Love and Orthodontics - Love & Orthodontics

Two magnificent paths to your magnificent future

11/28/2016

There are two paths to take in order to realize your own greatness. They enhance your mental and physical health and increase your gratitude.

Doing what you know is best for you, and being grateful are important steps to living magnificently.

Until you realize your incredible worth, you will not feel capable, loved, admirable, deserving, valuable.

Oh sure, when someone compliments you, it’s satisfying, even exhilarating -  for a moment or two.

But the doubts are there, underlying the elevation of your spirit.  You wonder… and in a while, the feeling of unsurety creeps back in…

So, how then can you feel sure? How can you know your worth?

Here are two ways to start:

ONE: Start doing tiny but important things you know are best for you.

Be straightforward.  It will feel great. Eat only what is healthful; skip the junk food - just once, then again and again. You’ll know you’re doing a good job for your body.

Take a walk. Love people around you. Remember that the driver that honks at you has his own insecurity. Send him love. You’ll feel so much better than if you send him anger.

This is the Slight Edge. You’re on it! (Read The Slight Edge by Jeff Olson -- you can order a copy by clicking on the Amazon.com link in the left column of this blog entry.)

“Every decision you make, no matter how small, is a step toward feeling worthy, or a step toward feeling unworthy.”
~ Chris Baker

TWO: Count your blessings.  Spend the day thinking of “gratitudes” - your warm and comfortable bed,  your morning shower, your safe ride in to work, your neighborhood, the sunshine, abundant food, your family…

“This is part of what a family is about, not just love. It's knowing that your family will be there watching out for you. Nothing else will give you that. Not money. Not fame. Not work.”
~ Mitch Albom

These two practices, the Slight Edge and Gratitudes, will connect you to your joy and your divine self. You will feel your worth. You will feel happy and positive, capable, loved, admirable, deserving, valuable.

“That’s what successful people do: simple things that are easy to do…Here’s the problem: every action that is easy to do, is also easy not to do.”
~ Jeff Olson

Just do it! One step, one gratitude at a time. Your life awaits!

Love,

Orthodontics began for me in love

11/22/2016

The brilliant Dr. Walter Doyle was the first dentist in the world to have taken and passed the boards in both pediatric dentistry and orthodontics.

Teaching orthodontics (like at this seminar near Washington, D.C.) is a big part of my life.

Abu Dhabi's Advanced American Dental Clinic is one place where I pursue my love of practicing orthodontics.

Orthodontics began for me in love.

After dental school, I loved the idea of learning about treating the poor growth and bites which can affect a child’s function, face and beauty. I wanted to help the child grow into his or her greatest beauty.

Before going off to the University of Connecticut for pediatric specialty training, while still at University of Kentucky College of Dentistry (as a faculty member), I visited the office of Dr. Walter Doyle, the world’s first dentist to have taken and passed boards in both pediatric dentistry and orthodontics. Wow! It was a privilege.

I was thrilled to see Dr. Doyle's cranio-facial orthopedic approach to young children with adverse growth, though I didn’t understand much then. He was teaching seminars for dentists, particularly pediatric dentists at that time, sharing his knowledge, wisdom and techniques.

Later, in my pediatric residency, I would get Dr. Doyle’s brochures for his seminars and read them longingly, wanting to take the seminars and learn more orthodontics. It had to wait. Connecticut was a “fur piece” from Kentucky.

But, God intervened with manifestation of my dreams!

After my pediatric residency, Orthodontic Faculty member Dr. Sam Weinstein offered me the opportunity to do a fellowship in Orthodontics there, at U of Connecticut. I jumped at the opportunity. Still I looked at the Doyle Seminar brochures and planned when I would be able to take those seminars.

Well, God again stepped in. Manifestations again, only better than I could have imagined.

One day I found myself talking to Dr. Walter Doyle about practicing with him in his Lexington, Kentucky, practice!!! He said, “Of course I would ask that you take my seminars.” OMG as we say!

The word co-incidence comes from a Latin word, congruens, “to come together perfectly.” (Shepherd, HE, The History of Coincide and Coincidence, Am J of Philology 1:3. 271-280)

To come together perfectly. Yes! (The rest is history, as they say.) As the Universe met my yearning to learn orthodontics, also, Walter and I fell in love and became partners in orthodontics and in life.

And in time, after the way-too-soon loss of Walter, the Doyle Seminars, now known as Dr. Chris Baker Seminars, represent my love and passion. They have continued to grip and guide me in my life of learning and teaching of orthodontics.

Coincidences in love and orthodontics - to come together perfectly!

The past does not need to equal the future

11/22/2016

You don't need to do what everyone else is doing, or what anyone else wants you to do. You also don't need to tell people what you're thinking or doing. You alone design your future.

You alone define your life to come!

“You have to begin to tell the story of your life as you now want it to be and discontinue the tales of how it has been or of how it is.”
~ Esther & Jerry Hicks

Remind yourself that you don’t have to do what everyone else is doing, or what anyone else wants you to do. You also don’t have to tell people what you are thinking or doing.

“Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in. Forget them as soon as you can, tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit to be cumbered with your old nonsense.”
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Whatever you decide to do, figure out how to do it and how to see it in ways that make you happy!

You design your future. You define your life to come. You can.

Now align your thoughts so the thoughts are about your life to come. Keep all your attention on those thoughts!

Send your thoughts of your big, bold dreams out into the Universe and watch them come back to you. Create your future as you wish it to be. It can be very different from the past.

Remember that old saying, “This is the first day of the rest of my life.”

Off to your new day, Prosperous One.

Love,

Let's be bored! (It's good for your kids.)

11/13/2016

Being "bored" helps children develop their imagination and develop problem-solving skills.

Healthy play away from screens is essential for children's development.

“Mom, I’m bo - o - red!”

Many parents jump into action, feeling it’s important to entertain and play with their children so they won’t be bored. And, the children are often entertained with screens, TV, movies, videos, pads, phones, games and computers.

Screen use is damaging to brains (children AND adults) and prevents imagination and pondering. Imagining and pondering are kinds of thinking that have quite the opposite effect to screen use.

These healthful "problem-solving" thinking patterns help the brain develop in ways that teach your child to prioritize, organize, cope and feel empathy and compassion for others. They also help your child learn, perform better, reduce risk of addictions, and have better relationships throughout life.

Studies show screen use is associated with structural and functional damage to brain regions involving emotions, attention, decision-making and thought control. (Lin & Zhou et al, 2012.)

Psychologists and physicians explain sensory overload, lack of restorative sleep and a hyper-aroused nervous system are symptoms of brain damage from electronic screens.

Dr. Victoria Dunckley’s book, Reset Your Child’s Brain, explains the child’s brain damage, symptoms and dysfunction caused by screen use. She explains the children are more impulsive, moody, and can’t pay attention. Dr. Dunckley reports on studies that explain the brain damage includes atrophy (loss) of both the brain's gray matter and white matter.

Screen use thus damages both brain function and brain structure (anatomy).

We used to think of computers as educational for our children, so it became important for children to have computer access at home and at school. Now we are realizing we were wrong about computer access.

Limit screen time. Watching TV, playing video games and spending time on the computer diminishes your child’s imagination by not letting them imagine worlds and outcomes of their own. Screen time also encourages children to be passive and uninvolved, which is unhealthy for mind and body. Better to be outside climbing trees, finding cloud shapes, running about…

Remember, it’s important for your mind to wander, to ponder. The wandering mind comes up with imaginative ideas and solutions.

Through boredom you find your curiosity, persistence, playfulness, and you develop hobbies that you like. Your brain needs you to spend time watching the world go by - people, cars, animals, and clouds.

Can you imagine sitting at the soccer game without looking at your phone? Or waiting in the pick-up line for your children at school? Or at work without looking at your phone all day?

Point is, if you go through your day and don’t look at your phone when you are waiting - for anything or anyone - you will be creating a more resilient, healthy, thicker brain, and enjoying your pondering.

Let your children be bored! Enjoy them developing in broader, amazing ways! Can you imagine? They will be smarter, more creative, more buoyant, happier, more quick to recover, stronger than ever, more interested in their world, nicer, more compassionate, more aware, more athletic, more fun to be around.

Let’s be bored

Post-election positivity!

11/13/2016

Independence Hall, Philadelphia.

Keep strong your intention to keep your attention on your imagining what you want your life to be.

The more you practice, the more you succeed.

If your intention falters, and your attention wanders, your imagining may be of all the things you don’t want your life to be. (Worries.)

“If you can understand, dear One, that the greatest obstaclesbetween you and the life of your wildest dreams are actually imaginary, a product of your mind alone, fiction.”
~ Mike Dooley

And likewise, when your mind imagines the life of your wildest dreams, you will realize those imaginings (dreams)! They were also fiction, when you started.

Intention - your plan. Make your plan.

Attention - focus; thinking. Keep it on your plan.

Imagining - picturing. Envision what the life of your dreams will look and feel like.

Practice, practice, practice! The more you practice, the more you will believe in your dreams.

“The more you believe it, the more it starts to become real for you. This is why it is so very important to believe in positive things, rather than negative things. Whatever you believe, you will find that you are correct. The universe has a way of presenting to you exactly what you believe. If you think life is great, you are correct. If you think life is tough, you will be proved correct too.”
~ Anita Moorjani

Your life comes from your thoughts. Keep strong your Intention to keep attention on thinking about your dream life.

Imagining it all, in love,

Designing smiles - Ortho-artistry

11/6/2016

"When you're smilin', the whole world smiles with you."

