- Published on
It is the tiny daily decisions that you make that create your life.
According to Jim Rohn, "Your philosophy determines whether you will go for the disciplines or continue the errors."
It is the tiny daily decisions that you make that create your life.
“Do I eat this or do I eat that? Do I read and study and grow? Do I go for a walk, or sit and watch TV? Do I invest some money every pay? Do I push myself? Do I love and give compassion and love to everyone I meet? Am I diligent, or do I focus on my fatigue?”
Each decision guides your path - a path of happiness and success or one taking you the other way.
It has been said that only five percent of folks operate on the level of diligence and disciplines, while the other 95 percent use poorer and broken approaches.
The best decisions are easy to do — and easy not to do. One poorer decision may not make a difference today, but over time…. you get the idea.
Today, you can decide what you will eat, what you will do, how you will use money, and how you will approach the people you encounter. You can make each tiny decision and define the trajectory of your life.
Course correction is possible, and necessary - the space shuttle is constantly correcting its course.
“Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” ~ Paul J. Meyer
Go for the joy! Go for the gusto! Go for it!
“Your philosophy determines whether you will go for the disciplines or continue the errors.”
~ Jim Rohn
“100 percent commitment is easier than 98 percent commitment.” When you justify incongruent behaviors once, you open the door to a lifetime of justifications.”
~ Dr. Clayton Christensen
It’s a new day! It’s your day! Make it a great one full of great tiny decisions. And then just see where you go!
Here’s to your success!
Love,
“Do I eat this or do I eat that? Do I read and study and grow? Do I go for a walk, or sit and watch TV? Do I invest some money every pay? Do I push myself? Do I love and give compassion and love to everyone I meet? Am I diligent, or do I focus on my fatigue?”
Each decision guides your path - a path of happiness and success or one taking you the other way.
It has been said that only five percent of folks operate on the level of diligence and disciplines, while the other 95 percent use poorer and broken approaches.
The best decisions are easy to do — and easy not to do. One poorer decision may not make a difference today, but over time…. you get the idea.
Today, you can decide what you will eat, what you will do, how you will use money, and how you will approach the people you encounter. You can make each tiny decision and define the trajectory of your life.
Course correction is possible, and necessary - the space shuttle is constantly correcting its course.
“Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” ~ Paul J. Meyer
Go for the joy! Go for the gusto! Go for it!
“Your philosophy determines whether you will go for the disciplines or continue the errors.”
~ Jim Rohn
“100 percent commitment is easier than 98 percent commitment.” When you justify incongruent behaviors once, you open the door to a lifetime of justifications.”
~ Dr. Clayton Christensen
It’s a new day! It’s your day! Make it a great one full of great tiny decisions. And then just see where you go!
Here’s to your success!
Love,
- Published on
Raising confident, self-reliant children should be a priority in modern society. The combination of gratitude and perseverance will serve them all their lives.
Dr Chris Baker's book, REAL, gives life strategies, including guidance for parents wanting to raise responsible, mature children.
A sense of personal responsibility is vital for children to develop happy and productive lives.
Dr John Rosemond's book, New Parent Power!, is a classic work on how to raise emotionally mature, stable and responsible children.
Putting your children on the right path to emotional stability and maturity requires giving them life tasks that accustom them to responsibility and confidence.
Her mother and father are in grief, probably still every day. Maybe she had siblings who are as well. She died one morning in August, 2016, when she took her life, jumping from her eighth floor medical school dorm room in New York City.
The medical school is scrambling to “pledge more compassion,” according to the dean of the Mount Sinai Medical School in his essay in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Why would he say that? People who go into Medicine are typically quite compassionate to begin with. They care about others. Most of them.
Of course, within any group of people, there are those who may be driven more by financial reasons, or who have mental health issues, even severe ones. But still, why would he say they will pledge more compassion? He’s on the hot-seat. His school has lost two medical students to suicide recently.
So, the spokesperson for the school has to respond.
Let us look at what seems to be going on.
Firstly: Culture of blame/victimhood. Our culture has become one of blame - both through our human wish to not think “bad” things are our fault and through our legal system that follows and assigns blame, and quite honestly, punishment, for the blamed.
Shall we call it blame?
Or shall we call it victim-mentality?
We have lost way too much of our sense of personal responsibility. We are not teaching our children responsibility. Our culture is rife with children who are not growing up well. The media is full of information about how the millennials, our young people “need” more support and direction in the workforce, and are not as capable of full responsibility and enjoyment in the working world as their predecessors.
Should a physician not be one of the MOST responsible members of society? The “millennials” are reputed to be sensitive, incapable of the kind of responsibility and commitment that their parents and grandparents exhibit. They have been called “snowflakes” referring to their fragility.
Do we want fragile physicians?
