Being an Ayurvedic Pracitioner in many ways is getting easier. 10 years ago most gyms didn’t have a decent yoga program. Most people now can recognize triangle pose a mile away. This shift into yoga has paved the way for us Ayurvedic Practitioners.  Our neighbors are discovering their interioirty… their inner body… their subtle physiology. Our hospitals have mind-body stress release programs. Our communities are starting to wake up  and look around for who is producing food locally.

Over the past few years, my husband and I have had a few dinner table conversations about who thrives and who struggles. We’ve noticed a few industry trends. My career in  yoga and ayurveda became full time when I was 27. Now I’m 37 and I’m very interested in supporting Ayurvedic Practitioners and yoga teachers in reaching deeper into their communities. To do so, though, we might need an additional skillset to our healing and preventive medicine skills.

This new skill set requires creativity, connection, communication, marketing, and basic online and offline business skills. We need a head for business. I never studied business before I went into business.  I went to a liberal arts college and the closest I could come to a business class was Economics. That’s not close.

We need to study business and marketing and the new economy as if it were the 8th chakra.

Here are my 3 tips for Ayurvedic Practitioners in 2011

1. STOP USING SANSKRIT. Most people don’t care about Sanskrit. Most folks would rather figure optimize their iPhone than optimize their bowel movements. They have no idea how the sanskrit language can open the subtle channels of their inner body. And because they don’t know… they don’t care. So if you want to attract these “most people” into your amazing healing work so they don’t have to pop pills every time something goes awry, you need to speak to the hearts and needs of the people you can help. When I stopped offering “Ayurvedic Cleanses” to my locals and started offering “Detox Courses” my numbers doubled.  I only use sanskrit when I teach Yogis… because sanskrit for Yogis is like dark chocolate for women. This means in smaller communities, using words like “Ayurveda” to describe what you do might create more confusion than clarification.
2. WHAT CAN YOU FIX? Now that you can talk to people using their language, which is English, figure out what they need that you can fix.  Pick up on trends. What do your people need? What can you fix? I recently noticed a plethora of injured friends and clients due to ski injuries (where I live most of my clients ski 2-3 times a week). I decided to offer Skier Rehab Clinics to “Fix” their Injuries. (Notice no “healing” is going on here, which almost brings us back to #1).
3. CREATE CHEAP GROUP COURSES. Stop focusing on consultations. This model of healthcare, holistic or otherwise is OUTDATED. It’s the old economy. It’s dead. If you are formatting your career on one-on-one work you are wasting your time, your knowledge and your ability to make a big impact. You must stop this nonsense. Our culture needs some rather huge wake up calls. You know what they are and you know how to address them. If you work with individuals you lose the force of the collective. You lose accountability, teamwork, community, connectivity, troubleshooting,  idea sharing, and culture shifting. You unconsciously reinforce narcissism. Last fall one of my mentor students mentioned how hard it is to make money over the holidays in Wellness Work. I took that as a challenge. I offered the Evolve your Winter Traditions Project between Thanksgiving & New Years, for 2/3 of the price of my consultations. I made a phat pile of  cash and received epiphany-oriented feedback. The next new course I offer the general public will be 1/2 the price of Winter Traditions. If you keep working one-on-one you’ll never make the impact we need right now. Hello. Plus, you’ll have a harder and harder time getting folks to cough up a Ben Franklin to hear your sage advice for an hour.

If you want to make it bigger in 2011, let me know. I’ll add you to the list for a free conference call on this subject , email me. Start investing in your marketing skills. I’ll share what I’ve learned in helping more people, and be one of those “thrivers” my husband and I discuss at the dinner table.

Learn •      Teach •       Earn Money •       Help Others