Podcast Notes:

Good to be here with you. As you know I have done hundreds of Podcasts over a 15yrs period, over any aspect of health care, Chinese medicine aspect.  I am a doctor in Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture. I had done a call-in radio show for past 10 years, which I loved. I’m happy to be back on, doing a few more aspect.

Today is going to be a little different. Normally I talk about specific health issues.  We are re-starting them as a podcast. With these, we will be talking about specific health issues and draw on 50 yrs experience of facilitation, coaching, and teaching. To talk about some specifics that relate to where we are as a people and a culture. 2020 saw many individuals and businesses go under in desperation. I want to give some ideas, or Coaching basically to help get out of that mode and start and recreate life in powerful way.

01:45 – The Chinese quote for crises is “dangerous opportunity.” that’s where we are. A great deal of danger and many people have been damaged, out of that we have great opportunity. Many business have gone under, but some companies are thriving right now. We need to learn from them. Learn to create and recreate our lives and attitudes so that we can move forward. Don’t be victims.

02:30 – One important thing is the old saying, “It’s not how many times knocked down, it’s how many times you get up.” Need to get up, start moving forward, recreate life more powerfully than ever, and move forward. I’m a chairperson of an Advisory board for an major malpractice insurance company. Last meeting, hundreds of acupuncturists have closed down their practice permanently. If any of them had gotten good Coaching and changed their attitude, to use this as an opportunity than disaster, any of them may have a more powerful practice, than ever before within 6 months. In order to do this, they need to be coachable, work on attitude and move ahead. During the great Depression, more millionaires were created than any other time in US history. Matter of attitude.

04:20 – I’ve coached hundreds of people in a wide range of Real Estate companies, set up created the training programs for three of the fastest growing Real estate companies in CA). Coached hundreds of individual agents, martial arts – was the apprentice trainer with world martial arts trainer, Peter Ralston, many small businesses, past few years focused on acupuncture clinics. Been teaching in TCM programs for over 20 yrs, and doctoral programs. I will say today what I’ve said in every class I’ve taught in the past 20 yrs.

05:22 – If your in practice/ business – doesn’t matter what field you are in, you need 2 things… you need a mentor and a coach. Someone to coach you on the business/ practice aspects in terms of your life and goals in order. Need someone who knows your profession and can guide you that way. Sometimes it’s possible to get someone in both professions, but it’s important to have both.

05:22 – One example, I worked with a fellow a few years ago. Was an acupuncture student at the time. I became his coach and mentor. Became very coachable. Did all the things I told him to do, that he didn’t want to do. Would send him case studies all the time that we would go over – that was the mentorship part. He followed his directions exactly. Within 6 months he had built his practice stronger than any other practice acupuncturists have within 10yrs.

06:55 – My experience over the years, noticed it first when training real estate. About 10% of people will succeed no matter what. About 40% will not make it, no matter what they do. They are committed to their failure. That means as a good Coach, as a good mentor, you are really teaching and training that 50% – you can have all of them be successful. That’s what I want to talk about today.

07:44 – You know about 2/3 of all acupuncturists are out of practice within 5 years. Unfortunately as 60% could make it if they had a good Coach. We are getting down to a quote by Thomas Jefferson, “nothing can stop the man, with the right mental attitude from achieving his goals.” Nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. That’s absolutely correct. That’s where we need to start. 40% of people will argue for their limitations. What we need to do is work with 50% of people to alter there mental thinking and attitude to achieve their ultimate goal.

08:31 – One absolute KEY is training people in the art of intention, and the ability to create it. Which is founded on absolute accountability. But THAT IS THE KEY. You have to have intention – meaning that no mater what, you will be successful. Need to have absolute accountability. You are the one that will make it happen.

09:02 – So that leads to the flow of Creation. Most people, and many coaches, approach this in the wrong order. To me, the order in this creative endeavor, you first must absolutely be clear and acknowledge what your purpose is. Why are you on the planet? What are you doing here? A good Mark Twain quote is, “the two most important days in your life, is the day you were born and the day you discovered why you are born.” What is your purpose for being here? That is the question. If you haven’t taken the time to look into it, as one of my teachers have said, ‘when is today a good day to do that?’.. and that day is today.’

09:55 – What is your purpose? Why are you here? If you are an acupuncturist, what is your purpose in that? You didn’t go into acupuncture for money. What is your purpose? Then, once you have become absolutely clear on your purpose, become clear ON YOUR VISION. By vision, I mean with all caps. Not seen with eyes, but with absolute clarity of your vision for your life.

10:27 – One of the things I’ve discovered of many years of training apprentices and working with other students, is that just before, literally just before they would communicate their vision, there was always one thing would occur…. Every time someone would communicated their vision, they would ‘giggle.’ Seriously they would giggle like little kids. When I worked with someone and we would work deeper and deeper into their vision, what is their purpose for being here and what is your vision. And finally he surrendered to experience that, and he started giggling. As soon as he did that I knew we were there. And he said, I wanted to be Steven Spielberg.