Sure enough, Louis Armstrong was so right! Studies show that smiling is contagious. Ever been around someone who just had something fantastic happen? Their smile and joy makes you feel good, too.

"A smile is the most powerful force in the world."
~ Sujith, produce manager at Spinney’s, Khalifa City, Abu Dhabi, UAE

Why do parents want orthodontic treatment for their children? Why do adults and children want orthodontic treatment?

Simply, of course, to have a beautiful smile.

And, what an honor it is, to have the privilege of providing the orthodontic treatment and see smiles blossoming into beautiful - gorgeous - captivating - radiant - magic.

It takes formal training and lots of experience, to learn how to accomplish the customized, individualized movement of teeth set in soft tissues and bone.

But first, the diagnosis - and this is how to have the most fun with your patients’ orthodontics and smiles!

What does the smile look like now - glowing - wonky - ragged - gummy - crowded…?

Take photos - lots of photos! Look at ‘em often!

Train your staff to snap a bunch of photos and save them in the digital chart. You will be able to see a lot. As I tell the patients, I can study your smile when you aren’t even here.
How and why did the patient grow the way he did?
What are the positions and relationships of the skeleton - the skull bones, including the upper and lower jawbones, that hold the teeth?
What are the positions and relationships of the teeth with each other? Most children have 20 primary (baby, milk) teeth, and another 32 (including the wisdom teeth) to come.
How many does this patient have?
Where are those teeth before they erupt - good position - poorer position - impacted?
How does the patient use their mouth and teeth - chewing, talking, singing, clenching, grinding, biting, sucking, showing emotion and affection, expressions of feeling - frowning, smiling, habits…
How does the patient breathe - through her nose, or through her mouth?
What are the growth patterns and expected changes in the future?

Get a GREAT history completed!

Include muscles, profile, frenae, tonsils, functional movements, facial considerations, habits, musical instruments - brass, woodwind, violin…
in your examination!

Trace and measure the lateral ceph, frontal ceph, panoramic and models!

Make a list of all your findings, skeletal, airway, occlusion, muscles, joint and function, tooth-size discrepancies, ectopic teeth, missing teeth, position of teeth, crossbites, need for sealants, restorative, future implants…
THEN list treatment recommended to address the findings, in the sequence you feel will work best.
Include retention as part of your treatment plan.
Include future needs: periodontal cosmetic procedures, implants, bone augmentation, crown and bridge…
Describe your “concerns” - the places in treatment that could be particularly complex or problematic.

Put all the information into a beautifully prepared treatment plan, printed on the computer and ready for the patient/parent to follow as you review at their conference.

Now - go have fun and co-create that smile you’ve designed!

“Every time you smile at someone, it is an act of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.”
~ Mother Teresa

Studies show that just seeing a smile can activate the muscles in your face to make that same expression (smile), without you even being aware that you are doing it. Crazy, right?

Make your smiles change the world!

Think about not overthinking!

11/6/2016

Look back and think about how you have worried too much about things that didn't really matter.

Connecting with nature is a healthy first step away from the dangers of overthinking.

Look back and think about how you have worried too much about things that didn’t really matter.

Or... when you've worried about things that mattered a lot, and your worrying didn’t change the outcome, but instead made your life harder through worry.

This is called ‘analysis paralysis’, when we overthink and feel, or are, paralyzed to make decisions and get on with life.
Overthinking can make you sick.

Then later and often, we find ourselves actually glad things didn’t work out the way we had thought we wanted them to.
“The past is your lesson. The present is your gift. The future is your motivation.”
~ Zig Ziglar

So stop it. Stop overthinking. (It’s creating problems that aren’t there.) Just let it be.

As I said to Molly one day when she was worrying about her progress in a college course, instead of doing her homework, "You are thinking too far in the future. For this moment, put your attention on your homework. Let God deal with how it plays out.”

Funny - there is nothing in this world that can trouble you as much as your own thoughts.

“Worrying is like sitting in a rocking chair. It gives you something to do but doesn’t get you anywhere.”
~ English proverb

If we look back, often what we thought were our wrong choices brought us to exactly the right place.

Have faith that you’re on your road. Eventually you’ll end up where you need to be, with whom you’re meant to be with, and doing what you should be doing.

Do you want to know how to clear your mind of the thoughts, worry, overthinking?

Connect with nature. Go outside or to a window and watch the leaves sway in the wind, the clouds mosey across the sky, or the light dapple and play on the surfaces of the earth - the grass, plants, sand, water…
Put your attention on your peacefulness. Sit and breathe in, and out. Think of 8 Things for which you are grateful. Number 1 - that you are breathing. Number 2 - that you can feel joy. Keep going…
Say, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

We can let go of what’s gone, grateful for what remains, and look forward to what’s to come.

Try it. Peace be with you.

Love,

The POWER of your smile

11/2/2016

Studies show that a smile is a signal to the brain to be happy. This sweet smile certainly makes me happy!

A UK study showed that a single smile can create as much happiness as 2,000 chocolate bars.

This is my beautiful friend Dr Fernanda, pediatric dentist at the AADC Abu Dhabi dental clinic.

Do you know that even imitating a smile actually changes the way the neurons process emotion in your brain?

Your brain turns on emotionally and processes happiness when you smile. Your smile is a switch on to happiness.

In the UAE, we have many languages that we all bring together, and translations to our familiar English language are often very cute. My patients say, “On your phone or off your phone.”

Your smile “on’s” your brain’s happiness center. Even if you don’t feel like smiling, and you make a “fake” smile, your brain creates emotion of happiness! Pretty soon, you’ll not have to fake that smile.

“On” that brain - as often as possible.

In Great Britain, a study showed that ONE smile can create as much happiness stimulation as 2,000 chocolate bars! "On" your brain - smile!

Their study also showed a smile can create as much happy emotion as if you were given $20,000! Smile often!

Most of us think that we smile BECAUSE we are happy. Now you know if you smile you will GET HAPPIER!

NAMASTE! This precious greeting says to another, “The Spirit in me sends love to the Spirit in you.”

You see, your smile is a gift for the person with whom you share your smile, and when they smile back at you, it is your gift coming back! The Divinity in us is shared. WOW!

Hey - smiling also has been shown to reduce your stress hormones, increase your endorphins (happiness hormones), and lower your blood pressure. Smile as you exercise. Or - smile when you don’t take time to exercise. Smile lots!

Out in California at Berkeley they did a 30 year study of the lives of the students in yearbook photos. Guess what? The students who were smiling in their yearbook pictures scored higher on standardized tests of happiness, were inspiring to others and had longer lasting marriages. And the broadest widest smilers had the highest ranking in each area. In general, their lives were more successful and more happy.

“A smile is happiness you’ll find right under your nose! “   ~ Tom Wilson

Another study looked at baseball players on baseball cards in 1952. The researchers found that the players who were smiling in their baseball card photo lived longer than the non-smilers. And the biggest smiles had the longest lives.

Smiling is good for you!

Your smile makes people think more and better of you! From a Penn State U study, we find that when you smile, people think you are more capable, more likable and more courteous.

Smile - you will be healthier.
Smile - people will like you more.
Smile - you and others will feel happier.
Smile - you will reduce your stress.
   and live longer!

“What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. They are but trifles, to be sure, but scattered along life's pathway the good they do is inconceivable.”   ~ Joseph Addison

We're all in this together

11/1/2016

At the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Derek Redmond was competing in the 400 meter race.  His father was in the stands, cheering.

Then, 175 meters into the race, Derek tore his hamstring. As he lay on the track, his father raced out of the stands to him. Derek got up and hobbled along the track, refusing the stretchers which would carry him, even though his win was now impossible.

Derek's dad reached him and walked with his limping son. They crossed the finish line together, after a full lap of the track, to a standing ovation from the crowd.

“We’re all in this together. If we take care of one another and go the extra mile to appreciate and play together, we all gain — every one of us is lifted up. Sure we could walk alone to the finish line. But the real joy comes from tackling the journey together, from raising our voices in one mighty, unified wahoo! “ ~ Pam Grout

“Most of us go through life a little afraid, a little nervous, a little excited. We are like children playing hide and seek, wanting to be found, yet hoping we won’t be, biting our nails with anticipation. We worry when opportunity approaches a little too closely, and hide deeper in the shadows when fear overcomes us. This is no way to go through life.”
  ~ Deepak Chopra

Look for the connection, the love, the possibilities out there in the "Field of Possibilities." See the people around you as the love that they are. Reach out to them. Like my husband Claude does, tell the lady at the checkout counter that they “obviously put all the good-lookin’ folks at the check-outs!”

Quicken your step and open the door for the person just ahead of you. Be like the Marshall, Texas, guys who stopped to help a lady with a flat tire on the road just outside of town.

(Turns out the lady was actress Julia Roberts, and she told the press about her experience this week, and how friendly that East Texas town is.)

“God does not further our spiritual life in spite of our circumstances, but in and by our circumstances.”   ~ Oswald Chambers

Love one another - every moment possible. It will miraculously transform your whole life. You may have no idea that it absolutely saves another.

Together,

Dr Chris Baker

Dr. Chris Baker is Past President of the American Orthodontic Society, a pediatric dentist and teacher of orthodontics, An author, dental practice consultant, mentor, and a current or former faculty member of three U.S. dental schools, Dr Chris practices and blogs in beautiful Abu Dhabi, UAE, and glorious Texas, USA.

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