Show Notes

Navigating entrepreneurship is challenging enough—but add chronic illness or invisible disabilities to the mix, and the journey is a whole new level of complex. In this episode, Patrick Casale and Destiny Davis, MS, LPC, CRC, share powerful insights on building meaningful, sustainable work while honoring your own needs.

Here are 3 key takeaways:

1. Honor Your Capacity: Your energy and time are your most valuable resources. It’s okay to say “no,” set boundaries, and recognize that your own well-being comes first—even when that means letting go of things you once loved or cutting back on work that’s no longer sustainable.
2. Build Supportive Systems: Whether it’s a supportive partner, intentional friendships, or business relationships with similar values, surrounding yourself with understanding people makes a huge difference. Don’t have that support? Explore peer networks, online groups, or communities where your lived experience is understood and validated.
3. Practice Self-Compassion Over Perfection: Normalize the ebb and flow of your energy. Some days will be productive, while others are meant for rest—and that’s okay. Focus on what you can do rather than shaming yourself for what you can’t, and remember that progress is built through small, sustainable steps.

More about Destiny:

Destiny Davis, MS, LPC, CRC is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Certified Rehabilitation Counselor in private practice in Atlanta, Georgia. She specializes in helping people with invisible illnesses and disabilities navigate relationships and build meaningful lives using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Somatic Experiencing approaches.

Destiny works with individuals and facilitates groups for adults, teens, and parents who want to strengthen their relationships with themselves, their families, and their communities. She created and facilitates Welcome to The Waiting Room, a membership community providing evidence-based, peer support for people with complex medical conditions.

As host of The Chronic Illness Therapists Podcast and leader of clinical consultation groups for medical professionals, Destiny bridges the gap between lived experience and clinical expertise in chronic illness care.

• Instagram: @the.chronicillnesstherapists
• Cohort Group page: revivepractice.com/chronic-illness-cohort
• Conference: chronicillnesstherapists.com

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Transcript

PATRICK CASALE: Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the All Things Private Practice podcast. I'm joined today by Destiny Davis, LPC, CRC, Licensed Professional Counselor and Certified Rehabilitation Counselor in private practice in Atlanta, Georgia, specializes in helping people with invisible illnesses and disabilities navigate relationships and build meaningful lives using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and somatic experiencing approaches.

She works with individuals and facilitates groups for adults, teens, and parents who want to strengthen a relationship with themselves, their families, and their communities. Welcome to The Waiting Room is something that she's created, a membership community providing evidence-based peer support for people with complex medical conditions. Host of the Chronic Illness Therapist podcast and the leader of clinical consultation groups for medical professionals, bridges the gap between lived experience and clinical expertise in chronic illness care.

Very cool. Welcome to the show. We actually haven't really spoken on chronic illness on this podcast, which is shocking considering I have so many of them.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah, well, I'm glad we can have that conversation today.

PATRICK CASALE: Sure, yeah. So, anything I missed in your bio that you want to share with people who are listening?

DESTINY DAVIS: No, it sounds way more impressive than I feel, but those are all the things that I'm doing, so…

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, I can relate. I always cringe when people are reading mine. I'm like, "Well, this is someone else."

Okay, so I know a lot of you listening probably are going to resonate with this conversation. You know, navigating being a small business owner, entrepreneur, or private practice owner, whichever classification you place yourself in, and having a chronic illness, or a chronic co-occurring mental health condition, or medical condition, sorry, and the energy that it takes to not only take care of yourself, but to take care of your business, and how much of a challenge that can be some days, actually, most days.

DESTINY DAVIS: Most days, yeah.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, so.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, take it away.

DESTINY DAVIS: Okay, starting point, not feeling well is definitely a part of all of this, and I think that actually leads into one of the points of why entrepreneurism feels so right for me still, even though it takes a lot of energy and time, I get to kind of choose day-by-day what I'm going to put my energy in, especially, when you start thinking longer term. You know, you've got these long-term projects going on, and you can say, like, I am going to drop the ball on this for a week. And it's okay, because this is, again, long-term. So, it allows you to ebb and flow with it, which I find really helpful.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, I think the ebb and flow process is huge. And I don't think we start there, right? Like, I think for a lot of us, we start more in a shame-based mindset, which is, how come I can't push through? What is wrong with me?

