Table of Contents
Over the last two decades there has been a shift in dental practice ownership. Both dentists and dental workers have gravitated more and more toward DSOs. In fact, private dental practice ownership has decreased from 84.7% in 2005 to 73.0% in 2021 with a marked decreased in ownership attainment among younger dentists. So, taking control of your future, your dental practice organization and your legacy has never been more important. But we know something else about dentists too.
Dental practice owners have brains that are already trained to overcome obstacles, now it’s time to apply that to your business acumen. Let me back up. Multiple times in my life, starting with my youthful dreams of basketball stardom in the NBA, I’ve either failed or I’ve been told that what I am attempting is impossible. I’ve listened to these voices, both my own and others, at various times with varying degrees of success or failure. Many dentists, operators, and leaders I’ve met in my life have shared these same types of successes and failures.
What I’ve come to learn from these experiences—and what I hope dental entrepreneurs take from this post—is that only when I’ve steered clear of comfort and dissenting voices and faced challenges head-on with eyes wide open, have I been able to live up to my true potential.
“The most important conversations you’ll ever have are the ones you’ll have with yourself.”
~David Goggins
Recently, I read David Goggins’ book, Can’t Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds and it was such a mind shift for me that I wanted to share it with you, the dental practice owner. I coach dental practice owners and dental entrepreneurs almost daily and I have learned that they are some of the most resilient, persevering business owners I have ever met. And yes, sometimes they get in their own way.
You work so hard for so many years training to be a doctor; then you work to get established as an associate; if you’re lucky you get or find the opportunity to start or buy your own practice; and by the time you’re in a position to scale and grow your practice, many times you’re overwhelmed, harried, frustrated and are just working to get through your day. I think this book can be a real mindset shift for you. So, here are my takeaways to help re-inspire, re-invigorate and re-align you on your path to growth, opportunity and success.
Teach Yourself to Finish in the Black in Your Dental Practice
In his book, David Goggins contemplates what he calls the mindset of accomplishment. He emphasizes always finishing the day ‘in the black’ as opposed to ‘in the red’ or at a deficit. The general idea is that each day, if you complete what needs to be completed you will have and maintain a habit of accomplishment. This habit yields self-esteem, confidence, and a trust in yourself that you are a person who is filled with GSD, in other words, someone who gets stuff done.
Diametrically opposed to that mindset: If you finish every day in the red, if you chronically fail to complete what needs to be completed, this too becomes a habit. You will teach yourself to consistently not finish things or to let things go that should be done. That habitual mindset leads to stagnation and, yes, failure.
If you build the habit to finish every day in the black, you will self-replenish your well of confidence, moving things forward in your life and your dental practice. Due to your shift in mindset, you will also be preparing for setbacks that will inevitably arise. Setbacks happen, this is a guarantee. But, a mindset of accomplishment helps us prepare so that setbacks don’t become stopping points.
Think about it like this: There’s an angel and devil on your shoulders, the angel represents your conscience while the devil represents temptation. I’m personally fascinated by this angel/devil trope.
However, in Goggins’ world, the way I see it, the angel is really trying to save our minds and hearts by steering us into unknown, uncomfortable, and uncharted reaches of life’s challenges so that we must confront our fears and overcome our inner obstacles. While the devil is guiding us away from challenges and into an existence of softness, and comfort. Too much of this makes us weak and threatens to soften us to the point of being unable or unwilling to take on the challenges that life throws our way.
Now, I’m not trying to say that you, the dental practice owner with the amount of responsibility on your plate and challenges you face daily have become soft. No. But you may have entered a period of stagnancy both within your dental practice and in your mindset as you have moved from obstacle to challenge to crisis and so forth. It’s what’s called a siege or fixed mindset and there are times when we need to re-enlighten ourselves and retrain our brains to think a little differently.
In essence, we are training our minds every day, it’s just a matter of what we’re training them for, facing our challenges or putting them off until tomorrow. It’s up to each of us to decide how we’ll show up. So, how do you train your mind? Goggins has several strategies he describes in the book. Following are three of my favorite strategies.
