Podcast appearances and mentions of melissa forziat

Melissa and I recorded this conversation a few years ago. But the marketing information is certainly current and extremely helpful for small bus9iness owners. Also be sure to check out her free eBook: "Small Business Marketing on a Budget" link below.   Melissa Forziat is a Southern California-based marketing speaker, consultant, and author. She works with small business owners to develop and execute strategic marketing plans and with business organizations to train their trainers in small business marketing.   She offers keynote speeches, presentations, workshops, and webinars, with her 2018-2019 speaking schedule taking her to Arizona, Hawaii, Missouri, Texas, Washington, DC, Wyoming, and as far as New Zealand!  To date, she has delivered 47 workshops to over 1350 attendees in 9 US states and 2 countries and 37 webinars to over 1600 attendees, with collaborative partners in 11 US states.   Melissa is the author of the free eBook and companion workbook Small Business Marketing on a Budget and Board President of Ventures nonprofit, which helps low-income entrepreneurs in Seattle to gain self-sufficiency through business ownership.   Before starting Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing, Melissa's early career involved roles with the Olympic Winter Games, Rugby World Cup, and the US Olympic Committee (managing dozens of events for visiting teams and dignitaries, from Polish track and field teams to Saudi Arabian princes).  Through her experiences with some of the biggest brands in the world, she learned the principles of building a strong brand and how to deliver the right message to the right audience time and time again.  Melissa is passionate about working with clients to find effective marketing solutions that allow their businesses to thrive.   A former gymnast, Melissa never quite made it to the Olympics in her sport, but she has taken Olympic-level marketing wisdom all over the world and made it accessible to the small businesses that need it most! Download her free ebook: “Small Business Marketing on a Budget” here: http://melissaforziatevents.com/free-ebook-small-business-marketing-budget https://melissaforziatevents.com/   Deborah Bailey is a writer and host of Women Entrepreneurs Radio podcast. Learn more about her and her books and writing courses at: https://DBaileycoach.com For Deborah's paranormal and fantasy romance fiction, visit: https://dbaileycoach.com/brightbooks  

Andy is joined today by KT Merry of KT Photography! KT has been recognized for her industry excellence by top media outlets such as Harper's Bazaar and Vogue, and she has built a thriving and very profitable business that allows her to also pursue her passion for conservation by using her art to protect the planet and its inhabitants who are most vulnerable. Over the past ten years, KT has evolved into a multidisciplinary creative with a highly profitable house of brands such as photographing luxury destination weddings and editorials around the world. KT shares how her love of photography developed and how she assisted some major fashion photographers. She discusses her ideal client and elaborates upon some of the quotes that she has on her website and identifies the why behind what she does, discussing her passion for protecting the planet and how she has married that with her passion for photography. She touches upon how she came upon photographing weddings, how she feels about digital over film, what her philosophy on lighting and composition style is, and what it's like having her husband Chad as her business partner and how they balance their professional lives with their personal lives. She describes her morning routine and how that helps keep her mental health in check, also describing two books from which she reads a page each day. She and Andy also discuss the various benefits of meditating such as being less reactive and not as impulsive, and, for any photographers who might be listening, KT reveals what gear she is currently using! Andy is so grateful for KT's time and had such a great time chatting with her! Be sure to check KT out online, and as always, if you can think of at least three good friends who might benefit from and enjoy this episode, be sure to share it with them! Andy would also be appreciative if you were to subscribe to the podcast if you aren't already and to leave a top review wherever you listen to the podcast, especially since it really helps the show and helps people find it! ​​Are you looking to boost your sales or get more clients? Check out the Create Your Most Profitable Marketing Strategy course from marketing expert, Melissa Forziat. If you feel disorganized or overwhelmed with your marketing, if you feel like you're leaving money on the table, or if you just want to get more word of mouth going for your business, this online course is perfect for you. Andy only works with sponsors whose work he has thoroughly checked out, so he knows that with Melissa's guidance, you will create your road map and answer questions like where to market your business, what systems to create, and how to follow-up with every client or potential client in your pipeline. As we all know, weddings are about relationships, and marketing your wedding business should be about relationships too. A course as detailed as this would usually be priced in the thousands, but to make it accessible to small businesses, Melissa is making it available for only $247. PLUS, as a listener of The Wedding Biz, you can use promo code WEDDINGBIZ to get 10% off, so if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, sign up for the course today! Have you heard about Stop and Smell the Roses with Preston Bailey on The Wedding Biz Network? Listen as Preston shares the secrets, tools, and technologies behind his extraordinary ability to create a theatrical environment out of any space. Also, don't forget about Sean Low's podcast The Business of Being Creative, where Sean discusses the power of being niched, pricing strategies, metrics of success, and so much more. You can find both shows on The Wedding Biz Network.   SUPPORTING THE WEDDING BIZ Become a patron and support Andy and the show! If you are so inspired, contribute!   Time Stamps [0:48] – Andy reveals that today's guest is KT Merry of KT Photography. [1:48] – Andy points to a specific quote from KT's website. [2:20] – KT elaborates upon her ideal client. [4:35] – Discover how KT's love of photography started. [6:02] – KT chronicles how she assisted some major fashion photographers. [8:42] – Andy references a book that he has been reading. [9:42] – KT reveals how she came upon photographing weddings. [12:48] – KT discusses how she feels about digital vs. film. [14:47] – Learn about KT's philosophy on lighting and composition style. [17:16] – Enter the code WEDDINGBIZ at Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing for a 10% discount! [17:52] – KT discusses what it's like having her husband Chad as her business partner. [20:24] – KT reveals how she balances her business life and her personal life. [22:28] – Learn about how KT uses profit to affect change over things she cares about. [25:33] – KT discloses whether or not she still has concerns about finances. [26:48] – KT shares what retirement will likely look like for her someday. [27:43] – KT reveals that she has a virtual store for fine art prints. [28:31] – Hear KT describe her morning routine. [31:34] – Andy and KT discuss the benefits of meditation. [34:10] – KT talks about her evening routine. [34:53] – Discover what gear KT is currently using. [36:41] – Andy shares with us where we can find KT online.   RESOURCES Monique Lhuillier Clip 1 (by Peyton Frank) Monique Lhuillier Clip 2 (by Peyton Frank) Bella Belle Clip (by Peyton Frank) Gay Hendricks - The Big Leap: Conquer Your Hidden Fear and Take Life to the Next Level Gay Hendricks – Conscious Luck: Eight Secrets to Intentionally Change Your Fortune Marianne Williamson – A Year of Miracles: Daily Devotions and Reflections John Jantsch - The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur: 366 Daily Meditations to Feed Your Soul and Grow Your Business Viktor E. Frankl - Man's Search for Meaning   Find KT: KT Merry Photography - WebsiteKT Merry Photography - Facebook PageKT's Instagram PageKT Merry Education - WebsiteKT Merry Education - Facebook PageKT Merry Education - Instagram PageRender Loyalty - WebsiteRender Loyalty - Instagram PageKT Merry Fine Art Print Shop - WebsiteKT Merry Print Shop - Instagram PageREFINED Co - Website Follow The Wedding Biz on Social: The Wedding Biz The Wedding Biz on Instagram: @theweddingbiz The Wedding Biz on Facebook: @theweddingbiz The Wedding Biz Network The Music Makers   Support The Wedding Biz by clicking here.   Title Sponsor: This episode is sponsored by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.

Reflections on Content Creation and the Therapy Profession Curt and Katie chat about our principles and philosophies as they relate to the work we do, including podcast creation. We also reflect on the feedback we've received on episodes with large listenership as well as other typical responses we get to the work we do. Considering content creation as part of your business? This isn't a how-to, but it certainly can give you things to consider before you dive in. In this podcast episode we talk about how we put together the podcast We've received a lot of feedback recently about our episodes and we wanted to talk about how we make decisions on what we talk about, who we interview, whether we call folks out on the podcast, and how we edit the episodes. Our Philosophy and Principles for creating content for the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide “We can talk about how to navigate the career, but at some point, we become complicit in a broken system. And so, we've been talking about how to balance: how do we give the tools to navigate what is, and then also give the empowerment and/or the validation that advocacy needs to happen.” – Katie Vernoy How to navigate the career as is (tools and strategies to survive in this field) The importance of advocacy in moving forward with our field How to strategically time advocacy for best effect How we take in feedback and respond Responding to Feedback from our Audience on our “What's New in the DSM-5-TR?” Episode The concern about the Autism diagnosis changes Whether we should have called out Dr. Michael B. First and the impressions of what was said Grappling with the tension between protecting our audience and getting our guests on record and/or advocating for change in the larger systems How people can impact what becomes DSM 6 (and the efforts we are advocating for) The feedback we received and how we sort through it and improve The limits of our capacity Our plans for additional interviews to address the changes “It's been my experience in advocacy, that large systems end up ignoring those individual voices. Those individual voices are incredibly powerful when they're used in the right place at the right time.” – Curt Widhalm A Broader View of the Feedback We Receive on the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Podcast The depth of the conversation and our ability to deepen conversations with additional episodes Audience members anchoring on the title or episode artwork and not looking at the whole episode when pieces of the content resonate in a different way Our Plan Going Forward with the Podcast Advocacy, information, and focus on the profession Not as much of a focus on business building, money mindset, and side hustles Real conversations about the realities of working in this profession Working to leave the profession better than we find it   Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Thrizer Thrizer is a new modern billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible AND clinicians should earn what they are worth. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer, you can potentially save them hundreds every month, with no extra work on your end. Every time you bill a client through Thrizer, an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the client's insurance. From there, Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursement quickly, directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by check, confusion around benefits, and obscurity with reimbursement status, they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It is very quick to get set up and it works great in completement with EHR systems. Their team is super helpful and responsive, and the founder is actually a long-time therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee! Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit on therapy. Sign up using THIS LINK if you want to test Thrizer completely risk free! Sign up for Thrizer with code 'moderntherapists' for 1 month of no credit card fees or payment processing fees! That's right - you will get one month of no payment processing fees, meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time! Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing Today's episode of The Therapy Reimagined podcast is brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing. Melissa is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources.  Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media?  Check out the “How to Win at Social Media (even with no budget!)” course from marketing expert, Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand.  It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising.  Melissa will work you step-by-step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.  How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the thousands, but to make it accessible to small businesses, it is available for only $247.  PLUS, as a listener of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, you can use promo code THERAPY to get 10% off.  So, if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, click THIS LINK and sign up for the How to Win at Social Media course today! Please note that Therapy Reimagined/The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Podcast is a paid affiliate for Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing, so we will get a little bit of money in our pockets if you sign up using our link. Thank you in advance!    Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! The Therapy Reimagined Mission Our Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: What's New in the DSM-5-TR? A Living Wage for Prelicensees Mission Driven Work Therapists are Not Robots Why You Shouldn't Sell Out to Better Help Advocacy in the Wake of Looming Healthcare Shortages   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/   Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated):   Curt Widhalm  00:00 This episode of The Modern Therapist Survival Guide is brought to you by Thrizer.   Katie Vernoy  00:03  Thrizer is a modern billing platform for private pay therapists. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer you can potentially save them hundreds every month with no extra work on your end. The best part is you don't need to give up your rate they charge a standard 3% payment processing fee. By using the link in the show notes you can get a month of billing without processing fees just to test them out for your clients.   Curt Widhalm  00:30 Listen at the end of the episode for more information.   Katie Vernoy  00:34 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing   Curt Widhalm  00:39 Melissa Forziat is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources, including the very special course How to Win at Social Media, Even with No Budget. Stay tuned to the end of the episode to learn how you can get the most from social media marketing, even with little to no budget.   Announcer  00:59 You're listening to The Modern Therapist Survival Guide where therapists live, breathe and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy.   Curt Widhalm  01:12 Welcome back modern therapists. This is The Modern Therapist Survival Guide. I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy. And this is the podcast for therapists and things that we do the things that we have come up in our field, the ways that we want to spread our messages. And if you're not a therapist, welcome and listen to it from the angle of our intended audience being therapists. Katie is laughing at me because she said that this is an episode where we're not supposed to sound defensive.   Katie Vernoy  01:53 Oh, dear, we're already off track. Thanks, Curt. No, I think this is an episode where you have to be completely transparent like this is this is an episode that we need to do. And I think that there's positive and wonderful things that we need to talk about. And there's some stuff that we might have some feels about to use the language of the young folks today.   Curt Widhalm  02:15 I don't know who you think is the young folks today?   Katie Vernoy  02:19 Fine, fine. Let's move forward.   Curt Widhalm  02:22 All right. We have a lot of new listeners here over the last few months. And we want to thank you for joining us each week. And it's been a while since Katie and I have clarified a lot of things about our podcast, this is maybe an opportunity for some of our new listeners to get to know us in a little bit different way and for our longtime listeners to maybe be able to have a little bit better understanding of what Katie and my process is. And the working title of this episode is. So you want to be a content creator. This is really less of a how to episode and more of a here's the things that have come up in our process that helps us to define how we largely go about things. Now a lot of our listeners who have joined us recently found us through our DSM five episodes, some of our continuing education content. And what we want to do in this episode is kind of talk about what some of the things are that have come up for us as content creators here over the last few months, and how we made some of the decisions that we've made and kind of some of the principles that we do in making our product, something that hopefully all of you enjoy.   Katie Vernoy  03:49 Starting with the principles. I think when we first started and this was way back in 2017, I think the idea was, let's put together a podcast that has conversations that don't typically happen, at least not in public spaces. A lot of therapists, I think, have some of these conversations in the background. But it's not something that is happening in grad school. It's not something that's happening in supervision frequently, and it's kind of the realities, the survival guide tactics of how do we actually navigate this career. And what we've found over the years is that the additional piece is like yeah, we can talk about how to navigate the career but at some point, we become complicit in a broken system. And so we we've been talking about how to balance how do we give the tools to navigate what is and then also give the empowerment and or the validation that advocacy needs to happen. And then each of us can step up in our own ways, whether it's in how we practice individually in our offices, or what we say to our legislators or those kinds of things like how can we advocate true change for our profession, you know, whether it's equity, whether it's pay, whether it's decolonizing, our practices, all of the things that we've wanted to make sure that stay in the forefront, we recognize that it's a hard way to balance because if we completely destroy mental health right now, because it's not working then, there's no mental health. But if we complicitly and complacently stand by and continue to reinforce how it's being done, then we're not making any progress. And so we're trying to walk that line to be able to say, Hey, this is what the profession is, this is how you can navigate it. And this is what we see as a potential future. And let's give you the tools to be able to help us all come together as modern therapists to push towards that new future.   Curt Widhalm  05:45 A lot of what our conversations on the back end have been here over the last month or so has been about a lot of the response that we've had, hearing from some of our audience members directly, following some of the online interpretations and reactions to our DSM-5 update episode where we had Dr. Michael be first as the APA, co author of the DSM-5-TR. And our background conversations between Katie and I have been why did we make the decisions that we made with this particular episode? And how does this fit within a lot of what Katie was just describing as our principals here. And Katie and I have been long involved in a lot of advocacy work, and know that some of the reactions that we've seen the immediate petitions to change the autism diagnostic criteria, based on the information that was presented in that episode, to prevent the DSM-5-TR from having those very changes made. And Katie and my work in advocacy, we knew that that kind of an effort is mis timed, because those books were already published in sitting in warehouses all around the world at that point that understanding some of the advocacy process is very much an important piece of this, that you hear us in a number of our episodes across time talking about advocacy. I don't know that the emphasis on how freaking long things take...   Katie Vernoy  07:33 So long, so long   Curt Widhalm  07:35 ...is something that people tend to forget. And there's oftentimes this very reactionary in the moment sort of thing that happens that people lose their enthusiasm, because then there's a next in the moment sort of thing happens. And this is why our principals are so important to us is because it helps us in deciding not only what we address, but how and importantly, when we address them. And if you want to hear in depth kind of discussion about it. We'll link in our show notes over at MTSG podcast about our efforts several years ago to get a mental health professionals organization to make a statement on paying pre licensed therapists a living wage. This is a long term process sort of thing. And I think that this starts to speak into some of the criticisms that we've been hearing about the DSM-5 episode from some of our audience here.   Katie Vernoy  08:37 The other element that I think is important is being able to go into conversations with reasonable expectations of what's going to happen in the conversation. And so there's the timing of the advocacy, but there's also getting a full picture of what the actual situation is. And I know for me, in interviewing Dr. First, I was expecting a lot more pushback on the questions we actually asked around inclusion around the discussions with folks with lived experience, around the limitations of the diagnoses. And the fact that he was willing to engage in those made me very excited. Now, as we had the conversation. There were a few different things that I was trying to pay attention to. And this is I guess, this goes into kind of editing choices as well as kind of the advocacy element of it. I wanted him on record about kind of what his perspective was, what his process was those kinds of things and I know that there was some language that he used, it was pretty cringy, there was a lot of outdated language, there was a little bit of editing to try to soften that for our audience as kind of a protective measure for our audience. But we couldn't edit out the cringiness of this individual. My concern, and this is something I've grappled with. And I, maybe maybe we would do it differently if we interviewed him again tomorrow. But I wanted to hear all of the pieces. I wanted it all on record. And so there were things that he said that I might have called him out on in person. But recognize that was potentially risking getting the next question answered. And the next question answered. It potentially risked the interview not happening, him not being recorded and on record with the things that he ended up saying. And to me, I felt like there was this really push pull on how do we protect our audience? And how do we move forward with the advocacy that needs to happen around this outdated medical model book that we all have to use?   Curt Widhalm  10:51 I think to that point, this is our protection of our audience, is within the scope of Katie and my principles. And I hope that our principles aligned with a lot of yours. But, you know, being very clear to what Katie said earlier, we are about advancing our profession, we are about better pay, we're about better education. And we incorporate a lot of social justice work within that. And it's very informed by a lot of social justice work. To peel back the curtains a little bit on our process. We do edit our podcasts, we aren't as clear as what our finished product is. We've edited...   Katie Vernoy  11:09 Clearly not.   Curt Widhalm  11:12 ...we edit out ums and coughs, and we allow our guests to be able to say, Hey, I didn't say that correctly, would you edit that back? Let me restate this in another way. And because we develop relationships with a lot of people who come on this podcast, we're very accommodating of that. And in this particular recording, part of what we consider is, is it important to advocate in this particular moment on something that's informative of our principles, and potentially lose the entire interview in the first place, then it becomes Katie and me pissing off one person and not having a podcast, whereas the 1000s of people who have downloaded, listened to, reacted to, made their own commentary, on what was said, is much more important within the advocacy process than us calling out one particular person at one time.   Katie Vernoy  12:44 Yeah.   Curt Widhalm  12:45 We feel that it's a lot more important to be able to hear, again, the very outdated and potentially harmful ideas of people who are in positions of power, much more so than being able to correct them in a moment by moment basis. And this is part of seeing advocacy as a much bigger unfolding process. And I think that a lot of the commentary that we've seen have separated, Katie and me from the comments by Dr. Michael First. But I see that people are also, you know, kind of holding us accountable on this too. And it's very much a stylistic decision. Just because we didn't push back on it doesn't mean that we agree with it. In fact, hopefully, this gives a lot more emphasis to our calls to action that will be coming over the next few months and several years as it leads up to whenever the DSM-6 comes out, of better being able to advocate for who's on these committees and how their processes are because this is information that had that episode just been. Here's the straightforward updates of what's happening. I don't think that would have ever shown up to the light of day.   Katie Vernoy  14:07 Sure. And I think the additional piece, I guess there's more than one piece, but that additional piece to that is I wanted to get to how do people impact this process, and we have him on record talking about that process and how people can take stances and give feedback and all those things. And I also was able to say to him like, hey, yeah, reach out to these lived experience and diagnostic communities to get feedback, like proactively seek it out. And he said, Oh, well, we kind of do that. Actually. That's a good idea. So it's, maybe it's small, but it's still there's things on record that can be used by folks who are advocating with the APA, that who are advocating around some of these changes where it's like, hey, the guy who is running this Committee, said it was a good idea or said this was their process. Here's why this process isn't happening. We need to address it, I mean, I think it's just it's creating a body of evidence. But I do want to go back to kind of our audience and the, and the harmful language. And I want to take that in. I really want to think about that because to me, I, I recognize that there are spots bias, different things that frame what I think is going to be harmful and not harmful. And I and I know we talked about this, Curt, that like the two of us had a larger goal with that that interview. And so I don't want us to lose sight that there were folks who are were harmed by some of the language that Dr. First used. And I'm not sure how to specifically address that. I mean, maybe we put content warnings on on things, you know, I'm not sure. I'm not sure how to do that. I mean, I don't know what what additional thoughts you've had around it, Curt. But I just for me, I feel like there are two things that are happening. And I think we may lean more towards like the let's get stuff done. Let's not worry about the small things in the moment with the larger picture. But for some of the folks that are responding, it didn't feel small, and it wasn't small to them, and it was harmful to them. And I don't know how to I'm gonna be honest, I don't know how to resolve that, given our advocacy efforts and the desire to get someone with that level of power over the next iteration of both the ICD and the DSM on record. And so I'm not sure where to go with that.   Curt Widhalm  16:27 It's been my experience in advocacy, that large systems end up ignoring those individual voices. Those individual voices are incredibly powerful when they're used in the right place at the right time. And it's kind of looking at where our experience is where our tools really are effective in being able to affect these larger systems that when Katie and I have been in congressional offices, when we've been talking to legislators, when we've been talking to professional organizations, those voices, when they're expressed at the right time, are incredibly impactful for humanizing what is happening, working in the macro systems doesn't negate that the micro systems are happening. But for systemic change to happen, we have to address the macro systems in the ways that the macro systems have shown that they can be changed.   Katie Vernoy  17:30 Sure, yeah. And I think that's it goes back to our principles around recognizing that we have to work within if we want to be therapists, right now, we, we must work at least, you know, sufficiently within the system that's created while also trying to disrupt it. And so it's, it's a hard line to walk I know, we're never, we're never going to say we can always do it, right. You know, like we're gonna have times when we we miss judge or miss title. And I think that, that we, you know, when folks have called us out, when we've missed us in the past, we oftentimes do come back and have deeper conversations. And so please keep holding us to account for the things that are happening in the micro system, so to speak. But recognize that you know, that there are times when we may disagree based on the goals we have in the macro system. Does that make sense?   Curt Widhalm  18:20 Yeah.   Katie Vernoy  18:21 Okay.   Curt Widhalm  18:22 And I think that this also speaks to what we noticed as content creators, is some of the accountability that people feel like they're holding us to, are things that we actually already do. It's just that...   Katie Vernoy  18:38 Exactly.   Curt Widhalm  18:39 Now, in the aftermath of the DSM-5 episode, one of the comments that I keep coming back to is a one from a deleted now deleted user on Reddit. The comment says, the interview starts talking about autism around minute 13. It's not an in accessible interview, and that it has no transcript or subtitles, so fuck them for that, too. And then, in this post, several people posted links to the episode where the transcripts already existed in the first place. And one of the things that if you're considering going into content creation, helping you potentially avoid some obstacles and these kinds of things, and being clear about your principles, really does help in that. We've been making things accessible for quite a while.   Katie Vernoy  19:30 And we haven't always but it does, there's a cost involved. And we're doing this for free for the most part, you know, we've we've been able to start getting sponsors at different points. But we're not making a whole bunch of money where we can have fancy solutions. And so we've, we took this feedback that people couldn't find the transcripts. And so we've we've added a little solution, so they're easier to find now, but we are both two therapists, we both have our own practices. We do some consulting but like this is not our full time job. And so we're trying, I guess maybe this is where I'm sounding defensive, I'm not trying to, but like, we're doing the best that we can. But I think, to me, when I hear this, I see something where we're trying to make a difference. You know, we're trying to do some stuff to bring some things to light to move things forward. And we're not going to always get it right. But we are a way easier target to get mad at than the large system. So don't wait like don't waste your your energy on calling us out for stuff like not having transcript because we actually do, like use that energy towards the actual change you want and not on two random podcasters.   Curt Widhalm  20:40 And we got several comments in the first week, after directing, you know, emphasis towards are we going to have follow up episodes about the changes in the DSM, we will, it takes some turnaround time for us, especially on something that that book wasn't even available for three weeks after the podcast aired, which was nearly a month after we made the interview, to Katie's point of we're two podcasters. If you want us to be able to do more, here's our pitch to join our Patreon and make it to where we can have a full time job doing this kind of stuff. But in the meantime, our turnaround and response times is sometimes very much around what we're capable of doing around our regular day to day practices and families and all of that kind of stuff. In the past, we've been sometimes able to turn things around literally overnight. That's not something that can necessarily be relied upon, in this particular space for us and until you join our Patreon and wonderful things. It's something we're we absolutely do do our best. It's that we're in a slow moving profession too. Nothing about you know, really anything is going to be best addressed by a podcast on something that needs to happen in an extremely timely manner.   Katie Vernoy  22:13 Sure, and I think to expand out kind of what we're doing as our follow on to the DSM-5 updates is that we've been reaching out to folks in the Autistic community in the grief community in the trans and gender nonconforming community. And as well as people in the trauma community to be able to have in depth conversations with folks with lived experience around, for example, with the Autistic community, we want someone that can talk with us about the diagnosis stuff that's going on to DSM-5-TR but also self diagnosis and, and those types of things. So we can really have a conversation with someone that's living it versus us saying like, yeah, we disagree, you know, or, or we agree with this part, but not that part. I mean, like, we have our own opinions, and we'll share them. But we don't want to be the only voices speaking to this. And it takes time to be able to identify the people or persons, the person or persons that people are people. Yeah, I don't know, to find the right, the right folks to be able to have the real conversation that we need to have, as we've continued forward and our audiences grow we've found it even more important not to just say, like, hey, our friends, so and so is in this community, let's reach out to them, but actually saying like, Who is the person that is making the most noise that has the biggest audience who can actually make a difference in this space, let's amplify that voice on the podcast and whatever way that we can. And so we're still learning, we're still growing. And we don't, we can't... People are not popping on the podcast immediately. Like, everybody's got schedule issues. And and we're we're wanting to have a great conversation versus a fast conversation.   Curt Widhalm  23:51 And, you know, this is hopefully where some of the people that we are reaching out to at this point, we'll be able to build and combine our efforts of this community. And their's to elevate some of this stuff. And hopefully, as we get those things organized and recorded in the upcoming months that you'll be able to see that. So here's also your reminder to subscribe and not miss any of our content. One of the other things within this process, though, is also the way that people have anchored on to very slight aspects of the content that we put out whether it's a specific comment within a larger, longer format, whether it's wanting deeper, more informative things out of what is relatively a smaller format, and what I mean by that is, we also try to make our episodes 30 ish minutes. We sometimes wax poetic most of our episodes, I think ended up around 40 minutes or so but it's an incredibly weird balance. Of people on one hand can take one very, very small piece of what is happening in an episode and make assumptions about the rest of the content or ignore the rest of the content based on that, or on the other hand, we've also had some criticisms of, we don't go deep enough and 30 minutes when it's two or three or four voices, depending on how many people that we have on a particular episode. That goes by very, very fast.   Katie Vernoy  25:30 What and when especially the one that said we didn't go deep enough, I mean, we did respond with like two or three more episodes to discuss the nuance of what was was being asked for. I think, to me, the thing that makes sense, and I want to take full ownership of this, because oftentimes, I'm the one that's titling the episode. And sometimes we're, we're framing the episode in a particular way, because we think that's what's most compelling. And that seems to be another thing that folks will anchor on. And if I've titled without thought, you know, to a specific element, or it's been framed in a certain way, I think folks have difficulty looking at the whole piece. And so I wanted to, I want to say, I have very much been trying to be thoughtful about titles so that people will get a sense of what's actually on the episode. But there's definitely times when people have have responded to the title only, and either decided they would not listen to the episode because the title was not one that they liked. Or they framed the whole episode based on that title and their interpretation of the title. And so I'm working on it, folks, I'm trying to get better Curt usually helps. But like sometimes we're you know, we divide and conquer, so to speak, he does more editing, I do more of the show notes and episode artwork. And so this is a two to four person, maybe five person, little enterprise here. And none of us do this only, like we all have other stuff going on. And so and even life stuff, like we talked about a couple weeks ago, can get in the way of us being able to do stuff, but like, we recognize that sometimes something resonates, and it's hard to look at the whole piece. But before, before taking too drastic an action like giving us a really bad review. Or blasting us on social like try to listen it to it as a holistic piece if you can.   Curt Widhalm  27:28 And it does help and we do respond. She can email Maggie over at podcast@therapyreimagined.com with feedback about stuff and she's not Katie or myself. She's a very wonderful part of our team that, be nice to Maggie. But...   Katie Vernoy  27:43 Yes, please be nice to Maggie.   Curt Widhalm  27:45 But I think it helps to, once again, just kind of clarify the things that we do. It's The Modern Therapist Survival Guide, we want to encourage and help each of you along your journey, and be able to provide some guidance or put some things within perspective or advocate for some things. It's why we've really started moving away from some of the more coachy aspects of our content. We've done some in the past and part of keeping conversations going is not having the same conversations over and over again. And while we're hesitant to say we're never going to have a coach on here, again, or something like that, we do have a back catalogue with plenty of people to talk to you about how to set up a practice. There are plenty of other podcasts who can have that same conversation over and over again. And that's a great space for them to be in. It's not where our space is. Our space is about advocacy, it's talking about the things that are affecting our practices, it's being able to provide timely, hey, here's your surprise, here's the no surprises act, it's it's being able to help channel some of the energy and emphasis of the conversations that we're having to make change, it's being able to take the action steps. If you want cheerleaders of here's how you go and set up your office. Great, not us.   Katie Vernoy  29:30 I think there's like you said there's a lot of back catalogue stuff that has business building and practice building and I am also hesitant to say we won't have a coach on I think the the difference that we want to bring to it is that we want to get into the stuff that's not polished. We want the real conversations, we want this stuff that goes into what it's really like to be a therapist now what it really is to be able to do work and have a private practice and...   Curt Widhalm  30:04 Or work in community mental health. And...   Katie Vernoy  30:07 ...well, let me finish my my thought here just really quickly, but like to be able to compete when there's disruptors in the space like BetterHelp, and all of the tech companies that are coming in and dominating the space, to work in community mental health and identify a pathway forward, to have a sustainable career, if that's where you decide to be. I mean, like, there's, there's a lot that is in there, that's not, here are the five steps on how you market your practice. Now, we certainly have episodes like that. But I think, to me, it's more about the reality of the therapist, as a person and a professional. Not, this is how you build your practice. So I don't think we're going to avoid those topics. It's more that we're not going to have the same conversation over and over again, about money mindset, and how you avoid burnout. And how you start a side hustle like, we have those episodes, you can go back and look at them. But we're not going to keep having that conversation over and over again.   Curt Widhalm  31:06 And what we are going to have is, here's the updates as they're coming along in the field. Here's amplifying voices from marginalized communities, whether it's therapists, whether it's the systemic barriers that continue to cause mental health problems, whether it's the systemic barriers to having an appropriate mental health workforce on both an individual and a national and universal level, that at its core, this is a podcast about being able to leave our field in a better place than where it was when we started. And that is going to be an ever evolving conversation. And we're thankful that you're holding us accountable in this process, we just really want to make sure that we're all on the same page so we can actually take these things and make them into change.   Katie Vernoy  32:06 I think that's where we finished. That's a good place to stop. Thanks, Curt.   Curt Widhalm  32:11 We talked about a number of our episodes in the show notes, you can find those at MTSGpodcast.com, as well as all of our back catalogue and we did make some references to Patreon and you can also support us on Buy me a Coffee and very awesome thank you to those people who are patrons and coffee buyers. And until next time, I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy.   Katie Vernoy  32:39 Thanks again to our sponsor, Thrizer.   Curt Widhalm  32:42 Thrizer is a new billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible and clinicians should earn what they're worth. Every time you bill a client through Thrizer an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the client's insurance. From their Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursements quickly, directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by cheque, confusion around benefits and obscurity with reimbursement status they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It's very quick to get set up and it works great in complement with EHR systems.   Katie Vernoy  33:21 Their team is super helpful and responsive and the founder is actually a long term therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times. Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit therapy. If you want to test Thrizer completely risk free our very special link is bit.ly/moderntherapists, you sign up for thrice or with the code 'moderntherapists' you will get one month of no payment processing fees meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time.   Curt Widhalm  33:56 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.   Katie Vernoy  34:01 Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media? Check out the How to Win at Social Media, Even with No Budget course from marketing expert Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand. It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising. Melissa will work you step by step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.   Curt Widhalm  34:30 How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the 1000s. But to make it accessible to small businesses, it is available for only $247. Plus as a listener of The Modern Therapist Survival Guide. You can use the promo code 'therapy' to get 10% off. If you are ready to go to the next level in your business. Click the link in our show notes over at MTSGpodcast.com. And sign that for the How to Win at Social Media course today.   Announcer  35:04 Thank you for listening to The Modern Therapist Survival Guide. Learn more about who we are and what we do at MTSGpodcast.com. You can also join us on Facebook and Twitter. And please don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss any of our episodes.

