STP 169 | Fear, Failure, and First Steps: How Ira Hays Put His Mission in Motion
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Ira Hays: I think some therapists think they learn something and they have to protect it, and I would say do the opposite. If you learn something and it's effective, give it away. You don't have to protect it. If you just give it away, give it away, it, it'll all come back.
It'll help you grow.
James Marland: Hello and welcome back to the Scaling Therapist. This is your host, James Marland. am very pleased to introduce my special guest, IRA Hayes to you. Ira is a one of, if not the first. that wasn't a co-host on the scaling therapist, oh, three plus years ago. And
Ira Hays: Cool.
James Marland: been following him and his work with schools and his pr, his practice that he owns, he is doing some incredible stuff, has some lessons about growth and has learned a lot along the way. Ira, I'm gonna let you introduce yourself, but welcome to the show.
Ira Hays: Yeah, thanks. It's great to be back. It's nice to see you. I've been following a lot of your stuff too, so I've been [00:01:00] learning along the way. Hopefully we'll talk about that a little bit. But yeah. So my name is Ra Hayes. I'm a, a licensed clinical social worker in New Jersey. I've been doing this for a little while now and practicing.
I have a private practice that I've been building out for about the last 10 or 12 years. I recently, about four months ago. A role as the clinical director at Interspace Counseling. In here in Old Bridge, New Jersey. I work with an app called bia, where I also work with kids with phobia and school phobia.
Just recently launched another company called Launch. And I've been trying to stay busy and follow some of your content, trying to work on a book and we just talking prerecord about potentially expanding into some other things. So yeah, definitely busy. And I occasionally teach as well when I have a chance.
James Marland: Sure. why not? You sound very, very you said I'm trying to keep busy, like I was trying to keep up with all the things you were doing, launching this and doing that. Let's talk about your evolution. Did you, you started out as a, [00:02:00] you just a, did you start out as a group practice owner or did you grow into a group practice Owner?
Ira Hays: Yeah, so I started out just trying to get by, like working as a therapist, having a, full-time job. And then created Hay Health and Wellness on the side. My wife's also a therapist, so it started with just the two of us. And then recently, idea of launch with a new partner of mine and hired a staff there, kind see clients because my practice had gotten bigger than what I could handle, and my friend practice has gotten bigger than his.
So things have grown a bit more organic. For me, it's always been like, what's the mission? And then when I'm overloaded, how do I expand the mission a little further? How do I help a little bit more people? It's definitely been. Experience because originally I was just focused on what, what can I, the 20 I'm help.
And now it's the, okay, good at doing a different things. How do.
James Marland: So I've been reading the time as a tool recently. It's the, the Benjamin Hardy. 10 x is easier than two X guy, [00:03:00] he is always, he's been saying that your, your impact or your future goal, your future self, how you view yourself impacts your fut, impacts your present. You, you allow that to direct the path that you take.
And big goals mean you have fewer choices to get to your big goal. You like some of the things that might. You might do are irrelevant or they're not even an option because your, your big goal, you can't do them if you wanna achieve your goal. And so as you were talking about, oh, I grew and I do this, and how do I keep expanding? What's your mindset on like goals and achieving goals? Do you, do you have a process for that or are you just what's, what's my next thing?
Ira Hays: That's a good question. I think, I probably suffer a little bit from A DHD. My goal split very frequently into different areas and it's usually specific interest of mine or something [00:04:00] where I feel like it's all aligned with my goal. I've had this big goal now. For the last 10 or so years, like of getting kids back to school who are school phobic and also simultaneously, treating some of the things that I stumble upon while I'm doing that.
So it started with getting kids back to school. Then I discovered OCD being part of that problem and, the treatment being overlapping and then discovering a met phobia and getting involved in that. And most of the stuff that I've gotten involved in is really just I see it like a tree.
The tree is getting kids back to school and treating people, and then all these little branches are ways in which I attempt to. Figure out a new way to help, so some of them have, I've just stumbled upon, sometimes people reach out to me and they're like, Hey, BIA is a great example.
I had posted something a year or two ago about working with a phobic kid, just out of, shock that no one was talking about it. And then the, the, the owner of BIA likes. Messaged me and said, Hey, no one out on the east coast is talking about this. What, what's, what's [00:05:00] going on? Whatcha up to I, I made this app.
Would you take a look at it? And I looked at it and I thought it was awesome. Started using it with some of the kids and then he invited me to help him build that out for like more. School phobic related things other than just the phobia. In some cases I've been very lucky that people just see what I'm doing and reach out with a lot of interest the same.
