Our Industry’s Toxic Relationship to Money: What it Costs Us All
Release Date: 03/23/2026
The Money Sessions
Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? What does it actually mean to be good enough to charge $600 per session? More certifications? Another modality? A better niche? A prettier website? Most therapists assume that charging premium fees is simply a reflection of clinical expertise. But in this episode, Tiffany challenges that assumption and asks a much deeper question: What if the thing that allows someone to charge $600 per session has less to do with what...
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Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? What happens when a therapist charges $600 per session and becomes the target of criticism, projection, outrage, and endless commentary from other therapists? In this powerful and provocative episode, Tiffany sits down with a mystery guest we'll call Maverick—a Canadian trauma therapist who built a thriving premium fee practice and now charges $600 per session for deeply relational trauma work. Maverick shares the...
info_outlineThe Money Sessions
Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? Therapists are afraid of a lot of things. Raising their fees. Leaving insurance panels. Being visible. Being judged. Failing publicly. But according to Tiffany, one of the biggest obstacles standing between therapists and the lives they actually want isn't reality. It's a story. A story that says: Insurance is the only safe option. The market is too competitive. Clients won't pay. The economy won't support it. ...
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Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? What if the “messy middle” isn’t proof you’re failing… but proof you’re growing? In this deeply honest episode, Tiffany sits down with Danielle Robbins, an LMHC in New York, who went from opening a private practice with one client at a $200 fee to charging $255/session, nearly full, and preparing to leave group practice for good. But this is not a shiny overnight success story. This is the story of fear....
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Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? What if the thing standing between you and your Life First Practice isn’t strategy? What if it’s the story you tell yourself about who you’re allowed to be? In this deeply personal episode, Tiffany shares a surprising encounter that sparked a profound realization about wealth, self-concept, and the invisible limits therapists place on themselves. A simple conversation about the Hamptons uncovered something many...
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Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? What happens when the practice you built starts feeling like a trap? In this deeply honest Money Sessions episode, Tiffany sits down with therapist Hillary Pilotto to unpack the emotional, financial, and identity-level shifts that helped them go from exhausting $6K months to consistent $10K+ months… while seeing WAY fewer clients. And here’s the thing: Hillary already had what many therapists think they want. A...
info_outlineThe Money Sessions
Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? There is a reason so many therapists are exhausted, resentful, financially anxious, and quietly fantasizing about leaving the profession altogether. And it’s not because they “aren’t good at business.” It’s because most therapists are trying to run their private practice like a cupcake shop. In this sharp, disruptive, and deeply clarifying episode, Tiffany unpacks one of the biggest misunderstandings...
info_outlineThe Money Sessions
Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math. 🎁 Download our FREE Fun with Fees Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? Think therapists in Canada can’t charge premium fees? Think again. In this episode of The Money Sessions, Tiffany sits down with Amelia Sloan, a Canadian-based therapist whose journey challenges the belief that geography, culture, or the therapy industry determines what you can earn. Before making changes in their practice, Amelia was seeing 15–18 clients a week, charging roughly $80–$140 per session, and bringing in about $5K–$6K...
info_outlineThe Money Sessions
Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math.🎁 Download our FREE Life First Fees Private Practice Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? Therapists are asking the wrong question. The question is not: “How do I get more clients?” The real question is: “How do I become a therapist whose work creates powerful, noticeable transformation?” Because in 2026, clients are no longer simply looking for weekly emotional maintenance. They are looking for results. And therapists who can confidently help clients experience meaningful movement—without...
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Ready to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math. 🎁 Download our FREE Fun with Fees Calculator 👉🏽 Ready to charge Life First Fees? What happens when you cut your income in half… and feel more free than ever? In this unforgettable episode of The Money Sessions, Tiffany sits down with Krissy Johnson, LMFT, whose path into private practice is anything but traditional. Before becoming a therapist, Krissy toured the country as a performer. When COVID shut down the industry, she finally used the therapy degree she had earned years earlier—quickly building a full...
info_outlineReady to set your fee? You choose the dream, we’ll do the math. 🎁 Download our FREE Fun with Fees Calculator 👉🏽 https://www.leaninmakebank.com/free
Ready to charge Life First Fees? Click here to fill out an application
There are people out there who want therapy and can easily afford $300, $400, even $500 per session.
They’re not rare.
They’re not mythical.
They’re not just in Silicon Valley or Manhattan.
They’re everywhere.
But many of them will never walk through your door — not because they don’t need therapy, and not because they don’t value therapy.
They won’t come because they don’t trust therapists around money.
In this episode, Tiffany pulls back the curtain on a dynamic that’s quietly shaping the future of our profession: the toxic relationship therapists have with money — and how it’s pushing well-resourced clients away from therapy altogether.
After a decade of working behind the scenes with therapists and hearing what’s really happening inside private practices, Tiffany shares the uncomfortable truth:
When therapists publicly shame wealth, criticize colleagues for charging premium fees, or martyr themselves financially, we don’t just hurt ourselves.
We damage the credibility of the entire profession.
And the clients who could most easily pay Life First Fees?
They see it.
They read the Facebook threads.
They watch the Instagram commentary.
They notice the resentment and the guilt around money.
And then they quietly go somewhere else.
Executive coaches.
Consultants.
Energy healers.
High-end coaching programs.
Not because those professionals are more qualified — but because they appear more confident about the value of their work.
In this episode, Tiffany breaks down:
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Why therapists with toxic money beliefs are unintentionally repelling well-resourced clients
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How therapist culture often shames colleagues who want financial stability and freedom
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Why people who can afford therapy are actively paying attention to how therapists talk about money
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The hidden ways martyrdom and self-sacrifice show up in therapist business models
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Why marketing strategies alone cannot fix a broken relationship with money
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How unresolved attachment wounds often get projected onto financial exchanges with clients
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What happens in sessions when therapists feel anxious, ashamed, or conflicted about charging fees
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Why many high-income clients end up working with coaches instead of therapists
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The professional authority therapists actually hold — and why we routinely undervalue it
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How raising the bar around money conversations can elevate the entire field
This episode is a direct call to therapists to step into professional leadership — not just clinically, but financially.
Because therapy is not a charity model.
It is a professional service grounded in deep psychological expertise.
And when therapists treat it that way, clients respond accordingly.
If we want a profession that is respected, sustainable, and capable of transforming lives, we have to transform how we talk about money.
If you’re ready to build a Life First Practice and charge fees that support the life you actually want, email Tiffany at tiffany@leaninmakebank.com with the word “Ready.”
Or apply to work together through the link in the show notes.
It’s time for therapists to stop apologizing for earning well.
It’s time to raise the bar — for ourselves, for our clients, and for the profession.