Today, I want to talk about why you shouldn’t be afraid to charge what you’re worth as a coach and how to get over your emotional hang-ups about the M-word.
That's right... Money.
Having trained well over a thousand people to become internationally certified coaches, I know that something happens when you first go out into the marketplace and start to change people's lives, and start to make a difference in the world.
And that is, people out there struggle to charge Money.
They often think to themselves, "How could you charge what you’re worth for being a life coach? How could I charge money for these gifts that I have? How could I charge money for helping people heal and transform their life?
How can I charge money for helping people get clarity, and get direction of where they want to go in life? Helping them find their purpose and their mission?
How can I charge money for helping people improve their relationships? How can I charge money for helping people feel happier? "
This may not be something that affects you, but I can tell you from first-hand experience that it affects tens of thousands of difference-makers around the world.
I didn’t know how to charge for my services
When I first got started over 11 and a half years ago, I didn't know how to charge money. It may just sound foreign to you, I get it. But here's the thing. A lot of people struggle with this concept, and I definitely was one of them.
What I used to do was just give free coaching sessions left, right and centre. Anyone at all that wanted help in any way, shape or form, I would give up my time for that person.
I would help them as much as possible. But I just didn't know how I was meant to charge money.
And I had a whole range of things going on inside myself.
Was it confidence issues?
Was it self-belief issues?
Was it believing that I had this gift that I wasn't meant to charge for?
Was it because it had a slight spiritual element to it?
I really did struggle. I mean, how was I meant to charge money?
Reiki and Dr Usui
There is a healing art form out there known as Reiki. It’s a hands-on/hands-off or distant form of energetic healing. It's been around since the beginning of time really.
The teachers of it were lost for a little bit and it was rediscovered by a gentleman named Dr Usui.
Now, I was actually fortunate enough to be trained up to master level in two different strains of Reiki, Tibetan Reiki and Usui Reiki. So I hold my masters in both forms of Reiki healing.
During that time, I read about the history of Dr Usui, and I learned something quite fascinating.
See, Dr Usui used to travel from village to village in Japan, doing energy healings on the people in that village.
What he found was that when he did these energy healings on people, they transformed completely. At the end of the session, they would swear to him that his healing had healed the illness or the issue that they were facing.
Dr Usui would continue on his way, travelling from village to village. He would eventually make his way back to that village six to twelve months later.
And unfortunately, when he came back, he was surprised that most of the illnesses and issues that he had worked on had come back. They had not actually been permanently removed. As in most the stuff he'd been working on was not actually fixed at all!
It was only a temporary fix, and he couldn't work out why this was.
So, what he decided to do was change something about the way he delivered his service.
Dr Usui wasn't charging because he believed and felt that the energy of Reiki was being passed through him into another human being. How could he possibly charge for such a service?
He realised though, that something had to change because people weren't changing. They weren't staying changed, they weren't changing for good. So, he decided to change the rules of his session.
The offering – charging for your services
What Dr Usui decided to do was if you wanted a healing session from him, you had to provide an offering at the session.
The offering could be anything at all. It could be a handwritten card, it could be a gift of food, it could be a gift of services, it could be a gift of smiles, it could be gratitude - anything at all.
However, there HAD to be some form of exchange that took place.
And so the villagers were told in advance that when Dr Usui comes through the town that they must bring an offering if they wish to receive a healing, and they must exchange that offering at the time of the healing.
You may be thinking, "What the heck does this have to do with you and I charging for our services in coaching?"
Well, here is the remarkable thing that Dr Usui found hundreds of years ago. What he found was once he asked for an offering at every single healing he provided, when he travelled back to the villages six to twelve months later, every single result that he had gotten with that client previously had stuck.
The healings had actually lasted. The change had been permanent.
Now you may say, "Well Ben, how does this work? They're getting an energy healing, but why does the energy healing work at a much deeper level, and a more permanent level if they do some form of offering during that process?"