What is Eco Anxiety? An Interview with Dr. Thomas Doherty Curt and Katie interview Dr. Thomas Doherty about Eco Anxiety. We look at the history of eco anxiety, what therapists should know about the environment, the concept of environmental identity, and how we can support clients with Eco Anxiety in therapy. We look at ways to bring these topics up with our clients as well as empower them to take action. An Interview with Dr. Thomas J. Doherty Thomas is a clinical and environmental psychologist based in Portland, Oregon, USA. His multiple publications on nature and mental health include the groundbreaking paper “The Psychological Impacts of Global Climate Change,” co-authored by Susan Clayton, cited over 700 times. Thomas is a fellow of the American Psychological Association (APA), Past President of the Society for Environmental, Population and Conservation Psychology, and Founding Editor of the academic journal Ecopsychology. Thomas was a member of the APA's first Task Force on Global Climate Change and founded one of the first environmentally-focused certificate programs for mental health counselors in the US at Lewis & Clark Graduate School. Thomas is originally from Buffalo, New York. In this podcast episode we talk about what therapists should know about Eco Anxiety In preparation for Earth Day, we wanted to understand more about Eco Anxiety and what therapists can do to support our clients and the planet. What is Eco Anxiety? The history of Eco Anxiety, including worry about the use of chemicals, climate change The importance of words, personal experiences, how the client sees the world The diagnoses that align with this area, the types of impacts on clients What Should Therapists Know About the Environment? Resources related to climate change How to explore Environmental Identity Understand our own Environmental Identity The 3 basic psychological impacts from the environment (disaster, chronic, or ambient) The benefits of nature and how people in all environments can access them What is your Environmental Identity? “Our environmental identity is really all of our values and experiences regarding nature, in the natural world.” – Dr. Thomas Doherty Relationship to the natural world Significant experiences in the outdoors The nuance of bringing these ideas up in Urban areas What “nature” means to each of us “One of the things I tell people is that, around the world, there's millions of people that are working on climate change issues, and all these different areas, and people are studying things, and they're building things. And it's really inspiring to be around some of this stuff. So that's an important message to get out to people it. Yes, it's a big issue. But there's a ton of people working on this, think of all the people even in the Los Angeles area that are going to work every day, on climate and public health.” - Dr. Thomas Doherty How Can We Support Clients with Eco Anxiety in Therapy? Understanding the basics on the environment and climate change Building capacity to be with these issues Reeling in the anxiety, imagination Understanding the waves of emotions and completing the anxiety cycle Giving clients permission to talk about the environment and how to open up the conversations Coping strategies specific to Eco Anxiety Suggestions for activism and what clients can do to improve the environment Helping clients to identify if they are doing enough Where to find resources on environmental efforts How therapists can employ climate awareness in their practices Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Thrizer Thrizer is a new modern billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible AND clinicians should earn what they are worth. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer, you can potentially save them hundreds every month, with no extra work on your end. Every time you bill a client through Thrizer, an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the client's insurance. From there, Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursement quickly, directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by check, confusion around benefits, and obscurity with reimbursement status, they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It is very quick to get set up and it works great in completement with EHR systems. Their team is super helpful and responsive, and the founder is actually a long-time therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee! Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit on therapy. Sign up using bit.ly/moderntherapists if you want to test Thrizer completely risk free! Sign up for Thrizer with code 'moderntherapists' for 1 month of no credit card fees or payment processing fees! That's right - you will get one month of no payment processing fees, meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time! Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing Today's episode of The Therapy Reimagined podcast is brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing. Melissa is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources.  Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media?  Check out the “How to Win at Social Media (even with no budget!)” course from marketing expert, Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand.  It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising.  Melissa will work you step-by-step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.  How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the thousands, but to make it accessible to small businesses, it is available for only $247.  PLUS, as a listener of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, you can use promo code THERAPY to get 10% off.  So, if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, click THIS LINK and sign up for the How to Win at Social Media course today! Please note that Therapy Reimagined/The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Podcast is a paid affiliate for Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing, so we will get a little bit of money in our pockets if you sign up using our link. Thank you in advance!  Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Dr. Thomas Doherty's Practice Sustainable Self Climate Change and Happiness Podcast Dr. Thomas Doherty's Consultation and Training Program on the Environment The Psychological Impacts of Global Climate Change by Thomas J. Doherty and Susan Clayton NY Times: Climate Change Enters the Therapy Room Climate Psychology Alliance Project Draw Down Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: What's New in the DSM-5-TR with Dr. Michael B. First What You Should Know About Walk and Talk Therapy part 1 What You Should Know About Walk and Talk Therapy part 2 (Law and Ethics) Shared Traumatic Experiences Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/   Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated): Curt Widhalm  00:00 This episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide is brought to you by Thrizer.   Katie Vernoy  00:04 Thrizer is a modern billing platform for private pay therapists, their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer you can potentially save them hundreds every month with no extra work on your end. The best part is you don't need to give up your rate they charge a standard 3% payment processing fee. By using the link in the show notes, you can get a month of billing without processing fees just to test them out for your clients.   Curt Widhalm  00:30 Listen at the end of the episode for more information.   Katie Vernoy  00:34 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing   Curt Widhalm  00:39 Melissa Forziat is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources, including the very special course How to Win at Social Media, Even with No Budget. Stay tuned to the end of the episode to learn how you can get the most from social media marketing, even with little to no budget,   Announcer  00:59 You're listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide where therapists live, breathe and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy.   Curt Widhalm  01:15 Welcome back modern therapists. This is The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy. And this is the podcast for therapists about literally at this point, just everything that we come across in our practice in our field. After a couple of 100 episodes, we continue to find new areas that we're hearing conversations in the background and wanting to be able to put you our audience in touch with the people who are leading some of these conversations. And as close as we can tie this into Earth Day, we wanted to talk about eco anxiety and those clients presenting with concerns about climate change. And this being an area that we've been aware of for a while but figured we would get somebody who's really, really smart about this. So welcoming to the podcast today Dr. Thomas Doherty, a psychologist up in the Portland area, and with his podcast, also Climate Change and Happiness. We are very happy to have you here today. Thanks for joining us.   Dr. Thomas Doherty  02:25 Thanks, Curt and Katie, I'm glad to be here.   Katie Vernoy  02:28 We are so excited to have you here. And to have this conversation. The first question that we ask everyone is who are you? And what are you putting out into the world?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  02:38 Yeah, that's a great question for all of us to think about every day, you know, today I'm thinking about being a parent of a parent of a 14 year old and getting her out to school, I have my day, I work from home, mostly these days, because of the pandemic, a lot of my practice has shifted to my home office. And so I'm, and I'm a psychologist and I have most recently been really immersed in this area of environmental identity and people's connections with nature and their concerns about nature and the natural world and climate change. And that is something I've been interested in. But now, you know, the world has caught up to me a little bit on this, and a lot of other people are interested in it too. So it's really, that's kind of where my where my focus is these days and exploring some of these issues.   Curt Widhalm  03:23 So let's start from the basics here and kind of work our way up into some of the bigger ideas. Let's start with defining what is eco anxiety and maybe how that's a little bit different than kind of passing concerns around environmental transition sort of stuff.   Dr. Thomas Doherty  03:40 I'll make a point that we can cycle back to about this because people, we have anxiety when we're concerned about some, you know, we're apprehensive about some potential threat in the future. But you know, there's a saying in therapy, you know, you've heard where we care. And so anxiety is a signal to us. But it's also a signal that we have values and we have things that we care about and things that are important to us, right. And so very quickly into the eco anxiety conversation, I like to pivot to that value piece because it helps to ground people. And we can get to that. But eco anxiety is a term that started by my reckoning, it started to be used in the media around 2007, give or take. And it was originally describing people's concerns around just these kind of insidious environmental issues that we know about that are that are hard to track, like plastics, in the food chain or chemicals, or various kinds of you know, these kind of forever chemicals that are floating around. And it really insidious kind of feeling that that's kind of where that that term first originated in my research of it. And then of course, it's more recently been attached to people's concerns about climate change, and the potential changes that could happen to the environment and other species. So it has It has a history and then it you can go back to say, even people's concerns about nuclear war and during the Cold War, or people's concerns about chemicals in the environment, going back to Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which was published in the early, early 1960s. So it does have a little bit of a history if you dig this idea of being concerned about the state of the world. But in the last couple of years, it's really been amped up because of the predicted, you know, disasters and events associated with climate change have been happening to people, and they've been happening close to where you live. And we've been seeing this on the news or even personally, experiencing in terms of heat, smoke, fires, severe storms, flooding. And so that's, that's kind of taken this, this kind of general, you know, existential concern that all of us have at one time or another, and really, really amped it up for people.   Katie Vernoy  05:55 It's so interesting, because when you talk about that, I feel like especially for those of us on the West Coast, it feels very present related to the fires. You're up in Portland and I, before we were started, I gotten to Portland a couple of times, and, and I think it's an amazing city. And the first time I really got to explore it, it was under ashes. And air quality was pretty, pretty gnarly. And it was something you know, well, before the pandemic, folks were wearing masks just to try to get through day to day and it, it felt very apocalyptic to be there, the sky is this horrible color, or maybe, you know, in a weird way, a beautiful color, but then there's also just ash raining down and, and to me, it feels very logical to say like, this is going to impact all of us. And for some folks that might impact more dramatically. This this idea that the world is failing is coming to an end that we're destroying the planet. And so what's it mean? Is there is there a kind of subclinical, like, I'm worried and care about the environment? And there's clinical eco anxiety? Like, is there a discernment there, that we can make for our audience?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  07:08 Yeah, I would say so. And it's really neat that we're, we're, you know, the, the listeners are therapists, because we can get into this kind of thing. So a lot of it is, it's really juicy, it's about our meaning, it's about the words that we use, you know, so when I start to when I start to talk to people, I'm immediately being very observant to what they what their language is, what their personal experiences are, you know, even using terms like apocalyptic and stuff like that, it gives us a clue to how we're seeing things, right. And then there's that people, I have some control over my words, and I have some control over what language I use. And so they immediately were, were started, just like any other kind of therapeutic issue, whatever, whatever it happens to be, we're just really listening for the narrative, you know, and therapists, of course, themselves have been influenced by this as well. So that's also been a tripping point is that the last couple of years therapists themselves have been, they're human, and they're, they live in Portland, or whatever. And they're dealing with the smoke and the heat. So they're going through it also. So all the therapists that were listening, that are listening are going through this as well. So we're not sheltered from this, there's no special eco anxiety diagnosis, as you know, there's, and I know you were talking to DSM experts. And so it's really touchy about, you know, what's in the DSM. And there's really important rules about diagnostic categories are made. So what we're dealing with is, and we don't need a new diagnosis, we we have the tools, we can diagnose someone's feelings of depression, or anxiety or trauma, with quite amply with existing DSM. And so anxiety is a normal emotion, we all feel it, it's a healthy, useful emotion we were, that's how humans survive, we, you know, anxiety keeps us alive. And also we have social anxiety and different other kinds of anxiety about our performance, and how we fit in with our tribe of people and all that sort of stuff. So, so we have to remind ourselves that anxiety is normal and some anxiety about the future. And there's so many things to be anxious about in the, in the, in our global interconnected world, all of us sit with some anxieties, from time to time, that's quite normal. And it helps us to be the best people that we can be like with any other kind of anxiety issue. To me, there's three levels, there's normal feelings, there's adjustment level problems, that would be kind of adjustment disorder level. And then there are, you know, more diagnostic problems, like, like someone might meet criteria for an anxiety disorder. So if someone's concerns about the environment are affecting significantly affecting their sleep, or their diet or their relationships or their work or going to school, you know, if there's that significant impact on activities of life, then, you know, if the patient or client is, is amenable to that, I mean, that's, that's, we can use that label to help them. Yeah. So, and I think our goal is to allow I think a lot of people myself maybe yourselves as well, we all of us will move into that adjustment disorder category from time to time, you know, in the sense of wow, we're really needing to do some extra work to adjust to this stressor that we have. And it could, it could be temporarily affecting our sleep or things like that. So that part of the goal is to keep people in the adjustment. And, you know, keeping them toward health, and helping them to not fall into the deeper diagnostic issues.   Curt Widhalm  10:25 I'll maybe for spicing this up a bit come at this from more of the alarmist side then, you know, this seems to be, you know, following all of the climate predictions, everything else seems to be getting worse and worse. And in managing some of these conversations with our clients, we're going through this too. And it's, it feels like it's so much bigger than what any one of us individuals can do. And it seems like a lot of us are managing these conversations, it's just kind of like well, put your head down and hope for the best and focus on the positives. But I'm imagining that that is not the only things that we should be doing here.   Dr. Thomas Doherty  11:08 Yeah, yeah, it is. And that's part of it is bearing witness to this, you know, it is scary, it is overwhelming, I will go through moments of overwhelm, too, I mean, and it, it's a paradox, the more you know, ignorance is bliss. And if you don't know much about this, you don't, it's not concerning you, because some of these things are far away, for you don't necessarily have to link, you know, weather changes to the climate. So certain people are more vulnerable. Even traditionally, people have been more vulnerable people that are environmentally minded, in general, people that are environmental professionals, or conservation professionals, or teachers or scientists, public health people, you know, so those people have been vunerable are more vulnerable, because they know a lot, putting your head down for a moment is fine, you know, that's okay. But, you know, it's about building capacity, you know, it's about building capacity to be with these issues, you know, some basic kinds of cognitive behavioral and other kinds of therapy techniques are helpful about just helping people to, to kind of grade what is the true danger today, like, how are things going right? Today, when you walk outside your door, it just keeping you know, getting people into the present moment, helping people to be more mindful, essentially reeling in, reeling in the anxiety, I say, you know, your your horses are going to one of my chair therapy sayings is that your horses are going to ride like you, if I My imagination is going to go on, on anything, just don't, your horses are gonna ride, but just don't ride them, you know, so let your imagination is going to do what it's going to do. But let's come back to the present moment. And so I feel like there's a wave function here where people get really stressed, and we kind of help just pull it together, build some capacity to take in a little more. And then, you know, so this ride, you know, there's this kind of despair, empowerment curve that happens in environmental work in general. But in any kind of important work, you know, you're trying to write a novel or anything, you're gonna go through periods where you're up in periods where you're down. And so it's helping people just to get into that little longer flow. But not sugarcoating it either. I mean, that's not helpful. It is, it is scary, and it is dangerous. And ultimately, people do need to find a way to take some action, you know, because that's the way to complete the anxiety cycle is, is to take some action. So so it gets really existential gets political, we need to be like really upfront about all that.   Katie Vernoy  13:27 You said that folks who don't know kind of can keep their heads down or not even know they need to keep their heads down, that that kind of ignorance is bliss.   Dr. Thomas Doherty  13:36 Yeah.   Katie Vernoy  13:37 And it feels like in, in these times, therapists can't be ignorant to these issues, because so many folks who are walking into our doors or are opening up our virtual office windows, I think that they are worried about these things. And so what do you think are the basics that all therapists should know about this?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  14:00 Yeah, yeah. And it is becoming it is becoming a competency, right, either a sub competency that everybody needs to know a little bit about and then some people are choosing to, to make this more of a subspecialty we're just in the new territory for that. I mean, I do a training program like a 10 week, Zoom based program for therapists, eco and climate conscious therapists that I've been doing, I started last fall and I'm into my third round of doing that. And then I have people I have therapists in from around the US and also from Canada and Australia and England and Germany. And so people are reaching out to me about that. And they are because there are very few resources. There's the climate psychology alliance in the US and in the UK, and they're they're really working hard to try to bring things together so it's it's not a it's not a barren territory. There's there's things happening, but it's it's still new. And so what should all therapists know? That's a good question. On the positive side, I think the most positive thing, and the thing that I tend to go to with clients is this idea that I mentioned earlier of environmental identity, right. So this is an idea that really is, is, is, is ready for primetime, it's the sense that we have it, all of us have an identity in relation to nature in the natural world, how we see ourselves in relation to nature and other species and places, it's similar to our other kinds of identity, like our gender identity, or cultural identity, or sexual identity, these kinds of identities, we need to give people some information about them, so they can think about them and articulate them, and then kind of take pride in them and, and enact them, right. And so our environmental identity is really all of our values and experiences regarding nature, in the natural world. Climate change, and environmental issues really, really threaten some of that to us. And, and one of the big problems in the modern world, you know, is that people haven't been, unless they're sort of Environmental Studies student or nature writer, or, you know, an outdoor educator or something very few people have been taught to really get clear on their environmental identity, we pick it up, and it's kind of tacit, and it's kind of in us and we could either of you, we could talk about your your significant experiences, you know, whether someone's an urban person or a rural person, or they have done outdoor, they feel comfortable doing outdoor camping, or they have pets, or they have connection with other species, it's everybody's story is slightly different. But you know, that that's the value. And that's the base where we would then take action in the future to be the person we want to be. So as you know, I think, hoping that all therapists can help people to help clarify their environmental identity, why is this important to you? Where did you come from? What does it mean to you? And this becomes a base that you can get really strong on. And then I think it calms people down and it says, Okay, this is this is a real thing. This is part of mean, this is why I'm concerned, and some of that free floating anxiety will come down. And so that's, that's one, that's one piece. The other the other piece, I would say is there's three basic impacts from mental health, mental health impacts of climate change that people should be aware of. The first one is kind of obvious as disaster impacts when you're really affected by a specific situation, like a heatwave, or, or fires or any kind of thing. And there's a whole range of, you know, disaster psychology research and Mental Health First Aid and things like that, that you can, you can learn about. The second is the more chronic impacts, which would be being displaced, like being a climate, refugee, chronic chronic economic problems, you know, things that last a long time and then are that aren't easily solved. And then that immediately dovetails with all environmental justice issues, and people's placement and things like that. So it brings in, you know, social environmental, justice, focus. And then the third category is the, the kind of ambient impacts the subjective emotional impacts of just watching things from afar. And depending on where you are, as a therapist, you might find clients in any of those boxes, or multiple boxes. And so the approach is slightly different.   Curt Widhalm  18:05 And you've written an article on this it for American Psychologists that will link in the show notes that goes into those features a lot more deeply than here in a minute on our podcast here. I want to go back to your first point that you were just talking about, in Katie and I both have practices in very urban settings, that Los Angeles, we end up with a few people who really have some access to some of the greater outdoor activities that we have around here. But how do you bring these conversations up to clients who maybe not quite verbalizing some of their relationship to the environment yet?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  18:48 Yeah, that's a good point. And, and that's, that brings up the larger question of how to bring these ideas up in general. And so, you know, like, with any other kind of focus that someone has, therapeutically, we have to give signals about what we're doing. Because, you know, this isn't about necessarily putting something on someone, you know, clients come in for a service. And so we want to help them solve their problems, people that I work with, you know, I know in the, in the, in the branding of my my practice, sustainable self, and I talk, they know a bit about my work, and I've done teaching and research so people already come in, or are drawn to me because Because of this, and it actually, you know, so it's important, I think, for therapists to have multiple levels of signaling, like say, if you want to work in this area, put it on your website or your or your, your materials that this is an area that I'm interested in, and that gives people permission because people don't necessarily know they can talk about this kind of stuff. You know, I say one of my another one of my therapy sayings is we have issues and we have Issues so it's, you know, capital I issues like the big things we want to take on in the world and concerns about justice or climate change, or you know, whatever our destiny is to that we're working on. And then we have our lowercase I issues, which is our baggage, our neuroses, our weaknesses, our, you know, traumas and things like that. And so, you know, being clear, we're open to both of those things like Yes. What do you want to achieve in the world? But also how what's what's what's holding you back? And what are some of your issues because they they're kind of related together. And so to come back to your thing about your, your question about nature, there's a lot of consciousness raising, and a lot of sort of psychoeducation, you could do in this area, because again, a lot of people haven't really study this or broken this out. And so even the term nature, you know, the way I think about it, at least from my, you know, work and in broader areas of environmental psychology is nature's is a big term, that means a lot of things to a lot of people. And there's practically in our lives, there's a spectrum of nature, connections from indoor nature, like plants, and even virtual nature, like artwork and things like that, but you know, plants and pads, and then there's nearby nature, which is parks and gardens and green spaces, and, and then there's more, you know, manage nature, like forests and seashore and then there's, you know, wild or perceived wild, there's, there's a whole spectrum. So you can be living in Manhattan, and still be part of that spectrum of nature. And arguably, I would say, many of your clients have a lot of nature around in their lives, but it might be more of that indoor nature in terms of plants and paths, or their imagery and their art or their nearby nature, like their parks or gardens and green spaces. And so there's, and you get benefits, you know, another doorway here is just talking about all the health benefits of connecting in in safe, you know, outdoor green spaces in terms of stress reduction, and in terms of mental restoration, and creativity, educating people, and then they become more empowered to say, oh, okay, I can claim some of this for myself, because, you know, sometimes urban people feel like, Oh, I can't be that, I can't be that eco person, or I can't be that outdoor person, I didn't grow up doing that, or I don't feel comfortable, you know, camping. And so then they, they, they cut themselves off from from the switch. But that's not necessary. There's a space for everybody. So and then this grades, just generally into basic self care.   Katie Vernoy  22:07 When we look at folks with different levels of connection to nature, or different types of of environmental identities, it to me, it feels like the the conversation saying like, this is how you would have the conversation seems a little bit daunting, because there's such a different experience we all have. And and I guess the question that lends to me is for folks who men or their big I issue is not related to the environment, are we missing something, if we don't introduce the topic?   22:41 It is daunting. I mean, some of these issues are politicized. And we have to kind of be aware of, you know, the culture of who we're working with, and things like that. But I find over time, that, you know, when I open this up in a general way, people, what I actually find is when you when you start to scratch the surface on this, people often have a lot to talk about, around all of these issues, because they just don't, they have very little opportunity to speculate or talk about any of these kinds of things. One of my environmental identity exercises, like just a simple lifetime line, and just from birth to the present, what are significant experiences in nature, the natural world or paths or things like that, and that opens up all kinds of all kinds of things. But, you know, I think one way to bring up the environmental identity piece is just again, in terms of general discussion of other kinds of identities that people have, you know, so, you know, in my work, I help people think about all different kinds of identities, they have their, their cultural identity, their gender identity, or sexual identity, their environmental identity, how they think about nature and natural when you could just add that in there as part of the suite of things. That's, that's a kind of a fairly benign way to just put that out on the table. Or when someone is concerned about, you know, or if they're, if there is a environmental stressor that's happening, like heat, or smoke, or some sort of issue happening regionally, someone can say, well, these kind of outdoor stressors sometimes affect our identity and who we are and our and our values. And is that happening for you? And I can guarantee you if you'd ask people that in Portland, during that, when the ash were falling, there would be a lot to talk about there. Oh, yeah. And so having that in our tool belt, had all therapists having that in their tool belt was really helpful. And then of course, for the therapists themselves as part of their life as well because they have their own environmental identity and that in like with a lot of things, like in the work that I do with therapists when we're doing this training, I lead them through their own environmental identity They do all the exercises themselves, and it's really rich and really fun and people get really into it, but you know, it's like doing your own work essentially, like in any other kind of therapeutic issue, you you push your own boundaries and see what what affects you doing a family tree diagram but having an environmental identity family tree so you think about all The environmental identity of all the people in the family through your parents and your siblings and your grandparents and the generations, people get really wow, that's this is really neat. I never thought about this. And I know we're talking about the anxiety and coping, but it's also it's also a growth opportunity. And I think therapists are particularly well positioned for that, that growth opportunity aspect.   Katie Vernoy  25:22 And I was thinking even, you know, when you're, when you're opening that up, and someone does say, yeah, it freaks me out. I don't like to think about it, you know, the world is dying. And you know, and I'd rather just focus on X, you know, how do you address that? Because I think that there are folks, it feels daunting, and maybe this is me needing to do my own work, but it feels very daunting to think about a planet dying. And, and or becoming uninhabitable. Maybe that's a more accurate way to talk about it at this point. But it's something we're that's, that's overwhelming. That's, you know, there's there, it feels like there may not be ready at hand solutions, and and the advocacy efforts seems like that could be helpful. You said kind of those types of things, but I guess I'm just searching for, where do these conversations go, when you identify that someone is really freaking out, because there's ash falling from the sky, or the levees have broken? Or, you know, their house was burned down? You know, like, it seems like some of this stuff, you know, if we if we move away from the crisis, you know, like disaster and direct effects to the more indirect effects, like, how do we have these conversations in a productive way?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  26:33 Yeah, well, obviously, if someone's going through a true disaster than we we're, then we're really in disaster mental health territory was really about affecting, helping people with activities of daily life, like, how are you doing in terms of, do you have food? And where are you sleeping and clothes. And so that's, that's kind of that red cross level of work. And some of it is it is basic sort of trauma work. So you could have, you know, really, for a lot of just stabilizing, you know, mindfulness and relaxation, and really helping people to get stabilized, and all that sort of stuff. I mean, one of the things I tell people is that, you know, once you get into this work far enough, you also start to meet all kinds of neat people that are doing all kinds of things. And there's 1000s, or millions of people. I mean, around the world, there's millions of people that are working on climate change issues, and all these different areas, and people are studying things, and they're building things. And it's really, there, it's really inspiring to be around some of this stuff. So that's an important message to get out to people it. Yes, it's a big issue. But there's a ton of people working on this, think of all the people even in the Los Angeles area that are going to work every day, on climate and public health and things like that. And so that's important. You know, one of my images is this, I call it the upside down pyramid. And people get really upside down, it's like this pyramid is like over the top of them pointing at them. And they have very little resources in this, the scope of the issue seems so huge, they just are crushed. And just naming that as an experiential thing that we feel that is important. Because that's validating for people. But then we say, You know what the reframe is, let's flip that pyramid on the ground. And let's put it on a base. And let's stand next to the base, like what do you need to do every day to take care of yourself? So it brings the conversation back to basic self care, what are the bricks in your foundation, diet, sleep, exercise, your family, your work? And let's focus on that. And let's build some organic energy. So you can work on some of these issues, you know, some of it is, that's a kind of a stabilizing thing that I would do. And a big culprit here is media use and media intake, people get really immersed in the news. And of course, with the pandemic, and with the war in Ukraine, there's so many things out there that are troubling, and that there's nothing wrong with being an informed person. There's nothing inherently wrong with news media in itself, but it's the overwhelming immersion in it that really, really affects people's nervous system. So I'll often say let's, let's do a bit of a news. Let's look at your news diet, because it's usually lurking there. And let's let's let's think about where you went where and how and when you're accessing news, particularly digital news, news on your phone. And, you know, like, Henry David Thoreau would have said, you know, a few 100 years ago, you know, like, the news is your life like that, like go outside the door. And that's the news. So I help also help people to get into more into their daily life and pulled out of the news and that, that will very quickly help help our nervous system to change a little bit. So some of that, that overwhelming, apocalyptic thing is kind of a perception that happens when we're really jacked up and have a stress and a fight or flight response. And so, these are truth threats and we don't want to again sugarcoat things, but our perception of them can really change, if we can kind of pull ourselves together and come down into the present moment. So it is it is, again, it's this, this this process, and it's engaging, you know, bearing witness and sitting through it, when people are really, you know, really impacted we have we feel it, you know, so there's, we have to take care of ourselves well, because then we get the compassion fatigue kind of issue that can happen as well.   Curt Widhalm  30:29 Moving beyond the individual that, you know, a lot of what we look at systemically is individual reactions to systemic problems. I'm sure that there are clients that want to get involved in more activism type things that help to take this on in a broader way. What kinds of things do you find yourself suggesting to clients is maybe taking this beyond kind of their own individual reactions to the world going on around them?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  31:00 Yeah, and that's a huge piece, because we get so many messages to do action and to take to take action and people feel, you know, again, people are like climate hostages, I say, because we're in this big system, but we really can't affect what the US Senate does, or what corporations do. And so it does feel people are trapped. But it does feel good to take action. And so it really it really, it's kind of a bespoke kind of custom approach to each person, like, who are you? Where are you? What, what kind of actions would you do? Where are you placed so it really becomes a conversation. You know, there's a front line there of direct action, you know, terms on picket lines around the protest lines, and there's about behind the lines, where people are doing all kinds of other things, websites, and fundraising and research and helping the community. And so it really freeing people up to say, Well, where do you fit on that spectrum? And what what are you drawn to? What are you curious about some of it is education, like, you know, we might just need you're curious about a certain area, well, then maybe just educating yourself about it, it's, it's kind of, beyond the kind of simplistic, you know, these are 10 things you can do for the environment, you know, helping people to find something that's, you know, authentic to themselves, they can do for a while that fits into their, their gift. And then there are, there's, there is a basic sense of sustainability, that's good for therapists to know, it is, you know, making major life changes about how you get your power in your home, or how many cars that you own, or your diet, or how many children you have, these are the big ticket items that do do affect our carbon footprint. And so trying to, you know, just educate people, they can make their own choices, obviously, and it's not that easy to say, install solar panels on your house or do whatever, because it depends on how much money people have, and whatever. So we don't want to shame people or guilt people. But we do want to give them some good information. So if you do want to make changes, you know, your light bulbs are less important than whether you have an efficient water heater, you know, that kind of thing. So there are some basic sort of sustainability, things to know about. But in terms of the climate, that's a large, it's a life thing, like in all of our life. For the rest of our lives, climate change is going to be an issue. So it's like engaging with something like poverty or injustice, it's something that we're going to we can engage with in various ways through our life. And when people are younger, they might be more on the frontline. You know, when you want to encourage people we need, we need people on the front line. And if you're a frontline person, let's let's get you there. I was a frontline person when I was younger, now I'm a parent and I'm more of doing other things. So you know, it's going to there's a you know, if we have future conversations, we there's a whole developmental thing here we can think about what elders and adults and parents that's a whole nother that's another lens to lay over this kind of thing that therapists are really good at. But in the short run the the the action is something that it's authentic for you. And you might already be doing enough. You know, you if you're a parent and you're working, you might be doing enough, you know, that's the other message to give people ultimately, in a good in a good world, experts in government are going to be dealing with this kind of stuff, not your average person. So that's where we're trying to go go with this as well. So I do want to liberate people a little bit to say, you know, you don't you might be doing enough right now. And that could be that might be important for people to hear.   Katie Vernoy  34:34 To that point. I think there's kind of an implied knowledge that I don't know that I have exactly, and maybe you can direct me specifically to some reputable resources. But as far as you know, kind of the basic sustainability those types of things are there go to resources that you would recommend to make sure to kind of do a self assessment around basic sustainability.   Dr. Thomas Doherty  35:01 That's a good question. The first place I think about in broad terms is Project Drawdown, which is a organization and an linkages of a bunch of people that are really working on, you know, a comprehensive approach to climate change. And the Drawdown website is just a wealth of information, it can be a bit, you know, there's a lot of different areas there. But if you really want to kind of see a comprehensive approach to climate change across society, in different areas, and styles, that's, that's the kind of the place to go. And it's also can be actually inspiring to see all the things that people are doing, I think, each state, if you look at each, each state, I mean, in terms of state departments, you know, the sustainability county, city, I think that's also a good place, you know, check out what's happening in your region, because then it makes it more local. So whatever town like, you know, because I think that's, that's a place where you can start say, Oh, wow, this is my, my territory, and people are working. So that's, that has a social aspect to it as well.   Curt Widhalm  36:06 Any last suggestions as far as ways that therapists can incorporate more climate awareness in their practices with their clients?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  36:16 Yeah, I think as therapists, again, all of you, you've both been therapists, for all the people that are listening, you know, if you've practiced enough new things come onto the scene, and we learn about them, you learn about new therapy modalities, you learn about how to do how to work with different kinds of clients. And so I would encourage therapists to just make space in their repertoire, to start bringing these and just experiment with it. It's not, it's okay to ask some of these questions and do some learning and practice. And so I think that's probably the as therapist, I think, are careful. And they don't want to work outside of their comfort zone or outside of their competency. And so that sometimes holds the field back, I think, from doing innovative things. And so I would encourage therapists to surface some of these questions in their work and share selectively maybe some self disclosure about what they're doing. And just experiment and just see which clients it lands for. Because it could open up some, it could open up some interesting conversations, you'd be surprised. And if people have other things they're focused on, and this, you know, environmental climate isn't the thing, that's perfectly fine, too. But I'd encourage people to experiment with this, because therapists have all these tools to bear, they don't have to learn a lot of new stuff. If you already know how to help people with anxiety about work and social anxiety you can, you can also help people with their anxiety around environmental and climate issues as well. So I'd encourage people to just to add, add a line in their repertoire about this and to see, see what happens.   Curt Widhalm  37:46 This doesn't have to be in your face sort of stuff. One of the things that I appreciate from your website is even putting things like bus lines that are close enough to your office that are accessible for people that can be front of mind sort of things that this does not have to be necessarily explicitly thrown at every single client. But even just kind of when you're considering this. I mean, no, not every office location is going to have these kinds of things. But ways of just kind of also leading by example seems to be right.   Dr. Thomas Doherty  38:19 Yeah. And Curt, that you're speaking to sort of like a green business, and so we can think about our practices as a business. And is it? Is it a sustainable business? Is that a green business? And so that's another angle for therapists, even if they're, even if they're dealing with another specialty, you know, maybe they're dealing with pediatric mental health issues, or ADHD or whatever that isn't it is, but doesn't, it doesn't mean they still can't think of their life, their own lifestyle, their own practice in a sustainable manner as well.   Katie Vernoy  38:50 Thank you so much. This has been really, really helpful, a great conversation that I feel like we've just started, where can people find you and learn more about the work that you're doing?   Dr. Thomas Doherty  38:59 Yeah, yeah. Thanks, Katie. I really appreciate the conversation too. Well, people can find me, my my website, selfsustained.com. And my podcast is climatechangeandhappiness.com. And if therapists are interested in some of the training that I'm doing, you can find information about my consultation groups at selfsustained.com. This is an adventure things are going to be growing and changing. Even this year, I'm looking at the different writing and different kinds of ways to maybe do groups that can reach people outside of my region. So yeah, please seek me out and I'd be happy to happy to chat with people.   Curt Widhalm  39:40 And we will include links to those in our show notes. You can find those over at mtsgpodcast.com. And please also follow us on our social media, join our Facebook group, The Modern Therapist Group to continue this conversation and share ways that you are addressing this in your practices as well, and until next time, I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy and Dr. Thomas Doherty.   Katie Vernoy  40:05 Thanks again to our sponsor Thrizer.   Curt Widhalm  40:07 Thrizer is a new billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible and clinicians should earn what they are worth every time you build a client through Thrizer. An insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the clients insurance from their Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursements quickly directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by cheque confusion around benefits and obscurity with reimbursement status. They allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It's very quick to get set up and it works great in complement with EHR systems.   Katie Vernoy  40:47 Their team is super helpful and responsive and the founder is actually a long term therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times. Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention, money won't be the reason they quit therapy. If you want to test Thrizer completely risk free our very special link is bit.ly/moderntherapists. You sign up for Thrizer with the code moderntherapists you will get one month of no payment processing fees meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time.   Curt Widhalm  41:22 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.   Katie Vernoy  41:28 Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media? Check out the How to Win at Social Media, Even with No Budget course from marketing expert Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand. It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising. Melissa will walk you step by step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.   Curt Widhalm  41:56 How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the 1000s. But to make it accessible to small businesses it is available for only $247. Plus, as a listener of The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide you can use the promo code therapy to get 10% off. So if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, click the link in our show notes over at mtsgpodcast.com and sign up for the How to Win at Social Media course today.   Announcer  42:29 Thank you for listening to the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. Learn more about who we are and what we do at mtsgpodcast.com. You can also join us on Facebook and Twitter. And please don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss any of our episodes.

