Being A Therapist

This week we're answering a listener question about what being a full-time therapist is actually like.
The pros, the cons and everything in-between.

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Transcript

Richard: 0:10

Hello podcast fans! It's time for another episode of Therapy Natters, the podcast series that hopes to give you a little bit of insight into what therapy can do for people. Whether you're a client looking for a bit of a leg up, or a therapist yourself looking for free CPD, either way you've come to the right place. Hello Fiona, welcome to another episode.

Fiona: 0:33

Hi, Richard. How are you doing?

Richard: 0:35

I'm all right. It's worth mentioning actually that this this could go on a CPD list. I put podcasts on my CPD record for my regulatory body. UKCP would accept it, BACP would accept it. I think anything, any journal you read, any article, blog post, anything that you read that's anything to do with therapy. But if you're a therapist, you can add that on to your continuing professional development. I hope people realise that.

Fiona: 1:04

You absolutely can. The only thing is that you do need a balance. So if somebody was to submit in UKCP, it's 50 hours a year, if they said well, I listened to a hundred 30 minute podcasts. no, that's not, that's not okay.

Richard: 1:22

Need to do something else.

Fiona: 1:24

they've got to do a range of things, but some of it, certainly.

Richard: 1:27

It'd be quite nice to see our names on somebody's CPD record for our podcast.

Fiona: 1:32

It would,

Richard: 1:33

That'd be really sweet. Yeah. I... I keep meaning to contact some of the local therapists in the area and set up some sort of peer group meet up from time to time, but... I already do a bit of that because people have contacted me. Hello, Lyni! If you're listening, she's an art therapist in the town local to me. And, actually I need to reply to her message. She sent me a WhatsApp message this morning. Hello again, Lyni. I will reply to that first aid training thing. You can't do everything though, can you? Every event that pops up, I keep seeing lots of things for... Come to London! David Corr is doing this training in November. I'm like, I'd like to do that, Remembrance Weekend. It's probably about the same time this episode comes out. I can't do it, I haven't got, I just don't have the time. But I want to do all these things. Because it helps me in my job.

Fiona: 2:26

Absolutely. I'd like to do his course as well. I can't do it either. I've got Shaun coming to stay.

Richard: 2:32

Shaun from last week, yes.

Fiona: 2:33

Shaun from last week, but just going back to the peer support group. It was doing that task that you just said of contacting local people, which got me involved with the National Council for Hypnotherapy, which is what changed my life,

Richard: 2:52

Yeah, and mine as well actually.

Fiona: 2:54

it was when I moved to Loughborough from Exeter in 1998. I thought, oh, wonder if anything's happening. So I got the yellow pages out I phoned up. All the people in Leicester and Loughborough and around,

Richard: 3:08

Armstrong Prior.

Fiona: 3:09

and one was Martin Armstrong Prior. Hello Martin, if you are listening.

Richard: 3:13

Hello!

Fiona: 3:14

He's still active in Scotland now. He

Richard: 3:17

Lived in Scotland, yeah.

Fiona: 3:18

He said, no, nothing's happening, but it would be a good idea. So we arranged a meetup in a coffee shop. Which he didn't get to, because his car had broken down. So we went and got him and brought him back to it. So it's all very confusing, but there were only three of us. Beverly was the other one. Yes, it was Martin then who got me involved with the NCH, and the rest is my history.

Richard: 3:46

And became a bit of my history as well because it was because you were on the committee at the NCH that I... Joined the committee on the NCH, which then led me down all sorts of different paths. I became the CPD director I was getting free CPD, folks. Every month I was doing this full day meet somewhere in the UK and I was going to attend all of them for free. It was great. And here I am all these years later Loving the sound of my own voice, it seems. Because being a therapist can be quite a lonely profession, because you, you sit, ynd you share somebody else's world, but you don't really share yours with anybody. Whereas if you've come out of an office where there's 50 people around you, suddenly, you're thrown into very solitary work, and it can get quite lonely. So you do need to find that balance. We had an email, actually, from Dee from Wilmslow, talking a little bit about this. I shall read it out. Oh, it was to both of us! Hi, Richard. Hi, Fiona. Oh, yeah, hello to you.

