- Are you a wellness practitioner struggling to engage your clients in your treatment plan?
- Are you finding more and more clients are dropping out of care despite your best efforts?
- Are you feeling more and more frustrated and angry your practice is not growing?
For the most part, the reason is ego.
Hi, I’m Dr. Andrew Arnold, founder of the Million Dollar Wellness Intern program and today I want to show you 3 ways you can manage your ego better to create a more peaceful loving life and practice.
So, what is ego?
The identity you have created to survive and function in the world, to fulfill your role as a wellness practitioner and run a wellness practice.
The ego is your conscious thinking, that part of your brain that thinks it is running the show.
The ego tells us what we should and shouldn’t do.
It thinks it has our best interests at heart when in fact, it is solely focused on flight, fright, and fight. Its job is to protect, to keep you in survival and fear and, through all this, make you look good.
It is founded on how it interprets your inner, subconscious thoughts that form your beliefs. It usually, however, misinterprets these inner messages ignoring the ‘gut’ and the ‘heart’ and ruling from the head.
The ego keeps us locked away in our heads in an endless cycle of babble and this keeps up disconnected from being present.
Our sub-conscious runs programs that dictate our existence. The ego, however, runs its own programs commonly known as stories. These are the stories we tell ourselves and for the most part, they are just that, stories! They do not make who we are.
Eckhart Tolle says, ‘The most common ego identifications have to do with possessions, the work you do, social status and recognition, knowledge and education, physical appearance, special skills, relationships, personal and family history, belief systems, and often nationalistic, racial, religious, and other collective identifications.’
These ego identifications are not who you are!
We all have an ego, this is part of the human condition, however, it is not your true essence.
As wellness practitioners when we come from ego our practice and client management become dichotic. We operate from survival, fear, and scarcity and this only leads to blame, shame, anger, and frustration. We judge our clients, making them wrong and this is not coming from unconditional love.
The ego is not about ‘how can I serve’ or ‘how can I give’ rather ‘what do I get’ and looking good. Many wellness practitioners suffer from this condition.
To truly evolve as a wellness practitioner master it’s about waking up, becoming aware of the traits and behaviors of the ego.
With this consciousness, you can then begin to make different choices and this will drastically change your life and your practice.
I have helped many wellness practitioners develop mindset strategies that attract more clients, and not only that, the right clients!
In my program, I deep dive into this and much, much more but today, I want to share my 3 tips on managing your ego, to create a more peaceful loving life and practice.
Stop taking things personally.
The ego thrives on attention and in a weird way, loves to be offended. There’s a part of you that actually wants to feel wounded, wants to be the victim, needs pain and conflict. Think about a negative client review or feedback. When we allow ourselves to be hurt we are in fact, giving our ego permission to take control of our lives and create pain. To shift first we need to make a conscious choice to recognize love as our natural state, and this means unconditional love. Wellness practitioners and humans in general, are born to connect to their clients. Our natural state is to feel joy, not sadness. If a client does or says something that makes you feel any negative emotion, you actually have a choice. You can choose to react and engage in conflict or recognize this is an opportunity to grow. You can choose to see that almost all the time, when a client behaves negatively towards you this is a projection of their ego. So, don’t waste your time or energy on ego battles. Save it for those clients who love you and want to see you. Save it for love and service.
Forgive.
The ego loves being righteous! This is how it survives. The problem is, this creates a roadblock to your true purpose and destination. It stops you from doing what you need to do to move towards love and truth. The ego is like a weed. In spring there maybe flowers but if left untended it will choke all the other flowers and this can leave you in a not so good place. The key is to forgive and let go. Forgive your clients, don’t judge. They are on their own journey’s and your role is to simply be there for them, showing them the way. When you let go your heart opens and you stop being right! Instead, you choose unconditional love and service. Forgiveness and letting go allow you to follow your true purpose.
Let go and observe.
Become the interested observer. Let go of being right. Don’t try to win. Instead, just observe. Your ego is always wanting to prove itself, wanting love and validation. The thing is your higher self does not need validation. It already knows it is LOVE. The key is awareness, and in this awareness, space opens without expectation. When we observe without expectation you stop adding meaning. You see your clients for who they are as opposed to thru the ego’s lens of scarcity and lack. There is then the opportunity to observe those clients who are your Grade A’s and those who are not from a space of unconditional love. You let go of controlling clients, trying to turn a Grade C into a Grade A. This is freedom. Eckhart Tolle said, ‘’The moment you become aware of the ego in you, it is strictly no longer the ego but just an old, conditioned mind pattern. The ego implies unawareness. Awareness and ego cannot co-exist.’’ The ego serves a purpose however when it takes over the mind this causes you to fall out of alignment with your true inner-self. Learn to manage your ego better and create a wellness practice that is more about peace, love, and authenticity. Gandhi said, ‘’When the ego dies the soul awakens’’. Let your ego die…a little more each day…so your own soul can awaken and grow. So, your freedom and joy can grow. So, your peace can come forward.
Bless your life, your clients and your practice by letting go of your ego.
About the Author:
Dr. Andrew Arnold is a Chiropractor and founder of the Million Dollar Wellness Intern program.