Therapists Are Not Robots: How We Can Show Humanity in the Room Curt and Katie discuss how big life events (a big diagnosis, a huge personal loss, injuries and medical conditions) can show up in the room. We explore how much humanity is okay to share with our clients. How do we decide what we tell our clients (and how do we manage their reactions)? We also look at how we take care of ourselves while also taking care of our clients. Therapists aren't robots, but we certainly need to be aware of our clients when life happens.  In this podcast episode we talk about appropriate self-disclosure practices for modern therapists going through life events As therapists it's important that we hold a professional exterior during therapy. But can it be helpful to share with clients the big moments in our lives? How can we be human in the room? What are some considerations for therapists when deciding to self-disclose? Showing your humanity can help bond a client with the therapist. Self-disclosure may be different for planned or unplanned life events and whether they come into the room or private/hidden and in the background of your life Deciding when and whether to tell clients Clients often will use the therapist as an example on how to handle big life events. Not all settings are appropriate for therapist disclosure. Clients do not have the same confidentiality requirements as therapists; if you self-disclose to a client, it could be known by others or other treatment team members. In self-disclosing, the therapist will need to process the disclosure with the client. Processing difficult personal material with multiple clients could be difficult for the therapist. How much you disclose will depend on the client, but you might share more with a long-term client than a newer client. “In evaluating both the psychotherapy relationship and the actual relationship you have; I'd guess you'd probably be looking at some of the clients and how long you working with them as a part of the decision-making process. If it's a brand-new client, it's probably not a great thing to say ‘hey I'm going through this super emotional and vulnerable thing on my own right now.'  It's a lot different if this is a long-term client you've been with for several years” - Curt Widhalm Are there ethical considerations for therapists sharing about our lives? There are no BBS outlined ethical considerations for sharing personal disclosures in therapy. The therapeutic environment should encourage a client to question the therapist. The therapeutic environment should encourage clients to participate in self-advocacy. Remember that certain self-disclosures might be triggering for clients; be mindful of what you share with who. Document all ruptures in relationships in your note and what you did to help heal the rupture. Be mindful - clients could be retraumatized or try to care take after a therapist's disclosure. Not all clients need to know everything; know your population. “We harm the client if we don't acknowledge, we don't apologize, we don't repair. If we try to pretend something didn't happen, that's where we can get into trouble and that's when we get in trouble.” – Katie Vernoy What should new counselors and therapists know? Therapists are human! Life will continue to affect you even while working. It is important for therapists to take time off when they need it. Ruptures in the therapeutic relationship will happen; it's all about how you handle it. New counselors often want hard rules for how to act, but it gets easier with experience. The most damage happens from not acknowledging or apologizing for ruptures. When ruptures occur, be honest and accountable to your clients. Sharing our human moments with clients can create a deeper and richer relationship. Don't forget you don't have to do this alone – always consult if unsure on disclosures! Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Thrizer Thrizer is a new modern billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible AND clinicians should earn what they are worth. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer, you can potentially save them hundreds every month, with no extra work on your end. Every time you bill a client through Thrizer, an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the client's insurance. From there, Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursement quickly, directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by check, confusion around benefits, and obscurity with reimbursement status, they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It is very quick to get set up and it works great in completement with EHR systems. Their team is super helpful and responsive, and the founder is actually a long-time therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee! Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit on therapy. Sign up using THIS LINK if you want to test Thrizer completely risk free! Sign up for Thrizer with code 'moderntherapists' for 1 month of no credit card fees or payment processing fees! That's right - you will get one month of no payment processing fees, meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time! Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing Today's episode of The Therapy Reimagined podcast is brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing. Melissa is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources.  Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media?  Check out the “How to Win at Social Media (even with no budget!)” course from marketing expert, Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand.  It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising.  Melissa will work you step-by-step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.  How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the thousands, but to make it accessible to small businesses, it is available for only $247.  PLUS, as a listener of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, you can use promo code THERAPY to get 10% off.  So, if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, click THIS LINK and sign up for the How to Win at Social Media course today! Please note that Therapy Reimagined/The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Podcast is a paid affiliate for Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing, so we will get a little bit of money in our pockets if you sign up using our link. Thank you in advance!  Support The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide on Patreon! If you love our content and would like to bring the conversations deeper, please support us on our Patreon. For as little as $2 per month we're able to bring you more content, exclusive offerings, and more opportunities to engage in our growing modern therapist community. These contributions help us to expand our offerings for continuing education events and a whole lot more. If you don't think you can make a monthly contribution – no worries – we also have a buy me a coffee profile for one-time donations support us at whatever level you can today it really helps us out. You can find us at patreon.com/mtsgpodcast or buymeacoffee.com/moderntherapist. Thanks everyone. Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Struggles of the Novice Counselor and Therapist  by Thomas M. Skovholt and Michael H. Rønnestad Abstract: Shared Trauma: The Therapist's Increased Vulnerability by Dr. Karen W. Saakvitne Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Impaired Therapists When is it Discrimination? Navigating Pregnancy as a Therapist Infertility and Pregnancy Loss Document Every F*cking Thing  Getting Personal to Advocate for Compassion, Understand, and Social Justice: An Interview with James Guay, LMFT Walk & Talk and Other Non-Traditional Therapy Settings: Part One Walk & Talk and Other Non-Traditional Therapy Settings: Part Two Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/ Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated):   Katie Vernoy  00:00 Thrizer is a modern billing platform for private pay therapists, their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer you can potentially save them hundreds every month with no extra work on your end. The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee. By using the link in the show notes, you can get a month of billing without processing fees just to test them out for your clients.   Curt Widhalm  00:26 Listen at the end of the episode for more information.   Katie Vernoy  00:30 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing   Curt Widhalm  00:35 Melissa Forziat is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources, including the very special course How to Win at Social Media, Even With No Budget. Stay tuned to the end of the episode to learn how you can get the most from social media marketing, even with little to no budget.   Announcer  00:55 You're listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, where therapists live, breathe and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy.   Curt Widhalm  01:08 Welcome back modern therapists. This is The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy. And this is the podcast about all things therapists for therapists the things that we do how we are in the world. And today's episode is about our humanity, of the things that come up in our personal lives that may end up affecting the things that we relate to clients. And we've touched on this in a number of episodes before but potentially having a little bit more nuanced conversation here today. This is a topic that's been discussed in the literature for quite a while. And Katie and I have heard varying pieces of advice, we've given different advice. And I think that we're going to summarize this a little bit later in the episode. As we're going into this, Katie when you think of humanity, at least from the therapist side, what comes up for you?   Katie Vernoy  02:12 A lot of things come up. I mean, when I first started as a clinician, I talked with a supervisor about some of this stuff about being a human about things that come up. And at one point I was I was having physical ailments, that meant that there were times I may not be able to stay present in the session, and even in talking about how to manage that, you know, I'm sorry, I got to quickly take care of something and another room, you know, whatever it was there always felt like and this was obviously like 20 years ago, there was always this thing of trying to hide anything that might be bothering me physically wrong with me anything that was happening to me and so I have that element of it, which is like okay, you know, the the training on the blank slate and and being completely neutral in session, which we've talked about a million times around, that that's just can't exist. And we'll we'll link to a lot of these episodes in the show notes. But then I also reflect on how much time I spent in kind of mileu settings at client's homes. We even talked about some of this in the non traditional therapy settings episodes related to walking and falling down or having some of those situations. And so to me, being someone who's had life happen over the last 20 years, and we'll talk about some recent stuff as well, as well as someone who's got physical ailments. And is just super clumsy. I show up as me in session all the time. And that's not something that I can hide. And so I'm looking forward to this conversation today. Because I think it's something where a lot of therapists struggle with sorting through how much humanity can they bring into the room or into the relationship and I something, I feel like I've managed until recently, and I feel like I'm grappling with it again. And so it's a tough one.   Curt Widhalm  04:18 The framework that we're gonna follow here in our episode is from an article from apaservices.org, called occupational vulnerability for psychologists. This was prepared by Karen Saakvitne, I'm hoping that I pronounced that right. And this is from 2008. I think it holds up still pretty well. And speaking to some of the nuance of we're humans in this fields that we are going to have like things that come up things that are going to affect our work, things that are going to affect ourselves and potentially impact our clients. This is a proposed framework that looks at a lot of different dynamic factors that I think it helps to maybe frame this, as I think a lot of the advice that we get early on in our career is, err towards that blank slate side.   Katie Vernoy  05:19 Sure.   Curt Widhalm  05:20 And it's potentially because there's maybe a belief that new therapists don't know what they're doing. And therefore, they're safer advice in not risking sharing too much in order to not put an emotional load onto clients. I'm also going to make a suggestion that there's probably some patriarchal gender bias in that that a lot of theories and stuff are based out of men who are socialized to not share a lot of emotions, that having even more straightforward rules of not sharing things. And it doesn't surprise me that potentially over the last 30 or so years, as the demographics of our field have shifted, that the conversation around this has shifted. And, and I think that it's probably more likely that those who practice in settings like Katie was describing those who practice for more humanistic models or social justice oriented models might be more open to sharing things. First and foremost, I think that we have to talk about you as the individual, and you as the individual therapist, and that's what's outlined first here in this APA article, we each have our own personal histories. And that is going to affect a lot of things, it's going to affect our choice of where to work, the clients that we work with how we work. And part of it's really just taking ownership of yourself first.   Katie Vernoy  06:54 When when we're talking about our personal histories, I think they're the things that we're still working on and need to be aware of, and continue to show up for ourselves, whether it's in our own therapy or in other things, there are things that are in our personal history, or part of who we are now, that may may may lead us to be impaired. And we have a whole episode on impaired therapist, so I won't go there. But there's that argument that some folks have that if we can't be perfectly healed, we shouldn't work with any clients. And I think that we can still be impacted by our personal histories and work with our clients.   Curt Widhalm  07:31 Sure.   Katie Vernoy  07:32 The nuance is determining does that impact which clients you take? So some of it may be about whether or not we can kind of curate our clients to be able to support who we are competently, confidently able to work with? We go into some of that nuance in Is it Discrimination that episode as well. But to me, I think that acknowledging and being very aware of ourselves, helps us with some of this personal history stuff.   Curt Widhalm  08:00 This takes a lot of our own internal process in order to get to that point. And I think that, you know, this is something where we are not as a field, very good at encouraging emotional discussion, from therapists from, you know, trainees from supervisees, that if you over share in therapy, then or in supervision, then you're going to be seen as not predictable enough. But if you under prepared, then, you know, you're at least going to be towards that blank slate end of things. And that's at least going to make things nice for clients. But how often do we hear from each other and from our audience as far as just like, oh, some of those vulnerability sort of things are what actually humanized you and made me want to work with you more. There's such a gatekeeping process around emotions just that are allowed to even come up. And it's that we're not taught how to reflexively demonstrate those in supervision that can then have some sort of an enactment in our therapy sessions that teaches us how to do this well. And so we get kind of this vague advice of like, you know, go and do your own work, go and go to therapy, figure your stuff out, when really, some of this stuff could be modeled a little bit better in the way that we teach people of like, here's, here's the how of how you show up. I think we're focused too much on like, the what, of what you're allowed to say, and therefore it becomes kind of restrictive rather than supportive in this process.   Katie Vernoy  09:51 We've gone through that supervision relationship and these things and other episodes and I think there's there's so much nuance there that we can't dive deeply into that. But I think kind of summarizing that point, I think we're saying know what, what impacts you have emotional conversations, get consultation or supervision that allows that to happen. And and be aware that you can't avoid it. And so if we move on to other elements of things that could be vulnerable in session, we're really looking at what's happening now. Right, like the things that happen as they go along. And I think those things are harder, because sometimes they can be predicted, like we had a conversation on, you know, pregnancy, and therapists preparing for that, and subsequent episodes around pregnancy loss and those kinds of things. But I think it's something where we've talked about predictable things. But there are also things that are very unpredictable that can happen in our lives, family emergencies, I recently had a personal family emergency, and a death in my family. And so I've been recently dealing with something that's very sudden, very surprising that I've had to then navigate with my clients. And I think, to me, what was surprising about it is this is I think, one of the most impactful things that has happened in my life. And I had had other deaths happen while I was a therapist, I've had, you know, my own fertility journey as a therapist, I've had so many things, but this one was surprising because in trying to be present, I had to navigate different elements of my relationships with my clients. And to me, I think, it felt a little bit like I was starting fresh. And so I know you've had other big things happen in your life as well, I think we've mentioned in previous episodes that you had a major bicycle accident, what was your experience in trying to navigate those things, because I think when we can prepare for it, when we know when it's something we're bringing to the table, I think we have, although not enough guidance, we have some guidance. But when there's something all of a sudden that happens in our lives that deeply impact us, I think that's where it becomes much harder, because we're so human, in those moments.   Curt Widhalm  12:03 It definitely brings up the humanity, and those things that are hidden, the relational things, the grieving things that you're talking about. And then they're the things that absolutely make it into the room, you know, my bike accident, I had my jaw wired, I've had other surgeries in the time where I've had, you know, bandages on my hands that are obviously different things from the last time that I've seen people, and this comes down to personality and work styles too is, you know, I'm somebody that, hey, alright, you're bringing it up, let's talk about it. Or I know that you're the kind of person who's gonna bring it up. So I'm gonna bring it up at first just to kind of alleviate the discussion about it as much as possible. And it's kind of with that reassurance of like, I'm alright, I'm getting treated for this, this is me showing up in my humanity, that the vast majority of my clients were like, Oh, you're not making a big deal about it, we'll spend a couple of minutes and then move on with our lives, I think it's a lot harder when it comes to those hidden or covert sort of things that are going on in our lives. With those particular things all of my clients could see what was going on with me, it's some of the other things that they can't see, they fill out the rest of my life, I'm okay talking about it now. But several years ago, I got a phone call from my wife right before going into sessions. And she said, hey, the test results are back and I have cancer. Not having really the opportunity to process that, on my own time, even before going into sessions. But it's something that I really didn't share with clients until after her treatment was over. That it was something that my population didn't really have the need to know that, that if I had to rearrange appointments to you know, to help be a part of treatment, or any of those kinds of things. It was just kind of business as usual, as far as my clients were considered and it wasn't so much a, you know, super conscious, like, I'm not wanting to talk about this. It was more of a selective like, this really doesn't impact my clients right now.   Katie Vernoy  14:21 Yeah, when I got the call recently, I knew I needed to cancel everything for the next couple of days. And I basically just cancelled and said I'm there's a family emergency I'm dealing with. And so there were folks that knew was an emergency. And then there was also folks who were scheduled who I sent out an email or a text or those kinds of things, saying that I had an unexpected death in the family. And I only told folks who were scheduled or trying to schedule in those weeks. And that felt very strange to me, because those folks there's a conversation about it. It is one of those things that's a little bit more private. I don't know hidden or covert sounds like I'm trying to purpose had something but it's something that's more private, where me grieving and going through that is not something that necessarily is relevant to my clients, as long as I am paying attention to my own level of competence and being able to be present for my clients. But it's interesting because there's, I'm seeing the difference between the clients who know, and the clients who don't. And I, I feel like as a therapist, I'm present, and I'm taking care of myself, but for the clients who know. And some clients know exactly, you know, not exactly what happened, but more detail than others, just depending on the relationship. And that was more in the conversations, but I'm finding clients checking in with me, I'm, you know, there are definitely clients who this has brought stuff up for them, which is not necessarily certainly something that I want to process with them. I feel like I know my limits of capacity there, I don't want to be processing this major loss with my clients. And I also understand that they may have their own stuff that I'm trying to figure out how to help them process. But I'm also finding with some of my clients that they're wanting to check in. And they're seeing this as an example of how to manage a big loss. And so I'm talking about structure and meaningful activity is helpful to me, and I'm making sure to pay attention to my energy, and I'm focusing in on this, and this is how I'm doing it, and I'm okay. But this is clearly a loss, that's going to be hugely impactful. It's life changing. And some of them know what that is. And so I've had clients get teary, actually start crying, there was times when I've had to redirect because they feel like, well, but what I'm bringing to you isn't even as important as what you just are going through. So how do I even be, you know, how do I even be a client here? And I've been able to successfully redirect those clients. But I, I feel like it's been such an interesting process, because I'm having such a wide array of experiences in navigating this. All the while, grieving and trying to sort out how do I be a therapist during this time, and I feel like I'm doing it, okay. But I also, this is a traumatic loss, this is something that I don't even know what's going on for myself, and so. So it's really, it's really interesting.   Curt Widhalm  17:11 So a couple of things from the APA article that you're highlighting here is, in evaluating both the psychotherapy relationship, that the actual relationship that you have, I would guess that you're probably looking at some of the clients and how long you've been working with them as part of this decision making process. Like if there's a brand new client, like, not a great thing to just be like, Hey, I'm going through this super emotional vulnerable thing on my own right now, it's a lot different if this is a long term client that you've been with for several years, part of it's, you know, as you know, some of the clients that if this is going to be something that, you know, potentially as a possibility of triggering, or re traumatizing them about something going on in their lives, that you're gonna be a lot more selective about.   Katie Vernoy  18:06 Yes, and I think that it's interesting, because I did have, I've had some newer clients that I've had to navigate this with, who I did have to cancel knew that there was a loss, and I was able to do it at a very high level, where it's like, I'm okay, I'm managing it, this is how I'm taking care of myself, and we moved on, whereas longer term clients are more interested in exactly what happened and taking care of me. I think the other thing, and this is in this article is the clients who typically seek me out, you know, we've talked about I do sacrificial helping syndrome and, and I have caregivers. And so I also was very aware through this process and continue to be aware that there are some of my clients that will want to take care of me, because that's why they came for therapy. And so I'm, I'm trying to very actively engage in some of that dynamic with them, to help them to see how they get their needs met, how I'm taking care of myself, and being able to do that, because it's, it just it's very interesting to be able to sort this out. But it's, it is very much case by case for my clients.   Curt Widhalm  19:13 And, you know, part of what we also have to talk about here is you and I both work in private practices that can tend to be more intimate just in their expectations. It's potentially different than higher need work settings where some of the vulnerabilities just might not be as appropriate, just due to the needs level of clients in those particular situations.   Katie Vernoy  19:45 And I think with those situations, oftentimes when I've had bereavement or other kind of big things going on in my life, I had, you know, 27 clinicians who could take on each one of my cases and have that covered. And it was something where there was structure set in place for there to be a full treatment team and other people available now. Everybody's overwhelmed and busy. So that's never a good plan. But But there wasn't something where it's like I see them, or I have a colleague who has a little bit of capacity who could potentially see them or be available to them. And they're not likely to actually take me up on it, it's it's that planning is very different in private practice versus an agency because in an agency, there are a lot of other people that have their eyes on the case.   Curt Widhalm  20:36 Part of this speaks to just kind of the roles that we have, as you're demonstrating here that, you know, if you're in those case managers situations, you can step in, you can assign other people to it, that there's a universality of experiencing vulnerability, there is not a universality of how to handle it, especially with these unexpected situations that arise. That kind of nuance is what's sorely lacking in the way that we talk about this in our fields, because we tend to, especially earlier in our careers want nice, structured here's, you know how the answers are. And the longer that we practice, the more that we understand kind of the it depends of the situations and that it depends isn't necessarily the same from one client to the next. Now, some of the risks that come along with that, though, is that what you're talking about your clients are not bound to the same confidentiality that you are. And another, you know, consideration just as far as your workplace goes, it's just going to be that one person finds out whether it's another staff member, whether it's a client, potentially everyone knows, even if it's not something that you necessarily know that some of your other clients can and should be aware of.   Katie Vernoy  22:00 With social media, and all of those things like I typically am fairly private, but I have been a little bit more open sharing obituaries, for example, or the things that are going on, I still try to keep it with just friends, but you know, friends of friends and screenshots and all that kind of stuff. And so I think it is important to remain aware of those things. And it is important to, to continue to kind of take care of myself within those things. Because a client may pop up and say, Hey, I heard about death in your family. Why didn't you tell me and I, I honestly am trying to both take care of myself and my clients in doing so because any moment of talking about the death in my session can be clinically appropriate, but maybe more challenging for me to be able to refocus on the session. And so it's it's a weird, it's a weird balance that I'm trying to strike. And it's said in this context of in society, especially Western society, US society, we don't know how to manage grief as it is there's expectations either that you were destroyed and can't do anything, or that you are out for three days, and then back to work with no problems, or anywhere in between. But the nuances of this becomes very hard to navigate. And different clients know different things. There's stuff publicly that people can find. And there's also the strangeness of the relationship as a therapist with a client on what actually is in that relationship. What do we what do we owe our clients? What information do they need to know how well do they need to know us? And that's also an it depends based on client by client. But it's, it's just such a strange thing to navigate. Because there's not I don't think there's clear guidance as society on how we talk about these things much less, as therapists we're supposed to have this higher level of functioning, because we have to take care of our clients.   Curt Widhalm  23:56 You know, kind of one last point is as far as how we're talking about the way that this is expressed in early career clinicians. Skovholt and Ronnnestad had a 2003 write up that talks about how novice counselor struggled to find the balance between porous and rigid emotional boundaries. New counselors try to work on that balance between rigidity and under involvement with the client and softness and over involvement with the client. And I think that part of this is, again towards that, when in doubt, be safe. But as you're highlighting here, there's a lot of just other available information about us. I think as we become more seasoned in our work, and part of this as some of these things end up happening and coming up, we get better at handling the awkwardness of situations when clients who might not want this information might not be ready to handle this kind of information about us that we get better handling those ambivalent situations that could be therapeutic ruptures, if it wasn't handled gracefully, or in those times when it's not, that we're better at being human in our responsiveness to some of those mistakes.   Katie Vernoy  25:18 I really want to highlight the rupture element, because I think that there are times, you know, being a therapist for 20 years, or more than 20 years at this point, there have been ruptures based on my own humanity. And there certainly have been things where I've not been able to be as present for my clients, because what's going on with me. To really highlight the point you just made, I think there's that element of, we can be human, there are times when our humanity is going to mean that we are doing unethical or illegal work, you know, and so we have to do the best that we can to not show the humanity in that way. You know, that's the impaired therapists thing. That's the the other episodes that talk about that element. But but there are times when my physical health has not been up to snuff. And I've not had the spoons or the bandwidth to be able to interact appropriately with clients and have had and said things that were not helpful. Sometimes they actually were disruptive. And we can reach back to the the notes episode on on documenting things that are disruptive, because you're overwhelmed. To me, if you are unable to be fully present and vulnerable and recognize within yourself. This was about me. And is that okay with a client? And if not, how do I get to a place where I can actually process that with them, and be available to them in a way that's helpful. I think that's where we get in trouble, we harm the client, if we don't acknowledge if we don't apologize, if we don't repair, if we try to pretend something didn't happen, I think that's, that's where we can get into trouble. And that's where we can actually be harmful. But there will be ruptures based on our humanity, hopefully not gigantic ruptures. And certainly if your humanity is your drunk in session, or you're sleeping with your clients, no, thank you. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about you're grieving or you're worried or you're jacked up on hormones, or whatever it is, that is going on that means you need to be extra aware, extra available to your clients and have the conversation with your clients of, if I'm doing something that's not helpful, or you're not sure what's going on, in how we're interacting, let me know and actually seek that feedback and have those open conversations. I think that's when the the blanket, don't share anything is more helpful. Because if you if you can't sit with clients telling you like, Hey, I didn't like your response to that, or you seem really spaced out right now, or, you know, your, the way that you're talking about these things don't make sense to me. If your clients can't say those things to you, you have to be more accountable to your humanity than if they can.   Curt Widhalm  28:04 And I like that you're bringing up the the ruptures can also happen in the absence of saying anything when your clients are picking up that there's something going on with you that you're not available that you're not, you know, following up on extra resources between sessions. Do you have any suggestions as far as like, when those clients do set up, like, Hey, I've been expecting more of you, you're not showing up or you might feel compelled to disclose something more than what you're prepared to share at that time?   Katie Vernoy  28:37 When I've had more of those types of conversations with clients. I mean, it always goes to it depends. There's been some clients where they've read into things that weren't there. And so I've talked about I'm sorry, I had a headache, you know, and it was, it was not something that was personal. It was, Hey, I didn't mean to do harm, I see what you're saying. And it really was a headache. And it's not some other thing that you're talking about. And that doesn't always work, like just kind of say like, Hey, it is something but not what you think let's move on. But recently, I had a client that disclosed something really personal to me that hadn't been shared in long standing client. And it was something where I had my own response to it. And I was kind of busy trying not to over emote about what I was hearing because I was so heartbroken for this client. And I was disconnected. And when this client reached out to me and said, Hey, I felt really invalidated because you were disconnected. We were able to have the conversation, I was able to say, hey, my intent was to take care of my own emotions in that situation. It was something where I was also exploring my own potential responsibility of not being able have you not feeling comfortable to share that with me prior. And now let me share with you my responses and what that gave was an opportunity for me to actually process through, and it was something where I was able to then say, hey, this was what was going on for me without it being so raw in the moment. But in truth, I think it's it's hard to have a blanket like if someone says, Hey, you're not present, you know what's going on with you, because I think there is so much nuance for some folks, it could be as simple as saying, like, Yeah, I've been, you know, really overwhelmed, or I've been working on something, and it was distracting to me, I apologize. Let me get back on track. For others it might be, what you're bringing up is something that really is very resonant for me. And so I'm working hard to manage my reaction so I can be present for you. And other folks, you know, like I said, there's clients that have asked what exactly happened, and how are you handling it. And I've been saying, like, this is what happened, this is what's going on. And this is how I'm handling it. And needed that true humanity and self disclosure that then allowed them not to kind of make up their own stories in their head about what I was doing and how I was taking care of myself. And so I don't think there's one answer, but I think being present to your clients in those situations and reaching out, and sometimes it's even like, Hey, you're having a reaction, what's going on? And then that gives them an opportunity to say, well, like, I didn't like what you just said, right there. You know? So I don't know if that answers your question completely. But I think it's that that element of being as present and human as possible in the room, recognizing that there is the therapist version of humanity that kind of sits there that that has some of these extra boundaries in place. So that you're not saying like, yeah, I, I'm really pissed at my spouse, or I'm, I'm having a moment, or I don't know that I want to be a therapist anymore, whatever that is, you know, I think there are things that we don't there's, there's humanity, we don't share with our clients. And there's humanity that if we can curate, that's maybe that's not the right word. But if we can thoughtfully and deliberately choose how we share our humanity with our clients and open ourselves to them being available to that, then we can, I think, have deeper richer relationships where clients feel truly heard and seen and connected.   Curt Widhalm  32:18 I think to maybe give you a direction to go here on this is, if you're going through something don't feel like you have to make the decisions yourself. You're allowed to be human but consultations, always great idea and get some other perspectives and join our modern therapist community and know that we have a pretty good following of people that understands thinks in very much similar ways to the way that Katie and I do and rely on those who have been there before to help you guide you through some of this process. You can find our show notes over at MTSGpodcast.com and you can also join our Facebook group the modern therapist group, follow us on social media. And until next time, I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy.   Katie Vernoy  33:17 Thanks again to our sponsor, Thrizer.   Curt Widhalm  33:21 Thrizer is a new billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible and clinician should earn what they are worth every time you bill a client through Thrizer, an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the clients insurance. From their Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursements quickly directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by cheque, confusion around benefits and obscurity with reimbursement status they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It's very quick to get set up and it works great in complement with EHR systems.   Katie Vernoy  33:59 Their team is super helpful and responsive and the founder is actually a long term therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit therapy. Our very special link for Thrizer is bit.ly/moderntherapists you sign up for Thrizer with the code moderntherapists you will get one month of no payment processing fees meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time.   Curt Widhalm  34:32 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.   Katie Vernoy  34:37 Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media? Check out the How To Win at Social Media, Even with No Budget course from marketing expert Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand. It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising. Melissa will work you step by step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.   Curt Widhalm  35:07 How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the 1000s. But to make it accessible to small businesses it is available for only $247. Plus, as a listener of The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, you can use the promo code THERAPY to get 10% off. So if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, click the link in our show notes over at MTSGpodcast.com and sign up for the How to Win at Social Media course today.   Announcer  35:39 Thank you for listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. Learn more about who we are and what we do at MTSGpodcast.com. You can also join us on Facebook and Twitter. And please don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss any of our episodes.