Fiona: 4:57

Thank you for including me, Dee.

Richard: 4:58

yeah, she did. Hi, Richard. Hi, Fiona. I have a question for you about therapy. I currently work as a customer service representative, answering phones and taking sales orders, and I'm seriously considering becoming a counsellor, and I've been looking at various UK courses to train. It is quite an investment, and although I'm keen right now... Who knows how I'll feel in four years time. I'll be interested to hear your lived experiences of being therapists and understand more about the pros and cons of being a therapist. Thank you, Dee from Wilmslow. Where's Wilmslow?

Fiona: 5:32

That's Cheshire, south of Manchester. It's where the footballers live.

Richard: 5:36

Is it? Ah,

Fiona: 5:38

Yeah, Andrew, who did the session on people pleasing, he's in that. Cheadle, which is next to Wilmslow.

Richard: 5:45

Oh, I know Cheadle. Yes, of course. Oh, now I know where you are, Dee, I can, put a, a place to your name.

Fiona: 5:52

always like to stick a metaphorical pin a map when I'm talking about anybody, Yeah.

Richard: 5:58

I think it's because, as therapists, we are genuinely interested in people. We wouldn't be particularly good therapists if we weren't. Or we wouldn't stick it out for very long if we thought we were only in it for a, for a job. It's just my job, I just do this for money. No, if you want to earn money in any way shape or form, little or lots, don't become a therapist. You do it for love.

Fiona: 6:21

I think you're being a bit too cynical

Richard: 6:24

Even for me, yeah,

Fiona: 6:25

but I think you do, you do have a point. I'd like to ask Dee sort of, well, what is it that she sees about being a therapist that appeals? But if you were to sit down with a careers advisor and say my values are making money, then correct, you, you're not gonna get a suggestion of go and train as a therapist. It is a perpetual problem in the therapy world, about pay. There are plenty of organizations that say you have to get your X number of client hours, usually 450, but not always, in order to qualify. In fact, some of the counseling courses are a lot less than that, but doesn't really matter what the number is. You have to get X number of hours. And you can't charge for those. You have to, you have to do a voluntary placement. So people are, giving their time and there are institutions dotted around the place who use this to get free staff so that they don't have to pay. So that is, that is a thing.

Richard: 7:35

And that sounds like they're taking advantage of people, but it's the system that we've got in the UK.

Fiona: 7:41

there, there are some who say that they are.

Richard: 7:44

yeah, but I'm trying to think of the positives there. Cutting your teeth in an agency, the experience you gain, it's only like an apprenticeship, but you're just not paid at all

Fiona: 7:55

If you were not even paid enough to cover your own supervision, I would really have a problem with that.

Richard: 8:01

Well, a good agency would provide, should provide a supervisor.

Fiona: 8:04

Yes. Some do, some don't. I know when I was getting my hours for my counselling course, which I did in between doing my rubbish hypnotherapy course and a good one, then I had to get 100, I think. But I could do some in private practice, so I could use some of the people who were coming to me. For hypnotherapy, and if that wasn't quite what they needed, I could use some of those. But I did some in the GP practice, my own GP practice. I spoke to them and said, would you like a free counsellor? And so I did, I did some hours there.

Richard: 8:41

Who says No? Would you like a free mental health counsellor to work here? Yes, please. Because it's 90 percent of the issues that people bring in.

Fiona: 8:49

yeah, I mean, this was a long time ago, so the attitude to it wasn't quite the same. But I was willing to do that, and I still think of some of those clients now. One in particular was absolutely fascinating to work with. She was... of a demographic that would not be able to pay for private therapy. And she had some very interesting spiritual beliefs that needed to be hashed out as well as the day to day, how do I live in this world with no money, no prospects, et cetera, et cetera. So she was absolutely fascinating. In private practice most of us do some pro bono work, but it's. Those sorts of people don't tend to find us, and we don't tend to find them, so it doesn't tend to happen. So that was really fascinating. The other one was somebody who'd been held hostage by somebody with a gun.

