Blind Spots


fly In his book You2, Price Pritchett tells the story of a fly who kills itself, trying to fly out a closed window, banging its body against the glass till it falls exhausted to the sill, while ten feet behind it, the door is wide open.

The story feels eerily familiar. I can often see where I want to go, it’s just out there beyond the glass, and I keep going towards it and bouncing off. If I turned and looked behind me, I’d see the door is open.

I’m sure you’ve had that experience in your practice, I know I have. A client keeps trying the same old way of meeting the pain in their life, and it’s not working, they just keep getting more of the same. Being one step removed from the problem, you can probably see that there are other, more effective ways.

That’s one of the reasons why we do supervision, and one of the reasons why therapy works. Other people see a different picture, because they’re standing in a different place, with a different set of lenses. And whether that picture is expressed or not, its presence in the room creates something different. I have no doubt that you provide this for your clients every day, providing space for pause, reflection and another perspective. I have no doubt that in relation to your client work and your personal process, your supervisor and your therapist provide this space.

But what about the business side your practice?

I recently spent a weekend with a group of like-minded individuals, each of which has their own small business in the healing professions. It was what Napoleon Hill referred to as a Mastermind, in his classic book “Think and Grow Rich.” A mastermind works on the principle that when a group come together, the effect is far greater than the sum of the parts. Something magical happens.

Something magical happened for me at that weekend. Someone pointed out one of my blind speyeots. My glass window of choice is that if something isn’t working, it must be my fault, I must have done something wrong. I can tie myself in knots trying to work out what it is. In short, I often look for a problem that isn’t there, and if I’d just turn round and look in another direction, there is often a simple way out.

When I talk to therapists about their practices, I often hear them trying hard to solve the same old problems in the same old ways. Perhaps, like me, they look to themselves to find the fault, the reason why it’s not working out for them. Or perhaps they are strongly attached to it having to be one particular way, such as, the local GPs should be sending me work. Or perhaps it’s a refusal to acknowledge that they might need to try something different or take some action, like get their bookkeeping up to date BEFORE the income tax return is overdue. Whatever the problem is, someone else somewhere else has generally experienced it, and there are a number of ways of approaching it, but until we acknowledge that we might have a blind spot about it, and allow someone else to bring their perspective, we are unlikely to find a different result waiting for us.

If something isn’t working in your practice, maybe I can help you. Maybe you’re struggling to find clients or drained from working with clients that don’t suit you Maybe you’re working really hard but still not earning enough. Whatever the problem, maybe you could use a fresh perspective? Contact me here for an appointment or to arrange a free 20 minute consultation.