And then some things were really purposeful, like probably the last, I'd say four or five years I've been just going out and just training schools. It's funny, I read the Go-Giver, you're talking about the books that kind of motivate us. But I read the Go-Giver years ago. Yeah. Yeah.
It's such a great book. And I think it really overlaps the world of, of kind of marketing and business and mental health. And I found that, I just started saying I'll give a free training here, a free training there. And probably trained seven or 80 different schools in New Jersey, and I did some in Maryland and a little bit of work in Florida, a little bit of work in New York.
Just trying to. Get people the information that I had, and now I'm pivoting a little bit and trying to do the same thing with launch. I'm [00:06:00] training new people here at Innerspace. I'm training the staff on how I use ERP to treat school phobia and phobia and, and, and school attendance.
So it's all following the same mission. But when something new branches out, it's more out of. Now I've finished this and now how do I take it? The next step, and I will admit there's been a couple side quests. Particularly my book has been a major side quest of mine that, I probably started three or four years ago and, recently got pretty close to the finish line, then took this new role.
It's postponed things, but I was looking, at ways to expand what I'm currently doing to more people, essentially.
James Marland: What is, what is your book about?
Ira Hays: School attendance. Yeah. So it's really,
James Marland: it's the same mission, just a different way of trying to implement it.
Ira Hays: yeah, it's the same mission. I, I feel like the book, a lot of people were talking about where, what rep, what can I. What can I read to get more information about this? And when I really looked, there wasn't anything specific out there that was [00:07:00] doing the kind of work that I'm doing with schools. That was like readily available.
So I was like, man, I, I, it was an, it's an attempt to capture. The, I see school attendance and breaking it down into school avoidance, phobia and, and school refusal. And like the process in which I work with school attendance which has been helpful and which people were just expressing a lot of interest in more than just the 90 minute.
And sometimes I would go do a three hour training or six hour training, but still at the end they were like what are the resources are there? And I'm like, it's somewhat novel, so I think you, it would be hard to find, there might be a couple papers where they exposure for school at, but the specific breakdown in the way that I do things is relatively novel.
Get it out there, to more people.
James Marland: What what did you, what, what was the process like for you? Did you just start, re sit down and like things flowed easily? Did you hire somebody to help you? Did you look up outlines? You regret your decision at one point? What
Ira Hays: I think I, I don't regret the decision, but I think trying to write it has been again, [00:08:00] I'm not a writer, if anything, I, I fear that I have a little dysgraphia from what and like difficulty getting that out. It really started, the, the easiest thing for me to do was, when I had periods of like high motivation and, and high determination, I would just go for an hour or two walk and I would dictate notes in my phone, and then eventually I would sit down and start organizing these ideas and sequences of information.
And that's probably why it's taking me so long because I'm not, able to say here's three weeks I'm gonna go, it's more like I've got an hour or two, I'm gonna get information out and then I'm gonna eventually. I get it. I'm getting pretty close to something that resembles a finished product minus like a a couple of chapters and then a final edit, I think right now.
But there's still probably several dozen hours of work to do. But it's been an interesting ride. It has not been linear at all. It's been like, oh. The mental health field in general is a little bit slower, I think, in the summer. So [00:09:00] it just happens to be nice at that time too.
So I'll get, June and July and August I'll get a lot of work done, and then times now it's wow, I'm so busy and there's so many kids that are struggling that, I'm, I'm not allowed, I'm not able to dedicate a lot of time to it. But it.
James Marland: are you? Oh, I was just wondering how were, did you, how did you stay motivated to continue to do it? Because sometimes those, the, those dreams get piles of paper and work dropped on them, and then they, it's hard to come back to them. What, what do you think kept you going?
Ira Hays: Yeah, I think it's interesting when I'm meeting with like the new therapist and the interns that I work with, I talk about how, they always think I don't know if I'd wanna teach or I don't know if I'd wanna do that. And I say, wait till you solve a problem that you think no one else has solved.
And then you're gonna have this burning desire to help other people solve that problem. And that's really what it's been for me all along, I each time it's like I'm content with where I'm at. I'm content with what I'm doing, but I feel like, wait, there's [00:10:00] more people that want help with this or, there's so many different barriers to people getting what they need.
And it started with. Me in my private practice, I'm outta network and how can we help people in network? There's really not a lot of OCD or good phobic treatment in network. So interspace solves that problem, right? If you live in New Jersey and you have OCD or you have a school phobic response, like you can now get in network support through your insurance.
So that solved one problem. But then there's the people that are outside of New Jersey, right? So I can go do trainings or I can provide something else that solves that problem for, and I think the book was like my burning desire that, I'll have parents, I've had parents from Kentucky or Tennessee or something.
