Below are the episode show notes and transcript. Some episode transcripts have been edited more than others, but they are up in the meantime to help those who would rather read and for searchability on the web. Extensive editing has not been prioritized as I seek to both produce regular content and maintain my own wellness. Enjoy!
Show Notes
A journey begins with a step… And then another after another.
Outcomes are the results of actions.
Intentionality in actions involves habits!
Consistency is key, but it starts with that next step!
Where will you take that next step with your habits?
Check out episode 24 to be challenged about how you can leverage habits for future transformation and results!
Get home faster with 10 tips from my free PDF guide, Maximize Your Clinical Efficiency! Click to get your guide NOW!
Today’s sponsor: White Coat Investor courses – advance your financial literacy and wellness with a course from WCI. Click here to check out a course today
Transcript
You may think I could never do that big thing. I could never run a marathon, become that successful help. So many people or graduate from medical school. And yet that person had to start somewhere and take a step forward. First one, then another, if you need to be reminded about the importance of small investments for the future, just as I do stick around for the rest of today’s episode. Thank you so much for joining me here on the meed well podcast. We’re already to episode 24. I’m so excited to be here with you in the new year, talking about physician wellness and how we can each take that next step forward. Thank you so much for listening for subscribing, for sharing. I’m so thankful that others have seen that this is valuable and have joined me on this journey. If you wanna get home sooner, download my free guide, maximize your clinical efficiency.
It has 10 tips to help you get stuff done and get home faster today. We’ll be talking about how small investments can lead to bigger results, how these results can be amplified in the future if they there’s intentionality and proactive, intentional action. So this is gonna cover intentionality with small habits financially, personally, and professionally.
But first let’s hear from today’s sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Dr. Jimmy Turner’s book, a physician philosophers guide to personal finance. The 20% of personal finance that doctors need to know get 80% of the results. Dr. Turner gives a great description saying in medical training, our job is to hone our craft by learning and practicing the best possible medicine for our patients. Unfortunately, medical training, isn’t free. If you are ready to learn how to effectively pay down your student loans, if invest efficiently and achieve financial freedom early in your career. And this book is for you, you can download a copy at the Amazon link in the show notes. Dr. Turner’s also working on a book about physician wellness and burnout to look forward to sharing that with you when he comes out with it. All right now, back to today’s episode.
So you may have guessed from prior episodes that I like reading about process improvement and productivity. It’s not that I, it all together by any means. There’s lots of growth that I still need to achieve, especially around household tasks, chores, cleaning, and organizing certain things in particular technology, my emails, things for work. I’m pretty good. On the other hand, noticing what needs to be cleaned around the house, especially before my wife does definitely still a work and progress. My mentor challenged me recently to plan and set goals in the new year. One big one for me is intentionality.
Whether it’s at work at home, it’s gonna be one of my big words for 2022. I also recently read James Clear’s book, atomic habits. He talks about making habits easy to do the desired thing, which can require designing your cues and your environment in order to support that. So with all that in mind, I wanna lay out some areas that could benefit from incremental changes, small investments over time that in the coming year and beyond, regardless of when you’re listening, that these things would pay dividends for you. So first investments financially, these small incremental changes. So taking a look back for me growing up, I had a savings bank that had buckets for give, save and spend. It was how my parents helped me learn some of my financial habits early. I also learned about saving and investing, saving bit by bit some of the white coat investor themes going over that time in the market is typically better than trying to time the market.
I’ve had to learn about finances, the loan terms, public service, loan, forgiveness, whether residency or particular jobs qualify. And you can look at their employer identification number or E each of us has to learn how to budget, how much that each of us needs to be financial actually independent. These may not be things that you’ve looked at in the past. Not things that I’ve looked at in the past, but am more aware that I need to have a plan, little steps of learning, really add up, for instance, getting disability, insurance and life insurance. If you have dependence or someone, depending on your income, these things are not, they’re not rocket science, but if you don’t know them, you don’t know them. And so finding out what are the gaps in your knowledge, and then taking steps to fill that in. It’s no different than in your medical practice, learning about things that you didn’t know.
