Align Therapy Shop

If you don’t want to spend the next 10 years wishing you had learned how to phase out insurance sooner, comment ACCELERATOR and I’ll send you my vault to help you navigate the client + insurance conversations that make this shift easier.

If your practice is fully booked, but the only answer still feels like “more clients because that’s just the economy right now”… I want you to consider that this might be a business model problem instead.

(And listen, if you’re happy on insurance and genuinely love the practice you’ve built, great. This reel isn’t for you. This is for the therapist who is fully booked, exhausted, and know they can’t keep doing this forever.)

Most therapists have been told this is just the reality of the field: Insurance reimbursement is low, the economy is tough, everyone is struggling.

This is just how it is.

But if that were true, how do therapists all over the country build profitable private-pay practices every single year?

The biggest lie therapists have been sold is that struggling financially is just part of helping people. And the frustrating part is you’re already working SO hard to be THIS burnt out and resentful of the work you’re so passionate about.

Most therapists respond the only way they know how:
→ take on more clients
→ get another certification
→ join more insurance panels
→ hope it eventually feels stable

But insurance isn’t stability. Stability is knowing how to generate clients with or without insurance.

That’s what therapists inside The Private Practice Lab are learning every month: how to trust themselves to market, fill a caseload, and create stability outside of panels.

If you want to take your first baby step towards that, comment ACCELERATOR and I’ll send you my vault with scripts and templates to start that conversation with insurance panels and clients.



[therapist burnout, therapist income, therapist salary, how much do therapists make, cash pay therapy, out of network therapist, group practice owner]

Yes, you can ABSOLUTELY phase out of insurance without burning your whole practice to the ground (thank God 🙌🏼!)

In fact, therapists in my Private Practice Lab do it all the time.

But if I had to guess, I’d bet the question that you’re REALLY asking is “How am I going to replace the referrals + income insurance was giving me?”

(Because you already know it’s possible. You’ve seen other therapists do it.)

Leaving insurance is one thing… building a fully-booked private pay caseload so you don’t have to crawl back to the same panels that were exploiting and underpaying you is another.

What you need to learn is:

→ how to replace insurance referrals with inquiries from your marketing
→ how to set an aligned private-pay fee based on real numbers, not just vibes
→ how to position your niche so the right clients KNOW you’re worth paying out of pocket for
→ how to talk about private pay with clients without overexplaining, guilt, or spiraling
→ how to phase out panels strategically instead of impulsively dropping everything and praying

I KNOW it’s terrifying to make this change. But tell me what’s scarier? Taking a calculated risk to build something different… or changing nothing and being in the exact same place for the next 10 years?

When you learn how to do those things, you stop feeling like one cancellation, one policy change, or one insurance company decision can throw your entire business into chaos.

That’s exactly what I teach inside The Private Practice Lab.

Comment LAB and I’ll send you the details 🫶



[how to leave insurance panels as a therapist, how to get private pay clients without ads, therapist working 4 days a week, can therapists make six figures, how to start a private practice, therapist burned out on insurance, how to fill your therapy caseload, going private pay as a therapist, therapist charging full fee, sustainable therapy practice, therapist who doesn't take insurance, drop insurance panels therapist]

I don’t know when therapists became the one profession expected to absorb everyone else’s financial hardship while ignoring their own.

When I worked in community mental health, it was common for staff (therapists and other behavioral health professionals) to talk about which food pantries were best in the area, as many clients were on food stamps. There’s absolutely no shame in this, but it did always feel odd to me that therapists often needed to receive the same govt assistance as their clients.

And yet therapists are still told charging sustainable fees is “greedy.” 🙃

I am the primary earner in our home. If I was stuck in the martyr mentality I was trained in, my family wouldn’t survive.

$27 a billable hour, which is what I was making in an agency, is not sustainable for supporting a family.

I moved to Boise from LA 11 years ago for a cheaper cost of living. Yet cost of living has tripled here in the last decade.

Does anyone ever consider that making the decision to go private pay + premium fee is an act of survival within a corrupt system?

Not an “greedy” action? You can care deeply about people AND charge appropriately.

Those two things are not mutually exclusive.