What You Should Know About Walk and Talk Therapy and Other Non-Traditional Counseling Settings – Part 2 Curt and Katie chat about non-traditional therapy settings like outdoor walk and talk therapy as well as home-based counseling. In the second of a two-part, continuing education podcourse series, we look at law and ethics, accessibility, informed consent, navigating confidentiality, dual relationships, and what therapist might want to consider before getting started. In this continuing education podcast episode, we look at the laws and ethics related to non-traditional therapy settings For our fourth CE-worthy podcourse, we're looking at the laws and ethics of bringing therapy into non-traditional settings, including walk and talk therapy and home visits. We cover a lot of topics in this episode: Debunking the hesitations of using non-traditional therapy settings Minimizing liability and concerns related to these environments Is it unethical to not consider these environments? Access and payment, including insurance/managed health care concerns and fee setting Unpredictability in the environment Scheduling and permission for services Business practices and systems that support this type of dynamic practice Accessibility of walk & talk and home-based therapies Financial, physical or other types of accessibility (and navigating those) Ways to make sure you clients can access the service and are prepared for the environment Extending boundaries and the consequences of these situations Documentation of any concerns that arise Clinician comfort and preference, do no harm, and do good Informed Consent for non-traditional therapies Client choice and appropriateness, including informed opt-in (and opt out) Health conditions, screening or attestation related to risk and liability Clinician safety and how to talk with your client about these concerns Cancellation policies and back up plans Ability to terminate (both passively and actively) Collaboration and communication Confidentiality when you're meeting outside of the therapy office Managing the risks of the limits of confidentiality in these other settings Collateral consent forms for additional members of the treatment Release forms for others in the home Co-creating the plan to manage these situations Ideas for how to explain the relationship, if needed Active and passive loss of confidentiality (and how to talk about these risks) Boundaries versus confidentiality (for example where in someone's home to meet) Documentation and consultation Dual Relationships that can happen during walk and talk or home-based therapies Professional therapy never includes sex Casual nature of the relationship in these settings and the threat of friendship vibes Not all dual relationships are problematic Host/guest dynamics as something to pay attention to, but not necessarily harmful Navigating the potential medical needs of home-bound clients (helping and/or advocating for more help) What therapists should assess before getting started Liability and malpractice Logistics and planning Assessing client vs clinician benefit Assessing competency for these types of services Training, consultation, supervision, documentation Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Thrizer Thrizer is a new modern billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible AND clinicians should earn what they are worth. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer, you can potentially save them hundreds every month, with no extra work on your end. Every time you bill a client through Thrizer, an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the client's insurance. From there, Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursement quickly, directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by check, confusion around benefits, and obscurity with reimbursement status, they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It is very quick to get set up and it works great in completement with EHR systems. Their team is super helpful and responsive, and the founder is actually a long-time therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee! Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit on therapy. Sign up using THIS LINK if you want to test Thrizer completely risk free! Sign up for Thrizer with code 'moderntherapists' for 1 month of no credit card fees or payment processing fees! That's right - you will get one month of no payment processing fees, meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time! Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing Today's episode of The Therapy Reimagined podcast is brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing. Melissa is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources.  Are you looking to boost your reach and get more clients from social media?  Check out the “How to Win at Social Media (even with no budget!)” course from marketing expert, Melissa Forziat. It can be so hard to get engagement on social media or to know what to post to tell the story of your brand.  It can be even harder to get those conversations to turn into new clients. Social media marketing isn't just for businesses that have a ton of money to spend on advertising.  Melissa will work you step-by-step through creating a smart plan that fits within your budget.  How to Win at Social Media is packed full of information. Usually a course as detailed as this would be priced in the thousands, but to make it accessible to small businesses, it is available for only $247.  PLUS, as a listener of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, you can use promo code THERAPY to get 10% off.  So, if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, click THIS LINK and sign up for the How to Win at Social Media course today! Please note that Therapy Reimagined/The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Podcast is a paid affiliate for Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing, so we will get a little bit of money in our pockets if you sign up using our link. Thank you in advance! Receive Continuing Education for this Episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Hey modern therapists, we're so excited to offer the opportunity for 1 unit of continuing education for this podcast episode – Therapy Reimagined is bringing you the Modern Therapist Learning Community!  Once you've listened to this episode, to get CE credit you just need to go to moderntherapistcommunity.com/podcourse, register for your free profile, purchase this course, pass the post-test, and complete the evaluation! Once that's all completed - you'll get a CE certificate in your profile or you can download it for your records. For our current list of CE approvals, check out moderntherapistcommunity.com. You can find this full course (including handouts and resources) here: Walk &Talk and Other Non-Traditional Therapy Settings Part 2 Continuing Education Approvals: When we are airing this podcast episode, we have the following CE approval. Please check back as we add other approval bodies: Continuing Education Information CAMFT CEPA: Therapy Reimagined is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists to sponsor continuing education for LMFTs, LPCCs, LCSWs, and LEPs (CAMFT CEPA provider #132270). Therapy Reimagined maintains responsibility for this program and its content. Courses meet the qualifications for the listed hours of continuing education credit for LMFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, and/or LEPs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences. We are working on additional provider approvals, but solely are able to provide CAMFT CEs at this time. Please check with your licensing body to ensure that they will accept this as an equivalent learning credit. Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Cooley, S. J., Jones, C. R., Moss, D., & Robertson, N. (2022). Organizational perspectives on outdoor talking therapy: Towards a position of “environmental safe uncertainty.” British Journal of Clinical Psychology, 61(1), 132–156. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjc.12315 Boland, K. M. (2019). Ethical Considerations for Providing In-Home Mental Health Services for Homebound Individuals. Ethics & Behavior, 29(4), 287–304. https://doi.org/10.1080/10508422.2018.1518138   For the full references list, please see the course on our learning platform.   Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Walk and Talk and Other Non-Traditional Therapy Settings Part 1 Field-Based Private Practice with Megan Costello, LMFT Dual Relationships: Pros and Cons The Balance Between Boundaries and Humanity (an interview with Dr. Jamie Marich)   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is a member of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists ethics committee, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University, lecturer in Counseling Laws and Ethics at California State University Northridge, a former Law & Ethics Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, and former CFO of CAMFT. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, with a Master's degree in Clinical Psychology from California State University, Fullerton and a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology and Theater from Occidental College in Los Angeles, California. Katie has always loved leadership and began stepping into management positions soon after gaining her license in 2005. Katie's experience spans many leadership and management roles in the mental health field: program coordinator, director, clinical supervisor, hiring manager, recruiter, and former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. Now in business for herself, Katie provides therapy, consultation, or business strategy to support leaders, visionaries, and helping professionals in pursuing their mission to help others. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: www.mtsgpodcast.com www.therapyreimagined.com www.moderntherapistcommunity.com Patreon Profile Buy Me A Coffee Profile https://www.facebook.com/therapyreimagined/ https://twitter.com/therapymovement https://www.instagram.com/therapyreimagined/ Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano http://www.crystalmangano.com/   Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated): Curt Widhalm  00:00 This episode of ModernTherapist's Survival Guide is brought to you by Thrizer.   Katie Vernoy  00:04 Thrizer is a modern billing platform for private pay therapists. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer you can potentially save them hundreds every month with no extra work on your end. The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee. By using the link in the show notes, you can get a month of billing without processing fees just to test them out for your clients.   Curt Widhalm  00:30 Listen at the end of the episode for more information.   Katie Vernoy  00:34 This episode is also brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.   Curt Widhalm  00:39 Melissa Forziat is a small business marketing expert who specializes in marketing advice for businesses that have limited resources, including the very special course How to Win at Social Media, Even with No Budget. Stay tuned to the end of the episode to learn how you can get the most from social media marketing, even with little to no budget.   Announcer  00:59 You're listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide where therapists live, breathe and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy.   Curt Widhalm  01:15 Hey modern therapists, we're so excited to offer the opportunity for one unit of continuing education for this podcast episode. Once you've listened to this episode, to get CE credit, you just need to go to moderntherapistcommunity.com, register for your free profile, purchase this course, pass the post test and complete the evaluation. Once that's all completed, you'll get a CE certificate in your profile, where you can download it for your records. For a current list of our CE approvals, check out moderntherapistcommunity.com.   Katie Vernoy  01:47 Once again, hop over to moderntherapistcommunity.com for one CE once you've listened. Woo hoo!   Curt Widhalm  01:54 Welcome back modern therapists. This is The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy and this is our second in a two part episodes for our CE content on doing therapy in non-traditional therapy settings. Part one was a lot about the logistics and clinical concerns. Part two, we are looking more at law and ethics concerns. We had made reference to a number of things as far as precautions to take. And if it's not written down, it's probably not something that you had thought about ahead of time or so the lawyers who are suing you would say. So, some of the concerns and stuff that we're going to talk about here today is about, you know, avoiding any liability, minimizing liability that we can take into this episode. So Katie, what are the most important things for us to talk about now? What are you hearing from some of the people who are consulting with you? And let's dive in from there.   Katie Vernoy  03:05 Sure. And just to clarify for folks that this is the first one I would recommend going back to the previous CE episode, it's kind of a 101 on what walk and talk and home based therapies are and clinical considerations, benefits and how to do it. So definitely check back to that one. The most important thing is that we think about what we're doing ethically. And that's kind of what this conversation is going to be about. But I think the first place to start is to look a little bit at why there's been such a hesitation around employing especially therapies like outdoor walk and talk kind of therapies. I think home based has been around for a while, but there's been hesitation just in any kind of non-traditional setting. And part of it really stems from provider anxiety, or kind of the rigidity that we can have around what therapy looks like. Is it just in my office in the safe space where I can control everything? And I think there's a lot of stereotypes around what therapy is. And one of the articles I was reading Cooley et all 2021 put together an article 'Organizational Perspectives on Outdoor Talking Therapy' in the British Journal of Clinical Psychology. Cooley's done a lot of these things. In looking at the systemic pushback on this, what they really posited is that we need to get to a place of environmental safe uncertainty. And what that means it's a position of openness, curiosity and collaboration regarding the therapy environment, including the possibility of other environments being more conducive to therapy, other environments meaning not the office. And that leads me to kind of the first point which is: Is it unethical not to consider these environments because they maybe more conducive to treatment, then sitting in your nice little office?   Curt Widhalm  05:06 We have talked about in some of our previous presentations about how much of our field is modeled around clinician comfort and clinician principles, rather than necessarily what's best for clients. And some of those are logistical concerns, you know, we can't always just, you know, stack six or seven clients in a day back to back if it means that we're having to also travel to different parts of a city or county or, you know, much further if you're working in rural practices. If what we're going to is kind of the core principles of have the first stance of like, do no harm, but our second stance is do good.   Katie Vernoy  05:47 Yeah, exactly.   Curt Widhalm  05:50 And, you know, this is that push pull between those two concepts. Is the environment of our office is one that is hopefully set up best for do no harm. And it's kind of in that good enough for like, doing good. Now, what I'm hearing is the aspirationally, doing best is doing therapy, where it's going to most benefit the client.   Katie Vernoy  06:18 Yes.   Curt Widhalm  06:19 And we do have, you know, some examples of this that, you know, for instance, Italy, as an example, here is a country that does not have mental hospitals. That it is about being able to work with people with mental illness, in the environments that they live, that kind of thrusts them into needing to have the right approaches to clinical intervention that leads them best into their day to day lives. On the other hand, we have America where we throw people in jail and ignore that mental illness might be a factor. And that's not today's episode.   Katie Vernoy  07:01 No, no. But I think that that really hits at the crux of the argument here, which is, there are people for whom home based or walk and talk therapy is the best form of treatment. And so the best way we get to a system that supports it is holding this environmental safe uncertainty, which is being able to be open and safely open to the idea that we can be in an uncertain environment. Another systemic concern, which I think gets in the way and dances around with some of our our ethics and laws, is payers and payment. Now, insurance coverage, you know, Medicaid, for those of you in the United States, oftentimes covers a lot of this stuff. But there are concerns around driving time, and is that billable? I know, we had a huge argument around that when I was completing mental health but if you are a private practitioner, and you're needing to then charge extra to drive to a client's home, for example, or do you on the flip side, decrease your fees, if you let go of your office, and you're only seeing people in these non traditional spaces. And it really puts this thing of around payment of are we being limited by payers, whether it's insurance payment, or how much someone can afford to pay on what treatments we can offer. And we at least there's a CAMFT ethics code three point eleven or 3.11, that says we actually have to tell people about options for treatment, even if their insurance company doesn't cover it.   Curt Widhalm  08:47 So much around payment is going to be in the: we charge for services that we actually provide. We let our consumers know what we're actually going to provide. So that way, they can opt into what is best for them. And that's going to take a couple of different forms here. Like you know, on one hand, you're talking about, you know, managed care system, but keep in mind that these ethics codes are written in a way that helps to maybe hit kind of the best catchment of every type of practice in being able to write them. And so, I'm going to start not with managed care systems here first, I'm gonna start with, you know, those private practices that are all cash payer or doing super bills. You might, you know, have a client where you say, alright, I can go and see you at your house. But it's also going to take me time to drive there. And this is roughly how long it's gonna take me to drive here. Here's my driving fee. You cannot put that driving time as session provided time on something like a super bill, those are actually two separate line items. And so this is that recommendation of charge appropriately for the services that you're providing, out what you're speaking to, and going back to the manage healthcare part of it is that drive time isn't an option. And so therefore, it kind of thrust some of the business practices to, if they're going to operate efficiently, maybe not allow for that kind of time to sit there in the middle. It is a possibility with maybe things like, you know, a private health insurance company that you can still tack on that drive time to those clients, that's just being able to get to a different service, insurance probably isn't going to reimburse it. But I think that, you know, in my limited knowledge of some of the federal health care systems, I don't think that that's going to be an option there.   Katie Vernoy  11:01 Well, and I think with some of the the systems that require those things like Medicaid, Medi-cal, Medicare, you know, some of those payers, they're gonna have their own rules, and whether drive time is billable or not, I think is something that you want to pay attention to. I think the challenge is, is when it's your own private practice, and do you have it as a separate line item? Or do you just charge more for the service? You know, is there is there an issue with saying, I'm going to raise my fee, X amount, and I'm going to spend 30 minutes driving to client a, and zero minutes driving to client B, but they're both point paying the same amount? Is there a concern there?   Curt Widhalm  11:49 Yes. And it's gonna fall under those usual and customary amounts. And, again, there's probably going to be people who do this kind of stuff anyway, and just kind of all lump it into one sort of payment and don't pay much mind to it. But when clinicians are being examined for what is your actual usual and customary be prepared for questions like how do you figure that out? If somebody is to look at client A where it's alright, you've got this 30 minute drive time incorporated into this fee? What's the justification for the exact same type of services just being provided in your office having a completely different fee? And you need to be able to reasonably and prudently explain the differences between those two, because when it comes to what your usual and customary fee is, it's also the justification for those fees that needs to be explained.   Katie Vernoy  12:48 And I think the equity and the ability to do a fair payment for all clients, there's arguments in both directions in that if, if on average, I spend X amount of time driving, and I don't charge individual clients for driving, you're saying that's not okay.   Curt Widhalm  13:07 Correct.   Katie Vernoy  13:08 If I go, if I go all over town, and client a is typically a 30 minute drive, sometimes they're a 90 minute drive, client B is usually a 10 minute drive, but sometimes they're a 40 minute drive, I need to charge them differentially is what you're telling me.   Curt Widhalm  13:22 You need to charge for what you're actually doing. And you need to do that appropriately. And you need to have that kind of stuff set up, up front.   Katie Vernoy  13:32 Okay.   Curt Widhalm  13:33 And especially with our no surprises act being introduced in America here in 2022, is there's a potential that if you're having kind of these traffic concerns, as you're describing, that it's a separate line item that you're going to need to put in your good faith estimates to clients. Because the whole point of this is that it's not to surprise clients with your billing. And the best way of protecting yourself on that is putting that information in writing ahead of time and having clients see it and agree to it.   Katie Vernoy  14:13 Yeah. And I think there's there could also potentially be an argument just having a specific fee for home based services. So here's the session fee. Here's the home based services fee. But you're saying if somebody is further away, I got to charge more.   Curt Widhalm  14:30 Saying that it needs to be commensurate and clear with your policies.   Katie Vernoy  14:34 All right. All right. All right. We don't want to get stuck there.   Curt Widhalm  14:37 That results in a higher fee, then that's commensurate with whatever policies you have.   Katie Vernoy  14:43 All right. So there may be some fee stuff to sort out if you're doing this, especially if you're driving a lot of distance most days. Some of the recommendations that I've given to folks in the past is setting up what I would call catchment areas. So on Monday, I'm in this area of town On Tuesday, I'm in this area of town on Wednesday, I'm this area of town. And on Thursday, I'm at the walk and talk location by my office or whatever, right like you, you know, just so that you diminish those differences. However, regardless of setting that up, and potentially putting systems in place, there is still going to be unpredictability. And that can be due to a lot of different things. So you've got the unpredictability of the environment, which we talked about in detail in our previous episode. But there's also this unpredictability on, if you're outside what the weather's like. If you're going to someone's home, if they have visitors. And I think there's those types of things where when you have so little control, the system says, "No, don't do this, don't do this. This is scary."   Curt Widhalm  15:50 So as a resident of Southern California, where our weather is usually 75, and sunny, I don't find myself traveling to other places in the country, sometimes where I forget that weather is different. Like...   Katie Vernoy  16:04 There's... weather is a thing in places Curt. I know, it seems weird to us, but there's actually weather in other places.   Curt Widhalm  16:11 So, my informed consent is being cognizant that people are not fragile little beings, and that they can make their own decisions about things. So it does make mention of weather does happen, and it's your responsibility to be dressed appropriately for it. And that's at least, like this is a foreseeable thing that can happen.   Katie Vernoy  16:43 Yes, we'll go into more of this and the informed consent section, because we could dig into this very deeply, especially the the fragile little beings. But, um, but I think just as far as kind of the overarching systems concerns, just to close this out, I think the other pushback that often happens is scheduling and getting permission for the services that are provided. Whether it's getting permission to go into someone's home, school or office. Whether it's scheduling to get to a certain location, I know I've had to shift clients by 15 or 20 minutes to get to walk back to my office between sessions. And I think the difficulty with that means that you have to be able to navigate those things with your clients. Because, well, if we're in the office, it'll be at this time, if we're at the park, it'll be at this time. And if we're in video, it'll, you know, like, it's, it's something where navigating those concerns, I think, can be very hard for some clients, because they want their exact time, every single week.   Curt Widhalm  17:46 And as we mentioned, in the first episode, this is a little bit more of that dynamic practicing that you need to be able to respond in any sort of given situation and, and it's having backup plans, you know, in the days where there is inclement weather, it might change that, alright, we're not meeting at the park, we're actually meeting at an office instead, or, and...   Katie Vernoy  18:10 We're doing video, doing telehealth.   Curt Widhalm  18:12 And that might affect a start time. And I think it's prudent of therapists to make sure that we revisit that as a possibility fairly frequently with our clients so that way, it's not a surprise when and if it does come up.   Katie Vernoy  18:29 Yes, yes. And I think just allowing for that in the conversation. So. So that's kind of the high level systems concerns. I think we've addressed those well enough. I think that the brunt of our conversation is really going to be around the legal and ethical concerns that a lot of people bring up that are kind of more individual with your client, the things that you have to grapple with not just as a system, can we say it's okay to do this thing. Some of the thoughts I am sharing are from an article, Boland 2018, 'Ethical Considerations for Providing Home Based Services for Homebound Individuals.' It's obviously there's some specific things to folks who are homebound. And I want to mention those things. Because if you're doing home based therapy, it could be for someone that is homebound for mental health reasons or physical reasons. But it also talks I think sufficiently around the types of things that you might encounter in an environment that is not yours that you don't control. Accessibility, I think is is one of the reasons that people say to do this to go to people's homes, meet them where they're at, they don't have to, to drive, those kinds of things, but it's also a complaint, especially around walk and talk therapy. And so there is a value in a lot of the ethical codes around accessibility, about providing therapy across the board and in my thoughts, you know, like there's physical abilities and accessibility that you want to make sure if you're doing a physical activity together, you know where we can make sure that you're able to walk together or if you if someone is not able to walk that, that, if they would like to be outdoors, you can provide them space to do that, whether it's in a wheelchair or in other types of settings or primarily sitting outdoors, those kinds of things. But it is, I think, a harder concept around, okay, if I've got someone who is disabled, or who has another challenge that outdoors might not work for, this may not be an accessible modality for them. There's also just the physical concerns. And you'd already mentioned, like they need to wear the right clothes and to do the things but but there is making sure that when they show up, they can access the service. So I wear a hat. And oftentimes during the summer, I wear sunscreen, and you know, I make sure that I've got the right shoes on. And so one of the things is looking at if someone comes unprepared for what you're signed up for, what do you do with that? I mean, you kind of just said, I leave it up to them.   Curt Widhalm  21:00 So I'm looking at the American Counseling Associations Code of Ethics here. And this is A6C documenting boundary extensions. And I'll paraphrase this, but it's if counselors extend boundaries, they must officially document prior to the interaction when feasible, the rationale for such an interaction, the potential benefit and the anticipated consequences for the clients. When unintentional harm occurs, the counselor must also show evidence of attempt to remedy such a harm. And I think that this is a really good and dynamic ethical code here because it says that what we talked about in the last episode and and what we're going to get into with our informed consent discussion here in a little bit, is that we need to anticipate what the consequences of situations are. But these are also things that are going to be dynamic, that if a client is showing up doesn't have the right footwear, for example, you know, is going for a walk on a trail in flip flops is going to be something that is doable for them is you need to then document that you're having that conversation. And that it's up to them to be able to continue to opt into it. And if they do end up getting hurt, you do need to document like, what it is you're doing. So you can't just be like, "Well, alright, if you want to walk in flip flops that's on you," like, really, like you don't, there's just there's a potential, like there's a long walk, these might not be stable enough shoes, you know, the person gets a blister halfway around the loop, like, you know, you gotta be like "You need me to get your band aid?" like "You want to wait here until, you know, you paramedics come?"   Katie Vernoy  22:59 I think it's I think all of those things are really important because to me, there's also the other element, when you talk about extending boundaries, just the element of I'm wearing those kinds of clothes, I may be in not as good physical shape as my clients as far as how fast I can walk, how long I can walk, I fell once and my client helped me up. We'll talk about that in dual relationships a little bit later. But I think it's it's something where this is a little bit harder to, to kind of cleanly say is that are these forms of treatment accessible or not? And so the the question I have here is, do you need to be able to provide these options for all people?   