Private Pay Practitioners Premium Podcast

I keep seeing therapists spread themselves thin trying to post on Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Threads, whatever new thing just launched. You don't need to be everywhere. You need to be where your people are - consistently. Pick one. Maybe two. Get good at it. Let the rest go. DJ

This week I sat down with Ingrid Johnston, a marriage and family therapist in Washington State who's been in private practice for almost 10 years. Ingrid had a decade of steady growth. Then she took a 3-month sabbatical after burnout - and when she came back, she just... coasted. Didn't put energy back into the business. Didn't market. Didn't realize the landscape had changed. By 2025, her caseloa...

This week I sat down with Inna Zusman, a bilingual couple and family therapist in Maryland who specializes in multicultural relationships. Inna came back to therapy after 20+ years in corporate HR. She'd been recruiting therapists for years, so when she decided to make the switch, she treated it like a business decision - not a dream. We got into: Her idea to give discounts to clients who stayed l...

Tiffany Castellanos has been in private practice since 2009, but everything changed when her husband became disabled and she became the primary breadwinner. Add in clawback horror stories from colleagues, and she knew it was time to drop the insurance panels. Now practicing from Madrid, Spain (yes, legally - we get into that), Tiffany is building something unique: a practice serving expats navigat...

This week I sat down with Michele Tulk, a psychiatric nurse practitioner running a solo private pay telehealth practice in Washington state. Michele's path: stocking shelves at Target, pharmacy tech, CNA, RN in the ICU and ER for years, then psych NP on a specialized inpatient PTSD unit at the VA. She started her private practice in 2018 as a side gig while working full-time at the VA, working 65...

Private Pay Isn't a Dream. It's a Decision. This one is short and direct. Every day I see therapists who treat private pay like a wish - hoping clients will show up, hoping the numbers will work out, hoping it gets easier. Hope is not a strategy. Private pay works when you stop waiting for permission and start building with intention. It works when you treat it like the business decision it is. Yo...

This week I sat down with Anna Cimburek, a palliative care and hospice social worker turned grief therapist. Anna's dad died from pancreatic cancer in 2011 - 7 weeks from diagnosis to death. She was 27 and couldn't find any literature on adult child loss. That experience eventually led her to hospice social work, where she spent 4.5 years doing inpatient end-of-life care. After her brother also di...

This week I sat down with Steffeny Feld to talk about intensives - what they are, who they're for, and what therapists get wrong about them. Steffeny started her practice during COVID and never touched insurance. A friend connected her with a business coach who said "you don't need to get on any panels" - even her clinical supervisor thought it sounded "sus." But it worked. She went from weekly se...

This one's for everyone who's been spinning on the niche question. You don't need to have it all figured out. You don't need to pick the "perfect" niche. You just need to start somewhere. In this minisode, I break down how to approach niche selection without the spiral. Still stuck? I'm now offering Niche Positioning Reports. You tell me your niche, state, rates, and income goals - I send you a pe...

Everyone tells you that you MUST have a niche or your practice will fail. That’s not true. Some of you are thriving as generalists and should stay that way. In this episode, I’m helping you figure out if you’re a happy generalist who just needs better systems, or if lack of niche clarity is actually costing you money and clients. I cover: ∙ The signs you’re a “happy generalist” who doesn’t need to...

This week I sat down with Jana Glass, a solo practitioner in Sandy Springs, Georgia who specializes in perinatal mental health, trauma, and addiction. Her insurance exit story is one of the wildest I've heard. She took insurance for 15 years. Then BCBS sent her a letter about a client she'd seen two years prior - a woman who'd been on short-term disability for anxiety. Jana saw her for 6 months, u...

You THINK you have a niche. But does it actually do what it's supposed to do? In this episode, DJ breaks down the five most common niche mistakes therapists make - using real examples from consultation calls. If your marketing feels exhausting, if consultation calls aren't converting, or if you're not getting the referrals you want, your niche probably isn't specific enough. What you'll learn: The...

NEW: Therapy for Therapists with Tiffany Green First episode of 2026 is live. Tiffany Green is a solo practitioner in Chicago who's built a practice where a third of her clients are therapists. We talked about how that niche found her, what it's like to do deep work with people who do deep work for a living, and the three categories she sees therapist clients wrestling with: personal stuff, existe...