Richard: 9:49

Oh!

Fiona: 9:50

That was really, really fascinating because it was when I was, I was training and I'd learnt that you don't need the story. You don't need to know what the story is. You only need to know what's happening for the person. Oh, to, to not ask, what happened?

Richard: 10:07

Yeah. Yeah.

Fiona: 10:09

real, real challenge. But anyway, this is a slight tangent, but I hope it's sort of vaguely interesting. If not, you can edit it out.

Richard: 10:17

I'll keep it in the Patreon version.

Fiona: 10:19

Yeah.

Richard: 10:19

They can have the lot. They have like 45 minutes of us waffling and telling jokes.

Fiona: 10:25

No, I think it's quite, I think that's quite useful in a sense. So, I did do that that free stuff to get those hours, get it done, but it was worth it. It was beneficial. But, if you are going to a training school where they want you to do 450 hours free, I'd look for a different school. We can say that here, can't we? We're free to say that.

Richard: 10:47

Oh, yeah, of course. Goodness, yeah. Do what you

Fiona: 10:49

Also, I think one thing that Dee said there is, what will I feel like in four years time? Not all of the training schools require you to commit to the four years in one go. There might be... exit points that you can stop off and do something. So, the National College of Hypnosis and Psychotherapy, which we've both been involved with, still are. There, you can do stages one and two, and... then you are a hypnotherapist. You carry on to do stages three and four.

Richard: 11:27

pay for your training.

Fiona: 11:28

yes, you you start, you start earning money after stages one and two. If you then want to carry on to three and four, you're earning money that pays for it. But you don't have to. You can stop at that point if that suits you. So, look for flexibility in the training schools that you're considering. I would also suggest looking at the scoped framework to see where you would fit on the scoped framework. Any school should now be telling you where you would fit, and with the National College, you'd be in column C, which is the highest column. So, think about that. Then you need to be thinking about whether you want to be employed or in private practice. If you want to be employed, don't go to the National College, because you're not likely to get employment as a hypno psychotherapist.

Richard: 12:24

yeah, they're looking for counsellors.

Fiona: 12:26

They're looking for counsellors. There are ways to get into the NHS with psychotherapy trainings. But the, the H word is not generally... There are

Richard: 12:36

The H word.

Fiona: 12:37

There are some people who do, do get into the NHS with hypnotherapy.

Richard: 12:43

as a hypnotherapist who's also a psychotherapist, you can call yourself an integrative therapist,

Fiona: 12:48

Yes, you can.

Richard: 12:50

and I think the NHS would, would recognise that if you're integrative, you'd also use CBT, which they're a big fan of, rightly or wrongly.

Fiona: 12:58

You would probably need to do a top up training to get into, uh, what used to be called IAPT. It's now... NHS talking therapies, you'd need a top up training. They do now have a fully funded training route for psychotherapeutic counsellors within the NHS but that's the pilot stage so they're in year two of a three year program on that but they haven't recruited new people to start in year two. So they're doing the full three years before they're then deciding how to continue it. So those things are, are really important. I mean the pros and cons of employment and private practice are fairly obvious. You've got the freedom, the autonomy in private practice and you earn a lot more per hour. But you don't have the security, the pension, the sick pay, the maternity leave, the

Richard: 13:56

you might,

Fiona: 13:57

There's a lot you don't have.

Richard: 13:59

yeah, a lot that if you need to find, you do have to pay for. I've spoke to different therapists over the years that have been employed and have been in private practice, and they've earned more when they've been employed than they did in private practice, because they constantly had work, and they were constantly being paid, and there were some... Private practitioners who just sit there staring at their emails, waiting for something to come in, twiddling their thumbs, earning nothing. Because when you train as a therapist you're not trained how to build a business, you're trained how to be a therapist, and they need to learn how to build a business, and that's different. So

Fiona: 14:32

Yeah, and those, those skills, of being a therapist are quite contrary to the skills of marketing.