Secondly: Belief in mental issues, mental illness, and need for psychiatric counseling. The follow-up to the medical student suicides has the schools looking at how they can provide more support to the students in the area of psychiatric visits for mental health support at discounted fees, and “breaks” after the adult medical students experience the death of a patient.
Reading a recent Wall Street Journal article (Lagnado L, After Tragedy, Med School Pledges More Compassion. WSJ 2017.03.23), I found myself agape.
As a 10-year critical care nurse, I not only experienced death of patients on a regular basis, but was responsible for the life-saving measures to attempt to save and prolong life. Did we nurses feel affected when a patient died?
Of course. What did I feel when the cardiologist patted me on the shoulder, and said, “Do what you can,” and left the ICU? I felt a sense of huge responsibility, commitment, love and concern for the patient and family.
What did I feel when we had lost a child patient in the emergency room and the attending ER doc said, “Would you go tell the family?” Huge responsibility, commitment, love and concern. I knew I could do that well, even knowing I would most likely be teary with the parents, and help them through the first moments.
And these docs who delegated huge responsibility to a capable and dedicated nurse were not snowflakes. They were quite responsible with venerable careers in medicine who were sharing shouldering the burden of human suffering.
None of my colleagues nor the physicians that I knew well had psychiatric or psychologic counseling or “breaks” when the patient died. We all grew emotionally, spiritually, and in our awareness of the preciousness of life as well as the limitations of life, medicine — even modern medicine.
For me and my colleagues, in medicine and in patient care, each day is one full of anticipation and excitement for what we can bring to our patients. It is a day full of Gratitude as the day’s operative belief.
Why are medical school academics not familiar and comfortable for the medical student?
OK - I went to dental school, AND worked basically full-time as a nurse, through my four years of dental school. I have been appointed to faculties at 3 dental schools and taught medical and dental students, and I have been part of admission committees deciding which applicants get an interview, and which of the interviewees get an offer to be a student in that school.
I have watched my son become a dental school faculty member after his medical school education, and in addition to his huge responsibilities running two clinics, faculty practice, and the other a patient care clinic, he is doing his post-doctoral Master’s in Public Health and being an active husband and father in his nuclear family. (And yes, he has a wonderful wife!) He loves it all. It makes for a wonderful life of love of others.
As to the medical education and its academic pressures: The students admitted to medical school have demonstrated academic ability in the tough pre-med courses, and finish those with high GPA’s, high MCAT scores, and high involvement in extra-curricular activities. In fact, the committees aren’t interested in students who have not shown a high involvement in extra-curricular areas, including work.
Why? Because, the student who has not handled the well-rounded schedule of schoolwork, community work, and other areas of teamwork, will not thrive in medical school. Other areas of teamwork include athletics, music (choir, band, etc.), volunteer work. These help show an applicant’s balance and “whole-person-ness.”
Grueling academics? Sure, it’s top-level academics. Don’t you want your physician to know stuff? But grueling? These students have shown they can handle their demanding academics and still handle life. There are days, weeks, semesters, in medical school that challenge one, and especially the student with a young family, or with family members who are very ill, or a marriage that is not solid.
And, the schools might need to improve their support of those students in that the student should be encouraged to take a leave of absence in order to deal with the life-challenges and then come back to medical school if they feel — and are — ready.
Surely, even our most capable students, admitted to medical school, having grown up in our victim-culture, modern media, including news, movies and social-media, and resultant societal beliefs, are vulnerable to, as the articles suggest, the “burn-out” and depression of being a medical student.
It is the school’s responsibility to help any students that are not thriving, to be identified and counseled that the fit of the profession may not be for them, to encourage student groups to discuss and help each other in the experiences of medical training. But to decide that, as Mt Sinai has done, that “honors” should be given to more than just the 25% that earned it, that “high pass” should also be given to a bigger group, is absurd. Their rationale is that the system “PROVOKED intense rivalry among students,” is the same sort of thinking that leads every soccer player to get a trophy.
And so, Mt Sinai med school “hopes to drop these limits altogether.” Every student will be equal.
REALLY?
Isn’t that more of what got us into this mess already? When the students have no evaluations or performance grading, how will the residencies and post-doctoral specialty programs choose their applicants from the pool. The suicidal med student will be an equivalent candidate to the most mature med student?
What kind of medical care will be provided by the student who has been told he is “honors” material when he is not, or by the student who believes he is “burned out” when he graduates, or by the student who utilizes the psychiatrist who is treating the mental health issues the young physician believes he has? Do you want your physician to be one of those doctors?
And, as my husband Claude points out, after his law school education, what a field-day the lawyers will have when a family or patient sues the doctor who has a history of psychiatric /psychologic counseling throughout school and beyond. (HIPAA, you say?
There is no such thing as confidentiality today. Just ask the leakers of the highest level confidential and classified information in the news, no less. No, on top of burn out, those physicians will have a hell of a time with the lawyers.