They'll call me and I'm like, I, I'm sorry, there's not a whole lot. I can't treat your child from New Jersey unless I get licensed there. But, I'll try to refer 'em back to maybe one or two of the videos that I have on YouTube and then I think the book would've been or will be when I get it out.
I gotta watch my language with that. Not would've been, will be [00:11:00] when it actually gets out. It's just a continuum of here, but you have, here's something that you could read that really lays out. What you can, how you can help your own kid, or how you know you can help the kids that you're working with.
Because it is written not just for parents, but also if you were a school counselor, gets into enough detail if you're a therapist or school counselor working with someone it would be super helpful to read. So it really all feeds from that. It's just like, how do I expand beyond with this answer?
Particularly with the phobias, I hear so few people talking about it and, and, and treating it effectively. And to think that, every school that I walk into, if there's 3000 kids in that school, there's probably eight or 10 of them that are really struggling and no one even talks about it or knows what to do.
And it's, they can't go out to dinner with their family. They're not getting to school, they're not eating before school. There's so many life limitations and really I, it's pretty easy to treat for in a couple weeks. It's not like a lifelong therapy. It's a few weeks of pretty solid treatment, so [00:12:00] just.
That's where.
James Marland: Yeah, the joy of being, being able to help people and solve problems that they thought were unsolvable in a way that is and better for them. Yeah, that's very motivating. We were talking you, you've tried a lot of things. I, I guess I have two questions. There's, there are some people who have great ideas like you, but they're afraid to, go out of their comfort zone or they're like how I make money is just one-on-one sessions, or whatever I'm doing, so I have to keep doing this. And so then they're not able to some of these new things. What, what's your perspective on that? Like you've been able to like. out of your comfort zone in a lot of different things, and probably some of that's personality and some of that's like you, like you, you're energized by the new things. But how, how would you, if a therapist who has a great idea was sitting across the table from you and you're, and they're like, oh, I'm just, I don't know if this is gonna work out. I, I don't know, can I [00:13:00] do this? What would you say to them?
Ira Hays: I would say set, the minimal standard requirement to get started. Don't try to, every program I started the, probably the first program I opened I was school-based and I was asked to solve a couple problems there. That first program. Like I thought about it, I spent a lot of time perseverating about it, and I still made changes once it was made.
It wasn't easy for me to get outta, I I was definitely, this is not in my comfort zone but I guess repeated failure. I was so scared of failing, so scared of failing, and I realized, I, I had to adapt a growth mindset myself. It's interesting 'cause I work with the kids to adopt a growth mindset about, overcoming their angst and their, their OCD or their school attendance.
And meanwhile I was being, a little bit rigid with myself. Oh, if, if it's gonna fail, I can't try it. And then I would say, I've had a couple things that I failed, or a couple things that I did and maybe I was mildly successful and it just didn't work out the way I wanted to.
But, I guess it's easier for me to [00:14:00] sleep as a failure than as not trying, so if people need help and, and I try and I fail, then I can live with that. But if people need help and I do nothing, then that's hard for me to stomach. So I'll just keep trying and keep trying and there are some things that have not gone my way but.
Just takes a couple things to go your way to like actually get some traction. I think particularly in this field, if you're able to help people and you're directed by the mission, then it's, it, the money and the, the, the practice and everything else will take care of itself. But if you put your head down and say, how am I gonna help these 20 people?
How am I gonna help a hundred people? How am I gonna help this person? How do I not say no to another person? Then. Everything else falls into place. So I would tell them don't be, don't try to have it all figured out. Don't be scared. Just take a step towards it, which is a lot of, it's funny because I, I'm an ERP therapist, right?
That's what I'm telling. A lot of the people that come to me, they're like fearful of, taking a step towards school or taking a step towards discomfort. And I, I gotta practice what I preach. So I gotta lean into it a little bit. The first time I did a presentation maybe [00:15:00] 10 years ago or so.
I was nauseous, sweating, terrified. It was not natural to me. It was terrifying. There's probably like 200 people there, and I wasn't doing what everybody else was doing. I was doing something new. So I was so nervous about being scrutinized for people not getting it, and it was pretty well received.
And then within a couple years, I'm booking 50 or 60 presentations a year because people are interested in. What I was doing. So it, it was okay to be not perfect that first time. I was far from perfect. I was probably so anxious. It was probably terrible to be honest with you, but I did it and I survived.
And then, I, I honed it a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more. So just don't have it perfect. Just go, just do it. Like you're gonna be anxious if you do it. You're gonna be miserable if you don't. So just do it.
