Wednesday Column

When my colleague, Gretta Carney and I got together to look for space to share for our practise of homeopathy, it was a long hard slog of looking at office spaces in Napier that were never quite right. Sometimes (often) it was the price that wasn’t right: we were burgeoning health workers who wanted a professional space to work from, with a budget of next-to-nothing. That’s reasonable, right? I am a firm believer in things happening as and when they’re meant to. So, after about 12 months of being fussy about spaces we saw, I walked down the corridor at 82 Dickens St to have a massage from Amanda Bell at Napier City Massage and saw that the office space next to hers was empty. Through the five-millimetre gap in the blind on the door I could see the perfect clinic space was waiting for me on the other side. So, I asked Amanda about the landlord, made the call and voila! We had a clinic space! A weekend of painting and curtain making later, we were ready to roll.

When we had our inaugural Staff Meeting, Gretta and I established a kaupapa for the space – we decided that we wanted the space to be one of supporting people to flourish. What I love about this ethos is that we can hang anything we do off this scaffolding to see if it’s a good fit for our practice. Part of our initial vision was to open up the space to other professionals. We agreed that we wanted to do so in a way that was accessible financially – that having been such a large stumbling block for us on our journey. Well, now, we have finally got our act together and are ready to offer the space to other practitioners. You don’t have to be a homeopath, but a natural-health bent would probably be a good fit.

Gretta and I are excited about this next step in our journey of helping to create a thriving health-conscious community in Napier – if you’re excited about it too, then get in touch.