Twenty years ago, when I started my EFT and energy healing practice, I was very new to the 'manifesting' world. Over the years, I learned to create a vision: "How do I want my business and life to be?".
After a few years of struggling and feeling a bit desperate to have a more successful business, I decided on this vision: 10 clients a week and
a 2-week waiting list.
That sounded just perfect. A 2-week waiting list meant not looking for clients, and 10 clients a week sounded awesome. 2 clients, 5 days a week – "I can do that! That's not even hard work", I thought.
Priorities
I've had to do a lot of rethinking my priorities in the past 18 months due to many factors, including my dear mom's condition. And in the past month, 'failure/success' and
what that means, has come knocking for a fresh look.
In full transparency, I've had a few thoughts of retiring recently. Gasp. And it's not because I don't love and enjoy my client sessions!
The thing is - a business takes a lot of other bits and pieces around the client sessions. And that's the harder part for me. It's all those bits that I sometimes feel like retiring from!
However, when I
really sat with the thought of 'retiring' and no longer doing what I love most – supporting people through emotional troubles to a place of calm clarity, peace and strength – I found it silly! I don't want to retire.
The bigger insight
I realised that the beautiful dream I had 20 years ago has not exactly happened yet… and if I retired now, it never will. How could I possibly stop now? It would feel like giving up my biggest
dream. That would feel like giving up something very dear to my heart.
At the same time, it feels impossible to reach that dream – not now, with mom's additional needs, and possibly not ever. All of it felt really sad.
I talked with a friend and what came out surprised me. My friend said: "What you've just brought in doesn't sound like a business problem at all. It sounds like a grief problem."
Oh, my goodness, that hit
me in the chest. I can see this kind of thing so clearly for others, and yet when I'm 'in the woods' of my own life, it's harder to see what's truly going on.
Of course. I'd bundled 3 things together:
- The business I have now
- The business I want (that will meet new needs)
- The business I imagined 20 years ago
My friend helped me pause and take it in… perhaps they're no longer the same thing.
A different person
created that dream
I was a different person 20 years ago. My mom was healthy. I hadn't spent years supporting her and her carers. I hadn't accumulated 20 years of experience and wisdom about what I actually enjoy, what fuels and energises me.
I didn't yet know that I was an introvert and HSP – and how precious my energy resources would become. I didn't yet understand how much I value spaciousness and a slow pace, and how the kind of 'full practice'
that others have, would have drained and deflated me.
Mourning an old vision
The realisation dawned that I'm mourning a dream that belonged to a younger version of me. A dream that defined a successful practice by the number of clients every week, and a waiting list.
But in the meantime, life took its own direction. Nothing in me back then was prepared for the journey ahead – my mom getting ill, me being in the UK, trying
to manage my responsibility and heartache about not being more available for her.
Brainstorming with my friend, I realised that my younger self's dream was appropriate for her. And given what's on my plate now, the original dream simply doesn't fit.
Two possible futures
Thinking of 2 different possibilities helped me gain even more clarity.
Future A: I have 10 clients a week and a
2-week waiting list. A busy practice. People constantly wanting my help. More admin and emails to attend to. I would be successful by the standards I imagined 20 years ago. But… I'd be exhausted. No room for writing, creativity, my mom, my sister, gardening, or leisurely cooking experiments. It would stress me out not to be able to help someone sooner than 2 weeks from now.
Future B: I have 4–6 clients a week and a lovely group. My writing is flowing. I create Insight
Timer tracks and free videos regularly. I have enough income. There is ample space to support my mom when needed. I'm calm, enjoying my work. There's no waiting list, and no external badge of success.
Which one would I choose today? You're guessing it. The 2026 Liesel instantly chose the calmer, more spacious option. 😊
Of course, I had to use EFT tapping for the grief and loss of my original dream. I spent so long envisioning it and clearing the obstacles
towards it. This felt like a classic case of: "I can't let go of it because I've already invested so much time and energy!"
What happened instead of that dream
So that outward 'success picture' I wished for 20 years ago never really happened in that way. And yet, when I look back honestly, here is what I notice:
- For twenty years I have helped people transform aspects of their lives and heal trauma, built a business using
gifts I didn't even know I had, and learned an extraordinary range of skills I could never have imagined needing.
- I have kept going through deeply difficult personal circumstances – including hosting a workshop on the day of my father's funeral.
- I have adapted, pivoted (a lot!), and continued to show up, year after year, for work that truly matters to me.
Many people dream of doing meaningful work for twenty years and never get there. When I look back now, I feel
incredibly grateful.
It didn't happen in the way I had imagined. Yet benefits have come in other ways that I could not have foreseen 20 years ago.
The question of waste
To be honest, it took me quite a bit of tapping to truly let go of that old dream I'd hung on to for 20 years. I had put big expectations and pressure on myself. To let go of it felt almost like all the time, money, energy and effort I'd invested in it were
wasted.
But after tapping for that apparent waste, I realised – none of it was. It all had results for me, just not in the way my imagination had thought it would. I am now a person who can do so many more things than 20 years ago. How is that a 'waste'?