James Marland: Yeah. Lot of, lot of good wisdom in there. I think the the, the, one of the first things you said was just, what's the minimum that you can, like MVP, it's called in the business world, minimum viable product. You don't have to. Do the whole thing [00:16:00] and make it all perfect all at once. What is, what's the first experiment you could run to see if this is something that's viable?
Ira Hays: Yeah.
James Marland: like you mentioned, that growth mindset. It's so valuable, the growth mindset and. Understanding that failure is part of the process. In fact, the lessons you learn from failure will probably propel you further than the success because the success is you're not sure what you did right?
Like it could have been you just got lucky at the right time. the failures teach you some lessons that you would never learn if you were just successful right out of the gate. So what were we, what were some of the. Lessons you learned from your failures or what were some of the, the obstacles you had to overcome to continue to grow and scale the way you have been?
Ira Hays: I think just I had to overcome like my being content with just helping the few people that I was helping. Like I, for a [00:17:00] while there I was like, okay, this is my domain. I have some control over it. And then at. Another point, I opened the floodgates and said, okay, if, if everything's my domain, what do I do next?
So if every parent that calls me I wanna try and help them, that took me a while because it was just overwhelming. The idea and the concept of it was really overwhelming. I think being on, like social media particularly, I'm pretty active on LinkedIn. That was super scary for me at first.
I'm not a social media person. I don't ingest a lot of social media, but I certainly had ideas that I wanted to share and saw that as a good forum start sharing. So the first time I started posting and writing articles was really difficult for me. Like I just was like. The vulnerability and are people gonna care what I have to say?
And then just saying what does it matter if, if four people like something and four people learn something from it, or one person learns something from it and then treats a kid differently and helps them, then it's probably worth putting it out there. So I think figuring that out, but really learning the, i the business of, you, you could be the greatest therapist on the planet and if nobody knows you exist, you help.
No one. And I think [00:18:00] once you become, proficient at doing something, I think it's really important that you look at okay, now if I'm proficient at doing this, depending on whether other people know about it and how to do it, it's like, how do I get that information out there?
How do I advocate for the correct treatment of like obsessive compulsive disorder? And I think it made it easy for me because. When I first started working with school pH, obsessive compulsive disorder, I saw a lot of people doing it incorrectly. So it build up a lot of passion. There was something for me to correct, like there was something for me to say Hey, you might get better results if you do this.
So I think that helped build. More of a desire and more motivation where I think some people stay in their comfort zone of oh, I've learned this one skill and now let me just apply this skill to everyone. And what I found is if you learn one, particularly in therapy, if you learn one modality, it helps.
A subset of people. But as soon as you try to, apply it outside that subset, you're con you're likely not doing the most effective thing for them. So I think that's, and I'm just constantly open to new things too. [00:19:00] So when something new comes up, I'm gonna give it a try. So that's been like motivating too.
It, it's been really helpful for me.
James Marland: Wow. Any other pieces of advice for somebody who is, who, who's a therapist or group practice owner and they're thinking. wanna do, I, I, I too, like Ira can help people. I know I've solved this problem they just have this idea and they're like, I don't know what to do. What would you, what would you say to them?
Ira Hays: I'd probably say, just start. Just get on. I tell all my interns, all my therapists get on LinkedIn and spend a couple minutes a week. Just post what you think, post what you believe, ingest what other people are thinking. Let it build up, make connections with people that are doing things that you find interesting and allow their.
Affect your work
thing.
Giving away what you have, going and giving knowledge. If you're really good at, I don't know, helping kids who are oppositional or helping kids who can't sleep or helping kids who are dealing with medical crises. Go give [00:20:00] that information away to the schools or the programs or the hospitals or wherever it is that's going to be beneficial for you.
For me it's always been an interesting thing because, I work it with a program, so there's, if I'm training therapists or I'm training school counselors. I might do a training and I'll do it for free. I'll give away the, all that information, but it seems to return to me. Like people then they look to me for Hey, what do we, how do we help these kids?
When it comes to that specific role. So I would say don't, I think some therapists think they learn something and they have to protect it, and I would say do the opposite. If you learn something and it's effective, give it away. You don't have to protect it. If you just give it away, give it away, it, it'll all come back.
It'll help you grow. And that is in social media, that's in, probably in, if you're writing on Substack or anything else like that. If, if you're putting information out there, give everything, behind the scenes a look and, let them know what you're doing.
James Marland: Yeah. The. The, the book, the Go-Giver seems like a very authentic way for helpers and healers [00:21:00] to, to continue to grow and lead. Like it's, it's not, it's like against some of this get rich quick or manipulate people into buying from you. It's just an authentic, it's an authentic model. For, for personal and business growth. So I'm glad you mentioned that. So you're doing a lot of stuff. I'm wondering where, if people wanna know more about your work and what you do, and if you have any trainings or videos where can they find you and how could they get in touch with you?
