Tips for Early Career Therapists (advice from a psychologist)

Oh I wish I had some of these advice when I was in grad school. I started off working in underserved communities in nonprofit orgs and I was paid close to nothing while working with a very severe population. Worse was the director of that clinic openly said that we should accept that we don't get high pay because we chose to work in this field. Low morale. Luckily, I left that place and moved on to better places and now have my private practice. My advice to those who are collecting their hours for licensure is to make sure the agency or place they work at is stable. If you constantly have supervisors leaving or the place is not supporting you to get your clinical hours, it's best to start looking for another place because I had friends in the field taking longer to finish their clinical hours because of difficulty getting supervisors to sign their hours or even getting adequate amount of hours each week.

Kind of along the lines of values that Dr. fang spoke about is reflecting on why you are in this (or going into) this field. Figuring out your why can help you figure out your niche (population, areas of expertise, etc). If you don't know what workplace you wanna work in, that's okay! That's the point of graduate school and pre-licensure.. getting those different experiences to help you figure out what you want! You are not supposed to have it figured out. In fact I don't know anyone who has everything figured out haha but you learn along the way and figure out what's best for you. It takes time, experiences, and reflection.

So appreciative of this as usual, Dr. Fang! I’m a graduate student and my professor sent my class a link to one of your videos last week and I was so excited it was like seeing a familiar face ☺️

The career coaching advice is fun to contemplate, but in reality, social, economical and political forces ultimately determine the options your left with. Choose wisely and learn to accept the situation and love your self.

Great video, I start grad school in the fall so this was well timed for me

Thank you! I am getting my bachelor's and looking into masters programs now!

Thank you for this video. I have been a therapist for 10 years and I wish I would of heard these things when I was starting out. Thank you for helping future therapist 🥰.

This was very helpful, thank you 💚

This channel is going to blow up even bigger trust me - it’s the holy grail

You forgot to say to watch and learn from the Private Practice Skills channel! ☺️ Truly your tools and website building course were a lifeline for me my first year out of grad school. You’re right on with “take your time”! I completed my degree in four years while I worked, and it was the right pace for me and alleviated financial burden after graduation. One slight nuance I’d add is to imagine HOW you want to feel in your dream job, not necessarily WHAT the dream job is. I say this as a second-career therapist who knows what it’s like to get to your “dream job” and realize it’s not so dreamy after all.

This video was recommended to me at the perfect time. I’m 24 and in the 2nd year of my clinical mental health counselling program. I’m loving my program, but I’m starting to feel discouraged because I feel so far behind from everyone else I know. I don’t know my ideal job, preferred theory/approach, environment, etc., and I’m starting to think that if I rush through my program faster, maybe I’ll figure it out after I graduate. Your advice was really encouraging to me and it reminded me to breath, take my time and think back to why I originally chose this career path/degree.

Thank you for this video. I really resonated with slowing things down. I'm in my first year as a pre-licensed therapist. Part of me wants to hurry up and get licensed but the other part of me is like can I effectively work with 25 plus clients a week 🤔

Did we tell them to run? Just kidding. I think this is a great advice video. I wish I had this back in the day.

First 2 minutes kinda freaked me out!

Thank you so much! You are so helpful to me, an international student! 🤍🤍