Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in health and wellness but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Dr. Nashalla Gwyn Nyinda, Clinical Director of Tibetan Medicine & Holistic Healing, located in Boulder, CO, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

I work to promote Traditional Tibetan medicine, a system of medicine practiced across the Himalayan countries and into Mongolia, also called Sowa Rigpa. I practice in the  U.S.A and worldwide. Our clinic offers a range of services to meet the needs of people seeking better balance and health and learning how to best support themselves on all levels of the Body-Mind-Spirit. I provide additional education and internship opportunities for qualified candidates in Tibetan Medicine and the Sowa Birthing Method ™.

On staff are myself and my husband. Both of us are fully trained Traditional Tibetan  Medicine physicians. We offer all that our system has to give in the healing arts platform we are trained in, as well as in mental wellness and meditation techniques. We also offer complementary medicine, nutritional and dietary consults blending modern science with the ancient wisdom found in Asian healing disciplines. Our primary goals are helping to educate and provide services for a variety of acute and chronic conditions in conjunction with allopathic or alternative treatments.

The Sowa Birthing Method™ is a bodywork series for expectant mothers and offers a  complete care package and support system for the special and sacred time in a pregnant woman's life. The goal is to serve the needs of the nervous system and the mother's body to carry the mother with integrity and vitality well into her postpartum phase and help reduce the need for interventions and postpartum depression.

Tell us about yourself

I began my studies of Tibetan Medicine in 1999. I stumbled into an introduction to  Tibetan Medicine class at my university that was taught by a family practice MD who had been studying its methodology and applying it to his own practice for over 20 years. I  had been receiving five-element acupuncture since the age of 15 and had been practicing as a herbalist for several years at that point. I worked in the natural health food and vitamin section putting myself through college and was already in love with the sciences of anatomy and physiology.

The short story was I had a class with a guest teacher, a monk physician who was said to be the 5th incarnation of the same doctor. We all had to bring our urine into class as we have a special and unique urine diagnostics theory and practice in the Tibetan Medicine system. So I brought mine in. This monk physician spoke no English, did not read my pulse or look at my tongue, did not ask me any questions, and when he looked at my urine, he looked at me intently and then proceeded to tell me all sorts of a spot on accurate info about how I slept, my mental propensity for anxiety, that I ate too much pasta, and so on. I was floored because I was used to having my pulses read and this sort of thing, but this was far more detailed than that, and he literally had not touched me or asked one question. So I thought, I want to know how to do that! The short version is a lot of trips to Nepal, then moving to India, and ten years later, I was qualified as a Menpa, or Doctor of Tibetan Medicine, after taking my second series of exams in  Tibet (China) in 2009. I now have patients bring their urine to their appointments with me, so it took a while, but I learned how to do it!

My biggest motivation always was and still is to bring this special and very useful system of healing to America. To help benefit patients who have tried all options and still have no relief. To show them how to best help and tend to their bodies themselves between visits. I want to strengthen every patient's self-knowledge of nature, and our bodies respond to seasons and foods in balance and imbalance so they themselves don't need to rely on prescriptions and herbal pills after they recover. They can be in the driver's seat of managing chronic and acute conditions.

There is truly no greater satisfaction than seeing a patient who is chronically ill and has suffered for long periods of time feel better, have better digestion, increase energy, and improve their quality of life. I suffered a lot from learning this system. At the time I went to study it, there were only about three non-indigenous Western persons qualified to study. There were three books in English only. Everything was Tibetan, and I had to move abroad and learn the language to study and literally immerse myself in a different culture. I think of this whenever I see patients feeling better and that all the hardships I went through to become qualified were worth every moment of difficulty.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

Making Traditional Tibetan Medicine better known in America.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

It is vital that anyone in the healthcare field make sure they are not over-extending themselves. There is never an end to the suffering of humans when it comes to illness or disease and mental suffering. You can only be genuinely helpful when you are healthy and balanced. We can see from many studies and statistics that health providers get burnout and compassion fatigue. This is due both to a broken healthcare system where Drs are subject to answer to shareholders in hospitals and insurance companies and secondly to our self-made expectations that we have to be available to help 24/7 or were not being helpful or compassionate enough.

Having healthy boundaries and setting a schedule that balances life and work is key to long-term healthy healing art or medical business. For example, I shut down my email and don't answer work phone messages from Friday at five until Monday morning. During my holidays, I don't look at work email; I am with my family and kids. I have set time away and stick to it. Lastly, I make personal retreats to recharge my own system several times a  year. Yes, running a business with this kind of switching off may make it hard to feel like you're being "as productive" as possible. But you have to care for yourself too, or you can't give the 100% needed during business hours. So that balance is hard but very critical in being long-term successful.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Love what you do. Know it takes a few years, and work on your relationships with those who will refer you. We never advertised; we were always 100% word of mouth, given that we were a system of medicine completely unknown in the USA that says a lot about what happens when you do a good job.
  2. Care deeply, giving it your all in the allotted hours you work a day. You let your clients know that by being present, caring, and providing good follow-through. Word of mouth goes farther than any paid advertising ever will.
  3. Balance work life and make sure you don't get behind on paperwork. Set aside a day that is for retaining calls, paperwork or taxes, etc. If not weekly, do it twice a month; otherwise, it eats into your work-life boundaries.
  4. Listen to feedback. Consider it, and don't be defensive if you and a client don't see eye to eye. Learn how to take feedback to make what you offer even better.

Is there anything else you'd like to share?

You can be an active participant in your own healing journey. It takes a fierce willingness to look at oneself — and commitment to loving yourself enough to have those hard looks. Follow through with what needs to change. You know your body best — you live in it. Remember to advocate for yourself with healthcare.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://www.holistic-health.org/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tibetandoctor
Academia: https://naropa.academia.edu/NashallaGwynNyinda
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TibetanHealing
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tibetanholistichealing/

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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