Richard: 14:40

Mmm,

Fiona: 14:41

if you're going to be in private practice, you have to get the grip of marketing and building a business and seeing it as such. Now in the old days therapists were seen as, or counsellors mostly, but all therapists, I think, were seen as a sort of secondary job. It's a sort of part time, almost fanciful thing. Often wives of successful men who want something to do. So they train. And so they were doing three or five hours a week of client work. And, that's all very well, but that's not really what we're talking about here. We're talking about it being a career and it absolutely can be, but you have to put the work in to create the business. They don't just form a queue at your door as soon as you've got your certificate.

Richard: 15:32

yeah. So there are pros and cons. of being self employed. There are pros and cons of being a therapist. Lots of pros. But of course it can be quite draining, it can be quite emotional, and you've got to know how to handle that. In fact I had a sports massage the other day, and the therapist there did say, as she was giving me a massage. She was saying, how do you handle all the stuff that people bring in? Because sometimes people bring things in here, and they want to talk to me about it. And I have to say to them, oh, that's not what you're here for. How's your shoulder? Keep her boundaries. Because she's learned, after listening to people, she can't deal with it. It's too painful. It's too draining for her. And so she said, well, it must be draining for you. Every single session must be draining for you. And that's not always the case. It's not that every session can be draining. Or rather, not every session can be emotionally draining. But many are. Otherwise, why are they coming for therapy, if they're not going to be bringing something in that's quite emotional and draining to them? And there, they want to dump how they feel at your door and walk away without it, while they've left it with you, if you don't know how to deal with it.

Fiona: 16:48

I know we've said this before, that not everybody who goes for therapy has significant emotional stuff. Sometimes they're, they're exploring the meaning of life, and so on. And that can be, that can be draining in a different way. It's quite challenging. Philosophical discussions. But, yeah, it, it is a thing where people say, well how do you... And the thing is... it's not something you can really be taught. It's not, you do this and then you do that and then it's okay. I think there's a sort of natural naturalness to, to whether you can. Leave it. But there's also, there are some practical things that you can do when, and we talked about it recently, didn't we, Richard, in your supervision about a client and saying that the client leaves their stuff in a pile on your floor and then you hoover it up or sometimes you, you put it onto a dustpan and brush and put it onto my floor.

Richard: 17:44

Oh, I'd forgotten we'd talked about that. Yes, yes. I haven't needed to do that for a couple of months, but yeah, yeah,

Fiona: 17:49

a supervisee this morning who said to me I don't want to now dump this all on you. And I didn't actually say it, but my thought was, well, it's okay because it loses its energy as it goes through the chain.

Richard: 18:02

Yeah,

Fiona: 18:03

So I've still got

Richard: 18:04

long have we been saying a trouble shared is a trouble halved?

Fiona: 18:07

Yeah, I've got the pile of stuff that she'd left on my floor. I haven't swept it up yet, but it's not causing much problem.

Richard: 18:13

it might be when you look at it next It's gone. It's sort of blown away by itself, but we do we do need self care I think as therapists we can't look at a working week as being a working week is 30 hours So that means I can see 30 clients some people can depending on the work that they do especially if it's CBT worksheet based. And you're not building a relationship with that client. But most people who become therapists, it's because they're people people. And they're going to be building a relationship with the client. Because we know, after all the studies, that actually the relationship is more important than the worksheets. Who knew? We all knew. Why did we need to have to study this to be told this? But we still have to flag that up sometimes now. They go, no, the worksheets are fine, it's a help, but the relationship is even more important than some CBT tick box exercise. It really, really is. And that, creating a relationship with another person, getting to know them, getting inside their head, being genuinely interested in everything that they say... Yeah, I went to the GP when not so, it was a few years ago now. I went to my GP and said, why am I falling asleep? I feel like I'm gonna nod off after every client. What's going on? Is there something wrong in my brain? Maybe there is, maybe there isn't, but I think I was just seeing too many clients. And I've whittled it down. You can't see 30 people a week. I wasn't, I wasn't seeing that many, but we know people who've tried to. Shaun, who used to try and see that many people. And...

Fiona: 19:46

he still does.

Richard: 19:48

What? Ah Shaun!..