DESTINY DAVIS: Yes, and I've definitely been there. And I think, of course, your environment has to really be supportive of this kind of grace and compassion that you're trying to instill for yourself. And that doesn't even always mean that your, you know, partner or family is going to give you the exact right emotional response that you're looking for, but at the very least that they're not shaming you, that they're not, you know, making you feel like you should be doing more. You know, I'm lucky in that way.

So, my partner has always been like, "This is the bare minimum money you need to make in order for us to be okay." And it was a very low number. And so, that was how we started that conversation.

At the time, I was very like, "Oh my God, no. Like, I've got to bring in more than that. I've got to…" And then, over the years, it was like, whenever I started to feel the pressure, I was like, "Wait, that's all I need to do. Anything more than that is extra."

PATRICK CASALE: Sure.

DESTINY DAVIS: Helped a lot.

PATRICK CASALE: It's a good reframe in perspective check, and you know, obviously, support is so important. And for those of you listening who are like, "I don't have that." You know, I know it's a privilege to say that, like, supportive partnerships or friendships are really crucial. So, for those of you listening who are like, "I don't know where to turn." You know, I think we can talk a little bit about how to build in supports into your life.

But for me, this is going to sound like a polarizing statement, but COVID was probably the best thing that's ever happened to me in a lot of ways, not saying that it wasn't a horrifically traumatic experience for the entire world, but moving from a office to my home, having control of my environment at all times, and I really started to, like, flourish in terms of energy management and protecting my spoons, and being able to energy stack when appropriate. And I've been able to create so much from the confines of my office and my house. And also, got diagnosed ADHD and autistic along the way. And it all started to really make sense.

And when we talk about invisible disability, right? We're talking a lot sometimes about those two neurotypes, in general, being disabling conditions. And it's like, "Damn, I'm so glad that I know and…" There's always a both, and on this podcast, is like I feel more disabled now than I ever have in my life.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah, because when you're aware of what your limitations are, you feel it more. But at the same time, when you're aware of them, you can work with them more, so long as you are incorporating that compassion, you are giving yourself a lot of grace when you don't, and you're realistic with what your goals actually are anyway. You're not having the biggest, most lofty goals when you don't have experience with the smaller stuff first.

Big and lofty goals are great. I'm putting on a conference next year. Never thought I would be here doing so, but at the same time, like, if my energy didn't allow, and I didn't have the right support and partnership, this only happened, the conference, only happened because Victoria Rodriguez came to me and was like, you know, we just connected right away, and both have the same work ethic, and the same passion, and the same thought process. It was kismet. It was totally like, this is what I've needed this entire time, and now I have it. Now, we can, like, and go.

PATRICK CASALE: Sure, yeah, yeah. And you know, I think it's like, again, trying to understand the way that you move through the world, and the way that you absorb, and take in energy. And you are going to have bad days, right? Like, there are going to be days where you're really low energy, and maybe all you can do is lay on the couch, and binge-watch Lord of the Rings on repeat for the millionth time, or Naked and Afraid over and over and over again for some reason. And some days you're going to, like, feel like you have intense bursts of energy and creativity.

And I've had to learn to ride the wave of like, not beating myself up on the days where, like, I can't really do much other than just my basic needs for daily living, and accept the fact that my energy just has such an ebb and flow because my systems are so sensitive that I get sick constantly. And I travel a lot for my work at this point my career. So, I'm always sick. I'm always in chronic pain. All these very rare, weird, co-occurring, chronic medical conditions. I mean, it's just been a interesting ride, to say the least. But really appreciating the days where I can do the things that I feel really passionate and inspired by, instead of, like, beating myself up constantly.

And I think some of this, honestly, is like working through our own internalized ableism that comes up when we're like, "We should be able to do more. What is wrong with me?"

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah, and I think this might be a good place to talk about something like CBT versus Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, because in the beginning… So, you know, cognitive behavioral therapy really relies a lot on evidence to change your belief system. But if you don't have the evidence to say, look, and this society decides that people are worthy when they're successful financially, things like that. And so, if you don't have the evidence for that already, you can't really CBT your way into that.

For me, it was Acceptance and Commitment Therapy all the way. Like, I had to really focus on… And I get the pushback a lot around acceptance. And, you know, how that can kind of make you spiral and feel hopeless. And, you know, it's all part of the process, Acceptance and Commitment. Therapy, it's a therapy. So, it's not a one kind of thing that you could just say, and now you're accepting, and now you feel better.