⬇️ If you want to learn how to phase out insurance completely and make more with a fully-booked private pay caseload, comment ACCELERATOR and I’ll send you the exact steps I teach therapists to transition toward private pay today.



[therapist humor, therapist memes, private pay, therapist, therapy, private pay practice, business coach for therapists]

⬇️ If you want to learn how to phase out insurance completely and make more with a fully-booked private pay caseload, comment ACCELERATOR and I’ll send you the exact steps I teach therapists to transition toward private pay today.

I received an email recently from a fellow therapist that absolutely FLOORED me. It said,

”Dear Krysteena, I like to think I pay pretty close attention to things like inflation…but I figured you may not know that the last 6 years of inflation have been 28%.”

TWENTY. EIGHT. PERCENT.

I’ve seen therapists in Facebook groups doing the math and pointing out that if insurance reimbursement had actually kept pace with inflation, many therapists would be getting paid dramatically more than they are today.

Instead, many of us are expected to absorb rising costs year after year while reimbursement barely moves.

Back in the 80s, the insurance reimbursement rate averaged at $70 an hour, and now it's still only on average, $85 an hour. 🙃

People think, “I can't raise my fees because everyone is struggling.” It’s like, well… the world is getting more expensive.

The world is getting more expensive. If you want your practice to survive, your fees cannot stay frozen in time forever. You HAVE to do this.

And I promise you, it does not make you less of a compassionate, ethical therapist to do so.



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People will spend $200 on dinner that’s gone in 45 minutes… but therapists will spiral for 3 business days about charging their actual fee.

GIRL. TRUST ME. You are NOT “being selfish” for charging the damn fee.

When you really break it down, therapists are often paid wildly low for the amount of education, training, debt, liability, and emotional labor this work requires.

For instance, plumbers and electricians can charge $150-$300/hr and nobody expects them to apologize for it. And to be VERY, VERY clear, skilled trades SHOULD be paid well. 👏🏻

But therapists will spend years in school, do unpaid internships, pay for supervision, CEUs, licensure, insurance, office space, EHRs, trainings… and then feel guilty charging a fee that lets them live WELL??

Absolutely not. Undercharging doesn’t make you more ethical. It usually just makes you more exhausted, more resentful, and more likely to burn out of a field you actually love.

I want you to feel PROUD saying your fee, and to say it with your whole chest.

You should be proud because the work you do is worth every damn penny.
Proud because YOUR life matters too.
And proud because being paid well is one of the reasons you’ll be able to keep doing the impactful work that you are so deeply passionate about.

So how do you calculate your fee? Your fee should be based on:
👉🏻 what you need to take home
👉🏻 how many clients you can realistically see
👉🏻 how much time off you want
👉🏻 and what it actually costs to stay in this work long-term

Comment CALCULATOR ⬇️ and I’ll send you my free Revenue Calculator so you can stop guessing and see what you actually need to charge.



[therapist humor, therapist memes, private pay practice, private practice, therapist marketing, licensed therapist]

Here’s the 21 things you can do this month to phase out insurance and fill your caseload with private pay clients (save this list!)👇🏻

6. Start beefing up your marketing - starting with your website and niche.
7. Make sure your niche is CLEAR. Not “I help women with anxiety” but rather, “If you’re mentally reviewing todays tasks, tomorrows tasks, and tasks 1 month from now every night in bed before you can fall asleep - I’m the therapist for you”
8. Start learning your website stats so you know if the changes you are making are working and how to improve.
9. Position yourself as a specialist of your craft on your website. Private pay doesn’t want a generalist.
10. Focus on other SEO optimizations on your website: Targeted services pages, focused blog posts, a detailed FAQ (to help with AI searches), meta-descriptions with keywords, optimized alt-text for all photos and images…
11. Find your people - no one should make this change alone and there is a lot of noise out there about how therapists “should” run their practice. Find therapists who are doing what you’re doing, support you, empower you, and keep you motivated when sh*t feels hard (the Lab is a great place for this)
12. Look at your beliefs around money because it’s going to come up (if it hasn’t already). Create a mantra such as “I am worthy of a good and prosperous life” “My services are easily worth X dollars per session”
13. Re-evaluate your brand. Would you want to inquire about therapy with you if you stumbled upon your website? does it evoke the feeling you want your clients to feel? Does it show your personality and style?
14. Become KNOWN in your community. Start meeting up with more therapists. Go to mixers and consultation groups. Ask other private pay therapists out for coffee. MAKE FRIENDS. Real relationships are key in long term business.

