Listen Now

In this episode, Sachin interviews Dave Asprey, a speaker, best-selling author, and biohacking entrepreneur, by video from Costa Rica. Dave shares some of his experiences, including the health challenges that enabled him to invent biohacking to improve his health. Dave discusses states of consciousness, tools for biohacking, tech entrepreneurship, the importance of mentors, how he deals with personal attacks from trolls, and how he has achieved greater equanimity in the face of stress and triggering events. Dave shares hacks he learned that he wrote into his books. Listen in for many more hacks you can use for better health.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes everyone and introduces the guest, Dave Asprey, who speaks on being an entrepreneur. Dave is a long-time entrepreneur and a best-selling author. His newest book is Smarter Not Harder. Sachin recommends you read it. Dave will talk about his experiences and how he can help your functional medicine or holistic health coaching practice.   [1:59] Dave joins the podcast from Costa Rica. Sachin thanks him for joining us. Dave is passionate about helping people feel and do their best. Dave is known as the Father of Biohacking. His definition of biohacking is the art and science of changing the environment around and inside you for full control of your biology.   [2:55] The definition is still basically the same but the domains of the environment around you that you can change are constantly expanding. Some of the biohacks that have the broadest impact are at the cellular level. When your cells start to work better, your capacity for consciousness starts to improve. You have more bandwidth to access hidden parts of reality.   [4:02] Dave speaks of the hidden parts of reality and non-ordinary states of consciousness reached through neurofeedback and breathwork and having science-based and consciousness-based techniques that allow us to access altered states of high performance, including healing, relationships, and feeling inner peace and compassion.   [4:54] The set of tools for biohacking is ever-expanding.   [5:40] Writing didn’t come naturally to Dave. He is a computer coder by training so he knows how to group things logically. He held Google’s first servers when Google was two guys with two computers. He co-founded the Professional Services Group there. He was part of building Salesforce’s architecture when Salesforce had eight employees.   [6:09] Early-stage work requires structured thinking and the ability to teach new knowledge. For five years, Dave ran a program at the University of California starting each day in a tech startup and then teaching working engineers in Silicon Valley for two and a half hours how to build the internet and cloud computing. After dinner, he studied trade journals and wrote his next class.   [6:44] It was stressful, but Dave learned to assimilate information rapidly, translate it, and make it teachable. That made him one of the most powerful people in his company. Teaching is the best way to learn something. If you’re not going to teach, write a book as if you were teaching. When Dave writes, he asks how he would teach it. That forces him to structure his thoughts.   [7:35] Dave is good at building the skeleton of a book and at putting the outer skin on it. The part of writing he doesn’t enjoy is putting the muscles on the skeleton, so he works with a writing partner to flesh it out before putting on the finishing skin.   [8:37] Dave’s first book, The Bulletproof Diet, had managed to break onto The New York Times list. He talks about the tech he used to achieve altered states of consciousness so he could write. The tech and coffee got him into a flow state quickly.   [10:04] Sachin advises opening Smarter Not Harder and finding something to quote on social media, giving Dave credit. Teaching knowledge is the best way to learn it. Dave’s goal as an author is to say something that hasn’t been said. He writes books to be launching points for things you haven’t seen somewhere. Quote something from the book and add your nuance to it.   [11:48] Sachin adds, nuance it to your audience.   [12:34] Dave mentions WIFY, What’s In it For You (your client)? Create content not for yourself but for your audience. Put yourself in your audience’s mindset. What is the goal of your audience? How do you make what you have to share relevant and useful for them? Dave credits Joe Polish for WIFY.   [14:21] In Dave’s early 20s, he was running a portion of the IT for a hospital. It was taking him a lot of time to manage their eight servers that did most of the work. He considered how to automate his job to free up time to learn more about tech. That was the thinking that led to the early days of cloud computing.   [15:00] Dave says with confidence that the first shipping modern cloud computing was his product. It shipped one day before Marc Andreessen shipped Loudcloud. There were probably 1,000 people in Silicon Valley all working on the same concept. It was driven by laziness. We all have a deep shame for being lazy. Dave explains how laziness is biologically built into us.   [17:27] Dave wants to have his cake and eat it, too, and says that’s normal and healthy; just find a way to do it. That will motivate you more than the hope of being efficient. Dave wants “epic,” not efficient. He tells how to motivate yourself to exercise for eight minutes.   [20:21] Dave has set up the world’s first biohacking facility, Upgrade Labs, in Santa Monica, California. Thousands of people have come through it. Dave is franchising it across the country with dozens of labs opening soon. You can go to ownanupgradelabs.com to get a franchise of a business that is profitable and makes a huge difference to the people who go there.   [21:06] Dave could write his book because after thousands of people have come through his biohacking facility, he had enough data on five big domains people are asking about.   [22:04] Dave is on 25 or 30 advisory boards and he has a portfolio of biohacking companies he has invested in. He does a lot of advising work for equity so he often has the conversation on where entrepreneurs waste their time. Many entrepreneurs are looking to prove they are good enough. There’s a great deal of shame-based behavior. Many were bullied in school.   [23:12] Instead of running away from their past, what if entrepreneurs figured out what they are moving toward that’s worthy? That is so much more motivating than running away. That’s working smarter, not harder. Work hard when you need to, but there’s no correlation between working hard and success. You’re not here to be a better worker.   [25:10] When you read Smarter not Harder, figure out what you want. What matters to you? What problem are you going to solve? How do you want to be? This requires freedom of energy and freedom of time. If you’re working hard, you have neither one. This book says, let’s give you five to ten hours a week back, and let’s double your energy and let’s see what’s possible.   [26:52] Dave’s advice for people under 35: spend time with old people, your elders. These are people who’ve already had to solve all the problems you’re trying to solve. You could try to do it all by yourself, but you could get help from others. Dave talks of the many health challenges he experienced in his early 20s that enabled him to create the biohacking movement.   [28:17] Dave ate salads and exercised 90 minutes a day, six days a week, but didn’t lose weight. He still weighed 297 pounds. He realized it wasn’t working even though he did everything he was supposed to do. Smarter Not Harder is his revenge for those lost 702 hours. He then listened to orthomolecular physicians, now known as functional medicine practitioners.   [31:26] Dave started working with the Silicon Valley Health Institute and became chairman and president of it when he was 30 and was the only guy under 50 in the room. He applied a strategy of finding mentors in business and following leaders who lived by different rules. In a tech company, a VP of Strategy taught Dave how to navigate the halls of power.   [33:16] Go to the elders and ask them how they dealt with marriage. Ask them what they learned. They all know and they want to tell you. He tells of mentoring he received from Ken Crittendon, who had in turn been mentored by Jack Welch. Joe Polish was another mentor. They want to help you and they’re not transactional about it. Dave lists more mentors.   [35:22] When you are mentored, let the mentor know that you followed their advice and it helped you. They will be more inclined to continue to mentor you. As an advisor, Dave wants equity in the company as skin in the game. It gives the advice more weight when the company has paid something for it. Free advice, even when it’s great, is not often followed.   [36:12] Sachin says, if you pay, you pay attention. Sachin gets excited when he gets feedback from someone who applied his advice successfully.   [38:00] Dave tells of a “wantrepreneur” who made a knock-off of the oil for Bulletproof Coffee that didn’t work because it was the wrong formula. He says some narcissists and sociopaths want to steal your idea, make it cheaply, and claim credit for the original. Dave calls it the race to cheat instead of the race for results.   [41:08] Sachin wants you to know that Dave is the real deal and his recommendations are for things that he has done. Dave also endorses Sachin as one of the genuine helpers. There are helpful souls in the entrepreneurial health community. Dave cites Daniel Amen and David Perlmutter as people always willing to help. Some people will try to take advantage of helpers.   [42:48] David tells how good people help each other to win. People pretending to be good don’t do good for others. They want you to lose if it benefits them. You need discernment to see when someone wants to take advantage of you to their benefit and your harm. The more successful you are, the more those people are attracted to you. Your discernment is visceral.   [46:57] Dave tel

In this episode, Sachin emphasizes how the abundance mindset works to attract and create abundance in your life, relationships, and businesses. An abundance mindset is key to your happiness and success. Listen in for tips on getting rid of scarcity and negativity and dwelling in joyful abundance.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin introduces the topic for today, the abundance mindset. This is one of the most important mindsets to adopt and is crucial and key to your success and happiness and the legacy that you leave behind. Everyone around you, including your kids, is paying attention to your mindset, whether you express abundance or scarcity.   [1:40] Sachin has 14 rules to follow when it comes to abundance. He asks you to pick one, then two, and work your way up to all 14. He promises you will have plenty of opportunities every day to implement all 14 rules. Write them down and be more conscious of whether you are abundant in your thoughts, actions, behaviors, and in your reflection.   [2:17] There is always opportunity for us to find abundance and Sachin has learned that you always find what you’re looking for. So if we seek abundance, we become abundance, we embrace abundance, and we act abundantly, then abundance flows in our direction. Our actions act like an antenna to attract the right people and circumstances into our lives.   [3:00] 1. The difference between an extractor and a multiplier. A multiplier takes an idea and multiplies its value. This is like juicing an orange and planting the seeds. If we carefully pluck the idea from a conversation, we can plant a seed and grow it. An extractor has a scarcity mindset. They try to extract every drop of juice but miss the seed. They are always disappointed.   [5:38] 2. The quantum handshake. Think about how you show up to greet and connect with people. Use what’s culturally appropriate for them and your relationship with the person. Sachin describes handshakes and greetings from Level 0 (dead fish) to Level 3 (firm handshake, left hand on the shoulder, with a compliment). Or give a heart-to-heart hug with a compliment.   [10:06]  3. Leave people and places better than you found them. Clean up after yourself at a restaurant. Clean up your room at a hotel. Make other people’s jobs easier and make them feel appreciated. In a hotel room, leave a generous tip and a thank you note. How would an abundant person act in a situation? They leave people and places better than they found them.   [11:51] 4. Stop playing victim. It’s hard to play victim and have an abundance outlook on life and an abundance of opportunities coming your way. Abundance runs away from victims. Victims never take ownership of what’s happening in their life. As a result of playing victim, energy and abundance do not flow their way.   [13:29] 5. Trust the journey. Sachin’s sister-in-law had a saying, “Everything works out in the end. And if it hasn’t worked out, it’s not the end.” It’s rare when everything goes as planned although we might achieve the outcome. Part of life is trusting the journey. The universe, which is abundant by design, has a plan for you.   [14:49]  6. Never show up empty-handed. Bring a gift when you visit someone’s house, especially for the first time. If you’re car-pooling, show up with snacks. Pay for gas. It says a lot about you when you show up with an abundance mindset. Sachin loves bringing artwork, that will be part of their lives forever.   [16:24] 7. Empty your cup. If our cup is full, there’s no room for creamer. Every day we have to empty our cups a little bit so that others can pour into us; the universe can pour into us. Part of that is having humility.   [17:01] 8. Create a vacuum. Emptying your cup ties into creating a vacuum. Create a vacuum of opportunity so energy comes your way. Clear up your calendar so that you have room for opportunity. Clean up your closet if you want new clothes to flow in your direction. You have to create some lack for abundance to flow your way. The universe hates vacuums.   [17:53] 9. Always send a follow-up. When you interact or engage with somebody, send a follow-up message. Take a picture with them as a reminder in your photo album to follow up with a text message and check in with them. If you’re thinking about that person, check in with them. Maintain relationships. You never know when you can help that person or they might help you.   [19:04] 10. Genuinely be supportive. Supporting can be sharing a post or making a referral or an introduction for that person. Sometimes it could be commenting on their social media and giving them an endorsement or writing them a review. Be genuinely supportive of businesses you patronize, entrepreneurs you might know, and your friends and family members.   [19:51] 11. Send them a thank you gift or note. Thank you emails often get lost. Send a text, a voice note, or best of all, send a hand-written card or thoughtful gift. Something like that can go a remarkably long way. There are send-out services you can use to send a note with a gift.   [20:46] 12. Eliminate all the moaners and groaners. Get rid of the Negative Nellies and Nelsons. You don’t have to unfriend them but unfollow them. If somebody continually triggers you and takes you out of an abundance mindset, you don’t want to see their posts. You can still remain friends. Clean your feed. Abundance loves company. Mirror people with abundance mindsets.   [22:28] 13. Be unusually happy and blissful. When you have a smile on your face, the chemistry in your body completely changes. When you start showing up happy and blissful, it gets people’s attention. Pay attention to your energy and how you’re showing up.   [23:14] 14. Leave a tip. Be generous with how you acknowledge people. It doesn’t have to be exorbitant, but be generous. “Tip fatigue” is for people who have scarcity mindsets. When you give, there’s always more. Sachin’s mentor Majeed taught him, “It’s just money.” Money is energy. It’s a representation of how we show up energetically.   [24:28] Sachin hopes these tips are helpful for you. He hopes there is one thing in there that you can identify as a way to show up to be more abundant. He hopes that this gives you an opportunity to be reflective and also to take action. It’s not thinking about abundance that counts, but it’s the action steps that you put into place that truly matter.   [24:50] Sachin would love to hear how you apply this framework and what you found to be most impactful and beneficial, and how, over the next few weeks and months, how being more abundant in your life has created more abundance for you. Sachin sends you lots of love and gratitude and wishes you abundance, health, and happiness.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Jay Abraham Joe Polish   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

