How Building a Heart-based Business Can Ignite Your Most Transformative Journey

Running a heart-based and soul-driven business in the wellness industry is one of the most courageous, fulfilling and purposeful careers to pursue.

A career of this calibre is likely to offer deep connections to your own learnings, growth and experiences. You will be required to hold space for the evolution and growth of your clients, all whilst ensuring that your business is profitable.

Something that is rarely shared when growing a heart-led, service-based business is the personal development and spiritual work required from new and existing business owners. Today, we will be exploring this topic with the intention to remove any obstacles that may be leaving you feeling stagnant or stuck in your business.

We want to keep you moving forward so that you can share your medicine and magic with your clients.

For many of us, our wellness or spiritual business is often the first we’ve run. This means we have the steep learning curve of working out how to do marketing, client attraction and servicing, tech, social media and financial tracking. We also have the opportunity to grow through meeting the more shadowy based aspects of self and overcoming the various mindset challenges that arise along the way.

It’s often said that building and growing an authentic service-based business is the best way to raise our consciousness. I couldn’t agree more.

In our day-to-day lives we can easily turn a blind eye to our habits, beliefs and behaviours but if we do this as business owners, it may have a big implication on our lives and businesses. That’s why it’s important to resolve whatever is keeping us stuck and, as a by-product, a spiritual expansion or evolutionary opportunity may be on offer.

When your business is connected to your deeper “why” and your soul-mission, you will breakthrough challenges and realise just how resilient you are. The reality is, however, that most of us will experience doubts and fears along the journey of business growth. If we can re-frame these doubts as opportunities for us to evolve as business owners and humans, it will make the journey more enjoyable and easeful.

Ultimately, your business grows as you do.

To support you on this journey, you’ll find a few tips to help overcome some of the common business and personal growing pains faced by holistic and wellness business owners:

1. Know your worth - Charge your services at a rate that reflects the value of your time, energy and expertise, and get clear on your invoicing and payment methods to ensure you are paid the right amount, on time, every time.

2. Create healthy boundaries with clients - Stick to the time allocated for appointments, be clear about your availability between sessions and make sure to re-charge and ground your energy after client appointments.

3. Step into your authentic power and challenge imposter syndrome - When doubts arise, remind yourself of your abilities, your experience and wisdom, your qualifications, and your client’s transformations. Embody this, then act in your business from this place.

4. Challenge the fear of visibility - To grow, you and your business will need to be seen. If the fear of visibility arises, take some time to nurture the part of you that’s scared of judgement and let them know that it’s safe to be seen.

5. Have clear boundaries between business and home life - Get support at home if things are ramping up with your business and review your work tasks by using the “4 D’s” of time management: do, delegate, defer or delete. This will help you to be present at home and present with your work without leaking energy between the two.

Which of the above resonates with you?

It’s important to remember that almost all new and existing business owners experience one or more of these growing pains as they grow in their businesses. The sooner you identify and move through them - with support where you need - the more growth and success you, your clients and your business will experience.

Every time we face a shadow aspect of ourselves, or a new business challenge presents itself, we should view it as a gift. Even if it feels uncomfortable at the time, it offers a unique opportunity to grow and deepen our resilience.

As we grow our soul-led businesses and dive deeper into ourselves, we unlock new levels of our innate healing powers and embodied learnings, which ultimately empowers us to create and hold space for our clients in a more potent way.

Let’s start the conversation. As you’ve grown your business, what have been your biggest personal and spiritual growth areas? We’d love to know.

IICT can help you grow

IICT is a professional industry body that provides professional recognition, access to insurance and resources to support the growth of your practice. Available in over 35+ countries and with over 1,100 modalities approved, IICT is the leading international professional body for complementary therapists. Join IICT here or contact our team to find out more about becoming a member today.

Article written by: Claire Bradshaw

Claire Bradshaw is an ex-corporate marketer, turned wellness coach and yoga teacher, turned business coach for holistic professionals. She supports her soul-led wellness business clients to create and grow their business authentically, intentionally and sustainably using her signature framework - the Holistic Business Builder. To learn more about how to grow your business, watch her free masterclass here or connect on Instagram @_clairebradshaw_.