Fiona: 19:51

Shaun, I mean, one thing about Shaun we adore Shaun, but don't try and model Shaun if you're going to be a therapist. No, he's, he's unique. We're all unique, but Shaun is unique with a capital U, N I Q U E. He's different. He lives his life differently. But.

Richard: 20:11

I was hoping he'd learnt the hard way to not see that many clients in a week.

Fiona: 20:16

no,

Richard: 20:17

But hey, okay.

Fiona: 20:19

you can make a decent living in therapy there are people who make a very good living, but sometimes sometimes, not always, just sometimes people can do that by exploitation of, of making, you know, sort of ridiculous claims and charging ridiculous amounts,

Richard: 20:36

Yeah, especially people who are interested in hypnotherapy. Because you can use the hypnosis magic word as this clicky, click your fingers. I'm gonna make everything that you've experienced in all your life go away. You'll never have to think about it again.

Fiona: 20:52

That

Richard: 20:52

And charge a thousand pounds an hour.

Fiona: 20:54

that presses so many buttons for me. But I just worked out if you've seen 20 people a week and charging 80 pounds, which is a sort of vague average I would guess 83, 200 pounds a year. That's, that's pretty good.

Richard: 21:10

Uh, well it's, it's uh, yeah, it sounds good, buuuuut...

Fiona: 21:15

There's going to be, obviously, you're not going to get 20, well, you might, but if, to get 20 a week, every week, 52 weeks a year, you know, you've not got your holidays, etc, etc, you balance it out. But it is possible to do okay, and then going back to what I said earlier about getting involved with the National Council, etc. There are other things that you can do in the therapy world. You don't have to just do therapy. You don't have to just sit there and work with people. You can work for professional bodies. I'm doing an organisational member review next week for UKCP. I get paid for that. I don't know how much it'll be, but... It's a few hundred pounds for a few days work. it's not easy. But it's, it's different as well. And that's another thing. Variety is good. So that's nice. You can get into training. You can get into running CPD events.

Richard: 22:12

You can get Into podcasts

Fiona: 22:14

you can get into podcasts. You can get into all sorts of things. you don't just have to do that one thing. I've often said to UKCP, I'd like to do something to help people understand the benefits of getting involved in a professional organisation, because It has been. I'll own it myself. It's been hugely beneficial to me in terms of the, personal relationships. And people have seen it on here, the people who've come on as guests, like Inger and Jan and Julian, just as examples. You get to know more you get to see more putting something back, because a lot of the stuff is voluntary, but then if you do the voluntary stuff, you then get into the bit where you can get some paid bits. I think perhaps we need to move on to the element in Dee's email that really struck me, which is about, I don't know how I'll feel in four years. Now. We all start off, don't we? Yes, all, never say all, but we all start off by choosing a route to go down in terms of jobs or careers or universities or studies or whatever. We have to plump for something around about the age of 18. We think, that sounds like a good idea, I'll go and do that. What we're looking for, then, will vary from person to person as to what they're looking for. But there will be, usually, some element of gaining security, so Money to be able to live. If that's not part of it at all, then that either suggests you've got it already, or that, you know, there are people who live off grid and... So on, but most people are looking for something that will enable them to live. Then we've got that, that phrase of whether you work to live or live to work. If you can find something that isn't simply a process of I'm going to work, I'm coming home, the bit in between is only there to support the bit when you're then At home and living, if you can find something that has meaning to you, then that seems to me to be the ideal. But that meaning will vary. There are people who find great meaning from cleaning the toilets, which is great because somebody needs to clean the toilets.

