re talking about EMDR intensives, but I’ll give an example of one of my passive income streams. This podcast is one of my income streams, and it’s filling a need. It’s filling a need for therapists to have a place to go that they can access free content that helps them think about different things that they might have not have thought about, consider different ways to diversify their income, or even incorporating things into their practice that they didn’t know exist, like EMDR intensives, for instance. As well as to help them grow their practice and all for free. That fills a need but I make income doing it. So going back to abundance mindset, it doesn’t mean that by providing one service or one way that you have to give up other ways or stop filling other needs.
JaCarie: Absolutely. I agree with that. And I think one tip that I want to give the listeners about not only abundance, but diversifying income is you have to visualize it. I would say, go take some quiet time, create a vision board or a mental image of your ideal practice. What would that look like? Include elements that represent abundance, such as a full client’s caseload. And what does your schedule look like? Thriving client relationships. Financial security. What does that look like? And that visualization will help program your subconscious mind for success. That’s just a start. Start there.
Kayla: Agree. 100%. So, JaCarie, I know you work with therapists and coaches. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
JaCarie: Absolutely. So, like I said at the beginning, I help therapists start and scale their private practice by adding private pay therapy intensives. I actually have a program called Beyond the Couch Private Practice and I also have a Facebook community and the Facebook community is called the Private Practice Lounge. And in there, it’s kind of giving what Kayla gives on this podcast feel of like free resources, no gatekeeping. I do live trainings in there and just, again, trying to build a community of people that’s going to root you on and support you on your journey, not only building your private practice, but also adding E MDR intensive to your practice.
Kayla: So, if you’re interested in joining JaCarie’s Beyond the Couch Private Practice Program, check out her website at www.jacarieelainecoaching.com.
Or you can join her Facebook community by heading to kayladas.com/jacariegroup
Or you can simply scroll down to the show notes and click on the link.
JaCarie, thank you so much for joining us today on the podcast and sharing how we can create an abundance mindset with EMDR Intensives.
JaCarie: Thank you so much for having me on here to discuss EMDR Intensives and my love of abundance mindset.
Kayla: Thank you everyone for tuning in to today’s episode and I hope you join me again soon on the Designer Practice Podcast.
Until next time, bye for now.
Podcast Links
JaCarie’s Beyond the Couch Private Practice Program: jacarieeileencoaching.com
JaCarie’s Free Facebook Group: kayladas.com/jacariegroup
Canadian Clinical Supervision Therapist Directory Waitlist: canadianclinicalsupervision.ca
PESI Trainings: kayladas.com/pesi
Credits & Disclaimers
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