Curt Widhalm  23:47 Going back to what I said at the top of the episode, is that sometimes you're going to provide therapy that is just based on clinician preference to. You know, what, when we talk about accessibility sort of things, we, as individuals, and especially in private practices don't need to absolutely make ourselves 100% available in every single direction for every single possible type of client. And this is where we do the good enough approach. And we take steps to address situations that are more accommodating as those situations arise. And it may not be immediately, you know, you're talking about clients with disabilities or something that might affect mobility. Well, that might be a consideration that you look at as far as your office building or whether or not you participate in therapy outside of the office. Some of these situations are also going to come up with some of our able bodied clients. You know, if you have have a client who breaks their ankle in between sessions that this is now something where you may not be prepared for that. What you're going to want to do is then stop, evaluate the situation, go through what the new risks and consequences of things are. We like, 'Alright, man, like, you got to hobble along on your crutches faster along with me. So that way we...' Probably not a good recommendation there. But it's, you know, all right, we might not be able to have a full, you know, loop of sessions, you might be like, left out there, would you rather sit on a bench instead?   Katie Vernoy  25:41 Or would you rather meet via video? There are those types of accessibility. And then I think there's also some of the things and we started talking about this in the last episode, but for home based clients, where do we only provide these things for folks living in certain neighborhoods? Where we feel safe? You know, do we only provide home base for people that have a specific payer? I mean, or who can afford it? You know, I think it's, it's something where I agree with you, I think we do the best that we can. And some of it has to have some boundaries around our own needs, you know, we can only afford what we can afford to, as far as, you know, lowering fees, we can only do what we can do around our own safety, and we want to protect our own safety. But I think there's that element of being aware, are you providing a service that is inaccessible in a way that is discriminatory? And I think in this situation, I think it's very much case by case. And I don't think that this is a reason that you would not consider using these ever. I think, I think accessibility issues are pretty navigatable in this situation.   Curt Widhalm  26:56 Sure. And to be a little bit more open about this. There's a couple of citations here that I want to point out, Lazarus all the way back in 94, said one of the worst professional or ethical violations is that of permitting current risk management principles to take precedence over human interventions, and very much advocating for we should take these considerations into account. And that it may be unethical to not open our practices to being able to serve in a wider variety of communities. And the goal of this is to free therapists to intervene with client's specific situations in presenting problems, rather than just kind of sitting back and playing it in the safest way possible.   Katie Vernoy  27:55 Exactly. But speaking of being safe, I think it's time for us to jump in to the informed consent, because I think it's truly important. I think all of the ethical codes, talk about informed consent, and we definitely in these situations needs a very strong informed consent.   Curt Widhalm  28:12 Yes.   Katie Vernoy  28:13 So I think first off, we want to look at making sure that this is truly the client's choice. That the plan is created together. I know, there were times at least during the pandemic for me, when I was ready to be face to face with folks, I was not ready for being in the office. And so I started doing walk and talk. And there were some clients that I told it to. And after I set it, I was like, that was just for me. We did not end up doing walk and talk, I will I will put that out there. I was able to dial it back. But there was something was like, Hey, you want to meet me at the park? And they're like, "Umm, that seems weird." And so to me, because we've talked about in the previous episode that there was clinician benefit for being outdoors and walk and talk, mental health, wellbeing all that good stuff. And, and also efficacy because you're more creative and your brains working better. But that is not a reason to do it. Like it has to actually be co-created. And the treatment plan needs to be collaborative. And I think that's something where it can be very easy to say, well, this is my new thing, and we're all doing it. Or this is the only thing I do and you're gonna do it versus let's see if you're a match and I'll refer you out if I don't do other forms of therapy.   Curt Widhalm  29:33 So there's two things that you're talking about here. One is the creating the plan together. And some of this is also going to be based on clinician competence and actual services offered that, you know, the client may come in with ideas of what they want out of therapy, but if it's not something that you provide, you are still free to say no.   Katie Vernoy  29:56 Of course.   Curt Widhalm  29:58 And so I don't want anybody to feel like they have to absolutely twist themselves into knots in order to do something, if it's not something that you yourself are comfortable with. And you know, as far as the place where you provide therapy, you're free to say like, you know, I only work out of the office, or I'm only doing virtual sessions right now. And giving those referrals like Katie's talking about.   Katie Vernoy  30:24 And I think the point for the informed consent is to be very clear within the informed consent, how you're doing treatment and making sure that the client is opting into that, versus what they imagine therapy to be because you if you don't know how to describe it, how can they really know what they're opting in for? The other thing too, is, especially with some of these more non-traditional therapy spaces, they really need to recognize it's voluntary. And that they can opt out at any time. And I think... what it seems obvious, you know, to us, but there is the power differential. And I think there's also this element of when someone's doing a treatment that's specifically aligned to their location: ERP, desensitization, all the different kinds of things where somebody's kind of walking through something really challenging with their therapist, they need to know that they can opt out that they have some control.   Curt Widhalm  31:22 That's just good therapy and not abusive therapy in the first place.   Katie Vernoy  31:29 Of course, I mean, some of this is going to be like,duh, this is the normal thing that we would do in an informed consent, it just is, it's a bit different if you and your client are on a trail, and letting them know, you can opt out and walk back. And I will, I will finish the loop or I will follow you back. You know, whatever it is, I mean, I think people need to know that they have control and autonomy, and this is their treatment and not the clinicians dictation of what's going to happen.   Curt Widhalm  31:58 And in addition to that, you as the therapist leading the conversation on 'how is this working out for you?' that extends that action to not just waiting for clients to then passively opt out and just like leave you standing in a park the next week when you're supposed to be meaning there.   Katie Vernoy  32:18 Sure. Yeah. Specifically to the outdoor therapy, there are the health issues. And I think one of the things I looked at, talked about doing a health screening questionnaire, I feel a little concerned about scope of practice there, potentially a physician note or some sort of approval. But I've also seen consent for treatments that just have an attestation that I'm taking my own risks, and I'm healthy enough to do this. Where do you stand on that, Curt?   Curt Widhalm  32:47 I think that it's important that considerations be factored into it. And again, where I'm always a little weirded out that our profession treats people as both incredibly fragile and capable of making every decision in their life at the same time. So I like that the informed consents have: you're opting into this and you're taking care of your physical health as part of that consideration. It at least speaks to us thinking of, well, this could be a risk, and especially in more litigious areas, you know, if you're gonna get sued by somebody, this is again, reducing liability, because you can always imagine that opposing counsel in a deposition saying, "Well, why didn't you consider that this client might be not a good candidate for getting physical exercise?" So it at least is something that allows for you and your attorney in that situation to say, they attested that they could and that they were medically cleared for it, you know. Oddly, I see the same kind of language in things like sporting events like marathons and 10, Ks and five K's where it's like, you've you physically fit person, theoretically have cleared that you're medically okay to come in and do this. At worst, it's a line to check off in your informed consent. And at best, it's something that really does help to limit some of that liability for you.   Katie Vernoy  34:30 Another element with that is potentially like someone who is allergic to bees, or to bee stings or or some of the things that you may want to be aware of if you're outdoors with someone. I feel like that could be a separate conversation and/or something that goes into the informed consent. I have mixed feelings there.   Curt Widhalm  34:53 There's always going to be, no pun intended. There's always going to be something that inevitably gets left off of a list like that, you know, and there's got to be a natural line, like, you know, how specific you have to be with things like allergies, like, you know, you're going to be exposed potentially to tree pollen and, you know, if you're walking by a dog park, you know, animal dander say. So I like that there's at least something that points to you attest to, you know, if you're speaking to a client, you attest to that you are medically and physically capable of being in these environments as cleared by a medical professional. And you accept all risks that go along with being outside where you're potentially exposed to nature.   Katie Vernoy  35:48 I would almost add and this was this was something suggested in one of the things I was reading is that you kind of encourage them to tell you if there's anything you should know. I think if someone's allergic to pollen, and it's spring, I think, okay, I don't need to know that. But if someone is deathly allergic to bees I want to be aware of that. So that I know to call the ambulance when/if someone gets a bee sting. Now, granted, they could tell me that in the moment. But I don't know if I raise my liability if I'm aware that they have that concern.   Curt Widhalm  36:26 Most attorneys will do a very good job of finding some way to make you know, that you should have been aware. And, you know, so it's kind of that naivete is not a protection, and especially intentional naivete. So, yeah, it's a basically a longer version of the question that you asked: any concerns about you being outside and walking around physically, you know, that this is the kind of terrain that we're going to walk on, generally, well maintained sidewalks, at times, sidewalks with cracks in them, you're potentially crossing the streets in a couple of areas, or walking on the street for sections without sidewalks. If you're walking on a trail in a park, it's unpaved, maintained grounds that, you know, has potential tripping hazards. You can put some of those language things in there that, again, you're going for reducing liability, you're not going to be expected to protect against everything here.   Katie Vernoy  37:36 And I think just for to close that one up, I think I would put something to the effect of you're attesting that you're fine medically, and that you will inform the therapist if there's anything they should know.   Curt Widhalm  37:49 Yes.   Katie Vernoy  37:50 So another thing that should go into the informed consent are confidentiality challenges and how you're going to manage those. But we're going to do a whole section on that. So I want to skip that one really quickly. And go to clinician safety, because I think this is one that I was surprised in reading through the informed consent suggestions, that clinician safety was there. I don't concern myself with this prep for walk and talk therapy, I think that probably is something where I'm having at least a little bit of control over the environment and so I'm opting in. This is more for home based, where you're contracting basically, with your client, if there's anything that they need to manage for clinician safety, so this: is locking up pets, this is: potentially if there are family members that are very much against treatment, and maybe have even threaten the clinician, or if there's or if there are family members that just are going to be mean... I don't know. But that there are some safeguards in place, and talking about how the clinician is going to be remaining safe in those situations.   Curt Widhalm  39:05 And I think that the more clear that you can be with any of these things, the better because, again, you're looking for an open collaborative process here. In order for me to be able to help you know, again, coming back to like allergies, things for clinician has a strong allergy to something like perfumes, that might be a barrier to treatment when it comes to a clinician visiting someone's household. Yeah, and these are the things where yeah, you move up to having pet secured, if there has been a threat from a family member, you're gonna have to address that with your clients as far as "alright. I can't be in that environment and provide you therapy. We need to find something else to do." So again coming back to that problem solving alleviating this the the part of the problem and developing a new treatment strategy from there.   Katie Vernoy  40:07 And I think exactly what you said, I think that the biggest piece of that is maybe not even delineating all the clinician safety concerns. I mean, if there are specific ones, like I have these kinds of allergies or whatever, you may want to have that in there. But even just say if the clinician is not able to ensure/secure their own security, the session may be discontinued. I know for myself, it seems obvious. And I think this is something that actually is good both for kind of newer clinicians or clinicians under supervision as well as clients to think about this. But if you're in a client's home, and something happens, where you feel like your life is at risk, or if you feel like you're in danger, you should leave. Immediately.   Curt Widhalm  40:57 Absolutely.   Katie Vernoy  40:59 Whether or not the client is in a high state of risk, whatever, the clinician must protect their own safety immediately. And I think clients should, should know that, that they this is what they can do to mitigate the risk for the clinician. And if that risk is not sufficiently reduced, or if there is a risk there that the clinician is not comfortable with adult in the session, and/or suggests an alternate location to have that session.   Curt Widhalm  41:23 Because no matter how ineffective you may be, you will be more ineffective if you are dead or incapacitated.   Katie Vernoy  41:36 True story. And along the lines of plans, I think it's also important to have whatever plans you know for you know, that you can have for handling known risks for me COVID precautions, I've definitely incorporated those into all of my informed consents. And so, if you are only doing home visits for folks who wear masks, or only have certain levels of vaccination status, or whatever, I think those things need to be very clear. I think that there's the plans around the uncertainty of the weather, backup plans, and then I think a big one that I think all of us have been playing around with our cancellation policies. I know that many of us have shifted our very stringent cancellation policies to basically say, if you're sick, do not come and see me in person. But I think other cancellation policies around rain, you know, or if it's raining, we will switch to video. If you've got a visitor, what are you going to do, I think being able to talk about ways that you can minimize the negative impact on the practice, because we are businesses, we need to be able to run and we need to make our money. But also that makes sense and that are clearly stated in your informed consent.   Curt Widhalm  42:58 And one thing that I noticed with some of my clients that I was seeing outside of the office, is what you do when the time changes, and it gets dark way earlier and is...  an appropriate place. So again, this all falls under that foreseeable consequences and adapting to them and documenting that these processes have happened all along.   Katie Vernoy  43:23 Yeah, yeah. And I think all of that stuff is, is really important to be in the informed consent just to kind of run through just for for those of you who are taking notes, you want to make sure that they're aware of voluntary participation, that they're actually consenting for treatment. And actually, you may need collateral participation, consent for treatment. If you're doing stuff in home, if like a sibling or a fit parent or another family member is going to pop in time to time, making sure they know what they're opting into, health statements and potential plans around taking care of that, confidentiality and how to handle it, which we'll go into more detail on, clinician safety. Any plans for handling known risks. I think those are really important. There may be other things, but those all need to go into informed consent. And I think the question on this topic that I think, well, the first one was: Can people really know what they're opting into? And I think we've talked about Yes, I think we need to understand it and explain it to them. Yes. But you talked about kind of being left standing, the therapist, you know, kind of forlornly standing in the park by themselves and the client doesn't show up. And that's called passive termination. Right? The client just ghosts the therapist.   Curt Widhalm  44:45 Yes, exactly.   Katie Vernoy  44:46 But the interesting thing, and this was in the article around the homebound therapists or homebound clients where that if you were going to a client's home, they cannot passively terminate because: She just keeps showing up. I mean, I guess they could not answer the door. And I'm sure you had those. I've definitely had those long ago or they could not be there. But it's very hard, especially for someone who is completely homebound and cannot leave to passively terminate services. And is that, okay?   Curt Widhalm  45:18 We have a responsibility as therapists to ensure that the services that we're providing are effective with our clients. And one of the best ways of doing that is talking with our clients about it. And well, the situation that you're describing may not allow for that passive opting out. There should be some sort of approach that therapists are taking to regularly evaluate how the treatment is going. For my feedback informed treatment listeners out there, this is already built into just about every session that you're doing things. But for those who aren't engaged in that, we do have the responsibility of coming back and evaluating how are we doing on our goals? How's our treatment plan looking? And that should be done with some regular sort of interval, whether it's time based, whether it's number of session based, that if we're aware that clients can't passively opt out of sessions, we should take on some of that responsibility of giving them more of an active opportunity to opt out of sessions.   Katie Vernoy  46:37 Absolutely. And I think the other piece is also for us to continue to assess appropriateness, because another thing mentioned in there was that they may not want to terminate due to loneliness. And so we have a responsibility to make sure that treatment still necessary and that we're providing them with only the services that they need. And not just being a buddy that comes to see them every week. So moving on to bigger stuff. But that was kind of what needs to go what kind of the issues around informed consent. But now looking, I want to spend a little bit of time on confidentiality, as well as the potential for dual relationships. Because I think those are the big things. When we think about these types of services, I think those are the big things that are the big juicy things that we should be paying attention to. And starting with confidentiality, I think we cannot completely guarantee confidentiality, I don't think. But I think there's a lot of ways we can mitigate the risks. And so what are some of the things that come to mind when you think about confidentiality in either these public spaces or in someone's home?   Curt Widhalm  47:45 So the biggest things, and again, looking at it from limiting your liability standpoint, is talking about the potential risks and benefits of what this is. And so the risks are other people can overhear what we're talking about, we might need to speak in a more coded way. And really talking about that the limit of confidentiality, much more fluid when it's outside of the office, and when it is inside the office, because there is just that potential of being overheard.   Katie Vernoy  48:19 And I think what can compound that at home is that you might be overheard by the person that you're talking about. Or they may come in, or they may do the things, or you may want to introduce them, or there may be, you know, kind of a fluidity of them coming in and out of sessions. And so I think just being very clear on that, but I think as far as the cya elements of it, I think if they're going to be part of treatment, you do the collateral consent form. But I think making sure that if there are folks that are going to regularly be interacting, you want to get release forms. You can't obviously, you're not going to do that for the folks at the park, those people are just walking by. But like people in the home, you know, you may want to consider that.   Curt Widhalm  49:00 Well, and it's also part of what we're talking about into, be specific about it. Is asking our clients how they would want us to handle those situations where there are other people in the house, or where we are walking by other people outside. Help the client be able to make their own informed decision of and take some ownership over those situations as well.   Katie Vernoy  49:27 Absolutely. The big pieces outside, I think clients don't necessarily know and don't have the experience to think about how they want to handle it. Because it could be just let's, you know, we'll just pay attention. If somebody walks by maybe we either speak more in a more coded way or we break for a second and then pick back up once we pass these people or whatever. But I think if someone comes up to you or to your clients, people they know or people that know you, actually having the conversation is if someone comes up and talks to us, what are we going to say? You know, and I've heard you know, like, you can say this as a colleague, this is someone I work with. It can, it can be a lot of different things. Maybe it can be this as my babysitter, or this is my teacher, it could be this as my therapist, "Hey, meet my therapist." I mean, they get to decide. But I think if you have some ideas around how to manage that, then it can feel a little bit a little less daunting for them. Because I don't think that they necessarily immediately like, oh, yeah, I live in this community. And I'm walking around with my therapist. Oh. Oh, now I have to think about I don't think that's the first thing they think of when they commit to walk and talk therapy.   Curt Widhalm  50:42 And I've noticed this kind of trend change. And again, I work with younger population teens. Earlier in my career, it was just kind of like, oh, I, I don't want to necessarily, you know, let people know that I'm getting help. And teens these days are just kind of like, you're basically shouting out like, "I'm with my therapists," like this, "You need help this guy's great." Like, I point this out that there has been kind of a lot of these principles and guidelines that were written when therapy was a lot more hidden in the shadows. And I think with a lot more emphasis on mental health, that it's still important for us to have these conversations. My experience and the experience of a lot of the colleagues that I know has been that it's less and less of a concer. We still need to ask the questions, but people aren't is shamed by it in the general population. I know that there's still some cultural considerations where still getting therapy, in some cultures is going to be a sign of mental illness. That's why we still ask, but the trends are pretty positive on this.   Katie Vernoy  52:04 And I think that's very fair. And I think that there are going to be different things based on age differences, on what your role in the world is, I think some folks are fine saying that they're in therapy, but maybe not like "this as my therapist." And so I think, definitely ask, and I think the other element of this is, the confidentiality may be lost more passively. So it's not just somebody coming up to you, but maybe someone noticing that you and your therapist are walking the park every week at the same time, or you're coming to their home every week, you know, in your particular car with your particular, you know, kind of characteristics. And so it's something to consider, because people will be will need to be aware of the types of confidentiality that they're losing by having these types of services. But I'm sure that people that go into your building, most of the people sitting around and going like they're going to therapy, because like how many therapists are in that building? Like a bazillion.   Curt Widhalm  53:09 Yeah.   Katie Vernoy  53:10 And so people may lose confidentiality by going to their therapists office. And so I think the location thing I feel a little less concerned about, but I do think it is something to be aware of, and for clients to be aware of, as well.   Curt Widhalm  53:26 And a lot of the confidentiality factors, as a reminder to our clinicians, and to any clients who are maybe hearing this is, confidentiality is only the strongest where you have the expectation of not being seen or heard by a third party. And our discussions up to this point are really that even in the waiting rooms of therapy offices, there's not an expectation of privacy there. So you know, your points of even walking into the building or or walking around, we can point out like, hey, there's not that guarantee of confidentiality, like if we were in my office.   Katie Vernoy  54:11 Sure. I think the other thing and this is kind of a juicy question for us to dig into for a minute or two is boundaries versus confidentiality, and walk and talk maybe you're you're standing closer than the COVID guidelines were and that kind of stuff so you can keep close but really the one that I think is the toughest is if you're going into a client's home, they don't live alone. And I guess if they live alone, there's a whole other thing but the the option for meeting privately is in the client's bedroom. And I think that becomes very complex. It also speaks to the next one we're going to, the next section on dual relationships. But I think this is a really it's it depends for me on the client, sometimes it'll be a meeting with the client in their room, but with the door open, and we're talking quietly, so there's a little bit of space, sometimes it's I'm in the room with the door closed, you know, I think it really is client by client and the type of boundaries that need to be held. But I think there's a lot of a lot of risks that could be in this particular negotiation, because you're either like, hey, we have to be in a public space, and everyone can hear us, or we're in your bedroom and the door is closed.   Curt Widhalm  55:27 And this is also got a whole lot of needing to negotiate things with clients, potentially with parents. And that is something where, you know, being in a child client's bedroom and doing play therapy on the floor, sounds a lot more reasonable. But being behind a closed door with the child's might also be something where their poses risks. So this is not just a matter of any one particular characteristic of a client. And it's something that you need to thoroughly evaluate every single time that you do it and take and document the proper precautions. Document people. Document.   Katie Vernoy  56:12 Just document. And I think the other thing, if there are more than one private room, I think if you can be in a room with the door closed without a bed in it, I think that actually is quite helpful. I think it is a little strange sitting on a client's bed, if that's the only place to sit and you're with an adult client. It just it gets really complicated. And so I think being really aware of what the situation is, documenting it, and if you can't find a good space inside, maybe you just kind of, your head outside. But dual relationships: clearly do not have sex with your clients, there is no sex in professional therapy, or professional therapy does not include sex. That is obvious. That's one of the things about you don't sit on the client's bed, you don't even want to get close to that right. Or maybe you do but you document why it's okay to do that. But we've talked about this before, you also cannot become your clients friend, which can feel very easy if you're hanging out at the park, there's a nice breeze and you're, you know, shooting the breeze and or you're you're hanging out at their house, and they're serving you up a little bit of tea and crumpets. I don't know, there was a lot of British articles when we were reading this, but like, there is a lot of ways where we become very casual, and it can feel very much like a friendship if we don't watch out. And that's, that's potentially a very unhealthy and harmful dual relationship.   Curt Widhalm  57:46 Yeah. And I see this from time to time. And it's really when the therapist stops holding the boundaries. It is not coming back to talking about therapeutic goals, it's relying a little bit too much on the personal shared experiences, rapport building in session, 78, that's, you know, already been well established. That makes it very hard for clients to be able to really differentiate what actual therapy is happening there.   Katie Vernoy  58:27 As we've said before, not all dual relationships are problematic. Of course you don't, you cannot avoid all dual relationships. And in this case, you're going to have some dual relationships that you just have to make sure to navigate becoming their friend or having sex with them, No! But you will be a fellow travele, a