Ira Hays: Yeah, it's probably the easiest way to get in touch with me is on LinkedIn. Just connect with me on LinkedIn at I IRA HAYS, and then it's lcsw. Same thing on YouTube. I do have some content albeit that's part of the learning process for me, learning how to edit and like record, and that's been an awkward journey.
Definitely you can check out some of the information that I do on YouTube, and then I think if you go to Hayes health and [00:22:00] wellness.com and then interspace counseling.com depending on if you're looking for me in my private practice or the program that I run here in New Jersey, those are probably the best places to get me.
Yeah, I, I look forward to, I connect and talk to, if you reach out to me on LinkedIn, I'll, we'll definitely connect and talk and, and if you have questions or. You just wanna connect and share your own thoughts. I would, I would love that.
James Marland: And you have a, you have a podcast, it's, or you've been contributing to a podcast. It's for local or is it for a general audience? What is that? What is that about? And what is it called?
Ira Hays: Yeah. So it's it'll be in our space. And it's, it's not published yet, probably in the next week or two. The first episode will be out where you get to know it. Behind the scenes look at interspace counseling. The, the program that I run you'll meet me, you'll meet our kind of admin team and the owner.
And then the goal is to interview some people that we aspire to be similar to or to learn from. And it'll be for, parents, [00:23:00] clinicians people who are working with people that have anxiety, OCD, any other really mental health concerns too. Dial behavioral track as well. So where we're helping people with depression and mood related concerns.
So I think a host of people in the mental health community would, would benefit from, from watching.
James Marland: It's, it's awesome like podcasting's hard work.
Ira Hays: And I think, i, I'm learning how to edit and learning. I'm again, that growth mindset. It's like instead of, I dunno how to do that, I'm not gonna, it's just like, all right, I'll take my time and figure it out. And it's, it's been fun. It's been harder than I thought. I give you guys credit. I, I mean what, where you're looking at 150 episodes or so.
I think that's that's amazing.
James Marland: Yeah. Yeah, it's been a joy. I get to meet people like you. I get to do, I get to share some of my ideas, I get to give stuff away. The one thing I am trying to learn, it's the Who not How principle. That's another Benjamin Hardy book where you come up with a problem, [00:24:00] ask, how am I going to do it?
You ask who's the best person to do it, and I'm starting to learn. am, I am the best person to have ideas and set the vision, maybe record some content. But if I need to grow, I'm probably not the best person to spend half a day editing my own videos. So it's, it's a learning process. We're all learn.
It's, it's hard though, 'cause I wanna. I like doing it and I wanna hold onto it, but that might not be the best place that I add value to going forward. In the beginning it was, but as I grow, might have to learn to, to delegate a little better. Thank, so you told us where to go. We have, we'll put that in the show notes. I'll be looking forward to checking out your podcast when it comes out. Your, your book, definitely when the book comes out, let me know. I'll, I'll put a note in our the newsletter to let people know that it's coming out. Anything, anything else you do, to help, to help people parents [00:25:00] or, professionals. I'm just a big fan of that anxiety and, and that school phobic stuff. I, I worked in, a, a day hospital, and we had some kids like that. And it was rough for us. It was rough. We didn't have the, in the special knowledge. I think that, you have. And if we did, we would've I, I tapped you on the shoulder.
Anyways, thank you so much for what you do, and thank
Ira Hays: Yep.
James Marland: being on the show, IRA.
Ira Hays: Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. It's been fun.
James Marland: All right, friends. you, you heard it from Ira. It's time to have that growth mindset. Stop being afraid to fail and get out there and put your mission in motion. We'll see you next time.
Speaker: Okay, friends, final encouragement here. You heard it from Ira. When you're, when you learn something that helps people, don't hide it. Give it away. Share that idea. Offer that training. Post the lesson. Put something in [00:26:00] LinkedIn or in your social media. Just take that next step to share that information.
That's how you start building an audience, and that's how you get your mission to start moving. I wanna thank the pro-level sponsors for s- sponsoring "The Scaling Therapist." If your practice is stuck behind a business bottleneck, you don't have to solve it alone. You can visit the scalingtherapistservices.com directory and connect with our trusted providers.
The providers are Humor Speaks, RevKey, The Practice CoLab, Arc Integrated, TheraSaaS CRM, Guest Compliance and Consulting LLC, Freedom Business Solutions, Bosco LLC, and Profit Comes First. Pick one bottleneck, take the next step, and keep your mission in, in motion. We will see you next time [00:27:00]
