The Importance of Clients

Lately I've been thinking about clients, and my interactions with them as a shamanic practitioner. Anyone who has a business knows there is a tremendous emphasis placed on marketing to be successful. Leveraging Facebook and other social media, Google search, business cards, flyers, networking, you name it - it's what is pushed at us as business owners to gain a customer base, and more, and more clients. I admit, depending on the type of business this is vitally important to support long term success. Or is it?

My struggle with this concept is that I don't see "clients" as numbers, rather, I see people that I form a relationship with. I consider their communications with me sacred because I become privy to aspects of their lives that they wouldn't share with anyone else. Shamanism is very strongly based on ethics - at least that's how I see it. And most of the shamans I know have 9-5 jobs doing something else, and work as a shaman on behalf of their community on the off-work hours. So the people that I meet and work with understand that I will invest the time to fully understand what they need for healing. Simply - I am not interested in assembly-line healing. What I am interested in is being part of someone's life and aiding them in fulfilling their highest spiritual journey in this lifetime. Life is profound, and I consider it a sacred gift to be asked to step into someone's life in this manner.

So - as a result - I don't seek large numbers of people banging on my door for services. Instead, I constantly envision the right people approaching me for services who are also seeking shamanic healing. This relieves me of the unfruitful effort of trying to "recruit" people who may not understand what shamanism is or who have no real interest in alternative healing modalities.

Blessings to you,
Helen