Harmonise Your Voice, Wisdom and Passion with Ikagai
A framework to align your purpose on Substack
Therapeutic Writers on Substack is a space to gain clarity, confidence, inspiration and community for mental health, personal growth and wellbeing writers. Tools, tips and behind the scenes at Letters From Therapy. Upgrade to ‘pro’ to get everything!
Hi friends
I’m delighted to have become a bestselling writer on Substack this week, with over 100 paid subscribers and a validating little tick by my name. Thanks for supporting my work. It means to world to be able to turn my passion into income on Substack. If your goal is to ‘go pro’ too join us! 👆🏻
What makes your Substack ‘you’?
As therapeutic writers, we all want to ensure our right words reach the right people in the right way.
It can be easy to be blinded by bright lights we see around us, and get pulled away from our own passion and skills. So many publications in our field. Big names, endless topics, and not enough time.
Our writing can get buried under popular newsletters, and our effort goes unnoticed. We might make sacrifices to throw everything at it, spend time and energy writing different things, hoping something sticks. I know, I’ve been there!
It’s disheartening to hold so many insights within us, yet unable to relay it to those we want to reach.
Some may get so frustrated they give up.
Wouldn’t it be great to feel fully aligned, passionate, and confident in what we write, and know that our words are landing where they are needed? Isn’t it great we can be paid for that work?
“Ikigai” is the Japanese concept of "reason for being." In this post, I invite you to use the concept to find clarity on your publication’s focus, to attract and connect more deeply with those aligned with your work.
A ‘Reason for Being’ a Substack Therapeutic Writer
I had a passion for therapy when I was practicing over sixteen years. The honour of witnessing the transformation it brought my clients lit my soul.
As a big reader throughout my training and beyond, I devoured the words of those who walked this path before me. They seeped into my psyche and became part of me.
My professional work was a vocation, shaped first during my integrative therapeutic counselling training. Later, I embellished my work with the creativity, experiments, enquiry and somatic practices of Gestalt psychotherapy during my Masters. These deepened my work, softening the blocks my clients had lived with for too long so they could step into freedom.
We bridged the gaps and aligned outdated adjustments. We lit the dark corners that lay beneath, bathing their path forwards in light.
Many live with mental health issues derived from living in fractured communities, our self-serving leaders, old traumas, unconscious family dynamics (some left from generations gone), unhelpful internal patterns and other external pressures we humans have not evolved for. Maybe that’s why you’re writing here too?
I jump up in the mornings to write words that accomplish my mission: to alleviate suffering.
Words to help others make sense, reclaim lost parts and feel whole. Some readers tell me I’m good at it.
I wish I could work for free, to be able to offer my time with generosity, without harming myself.
Our transformative work, whether in person or through thoughtful writing, can hold life changing value.
It is okay to ask to be paid for our valuable work. We cannot live without income.
I found a home on Substack to pour my passion: integrative therapy, my personal history (love, loss, creativity, kindness), and skill set (insights, experiments, exercises, meditations, writing, design), into words.
My work aligns with those ready to seek more from their life, through greater self awareness, connection, meaning, and insight.
Readers say they feel understood, and put their trust in me.
They pay me in this beautiful exchange - so that I can keep doing it.
My Substack is my Ikagai.
Discover Your Substack's Purpose with Ikigai
Ikigai is the Japanese concept of "reason for being." I invite you to use the concept to find clarity on your publication, and connect more deeply with those aligned with your work. This prevents you vanishing in inboxes, or writing unaligned, bland words.
By applying Ikagai to your Substack, you’ll feel aligned, while helping others in a way only you can. Imagine your unique gifts bursting with passion reaching those souls who need and value your work.
To find your Ikagai, join the ‘pro’ tier to read on. In case you missed it: Welcome to the Campfire! | 32 Editing Tips | The Highly Sensitive Therapeutic Writer | Introduce Yourself! A New Home for Therapeutic Writers Coming soon: why going viral isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.