We all want to fulfill our soul’s journey and use our time here well.  It’s great that so many people are now aware of their life’s purpose of being of greatest service to others.

Yet there are many who yearn to use more of their skills and abilities on a daily basis by creating a rich and full client practice.  There are a lot of practitioners who are frustrated and struggling because they haven’t yet sorted out how to continually attract paying clients.  My heart goes out to them.  I certainly know what it’s like to get a glimpse of your soul’s journey and then not be able to support yourself financially while doing it.  In the last 9 years of creating my own successful business, a blend of life coaching, shamanic energy medicine, and also brand consulting, I’ve learned that it takes more than just good intent, high integrity, and strong desire.  It also takes some practical marketing skills.  For me, that simply means learning how to position yourself to the people who can most benefit from what you have to offer.  It takes looking within to learn from your greatest wounds to see how those lessons can be applied to others on a similar path.  In order to build certainty, not only in your abilities, but also in how you present yourself to the world, it often requires a more strategic approach.

I hesitate to use the word “marketing” when describing my upcoming Creating a Thriving Practice course with the Four Winds.  I don’t think of it as a “marketing” course.  It’s not about being a good marketer.  It’s about learning how to stand in your Truth, in the key awakenings of your own soul’s journey, and then be able to express those lessons in your speaking and presentation materials so that when you increase your visibility, you easily attract lots of people who are happy to pay you for the difference you can make in their lives.

I understand the challenge in talking about what you do. I’ve been fumbling around with language for the last couple of years trying to come up with a way to describe to others what I’m up to in a way that not only makes sense, but that they find it so valuable that they are willing to write a check for it.  That’s no easy task, but I now feel that I have some clarity.

Our conscious paths are deep and profound.  They happen at the level of the mythic and affect our lives in meaningful ways.  But when we have to use our minds to explain it, sometimes people aren’t able to relate.  We need a better way of talking about what we do.  There is a method that I’ve discovered to bridge the non-linear, sensing, energetic path with that of the linear, logical, rational way that our mind likes to comprehend things.  Here’s the key – it needs to be specific and individual to YOU.  We all know the importance of “making our own medicine” and utilizing our own unique gifts in the work that we do for others.  The same is also true for how we talk about what we do.

How I describe what I do should be different from how you describe it.  My particular challenges, awakenings, and life experiences are unique to me, as yours are to you.  Herein lies the gems that are waiting to be discovered.  These are the access points into the conversation with others.   What I mean is that you have to first look within at your own healing and success journey, see the most meaningful ways of how your path has helped you, and then talk to others from THAT PLACE.

As an example, a client of mine has been struggling with how to attract veterans with post traumatic stress disorder.  Even though he has never been in the military in this lifetime, I had him look at what experiences in his life mirror that of the veterans that he longs to be of service to.  When we discussed his lessons from being bullied at school earlier in life, he had the realization that veterans are warriors who do well with fighting their external battles, but when they enter their internal battle with PTSD, they are basically entering a gun fight with only their fists.  By positioning his healing work as helping them to have weapons to more successfully fight their internal battle with PTSD, he’s now speaking their language.

This is about reaching people where they actually are.  It’s speaking into their listening.  Not from your coach/healer/teacher place, but from a place where they can hear you best.

So here are some questions to ask yourself:

What’s the greatest truth that you’ve learned through your own experience?

What challenge has been your greatest teacher?

What have you discovered about yourself and about life by going through what you have?

What have been your most cherished accomplishments on your soul’s journey?

How can you use these as an access point into a meaningful conversation with others?

I believe that this is what Alberto Villoldo means when he says you take your greatest wounds and turn them into your greatest strengths.  Also, these are the areas where you can have the most compassion for other people as they go through a similar journey.  You understand how tough it is.  You understand the ins and outs of healing from those particular situations.

When you position yourself to people in this way, you not only attract those who you can most benefit, you do your best work in a way that comes easily to you. 

It’s not really a target market, but if it helps you to think of it in that way, then go ahead.  For me, it’s more about looking within, seeing the truths that you have discovered about your own life, and then positioning your services to others in that way.

A quote I heard a long time ago is that people don’t buy coaching or healings.  They buy situational problem-solving.  They have a specific situation in their life that is challenging and you happen to have some tools that can help them to solve their problem.  You only need to sell people themselves.  I don’t like using the word “sell” because that’s actually not what you’re doing at all.  You’re simply talking to people about what they’re facing and where they’re at.  You have a profound way of helping them so that they can attract what they’d like in their lives, whether it’s a more fulfilling relationship, a more satisfying career, or of simply being more at peace with themselves.

Are you a practitioner with not many clients?  It’s a shame to be sitting on all of the beautiful and powerful tools that you’ve developed while you could be actively walking the path of your soul’s calling, making a tremendous difference in the lives of others.  If you could use some additional tools in learning how to reposition yourself or your brand, then I hope you’ll check out my upcoming course, Creating a Thriving Client Practice with The Four Winds.   Be of greatest service to the world by more effectively reaching those that you are meant to touch.