Chatting with Andy in this episode of The Wedding Biz is Anna Price Olson! Anna is the editorial director of Brides and acts as the brand lead for the publication. Anna discusses how she got started in the industry, how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the industry (with not all of it actually being bad), what the state of the market is like right now, some of the exciting trends that Anna and her publication are seeing, how planners and couples can have the best chance at getting their wedding story covered in Brides, and how planners and photographers can get on the best-of lists! Anna also reveals what got her into the wedding industry and how one of the positive aspects of the pandemic has been people allowing themselves to break rules more and have more unique, personalized weddings. Andy has been aware of Anna's name for a while and keeps up with Brides, so he is really grateful for Anna's time and enjoyed having her on the podcast. Be sure to check out both Brides' and Anna's social media pages and also be sure to share this interview with good friends and colleagues who might benefit from and enjoy it and to leave a top review of the podcast wherever you listen! Are you looking to boost your sales or get more clients? Check out the Create Your Most Profitable Marketing Strategy course from marketing expert, Melissa Forziat. If you feel disorganized or overwhelmed with your marketing, if you feel like you're leaving money on the table, or if you just want to get more word of mouth going for your business, this online course is perfect for you. Andy only works with sponsors whose work he's thoroughly checked out, so he knows that with Melissa's guidance, you will create your road map and answer questions like where to market your business, what systems to create, and how to follow-up with every client or potential client in your pipeline. As we all know, weddings are about relationships, and marketing your wedding business should be about relationships too.   A course as detailed as this would usually be priced in the thousands, but to make it accessible to small businesses, Melissa is making it available for only $247. PLUS, as a listener of The Wedding Biz, you can use promo code WEDDINGBIZ to get 10% off, so if you are ready to go to the next level in your business, sign up for the course today! Have you heard about Stop and Smell the Roses with Preston Bailey on The Wedding Biz Network? Listen as Preston shares the secrets, tools, and technologies behind his extraordinary ability to create a theatrical environment out of any space. Also, don't forget about Sean Low's podcast The Business of Being Creative, where Sean discusses the power of being niched, pricing strategies, metrics of success, and so much more. You can find both shows on The Wedding Biz Network.   SUPPORTING THE WEDDING BIZ Become a patron and support Andy and the show! If you are so inspired, contribute!   Time Stamps [0:00] – This episode is brought to you by Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing. [0:49] – Andy announces this episode's guest to be Anna Price Olson of Brides. [1:46] – We learn where Anna's passion for the wedding industry came from. [2:51] – Anna describes what she does for Brides. [3:51] – Anna touches upon how COVID has impacted the wedding industry. [5:29] – We discover how Anna sees the market currently. [8:27] – Anna points out that more unique weddings are a plus side of the pandemic. [9:38] – Anna lists some of the trends that she is seeing in the wedding industry. [11:59] – Anna argues that hometown weddings can still be like destination weddings. [13:50] – Anna talks about Brides' targeted demographics. [15:10] – We hear about some interesting statistics about Brides and the wedding industry. [16:13] – Anna reveals how she feels about the immediacy of being in a digital world. [17:36] – Learn what Brides looks for in submissions. [19:39] – Anna explains what the criteria are for getting on Brides' Best-of lists. [22:14] – Anna predicts that the trend of personalization is going to continue. [23:13] – We discover where Brides might be headed in the near future. [24:45] – Andy shares where we can find Anna and Brides online.   RESOURCES Brides - WebsiteBrides - Facebook PageBrides - Instagram PageBrides - Pinterest PageBrides - Twitter PageBrides - TikTok PageBrides - The Royals Issue featuring India HicksBrides - The Minted + Brides CollectionBrides - The Biggest Wedding Trends To Expect in 2022Brides - A Diversity Pledge From Brides: Our Commitment to Anti-Racism   Find Anna: Anna's Instagram PageAnna's Pinterest PageAnna's Twitter PageAnna's TikTok Page   Follow The Wedding Biz on Social: The Wedding Biz The Wedding Biz on Instagram: @theweddingbiz The Wedding Biz on Facebook: @theweddingbiz The Wedding Biz Network The Music Makers   Support The Wedding Biz by clicking here.   Title Sponsor: This episode is sponsored by Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing.