But there were so many times where I would be, yeah, laying in bed with a migraine, or, you know, down, and out, like just energy-wise, I couldn't do anything. And all I could sit with was, "This is how I feel. There's nothing I can do about that. I can't change this. I cannot push past this, because I will make it worse."

PATRICK CASALE: Sure.

DESTINY DAVIS: And so, I started to focus a lot on those little things that start to move the needle. And at the time, in my business, sometimes it would… And sometimes it was, but sometimes it just felt like it was busy work that wasn't moving the needle. It was like I am just doing anything here that I can do to like, keep moving. And sometimes you don't know what things are actually moving that needle, and the other things are really just a waste of time.

What I knew for myself was that pure rest, just, you know, doing nothing, never felt good for me. I'm high energy, very, like, extroverted. So, I had to learn about myself along the way. And I think, especially, there's a lot of people who will talk about, you know, not pushing, and trying to get away from, like, productivity culture, which, of course, I think is important. And whenever I tried, I got worse. So, I started to learn, like, okay, one, I need multiple streams of income, because you can't rely on just one-on-one clients when you're sick. You know, I see it all the time in the Facebook groups, like, what did I do when it's that I'm canceling on this client for the second time. And that was a big part of wanting to make more money, and wanting to make money from different streams of income.

And again, just always doing something within my capacity, rather than, you know, of course, I've had a migraine that I was just down and out and wasn't doing anything. But as soon as I had that time and space again, I was doing a freebie that I put on my website or a workshop that I could just show up and I didn't have to prepare for. I just showed up and talked about the thing that I love. That's what also is important within the concept of, like, choosing a niche and kind of working within it, is that everything goes together. You don't have to recreate the wheel for each thing that you're doing.

PATRICK CASALE: No, it can become a very symbiotic, like, synchronistic process once you finally find that passion place of like, this is the stuff I want to be creating, and working on, and putting into the world.

And, you know, I think most people listening to this podcast are those who are probably more entrepreneurial and like, I want to create alternative streams of income. And it sounds like, for you, like you have your podcast, you're doing a conference. It sounds like you also have, is it a membership or some sort of collective? Yeah.

So, there are lots of ways to blend these passions together, right? So that it doesn't have to feel like 60-minute increments of time over and over and over, which, for me, it wasn't even an energy thing. I mean, it was, but it's more of a boredom thing. Like, I was just like, I've "mastered" private practice. I'm done with this. And that was just my ADHD side being like, what's next?

And in reality, I realized over the last couple of years to allow for that process to be my process, because I used to beat the shit out of myself for being like, "You're so lazy, and unmotivated, and you never follow through, or you can't ever finish what you start." And in reality, it was just like, oh, I just have an interest-based nervous system, and I need to really intuitively, like, follow the energy.

And that served me really well. But I would be lying if I was sitting here saying, like, I have not pushed myself into, like, the depth of hell of autistic burnout from running 20-plus retreats in four different countries or eight different countries for the last four years. So, like, my body, and my brain, and my system are all like, waving the white flag. And it's taken a lot to get to a point where I've been like, "Okay, I hear you. Like, we're done." And that was a hard decision to just openly admit, like, I think I've created a dream job that I can't really participate in because my nervous and sensory systems can't handle it.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah. Yeah. I think I want to bring up a go back to the concept of the support and the environment around you, because I was very intentional with the partner that I… We were together for six years before we got married. So, there were many, many times throughout that timeframe where you ask yourself, Is this the right person? Is this a person I want to marry or not? That's an appropriate question. That's not a question that's indicative of something wrong.

And that question, you know, there were so many times… So, my partner, he is entrepreneurial as well, but he's very much more like stay in the safe, and consistent, and disciplined, same thing every day. And so, he has that structure, which for a long time made me feel like I was doing something wrong for the same thing, that interest-based nervous system that wanted to do the next bright thing, wanted to do the next shiny thing.