In this episode, Sachin and Dr. Eniko Loud talk about Dr. Loud’s training, background, and interest in applying functional medicine practices to holistic dental care. Dr. Loud explains there is more to dental care than treating cavities and broken teeth. Sometimes teeth break when there is uneven pressure in the bite. Dr. Loud explains how this happens. She covers what kinds of problems mouth-breathing can cause, why there is so much dental crowding and a functional problem with braces. Listen in for information on holistic and myofunctional dental therapy.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin introduces the topic for today: oral health and beyond and introduces his guest Dr. Eniko Loud, a pioneer in the treatment of orofacial conditions. Dr. Loud provides dental care in a very holistic way using functional medicine. She focuses on the whole patient. Sachin shares more about Dr. Loud and how Joe Polish of Genius Network introduced them.   [3:33] Sachin welcomes Dr. Loud to the podcast.   [3:56] Dr. Loud was trained in medicine and dentistry in Europe. She had a passion for seeing the whole person. When she discovered functional medicine, it was a paradigm shift. She decided to get certified in functional medicine. She started making an impact on her patient’s health, with documents and dietary plans. She was excited about showing up for work.   [6:30] Dr. Loud tells how diseases of the body can show up on the tongue seven to 10 years before they show up in the body. She says bad breath is one of the biggest indicators of disease.   [8:11] Dr. Loud explains the patient's experience. The first appointment can take up to two hours. Based on functional medicine, there is a lot of listening and gathering of information. Before the appointment, Dr. Loud reviews records, diet, toxin exposure, and sleep habits. She connects all parts of the patient’s history with their oral health. Patients are amazed.   [9:38] Dr. Loud says this should be the standard of care in dentistry. Dr. Loud is a guide to her patients on their journey. She offers two ways, down the path of disease or the path of health. Most patients choose health. The patient is in the driver’s seat and makes all the decisions. Patients receive a report card after their hygienist appointment showing markers of health.   [12:15] The standard in Dr. Loud’s practice is for patients to have zero bleeding. That is how the patients can measure their success and progress.   [13:03] Bleeding gums might signal malnutrition. A lot of times, it indicates a lack of proper care. Mouth-breathing could be an issue or bacterial overgrowth even if they brush and floss properly. Toothbrush heads or mouth appliances may not be properly sterilized, spreading bacteria. Toothbrushes should be changed after two months. Dr. Loud likes electric toothbrushes.   [15:15] Dr. Loud likes Oral B iO series brushes. Dr. Loud says it rotates and oscillates so it is very effective at removing plaque.   [16:25] To tell if you have a tongue-tie, open your mouth wide and touch the roof of your mouth with your tongue. If you cannot, it is likely you have a tongue-tie. Dr. Loud explains some of the problems a tongue-tie can cause, and how the posture may be affected. Swallowing problems, sleep apnea, and snoring also may result from a tongue-tie.   [19:33] Dr. Loud describes a 3-D scan that can show abnormalities from a tongue tie. An oral surgeon can perform a frenectomy to relieve a tongue-tie.   [20:35] Dr. Loud recommends myofunctional therapy before and after a frenectomy to prepare the muscle for what it will have to do when the release is done.   [22:15] Two different things impact teeth; bacteria and forces. Most patients don’t know they have an overload of forces on their teeth. Dr. Loud explains what can happen when a crown is a few microns too high. This may change the joint position. If the forces are not distributed evenly, some teeth may be overloaded, crack, need a crown, have a root canal, and finally, extraction.   [26:11] Joint position problems may cause more extractions than tooth decay. There are different schools of thought on bite forces and the joints. It would require the dentist to start asking better questions like, “Why is this happening to my patients?” Wanting to learn to fix it may be the biggest problem.   [26:51] Dr. Loud works within a group called OBI Bioesthetic Dentistry and their focus is helping discover the root causes of dental diseases. Once they restore the natural anatomy of the teeth, the face immediately becomes rejuvenated. The focus is function. When you restore jaw joint function, muscles relax and don’t clench. There is no more joint pain and muscle tension.   [28:33] Orthodontics can aggravate the joint problem if the dentist doesn’t know what a stable bite should be or doesn’t have the knowledge to see the patterns of tooth wear. Dr. Loud explains the correct bite.   [31:13] After Invisalign, if the bite is still not mechanically correct, there are options available to correct the joint position. Dr. Loud explains the process she uses to keep the musculoskeletal system in balance. If there is tooth wear, they add back the enamel that’s missing with dental materials to restore the natural form of the tooth structure and stabilize the bite.   [33:01] Dr. Loud discusses research that reveals why dental crowding is happening in children. It may be due to diet and mouth-breathing. Dr. Loud recommends working with a myofunctional therapist and a pediatrician to remove dairy and sugar from the diet to reduce inflammation, mouth-breathing, and apnea.   [36:11] It wasn’t until after Breath, by James Nestor came out that Sachin learned the connection between mouth-breathing and dental problems. Breath is a diagnostic tool.   [38:13] About jaw size and wisdom teeth. Sachin’s relatives in India chewed on sticks to make toothbrushes. They had perfect teeth, no extractions, no braces, without having access to dentists. Soft foods and processed foods have weakened American teeth. Myofunctional therapists prescribe biting appliances to strengthen the joints and the bite.   [42:13] Dr. Loud explores functional medicine and has started a study of ayurvedic medicine. She is preparing to merge it into the functional medicine practice to address the emotional and spiritual parts of a patient, also.   [43:41] Dr. Loud shares her thoughts on the Ayurvedic principle of oil pulling. She believes it works by the effects of the herbs and the surface tension of the oil trapping the bacteria. She recommends it for people who have dry mouths. She tells the types she uses.   [45:12] Sachin thinks he should make an appointment with Dr. Loud on his next trip to Phoenix! He thanks Dr. Loud for the work that she does.   [45:52] Dr. Loud shares her contact information. See the links below.   [47:10] Dr. Loud talks about the associate she hired last year and is training her to help take care of patients. There has been a huge need since the podcast.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Joe Polish Genius Network Ben Greenfield Life Podcast Oral B iO toothbrushes Frenectomy OBI Bioesthetic Dentistry Invisalign Breath, by James Nestor Ayurvedic medicine   Dr. Eniko Loud:Dr. Eniko Loud is a pioneer in the treatment of orofacial conditions. She is reinventing the world of dental care with an in-depth holistic approach applying her extensive training in Functional Medicine. She is focused on treating the whole patient, not just the health of their teeth and gums, by examining biochemical, genetic, and lifestyle factors and how these impact the oral microbiome. She is a sought-after speaker in the world of cutting-edge holistic dental care and has appeared on podcasts such as Ben Greenfield Life and Treat The Source.”   Dr. Loud believes that providing excellent dental care is so much more than just treating the mouth, it requires treating the whole person. She acknowledges that one-size-fits-all dentistry is outdated and uses her training in functional medicine to identify disease patterns that caused oral health issues in the first place.   She is considered a “physician of the mouth” — getting to the root cause of dental hygiene issues, unique to each patient, that require disease resolution. Rather than just filling cavities, she examines the lifestyle factors, genetic, and biochemical imbalances that create disease in the mouth and guides patients to heal the underlying root cause. Her goal is to guide patients on their wellness journey toward optimal dental health.   Dr. Loud has had extensive training in all forms of dentistry as well as in functional and conventional medicine. She attended the School of Medicine and Dental Medicine in Romania, Oradea graduating with an MD and DDS degrees in 2000. In 2006 she obtained her doctorate from Case Western Reserve University and completed an AEGD residency, obtaining extensive experience in full-mouth rehabilitation and complex implant dentistry. She went on to complete a one-year Mastership in Implant Dentistry from American Dental Implant Association through Loma Linda University in 2009, then became the Dental Director for Bright Now Dental, overseeing the clinical development of 13 dental offices.   In 2013, she completed a Laser Associate Fellowship certification from the World Clinical Laser Institute, and in 2017 she completed a one-year Mastership in Implant Dentistry from the Global Institute for Dental Education. Finally, in 2019 she became a certified functional medicine provider by the Institute of Functional Medicine, one of only 3 certified dentists globally at the time. She received advanced training for applying for functional medicine in clinical practice, bioenergetics, cardio-metabolic diseases, environmental health and detoxification, gastrointestinal diseases, and hormone and immune-related conditions.   Following the completion of the IFM certification she attended the Kalish institute 12-month mentorship program for advanced lab interpretation, using lifestyle medicine and lab-based me

In this episode, Sachin and Aron discuss what an objection is, why you are getting objections, how to rethink objections, and how to remove that word from your vocabulary and get down to being of value and service to people.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin introduces the guest, Aron, one of the Perfect Practice community super coaches. Aron has onboarded many Mentorship and Accelerator clients. Aron is a fellow practitioner. The topic is objections.   [2:40] Aron has sold well over seven figures in the last couple of years. He has taken thousands of calls to help people get onboarded in programs. He had been shy and reserved and it’s been a great growth experience!   [5:38] Aron used to be afraid of confrontation in a sales call. He thought objection was rejection. With experience, he learned to reframe objections as forms of interest in making it happen.   [7:12] If you’re dealing with an adversarial type of conversation, then you’ve probably done something wrong. Objections are really interest in problems you’re trying to solve. Sachin uses the metaphor of a boxing coach in the corner cheering the client on. The goal is to build confidence.   [9:22] Aron differentiates between objections and excuses. Objections are usually at the end of a call before someone moves forward. No amount of objection handling will help someone do what they are not willing to do. You can’t drag a horse across a finish line.   [11:31] Building rapport with the client before the call prepares the client for the call. If you haven’t built rapport, you will face objections. Rapport is what they see from you. Do they have a familiarity with how you think, what you sound like, what you look like, and what you value? When you’re on the call, can you find commonality? Can you be approachable?   [13:16] Do you show up fully ready to listen to someone? Do you show interest in the other person, not as a dollar sign but as a real human being, and that you care about what they’re struggling with and care to connect them with a solution to solve that problem? If you feel it, it will come across on your call. Did you look at the intake form that they filled out?   [15:09] By understanding their circumstances, we’re able to provide a more fitting solution for them.   [16:10] A lot of the value practitioners offer is in the questions you ask to help clients understand that you know what you’re talking about. The questions you ask about their problem show them you have the experience in dealing with that problem to ask the right questions. People understand that you know what you’re talking about. Then the number of objections decreases.   [17:23] Trust is built through the questions you ask. Tell stories of real experiences about the problem they’re coming with. Once they can identify with the stories and experiences, then the trust is there.   [19:22] When Aron uses technical terms only if the client has seen them on a lab test and they’re presenting it. When you explain terms, don’t be overly technical. Making people confused decreases rapport. If someone feels ignorant during a call, that’s not a way to help them where they are. Don’t lose them. Help them stay on track.   [22:47] The moment you identify they’re not a good fit for your process, you stop, because you can’t take them where they want to go. You’ve got to be ethical and make that decision for them. You only want to work with people who are the right fit, as well. Look for the 20% of people who are the right fit for you.   [24:31] Aron uses a metaphor of swimming to see if someone is a good fit. As the conversation progresses, does it seem the client is swimming toward you and you are getting closer? Or are you chasing them in circles? You’re not selling a product, you’re committing to a relationship. Would you want to spend time with that person? Are they coachable and open to learning?   [27:20] Aron shares how values fit in functional medicine. What are the values important to you? Tell pertinent stories. If you don’t have client stories to share, start with your story. If you are clear on your values, you can communicate that on a call. Spell them out. Values can pre-address objections. For example, offer a transformational experience, not a diet.   [32:27] IBM developed a sales method they called BANT. B is Budget. Does the person have the budget to work with you? A is Authority or Able. Does the person you’re speaking to have the decision-making power to move forward? N is Needs. Do they have a problem you can solve? T is Timing. Can they work on their need now? Aron gives BANT examples.   [40:35] Sachin walks through BANT concerning his offer calls to see how it can give more transparency.   [42:27] Sachin outlines what the next segment with Aron will cover about objections in more depth. Sachin thanks Aron for sharing his knowledge on this episode of Perfect Practice.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Genius Network Rocky III Rocky IV How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie BANT   Aron Choi, N.D. Bio:Dr. Aron Choi, ND — Naturopathic Physician and Perfect Practice Advisor for The Perfect Practice Mentorship.   You will often find Aron co-hosting live trainings with Sachin, guiding prospective mentees through our enrollment process, and working with the team to make the Perfect Practice vision become a reality.   Connect with Aron: Website: Aronchoi.com Facebook: Facebook.com/DrAronChoi YouTube: Aron Choi, ND LinkedIn: LinkedIn.com/in/aronchoi   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Today, Sachin presents a solo episode focusing on your practice marketing success. Take one, two, or three of these ideas, to share your message and expand your reach in 2023.