Are you starting a business and don't have a lot of resources to pay for advertising? Or has the pandemic hit your cash flow severely and you're wondering what you can do with less funds than you had before? Tune into my interview with Melissa Forziat and learn "Smart Marketing Tips for Businesses on a Budget." We talk about what you can do to market your business, even if you are on a shoestring budget! #ABandP #BizHelpForYouhttps://melissaforziatevents.com/And, while you're there, sign up for her free Small Business Marketing on a Budget eBook!To learn more about Affordable Bookkeeping and Payroll, visit: https://affordablebookkeepingandpayro... I'm Candy Messer, President of Affordable Bookkeeping and Payroll and Podcast Host of Biz Help For You. This channel will share helpful information for you to run a successful business including tips in the areas of bookkeeping, payroll, sales tax, business licenses, and other compliance PLUS information I share from experts in other fields.To find even more helpful information, visit my blog at https://affordablebookkeepingandpayro...

During this episode we discuss strategies for managing and marketing your business, with less stress during (and after) the Covid-19 pandemic. This has been a stressful time for everyone and as a business owner, you should also make protecting your mental health a priority. Melissa shares tips for marketing your message and getting your business on track during times of change and unpredictability.    Melissa Forziat is a Southern California-based marketer, speaker, consultant, and author. She teaches small businesses how to market on a budget and helps them execute their marketing strategies, in addition to working with business organizations to train their trainers. She offers keynotes, presentations, workshops, and webinars, and her national and international speaking schedule has taken her as far as New Zealand! To date, she has delivered over 120 workshops and webinars to thousands of attendees. Before starting Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing, Melissa’s career involved roles with the Olympic Winter Games, Rugby World Cup, and the US Olympic Committee.  Melissa is the author of the free eBook Small Business Marketing on a Budget. https://melissaforziatevents.com/ https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents https://www.instagram.com/melissaforz https://www.linkedin.com/pub/melissa-forziat/37/142/744   Visit WomenEntrepreneursRadio.com for information about online courses, articles & interviews of interest to women business owners.  Deborah Bailey is a writer and host of Women Entrepreneurs Radio podcast. Learn more about her and her books and writing courses at: https://DBaileycoach.com For Deborah's paranormal and fantasy romance fiction, visit: https://dbaileycoach.com/brightbooks

During this episode we discuss strategies for managing and marketing your business, with less stress during (and after) the Covid-19 pandemic. This has been a stressful time for everyone and as a business owner, you should also make protecting your mental health a priority. Melissa shares tips for marketing your message and getting your business on track during times of change and unpredictability. Melissa Forziat is a Southern California-based marketer, speaker, consultant, and author. She teaches small businesses how to market on a budget and helps them execute their marketing strategies, in addition to working with business organizations to train their trainers. She offers keynotes, presentations, workshops, and webinars, and her national and international speaking schedule has taken her as far as New Zealand! To date, she has delivered over 120 workshops and webinars to thousands of attendees. Before starting Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing, Melissa's career involved roles with the Olympic Winter Games, Rugby World Cup, and the US Olympic Committee. Melissa is the author of the free eBook Small Business Marketing on a Budget. https://melissaforziatevents.com/ https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents https://www.instagram.com/melissaforz https://www.linkedin.com/pub/melissa-forziat/37/142/744 Visit WomenEntrepreneursRadio.com for information about online courses, articles & interviews of interest to women business owners.  Deborah Bailey is a writer and host of Women Entrepreneurs Radio podcast. Learn more about her and her books and writing courses at: https://DBaileycoach.com For Deborah's paranormal and fantasy romance fiction, visit: https://dbaileycoach.com/brightbooks  

Melissa Forziat is a Southern California-based marketer, speaker, consultant, and author. She uses her experience working with big organizations like Olympic Winter Games, Rugby World Cup, and the US Olympic Committee and now she teaches small businesses how to market on a budget and helps them execute their marketing strategies. She is the author of "Small Business Marketing on a Budget," and as a speaker she offers keynotes, presentations, workshops, and webinars. Website: https://melissaforziatevents.com/   My free eBook, "Small Business Marketing on a Budget" - https://melissaforziatevents.com/small-business-marketing-budget-ebook/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/melissaforz/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/melissa-forziat/37/142/744 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents

In Part 13 of our Masterclass Series, Building a Strategic Marketing Plan for Your Business, host Eric Dickmann talks with Melissa Forziat, Principal at Melissa Forziat Events. Melissa is a Southern California-based marketer, speaker, consultant, and author. She teaches small businesses how to market on a budget and helps them execute their marketing strategies, in addition to working with business organizations to train their trainers. She offers keynotes, presentations, workshops, and webinars, and her national and international speaking schedule has taken her as far as New Zealand! To date, she has delivered over 120 workshops and webinars to thousands of attendees. Before starting Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing, Melissa's career involved roles with the Olympic Winter Games, Rugby World Cup, and the US Olympic Committee.Melissa is also the author of the free eBook Small Business Marketing on a Budget: https://melissaforziatevents.com/small-business-marketing-budget-ebook/For additional resources on this episode and from our other episodes in this Masterclass Series, visit https://fiveechelon.com/masterclassFor more information on Melissa Foriziat and Melissa Forziat Events, visit https://melissaforziatevents.com/Episode #64Buzzsprout - Let's get your podcast launched! Start for FREEMarketing Automation with HubSpot Try HubSpot's all-in-one marketing software to simplify campaign management and drive new leads.Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.

