True Confessions Time

I was working with another MT yesterday, helping her get some things straightened out in her practice. I mentioned something I was working on straightening out in my practice.

She said "oh, I'm so glad to hear you say that, I thought you already had everything working just right. There's hope for me now too!"

I do not have everything "all worked out". I have my foibles and hidden pockets of "gotta get to that one of these days" too. So, in the holiday spirit of giving, here my Top 10 things in my practice that aren't as they "should" be.

1.  My major plan for next year is to start using intake forms. I don't use them at all right now. I should.

2.  My website is 2 months out of date (which is obvious because I have material on there with a date/time stamp). Some of that is technical but most of it is just me.

3.  I share parts of my personal life with my clients (though, honestly, I only do this when I think it's appropriate).

4.  I have been out of my "new client" cards (that I give to all new clients at the end of their first appointment) for months. Since I can print them out at home, this is especially annoying.

5.  I contribute to my retirement account randomly at best.

6.  I have needed to get myself set up as an LLC for several years. It's not hard and it's not expensive. And it still needs to be done.

7.  I have fallen behind on my bookkeeping badly this year. I chalk it up to a very rough year emotionally (the theme of this year has been "death" and "grief"). I'll spend part of my Christmas vacation going through a year's worth of bank statements and paper receipts to get myself updated. And I know I'll still miss some deductions.

8.  I signed an IC contract a few weeks ago without really reading it or negotiating. It's for a very short-term relationship -- it ends mid-December -- and I just didn't want to be bothered. On the plus side, I know the owner very very well and knew exactly what I was getting myself into.

9.  My session notes are free-form (that is, not SOAP), done in Word, and mostly for my own benefit. But one of my goals this year was to actually do them consistently and I have.

10.  I haven't backed up my (electronic) business files in weeks. I'll be doing that as soon as I post this blog.


We've all got a list, long or short, of things we "ought" to be doing. Every small business owner does. We're just one person (is that grammatically correct?).

Perfection is not an option.

But working away at that "ought to" list is. Here's hoping I get a few of the things on my "ought to" list knocked off in the next few months and have a shorter list to report this time next year.