I took a little time the other day to think about the past year at Cove and the overwhelming feeling I had was one of gratitude. As a small business owner, I owe my business and general survival to my customers, the people that trust me to put needles into their bodies and help guide them towards health. Each and every one of us holds the wisdom to know what our minds/bodies need to be in a state of balance and I have such feelings of awe and gratitude that you come in to seek that, to pull that into consciousness, at Cove.
Opening up my own practice in a new neighborhood, during a pandemic was, um, probably kind of stupid from an economic point of view. Building up new clientele at a time when none of the pre-pandemic business patterns hold true anymore has been a wild ride, but I honestly feel that it has paid off. My clientele is more diverse than it has ever been and it feels SO. DAMN. GOOD. to be helping a broader range of people. I cannot emphasize that enough. Everyone deserves access to healthcare and it is appalling that it is so often barred for people who are BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and/or from lower socioeconomic classes. I am supremely grateful to have a practice where I can make a small dent in broadening healthcare access.
I am fortunate to have patients that are thoughtful and so nice. You are good people and I am privileged to be around and learn from you. So, THANK YOU. Thank you for your trust. Thank you for referring your friends, family, and coworkers. Thank you for your Google and Apple reviews. All of these things mean so much to me, personally, and to the business of Cove. Y’all allow me to have this somewhat unusual, super fulfilling job and I do not take that lightly.
I hope that everyone is having a restful holiday and has a happy/safe/healthy/cozy/fun/whatever you want it to be New Year’s Eve, and I hope that that continues through the New Year.
xx,
Alex

“Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are.”
- Chinese proverb (taken from Tiny Revolution’s wonderful end of the year post)
p.s. To the people who subscribed to this newsletter after reading my interview with Sara: Welcome! You have by now deduced that I am pretty terrible at sending out newsletters with any sort of regularity or sense of urgency. I don’t really do resolutions, but I do have in mind trying to figure out how to write succinctly about Asian Medicine at some point in the future (my biggest mental barrier to writing more here is having no idea how to do so in non-term paper form), so please stick around!
All the good wishes of the season! Can you pick a very small topic and ask someone who knows nothing about it to interview you?