Photo credit: Alex Orrow Photography
Those of you who have done my Flourish Masterclass will know I’ve got a bit of a bugbear about something!
There’s a phrase in marketing that gets thrown around so often in our industry that I think many celebrants quietly recoil from it, and for me – it was a massive block.
“Who is your ideal client?”
Yes, yes, I understand the purpose of the question. I teach. I mentor. I run businesses. I know exactly why marketers ask it.
But…
Most celebrants didn’t step into this work because they wanted to “target demographics.” In fact, it feels like such an awkward question. It properly gave me the ‘ick’ actually. I resisted it and resisted it. I, like most celebrants, stepped into this work because I care about reducing trauma from a bad funeral and enabling WAY more joy than you could have from a registrar-led, legally restricted wedding.
We want to help people mark life properly… genuinely, properly. I genuinely don’t know a single wedding guest who has come out from a registrar-led wedding with anything deeper than “that was nice” as a comment. I don’t want the wedding to be nice. I want it to be bloody fantastic, amazing, brilliant, and the best wedding you’ve ever been to! We want it to be deeply transformative . Ceremonies aside, how do I apply this to my mentoring arm of my brand?
Perhaps the question isn’t:
“Who is my ideal client?”
Perhaps the real question is:
“Who already knows I’m the right mentor for them?”
Doesn’t that feel more human.
I’m Not Interested in Performing Perfection
If you are looking for a celebrant mentor who pretends they’ve never made mistakes, never doubted themselves, never worried about a ceremony at 2am, then I am probably not your person. I’m also definitely not your person if you don’t want to dig deep, work through issues, and come out the other side bigger, better, stronger, and even more marvellous.
Photo credit: Schmittat Photography
If you’re plodding along, then crack on. I’m not for you. I am a chronic overachiever, struggle with people pleasing, and have a monkey mind with an energetic soul and a great aura!
SO if you are looking for someone generous with their experience… transparent with their hindsight… and deeply invested in helping you become more you as a celebrant…
Then I may well be exactly who you’ve been searching for. You have found me now, because I am pulling you towards me!
I get it, and when I say ‘it’ I mean pretty much any hurdle You are struggling with:
- any limiting belief that’s getting on your nerves
- any family dynamics that are pulling you in multiple directions
- the struggle of boundaries
Photo credit: Hester Barnes Photography
I have been married for seventeen years, and it’s bumpy. .I’m Raising three children – also slightly bumpy! I’ve run businesses, I’ve renovated houses., I’ve juggled 3 jobs, walked the dog in the pouring Surrey rain, Navigated grief, stress, growth, exhaustion, joy, reinvention and all the wonderfully messy realities of being human whilst simultaneously standing in front of hundreds of people creating beautiful ceremonies and holding it together because when I am in that space, I light up!
You need to know that because celebrancy is not about becoming polished beyond recognition – that’s dull, quite frankly, it’s about becoming grounded enough to hold space for other people honestly and keep your own ego and insecurities on the other side of that door.
So Many Celebrants Have Lost Their Mojo
Particularly since the pandemic, I’ve spoken to countless celebrants who quietly confess the same things:
“I’ve lost confidence.”
“I feel like my diary is so empty”
“I’m overthinking everything, yet not getting it done.”
“I’m terrified of getting it wrong, so delay delivery in the script”
“I don’t know who I am as a celebrant anymore.”
“I feel such a non descript celebrant, beige and vanilla compared to everyone else’
Photo credit: Paige Mary Photography
Some wedding celebrants were trained during the pandemic but never fully launched as they went back to full time work.
Some are qualified on paper but still don’t feel ready in their bones.
Some have years of experience but feel disconnected from the work they once loved.
And some are brilliant, truly brilliant, but stuck in comparison and imposter syndrome.
Some hit the ground running post-pandemic when work was oozing off the walls, and now, the COVID catch-up is over, this new ‘slow’ is causing panic.
I understand every single one of those feelings.
And more importantly, I know how to help you move through them.
I Help Celebrants Find Their Voice, Not Mine
Photo credit: Hester Barnes Photography
This is important to me. I do not mentor people into becoming a smaller version of me, as that’s impossible because we are all unique. I mentor people into becoming a fuller version of themselves, and we start with finding out who that is!