The Private Pay Practitioners Playbook is now on Audible. 20 five-star reviews. Amazon best seller. And I narrated every word myself — because no one else was going to tell this story with the same fire. I wrote this book for the therapists who are done letting insurance dictate their income, their schedule, and their clinical decisions. The ones who are ready to build something sustainable — on t...

This week I sat down with Emma Kobil, and we went somewhere I didn't expect. Emma built a successful coaching business helping therapists grow their private pay practices. Her clients got results. She was doing all the things — the Facebook group, the weekly lives, the sales funnels, the Instagram, the course. And then she walked away from it. Not because it failed. Because she was miserable. She...

This week I'm sitting down with Tony Rella — IFS-certified therapist, author, and someone I've known since our insurance-panel days in Seattle. Tony fully transitioned to private pay in October 2024, and this conversation gets into the messy middle of what that actually looked like: the panic of Q1 2025 when referrals dried up, the temptation to go back, and the moment he realized he couldn't. We...

Hey everyone, Just dropped a bonus episode that I'm making FREE for everyone - members and non-members alike. This one's different. It's not an interview. It's not a teaching session. It's a raw, honest reflection on what happened at Saturday's Private Pay Practitioners Playbook crash course workshop. What I talk about: The Mistake - How I accidentally didn't record the first hour of the workshop...

This week I sat down with Kellyn McCullough, LMFT and EMDR-certified therapist in Washington State, who's navigating something so many of us are feeling right now. She took a year off for maternity leave, moved locations, and came back to a completely different landscape. The post-pandemic abundance? Gone. Now it feels like scarcity. And everyone - EVERYONE - does EMDR now. Sound familiar? We dug...

Dr. Lauren Chase joined me this week to talk about something so many of us face: the anxiety of leaving insurance panels. Lauren's a PhD-level provider (yes, insurance pays her master's-level rates - criminal), seeing 20-25 clients a week, and finally hit her breaking point. She regrets not starting private pay from day one, and now she's planning her full exit for 2026. We dug into: Why "disappoi...

This episode hit different. We talked about something that shows up constantly in the community but doesn't get enough air time: the pressure of being the primary earner while building or sustaining a private pay practice. The reality that if clients don't show up, the money doesn't flow. The challenge of saving when income isn't consistent. The weight of managing a household while also holding pe...

We're talking about the stuff that's making networking harder than it needs to be. What we're covering: The Cold Facebook Add - Why you need to introduce yourself before hitting "send" on that friend request (and what to do instead) The Salesy Networking Meeting - How to show up as a person, not a business card, and why pitching too early kills the relationship before it starts Rate Shaming - Yes,...

Hufsa Ahmad (2x TEDx speaker, EMDR specialist, 13 years in practice) joined me to talk about the networking mistakes we ALL make in early practice - and honestly, mistakes some of us are still making. What we dug into: Why "networking for referrals" backfires every single time Not having your pitch down (and how it makes you look inexperienced even when you're not) Dealing with therapists who don'...

Hey there, If you missed last night's Wednesday check-in, you missed one of the most powerful conversations we've had. Dr. Dominique Pritchett joined me to talk about evolving from therapist to paid speaker, and she brought ALL the wisdom. Here's what we covered: On Building a Speaking Business: How she went from finishing her postdoc to building a global speaking career (Spain, Ireland, Italy, So...

If you missed last night's call, you missed some REAL talk about what it takes to build a profitable practice without sacrificing your life. Maren Londahl-Smidt (Balance & Beyond Coaching, Profit for Keeps® Coach) and Denielle Rigoglioso (9-Thrive Private Practice Accelerator, Salt Water Coaching) joined me to break down: ✅ Why the "therapists can't make money" narrative is BS ✅ How Profit f...

Last night's conversation with Kirk Perry delivered exactly what we needed - practical insights about AI without the hype or fear. Kirk (former Meta AI leader, now founder of BrandNeue Archetypes) joined us to discuss how AI is changing therapy practices and what that means for you. What we covered: Why generic AI prompts give you generic (robotic) results How to use AI without losing your authent...