You are Highly Sensitive, so chances are, you are into woo-woo topics a little bit. Maybe not as much as some, but you can definitely feel that the world works in mysterious ways sometimes! So, let’s look at three ways you can attract clients as a Highly Sensitive Self-Employed Person and set some of that energy woo-woo to work for you!
Continue readingIf you’re Highly Sensitive and feel disheartened, overwhelmed or unfulfilled by the world of work, you may have thought about becoming self-employed. But does being a Highly Sensitive Self-Employed Person work?
You may (rightly) have some concerns about it. After all, for most of us, self-employment is not the common family path.
Self-employment is also definitely not for everyone. Yet, your High Sensitivity is definitely not a reason not to go for it.
In fact, when you set up your business in a way that works with your sensitivity (instead of fighting it), you could find that you are more inspired and more productive working for yourself.
Below are 15 reasons why being self-employed as a Highly Sensitive Person works.
Continue readingA good salad is nutritious and healthy and it also tastes good.
A good salad is pretty easy to make, but it does require one non-negotiable:
quality ingredients.
If your lettuce is dilapidated, the tomatoes are soggy, the radishes are flavorless, and the arugula is gooey then you won’t end up with a good salad no matter what you do.
Does that mean that bad salads don’t exist? No, in fact, they are everywhere. Many restaurants serve a flavorless salad on the side, add a lot of dressing, and hope you don’t notice.
O.k. Caroline, but what does any of this have to do with running a business? I don’t own a restaurant!
I’ll tell you:
The one thing you need more than anything else when starting your own business as a Highly Sensitive Person, is to have a way to bring yourself back to a state of trust.
Not blind trust, but trust that taking action will get you somewhere.
This is why self-care and emotionally savvy practices are a MUST when you run your own business. They are not a cute “option” for “when you have more time”.
As an entrepreneur, business owner or otherwise self-employed person, you need inspiring stories.
There are days when you will feel like it’s just too hard, or like nobody gets what you’re going through.
On those days, it’s important to fill yourself up with inspiring storylines. You need to be able to create a “the hero was in a pit of darkness, but fought the monsters and made it through” kind of narrative in your head.
If you can’t feel that deep sense of “I can make this happen”, then finding solutions is much much harder.
Finding solutions requires being able to put some of the fear aside. Doing that means you need access to a different feeling, a feeling of inspiration and a willingness to accept the challenge.
Maybe you’re lucky and you have friends or family who will tell you inspiring anecdotes to help give you a boost. Or maybe those are the exact people who will tell you to quit, have no idea what to say, who shake their head at you, or just don’t realise what the big deal is (“you’ll be fine, you always are”).
When you have no real-life inspiration stories, then novels and netflix can be a great source of getting your mojo back.
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If clients feel better after talking to you, while you feel much worse. If you find yourself ruminating on your clients’ issues – even though you rationally know there is no point to this. If you sense what is up with someone before they walk through the door or pick up the phone… you may be more than simply “caring”.
Feeling called to help others often has to do with personal life experience. More so than that, you may find that you have always been “that person”. Even when you felt tired or lost or discouraged yourself, people still want to talk to you to share their troubles.
When you are able to shake off your client’s problems at the end of a session, then you’re ready to work with the next client. But what if you struggle to let go?
Being a professional, chances are you’ve tried all kinds of things. If despite setting boundaries, taking some time to clear your head and talking yourself out of worrying, you still find yourself “stuck” with a host of feelings and pains that don’t seem to be yours, it’s time to check whether more might be going on. Continue reading
Most new businesses fail. That’s what the statistics say, and that sounds really scary, doesn’t it?
Yet, I don’t think it’s as scary or mysterious as it seems.
Let me illustrate with some examples that popped up in a google search:
I’m currently working with a client on her marketing strategy – which is fun! And it made me realise something more clearly: When I help her understand what marketing is for her work, the nitty gritty rules are different than they are for me.
The content that would inform her potential clients will be different than mine. The rules on what best to include and what to leave out are different. Why?
Because her clients are different from mine, and they are in a different phase of their personal journey.
As service providers, we all help people with a particular stretch of their journey (and there isn’t just one journey, there are many!). When we are really dialed in to our work, our essence and our strength, then we also zoom in on a very specific problem that we help our clients with.
And those problems come with specific needs.
When you are a self-employed Highly Sensitive coach, you need to make a healthy income doing what you do. Otherwise, your work is not sustainable and won’t last. Your Highly Sensitive coaching rates need to be truly viable.
As a Highly Sensitive Person, you bring a lot of attentitiveness and listening skills to the table. You emphathise with your clients, more than most. But, this also has a cost! You can’t be in this hightened caring mode non-stop. You’ll need down-time and you’ll need coaching rates that allow for that.
Many of your clients will understand this perfectly and not resent you for it. Yet, there will always be people who think that you “owe” them and who will contact you to let you know that what you are charging is wrong. According to them, your Highly Sensitive coaching rates should be on par with what they want to pay, not what is reasonable for you.
By the way, this can also happen if you live in a western country and have a few clients overseas who make a good local income, but have a much lower cost of living (and hence make less money than you do). They may expect you to lower your rates because they are used to paying x, y, z locally. Yet, you need to base your rates based on your cost of living, not theirs.
I think nowadays with all kinds of internet hypes and the ability to work from home, a lot of people feel a kind of hyped, fake pressure to turn their precious and healthy hobby into something more.
Suddenly, it’s not good enough to work on a project just for fun, as a creative outlet, or as an escape.
Suddenly it’s not good enough to be a parent full-time because since you are at home, you might as well work from home too, right?
Yet, here is one essential thing to consider about turning something fun into something lucrative:
