Ruth Mwangi – Lead Consultant and owner of Life Pillars Counseling & Consultancy

What are your full names, your age (if you don’t mind), the name of your business and your role in it?

My name is Ruth Mwangi and I am 38 years old.

I run Life Pillars Counseling & Consultancy, based in Nairobi.

I am currently the Lead Consultant as well as the owner of the entity.

What’s Your Story? How did you start, what is your motivation, what problem are you solving etc.

I graduated with a Master of Arts in 2009, and went ahead to work in a local private University for 9 years, in various Administrative positions while teaching part-time in the Counseling Department. I have always wanted to practice as a Counselor even though the profession was still quite young at the time and without mentorship, it seemed quite an uphill task.

Mentor or none, my passion for the trade drove me to come up with a name for my baby. In 2012, eventually, I came up a name. I registered my baby as Life Pillars Counseling & Consultancy, and began attending to clients on a part-time basis.

As I sought to still advance my education, I had to juggle full-time employment, teaching part-time and attending to clients.

In 2020, however, I had to leave formal employment to pursue my Consultancy on a full-time basis as I continued with my education.

I am always motivated in serving others and seeing their chaos transform into meaningful order. I believe God has given me the requisite grace and gifting for this so it is not a struggle but rather great fulfillment all the way.

I am currently attending to professional therapy needs at individual and group level. I am engaging diverse people on their mental health needs including self-care, anxiety, relationship dynamics, self-awareness, trauma, journaling, and much more. Life Pillars is also consulting for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs).

What motivates you to do what you do everyday?

I anchor my life in God and out of this I have found my creativity flowing as I continue supporting others navigate the good and bad time. I am motivated by the deep and continuing satisfaction I get from seeing a transformed person or group of people through professional therapy and support efforts.

Who has been your biggest motivation to do what you do?

God is first as my motivation. He has opened my eyes to how much injustices affect mental health and this motivates me the more to support others.

I also do have mentors both for my spiritual and professional work who have set good examples for me to emulate, challenged to grow and be better at what I do.

What unseen opportunities do you see that may result in making your business a huge success?

I believe in being authentic and creative is a sure way to progress. There are things I naturally gravitate towards and these are likely to be where I will thrive. Also, when one is creative, the experience in therapy becomes appealing and this would likely attract more people who would otherwise not respond to traditional ways of receiving therapy.

What is your parting shot for those wishing to join the entrepreneurship train?

Believe in yourself without entertaining self-doubt, keep the discipline and allow your creativity to flow freely.