11:20 – Now the reason people giggle is that when they see their vision, it’s always bigger than what they are capable of. Who can become Steven Spielberg? What he meant was that he wanted to be a phenomenal director of movies. But that seemed to be to big for him, partially because he was comparing himself to Steven Spielberg. So, the first step is to discover your purpose. Is it to save humanity? Raise a family. Than find your vision. What does your ideal picture look like? Often you can look to your high school walls. What posters did you have up there? What things did you have in life that you dreamed of becoming? Or dreamed of being? But gave those dreams up, because they seemed too big. Now you have to go back to that. What you really want is to serve a purpose. Now ONLY after you have discover, and clarified your purpose and your vision, only then do you set your goals. Any goals prior to that will be misdirected. If not, they won’t be strong enough for you to achieve. Then you create your goals. Then you create a schedule.

13:05 – I prefer a three year schedule, I have a three year plan that I lay out. That’s divided into trimesters. You are looking at the ultimate goal, then divide it into 6 different parts: social contribution, personal growth, business level, etc. Divide that into trimesters. What is the first step you need to take to achieve that goal, that get’s you to vision, that serves your vision. So set the goals. Three years is long enough to achieve anything (except being president). But you can pretty much accomplish any business goal. Create a schedule, break it down into bite size pieces, than create an action plan. I find it’s only effective if done in that order. Otherwise you can set goals, create a schedule, create an action plan, and actually on a rare occasion can achieve those things. But when you get there, you are not satisfied. Because it didn’t serve your purpose or your vision.

14:36 – A great quote from Lorin Brown, ” Your actions follow your beliefs. When there is conflict between your heart, (the subconscious) and your brain, (the conscious), your heart will always win.” No matter what you think you will do, if it’s not in alignment with your subconscious, with your heart, than it will be a failure. Start with your heart, and than the brain. Purpose is heartfelt. Vision is heartfelt. Goals are starting with the brain. That’s when you lay it out like an engineer. Then your schedule and your action. But always start with the heart, and you will be well served.

15:34 – Now one of the specifics fields with acupuncturists. Is that they have been trained into believing that making money is “evil.” If you’ve read Rich Dad, Poor Dad – you can see, how we create and how we have created by our families, and our social circumstance and beliefs, either patterns of success or non-success. A lot of acupuncturists have made the mistake of believing that making money is evil. And they are usually not conscious of that. They will regularly undermine themselves. There is great jealously in this field against those who are successful. I hear all kinds of weird things about myself. I was successful immediately when I first opened my practice. I’ve been successful the past 20 yeas. A lot of people have become jealous of that. Remember that money is simply a form of energetic exchange. I have been paid in many different ways in the past. The quote from the bible says: The LOVE of money is the source of all evil. So have money, just don’t love it. Don’t have the belief that it will bring you happiness. Don’t give up your vision, your personal integrity for money. But use money for the ways it can be used. I tell students all the time with those with poverty mentality are told: make a ton of money, and then give it away. There are millions of people you can help if you made money to support if you do it that way.

18:08 – So this is just a little introduction. In the next few weeks, I am going to go into more specific ideas into how to create your practice, how to recreate life, how to move forward. I highly urge you, if you are in practice, to find a mentor, reach out to someone. Expect very little, if anything from them, and give a lot. My wife is a master sports medicine acupuncturists. She is the acupuncturist of the San Francisco 49ers, St Mary’s Rugby team, she travels all over the world treating people in Rugby tournaments. She got there because she apprenticed with her mentor, who is the top sports medicine acupuncturist in the world, over the past 40 years. By doing that, she asked for nothing. What she did was help run this person’s program, she taught for free – for a very long time. She was always available and always showed up. If you want a mentor, that will be your relationship. That has always been the relationship in acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine. Go offer your services and then watch carefully and learn from someone who has more skill than you and more experience in practice. And hire a coach.

19:45 – One key thing about coaches. Here’s one simple clue. If you need an attorney, hirer the best attorney you can get. If you need a doctor, find the best you can get. If you need a coach, get the best coach you can get. It will pay off hundred times over in the long run. A good coach can make you successful in a few months. A bad coach may never make you successful. Get the best you can get. A simple clue on that is – if you want to make $100,000 a year than. if you work 2000 hours a year. 50 weeks x 40 hours a week = 2000 hours. that’s $50 an hour. So if you want to make $100,000/ year, never higher a coach that makes less than that, because they obviously can’t coach you to do something that they cannot do. Now I’ve always paid very well for my coaches. I’ve had people say, ‘why did you hire a coach? You’ve done coaching for 40years.’ I said, that’s not why I’ve hired a coach. I know nobody can BS me, like I can. You need someone who will hold you accountable. Pay for it, it will pay dividends a hundred times over in the long run.

We will be back in a week with another podcast, where we will go more into specifics as to how to be successful in 2021.

 

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), Western Perspective, Integrative and Functional Medicine. 

The Balancing Point health radio talk show about Traditional Chinese Medicine, supplements, nutrition, and more.  Host Dr. John Nieters, acupuncturist and health educator.  http://www.thebalancingpoint.net

Inspired by this podcast to take action in your life? Visit Alameda Acupuncture.