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin introduces the theme: 23 things you can do to uplevel your practice, reach more people, have a bigger impact, and make the world healthy, happy, and whole through the outstanding work that you do. Sachin assumes you do meaningful work and you’re passionate about helping people but you struggle to help more people learn about the work you do.   [1:29] No matter how many people you help, you’re always going to feel that way. You’re always reaching for the carrot dangling in front of you. If you’re looking for more ways to help people and looking to make this year more impactful, and you want to make the world, healthy, happy, and whole, then this episode may be helpful for you.   [1:51] Sachin will unpack 23 things, but he wants you to know that these things can be unpacked even further and there is a lot more to each of them. Sachin hopes you will find and take action on one to three of these things that excite you and help you to feel you are getting things done.   [2:27] Find something in your “zone of genius” that allows you to feel like you’re making a difference in people’s lives. Marketing is storytelling; it starts with the story that we tell ourselves before we start telling our story to others. If you struggle with that, Sachin invites you to listen to “Mindset Mastery,” Episode 42 of Perfect Practice, about breaking down limiting beliefs.   [3:10] Of Sachin’s 23 topics, the one that is most important for you to focus on is the one that resonates with you.   [3:25] 1. Have a website that is easy to navigate, that explains what you do, who you are for, how you solve the problem that the client wants to be solved and that you help people in a different way than what they’ve tried before. It should be easy on the eyes and mobile-friendly, and easy to schedule from. It should speak for you. It should have a pixel. Google it.   [5:16] 2. Use social media to share information about your practice, including updates to your services, new programs you launch, testimonials, case studies, educational content, and the life you live as functional medicine practitioners and health coaches. Introduce people to the way you look at the world.   [5:55] 3. Write articles or blog posts about what you do. Blog posts can be great for backlinks, education, and positioning you as an authority. You never know what can come from a great blog post or article you’ve written and who might see it, and what opportunities may open up for you, If you like writing, blogs can be a great way to express yourself. They can go viral, as well.   [6:31] 4. Offer educational workshops, in person or online, about what you do and what problem you solve, and whom you solve it for. You’ll want a punchy title that hooks people in and helps them understand the problem that you solve and how you solve it. Webinars and workshops are great ways to educate people and build trust, share case studies, and offer a discovery call.   [7:12] 5. Partner with other healthcare practitioners such as chiropractors, naturopaths, medical doctors, massage therapists, and personal trainers; there could be plenty of people that you could connect with in your region that can be great referral partners. Do a Google search for the best chiropractor in your town. Email them an offer to meet for coffee and discuss referrals.   [9:52] 6. Attend local health fairs and events to meet potential patients and promote your practice. Having a booth or table at these events gives you exposure to a local audience. You can have a raffle to give away some great prizes. Sachin has had great success at health fairs with a five-pound challenge. You can also sponsor these events to get a lot of exposure.   [11:16] 7. Run targeted ads on social media in your area. You can target people who have a certain demographic or meet certain criteria in your local region. Your ad can say “Local functional medicine practitioner…” or “Functional medicine practitioner in ____ City…” That could be a great way to hook people in.   [12:02] 8. Use email marketing to stay in touch with people. The fortune is in the follow-up. About 90% of people buy after 90 days. If you don’t have a retargeting or nurturing email strategy, most people are going to forget you or go to someone else whom they might perceive as caring more than you do.   [12:49] 9. Connect with other businesses you can collaborate with such as fitness studios, yoga studios, and health food stores. If someone’s seeing a personal trainer, chances are they’re interested in personal wellness. You should be known at your local health food store. Be their number one referrer and buy products there. Offer to do a workshop there.   [15:04] 10. Offer discounts or promotions, such as a free discovery call, to attract new patients.   [16:03] 11. Use online directories and review sites to promote your practice and encourage patients to leave reviews on online directories and review sites, such as Yelp! Tell happy clients how helpful reviews are in helping others learn about your practice.   [16:57] 12. Create a referral program to encourage current patients to refer their friends and family to your practice. As always, follow the rules and laws of your state for your scope of practice.   [17:19] 13. Attend local networking events. Sachin attended BNI for many years and joined the local Chamber of Commerce. It’s a great way to meet other professionals, build networking skills, and have a “givers gain” attitude. People attending these meetings have reached some level of success in their business and they’re willing to support up-and-coming businesses.   [18:13] 14. Use online marketing tools such as SEO to improve your website’s visibility in search results. If you’re not using SEO, Sachin encourages you to evaluate that. It could be a hidden opportunity awaiting you,   [18:35] 15. Create promotional materials, such as brochures and flyers. These can be digital flyers, as well. Promotional materials can help people understand what you do. Using, an infographic is an excellent way to be able to depict the services you offer and how you offer those services, and how they are better and different from what else is out there.   [19:00] 16. Host a “Meet the Practitioner” event. You can host an “Ask Me Anything” event. You can have an open house event to introduce yourself and your practice to your community, where people get to learn a little bit more about you and what you offer people, and how you are a positive influence on your community’s health and wellness.   [19:28] 17. Offer free health assessments or consultations to potential patients. Sachin does free or low-cost discovery calls all the time. It helps in getting new patients onboarded.   [19:53] 18. Use patient testimonials and success stories on your website and on social media to demonstrate the effectiveness of your programs. Use social media as a powerful agent to communicate case studies, success stories, and testimonials from patients in your practice.   [20:13] 19. People value telemedicine services as a great way to save time, energy, money, gas, transportation, time off work, etc. Make sure people know that you work with people remotely.   [20:59] 20. Partner with local gyms or wellness centers to offer functional medicine services. They7 may not offer the services that you do. Do a workshop there.   [21:33] 21. Use paid advertising. Print ads, online ads, banners, and billboards, can be great for promoting your practice. Never discount the impact that direct print marketing can have, even sending cards in the mail. It makes you more real to people when they see you in multiple locations and formats.   [22:07] 22. Create a loyalty program to reward and retain your current patients. How can you gamify the results that your clients are getting? Give them points for milestones achieved. Points add up to free products or services that you offer them, creating a gamification process. Clients love to be celebrated and they may not be receiving enough celebration in their lives.   [22:59] 23. Speak at local events or conferences to raise awareness about function medicine. Look on Eventbrite for local events. Join your Chamber of Commerce and see what events are happening. There are lots of opportunities in your local community and most cities for you to be able to speak and share what you do. We have a unique perspective on health and wellness.   [23:49] There’s a lot to unpack in each one of these. Find one that works for you. Start where you are and then keep growing, keep evolving, and keep spreading your message. Sachin hopes this helps you attain that next level of growth that you’re looking for. Here’s to an amazing 2023!   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live “Mindset Mastery” Episode 42 of Perfect Practice   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Today, Sachin interviews April Stroink on our money journey as practitioners. They discuss how April came into coaching practitioners on finances after being trained as a financial advisor. April shares how her baby benefitted from health practitioners when medical care was powerless to help her. April talks about how a holistic view of well-being is similar to a holistic view of financial well-being, which she calls “wealthcare,” and how she began coaching practitioners. The conversation covers how little entrepreneurs know about finances, and how they can put together a financial system they can manage with the right team. Listen in for advice on fixing your finances while you still can.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Today, Sachin is speaking with April Stroink. Sachin introduces April and her work of coaching about money and thanks her for joining the podcast.   [3:24] April describes her work as a “wealthcare” practitioner. Your financial well-being is closely connected to your physical health, mental health, and close relationships. It’s important to understand what’s happening in our finances if we want to get healthy.   [3:51] Finance is one of the pillars of overall good health and well-being. It is one of the major stressors for most people. When the body is under stress it releases cortisol. Stress also impacts sleep. A lack of sleep impacts health. In Canada, where April lives, money stress is the number one reason for relationship breakdown, as well.   [4:57] April was trained as a financial advisor to get people to retirement with a safety net. She was not trained in behavioral finance. Money is emotional and we have biases about it. People behave differently with their money than with other areas of their lives.   [5:56] April worked with clients who told her they were living paycheck-to-paycheck even though they were making a good income. The more they made, the less disposable income they had and they were drowning in debt from student loans and business loans.   [6:26] In 2017, April shifted her practice away from “assets under management” to helping people on the coaching side of things to help people understand their spending behaviors and their emotions around money so they can reach their financial goals.   [6:56] Along the way, April has been very in-tune with her “wealthcare” and healthcare and the health of her family. Her nine-month-old daughter was constantly sick. Antibiotics made her sicker. April tried naturopathic medicine and worked with an ND as part of her healthcare team. Within 48 hours her daughter was like a new child.   [7:54] April’s classical financial training wasn’t serving her clients. She needed a more holistic view to look at the entire picture of their wealthcare, as naturopathic doctors and functional medicine professionals use in treating patients. April’s approach to wealthcare is similar to this healthcare community. So she started to work financially with the community of practitioners.   [9:15] Numbers don’t lie. When you use good data, it takes gives you a solid foundation to work past the emotion of the equation. April asks her clients to step into the Chief Financial Wellness Officer role for their firms. There are three attributes of a CFWO: 1. To be fearless about their numbers, 2. To be curious about their finances, and 3. To be passionate about their numbers.   [11:36] April will show a client the mechanics that work with the cognitive biases around money. She says the biggest thing that she helps clients with is increasing and boosting their confidence when it comes to their numbers and their finances.   [12:57] We have to realize Parkinson’s Law that demand always meets supply. If we have a month to do a task, it will take a month. If we have a week, it will take a week. The same happens with our money. As business owners, we have the axiom that Sales minus Expenses equals Profit. As we grow, we can increase our revenue but our expenses also increase.   [13:50] You need to take a deep dive into the Costs of Goods Sold. What is your Gross Margin per unit of everything that you are selling? From there, you want to have as much margin as possible to run your operation.   [14:19] April conducts regular expense audits with her clients. She categorizes expenses into three buckets. The first bucket is “Key” (Key) Expenses that drive profit, including staff, software subscriptions, and marketing. In a business crisis, such as a pandemic, do not cut profit-driving expenses first. Consider the effect of any cut over 10 days, 10 months, and 10 years.   [19:37] The second bucket is “R” (Recurring) Expenses such as subscriptions and insurance. Research your insurance providers and you may be able to cut the cost for the same coverage. Look at all your systems and subscriptions with a critical eye regularly.   [21:20] The third bucket is your “U” (Unnecessary) Expenses. This is where it gets down to emotion. It’s helpful to have a third party who is committed to the success of your business but is not emotional about your business, taking a look and asking, “Is it necessary to have all this furniture or all this office space?”   [21:57] It’s not what you bring in, it’s what you keep. Be diligent about regular expense audits. Sachin’s wife goes over the credit card receipts every month and asks “Are you still using this subscription?”   [23:52] Take a look at the products and services you offer. Have you changed the price of the offerings to keep up with the cost of goods to provide them? Which of your services are profit generators and which are profit detractors? The one you are emotionally attached to because it was how you started your practice may be a profit detractor now.   [25:50] April asks clients first, “Do you have the right people on your ‘wealthcare’ team?” This includes your bookkeeper, your accountant, your banker, your lawyer, your financial adviser, or your financial coach. She wants her clients to have the right team because they need the data. Without the right data, the wrong systems may be put into place. April looks at their books.   [27:24] A lot of practitioners don’t understand the role of the bookkeeper, vs. the role of the accountant, vs. their role as business owners. Just as you cannot advocate your health to anyone else, you cannot advocate your wealth to anyone else. You are 100% responsible for your business.   [28:04] Bookkeeping is not regulated in Canada. April has a list of questions for clinicians to ask when interviewing potential bookkeepers. It’s important to have a proper “wealthcare” team in place so that you get the right data. Without the right data, putting the rest of your systems together is a moot point. “Garbage in, garbage out” will not help you.   [29:23] April has facilitated many courses for the Province of Nova Scotia, including “Financial Essentials 101 for Entrepreneurs.” The number one feedback she gets from the course is “I wish I had learned this when I first started my business!” If you don’t have the right habits when you start your business, bad financial habits may continue and may end your business.   [30:38] April thinks finances should be learned through conversations in the home, starting at a very young age, so people don’t become adults without knowing about finance and are confronted by institutions that profit from their being ignorant and in debt until they get to a place where they have to confront their bad financial habits when the money stops flowing.   [32:03] Finance should be taught in high school and as part of process management in colleges. Business owners need to be learning it immediately.   [32:54] Sachin points out that the three most profitable segments of our economy are health management, wealth management, and the food industry. The more we know, the better we can take these matters into our own hands. The powers that be are not necessarily interested in us having that skill set.   [35:40] April can be found on Instagram and Facebook @AprilStroink. People can book a free 30-minute consultation through the website Aprilstroink.ca.   [36:10] If you sign up for a free consultation call, there are some questions to answer before the call. April wants to know your impetus for calling her. What is preventing you from sleeping at night when it comes to your finances? How she can best serve you, and are you ready? She really wants to work with people who are ready to put the systems in place.   [36:53] April’s mission is to eradicate entrepreneurial poverty. She wants to make sure people are ready to do the hard work. It’s not easy and you do have to follow through.   [37:28] April’s last words: “Wealth is very subjective. What I determine as wealth for myself will be completely different from what you determine as wealth for yourself.” April wants to unpack the definition of wealth and talk about what prosperity means to you and what a purposeful life means to you. That’s what the definition of wealth comes to.   [38:28] Sachin thanks April Stroink for sharing her expertise.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live   April Stroink April Stroink is a money coach and advisor for individuals and entrepreneurs who want clarity, ease, and abundance with their finances. Here is April’s story from her website:   “Do you want to feel ease and calm around your finances? Let’s see if this is familiar: You work hard and make good money…but you’re still living paycheck to paycheck. You can’t seem to get ahead. The money stress causes you sleepless nights (and strains your relationships). You want to find a better way to manage your debt and save for the future. AND… above all, you want it to be easy. Sound impossible? It’s not. I know it’s not because I’ve been in your shoes… As an entrepreneur who’s operated and sold several profitable businesses, I’ve had the same challenges and dreams. I’ve navigated the highs and lows of owning a business and managing household finances.   “Many years ago I took over the reins of

Today, Sachin discusses the Gupta Program with Ashok Gupta. Ashok suffered from ME/CFS after catching a virus after two years of University study. He studied brain neurology, physiology, and alternative techniques and came up with a hypothesis as to what he thought caused ME/CFS. He trained his brain in a way that calmed his nervous and immune systems and allowed him to return to his activities. Listen in to hear how Ashok developed the Gupta Program, the success of his work with clients, how the brain uses neuroplasticity to rewire itself for health, and how you can experience this program in a free trial.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Today, Sachin is speaking with Ashok Gupta. Sachin introduces Ashok and his work and thanks him for joining the podcast.   [3:03] Ashok picked up a stomach virus on a trip to India during his undergraduate years at Cambridge. He went back to his third year at the university and suddenly was feeling much worse as a result of the virus. His health deteriorated until he could no longer continue with his studies.   [3:40] He was diagnosed with ME/CFS (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome). He couldn’t read the words on the page of a book. In his worst moments, he had to crawl to the bathroom. With his life ahead of him, he felt like he had hit a brick wall. He went from doctor to practitioner. No one could tell him what caused it but they said he may have it for the rest of his life.   [4:11] At Ashok’s worst moment, he was almost suicidal. He felt he couldn’t continue. He describes ME/CFS as your worst day of flu times 10. That started Ashok on a lifelong quest to try to understand what causes these unusual conditions. What’s the underlying basis for them?   [4:42] Ashok met so many others who were suffering. He made a promise to the universe that if he managed to get himself better, he would dedicate the rest of his life to helping others with this condition. Ashok studied brain neurology, physiology, and alternative techniques. He came up with a hypothesis as to what he thought caused ME/CFS.   [5:11] Ashok retrained his brain in an ad hoc way. He got himself 100% better and published some medical research on his hypothesis on this condition. Then he opened up a clinic to help others with these conditions. They started with ME/CFS and then discovered many conditions can be treated using neuroplasticity and brain retraining.   [6:25] The clinic has taken off over the last few years. When they started, the idea that you could train your brain to overcome an illness was an alien concept; now everybody’s talking about it. Ashok calls it the new branch of medicine.   [6:52] It’s not psychology. It’s not physiology. It’s looking at the underlying reasons for illness in the brain and retraining the brain. Neuroplasticity is going to revolutionize the way we treat many different conditions.   [7:34] Twenty-three years ago, it was assumed the brain was pretty fixed by the time we are adults. In the last 20 years, we’ve discovered that the brain is constantly rewiring itself. It’s constantly changing. We can shift even the way our immune system operates if we find the right keys for the right lock. Neuroplasticity is the idea that the brain is rewirable.   [8:28] Any change we make through psychological or physiological intervention, often then involves a shift in the brain. Neuroplasticity starts with that shift in the brain. The principle is to understand the science behind neuroplasticity, target it, and create accelerated change. Ashok explains how neuroplasticity fits in with epigenetics.   [10:23] Ashok tells about his process of treating a client through neuroplasticity. First, he helps the client understand the hypothesis. If you can fix the central system that is causing the abnormalities, a lot of the abnormalities will take care of themselves. With brain training, in many cases, the body can self-heal and look after itself.   [12:12] When people understand the hypothesis of the cause and root level of their condition, they look at the three Rs of the program. The first R is Relaxing the nervous system. This “softens the sand.” The second R is Retraining the brain. What patterns have been indented in the sand to cause this chronic illness? Rewire those neural pathways. That is the core.   [13:01] The third R is Re-engaging with joy. Laughter, singing, music; all of those things can once again support neuroplasticity and support health.   [13:28] Ashok shares his hypothesis of what causes many chronic illnesses. This body, this nervous system, and this immune system have been developed over millions of years. It is estimated that we share 40 to 50 percent of our DNA with a banana. We are survival machines, passing our DNA to the next generation.   [14:39] Our body cares more about survival than it does about our well-being. In our modern lifestyle, we are exposed to pollutants, stress, bad diets, etc. Our system feels under threat a lot of the time. That triggers our immune system’s defense mechanism. Ashok talks about COVID-19 attacking a person. The immune system gets triggered.   [15:21] In the majority of people the immune system fights the virus, they recover and go back to normal life. But if the system is weak, the immune system over-responds to defend the body. Even once the virus is gone, the system is in hyper-defense mode.   [16:16] Ashok compares the body to a kingdom, defending against an invading enemy. The Army is the nervous system and the Navy is the immune system. After defeating the invasion, all the kingdom’s resources are pumped to the weakened Army and Navy because if they fail, the kingdom fails. The Army and Navy stay in a hypervigilant state.   [17:56] Rewiring the brain tells the generals they’ve done a fantastic job of defending the kingdom, but the war is over. There is no further threat. You can stand down. Rewiring the brain retrains the nervous system and the immune system to stand down and brings the system back to homeostasis.   [18:59] Ashok works at the physiological level, including diet, sleep, and physical aspects; the emotional level, including meditation and breathing, and the mental and spiritual levels, training the brain that it is safe from threat. Brain retraining is a seven-step process drawn from psychology, visualization, past work, and therapy. The process has been refined over 20 years.   [20:40] Ashok’s core program is contained in 10 video sessions. Five additional video sessions are all about how to stay well. Ashok wants people to get well and stay well.   [21:28] Ashok shares a client success story. There was an 82-year-old client in New Zealand with fibromyalgia who was bedridden a lot of the time. He used Ashok’s program and he healed to 80% or more within a couple of months. Within four months, he was up to 95% healing. He decided he was going to travel the world after having had a severe illness for three decades.   [22:42] Ashok tells of a client with Long COVID. A marathon runner and cyclist in his 50s got Long COVID and was on his couch for a year. His son also got Long COVID. They both used the Gupta Program and were 80 to 90 percent recovered within three months. They got back to full recovery. The marathoner gradually got back to cycling and marathon running again.   [23:43] Ashok believes that a quarter to a half of the illnesses seen in a doctor’s office are illnesses of an overstimulated immune system. He lists examples of this type of illness. All of these conditions can be treated using this type of brain retraining approach.   [25:21] Ashok says children use the program along with their parents. Ashok is developing a program for parents to support their children while brain retraining. The Gupta Program is an online video program. In the children’s video, Ashok uses puppets.   [26:11] Everyone would like to change something, such as habits and limiting beliefs. Ashok tells how this program can help healthy people who would like to improve. As contrasted with psychotherapy, people are not just talking about what the problem is but are given tools to rewire their brains for the quality of life they want. Everybody can benefit from brain retraining.   [30:14] The brain is the master of all physiological responses. A recent study in Israel involved triggering inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in mice. Researchers then measured the electrical signature in the insular cortex and were able to use it to get the mice back to baseline. They were then able to recreate the IBD by applying the same electrical signature to the insula.   [32:24] Ashok notes that brain retraining starts with consciousness. Whatever level people want to work at is incorporated into the Gupta Program.   [33:53] This is becoming a mainstream idea. Functional medicine practitioners, alternative practitioners, acupuncturists, and coaches are recommending the Gupta Program as part of their practice. Some practitioners are recommending starting with the Gupta Program before working on the physiological level.   [34:18] The number one challenge Ashok has from patients and support groups is, “Oh, you’re saying it’s in the mind!” The brain and body are one system, one human being, that requires this holistic, integrated response. There are ways of accessing the unconscious brain that are beyond medicines or surgery but are brain rehabilitation techniques and building new neurons.   [35:44] Ashok has published medical papers and studies, including a clinical audit of patient recovery levels within one year. Ninety-two percent of patients improved. They published the first randomized control trial on a neuroplasticity program for fibromyalgia. In eight weeks there was a 40% drop in fibromyalgia scores in the study group but a 0% drop in the control group.   [37:01] The biggest challenge with any self-directed program is commitment and continuing to do it. Retraining your brain is not as easy as popping a pill. It requires daily exercise and daily commitment.   [38:21] Ashok comments about a possible nega

Today, Sachin discusses the vagus nerve with Dr. Navaz Habib. Dr. Habib has written the book, Activate Your Vagus Nerve. He continues to learn about the vagus nerve and its role in supporting the parasympathetic nervous system that leads to healing inflammation and associated ills. Sachin and Navaz cover the differences between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems and how to optimize the parasympathetic nervous system by stimulating the vagus nerve. Listen in to learn of some great tools for activating the vagus nerve in your patients or yourself.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Today, Sachin is speaking with Dr. Navaz Habib. Sachin introduces Navaz and thanks him for joining the podcast.   [2:08] Navaz credits Sachin for bringing him into the realm of functional medicine.   [2:44] In 2019, Navas released his book, Activate Your Vagus Nerve. He received a lot of supportive feedback. Since that time, Navaz has learned that he knows very little about the vagus nerve. The more you think you know, the more you realize you don’t. Navaz has been learning more every day.   [3:33] Navaz has learned that the vagus nerve … controls things in the same way that other nerves do. But it is … bridging the gap … in … understanding how the body functions … and how the brain has a way to control and support how the immune system and inflammation function within the body.   [5:01] Our lifestyles have changed over the last 50 years. We’ve gone from being outdoors taking care of our land to sitting indoors, eating processed food. Our bodies haven’t had the ability to adapt to these changes of being indoors, less active, and constantly comfortable. That has created an opportunity for our bodies to be primed for an inflammatory response.   [6:45] The autonomic nervous system sends signals from the brain to the body and from the body to the brain. The brain sends signals to areas of the body that need attention and shifts our state in either a sympathetic or parasympathetic direction. The sympathetic side of the nervous system is “fight or flight.” The parasympathetic side is the “rest and digest (& recovery)” system.   [8:44] The parasympathetic nervous system, mediated by the vagus nerve, is in control when we are not under direct threat. The vagus nerve is the only nerve that goes to essentially every organ within the thorax and abdomen. It dictates where the blood will flow and what state our body is in. That drives inflammation.   [9:59] Eighty-one percent of the information on the vagus nerve is afferent (sensory) information from the body to the brain. The sensory information is not the same as the traditional five senses.   [11:01] Sachin compares stimulating the vagus nerve to pushing a button that heals every cell, organ, tissue, and system in your body simultaneously. It’s too good to believe because it’s simple.   [11:42] Navaz explains why we need to shift our state to parasympathetic. We are in a state of sympathetic overdrive all the time, stimulated by our screens for hours on end. We need our gaze to be wider, as it would be out in nature if we were farming or walking. One way to shift your state is to go outside and shift your gaze. Get off your computer.   [12:42] Your breath also influences your state. Are you breathing effectively or ineffectively? Put one hand on your belly and one on your chest. Take a deep breath. Which hand moves first? They should both move, but the hand on your belly should move first. That’s a sign that you’re breathing using your diaphragm and you are likely not in a state of stress.   [13:34] If you’re stressed out and you’re in an emotional situation, somebody will say, ‘Take a deep breath,’ and that will help you get into a calmer zone where you start to think a little bit more clearly and that’s shifting you to parasympathetic. Rest, digest, recover and think more clearly during that state. Breath is the key to all of this.   [15:45] Research shows that you shouldn’t be either sitting or standing too long. Postural dysfunction will occur whether you are sitting for six hours or standing for six hours. Postural dysfunction creates local inflammation. The vagus nerve alerts the brain of that inflammation. Navaz gives his hypothesis that it’s best to shift between sitting and standing.   [17:27] Navaz offers ideas for stimulating the vagus nerve. Make breathing a little more challenging and teach yourself to breathe through your diaphragm even when you’re under stress. Gargling, humming, deep breathing exercises, anything that helps activate the vocal cords.   [17:54] Nineteen percent of the information flowing through the vagus nerve consists of motor signals flowing from the brain stem to muscles, such as the pharyngeal and laryngeal muscles that maintain a patent open airway in the back of the throat and tensioning and lengthening the vocal cords to create pitch and tone.   [19:03] Navaz explains why you might shed tears when you gargle, and how that demonstrates a parasympathetic state! He tells of the benefits of gargling. It creates hormetic stress and resilience.   [21:03] Laughing helps the function of the vagus nerve like gargling and it has a social aspect, as well. Social connection supports health.   [22:13] Texting and email have interfered with meeting people. Being in the room with people builds connection.   [24:04] Some people with health challenges need an extra push to stimulate their vagus nerve. Navaz uses tools such as the gammaCore Sapphire from ElectroCore to stimulate the vagus nerve electrically and significantly improve the pain from migraine and cluster headaches. Vagus nerve stimulation is often the missing piece to get inflammation down and under control.   [29:57] Navaz says the vagus nerve stimulation via the gammaCore SapphireTM is entirely pain-free. It’s very high-frequency and very low-voltage. It doesn’t create muscle contraction. However, if you have an implanted metal device such as a pacemaker or cervical spine implant, above the shoulders, this device is not recommended.   [31:49] The gammaCore SapphireTM has not been studied on children in research. The inventor of the device used it on his eight-year-old daughter for eczema with good results but it has not been studied.   [33:12] Navaz had an elite skater patient. She had had many falls, some resulting in concussions. She had suffered from eating disorders when young and came to Dr. Navaz with digestive issues, mild depression, and Hashimoto’s. Dr. Navaz tried the functional medicine approach and there were some small changes. The patient suffered another concussion.   [34:11] Dr. Navaz had her use the gammaCore SapphireTM during recovery. She noticed that this was the quickest she had ever rebounded from a head injury. She started noticing improvements in her digestion. Her pain was better. Her mood and her sleep shifted. She also came out of her depression. She credits all these changes to the healing of her inflammation.   [37:54] Dr. Navaz shares links for more information.   [38:39] Sachin thanks his friend Dr. Navaz Habib for joining the podcast today. Sachin recommends the book Activate Your Vagus Nerve and Navaz shares the link for it.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live gammaCore SapphireTM VagusNerveBook.com Activate Your Vagus Nerve: Unleash Your Body's Natural Ability to Heal, by Dr. Navaz Habib Oura Ring HRV   Dr. Navaz Habib Dr. Navaz Habib is the founder of Health Upgraded, an online Functional Medicine and Health Optimization clinic, working with high-performing professionals, athletes, and entrepreneurs to dig deeper and find the answers to what is holding back their health. He works with those who want to upgrade their health, allowing them to have a greater impact and serve more people. To learn more about the device go to: Gammacore.com   Connect with Dr. Navaz Habib: Website: Jaredyellin.com Get Dr. Habib's book: Vagusnervebook.com Connect with Dr. Habib: Website: Healthupgraded.com Facebook: Facebook.com/DrNavazHabib Instagram: Instagram.com/DrNavazHabib   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Today, Sachin speaks with Aron about some of the things you may wish you had known before starting your practice. They discuss determining the kind of practice you will have, how your offering may start small and then grow as you get more clients, and how as a practitioner, you are responsible to help as many people as you can, whether in a one-to-one setting or with a one-to-many offering. They discuss the discovery call, and how to get more of them. Listen in for thoughtful ideas on increasing your fun by increasing the number of people you help transform with your services.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Today, Sachin is speaking with Aron Choi, N.D. Sachin introduces Aron and thanks him for joining the podcast. Sachin and Aron both have coaching clients who tell them what they wish they had known before starting their practice.   [2:37] Aron always knew that he didn’t want to enter a conventional clinic setting. He was inspired by Dr. Masa, a trainer with the Seattle Mariners. He shadowed Dr. Masa to start his career. Next, he studied visceral manipulation with a mentor who charged cash.   [4:29] Then Aron joined Sachin’s mentorship. Aron started a micro practice and set up shop with patients and clients. That was the beginning of Aron’s practitioner journey.   [5:02] Aron struggled with finding a niche. He didn’t want to label patients by their conditions. He found that he liked working with people who are coachable, value health, and want to optimize their health. He wishes someone had told him that a niche is not a label or diagnosis. Sachin notes that it is rare for somebody to have only one problem or diagnosis.   [6:42] Sachin would go down a rabbit hole into a topic. He has evolved in the people he serves. At one time they were thyroid patients. Now he loves helping people solve problems he has solved for himself. He loves helping people find their self-worth. He loves making an impact. He loves coaching practitioners and other people who think outside the box as Sachin does.   [9:23] Sachin discusses one-to-one and one-to-many program structures. One-to-one programs are a good way to start a practice. One-to-many programs work for coaching. One-to-infinity programs work for digital or printed courses and training. As you acquire skills, you might transform from one-to-one to one-to-many.”   [11:30] Sachin gives an example of how a practitioner can be flexible in the delivery of services, such as by customizing a solution that meets a client’s budget. Sachin never let anyone walk out the door without being of some level of value to them. Sachin explains how supplements, products, or certain lab tests could fit within a budget and move the client in the right direction.   [14:29] Aron wishes he had known all that in the beginning! But eventually, he realized that an initial consult and a review of findings was an option. As you go, you can adjust your rates on your experience and as you get busier.   [16:00] A week from now, it will be a week from now. That person could be a week healthier because of you, or a week in the wrong direction, because they didn’t work with you. We do our clients a huge disservice by only giving them few and narrow options. It’s our responsibility to be flexible to their needs. Be creative and have fun.   [18:04] When people say “not now,” they may be saying “not now” to your program; they might not be saying “no” to you or to how you approach their problem. Keep moving them forward as long as you can be of value to them. But don’t say “yes” to someone you can’t help.   [20:38] The discovery call is similar to a test drive. It is not developing a treatment plan but discovering if the client will be a good fit. Should you offer a discovery call that is free or paid? Sachin explains how to decide. He tells about booking 30 complimentary calls from one webinar by saying, “We have a solution for everybody, regardless of your budget.”   [24:44] What if people don’t show up for their complimentary call? Introduce intentional friction into the process. Perhaps have people fill out a questionnaire before the call. Aron cautions practitioners to set their boundaries. Don’t be surprised into diagnostic mode before getting into an agreement to work together. Don’t undersell your value. Don’t over-accommodate.   [29:40] Aron shares the experience of his first virtual consult. He and the patient were both pleased with the convenience of consulting by video. People pay for convenience.   [31:21] You might charge for the discovery call and apply it to the cost of the program. You will get clients and customers who are serious about working with you.   [32:21] Aron didn’t realize that in the beginning, you need to grease the slide by doing what you need to get more people coming for your services. In the beginning, you need volume. You take a lot of swings to get your first home run! You don’t hit a grand slam every time you bat. You get on base. You hit enough singles and you get the run. Do a lot more to create more opportunities.   [34:42] What it means to be numb to the numbers. We don’t do it for the numbers, we do it for the number of lives that are transformed. Those can be micro-transformations or major transformations. However many are on a call, and the goal is to leave the people better than you found them. Then the focus becomes to do it in a way to have fun while you transform people.   [37:02] You could offer a service where you give a holistic and second opinion to whatever health challenge someone is having, at no cost. If someone is happy with a solution they had been proposed, they wouldn’t be looking for a second opinion. Keep visible. Find a way to stay connected with people. Join communities and interest groups.   [40:08] Aron learned recently that the first draft is always messy and ugly. The beauty comes when you edit. Create the first draft. You have to have something to edit. You will evolve. Building a business is never done.   [42:38] Sachin thanks Aron for sharing his journey, insights, and his story of getting where he is today.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live The Four Agreements   Aron Choi, N.D. Bio:Dr. Aron Choi, ND - Naturopathic Physician and Perfect Practice Advisor for The Perfect Practice Mentorship.   You will often find Aron co-hosting live trainings with Sachin, guiding prospective mentees through our enrollment process, and working with the team to make the Perfect Practice vision become a reality.   Connect with Aron: Website: Aronchoi.com Facebook: Facebook.com/DrAronChoi YouTube: Aron Choi, ND LinkedIn: LinkedIn.com/in/aronchoi More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Today, Sachin speaks with Jared Yellin, a serial entrepreneur who is highly passionate about making the world a better place, and who follows his dreams, no matter where they take him. Jared is bold and speaks his truth. He inspires Sachin and thousands of other people. Jared has been of service to Sachin’s community for many years.   Learn about a totally disruptive way to make the world a better place through technology with Jared and Sachin. If you've ever had a great idea but lacked the technical skills to make it a reality, this interview is for you!   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Today, Sachin is speaking with Jared Yellen. Sachin introduces Jared and thanks him for joining the podcast.   [3:00] Jared realized at an early age he was “perpetually and utterly unemployable” so he went all in on entrepreneurship. He’s a non-technical tech founder. He is not an engineer. He knows how to write direct-response marketing copy and he knows how to sell. Doing everything he could possibly do wrong, he built a B2B SaaS platform and it’s a pretty successful company.   [3:53] Jared outsourced his software development to a Boston, MA firm for $750K over 10 months. Jared self-funded it. It ended up taking over two years and over $2 million before he could launch. Then he learned about technical debt, from engineers cutting corners and making bad decisions, or debt. With enough debt, the project will implode. His project imploded.   [4:45] Jared still felt there was a need in the market for his solution, but he learned not to outsource early-stage software development. He started building a team. He hired a CTO with national and international experience who lived in Jared’s town. They built a software development team in the U.S., Canada, and India. The CTO was originally from India.   [5:24] The India team was made up of contract workers, which put the workers at a disadvantage in India for being able to bank, so they kept leaving the team for full-time work. So Jared opened a company in India in 2017 to hire the team. He used the company as a magnet for good talent.   [5:49] That company is SYNDUIT, a marketing software company for small business owners, now with tens of thousands of paying users, across 30 industries.   [6:14] Around two years ago, Jared realized he was obsolete at SYNDUIT. He was proud of the milestone but he wondered what to do next, at age 35 with a young family. He decided this next chapter had to be his moonshot. He had to do something that would shake up the world or go down trying.   [6:50] Jared then had a “calling” moment. The calling was to do what he had just done at SYNDUIT, 10 thousand more times over the next 10 years. He didn’t know what it meant but he knew not to negotiate against a calling, but just go with it. He didn’t ask questions.   [7:13] Jared called up his CTO from SYNDUIT, and his Director of Operations, Katie, and talked the idea over with them, to build, scale, and sell 10 thousand tech companies over the next 10 years. They said they were in, because it was Jared, but they had no idea what he was talking about, so he explained it to them.   [7:41] Jared planned to launch a tech ecosystem, where entrepreneurs from around the world can pitch their tech ideas in the “napkin sketch” concept phase. Everything that exists today started as an idea. Jared wanted to hear ideas from around the world pitched in a safe environment.   [8:22] What Jared was looking for was the right person with the right idea, in the right market, and with the right business model. When those four things are present, he would co-found a company with that entrepreneur. They would both have equity in the company so their values would be aligned. They would build the company, everything included, at cost.   [8:53] About 97% of the initial costs for the minimum viable company would be provided at cost in India by SYNDUIT. Jared launched Project10K committed to building, scaling, and selling 10 thousand tech companies over the next ten years, while ensuring that every entrepreneur he says yes to has the support and infrastructure to achieve product-market fit.   [9:26] Product-market fit is defined as having $10,000 a month in recurring revenue. If you achieve that milestone, you can raise capital, make strategic alliances, and find other opportunities. In their first two weeks, Project10K founded seven companies. It gave them the opportunity to tune the processes. The team scaled from 12 people to over 100 people.   [9:58] About 15 months ago, they stepped on the gas and have not looked back. Thousands of entrepreneurs have gone through this process from a variety of nations. Project10K co-founded around 150 companies in the first year. Project10K does a lot of testing on the front end, so by the time they say yes, there’s a high probability of the outcome of build, scale, and sell.   [11:01] The goal is to sell viable businesses within 18 to 24 months of founding. It’s working, and Jared’s certainty about their ability to execute is 11/10. They have a very strong leadership team, a profound ecosystem of co-founders, investors, and overall strategic people, and a ton of attention from athletes, celebrities, politicians, family offices, tech incubators, and foundations.   [11:42] The reason Project10K has so much attention is the impact they have had. They’re democratizing and decentralizing the tech industry. Their portfolio is diverse. There are more women ad founders than men. Most ethnicities are represented. The youngest founder is 11 and the oldest is 77. There are high-school dropouts and Ivy League graduates.   [12:13] Project10K is actualizing dreams. People have dream tech ideas but they don’t know where to go with them. Project1K provides a working home for them.   [12:49] Jared stands for leveling the playing field. Project10K enables people at the idea stage to have a business home. The process starts with them pitching their idea. Founders whose ideas have the most viability are invited to due diligence. If Project10X sees enough potential, it will co-found a company with the entrepreneur.   [13:27] Jared invites Sachin to be an ambassador for Project10K for his large audience of entrepreneurs. Jared invites any listener with a B2B or B2C SaaS idea to go to Project10K.com/Sachin/ and schedule your complimentary pitch. This is a free offer to Sachin’s listeners only to pitch their idea to Project10K. It’s a five-minute pitch to the team.   [14:39] A video, a manual, and a presentation template where you plug in your idea prepare you to make the pitch. There’s no app idea that’s too early. Don’t do market research, just pitch it. If the team sees a viable idea, they will invite you to due diligence where research is done.   [15:24] Project10K also democratizes investing. You don’t have to be accredited to invest in these private opportunities, thanks to an arrangement with Wefunder.com. Find out how to invest $1,000 or more by going to Wefunder.com/Project10K/. Watch the video and read about what Project10K does.   [17:30] Sachin loves this opportunity for investors, whether or not they are accredited, and that Project10K is inclusive of every entrepreneur’s ideas.   [19:18] Jared shares the story of Crystal Morrison, Ph.D., now a non-technical tech founder. When her child was born on the spectrum, she put her career on pause. She wanted to be a full-time mother to her child with needs. She found that being a liaison between all his therapists was exhausting though. That led to the idea of Meerkat Village, launching very soon.   [20:48] Meerkat Village is a platform where a family that has a child with special needs can set up a village to support that child. OT, speech behaviorists, grandparents, and others collaborate in the app to share resources, documentation, food trackers, and more to support that child in one location. It’s a new category of software, village-driven care. There are a lot of use cases.   [21:37] Jared shares another story. Dr. Stephanie, a dentist, wanted to know what was draining time and money in her office. She talked it over with her staff. They told her it was missed appointments that don’t reschedule. She discussed it with other dentists. Between 7 and 12 percent of revenue is lost by appointments that are missed and not rescheduled.   [22:46] The new app goes to the waitlist and starts sending out text messages to the waitlist any time an appointment is canceled. In the first month of Dr. Stephanie testing this software, she recouped $7,000 of revenue she would have lost.   [23:31] What Project10K focuses on is not building exponential change, it’s making an incremental difference. They make practical solutions to everyday challenges in people’s personal or professional lives. There are tens of thousands of these challenges across every industry. Jared mentions some of the industries using Project10K, including wellness.   [24:59] Project10K’s portfolio is very diverse. They look for ideas that have a financial model attached. The whole thesis is subscriptions. If you start up and get 10 users to pay you $100 a month, you’re going to make it. If it’s a free solution, you have to sell to investors, and that’s a  hard sell. With a business model, you can build it quickly in the market.   [26:22] This is a new standard of entrepreneurship. Jared realizes this project is bigger than he is. All industries, to date, have been disrupted. Innovation comes in and creates a new level of efficiency. Entrepreneurship has had a one to two percent success rate for thousands of years. Project10K is disrupting the model of entrepreneurship by providing an ecosystem of support.   [28:48] Every company in the Project10K ecosystem is there in service of each other. This allows them to bring entrepreneurship from a one to two percent success rate to a 40 to 60 percent success rate and a 100% transformation rate. Even if the startup is not sold, the individual will transform. Jared wants entrepreneurs to have it all, includ

In today’s podcast episode, we’re doing something totally different. My dear friend, Elaine Glass, joined us in our mentorship call and we talked about getting quiet. We did something different from what we normally do and we asked all of our audience members and mentorship clients to tune in while in nature, on their headphones, with no cameras, and no chat, and allow themselves to reflect inward. During this conversation, my camera was off, Elaine’s camera was off, and I had my eyes closed for most of the conversation so that I could go a little bit deeper, be less distracted, be more focused, and be much more present. It was such a profound experience for me, I almost want to do all my meetings with my camera off and my eyes closed because I felt it was so much more powerful for me and I got a lot out of it. So what I decided to do is share this very special moment with you, our podcast listeners, with all of you out there who are trying to biome the best version of you, who are trying to listen to the voice that is inside every one of us. To do that requires a certain level of quiet. There is so much noise in our world and so many distractions. With this episode, I’m going to invite you to do the very same: put on your headphones, lay down in bed if you need to, spend some time in nature, sit back, relax, get quiet, and pay attention to the dialog and the conversation. Be present, and in the words of Ram Das, “Be Here Now.” Enjoy this episode.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to a special episode of Perfect Practice. This episode was done with Elaine Glass and a mentorship audience tuning in while in nature, with no cameras and no chat. Sachin had his eyes closed for most of the conversation so he could go deeper with less distraction and more focus. He invites you to do the same.   [4:58] Sachin invites his dear friend, Elaine Glass, to the digital virtual stage of the mentorship call. Sachin tells how he and Elaine met through Michael Fishman, Founder of Consumer Health Summit (CHS). Elaine helps create the energy at CHS.   [6:07] Elaine is the author of Get Quiet: A Woman’s Simple Path to Knowing Who You Are, Loving it, and Living It.This episode applies to males and females. When we are constantly being distracted, being able to focus and get quiet is a superpower that we must work on developing. Elaine shares the wisdom she gained in overcoming obstacles and challenges.   [7:41] Elaine was in dentistry for 27 years. She transitioned into being a sage and guide to help people connect with their souls. At that time a friend asked her what she had learned after all those dental patients and getting to know their lives. It came to her that people just need to get quiet. She also needed to get quiet. It has been a decade-long journey developing a method.   [9:21] Sachin talks about the importance of practicing getting quiet.   [10:20] Elaine calls her dental office job her life class. She learned about the human condition and the mental/emotional connection to the physical and she started to connect the dots in her life. She had been struggling with autoimmune disorders, a very difficult marriage, and two small children.   [11:09] She transitioned out of the marriage and became a single mom. This brought up fear. When we are afraid, we speed up. That was a problem. The noise in her life got a grasp on her. She asked herself how she could lessen the fear. She realized she wanted to help people with their lives more than with the health of their teeth. She transitioned into being a guide.   [12:15] There was a lot of uncertainty and a lot of struggle with creating a platform, being an entrepreneur, and betting on herself. She went to conferences. She experienced financial struggles. There were a lot of obstacles to creating a new identity. The more she saw her problems the more she was afraid. She started to slow down, and relax into her brilliance.   [14:01] Being quiet comes when you are afraid to express yourself. Getting quiet is about those moments when you connect to a greater energy for strength, solutions, and answers. It’s when you access the greatness within yourself, even if it looks crazy to others. When we get quiet, we access spectacular things and begin to know who we truly are.   [15:50] Sachin recalls a conversation with his four-year-old son, who was thinking about “nothing.” At first, Sachin was triggered, thinking his son was deflecting the question. Then he realized his son was not focused on any thought, he was just being fully present in the world around him.   [17:18] The skill of getting quiet starts with honoring your life at the greatest and deepest level. It’s about what Sachin’s son was doing, being present. The greatest gift Elaine gives to herself and the world is to sit still and be present in her presence. She sees leisure as a valid human activity. This is contrary to most people’s upbringing, which leads to burnout.   [19:31] Getting quiet is about waking up to the life that you’re living now, honoring your life, and trusting the voice you hear, admitting where you are, feeling that deeply, because nothing can transform unless you deeply feel. That’s when you engage inldifferently. Those are the steps Elaine began to take early on.   [20:30] Sachin and Elaine discuss Vipassanā retreats. On one of these 10-day silent retreats, you are completely disconnected from the outer world and you go inwards. While a 10-day disconnection is extreme, you can practice it in micro ways in daily life.   [21:49] Elaine outlines her daily method to get quiet. It begins with your breath. Get back to a natural condition wherever possible. Connect with the breath of nature, the universe, a higher power, or God, matching your breath with that energy.   [23:07] Elaine uses a labyrinth (not a maze) with a certain pathway where you walk to the center and then walk out. Start at the mouth of the labyrinth. The center of the labyrinth is your soul. Getting there puts you in a state of tremendous self-love. Elaine talks about guidance to know what to do on the path.   [25:14] When you get to the center and unite with your soul, it’s like crossing a bridge and you can never go back to the way you thought or the way you were. Everything changes. Something clicks in your brain and you’re a different person. When Elaine did this, she developed an unwillingness to deal with things that just didn’t matter as much but do what she wanted.   [26:44] Everything changed for Elaine when she got to the center. People that she helped to take this path, their lives have changed, too. Sachin quoted Wayne Dyer, “When we change the way we look at things, the things we look at change.” Our perception is a powerful influencer of our reality.   [27:34] Elaine has helped many people walk this path as a guide and sage, she facilitates their walk. She talks about one woman who was very confused by the concept of the labyrinth. It was new. She had trouble surrendering to the experience. But she had so much pain, she was ready to do something and she trusted Elaine. Elaine had her walk the ancient path of the labyrinth.   [29:39] When people walk to the center, on their own, they feel an energetic shift within themselves. The woman knew something major had happened and she began to cry. She came out and they sat down. She shared her experience. She had seen herself as ugly but now she felt so beautiful. It’s one of Elaine’s favorite experiences.   [31:08] Sachin says when we see who we are, we see our inner beauty and we vibrate at a different frequency. When we are confident, present, and whole, the energy field around us changes, and the way people feel in our presence changes. We are attractive. Sachin wants this for as many people as possible. You can Google and walk a labyrinth close to you.   [33:01] Sachin has never walked a labyrinth, so he plans to take the opportunity with a client with this new knowledge he has. The labyrinth that changed Elaine’s life was located within half a mile of her home for over 20 years and she never realized it. She finally went there in search of answers and for an escape from all the entrepreneurial noise. She needed direction.   [34:07] Since the first time, each time Elaine gets to the center of the labyrinth, she hears a message from a very clear voice. One time she heard a line from a Michael Jackson song that said, ”You are not alone, I am here with you.” She got back to her car, turned on the radio, and the song was playing. Elaine has many examples of synchronicity that confirmed the messages.   [35:18] Elaine is here today at this point in her life because she had trusted those messages she received in labyrinths and she had taken time to get quiet and receive them.   [36:10] Elaine tells how to distinguish between the constant chatter in your mind and a guiding message. It is through this process that you can get this clear tuning in. When you hear that voice, it is just pure love, like a mother’s love. The overthinking mind is not very loving. This method is about how to get to that voice of love, the voice that is our self-love.   [37:08] You get to the self-loving voice by clearing out what weighs us down, whether the environment, our bodies, or our minds. You begin to have all these things just fall away until you’re a lightness of being when you can access this beautiful, loving voice.   [37:55] Elaine says she received a message about eight energy points in our bodies that shift the genomics of one’s body. She immediately thought it was crazy talk but then thought, if you’re not thinking crazy, you’re not thinking big enough. She thought this was big. She started channeling genomics, which she confirmed with geneticist Dr. David Sinclair of Harvard.   [39:52] Elaine channeled eight bony parts of the body that she says are energy points that can shift the genomics of the body. That corresponds with the eight paths of the labyrinth.   [42:06] The eight energy points are the top of the head, the chest and heart region, the abdominal region (the womb area

