What it takes to become a successful Natural Health Practitioner

I’ve received a lot of questions lately about how long it takes, and what it takes, to become a successful natural health practitioner.

Does it take a lot of effort, energy, concentration, money or time? What is actually needed?

So I thought I would share with you a little analogy…

I was on the beach the other day, on a spectacular Autumn day.  When I was looking out at the ocean, I realised it was a perfect example of how we see the world.

Looking at the ocean, we see the sand and the ground. We see some waves coming in. We see other people close to us.  We see the beauty of the ocean.

This is a lot like going on the natupreneurial journey.

On your natupreneurial journey, you don’t want to be at the beginning. Instead of looking at the lovely ocean, being at the beginning is like looking at multiple flights of steps going up and up and up to reach the path that leads to the ocean. We don’t want that – we want all the shininess and loveliness of success.  We want all the clients coming fast. We want the end part – NOW!

Looking at the steps leading to the ocean, there was one woman running up the stairs. She was working hard and was nearly at the top.  That’s one option for success.

If I don’t want to work that hard, though, I can still slowly start moving up the stairs, taking one step at a time.  When I get to the top of the first flight, things look a little different from here. The top of the stairs looks a little closer, the rest of the journey looks more manageable.

From there, when I looked at the ocean, I could see that the consistency of the waves and when they roll in, rather than just seeing them one at a time.

Moving backwards down the stairs is hard, just as it is in your business. It can be really unnerving, uncomfortable,  and sucky. Sometimes we find ourselves a couple of steps back and we’ve got to do those first steps again.

From the bottom, it feels really flat. You can only see one or two waves at a time and you can’t see the rhythm. Just like when you can’t see the rhythm in your business you feel like you’re going to get smashed by the next wave.  You feel overwhelmed by every next bill, every next crisis, every next thing.

But when we walk up a little higher, we can see so much more.

After we take the small steps to move forward, all of a sudden we get a bit more of a view and a bit more of a perspective on the things that seemed really scary before.

When we’re looking up the stairs, we don’t see that each of the steps is small.  There are a lot of small steps.  What we all want is to be at the very top of the stairs.  When we’re talking about stairs, we know that a person can’t take just a couple of leaps and bound and be at the top.  But when we think about our business, we think that’s all it should take to get up there!

Instead of realising that it is just a bunch of small steps, we only see the whole set of stairs. Sometimes that big epic thing seems so overwhelming.

Have you felt overwhelmed by trying to reach the top lately?

When you see someone who has made it to the top, you may wonder why she got there and you haven’t.

It’s because when you look at the first step, you think, “It looks boring! It looks dirty. It looks yucky and like no fun.”  Or you wonder how you should do it – how do you take that first step?  Is there a tutorial or a YouTube video about how to do this?

Maybe you could just take the step.

Once you’ve taken that step, another step appears.  You may be thinking you don’t want to take another step – you want to be at the first landing already. It looks scary, it looks embarrassing, or you think you might look silly.

But once you take that first step, even if the next one looks hard, you take that one too.  And pretty soon you get the hang of it, of taking the next step.  Rather than freaking out about it, rather than googling it, you just take the next step.

And the next thing you know – you’re up at the landing with the epic view. You created that thing.  You created the change.  How different does the world look from there?  Look at all the opportunities and possibilities you can see.

Here’s the thing – you don’t know what it’s going to look like once you’re up there until you take the steps.  You don’t know how hard it’s going to be, or how much time it’s going to take. You don’t know what opportunities and possibilities will become available…. Until you take the steps.

Doing the work, one step at a time.

If you want to, it is possible to get to the first landing super fast.  You could do three steps at a time, but it’s much more likely you’re going to fall over or hurt yourself if you try to leap ahead. There are things you will learn, and possibilities you will see only by taking the steps one at a time.

Back at the bottom, maybe we’re worried about not having enough money, or enough clients, or enough resources. If we just sit at the bottom and complain about not wanting to do the work, how many things are going to change for us? Nothing is going to change. There aren’t any more resources down at the bottom.

Even if it takes a lot more effort than someone else, when we take the small steps to move up, we can see that things change around us, and opportunities change around us as well.  You can’t see that those new resources become available just after you’ve taken those steps.  You have to take the steps to see the results.

It’s totally okay if you don’t want to do the work and you want to just cruise up to the first landing. But you can’t look at other people going four times faster and be jealous if you haven’t been doing the work and haven’t taken those steps. Other people may get there faster because they’re doing the work.

Once you’ve learned to take the steps, and built the practice, it becomes easier.  You find yourself getting into the flow.

And you may find that sometimes you want to experiment – maybe change things up, tweak things.  Instead of just going straight up the stairs, perhaps you want to try going sideways. But until you get into the practice, you don’t know how you can tweak things.

If you want to go quicker, and you have the right support, the right training, and the right backing, you can do that.  But there’s nothing wrong with taking your time and taking the steps one at a time, consistently and persistently.

So, what does it really take to be successful?

The bottom line is that what it takes to be successful is to do the work.  Take the steps. Move forward. 

Even when it feels like you don’t know what you’re doing, or like it isn’t working – keep doing the work.  The world looks very different each time you reach a new level.

At the bottom, we were apprentices.  You won’t be a master until you’ve practiced, and practiced, and practiced.  If you are only just now coming out into practice, it’s totally okay. Just realise that you are an apprentice. You don’t have to be a master yet. You have to practice and do the work. You have to see the people, and put the prices up, and freak out and worry about tripping up.

To be a master, you have to put the work in and get to the point where you are able to see other goals and visions for yourself that you couldn’t see before.

I’m not trying to make things hard for you when I talk about things taking time. I’m not trying to make things hard for you when I’m talking about working on your money mindset as well as your social media, your reach, and watching for opportunities at the same time.  What I’m saying is – be an apprentice. Make the mistakes, do the hard work, fall back down again and get back up.

Because the world looks very different on the other side.

I can’t describe to you what it will be like for you until you’ve done the work. I wish there was a great glass elevator that we could all just jump in and all of a sudden we would be successful, impressive, amazing, masterful naturopaths who are also masterful business owners. But it just doesn’t work like that and I needed to bust that bubble today.

It is worth the work and the effort when it comes to your business.

It is worth the effort when it comes to your mindset and when it comes to you being an amazing practitioner who helps more and more people in a way that is sustainable. You can become a master, but only after you do the stairs.

I look forward to seeing more of the lovely steps that you are taking, especially in the hub! I love, love, love seeing all the steps and the questions. Wherever you happen to be, ask the questions you need to get you where you want to be!