Richard: 24:54

I remember meeting somebody once who worked in a phone shop, and they were struggling to find meaning in their work, because it was one of the first jobs they'd ever done, and what meaning is there in just selling phone handsets? Well... We had a conversation about it, and after some exploration they realized that their values came out in their work. They wanted to do a good job, and the fact that they were asking the question of what's the point of this job means that they want, they want their career to have meaning and purpose. Well, That means everything that they did was with meaning. And their values, which were, I want to make the world a better place, means they were. Even selling phone handsets. Because if somebody came in and they said, I'm looking for a phone, what's the best one for me? They would find the best one for them, as opposed to, well, what's the best one for me? What's the most commission I can get out of these handsets? What's, what's the most money I can make my boss so that they promote me? But that's not what they were doing. Somebody would come in and say... What's the best phone for me? And they would find the best phone for them. They might save them on a, they might save them 10 a month. They might save them 50 a month, because you can spend a lot of money on handsets, if you lease them and so on. This person was using all of their ethics and values in their job, and all they were doing was selling phones. But they hadn't noticed that that's what they were doing, until they explored it in therapy. And I think we can all have that experience, whatever job we do.

Fiona: 26:37

Pretty much. I knew, I knew somebody once, this wasn't a client but I knew somebody who worked in challenging business rates. So the company would take on a case where a company would feel that they were being charged too much for their business rates and they would take the... landlord to court. Not sure I'm getting this quite correct, but the premise is alright, it doesn't matter. But what happened very often was that it was one branch of the government taking another branch of the government to court about, you know, that this part of the government is charging this part too much and they were just spending money to take it to court when it's all the same thing. Now, I had chats with this chap and there was no meaning to be found. Because it was ridiculous. The whole process was ridiculous,

Richard: 27:34

Yeah,

Fiona: 27:35

but, you know, most people in whatever job, they can find it, and we see this, don't we, you see, your, your phone guy, we see it with the people on the, the checkout or who are helping in the supermarket, you know, if you can't find something and they'll say, Oh, I'll take you. I say, No, it's okay. Just tell me the aisle number. No, no, no, no, I'll take you. I don't know if that's because I look like a little old woman. I don't know. But it doesn't matter. they've got meaning. They are being helpful. There's very few jobs where you can't find meaning. I mean, estate agents are vilified, but that's a very important job to help people to find the right home and the other way around to find the right buyer. So pretty much anything. I mean, Bankers. We need banks. They need to do their, their thing. We know the difference, don't we? We all know the difference between the person we're speaking to, who is there because they understand and the ones who are just following a script.

Richard: 28:42

Yeah, most of us need to work to pay the bills I know there's people out there that probably don't because of family money, but on the whole

Fiona: 28:54

I think the people who are wise, I mean this is a value of my own, but my value is that people who are wise, even if they do have family money, they still really do need to work. Just watching the Beckham documentary of how they got Brooklyn out working when he got to a certain age. No, you're not just getting your football boots, no, you've got to go and work for it. There's a really important value in that which is good for the person.

Richard: 29:25

We've all got our own lives. Our own values, our own interests, our own passions. But some people don't realise what they are until they're in their forties or fifties. Because their life script was given to them by somebody else, externally. And until you work it out for yourself, you might not be as happy as you could be. Because you've been living somebody else's life. And until you... live, just a little bit, your own life. You don't know, really, what your values are. I often find that people come into therapy and they'll say, I don't even know who I am. I've just been told who I'm supposed to be, or they've got defence mechanisms, and they just live by the defence mechanisms, and that's who they are. Somebody who acts in a particular way, or does a particular thing. Not based on anything other than, well, it feels safe to do this. And eventually that causes a problem. Now, you do find that a lot of people become therapists because they went to therapy themselves. That didn't happen with me. I fell into therapy because I liked words. I liked language and how it could influence people. I liked magic tricks and, and that's how I googled one when it wasn't Google in those days. I just put into a search engine, how does hypnosis work? Because I'd always been interested as a kid. I remember going to a library when I was about nine, asking for books on hypnosis. And this little tiny working class mining town library went, Oh, we haven't got anything like that. Now, they probably did, but it was just in some, in the psychology section rather than in the occult section that I think she was thinking I needed to look in on. There's nothing like that. Plus, I was this very young, tiny child asking about books on hypnosis. I guess I was a weird kid. I never thought about that until now. I must have been a pretty weird kid,

Fiona: 31:30

I'm sure you were

Richard: 31:30

oh,

Fiona: 31:31

cute.

Richard: 31:32

I, oh, uh, I was all eyebrows and nose Quite a big nose And quite bushy eyebrows.