And again, took me a long time to kind of be like, "No, my way is okay. His way is okay." And it actually complements each other. Because if he's home stable, like, he just wants to do his, like, 8:00 to 4:00 PM, you know, and make dinner every night, and kind of just be like, more consistent in his routine, that's what his nervous system really thrives on. That, of course, makes it so much easier for me to be like, random weekend, random night, networking event, travel here, do this. Like, even with our two kids. It doesn't come without sacrifice on either side. But I do think that, you know, if you're in a relationship right now, you know, and so you're not in a place where you kind of are in this choice point, I still think constantly looking at the people around you, whether it is your partner, or your friends, or the people you talk to about business, being really intentional with who you're giving your energy to.

PATRICK CASALE: Absolutely, yeah. I couldn't say that better myself. I think that we have to protect our energy at all costs. And energy and time are the two things that we don't really get back, right? So, you can always make more money. You can always lose more money. But in reality, the time and the energy spent doing the things is the stuff that, you know, is harder to replenish. So, being really intentional about who you spend your time with, who you share your ideas with, who you collaborate with, what you say yes to, what you say no to.

And I think it's really hard for people who are listening, who are newer, into the space of like, I feel like I have to say yes to everything, or I'm going to miss out, or I'm going to fall behind, or I'm going to be forgotten about, or whatever internal narration comes up, when in reality, it's like everyone is doing things very differently based on their own individual circumstances.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yep.

PATRICK CASALE: Social media does not help that when we see follow count, or we see engagement, or we see pictures of people on the beach working remotely. It's like, what am I doing wrong?

And I think it's really important, for those of you listening, to be like, I think you just need to get started however works best for you. And that could be like baby steps, one foot in front of the other. That could be, like, falling over and getting back up again and again, that could be sprinting. It really just depends on so many of your own individual circumstances, trying so hard not to get sucked into the like, "But look at what everyone else is doing around me."

DESTINY DAVIS: I think when you're working on boundaries with your own body and energy that actually goes hand in hand, if you can get past… Because somebody might ask, you know, "Well, how do I know what is the right first step?" You know, whatever you have the energy for. If you have the energy for it, and it is like within a business, kind of against, you know, making a freebie for your email list. It doesn't matter if you don't know if it's going to work or not yet. If you're just paying attention to what you have the energy for, and you're doing just anything, you're going to learn along the way what's working and what isn't working.

PATRICK CASALE: For sure.

DESTINY DAVIS: I mean, I still don't have a large following. I think people like see me, and the stuff that I'm doing online, I have all these different kind of streams of income now, and I think you would expect me to have a bigger platform based on what I'm doing, but it's actually pretty small. That used to bother me a lot. And now, it feels so intentional and like close knit and feels like the people who are in my community are in there because they want exactly what I'm offering, because I was always very specific, even with my website.

PATRICK CASALE: Quality over quantity at all costs. You know, I think we can get caught up in vanity metrics a lot of the time. You could have 100,000 followers, but if there's no engagement, or if people aren't purchasing your stuff, or participating in your programs, it's all just about vanity. So, I think that's important to notate.

And also, like, setting boundaries is really an important part of this as well. I've had two major throat surgeries over the last couple of years. I've had a paralyzed vocal cord now permanently. My voice gives out throughout the day. It has much less capacity than it used to have, which is fun for someone who does all of the things that I do, and I've had to really start saying no to a lot of opportunities that in the past I would have had more energy for.

But I remember the first thing I cut out after my second throat surgery back in 2022 was individual coaching. I was like, "I'm done with this. I hate it. It's a waste of my time. It drains me. And I can't speak for that long. Okay, cut it out."

But I remember getting bombarded by emails from people when I still had my Facebook group open, like, "Can I work with you? How do I get in contact? How do I schedule a coaching call? Do you do discovery calls?" And I was like, "No, I don't do any of it anymore." And that was really hard, because I was like, this is a large portion of my income, and I'm having to give it up. But I also had to acknowledge, like, one, it no longer lights me up.

Two, I do not have the capacity. And honoring our capacity and our limitations is unbelievably crucial when we're talking about chronic illness and invisible disability.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah, I think you always have to know what your fallback plan is, you know, if you're going to take a risk like that, that's a part that I think we don't talk enough about when it comes to setting boundaries. You know, it's easy to talk about the mindset piece, but you do have to have your life set up in a way that there's a safety net.

I always give an example, not sure if it's the best example, but like, if you like to gamble, but that's a risky activity, that you can lose a lot of money in, the only way you can do that as a hobby or as a thing is if you only bring a certain amount of money, and you do not go over that amount, no matter how much you win or lose.