Where do our relationship and understanding of money come from? How has it shaped who we are today and the decisions we make? How does our money mindset impact our practice and our business success? There are just some of the questions that my friend, Garrett Gunderson, and I discussed during our time together. If you’re open to a radically new perspective on money and how you can use it to transform yourself personally, you’re going to love this interview. Here’s some of what we covered: What is money? Where does our money mindset come from? What shapes our relationship with money? How does money affect our relationships? What are other ways to measure success at home and in business aside from money? What are some of the biggest money mistakes small business owners/practitioners make? What inspired you to do standup? Where’s a good place for us to invest our time and money? What’s more valuable, time or money? What’s some business advice you wish you’d gotten when you were just starting? For those of us with children, what are tools you can share with us to shape their money mindset towards abundance? What’s a piece of advice that you wish you had taken?   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Sachin welcomes and introduces his friend, Garrett Gunderson.   [1:12] Garrett is profoundly intelligent and funny and in this episode, he takes a topic that many of us have challenges with and make it enlightening and entertaining. Sachin welcomes Garrett and introduces him. Garrett turned 44 on the day of this recording!   [3:47] Sachin shares Garrett’s bio.   [6:12] Garrett tells about his Spiderman adventure with his two kids in his neighborhood.   [7:11] Garrett has an upcoming book that he has been working on for seven years. It is intended to take you on a journey of engagement to shape how we look at money and finance. Garrett believes it is time for a new conversation around money and this book will start it. The title of the new book is Money Unmasked.   [9:32] Money is a tool of efficiency. It is a snapshot that represents the value you’ve created up until this time. That could include luck. For most, it represents the energy that you’ve put out into the world because you’ve either served someone, solved a problem, or added value. It’s not why you’re valuable. It does not dictate what you are capable of doing. [10:04] Money doesn’t reflect your potential nor determine your destiny but it’s a way that we can tap into other people’s abilities to be more efficiently connected to what we’re doing.   [10:43] Garrett shares his thoughts about investing. We want our investments to grow, but what happens when it’s more than we can handle? What if you buy too many pieces of real estate or get involved in too many cryptocurrencies? The less related we are to our investments, the more risk we invite of not being clear about how we deliver value.   [12:01] You connect to people in relationships without money being a determining factor. See each other for the moment that we are in, not for the things we have. We struggle because we think that our value is in our money. People pose that they have more than they do, which creates jealousy and envy.   [13:59] Don’t connect your happiness to markets. Make investments in your skillset, and the best essence of your life. Investments can make you long-sighted or short-sighted. Everything in-between is where the joy and fulfillment come in. Garrett could buy real estate, but he only buys real estate that he can utilize. He uses his money intentionally. He never wants to retire.   [19:03] Garrett makes investments in himself as a human being for the connections he can have with other human beings because of that. He doesn’t want to invest in mutual funds because he’s not connected to them.   [20:24] Garrett asks questions to get to the best understanding of things. When people tell him “it’s science,” he asks what studies they are citing and where the science comes from. Better questions lead to better relationships and better learning that doesn’t come from the classroom. The classroom does not teach much about money. Garrett talks about the Series 65 test.   [22:47] No one is smarter than you in your soul purpose, in your values, in your abilities, in your passions, where you are at your best. Don’t do what everyone else is doing. What everyone is doing hasn’t led to sustainability, peace, and prosperity.   [23:35] Why Garrett is contrarian.   [24:45] Garrett tells how his views changed at age 18 when he went with a friend to teach English in South Korea. He found out that people are people, around the world. He learned about propaganda. He started asking different questions to start understanding what governments and financial institutions might do to control people.   [29:23] Garrett’s views on money and finance developed when he began an internship selling insurance and mutual funds at age 19. He asked questions about the RRSP and learned about the downsides. He kept asking questions and then wrote Killing Sacred Cows about the nine financial myths people can’t detect.   [32:23] We have four money personas. A lot of our money mindset comes from scarcity. Misers hold on to what they have. Conservatives accumulate for the future. Strivers earn more to have more status. High Rollers are addicted to opportunity. They all come from scarcity thinking that there’s only so much to go around. It is consumer conditioning. It started with Edward Bernays.   [33:13] Edward Bernays is the father of modern consumerism, which is a zero-sum game and scarcity. Childhood trauma has an effect and if we don’t address childhood trauma, we don’t mature in our money mindset. Garrett talks about his latest book, Disrupting Sacred Cows.   [34:27] Money affects our relationships. Garrett uses his marriage as an example. Once he and his wife understood their money personas, in 2008, they have not had a financial fight since. In their first year of marriage, they fought about finance over anything else. When we don’t understand the money factors that move us, we make bad decisions.   [36:02] Money affects our health. It’s a chronic stressor. When we focus on money we are not present or at peace.   [37:09] When people say they cannot afford their healthcare, they mean they are not worthy of it. Ask how you can afford it. Break it down into price, cost, and value. Garrett elaborates. If people don’t take care of their health now, they will spend far too much time in hospitals or decrepit. He uses the birth of his son, and a defect he had, as an example.   [40:15] Chapter 7 of Garrett’s new book talks about reclaiming time. Time is not money. Energy is money. If you are overworked or depressed, you will be able to deliver less value in the marketplace. Time is a measurement. Garrett explains using time for your soul purpose.   [42:54] In 2006, Garrett lost a business partner, Les McGuire, in a plane crash. For the next four months, he worked more but got less done because he was exhausted, trying to do it all himself. Receive support from other people instead of trying to do everything on your own. People are always willing to help. Sachin offers a recipe for being rich. If we were simply content, most problems would be solved.   [46:13] Garrett reflects on the advice he received but didn’t follow from Mike Sloan about ambition. He ended up doing things he didn’t want to do and was busier than he wanted to be because he was too ambitious for money. He should have listened to him. His ambitious past behaviors have ramifications in his marriage today.   [48:25] Garrett suggests how we can teach our children about mindset. He is teaching his children about purpose, career, fulfillment, and leisure; things that usually get pushed aside because of money. His oldest son is filming it and making a production, called Schooled. To end each lesson there is a fun purposeful activity to add structure to the teaching.   [51:58] Instead of defaulting to telling your children, “We can’t afford this,” ask, “Is it worth it?” Or say, “It’s not a priority right now. If you guys want to be a part of it, we might match the earnings.” Words cast spells. A lot of people are under the spell of scarcity and consumption, so break the spell. Garrett has conversations about service to others with his children.   [53:41] Garrett gives his advice for closing out 2022 and moving into 2023. There are millions of problems in this world and they should begin at the end of your driveway, not in your home. Don’t get caught up in an economy that’s impossible to predict. Focus on yourself. on your self-care, and on how you can serve more people, consistent with who you are.   [55:25] Learn more about Garrett at GarrettGunderson.com. Take the Money Persona Quiz at GarrettGunderson.com/quiz to predict what your bad money behavior might be or look at how to get in a better spot with your qualities. He invites you to come to his comedy shows or buy his books.   [56:28] Sachin thanks Garrett for being on the podcast to share his insights with practitioners. Our money mindset gives us permission to invest in ourselves. Sachin thanks you for tuning in today.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live MindShare365 Genius Network Rich Dad, Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!, by Robert T. Kiyosaki The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy, by Thomas J. Stanley and William T. Danko Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University: This Is Where It All Begins, by Dave Ramsey The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness, by Dave Ramsey Money Unmasked, by Garrett Gunderson (coming soon)! Series 65 RRSP 401(k) Edward Bernays Bitcoin   A little bit about me, Garrett: I’m a modern-day “renaissance man,” well, maybe. An Inc. 500 founder of a financial firm and amateur barista. A rookie fly fisherman and Wall Street Journal #1 Bestseller. A public speaker who’s delivered hundreds of keynotes, and a mediocre gu

Sachin Patel interviews Estie Starr about organic marketing. If you hate marketing, the things you hate about it are the things Estie Starr hates about it, manipulation, being salesy, and inauthenticity. Estie explains in great detail how an organic marketing framework allows you to reach your target client by being excited by what you do, the value it offers people, and how it can help them. Her “crazy dream” is building a consulting firm for small business owners, and she tells how she has succeeded in it since 2011. Her dream is to help everyone with their dream. Estie says you’re trying so hard not to sell because you don’t want to manipulate anybody, you don’t want to be salesy, that you are withholding your gift from people who need you! Listen in for a remarkable conversation about the marketing strengths you already have, and how you can reach more people in your target audience with more impact than an ad buy would do. Estie offers you a gift in the links below.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Sachin welcomes and introduces his friend, Estie Starr.   [1:15] Estie is a marketer extraordinaire. She helps people with marketing who hate marketing. Sachin welcomes Estie and reads her bio.   [3:23] Estie was born and raised in New York. She started marketing at age 7 and started her first profitable business at age 10. She went to a business school in New York where she got a degree in marketing. Estie left a CIO job she loved in 2011 when a new executive took over her team and demoted her to his secretary.   [5:08] Estie had “this crazy dream” to build a consulting firm for small business owners. She built a company to six figures of profit in two years with no ad spending. Her specialty is an organic marketing strategy where you don’t spend money on ads. By 2019 they were staffed in seven time zones with clients on six continents. Her dream was to help everyone with their dream.   [6:34] Estie wanted to teach marketing at a college level but she dropped out of a master’s program because it would have decreased her income. Colleges don’t let you teach without a master’s degree. So she taught entrepreneurship in high schools and opened a business school online in 2019. Estie has faced discrimination for not having the “look” of a businessperson.   [9:37] The most common marketing mistake is trying to be everywhere and do everything. Don’t try to do all the things major companies do with their huge marketing budgets. They’re already successful You are just starting. Choose the path that works with your assets.   [13:35] You should be going after a clear path to conversions. The goal of marketing is the creation and communication of the value of your product or service to your target customer or client to convince them to buy. Your marketing creates value. Your messaging communicates value. You want to be talking to the right people and convince them to buy.   [16:09] Estie shows the difference between manipulating people to buy something against their will and explaining to them why they might want to get something and how it could help them. Estie shares a case study from a student. Selling is being enthusiastic about your offer of value to someone who sees the value leading to an exchange of value in return.   [19:09] “Bro marketing” may be authentic to the person doing it, but if you try to buy their formula and it’s not authentic to you, it falls flat. Estie has a snow cone stand analogy. Marketing that works has at least 10 moving parts. You might have only one. Estie lists some of the conditions that are necessary for your marketing to get conversions. Be authentic to yourself.   [23:00] Estie was asked to critique a website recently, but the person wanting the critique had no idea if a website would work for his service. Estie talked him into calling the first 20 people in his target group. If you can’t sell something on the phone, you can’t sell it online.   [24:35] Start by making sure you’re clear on your value proposition and your ideal target. You can’t market before you know them. Find your SWON strength: Speaking, Writing, One-on-one, and Networking. As a business owner, you have one or more of these skills strongly. If your skill is speaking, look for where you can speak. If you’re a writer, write. Leverage existing audiences.   [28:23] One-on-ones have the hardest challenge in getting a mass audience. First, sit down with your immediate network, especially any who have access to your audience. Tell them specifically whom you want to get in front of. If they know them, they will connect you to them. Estie shares a couple of examples of how this works.   [31:55] You are trying to reach your BEEs: the Body, Eyes, and Ears of your Audience. Where are they physically? What are they looking at? Ears are referrals. Your best referrals are the people in your world. Who are they dealing with? Your Queen BEEs are the organizations, institutions, and individuals that your BEEs flock to.   [36:19] Estie says if you are unwilling to share what you do because you don’t want to manipulate anybody or be salesy, you are withholding your gift from people who need it. You’ve got to know how to present your value offer. You need to be paid for your time or you can’t dedicate your life to your practice. Consider talking with people as a first date. Look your best.   [39:15] Estie offers a free three-day marketing success challenge on her website EstieStarr.com/FreeGift. That’s a great next step. If you get on a call with Estie, she will explore an offer with you, according to your budget and your ability. She has offers from hundreds to tens of thousands of dollars, depending on the scale and scope of what the company needs.   [40:06] Estie tells about a testimonial she received the day of this podcast.   [42:36] Estie cites the law of attraction and says if you’re out of alignment, you’re going to attract people who are out of alignment as well, and then you’re going to wonder why.   [43:18] Estie’s program has 12 steps she explains in terms of a flower. These include core branding concept, vision/mission, pitch, unique selling proposition, target audience, the problem you solve, positioning, product, price, promotion, graphical branding, and sales process.   [48:36] Estie explains how you establish a sales process that builds a self-sustaining sales cycle, which is the essence of an organic marketing strategy.   [49:13] Sachin invites everyone to get the gift from Estie’s website to reach more people in an impactful way so the world gets healthier and happier. Marketing doesn’t have to be difficult. Estie talks about the wrong sales process. People are interested, they come in, and then you run a sales prevention strategy! Make sure your tech works if you use tech.   [51:30] Sachin shares a case study of his events. An event that had a 10K register didn’t have as good an ROI as an event that had a 3K register because the event with 3K had an offer that was articulated and presented much more clearly and built up a rapport.   [52:28] Sachin encourages you to go back and listen again to the frameworks presented in this episode, take notes, and check your marketing strategy against it. Let these frameworks support you on your journey ahead.   [53:54] Estie shares her contact information. She notes that she has been absent from social media for a while, but the content is timeless, and she is coming back to post more.