Yes, the medical schools owe their students the responsibility of taking the most ready, capable, mature, mentally healthy applicants, and then monitoring them at every level possible, and guiding, supporting and mentoring them to remain capable, mature, and mentally healthy. The schools must understand that what we believe is what we become.
The physicians who are responsible for these medical students must be brave enough to notice, say so, help as they can, including limiting the at-risk student to a leave of absence, or out of school. That is far better than seeing medical student lives lost to suicide, AND patient lives lost to mentally fragile physicians.
And we as parents must work on teaching our children responsibility and not victimhood. Let us have days full of Gratitude as the day’s operative belief. It is time.
The medical school is scrambling to “pledge more compassion,” according to the dean of the Mount Sinai Medical School in his essay in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Why would he say that? People who go into Medicine are typically quite compassionate to begin with. They care about others. Most of them.
Of course, within any group of people, there are those who may be driven more by financial reasons, or who have mental health issues, even severe ones. But still, why would he say they will pledge more compassion? He’s on the hot-seat. His school has lost two medical students to suicide recently.
So, the spokesperson for the school has to respond.
Let us look at what seems to be going on.
Firstly: Culture of blame/victimhood. Our culture has become one of blame - both through our human wish to not think “bad” things are our fault and through our legal system that follows and assigns blame, and quite honestly, punishment, for the blamed.
Shall we call it blame?
Or shall we call it victim-mentality?
We have lost way too much of our sense of personal responsibility. We are not teaching our children responsibility. Our culture is rife with children who are not growing up well. The media is full of information about how the millennials, our young people “need” more support and direction in the workforce, and are not as capable of full responsibility and enjoyment in the working world as their predecessors.
Should a physician not be one of the MOST responsible members of society? The “millennials” are reputed to be sensitive, incapable of the kind of responsibility and commitment that their parents and grandparents exhibit. They have been called “snowflakes” referring to their fragility.
Do we want fragile physicians?
Secondly: Belief in mental issues, mental illness, and need for psychiatric counseling. The follow-up to the medical student suicides has the schools looking at how they can provide more support to the students in the area of psychiatric visits for mental health support at discounted fees, and “breaks” after the adult medical students experience the death of a patient.
Reading a recent Wall Street Journal article (Lagnado L, After Tragedy, Med School Pledges More Compassion. WSJ 2017.03.23), I found myself agape.
As a 10-year critical care nurse, I not only experienced death of patients on a regular basis, but was responsible for the life-saving measures to attempt to save and prolong life. Did we nurses feel affected when a patient died?
Of course. What did I feel when the cardiologist patted me on the shoulder, and said, “Do what you can,” and left the ICU? I felt a sense of huge responsibility, commitment, love and concern for the patient and family.
What did I feel when we had lost a child patient in the emergency room and the attending ER doc said, “Would you go tell the family?” Huge responsibility, commitment, love and concern. I knew I could do that well, even knowing I would most likely be teary with the parents, and help them through the first moments.
And these docs who delegated huge responsibility to a capable and dedicated nurse were not snowflakes. They were quite responsible with venerable careers in medicine who were sharing shouldering the burden of human suffering.
None of my colleagues nor the physicians that I knew well had psychiatric or psychologic counseling or “breaks” when the patient died. We all grew emotionally, spiritually, and in our awareness of the preciousness of life as well as the limitations of life, medicine — even modern medicine.
For me and my colleagues, in medicine and in patient care, each day is one full of anticipation and excitement for what we can bring to our patients. It is a day full of Gratitude as the day’s operative belief.
Why are medical school academics not familiar and comfortable for the medical student?
OK - I went to dental school, AND worked basically full-time as a nurse, through my four years of dental school. I have been appointed to faculties at 3 dental schools and taught medical and dental students, and I have been part of admission committees deciding which applicants get an interview, and which of the interviewees get an offer to be a student in that school.
I have watched my son become a dental school faculty member after his medical school education, and in addition to his huge responsibilities running two clinics, faculty practice, and the other a patient care clinic, he is doing his post-doctoral Master’s in Public Health and being an active husband and father in his nuclear family. (And yes, he has a wonderful wife!) He loves it all. It makes for a wonderful life of love of others.
As to the medical education and its academic pressures: The students admitted to medical school have demonstrated academic ability in the tough pre-med courses, and finish those with high GPA’s, high MCAT scores, and high involvement in extra-curricular activities. In fact, the committees aren’t interested in students who have not shown a high involvement in extra-curricular areas, including work.
Why? Because, the student who has not handled the well-rounded schedule of schoolwork, community work, and other areas of teamwork, will not thrive in medical school. Other areas of teamwork include athletics, music (choir, band, etc.), volunteer work. These help show an applicant’s balance and “whole-person-ness.”