Accountability Begins with Yourself
Look into the Accountability Mirror – Find a mirror in your home. Now take a stack of post-its and write on each one 1 of your insecurities, dreams or goals. Stick each one to the mirror and look at it every day as a way to hold yourself accountable for what you say you want to achieve as well as overcome. Each time you reach a new goal or eliminate an insecurity, remove that post-it.
Do the Stuff You Don’t Want to Do
Every day, do something that sucks – By doing a task you hate, that’s boring, scary, or mind-numbing, you are developing your calloused mind. A calloused mind is no longer bothered by the boring, scary, or the hateful. It’s a mind conditioned to simply do what needs to be done. Start small. You can start with making your bed every day. It’s a chore, it needs to be done. Just do it. You start small and work up to the big sucky stuff.
While Growing Your Dental Practice, Remove the Governor
The governor, according to Goggins, is the part of your brain that is the little saboteur keeping us from reaching our fullest potential. Our brains are designed this way to keep us safe and it does this by making it unattractive to push ourselves, exert too much energy or take risks. So, how do you remove the governor? Push past your normal stopping point. This might be during physical exercise or staying a few minutes longer at your desk to complete one more task before knocking off. Start small and push a little further each day.
Developing A ‘Calloused Mind’ As A Dental Practice Entrepreneur
So much of what Goggins talks about really starts with small steps. These small steps start to recondition our minds into believing we are the person we’re trying to be. We all want to believe we are the people that “get stuff done” until we actually have to push a little harder to get that sh** done and then we tend to fail ourselves by giving into our lesser angels (or devils). But starting small is key to building up a calloused mind capable of pushing through the hard part, when we want to quit.
Getting started is key and it’s where many of us give in to the governor or that little devil. We see the task or sucky thing we have to do, and our brains freak out a little, like their looking for an exit in a crowded movie theater. You know the feeling. It’s that scramble in your brain where you hear yourself say, “I can do that tomorrow” or “does that need to be done right now?” or “I don’t wanna do this right now!” Or maybe you go into a little denial cloud and steer your attention quickly away from the thing.
Andrew Huberman, a neuroscientist and tenured associate professor in the department of Neurobiology, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine, coined a term for this very phenomenon in our brains that frantically look for the exit when faced with a challenging task, chore or job. He calls this frenetic phenomenon, Limbic Friction. He describes limbic friction as the gap between having or needing to do something and actually doing it. In Huberman’s own words, it refers to the amount of activation energy required to overcome the mental hurdles of anxiety or fatigue and initiate a particular activity.
It’s the uncomfortable feeling you get doing something before it has become a habit. But Huberman also says that this feeling, this friction, can actually be a very helpful and useful tool. Think of that friction as a small atom bomb waiting to go off. If you point it in the right direction, the direction of the task, that friction will give you the energy to complete the task; Thereby strengthening the neurosynaptic spark that becomes a connection in your brain responsible for making a new habit.
A Mindset of Accomplishment In Your Dental Practice Begins with Making Your Bed??
We humans have evolved to save mental energy, not expend it. So, it’s normal to want to cut corners, knock off early, or not make the bed in the morning. After all, making your bed is not going to help you scale your business. Or will it? Andrew Huberman and David Goggins assert that it will. By reconditioning your brain to do the sucky stuff, by recognizing that the limbic friction you’re feeling is the energy you need to get the task done, you are retraining your brain to find comfort in the uncomfortable; to enjoy and thrive on discomfort; and to experience excitement when faced with challenge.
In essence, we must find consistent ways to challenge ourselves and get out of our comfort zones so often that it becomes second nature. This will lead us down a path in which we see challenges as the norm, and we are able to blow past our fears directly into the calloused mind; the mind that instead of swerving to avoid the unknown, excitedly asks, “how do I achieve this?”
Let’s Go GSD!!!!!
Master your Mindset with our Mastermind
I have another strategy for you, it’s our monthly mastermind. This dentist-exclusive mastermind is an opportunity to work on that mindset, find solutions to your biggest obstacles, get resources and be a part of a community of dentists with your same challenges, obstacles, dreams and vision.
Have you ever been a part of a mastermind? It’s one of the best ways to overcome your fears, reshape your mindset, learn to do the hard stuff, find accountability and community for you and get out-of-the-box solutions for your dental practice. Join ours today and find your people.