That means helping you:
- Stop drowning in too much information
- Build confidence in your decision-making
- Learn how to guide without controlling
- Handle tricky couples and supplier dynamics
- Find your own choreography and ceremony style
- Understand accessibility and inclusion properly
- Navigate health & safety without fear
- Communicate professionally without losing warmth
- Dress in a way that feels aligned to your energy and clients
- Understand the luxury market realistically, not performatively
- Help you become your beast
It’s not about becoming a luxury celebrant overnight, or the top in the country of funeral celebrants, or the planner’s best ace card in their pack… THAT all comes with time.
You earn your stripes and rightly so, because there is dignity in that process.
The Celebrants I Work Best With…
…are always deeply thoughtful people. Really interesting complex humans
Usually 30+., Often coming into celebrancy after another life chapter, career, heartbreak, burnout, redundancy, motherhood, caregiving, retirement transition or a deep internal shift.
They tend to care deeply about people, about equality within love, about access to resources, about sustainability, and about freedom of belief and expression. Don’t get me wrong, I can hear the fact that, having said that, I don’t want to mentor mini-mes, I do actually want to find celebrants that share my core values!
For me, I want me celebrants, like I want my clients, to be intelligent, well-read, and emotionally aware! Wedding celebrants or Funeral celebrants who secretly worry they’re “too much” or “not enough” all at once… – YOU are my Ideal client 🙂
Might you shop at farm shops and Waitrose, because ethics matter to you? Do you support independent clothing brands over fast fashion? Do you love learning?
Are you a little eccentric in the very best way? Then HI! Over here! 🙂
I won’t misunderstand these wonderful, brilliant celebrants. I know, like, trust and recognise that underneath it all, Celebrants looking for a mentor simply want to feel more
Capable,
calm,
creative,
and trusted.
The Truth About Imposter Syndrome in the Celebrant space
I’m not going to sugarcoat it; There will always be celebrants who know more than you, Celebrants with bigger Instagram accounts, Better branding, Stronger SEO, More confidence, More experience.
But none of those people ARE you
For me, I want my couples , families and my mentees to find me because my energy makes them feel safe, Seen, Held and Understood.
Your work is not to become somebody else, And trust me, I understand how tempting that is and how hard that is to resist, but let me tell you….. if you do THAT…. it is a monumental waste of time.
To me, with my Celebrant mentoring hat on, I believe that I should be supporting you to get deeply aligned with yourself. Why? Because that’s where confidence and peace come from., and I’m ALL about that!
Why I Mentor
I’m going to pretend that someone has asked me that question, but in all honesty, no one has. It’s not until this very moment that I realise why. If you’ve ever experienced me teaching, guiding, supporting, mentoring, and speaking, it would have become profoundly obvious that I love my job. I’m passionate about sharing it, endorsing it, and supporting those that want to do it.So actually, the fact that nobody’s ever actually asked me why I want to be a mentor, I am going to take as a huge, huge pat on the back.
I shall, however, answer the question anyway.
I mentor celebrants and soul creative traders because I genuinely love bringing people out of their shell and stepping into their future self.
I continue to mentor celebrants because I care deeply about raising standards without crushing individuality.
I believe celebrants deserve support that is honest, experienced, practical and kind.
I know that if you take funerals, grief is cumulative, and if you don’t have celebrant supervision at some point in your career, you will hit emotional burnout.
And because over the years, my work has naturally evolved beyond ceremonies into education, transformation and guidance, because I already had the tools from my previous career, and with 14 years as a celebrant holding rooms, spaces, emotions, and stories I Have become the future self I wanted to be when I started
Alongside mentoring celebrants, I’ve also created and delivered:
- Several free celebrant masterclasses
- Public educational events, including Come To My Funeral
- Departure Lounge — private training experiences for businesses
- One-to-one marriage preparation work
- Swan Song — my online educational platform helping families approach end-of-life planning with clarity and compassion
- University speaker for international events at Surrey University.
Teaching and guiding It’s woven into everything I do….I just can’t help myself!
Photo credit: While We Wander Photography