Grueling academics? Sure, it’s top-level academics. Don’t you want your physician to know stuff? But grueling? These students have shown they can handle their demanding academics and still handle life. There are days, weeks, semesters, in medical school that challenge one, and especially the student with a young family, or with family members who are very ill, or a marriage that is not solid.
And, the schools might need to improve their support of those students in that the student should be encouraged to take a leave of absence in order to deal with the life-challenges and then come back to medical school if they feel — and are — ready.
Surely, even our most capable students, admitted to medical school, having grown up in our victim-culture, modern media, including news, movies and social-media, and resultant societal beliefs, are vulnerable to, as the articles suggest, the “burn-out” and depression of being a medical student.
It is the school’s responsibility to help any students that are not thriving, to be identified and counseled that the fit of the profession may not be for them, to encourage student groups to discuss and help each other in the experiences of medical training. But to decide that, as Mt Sinai has done, that “honors” should be given to more than just the 25% that earned it, that “high pass” should also be given to a bigger group, is absurd. Their rationale is that the system “PROVOKED intense rivalry among students,” is the same sort of thinking that leads every soccer player to get a trophy.
And so, Mt Sinai med school “hopes to drop these limits altogether.” Every student will be equal.
REALLY?
Isn’t that more of what got us into this mess already? When the students have no evaluations or performance grading, how will the residencies and post-doctoral specialty programs choose their applicants from the pool. The suicidal med student will be an equivalent candidate to the most mature med student?
What kind of medical care will be provided by the student who has been told he is “honors” material when he is not, or by the student who believes he is “burned out” when he graduates, or by the student who utilizes the psychiatrist who is treating the mental health issues the young physician believes he has? Do you want your physician to be one of those doctors?
And, as my husband Claude points out, after his law school education, what a field-day the lawyers will have when a family or patient sues the doctor who has a history of psychiatric /psychologic counseling throughout school and beyond. (HIPAA, you say?
There is no such thing as confidentiality today. Just ask the leakers of the highest level confidential and classified information in the news, no less. No, on top of burn out, those physicians will have a hell of a time with the lawyers.
Yes, the medical schools owe their students the responsibility of taking the most ready, capable, mature, mentally healthy applicants, and then monitoring them at every level possible, and guiding, supporting and mentoring them to remain capable, mature, and mentally healthy. The schools must understand that what we believe is what we become.
The physicians who are responsible for these medical students must be brave enough to notice, say so, help as they can, including limiting the at-risk student to a leave of absence, or out of school. That is far better than seeing medical student lives lost to suicide, AND patient lives lost to mentally fragile physicians.
And we as parents must work on teaching our children responsibility and not victimhood. Let us have days full of Gratitude as the day’s operative belief. It is time.
- Published on
PEDO - ORTHO WEEKEND
March 23-26, 2017
Crowne Plaza Hotel - Nashua, NH
Space limited to 35 participants. Your enrollment reserves your space in the complete package. For further information, contact Dr. Nicholas Roy at toothdoc17@gmail.com
IAO NEW ENGLAND
Study Club
March 31 - April 2
Sheraton Hartford Hotel at Bradley Airport
Windsor Locks, CT
Contact: Dr. H. Michael Sefranek - IAO New England Section - 401.247.1777 - mike@smilesdr.com
Sheraton Hartford Hotel at Bradley Airport
Windsor Locks, CT
Contact: Dr. H. Michael Sefranek - IAO New England Section - 401.247.1777 - mike@smilesdr.com
- Published on
Find the Joy in Your Everyday Practice Life:
Part II - The Critical Elements
Part II - The Critical Elements
A classic book for improving your life and your business is Dr Norman Vincent Peale's "You Can If You Think You Can."
Though it was written for parents, Dr Chris Baker's book, "Your Child's Smile," has been used as a textbook for dentists who want to treat children.
Dr. Wayne Dyer's classic work, "You'll see it when you believe it," takes readers on a step-by-step path toward living and loving both life and career.
Critical element 1: Gratitude
As you drive in to your practice in the morning, spend the drive-time in gratitude, loving your life and yourself.
Think about your simple gratitude, and about your sacred gratitude. While you may have some current situational gratitude - the new car you are driving, your daughter’s amazing sports performance last night, also remember the simple gratitudes - your home, your work, your shower this morning, the way your staff makes your patients happy.
And, practice your sacred gratitudes: feeling grateful for everything in your life - even the hard stuff, the challenges, the grief in loss, knowing no matter how difficult, there is benefit to you to come.
There is no substitute for feeling grateful, happy, blessed.
By the time you get to your office, you will be ready for a fantastic day where things seem to turn “your way.” I love the story of the doctor whose staff knew what sort of day “they were in for,” when they noticed how the doctor got out of the car - slowly, slumped, low-energy, or, on some wonderful days, upright, with energy, smiling.