The Cycle Of Reciprocation – Charge What You’re Worth
There is something out there known as a cycle of reciprocation. People in any form of negotiation understand the power and the certainty behind the cycle of reciprocation.
Here’s how it works. Any time someone does something good for you, you get locked up in a cycle of reciprocation, which means you have to reciprocate the good deed in order to equilibrate the process. You go back to a state of balance.
If there is no reciprocation done, what happens is the person gets trapped inside a loop of reciprocation. Now, that loop of reciprocation can often show up, and this is really one of the worst things to know. One of the worst things I learned is that if I do something free for another individual in the form of a healing or a coaching session, that individual will think day in, day out, night-after-night, "How can I possibly repay Ben for his service?"
I don't know about you, but you don't want to be up every single night trying to work out how to repay me for a free coaching session. You'd much rather be off in your life having a great life.
When people do a fair exchange at the point of the service being transferred, you begin to occupy space and time in the other person's mind due to the cycle of reciprocation. And that cycle of reciprocation often leads to a very specific type of emotion, and that emotion is guilt.
What we discovered through Dr Usui's teachings, and many other practices throughout the business world, in any form of services being delivered, is that if you don't know how to charge for your services, you actually run the risk of putting your clients into a cycle of shame and guilt.
Now, let's face it, it feels fantastic being generous. It feels fantastic giving things away. It feels really good, it does. It feels good to be generous, and it feels good to give (check out all these free stuff that we have for you!). However, we have to take time to understand and appreciate what actually happens to the person whom we are giving it to.
Removing Guilt
If you don’t know how to charge for your services and there is no exchange of an offering after your assistance, you run the risk of the cycle of reciprocation, and you run the risk of creating guilt inside your clients. Once I understood this, I immediately started asking for an offering.
Now, here's the thing, the very first Reiki healing I ever did was with a lady by the name of Jessica Faithful. Jessica had to provide an offering and actually provided an offering of a small carton of milk and a packet of Tim Tams.
Believe it or not, the very first payment I ever got for any form of coaching that I ever did in my life was milk and cookies!
From then on, I moved up to the reciprocation of $20 a session, then I moved up to the reciprocation of $40 a session. I moved up to the fair exchange of $50 a session, the fair exchange of $70, $80, $100 a session, and I made sure that the exchange took place inside that service being given. And lo and behold, people valued what I was doing.
Not only did they value what I was doing, but they also stuck true to their word, and they took the actions that actually resulted in their lives changing.
Charge What You’re Worth As A Coach
If you ever doubt yourself again about whether or not you can actually charge money and charge what you’re worth, just think of Dr Usui.
Think of him travelling through these villages, having the awakening, the undisputed epiphany, the enlightened moment of realisation that if there is not fair exchange at the moment for any service being given, what ends up happening is we throw the other person out of balance. We trap space and time inside their mind, and we put them into a cycle of reciprocation.
I hope this helps because when I heard this, it changed everything about the way I thought about charging money. It was no longer about me receiving money, it was about me making sure that the client felt good about the service they were receiving. It also made sure that the client had no guilt wrapped up around being given this gift of coaching, giving this gift of transformation because they felt they had exchanged something fairly for it.
Therefore, when it comes to receiving money and charging what you’re worth, believe it or not, it is not about you. It is about how the client feels about that service being received.
For this reason, make sure you do get some kind of offering. My suggestion is that the offering is in the form of money because it is very easy to track, it's very easy to understand, and it's a fair and clean way of exchanging services.
So, I hope this helps out on how and why you should charge what you’re worth as a coach. As I said, this information transformed everything for me as a coach because it allowed me to finally start charging money for my services.
If you would like to learn the most effective strategies on how to charge what you're worth and build a thriving coaching business, we invite you to attend our FREE online course called "How To Become A Highly Successful Coach". Click here for all the details and to RESERVE YOUR FREE SEAT TODAY!
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