Personal Work

Here are some profiles of folks who are well-positioned to benefit from personal work with me:

• You’re a social change leader who’s looking for personal support as you navigate challenging social change efforts.

• You’re part of a workplace, group, or organization that is struggling with challenging power dynamics, and you’d like to have a positive impact on the way things move forward.

• You want to live in greater alignment with your values. You’d like to work on making that happen.

• You’ve been accused of using your power or privilege unconsciously in a way that’s hurting other people and damaging your relationships.

• You’re part of an advocacy campaign or organizing effort where infighting is beginning to limit the chances of your effort’s success. You’d like to develop your personal ability to navigate difficult conversations.

• You’re experiencing burnout and/or disillusionment with social justice work. You still believe in it, but you wonder how you can continue when you feel exhausted and/or hopeless.

How much do I charge for per session for those paying out of their own pocket? (My session rates for organizational work are different.)

$200 per fifty-minute session for individuals

$250 per fifty-minute session for relationships or small groups

A sliding scale is available for those who are interested and struggle to pay the full fee.

Why do I charge that much?

In determining my price per session, I consider two factors:

1. What it means to you

2. My level of experience and expertise

What $200 or $250 per session might mean to you

For a lot of people, $200 or $250 per session is a lot of money. Nevertheless, this level of service might be worth it to you if we’re a good fit. I offer free 50-minute consultations to help us make that determination.

To ensure it’s worth your money, I…

• offer discounted packages when it makes sense for your situation

• consult with a supervisor regularly to improve my work

• check in with you regularly about our progress

• offer you the opportunity to request a full refund on your most recent session if you felt it wasn’t supportive (provided you’re either willing to have an open conversation with me about it or end our work together)

• abide by ethical standards set by the Processwork Institute

• keep up with regular trainings and professional development to support my growth

My level of experience and expertise

I believe my level of experience and expertise in teaching, organizing, and facilitating is commensurate with my fee. I can confidently say that there are very few people out there offering what I’m offering in private sessions. That’s not to say you can’t find loads of amazing folks out there, just that I believe my approach is both unique and powerful.

Isn’t $200 and $250 per session too much? If I really provide work that supports people, why would I limit it to people who can afford those prices?

This is an extremely important question. And I’ve thought long and hard about how to do pricing in an ethical way. I don’t think I have the perfect answer, but I do have an approach I’ve put a lot of time into developing.

If you’ve ever attempted to work for yourself, you may know that not all of what I am paid per session goes to my salary. I have to pay overhead for my business, cover my insurance out of pocket, and I have to pay taxes. After all that is said and done, I personally take home around $120 per session. This comes down to maybe $30-40ish per hour when factoring in the behind the scenes work I do to support my clients.

Still, I recognize that this rate is inaccessible for a lot of people who might really benefit from working with me. Is it possible to still do this ethically? The way I manage that challenging question is by working toward offering most of my content for free (on the My Perspective page), doing pro bono work with groups, and offering some of my workshops on a free or pay-what-you-can basis. This allows the majority of my work to be extremely accessible to everyone who’s interested. I do offer a sliding scale to individuals who are extremely interested in this work but struggle to pay a full rate, and I offer a range of package deals (which you can see below) that include large discounts off my single session rate.

If you can afford my rate and you benefit from my work, please do pay the full price. You can feel good knowing that the price you’re paying supports a lower rate for my work in other areas.

The realities of pricing and making a living in our society are extremely complicated, and they bring up a lot of thorny ethical considerations. I believe in working toward a different economic system. I also believe that, along with many others around the world, I’m taking small steps in my business model to create that system (albeit in an imperfect and messy way). If you have any questions about my business approach or ideas to offer me on making my work even more aligned with an economy that supports all of our needs, please feel free to shoot me an email at james.boutin@mailfence.com.

I offer a few tailored and discounted packages for folks looking for a defined outcome and scope of work.

Jump Starter Package (4 sessions over 4-6 weeks)

The jump starter package is limited-time offer for people looking for a quick boost of insight around a specific challenge or set of challenges their facing in their lives or work.

This package is ideal for you if you have room in your schedule to meet about once a week or every other week, there’s an issue you’d really love a different perspective on, or you’re curious about my work and want a low-risk way to try it out.

Cost: $600 ($200 discount off my normal session rate)

Developing Your Inner Talisman (8 sessions over 1-2 months)

A talisman is a mythological object individuals carry so they can enter trying circumstances and emerge unscathed. This package of work helps you contact a deeper sense of self and purpose in your work, which you can use like an inner talisman to help you grow through difficult situations that arise in your life and work. We’ll do this by exploring your earliest childhood memory or dream, the issues that give you the most trouble in life, and the moments when you feel most aligned with your purpose and being.

The eight sessions in this package are completed in 1-2 months, which means meeting once or twice per week. There will be one piece of homework between each session.

Because of the level of commitment involved, this package is ideal for folks who have a break in their lives from the grind of modern life and have time to invest in inward reflection.

Cost: $1200 ($400 discount off my normal session rate)

Navigating a Complex Conflict (6 sessions over 2 weeks)

This package is for two people who are struggling with a conflict in their relationship they’d like support with. It includes two individual sessions for each person and two relationship sessions where both people meet with me together (six sessions in total). If you have mutual friends or community who care for you both, it is ideal to involve them in our work. If possible, it is also ideal to find a location to do the relationship work in person. Homework may be required.

I like to do the first set of sessions in the first week and the second set of sessions the week after. Depending on how things go, we can consider continuing the work in the same way or adjust the package to support what’s needed.

Cost $800 ($500 discount off my normal session rate)

Dreamwork Intensive (6 sessions over 6 weeks)

Nighttime dreams can offer tremendous value to us in our waking life if we know how to work with them. This package is for folks who are interested in exploring the potential meaning of their nighttime dreams and integrating them into their waking life.

This package includes designing and making use of a dream journal, learning ways of thinking about and working with dreams, and facilitated work we’ll do with your dreams in session. One piece of homework will be required between each session.

A variation on this package can be developed for a group of people who’d like to work together in a group on their dreams. This is ideal for people just beginning to learn about dreamwork.

Cost: $800 ($400 discount off my normal session rate.)

Oppression Awareness Consultancy Group (4 sessions over 1-4 months)

This package is designed for a group of people who would like to pool their funds to receive feedback on real life situations they’re encountering in their oppression awareness practice. We’ll treat each session as case study work, so you’ll need to bring challenges you’re facing in order for this to work.

Groups limited to eight participants. There may be homework between sessions.

Cost: $600 ($400 discount off my normal session rate)