Before you walk through the door, take a nice slow breath through your nose. This engages the peace of your para-sympathetic nervous system. It changes your physiology immediately to one of peace. Then, you can walk in to your office and greet each team member by name.
We all love to hear our name. It has been said that your name is the most beautiful word in the whole world. Yes, greet with love and their name! And feel your gratitude for each one of them. Why not? - the alternative is not going to make you feel happier, and gratitude can make you remember all your joy.
Critical element 2: Your beliefs and thoughts
Decide to love your practice. Assuming you are continuing to practice dentistry, you don’t have to love your practice. Your choices would appear to be three: You can:
1. ...transition/sell your practice if you’re not happy with it,
2. ...keep trudging through your days and practice, facing the difficulties and challenges with dread at the worst, coping at the best, or...
Critical element 3: Decide to love the practice life, and do what you need to do to see it as joyous.
I know one general dentist in a small upper mid-western town who so loves his practice, patients, and staff! His life is full and his family reaps the benefits of a joyous husband and father.
Years ago he did not feel quite that way about his practice. It was much more work, not financially great, and he came to the fork in the road - toward joy? Or toward the "same old, same old"? His beliefs and thoughts had to change, and when they did, he ran smack into the knowledge and guidance he needed to transform his practice to GREAT, and with that, his life to GREAT.
You may think, “Dr. Chris, you have no idea…”, or “It’s just not that simple.”
Indeed, it’s not that simple. But it IS that worth it! And it gets easier and easier. You can turn your beliefs / perspectives of your daily “grind” to daily joy.
You can if you think you can.
Yes, it will take work. Work that has the magnificent outcome of bringing you to a joyous existence.
The work can be magnificently successful if you “get out of the way”, and get into the belief state as soon as possible. Nothing will change until you do.
How do you get out of the way? You might call this release, or surrender, or focusing on what is right in your life/practice. Dr Wayne Dyer liked to remind us, “You’ll see it WHEN YOU BELIEVE IT.”
Focus on what’s right. Act as if. Walk in that door in the morning and act as if your practice is the best place in the world to be. If it were, would you ignore the staff, or would you say a bright and cheery “Good morning, Claire” to each person you see, greeting them by name?
If your practice were such a happy place to be, would you look at the schedule with dread over the patients who are scheduled? Or would you think how lovely it will be to see each one? Act as if…
Believe it TIL you see it!
The change is in YOU.
Your belief, your trust, your joy will change everything, including your practice. And when that happens, you will truly be living your magical, miraculous, magnificent life of your dreams!
Just you wait!
Your staff will become wonderful (or you’ll find new staff who are wonderful and fit your new life well.) Your patients will be delightfully happy with your care (or the grumps will leave.) You will have created your great practice!
More critical elements to come next time!!
As you drive in to your practice in the morning, spend the drive-time in gratitude, loving your life and yourself.
Think about your simple gratitude, and about your sacred gratitude. While you may have some current situational gratitude - the new car you are driving, your daughter’s amazing sports performance last night, also remember the simple gratitudes - your home, your work, your shower this morning, the way your staff makes your patients happy.
And, practice your sacred gratitudes: feeling grateful for everything in your life - even the hard stuff, the challenges, the grief in loss, knowing no matter how difficult, there is benefit to you to come.
There is no substitute for feeling grateful, happy, blessed.
By the time you get to your office, you will be ready for a fantastic day where things seem to turn “your way.” I love the story of the doctor whose staff knew what sort of day “they were in for,” when they noticed how the doctor got out of the car - slowly, slumped, low-energy, or, on some wonderful days, upright, with energy, smiling.
Before you walk through the door, take a nice slow breath through your nose. This engages the peace of your para-sympathetic nervous system. It changes your physiology immediately to one of peace. Then, you can walk in to your office and greet each team member by name.
We all love to hear our name. It has been said that your name is the most beautiful word in the whole world. Yes, greet with love and their name! And feel your gratitude for each one of them. Why not? - the alternative is not going to make you feel happier, and gratitude can make you remember all your joy.
Critical element 2: Your beliefs and thoughts
Decide to love your practice. Assuming you are continuing to practice dentistry, you don’t have to love your practice. Your choices would appear to be three: You can:
1. ...transition/sell your practice if you’re not happy with it,
2. ...keep trudging through your days and practice, facing the difficulties and challenges with dread at the worst, coping at the best, or...
Critical element 3: Decide to love the practice life, and do what you need to do to see it as joyous.
I know one general dentist in a small upper mid-western town who so loves his practice, patients, and staff! His life is full and his family reaps the benefits of a joyous husband and father.
Years ago he did not feel quite that way about his practice. It was much more work, not financially great, and he came to the fork in the road - toward joy? Or toward the "same old, same old"? His beliefs and thoughts had to change, and when they did, he ran smack into the knowledge and guidance he needed to transform his practice to GREAT, and with that, his life to GREAT.
You may think, “Dr. Chris, you have no idea…”, or “It’s just not that simple.”
Indeed, it’s not that simple. But it IS that worth it! And it gets easier and easier. You can turn your beliefs / perspectives of your daily “grind” to daily joy.
You can if you think you can.
Yes, it will take work. Work that has the magnificent outcome of bringing you to a joyous existence.
The work can be magnificently successful if you “get out of the way”, and get into the belief state as soon as possible. Nothing will change until you do.
How do you get out of the way? You might call this release, or surrender, or focusing on what is right in your life/practice. Dr Wayne Dyer liked to remind us, “You’ll see it WHEN YOU BELIEVE IT.”
Focus on what’s right. Act as if. Walk in that door in the morning and act as if your practice is the best place in the world to be. If it were, would you ignore the staff, or would you say a bright and cheery “Good morning, Claire” to each person you see, greeting them by name?
If your practice were such a happy place to be, would you look at the schedule with dread over the patients who are scheduled? Or would you think how lovely it will be to see each one? Act as if…
Believe it TIL you see it!
The change is in YOU.
Your belief, your trust, your joy will change everything, including your practice. And when that happens, you will truly be living your magical, miraculous, magnificent life of your dreams!
Just you wait!
Your staff will become wonderful (or you’ll find new staff who are wonderful and fit your new life well.) Your patients will be delightfully happy with your care (or the grumps will leave.) You will have created your great practice!
More critical elements to come next time!!
- Published on
Find the Joy in Your Everyday Practice Life: Part I
Recapture the passion for your dental practice! The key to this is the way you see everything.
The orthodontic wing of the American Dental Clinic in Abu Dhabi, where I practice.
The American Dental Clinic in Khalifa City, Abu Dhabi, UAE.
It’s not only about technical skills! What are the differences that make the differences?
You can recapture the passion. Here I will share a totally different perspective that will change your attitude and mental approach to your practice, and will change your life!
Q: What do you have to change to make things change?
A: The way you see everything.
That may sound overwhelming, or ridiculous. Yet, no, it is actually a tiny simple shift in your thinking that can take you to the happiness you want, that can set you apart from other dentists. When your perspective on life changes, it can create powerful change. And, it all flows from love.
You see, when you start understanding that every tiny decision you make takes you where you go, AND, how your decisions are based on your beliefs,
NOW, you can change everything easily. It’s easy to do - and easy NOT to do! (I will introduce you to Jeff Olson in a bit, from whom I learned how it’s easy to do — and easy NOT to do.)
OK, now back to the way you see everything, and what love has to do with it. The two emotions from which all other emotions come, are fear — and love. In fear we worry. In fear we feel anxious, less than, depressed, despair, disgusted, helpless, even angry and lost. In love we feel grateful, hopeful, capable, curious and happy.
So, to begin to see everything differently, to begin to see things in your life change, you can look through the eyes of gratitude. Gratitude is abundance-thinking. When our view is one of abundance, our emotions are positive and our actions follow. When our thoughts are of stresses, our view is one of lack. And seeing lack, our emotions are negative, borne of fear. Our resulting actions stem from the fear.
When you look at for what you are grateful, your gratitude creates thoughts that change your emotion AND your actions. It all flows from love.
Bo Sanchez, Motivational Speaker, says there are three kinds of gratitude: Situational, Simple, and Sacred. In situational, you feel gratitude for a “big thing” like a new car, or getting engaged. Because we don’t have “big things” coming into our lives every day, we feel situational gratitude only occasionally.
Simple gratitude is what you feel across your life, and for all the simple things - your home, your family, your food, and so forth. That gratitude is better than situational, because you can feel it much more often so its feelings of abundance have the chance to impact your emotions and actions fairly frequently.
Finally, sacred gratitude is across the board feeling grateful for everything. This includes even the hard stuff, the challenges, the grief in loss, knowing no matter how difficult, there is benefit to you to come. That’s the best sort of gratitude because it is all the time, and for everything.
Now, go out there and think about the abundance of your life. Read over this a few times so you can put it into practice. You’ll start seeing EVERYTHING differently!
And next time, we’ll talk about more critical elements to finding joy. Gratitude is more than enough for now!
You can recapture the passion. Here I will share a totally different perspective that will change your attitude and mental approach to your practice, and will change your life!
Q: What do you have to change to make things change?
A: The way you see everything.
That may sound overwhelming, or ridiculous. Yet, no, it is actually a tiny simple shift in your thinking that can take you to the happiness you want, that can set you apart from other dentists. When your perspective on life changes, it can create powerful change. And, it all flows from love.
You see, when you start understanding that every tiny decision you make takes you where you go, AND, how your decisions are based on your beliefs,
NOW, you can change everything easily. It’s easy to do - and easy NOT to do! (I will introduce you to Jeff Olson in a bit, from whom I learned how it’s easy to do — and easy NOT to do.)
OK, now back to the way you see everything, and what love has to do with it. The two emotions from which all other emotions come, are fear — and love. In fear we worry. In fear we feel anxious, less than, depressed, despair, disgusted, helpless, even angry and lost. In love we feel grateful, hopeful, capable, curious and happy.
So, to begin to see everything differently, to begin to see things in your life change, you can look through the eyes of gratitude. Gratitude is abundance-thinking. When our view is one of abundance, our emotions are positive and our actions follow. When our thoughts are of stresses, our view is one of lack. And seeing lack, our emotions are negative, borne of fear. Our resulting actions stem from the fear.
When you look at for what you are grateful, your gratitude creates thoughts that change your emotion AND your actions. It all flows from love.
Bo Sanchez, Motivational Speaker, says there are three kinds of gratitude: Situational, Simple, and Sacred. In situational, you feel gratitude for a “big thing” like a new car, or getting engaged. Because we don’t have “big things” coming into our lives every day, we feel situational gratitude only occasionally.
Simple gratitude is what you feel across your life, and for all the simple things - your home, your family, your food, and so forth. That gratitude is better than situational, because you can feel it much more often so its feelings of abundance have the chance to impact your emotions and actions fairly frequently.
Finally, sacred gratitude is across the board feeling grateful for everything. This includes even the hard stuff, the challenges, the grief in loss, knowing no matter how difficult, there is benefit to you to come. That’s the best sort of gratitude because it is all the time, and for everything.
Now, go out there and think about the abundance of your life. Read over this a few times so you can put it into practice. You’ll start seeing EVERYTHING differently!
And next time, we’ll talk about more critical elements to finding joy. Gratitude is more than enough for now!
- Published on
Find the Joy in Your Everyday Practice Life:
Part II - The Critical Elements
A classic book for improving your life and your business is Dr Norman Vincent Peale's "You Can If You Think You Can."
Though it was written for parents, Dr Chris Baker's book, "Your Child's Smile," has been used as a textbook for dentists who want to treat children.
Dr. Wayne Dyer's classic work, "You'll see it when you believe it," takes readers on a step-by-step path toward living and loving both life and career.
Critical element 1: Gratitude
As you drive in to your practice in the morning, spend the drive-time in gratitude, loving your life and yourself.
Think about your simple gratitude, and about your sacred gratitude. While you may have some current situational gratitude - the new car you are driving, your daughter’s amazing sports performance last night, also remember the simple gratitudes - your home, your work, your shower this morning, the way your staff makes your patients happy.
And, practice your sacred gratitudes: feeling grateful for everything in your life - even the hard stuff, the challenges, the grief in loss, knowing no matter how difficult, there is benefit to you to come.
There is no substitute for feeling grateful, happy, blessed.
By the time you get to your office, you will be ready for a fantastic day where things seem to turn “your way.” I love the story of the doctor whose staff knew what sort of day “they were in for,” when they noticed how the doctor got out of the car - slowly, slumped, low-energy, or, on some wonderful days, upright, with energy, smiling.
Before you walk through the door, take a nice slow breath through your nose. This engages the peace of your para-sympathetic nervous system. It changes your physiology immediately to one of peace. Then, you can walk in to your office and greet each team member by name.
We all love to hear our name. It has been said that your name is the most beautiful word in the whole world. Yes, greet with love and their name! And feel your gratitude for each one of them. Why not? - the alternative is not going to make you feel happier, and gratitude can make you remember all your joy.
Critical element 2: Your beliefs and thoughts
Decide to love your practice. Assuming you are continuing to practice dentistry, you don’t have to love your practice. Your choices would appear to be three: You can:
1. ...transition/sell your practice if you’re not happy with it,
2. ...keep trudging through your days and practice, facing the difficulties and challenges with dread at the worst, coping at the best, or...
Critical element 3: Decide to love the practice life, and do what you need to do to see it as joyous.
I know one general dentist in a small upper mid-western town who so loves his practice, patients, and staff! His life is full and his family reaps the benefits of a joyous husband and father.
Years ago he did not feel quite that way about his practice. It was much more work, not financially great, and he came to the fork in the road - toward joy? Or toward the "same old, same old"? His beliefs and thoughts had to change, and when they did, he ran smack into the knowledge and guidance he needed to transform his practice to GREAT, and with that, his life to GREAT.
You may think, “Dr. Chris, you have no idea…”, or “It’s just not that simple.”
Indeed, it’s not that simple. But it IS that worth it! And it gets easier and easier. You can turn your beliefs / perspectives of your daily “grind” to daily joy.
