Meet Christopher Missimo: Co-Owner of Avanti Counseling & Consulting, Owner of Missimo Motivation, Therapist, J.D. Candidate Texas A&M School of Law, LPC, NCC, MA,

We had the good fortune of connecting with Christopher Missimo and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Christopher, what do you attribute your success to?
My “RAMP” (Relationships, Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose) model. In particular, the factors of focus and appreciation, which are “M” skills that can touch on the other three parts of the model. Most people look to the concept of “motivation” to guide their behavior or to bring an explanation of the lack of behavior. This is wrong. Motivation is too fleeting and centered around how we feel at any given time. Give a human a long enough day or week and they will experience the full range of emotions. In contrast, focus is 1000% a skill that is developed and it is one that comes through numerous failures. It can exist concurrent to bad emotions and with things we would prefer not to do. Focus is aided by appreciation. Appreciation is our ability to give thanks in real-time, even to the tasks that we don’t prefer at that moment. Your ability to appreciate the challenge or opportunity in front of you gives you permission to enjoy the process. We are able to focus on things we enjoy much more easily than things we do not. This too is a skill and is developed by practicing via written and verbal statements of appreciation, as well as the intent to find the good in every opportunity or context. Obviously, it goes against human nature to be able to do this successfully 100% of the time, but if you are able to increase the percentage of the day that you can show gratitude for, your success will grow because it will unlock the opportunity to focus. The last thing I’ll say about focus and appreciation is that they are enhanced by simplification. Too many, or the wrong relationships, roles, goals (R, A, and P of RAMP), etc., can hinder your ability to appreciate and focus. If you can simplify your life to your health, your main career aspirations, and a small group of close and trusted loved ones, typically you will find more appreciation. Obviously, personality types differ, but most people benefit from good health, a sense of purpose, and a few successful and trustworthy intimate relationships. While I somewhat touched on the other parts of the pillar, remember that the “most important factor” behind the success would include the two factors (yes, I’m cheating with two instead of one) of focus and appreciation because both play into the RAMP model as a whole. Both have the opportunity to exist every minute of every day. Both are something that you can begin working on right now. 

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
Avanti Counseling & Consulting is a psychological and counseling practice focused on provide therapy services to clients, but also on providing therapists with business, legal, and clinical development. So, while the practice provides standard private practice services to the general public, what sets us apart is our focus on bridging the gap that exists primarily for academically successful younger therapists that eventually want to run their own private practices. We have the “Avanti Advantage” program, which is a curriculum set designed to enable a therapist to run their own practice after they associate stage because they will have all the knowledge and tools ready day one. Our goal it to make it to where very intelligent and talented therapists can focus on caring for the community instead of worrying about learning to run a business. Missimo Motivation is a business focused on bridging the gap between mental and physical health. My focus in that business is on athletes. I utilize my RAMP model (Relationships, Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose) with athletes, families, teams, and high-level professionals to give them a structure and a shared set of language to accomplish their personal or team-oriented goals. Professionally I got here by first starting and failing to establish my first business in undergrad. I then started another around three years later, which simply would not get off the ground. Four years after that I rebuilt the same model, but better. I had gained experience through my professional work in private practice and I had sought out endless bits of information to help me develop. I intentionally put myself in business-oriented situations, meetings, events, etc., so that I could learn on the job. At the time, there wasn’t an “Avanti Advantage” program available, so I had to learn everything myself. Two years after that, the business was at a place where I could run it full time. It took a while to get there and while I developed my skills and sharpened my foundation, I worked at yet another private practice. Always learning and always seeking to develop. When I started, I worked in a literal broom closet for about $10 an hour, but 4 years after that I was running my own business and living off of it 100%. Approximately 6 months after that, I launched a second business as things really started to pick up. Now, here we are! My personal story begins during my childhood years when I was diagnosed with ADHD, Bi-Polar, Conduct Disorder, and Oppositional Defiance Disorder. The summarized version includes 10 years of therapy between ages 5-15, 13 years of medication (at one time over 10 pills per day) between ages 5-18, and multiple inpatient hospital stays between ages 5-11. The longest hospital stay was 3 months in an institution in Austin, Texas. This hospital hosted children and adolescents with severe mental illness. For example, my roommate was a positive schizophrenic, meaning he had vivid hallucinations, including seeing dead people. During this time, the state of Texas was also attempting to take me away from my mother who was a single parent of 2 boys. They failed in this attempt, due in large part to a team of mental health experts that fought on my behalf. Back then, I was not expected to attend college, hold a successful job, or engage in a healthy intimate relationship. In short, it was a traumatic and challenging childhood for many reasons. Focus, appreciation, and attempts at total ownership for my responsibility in life is what led me to where I am now.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
If you can, I’d say to go to Ocean Prime for a meal in Dallas. Ocean Prime is the best restaurant I’ve ever been to. At some point, you should also try North Main BBQ in Euless if the high price of Ocean Prime isn’t your thing. It’s a high-end (quality-food-wise anyway) BBQ hole in the wall! If you want something fast food, I’d go with Lisa’s chicken. If you’re of age and want to grab a drink, I suggest the Deep Ellum brewery for a tour. For entertainment, I personally enjoy the E-Sports Stadium in Arlington or attending a Dallas Mavericks or Dallas Cowboys game. Gaming and sports are my primary forms of enjoyment, along with weightlifting. If that’s not your speed, I’d say visit the Dallas Aquarium or Ft. Worth Zoo.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
My mom. Yep, the standard mom answer. However, my mom really is different. She is selfless to the point of absolute personal debilitation. She would quite literally give the food of her plate and the clothes off her back for her children. She would give up peace, money, and time for the rest of her family as well. That sacrifice helped to position me to where I am today. Most importantly though, she taught me that life is tough, but that we are tougher. After what we’ve been through, it’s hard to be intimidated by anything else.

Website: www.avantidfw.com and www.missimomotivation.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/missimo_motivation/
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-missimo/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/cmissimo
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/missimomotivation
Youtube: www.youtube.com/missimomotivation

Image Credits
Caroline Estes Photography