Fiona: 31:41

Oh, we need a picture!

Richard: 31:42

there is one kicking around in this office. I'll, I'll post it online. There's a, there's a, there'll be a link in the show notes of little me with this big nose and eyebrows. Now, had they actually said, yeah, here's the psychology section, maybe I'd have been interested in psychology younger, but I didn't know I was really interested in psychology until I was in my mid twenties, when I'd done this search engine search for how does hypnosis work, and then all these adverts popped up for colleges. Oh my goodness, it had never crossed my mind. I got goosebumps at the time. It was an absolute light bulb moment that says... You can work with people. Hey, you like people. You can work with words. You can work with language, because this was hypnotherapy. And you can work with music. Background audio. You can make CDs, and things like that. I was like, what? I always wanted to be a radio DJ! Now I can use words, and language, and music, and background sounds, and... Jingles? The equivalent of. I can do that! And help people lose weight, quit smoking, help them with their anxiety, lift their mood! Ha I was proper excited, and that sort of puppy running around with his new toy has never really quite gone away, because... I've always added something new in. New podcast, new podcast series, new people. Shiny, shiny things, new organizations, new committees to jump on new things. It's fed me since the year 2000 when I first put that search engine online. Here I am 23 years later and I, I could not think of doing anything else. I really, really couldn't. Once you find the thing that you like, then you stick with it, through the highs and lows. You live with the pros, you live with the cons, because there are cons, of course. It can be lonely, and that's why you reach out to people, and it can be scary. I remember one year, I think, I think we'd just had Billy. Billy was probably six months old, something like that, he was quite young, maybe a year old. Dawn came home from work one day. And she said, how much have you earned this week? Or how much, no, how much have you earned today? How much have you earned today? And I've been at home today, no clients today. Oh, right. And she wanders off into another room. And I mentioned that to her not so long ago. She went, that doesn't sound like me. It was on her mind. Clearly, we've got a brand new, we've got a new baby. We've got a mortgage. And my husband hasn't earned any money today. Well some days you don't. Because some days, you're writing articles for adverts and things.

Fiona: 34:29

yeah, those days that you don't, you don't sit in front of This Morning and Eggheads, etc., Court TV, you don't do that. You work, just as anybody who's... a private practice therapist. You set your times. These are my working hours. Let's just say nine till five, Monday to Friday. Fairly standard. And if you don't have a client, you might be able to have a lunch break, maybe.

Richard: 34:57

you can please have a lunch break.

Fiona: 34:59

Yes, yes, I'm teasing. But otherwise you're working. So if you've not got a client, you're working on your marketing, you're working on podcasts, you're working on your blogs, you're working on your website, getting your SEO working for you. You're working 9 to 5, Monday to Friday, if that's the times you set. If you set different times, that's absolutely fine. But you set them and you work.

Richard: 35:22

When I first met you, I was brand new into therapy. I still had a full time job, I think, at the time. Yeah, I would have done. yeah, I wasn't even married. And one of the things you said was, You get annoyed with therapists who just sit there and say, The phone hasn't rung. I've been sitting staring at the phone and it isn't ringing. What do I need to do? Well, maybe you didn't say you got annoyed, but maybe you were annoyed.

Fiona: 35:49

I probably did because I would be. Yeah, I mean, I still, I still

Richard: 35:52

don't just sit there looking at the phone.

Fiona: 35:53

I still find it frustrating. And just to say, oh, I do also find it frustrating when people don't take it seriously as a career. If that is what you're choosing to do as, let's take that stereotypical woman who's been at home with the kids. The kids are leaving home or growing up and the husband makes a lot of money. I know it's stereotypical, but stereotypes are there for a reason. And She thinks, oh, I want to do something worthwhile. That's, that's okay. As, as long as that's, you know, fully intended. Where I do get annoyed is the ones who pretend I'm being a bit harsh here, pretend that it's going to be their career, and then don't put the effort in to make it such. And there are, there are people, I mean, I think, I can't remember exactly, but you must've been in this sort of position of when you had to. leave that full time job to go into full time therapy. That's a big step for people. And I completely understand that because most people who train are in employment because you need to be, because you still need to be paying the bills whilst you're training. and that, jump that has to be made. I've somebody this week that I work with has just made that, that leap of right. Nope, not working anymore.