And it's the same way with your finances, with your body. Like, you have to know how much you can expend and what the possible consequences of that is. And then, how you're going to what safety net is underneath you in order for you to take that risk.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah.

DESTINY DAVIS: Sometimes, you know, when I'm working with clients, it's just true that they don't have that safety net, and therefore, they cannot take that risk. Other times, they have it, and it's a lot of mindset work, and we need to figure out how to help them see that so that they can take the risk and then see them grow from there.

PATRICK CASALE: Yeah, absolutely, yep, for sure. I know for me, like, right now, in this season of life of very low energy and low capacity, I've had to get a lot better at just not responding to messages. I get a lot of cold DMS from people like, "Hey, want to bounce this idea off of you?"

And I used to respond to everything, because I just am a chronic over-responder. And I hate having read notifications. I have to clear them, but that means then you saw that I've read it. And then, I'm in this dilemma of, do I respond? But I've just honestly copy and pasted something that's in my clipboard, and it's just like, "I am in a low capacity season. I am in major burnout. I don't have the capacity to respond to this right now." And that's helped quite a bit.

And you know, I think that's hard for those of you listening who are chronic, like, people pleasers, or maybe recovering people pleasers like myself. But once you start setting those boundaries, it feels really tricky to navigate, and it can feel really, like, uncomfortable, but after a while, it's like, damn, this feels really good, because you're honoring exactly what you need. And I think that's important is to really become more intentional and insightful into, like, what do I need in this season of life, and not look at it as like, this is permanent. Because I think for ADHDers listening, the permanency of something is really like, no, that feels like the walls are closing in.

So, for me, announcing that my New Zealand retreats in March are my last retreats, I never said forever, but I said for now. And I think that that's a big distinction for myself, to give myself permission to come back to something that maybe once again, if I somehow regenerate all of this energy I've lost, then I'll have more capacity.

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah, on a smaller scale with this chronic illness, energy, and the days that you don't have it, it's the same thing. I have to put this task down for now. I might be able to get back to it tomorrow. I might not get to it for a week, six months. I know my podcast has been like that. I've had all types of timeframes in which I've had. And I didn't know how long the break was going to last. But you have to, because you if you don't honor that limit, you're going to burn out, and that's not a good place to be in.

PATRICK CASALE: Nope, I can attest to that, and co-sign that, because that's where I'm in. But yeah, I think, for those of you listening, I think the big takeaways are like, give yourself some grace and some self-compassion around this stuff, because we live in a capitalist grind culture or society. And it's really easy to fall into a shame spiral of. But I have to keep this going. I have to continue doing this, even though you know that you are beyond your limits or that you are really suffering, so your well-being really has to come first in all of this. So, any last final thoughts for the audience?

DESTINY DAVIS: Yeah, I think that's great. I think my probably last, like, piece of advice is just to constantly be in observation mode. I think it's important to observe rather than make meaning of what's happening in that moment. And that observation mode is what's going to give you the intuition and the data you need to make better decisions in the future.

PATRICK CASALE: Absolutely. Well said, yeah, I like that a lot. Well, Destiny, thank you so much for coming on today and making the time. Tell the audience where they can find you. I know you have some exciting news as well that's maybe not quite ready yet, but you can certainly share it.

DESTINY DAVIS: Thank you, yeah. So, a couple of different things, Victoria Rodriguez and I are doing a cohort group, which I don't know if this podcast will come out before that. It's the end of August, on Tuesdays, six weeks, where we're teaching other therapists too. And we'll do more cohorts, I think, in the future, but teaching therapists how to work with chronically ill clients. And then, in spring of next year, we're going to have a conference here in Atlanta, in person, lots of good things there. So, you can find the conference info at chronicillnesstherapists.com. And then, I also have free consultation groups once a month. So, yeah, you can find me on the chronicillnesstherapist.com.

PATRICK CASALE: We'll have all of that in the show notes, so that you have easy access to everything that Destiny just listed. And it was really nice to meet you. And thank you so much for making the time.

DESTINY DAVIS: Thank you.

PATRICK CASALE: To everyone listening, all new episodes are out on Saturdays on all major platforms and YouTube. You can like, download, subscribe, and share. Doubt yourself, do it anyway. See you next week.