When it comes to Chinese medicine school one of the biggest complaints people have is the lack of business training they received. They graduate school feeling completely unprepared on how to open a practice and keep it running. They feel duped and resentful that their school let them out into the wild to flail and put blame on them for their business struggles.

Humans differ by having the ability to use their prefrontal cortex to make decisions from a higher capacity, but this requires more effort. And since we are still animals wired for survival we default to the perceived path of least resistance. So we tend to react more than we process. It requires less effort to react from our primal brain than to process, decide, and act from our higher brain.

I recently finished up a coaching series with a student and asked for her feedback on her coaching experience. She said “It wasn’t what I was expecting. It was actually better.” I asked what she was originally expecting and she said “I just thought you were going to tell me what to do.”

Believing that in order to attain freedom you must expand your business is a fallacy. Thinking that if you have a team to delegate your current responsibilities to will free up time for yourself and your business will completely run itself is an illusion.

I grew up in a time when teachers thought that shame and public embarrassment was a good motivator for children. And I also grew up as a gymnast which means I was literally judged and relied on scores for motivation and validation.

“Passive income” has become a bit of a buzzword lately. When people think of passive income they imagine themselves making money with little to no effort while sitting on the beach. While that’s sounds lovely, that’s really not how it works no matter what you’re seeing on Instagram. Sorry.

I see over and over in this field people who say they are tired, overwhelmed, burnt out, overworked, and under-earning and think that increasing their patient load, and therefore their income, will solve for all of this. So they hire business coaches or go to weekend seminars to learn systems on how to scale their businesses and earn more money.

Our programming drives our behavior and choices which ultimately results in how we show up and relate to one another. No matter how true they feel to us, what we are programmed to believe are optional thoughts. They are stories we choose to believe. And because we are in control of our thoughts, we can change these stories whenever we want when they no longer serve us.

We all have taken on cases that are outside of our speciality and strengths, or allowed patients to continuously violate our clinic policies because, frankly, we’re afraid to turn away the money.

I was scrolling through photos on my phone trying to find a certain photo from many years ago. This turned into a sort of trip down memory lane, reliving old memories and evoking many emotions. For those of you who have been following me for a while know that I went through a major life change in 2018. I effectively blew up my life:

Every couple of years I would get to a point in my career where I would feel completely dissatisfied, complain about being dead tired and on the verge of burnout. I blamed my burnout on working to too many hours, working too hard, too many patients, too many clinic days, etc. So I would solve for those problems by resting, scaling back, tinkering with my hours and schedule, and raising my rates. I would feel temporarily rejuvenated, but eventually I would fall back to that place of burnout. So then I would change something again. And again. And again.

I had been in practice for six years and business was good. Purchasing a home was brand new to me. I was so worried about these new expenses (actual and potential) that I started to consider picking up a few restaurant shifts to make extra cash. It’s what I did to put myself through school and I was good at it. I submitted my resume to a few Craigslist ads. One replied:

When deciding on how to set a price on services people often base their service on time. The more time the service takes, the more you charge. The less time, the less you charge. This is a mistake.

When a patient comes to see you for care they are not looking for your time. They’re not even seeking acupuncture. They are looking for…

When we aren’t able to do something or can’t seem to muster up the energy or the will to do what we need in order to take action a default question we ask ourselves is “What is wrong with me?”.

It seems innocuous enough. We often couch it in humorous self-deprecation, but in reality this kind of thinking doesn’t serve us. And over time it can become habitual thinking and possibly toxic.

“Back to the basics” doesn’t only apply to your clinical practice. You can use it anytime you start to feel overwhelmed, exhausted, over-scheduled, or like things in your life are off-track. It can also be used as a regular audit for yourself to be sure you’re still on the right path toward your goals. The main questions to ask yourself that help bring you back to the basics are:

Anytime anyone uses disempowering language it breaks my heart a little. I used to think that the reason why I got in to medicine was because I wanted to help people. And that is true, but it’s not the whole thing. After years of working with patients as well as a lot of my own personal development work I realize that I’m not interested in fixing people. I’m much more drawn to empowering people by helping them realize that they are the root of their success.

We are not born 100% brave. Yes, there are some people that are naturally less risk-averse than others, but for the most part we all have to learn and practice consciously and purposefully operating outside our default state of fear in order to move forward.

Out of all the emotions, feeling regret is one of the most painful for most people. Regret comes from something that happened in the past. And since it’s in the past that means there’s nothing you can do to change it to make you feel better about it.