You can if you think you can.
Yes, it will take work. Work that has the magnificent outcome of bringing you to a joyous existence.
The work can be magnificently successful if you “get out of the way”, and get into the belief state as soon as possible. Nothing will change until you do.
How do you get out of the way? You might call this release, or surrender, or focusing on what is right in your life/practice. Dr Wayne Dyer liked to remind us, “You’ll see it WHEN YOU BELIEVE IT.”
Focus on what’s right. Act as if. Walk in that door in the morning and act as if your practice is the best place in the world to be. If it were, would you ignore the staff, or would you say a bright and cheery “Good morning, Claire” to each person you see, greeting them by name?
If your practice were such a happy place to be, would you look at the schedule with dread over the patients who are scheduled? Or would you think how lovely it will be to see each one? Act as if…
Believe it TIL you see it!
The change is in YOU.
Your belief, your trust, your joy will change everything, including your practice. And when that happens, you will truly be living your magical, miraculous, magnificent life of your dreams!
Just you wait!
Your staff will become wonderful (or you’ll find new staff who are wonderful and fit your new life well.) Your patients will be delightfully happy with your care (or the grumps will leave.) You will have created your great practice!
More critical elements to come next time!!
As you drive in to your practice in the morning, spend the drive-time in gratitude, loving your life and yourself.
Think about your simple gratitude, and about your sacred gratitude. While you may have some current situational gratitude - the new car you are driving, your daughter’s amazing sports performance last night, also remember the simple gratitudes - your home, your work, your shower this morning, the way your staff makes your patients happy.
And, practice your sacred gratitudes: feeling grateful for everything in your life - even the hard stuff, the challenges, the grief in loss, knowing no matter how difficult, there is benefit to you to come.
There is no substitute for feeling grateful, happy, blessed.
By the time you get to your office, you will be ready for a fantastic day where things seem to turn “your way.” I love the story of the doctor whose staff knew what sort of day “they were in for,” when they noticed how the doctor got out of the car - slowly, slumped, low-energy, or, on some wonderful days, upright, with energy, smiling.
Before you walk through the door, take a nice slow breath through your nose. This engages the peace of your para-sympathetic nervous system. It changes your physiology immediately to one of peace. Then, you can walk in to your office and greet each team member by name.
We all love to hear our name. It has been said that your name is the most beautiful word in the whole world. Yes, greet with love and their name! And feel your gratitude for each one of them. Why not? - the alternative is not going to make you feel happier, and gratitude can make you remember all your joy.
Critical element 2: Your beliefs and thoughts
Decide to love your practice. Assuming you are continuing to practice dentistry, you don’t have to love your practice. Your choices would appear to be three: You can:
1. ...transition/sell your practice if you’re not happy with it,
2. ...keep trudging through your days and practice, facing the difficulties and challenges with dread at the worst, coping at the best, or...
Critical element 3: Decide to love the practice life, and do what you need to do to see it as joyous.
I know one general dentist in a small upper mid-western town who so loves his practice, patients, and staff! His life is full and his family reaps the benefits of a joyous husband and father.
Years ago he did not feel quite that way about his practice. It was much more work, not financially great, and he came to the fork in the road - toward joy? Or toward the "same old, same old"? His beliefs and thoughts had to change, and when they did, he ran smack into the knowledge and guidance he needed to transform his practice to GREAT, and with that, his life to GREAT.
You may think, “Dr. Chris, you have no idea…”, or “It’s just not that simple.”
Indeed, it’s not that simple. But it IS that worth it! And it gets easier and easier. You can turn your beliefs / perspectives of your daily “grind” to daily joy.
You can if you think you can.
Yes, it will take work. Work that has the magnificent outcome of bringing you to a joyous existence.
The work can be magnificently successful if you “get out of the way”, and get into the belief state as soon as possible. Nothing will change until you do.
How do you get out of the way? You might call this release, or surrender, or focusing on what is right in your life/practice. Dr Wayne Dyer liked to remind us, “You’ll see it WHEN YOU BELIEVE IT.”
Focus on what’s right. Act as if. Walk in that door in the morning and act as if your practice is the best place in the world to be. If it were, would you ignore the staff, or would you say a bright and cheery “Good morning, Claire” to each person you see, greeting them by name?
If your practice were such a happy place to be, would you look at the schedule with dread over the patients who are scheduled? Or would you think how lovely it will be to see each one? Act as if…
Believe it TIL you see it!
The change is in YOU.
Your belief, your trust, your joy will change everything, including your practice. And when that happens, you will truly be living your magical, miraculous, magnificent life of your dreams!
Just you wait!
Your staff will become wonderful (or you’ll find new staff who are wonderful and fit your new life well.) Your patients will be delightfully happy with your care (or the grumps will leave.) You will have created your great practice!
More critical elements to come next time!!