Richard: 37:20

It's scary

Fiona: 37:21

therapy. It's scary and exciting. A lot of people who do that are pushed into it. It happens with redundancy quite often. You get made redundant. Oh, well, oh! Now I can do this. I can take that leap. But for a lot of people, there's a gradual process, and there's a point at which they may be seeing six to eight people a week, and evenings and weekends, and it's all, life is all a bit too busy because they've got work, and then they're doing these. When do you make that leap to full time? It's a challenge. And some people never make it.

Richard: 38:03

No, they don't.

Fiona: 38:05

That's two words. Some people never make the leap, some people never make it in business. Um, and that's going to be the case with anything. I mean, you know, you hear most of what I know about other professions is from books I read, but there'll be people who start accountancy and don't get chartered status, there are people who study law but don't pass the bar exams, there's people who study medicine but don't become doctors. And people who do do those things that then leave and do something else. So it's not different from that. But perhaps there's a little bit more because going right back to the beginning of what you were saying, you do need to have the personal qualities in order to make this work. If you're not interested,

Richard: 38:52

yeah, you just need to be curious about people. Genuinely interested in people. That's it. That is it. Then you learn the theories. And

Fiona: 39:03

And strong enough, strong enough to be able to handle what is dumped on your lap.

Richard: 39:10

Well, that's one of the good things. about it, you're not gonna, unless you go straight into an agency and given a huge caseload, in private practice, you're going to start with no clients, and then there'll be one, and then there'll be two. It's unlikely you're going to go straight into a full working week. So if you are working full time doing this evenings and weekends, you're going to get practice at being able to differentiate and put things in boxes. And leave them there, and wipe your hands and go, Right, they've left that with me! I'm leaving this in this room, and you go home with a few deep breaths. And you practice what you preach. We teach people all about pattern interruption, CBT thought stopping, things like that. If you need to do that and take a few deep breaths yourself, and have that image of that client in your mind and their worries, and you shrink them down into the corner until they disappear. If you need to do that, you do it. I do. Should do the swish! Swish Swish it away! Well, we could probably do with bringing the episode to a close. I think we've gone off on enough tangents today, but we've definitely answered, I hope, Dee's question about the pros and cons and what it's like to work and be a therapist in the 21st century.

Fiona: 40:30

With the extension into finding meaning in whatever it is that you choose to do

Richard: 40:36

Yeah, and when sat down talk about this, that was what the episode was going to be about, finding meaning in your work, and we've gone very much into finding meaning as a therapist, which is fine, absolutely. And I hope people can use what we've spoken about and transfer that into every other profession, estate agents, law, whatever it is that you might be in. Selling phones in a phone shop, selling cars, whatever it is. The process is always the same. So, hey, what are we up to next week? It's a guests next week,

Fiona: 41:07

Bill

Richard: 41:08

Bill Hard.

Fiona: 41:09

Bill is a fascinating chap and he's going to talk to us about The Four Dimensions of the Heart, the theories that come from Buddhism.

Richard: 41:20

Would it be fair to say he was a Buddhist monk for a while?

Fiona: 41:23

I think so, but we'll check that out with him.

Richard: 41:26

I think he was. think he, yeah. He's a lovely guy. Absolutely lovely guy. Great therapist. Right. let's disappear for another week. Have a super week, everybody. Like we always say, there's a link in the show notes to keep in touch. I'll even put a picture of me from when I was nine, or younger, maybe. I don't know what pictures I've got. Into the show notes, why not? Have a look. I'll stick it on Instagram, and then you can... Follow me there. You can follow me on Instagram, you can follow me on Threads, on Twitter, I'm still calling it Twitter, on Facebook somewhere, I'm on YouTube but don't follow me in real life, please. That'd be great. Right, let's go. See you next week, everybody. Bye now!

Fiona: 42:08

bye.