And over time, you’re able to have a broader, more well-rounded understanding of how to care for cur certain patient conditions or how to do a particular procedure or how to manage certain social actions. For me financially, I didn’t consolidate my loans right out of medical school. Cause I didn’t know that I needed to, to start my payments for the income driven repayment plan I was on. And so I didn’t get those additional six months qualifying payments towards public service loan forgiveness. So that’s helpful to consider, okay, what, what can you learn and what can you pay it forward by sharing with other so that they don’t make the same mistakes to first financially second small investments professionally, it can be reading about patients, whether it’s in the moment with point of care, resources that help you better explain what your differential and thought process is.
And the workup of particular chief complaint that your patient comes to you. It could be looking at different articles that are coming out when with new, new guidelines, new treatment protocols, new medications, maybe going to conferences in person or virtually or all of the above. These are opportunities to stay on top of your specialty in providing good clinical care, your patients. It also involves taking time to reflect on your practice and your workflows. This may involve talking to your team to colleagues, even to administrators or others say, Hey, how can we make this better for each of the stakeholders then personally honing physical exam or procedural skills taking the time to reflect on how did that go? How was that lumbar puncture? How was that surgery? How did that discussion with a family about a sensitive subject? How did that go over? How was it received?
What questions were asked that maybe I should anticipate next time? How could I be more sensitive? And additionally, it’s important to take opportunities for leadership and develop those skills. It goes beyond just titles and physicians committees. You might be asked to be on leadership is about making choices that people then are able to rally around and follow. So it could have a title, but it could also be how you treat your staff and how you build the comradery and team engagement team culture that’s really needed to help advance patient care in your clinic or on your ward or your clinical service. So I want you to think about making small investments sign for the future and professionally, but then also personally could be that you wanna read more for me 2021. I didn’t read as many books as prior years, especially as I was starting this podcast, it was a trade off.
But I think in the coming year, I want to get back to getting that outside input from other authors. Other thinkers could also be taking new steps in your sleep habit, seeing more intentional with bedtime or when you get up just having discipline. And like we talked about intentionality could also be exercise. This is gonna be a big focus for me, especially figuring out how to leverage little workouts better. Especially since the last couple years have brought significant changes. Not only COVID but also just becoming a parent and figuring out how to balance all those responsibilities. Kind of let that slide. I wanna take those next steps forward to care for my own health. Another area personally could be investing intentionally in relationships, family, friends, colleagues, significant other we’ll revisit some of these more in subsequent episodes talking about just the importance of these relationships.
You are more, more than just a physician. You are more than just a medical professional. You are human being, and we need to acknowledge that just as health is more than just physical health. It also includes mental and spiritual and emotional health that you as a person, you have many roles. It’s not just being a professional, going to work. It’s also being a person, a friend, father, a mother, sister, a spouse, a partner, these things matter. And so personally making some of these investments saying I’m gonna have an intentional conversation with someone that’s important to me. I’m gonna have a phone call with my brother. I’m gonna call up this friend and catch up with them. It could look different for each of us, but again, intentionality taking those steps forward. So whether you listen into this at the beginning of a new year or just some other time looking to make changes with lasting impact, take a moment.
And imagine with me, imagine if you made some of these small changes in your habits, how could they impact you financially, personally, professionally 6, 12, 24 months from now? Do you like the vision? Do you really like that vision where you might end up if you stay on the same trajectory, but imagine if you stay on the same trajectory where you’re, where you’re at right now, no changes. Where do you think you’re gonna end up? Do you think a lack of intentionality is gonna move you forward? Do you like that vision? So a lack of intentionality. This is never gonna move you forward. I have to tell, tell myself that, remind myself of that over and over. So I want you to figure out what that next intentional step needs to be you for you today and take it. Thank you so much for joining me here on another episode of the MedEdWell podcast, please subscribe, share, and leave a review. Make sure you download my free guide, maximize your clinical efficiency for workflow tips and changes that could help you get home faster and check out the link in the show notes for the physician philosophers guide to personal finance. And I just want to say that you are doing such a great job, caring for patients in this new year. Please check in on each other. Take that next step in supporting physician wellness. We need each other. Thanks for all. You do. Look forward to seeing you back for another episode and have a great day.