In this episode, your host, Gabby Scott, speaks with Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing's Melissa Forziat about event planning, strategic marketing, and more.

In this episode, we have Melissa Forziat, from Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing. Melissa is an marketing strategies, consultant and author. Her expertise has helped numerous small business owners figure out their marketing strategy. Here are some key takeaways from today's episode: 1) Marketing is all about building your audience through various tools and systems. 2) Having a proven marketing plan and strategy is very critical for small businesses so there is a consistent flow of leads 3) You do not need a huge marketing budget when spreading your message to a wider audience. And this is the link to the freebie: https://melissaforziatevents.com/small-business-marketing-budget-ebook/ Join our Facebook Community here 

Melissa Forziat, business marketer, speaker, and marketing and strategy expert is sharing how to develop your own business & marketing strategy. While sharing some serious gold nuggets of information, we dove into how to develop your own marketing strategy and how collaborations can help your business see growth in ways you would never expect. If you’re an entrepreneur, you won’t want to miss this value packed episode! Get ready to want to collaborate with new people and don’t be afraid to ask! What we’re talking about A Love of Sports Marketing 101 Collaboration...With My Competitors?! A Love of Sports Melissa Forziat knows about how to commit to something. She was dedicated to her sport of gymnastics for over 18 years! It was in college that she knew she wanted to still have sports incorporated into her life in some aspect, so she got a job in the world arena of sports on the administrative side doing marketing and management for them. She honed her skills and ended up branching out into her own marketing and strategy business by happenstance. Marketing Strategy 101 Just as she coaches clients, Melissa began developing her marketing strategy and email nurturing sequence, working to know how she wanted to position her business and her brand. With annual fine tuning, her marketing strategy has evolved enough to be able to free up more time for work with clients and leisure. But her true focus has been in staying consistent with her brand, so that her clients and prospective customers know what to expect, and further build on her established reputation. Having a sharp strategy can also help you to identify holes in your message, or even ideas for passive income! Collaboration...With My Competitors?! Partnering up with another business to collaborate on a project isn’t always an idea that comes to mind when you’re thinking about your competition. Melissa shared some ways collaborating can help strengthen the message for both of your businesses. Collaboration can also bring awareness of your business to clients who may not have been on your radar or heard your message if it were not for teaming up with another business. It can be a win for everyone! Have you thought about incorporating a collaboration into your marketing plan? LINKS MENTIONED Melissa Forziat’s Website https://melissaforziatevents.com/ Melissa Forziat’s Facebook https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents

How do you plan on budgeting for your small car washing business? Learn to market on a budget for small car wash owners with Melissa Forziat. She shares tips and techniques to manage your marketing strategy and tactics. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/car-wash-the-podcast/message

How to market on a budget for small business owners with Melissa Forziat. She shares tips and techniques to manage your marketing strategy and tactics. This is Melissa’s second appearance on the show. Her most recent guide is "Overcoming Your Marketing Roadblocks". Her small business marketing guides focus on helping small business owners achieve greater success with their marketing initiatives. Henry Lopez is a serial entrepreneur, small business coach, and the host of this episode of The How of Business show – dedicated to helping you start, run and grow your small business. (TheHowOfBusiness.com)

Deborah Deras interviews, Melissa Forziat is a Seattle-based marketing speaker, consultant, and author. She works with small businesses to develop and execute strategic marketing plans and with business organizations to train their trainers.  She offers keynotes, presentations, workshops, and webinars, with her 2018-2019 schedule taking her to Arizona, Hawaii, Washington, DC, Texas, and as far as New Zealand! To date, she has delivered 47 workshops to over 1350 attendees in 9 US states and 2 countries, plus 37 webinars to over 1600 attendees, with collaborative partners in 11 US states. Click on https://melissaforziatevents.com/ and https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents/

In this episode, I speak with Melissa Forziat who is a high-level successful marketing speaker and consultant who focuses on helping small business professionals develop valuable marketing plans for their business to thrive. With her years of experience, and passion for helping people Melissa has been able to travel to more than 11 states and two other countries to deliver workshops and webinars that have helped thousands of small business owners and organizations take their marketing strategies to the next level! Melissa is here to speak to anyone who is thinking about becoming a speaker, or who are already on that path and need help developing a more strategic plan for their talks. She will share 5 simple yet valuable steps for booking more speaking gigs and take your journey in the right direction. *Get all my best tools, templates, guides HERE* -  (http://www.luisryan.com/book) * Partner with me here* -  (http://dominatewithluis.com/) *JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP!* - (https://www.facebook.com/groups/pdvip) In this episode: - Find out the different ways she helps individuals and small business owners with events planning and marketing consultations. - Best way to build your speaking career and where to start - How does a speaking event work for brand awareness? - Ideas and tips on how to become a successful speaker - What kind of speaker are you? Knowing the answer will help you develop good talks - How do you move from free talks to getting paid as a speaker? Connect with Melissa Forziat: - Website-  (https://melissaforziatevents.com/) - Facebook Group-  (https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents/) - Email-  (mailto:melissa@melissaforziatevents.com) Connect with Luis: - Website-  (http://www.luisryan.com/) - Instagram-  (https://www.instagram.com/luisryandiaz/?hl=en) - Facebook Group-  (https://www.facebook.com/groups/pdvip) / - Facebook-  (https://www.facebook.com/luisryan4) This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

On this episode listen to my conversation with Melissa Forziat, a small business marketing coach and event manager with international experience in event and brand management. Through her experiences with the biggest brands in the world, Melissa has learned the principles of building a brand, creating a marketing message, and reaching the right target markets. Access The Guide To Building Your Business Brand And Reaching Your Target Market Discover Melissa's backstory and how she came to specialise in small business marketing How Melissa accidentally started her business How Melissa approaches her clients Is Marketing the same as Sales? Why businesses need to have an effective marketing strategy Melissa's principles in terms of building a business brand  What's involved when building a high functioning marketing funnel Roadblocks Melissa encountered while helping her clients How Melissa balances her Business How Melissa contributes back to the economy Creating opportunities for ourselves  What Melissa's definition of grind is Links: A Step-by-Step Guide to Building Your Brand and Reaching Your Target Market Melissa's Website: https://melissaforziatevents.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents  Be sure to follow me on Instagram @aidanvoc Subscribe to the podcast on Apple, or anywhere else you listen to your podcasts. If you haven't already, please rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts! Freebies

We’ve all heard of branding, but have you thought about why it’s so important? How do you develop your style and brand so that you’ll succeed in your career? Special guest Melissa Forziat joins us for an illuminating interview all about crafting your branding. With Melissa’s experience as a small business marketing coach and event manager, she has all the tips you need to know.Melissa starts by offering some pointers on making the perfect business brand.Read MoreSupport the show (https://p2q.link/donate)

We’ve all heard of branding, but have you thought about why it’s so important? How do you develop your style and brand so that you’ll succeed in your career? Special guest Melissa Forziat joins us for an illuminating interview all about crafting your branding. With Melissa’s experience as a small business marketing coach and event manager, she has all the tips you need to know. Melissa starts by offering some pointers on making the perfect business brand. Read More

Today’s episode is a Boomtank Business Show Podcast Mash-up. It’s three interviews in one great episode, with three business women making it happen and their coaching for you. Each interview is roughly 15 minutes of terrific sharing. The interviews are in the order recorded. First up, Sara Oblak Speicher. Sara was the winner of my holiday Boomtank interview slot giveaway and what’s interesting is, I had already spoken with her about being a guest on the show. She talks business, manifesting and approaching your business in a profitable, healthy way. (episode time location: 3:47 – 18:45) - Next up, Nadine Crespo. She talks women in business and new women business leaders. Be sure to check out her RISE Mastermind. (episode time location: 18:45 – 35:52) - Third up, Melissa Forziat she talks about her past coordinating events for the Olympics and marketing your business. (episode time location: 35:52 – 51:05) - Lots of fun with these three. Tune in and enjoy!  P.S  If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a 5-star rating/review in iTunes. It really helps the show and I'll be sure to give you a personal "shout-out" in a future show episode. TY! https://www.boomtank.com

Marketing on a budget for small business with Melissa Forziat. Melissa is an entrepreneur, marketing consultant, event planner, and founder of Melissa Forziat Events & Marketing. She shares her interesting journey, from gymnast to small business owners. She shares specific tips & techniques for small business marketing on a budget. Special offer for our listeners: FREE E-Book download of “Small Business Marketing on a Budget”, and a 25% discount on the “Marketing Outreach Guide”. Visit the show notes page for this episode for links and discount code. Henry Lopez is the host of this episode of The How of Business show – dedicated to helping you start, run and grow your small business. (TheHowOfBusiness.com)

Today we are joined by Melissa Forziat - a Seattle based marketing consultant and event planner. Melissa currently works with small business owners and nonprofits to develop impactful events and strategic marketing plans. She is passionate about helping small business owners achieve success. Melissa has been involved in the 2006 and 2010 Olympic Winter Games, 2011 Rugby World Cup, and US Olympic Committee. Through her experiences with some of the biggest brands in the world, Melissa learned the principles of building a brand, creating a marketing message, and reaching the right target markets. She is passionate about strategically planning events and marketing campaigns to allow clients to connect their great missions, products, and services with their audience.I've asked her to join us here today so we can all be a little more strategic with our marketing.. Enjoy! -- My mission is to create 200 new multi-millionaire business owners. How? You'll do better when you know better.   Would it help you to have a mentor who can cut your learning curve by sharing their mistakes with you so you could avoid them?   Would it help you to talk to that mentor and learn how they shifted their mindset to allow success to happen in the first place?   Would it help you to hear them talk to other high-level entrepreneurs about their journeys, their mistakes and how they overcame their challenges to create the lives and financial success they desire? The Best Business Podcast was created for you to have all this in one place. If you like it, please subscribe, give an honest review and share with a friend you think will benefit so I may serve you both together.   "Your success is my success." -- Daryl Urbanski  

Melissa Forziat is the founder and principal of Melissa Forziat Events. She's run live events of all shapes and sizes, from Rugby World Cups to fundraisers for non-profits. She works with clients to develop possible opportunities for growth, for example, partnership marketing (a photographer could send business to a videographer and vice versa.) She also discusses how to make those calculated risks (look at the upside, pain of not doing it, and reward for doing it), developing confidence, and knowing your value. Resources Melissa Forziat Events (Website) Melissa (Facebook) Small Business Marketing on a Budget (Free E-Book)

Your habits can make you or break you!I am pleased to have Melissa Forziat on the show. Melissa is marketing consultant and event planner who has taken her expertise working in the area of big business and brought her expertise to the small business owner. She has written an e-book called "Marketing on a Budget".Please join us for a great discussion.This show is broadcast live on Wednesday's at 12PM ET on W4CY Radio – (www.w4cy.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (http://www.talk4radio.com/) on the Talk 4 Media Network (http://www.talk4media.com/).

This week's guest is Melissa Forziat, Owner of Melissa Forziat Events. She also helps a lot of small businesses with their marketing needs. Everything from free resources like her ebook to help them get started to marketing consulting and coaching. Highlights From This Episode: Melissa didn't start off planning to create her own small business... She grew up competing in gymnastics but after she was done being able to compete, she wanted to be able to stay connected to the gymnastics and athletic world. So Melissa started doing major international sport events and started by volunteering at the 1998 Goodwill Games. Next she worked the 2006 Olympic Winter Games in Torino, Italy and then worked a couple years for the U.S. Olympic Committee as part of their International Relations Department, 2010 Olympic Winter Games in BC, CA and the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand. At the end of the Rugby World Cup, she ended up landing in Seattle and as she was interviewing for event planning positions and jobs around Seattle, everyone wanted to know what she had done here specifically. In one of her informational interviews, she accidentally said that she is now accepting new clients. A week later that person referred a client to her, who was looking for a free-lance event manager... And so Melissa Forziat Events was created! After starting her own business, she also has the flexibility to work some additional international sporting events again, like she did with the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto and 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio, Brazil. The marketing piece came a little later, as you can't really do an event without marketing it, so they are really go hand-in-hand. When she got to Seattle, many of her friends ended up being small business owners and she was always getting questions from them about how to grow their client base, often on a very small budget. She also started working closely with a Venture Non-Profit, a Seattle organization that helps educate and train low-income, minority and other under-serviced people on how to take their idea and start their own small businesses. They also have limited resources and so she found that the skill set she was building to help her small business owner friends and the clients of Ventures was very much the same... People just trying to get by, pay their employees, take care of their families and pay for life but don't have a lot of money to get their message out there to acquire new clients and grow their business. Melissa got involved with Ventures Non-Profit (check out our interview with Beto Yarce, Venture Executive Director on Ep. 28), as a means to get to know more people in Seattle and be able to help. She started volunteering with them on a committee and was then invited to join the Ventures Board of Directors. She really sees the value of small business owners being able to be part of a community like Ventures because so many business owners, despite the type of business, share the same pinpoints and struggles as they figure out how to start and run their own business and sharing and learning from each other and realizing that they are not alone in it is huge. Though Melissa's business is named Melissa Forziat Events, most of the events she works on a larger scale projects, while she does a lot more on the marketing side for small businesses and solopreneurs. Even if you currently have zero dollars to spend on marketing, she has options for that... like her FREE "Small Business Marketing On A Budget" ebook and weekly blog with good marketing tips and a strong Facebook community full of other small business owners sharing tips, and helping each other out. Melissa provides a ton of free marketing information to help get small businesses to a place of being able to utilize her paid information, consultation and coaching. What do you love most about what you do? The people that Melissa works with. Whether working with a non-profit on an event or a small business on their marketing, there is an underwriting sense of passion she senses in her clients and she gets a lot of fulfillment in helping her clients realize their goals and dreams in their business, professional and personal lives. What have you found to be the most challenging aspect of running your own business? Staying confident. As your getting started and trying new things or taking on new types of clients, you may not have the experience yet to feel confident in your abilities. What was most surprising or unexpected with opening your own business? The shear volume of highs and lows in the roller coaster that happens in a single day. What set's you apart from others in your industry? The majority of the businesses Melissa works with are micro-businesses (5 or fewer employees) and she really enjoys helping those smaller businesses grow and get to a better place and while she likes to work with businesses in Seattle, she works with businesses all over the world. What is your greatest strength? Creativity in both how she helps her clients and grows her business. What habit do you wish you had? Better sleep schedule. What are you passionate about? Supporting the people she cares about... and her clients end up becoming those people. She also does improve comedy in Seattle. In the past, what was holding you back from becoming the entrepreneur you are today? After doing one of her first speaking engagements of teaching an Advance Marketing Class for Ventures Non-Profit, she had a line of business owners lining up to ask her questions and she realized that she does think about marketing for a living and way more then most business owners do, so she does have knowledge to share and a valuable service to provide. It comes back to confidence in having something that can benefit and help others. What is the best advice you have ever received? "Except Invitations". What is a personal habit that contributes to your success? A very detail oriented hard worker. Do you listen to podcasts? What are your favorites? Amy Porterfield podcast, which is a marketing focused podcast (I've heard an episode of Pat Flynn's "Smart Passive Income", with Amy Porterfield as a guest and it was quite good). The type of podcast's you listen to can tell you a lot about how you want to be, based on what you are drawn to or relate to the content and how it is presented. Finding the podcasts you like and then asking yourself why you like it can help you develop yourself and your brand and speaking style. What is your one book recommendation for our listeners? Melissa's FREE "Small Business Marketing On A Budget" ebook, which covers 10 different types of marketing that you can do if you have little to no money to spend on marketing. Episode Links & Resources: Guest's Website:  http://melissaforziatevents.com Like on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MelissaForziatEvents/ Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MForziatEvents Guest's offer: FREE "Small Business Marketing On A Budget" ebook Guest's recommended books/tools/resources: Melissa's FREE "Small Business Marketing On A Budget" ebook, which covers 10 different types of marketing that you can do if you have little to no money to spend on marketing. Guest's favorite podcast(s): Amy Porterfield podcast, which is a marketing focused podcast Learn more about Christian, other projects he's working on and his business at: www.Sea-Town.com Ways to Subscribe to The Sea-Town Podcast: "Like" the Sea-Town Podcast FaceBook Page HERE Click here to subscribe on iTunes Click here to subscribe on Google Play Click here to subscribe on TuneIn Click here to subscribe on Stitcher Help Us Spread The Word - Reviews Help a Ton! Thanks for joining me again this week. If you have any tips, suggestions, or comments about this episode - email me at ChristianH@Sea-TownPodcast.com. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it using the social media buttons you see at the bottom of the post. Thank you! And finally, please leave an honest review for The Sea-Town Podcast on iTunes! Ratings and reviews are extremely helpful and greatly appreciated! They do matter in the rankings of the show and I read each and every one of them.  

In this episode Shakira Brown a.k.a The Small Biz Whisperer talks it up with Melissa Forziat founder of Melissa Forziat Events, an event and marketing consulting firm based in Seattle, Washington which works with small business owners and nonprofits to develop impactful events and strategic marketing plans. Demonstrating a keen openness, Melissa shares her personal story on how her early aspirations as an athlete stalled but led her into career in event planning for the Olympic Winter Games, Rugby World Cup, and US Olympic Committee. Credibility has been at the heart of growing her personal brand and she shares how anyone can leverage trust to establish a position in your marketplace. “Building credibility is critical all along the way, and on two sides: if we don’t believe we’re credible, nobody else will,” said Forziat. “It’s something that’s been part of my story the entire way.”  Melissa is also the author of the eBook, Small Business Marketing on a Budget available at MelissaForziatEvents.com. Shakira and Melissa have an amazing conversation that extends to how their networking strategies shaped their careers and how every small business owners can leverage their own ingenuity to grow their enterprises without spending a fortune. Check out this Websites: http://njprexpert.com Follow Me on Twitter: @SmallBizWhisper Subscribe to this Podcast in iTunes (please leave a review if you like what you hear!) Subscribe to this Podcast in Google Play Subscribe to this Podcast in Stitcher    Show Notes: Melissa Forziat Events - http://melissaforziatevents.com/ Download Melissa's free eBook - Small Business Marketing on a Budget  Be a guest on Moment Masters Show - email podcast@momentmasters.com 

Topic: Small business marketing on a budget Melissa Forziat is a marketing consultant and event planner. She founded Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing in 2012 and currently works with small business owners and nonprofits to develop impactful events and strategic marketing plans. Before starting her business, Melissa held event planning roles at the 2006 and 2010 Olympic Winter Games, 2011 Rugby World Cup, and US Olympic Committee. In her spare time, Melissa is a member of the Board of Directors at Ventures – a Seattle-based non-profit that helps low-income entrepreneurs to gain self-sufficiency through business ownership. She is also very active in the Seattle improv comedy scene. http://melissaforziatevents.com Download her free ebook: Small Business Marketing on a Budget http://melissaforziatevents.com/free-ebook-small-business-marketing-budget