(CONTINUED IN THE COMMENTS ⬇️)

Here’s the 20 things you can do this month to phase out insurance and fill your caseload with private pay clients (save this list!)👇🏻

1. Set a date and say it out loud. Truthfully. Once you put this into the universe, there’s no going back.
2. Search your insurance contracts and find where it says “Termination”. Read it to make sure you know if there’s any weird things they want you to do aside from just sending a termination letter.
3. Write a script to tell your clients and do it ASAP. That way, you hold yourself to it and give them ample notice that this change is coming. (🚨 Comment ACCELERATOR for my private pay accelerator pack to give you the step by step for 1-3!)
4. Mail, email, fax the termination letter. VOILA! The hard part is done.
5. Set a private pay rate that helps you live WELL, not just scrape by. Say it out loud to yourself over and over again in the mirror until it feels natural..
6. Start beefing up your marketing, starting with your website and niche.
7. Make sure your niche is CLEAR. Not “I help women with anxiety” but rather, “If you’re mentally reviewing todays tasks, tomorrows tasks, and tasks 1 month from now every night in bed before you can fall asleep, I’m the therapist for you”.
8. Start learning how to read your website stats so you know if the changes you are making are working and how to improve.
9. Position yourself as a specialist of your craft on your website. Private pay doesn’t want a generalist.
10. Focus on other SEO optimizations on your website: targeted service pages, focused blog posts, a detailed FAQ to help with AI searches, meta descriptions w/ keywords, and optimized alt text for all photos.
11. No one should make this change alone and there is a lot of noise out there about how therapists “should” run their practice. Find therapists who are doing what you’re doing, support you, empower you, and keep you motivated when sh*t feels hard (the Lab is a great place for this)
12. Look at your beliefs around money because it’s going to come up (if it hasn’t already). Create a mantra such as “I am worthy of a good and prosperous life”, “My services are easily worth X dollars per session.”

(CONTINUED IN THE COMMENTS ⬇️)

POV: People pleasing, but make it a therapist who is so used to over-functioning that burnout starts feeling like evidence they care enough. 🙃

Don’t believe me? Let’s play a game and see how many you can check off from this list ⬇️
☑️ squeezing in “just one more client”
☑️ accepting sliding scale client even when it no longer feels aligned
☑️ answering emails at night
☑️ panicking over cancellations
☑️ over-explaining your fees
☑️ staying on insurance panels that are draining you
☑️ and convincing yourself this is just “part of being a good therapist”

And the scary part is that this is SO normalized in our field that many therapists don’t even realize how unsustainable it’s become until they’re completely fried.

I want you to hear me loud and clear:

Burnout is not evidence that you care enough. It’s evidence that your practice is depending on you to over-function in order to survive.

And respectfully… if overbooking yourself, undercharging, and staying on draining insurance panels were actually creating long-term stability for therapists… it would’ve worked by now.

That’s not a personal failure. That’s a business model problem.

This is exactly why I built The Private Practice Lab for therapists who are ready to stop depending on insurance, but want a real plan to replace it.

Inside, I help therapists build:

→ a steady stream of private-pay inquiries that doesn’t depend on posting every single day
→ the ability to say your fee without spiraling about clients leaving you afterward
→ consistent referrals that don’t rely on insurance directories
→ visibility that doesn’t require posting 24/7
→ and systems that help you phase out insurance without burning your practice down overnight

Because you deserve to be the therapist who:
🥳 takes time off without panicking
🥳 doesn’t dread cancellations
🥳feels confident saying their fee
🥳 and has a practice that supports THEIR nervous system too.”

If you’re ready to stop building your practice around being a martyr, comment ACCELERATOR and I’ll send you the exact steps I teach therapists to transition toward private pay today. 🫶