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live NASDAQ Tribe For Leaders Mastermind Kevin Thompson Entrepreneur LinkedIn Influencers Fiverr Upwork   More about today’s guest Estie Starr Estie Starr is an award-winning business consultant, exceptional marketing strategist, avid speaker, and the founder of Strand Consulting, a multinational business consultancy that’s focused on helping small business owners scale their businesses to make big profits. She believes very strongly that people can build professional and profitable businesses doing what they love, and she’s here to guide you so that you can bring your vision to life with a lot more ease.   Estie has been a certified professional coach for over 12 years and she pours all her experience into her work, making her services highly valuable and effective to anyone who seeks them. Through Strand Consulting, Estie can help small business owners around the world by providing business and marketing strategies that will allow them to launch and scale their businesses.   Links: Estiestarr.com/freegift On Instagram: @estiestarr On Linkedin: EstieStarr Podcast: Business Breakthrough Podcast with Estie Starr More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Sachin Patel interviews Christine Morgenstern Shin about her many facets from fitness, to nutrition, mental health, yoga therapy, and resilience. Christine opens up about her early-life challenges of depression, ADD, a serious mold reaction, Lyme disease, CIRS, and SIBO and how after 20 years, she pursued functional nutrition, Eastern traditional medicine, and yoga, which helped her to live actively. She covers the way she incorporates the polyvagal theory into yoga therapy to help her clients shift slowly to recovery. She describes her ideal client and the passion she has for bringing recovery to as many people as she can. Listen in for a greater understanding of her practice for wellness through yoga therapy and the polyvagal theory.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Sachin welcomes and introduces Christine Morgenstern Shin.   [1:17] Christine is a multi-faceted expert. She helps people with diet and nutrition, she helps people as a yoga therapy practitioner, and as a resilience coach.   [3:02] Christine went to college for exercise physiology. For 20-plus years, she lived with life-threatening depression, anxiety and ADHD. Fitness was her identity. When she got sick, she felt shame for not being able to heal herself.   [4:55] Christine experienced multiple symptoms. She went from being a cross-fitter to being stuck in a chair and crying. Christine tried seven or eight Allopathic doctors and specialists. Her diagnosis was IBS and she was referred to a psychologist.   [6:10] She took 20-plus years of pharmaceuticals for depression, anxiety, ADHD, sleep, and birth control. It was very shameful for her as a hard worker and high achiever. She found the world of functional medicine and went to school for functional nutrition. She also found the yoga movement, meditation, mindfulness, and visualization, which led her to yoga therapy.   [7:16] Christine started discovering polyvagal theory. She connected with a functional naturopathic doctor, a biological dentist, and a functional disease expert. Her symptoms were Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (CIRS) due to chronic mold. She was later diagnosed with late-stage Lyme disease and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO).   [9:00] Through Eastern traditions and functional medicine, Christine found a way to heal. She has moved her practice from working with healthy people for fitness to working with people who have chronic health conditions and mental health suffering, assisting with behavioral change.   [12:19] Christine had seen seven doctors who had not helped her. So she started researching alternatives and found functional medicine on the internet and took a class on functional nutrition. That class opened up doors for her. Wanting to regain her mobility brought her to yoga. She also tried acupuncture and other alternative modalities.   [13:54] In 2015, over the course of a year, Christine was able to titrate off all her pharmaceuticals. Disclaimer: Christine does not advocate for anyone to do that. It is just part of her story. She was open to going back to them if she needed to, but she has not. To Christine, it is a testament to how the body can heal itself if you go about it in the right way.   [15:05] Christine describes polyvagal theory as an updated map of your autonomic nervous system. The polyvagal theory was first described by Stephen Porges, Ph.D. Christine uses it to teach her clients to be active operators of their nervous systems. They have the tools to shift from a state that doesn’t serve them to a safer and more connected state.   [17:01] Christine discusses how our thoughts and beliefs work with the autonomic nervous system. Christine says the body speaks up to the brain more than vice versa. This is important if you have layered health conditions. To change your story, you first have to be able to change your state. Christine helps people to change their states to be ready to change their behavior.   [21:48] Christine describes three autonomic states as on a ladder: top, parasympathetic ventral vagal regulation (safety and connection), middle, sympathetic fight or flight (mobilization), and bottom, parasympathetic dorsal vagal response (immobilization). She explains the hierarchy between the states and how to move up the ladder. Christine notes examples of blended states.   [29:05] Christine presents a case study: A woman came to her with dissociations and didn’t know what her trauma was. Christine layered polyvagal theory with yoga therapy. The woman practiced multiple times per day. She came to acknowledge what the trauma was and was able to shift slowly to a higher state and understand the trauma isn’t her. She feels much freer.   [33:40] Christine created her practice with a lot of frustration. People don’t understand what functional nutritionists and yoga practitioners are. Talking about a scarcity mindset and an abundance mindset confuses people. Christine has a lot of education to get across to clients. Going through mentorship over the past year has been very refining for Christine.   [35:56] Sachin gives a quick shoutout to Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy for putting together the “Ask who, not how” mentorship concept. Our job is to solve patients’ problems and to hire the right people to solve our challenges. Sachin learns from the best and brings it back to share with the mentorship group.   [36:29] Christine calls the mentorship priceless. The framework and the tech solutions are excellent for her practice; she acknowledges how the framework has guided her in accomplishing her vision of rolling out hybrid programs and group programs to reach many people has improved her practice.   [38:57] Christine entered the mentorship without any list so she started from scratch. She’s building her email list. She’s done challenges, Lives, social media, Reels, and Master Classes since she started the mentorship. She has a platform to speak her truth. She enjoys being on a podcast and connecting with other practitioners. She’s at the point where she sees playing big.   [41:21] Christine’s ideal client is a high performer, recovering perfectionist, heavy thinker, overdoer, and a go-getter. You don’t have to be an executive, but a lot of her clients are. She has a lot of practitioners, creators, and entrepreneurs as clients. And supermoms. People tell her they didn’t know they had to slow down so they could go faster in a grounded way.   [42:12] Christine works with people that want to release what no longer serves them, whether it’s mental, emotional, energetic, or physical weight. It could be any of those realms. She specializes in mental health and the gut health brain. She works with people with hormone challenges or gut challenges as well.   [42:46] Christine has a group foundational program and a concierge one-on-one program. The group is a hybrid program with touchpoints. She has yoga therapy one-on-one sessions with people that want to dive into that more. The clients always come in for one thing but they leave with so much more, including mental/emotional resilience, and connecting with their true selves.   [44:01] Christine explains how she, a yoga therapist, differs from a yoga instructor. A yoga class mainly works on foundations and movement, layering in breath and mindfulness. Yoga therapy is more focused on the breath, with a little movement on the side. Looking at the person as a whole, we work on five “layers” of the body focusing on the health and well-being of the person.   [48:44] Christine shares her contact information.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live RadiantHeart.health Radiant Lifestyle Reset Polyvagal theory Sympathetic state Parasympathetic state Dr. Stephen Porges, Ph.D. Tony Robbins Neuroplasticity Ed Hollowell   More about today’s guest Christine Morgenstern Shin Christine is the founder of Radiant Heart, a lifestyle & longevity practice providing custom wellness support. She specializes in empowering high-performers and recovering perfectionists to holistically navigate chronic stress, anxiety, and stubborn weight loss. Her focus lies in brain health and behavioral change, as well as the interconnectedness between mental health, gut health & hormone imbalance. With primary roles as a Functional Nutrition & Lifestyle Practitioner, level 1 Yoga Therapeutic Specialist for Mental Health, and Board-Certified Behavioral Coach, Christine guides her clients to release what no longer serves them — whether it be mental, emotional, energetic, or physical weight. She utilizes the principles of functional medicine and nutrition, modern neuroscience, and ancient eastern traditions. By drawing from both western and eastern modalities, her approach is unique, bio-individualized, and foremost, rooted in love. On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/radianthearthealthfromwithin/ On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christinemorgensternshin/ On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinemorgensternshin/ Website for Radiant Heart Health: http://www.radiantheart.health/ Website for Radiant Lifestyle Reset: http://www.radiantheart.health/radiant-lifestyle-reset/   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community, and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Sachin Patel interviews Vikram Raya, M.D. about his polymath career, starting as a cardiologist, then a functional medicine practitioner, and much more. From his childhood, Dr. Raya was determined to master financial freedom. He is passionate about sharing his successes with the listeners, and how they can arrange for their increased success. Scaling your practice or other business requires an online component, at least, and Dr. Raya shares how you can start to build that component. Listen in for suggestions of role models for your Council of Nine Master Mind members to help steer your business choices.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Sachin welcomes and introduces Dr. Vikram Raya, M.D.   [1:47] Dr. Raya is a cardiologist who is trained in and practices functional medicine. He speaks internationally and is a high-performance coach and a real estate expert. He founded Vitology and is the CEO of Viking Capital Investments and has built a real estate portfolio. He wants to share some of the insights he’s gleaned from starting these companies.   [4:26] Dr. Raya has experienced a transformation from cardiologist and functional medicine practitioner to his coach and investor. He explains how he changed his identity from an M.D. to an entrepreneur. He looked for the golden thread that connects everything he was doing. From there he wanted to uplevel everything he touched.   [6:40] Things that happen can be a curse or a blessing, depending on your perspective. Practitioners saw COVID-19 as an opportunity to pivot. Sometimes your dreams are not your destiny. It’s OK to put things on hold, transform, and embrace a new identity.   [8:45] When he was a child, Dr. Raya’s parents worked very hard but argued frequently over money. This gave Dr. Raya a desire to master wealth for the peace of mind he believed it would provide. He cites five freedoms: financial, time, location, vitality, and mindset.   [10:49] Where in the financial freedom sector are you? Are you trying to get by or have you created legacy wealth and are trying to figure out how to solve world problems? Where are you in the time, location, vitality, and mindset sectors? Dr. Raya discusses each sector, with mindset being one of the most important. When you reach self-actualization, you have joy.   [14:21] Dr. Raya compares the happiness he felt after he pivoted from his practice to real estate investing and coaching. He wants to be location-free. He likes the Easy, Lucrative, and Fun (ELF) concept that shows you are in “flow.” Sachin remembers advising Dr. Raya, when they first met, to go after his calling. It took courage for Dr. Raya to do so.   [16:46] Dr. Raya’s parents and wife were questioning but supportive. Dr. Raya’s colleagues were more concerned than anyone else with the direction he was choosing.   [17:54] Dr. Raya suggests creating an imaginary or actual council of nine people, past or present, who can “whisper in your ear.” This is based on Napoleon Hill’s mastermind concept. Your inner guidance speaks. Dr. Raya shares who is on his virtual council. He likes their multidisciplinary dynamic. The golden thread is that they are polymaths.   [23:11] Once you reach a certain threshold in one area and create teams based on the current concept, you can go after a secondary pursuit. Dr. Raya tells how. If you want to scale your practice, you have to know what steps to take. Some business practices are universal.   [26:01] Sachin had such fun cutting hair as a teen that his mother feared he would become a barber. It came naturally to him but he had other goals.   [27:22] Dr. Raya suggests starting complementary businesses at first before changing fields, entirely.   [28:29] Dr. Raya’s goal is to spend his drive completely before he dies. Everything he’s doing is social, not solo. What drives him is adding income, value, and impact. Dr. Raya is a Double Comma Club member, earning over seven figures online.   [31:35] Tips for going online: 1.) Get absolute clarity on your desired outcome. 2.) Know the specifics of your “why.” 3.) Create that massive action plan and go after it. The action plan can be to stay brick and mortar, to go hybrid, or to go fully online. If you want scalability, you want to be online. If you want to be in the room with the client, then use a hybrid approach.   [33:09] If you decide to go online, find a mentor who can help you transition to an online business. Create your content for your patient or client to learn from. Add systems and automation and build a team to do the rest. Then start lead generation.   [33:57] Dr. Raya reveals the six main ways to get leads in two methods: linear and compound. Linear includes paid media, earned media, email list, manual outbound, and affiliates. The compound method is word-of-mouth referrals from raving fan clients.   [35:14] Ask three questions: 1.) If I charged 10X my price, what value would I have to deliver to the client to justify it? 2.) If I had to decrease my price to 1/10, but improve the product, what could I do to facilitate profitability? 3.) If I could just get one customer to be my advocate, what experience do I need to create so they would do it? Focus on value, profit, and experience.   [36:46] If you only got paid from your client’s results, what type of client would you choose? You would be more selective!   [38:09] How the client feels about how they experience your offering is the value you provide.   [40:21] Vikram’s vision for the next few years is scaling up what he’s doing now and bringing health and wellness with it in terms of human optimization and ultimate vitality, combining health, wealth, and mindset.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Vitology Institute Viking Capital Investments Joe Polish The Genius Network Napoleon Hill Mastermind Group Jim Rohn Leonardo da Vinci Walter Isaacson Elon Musk Tony Robbins Alex Formuzis Naval Ravicant Lebron James Giannis Antetokounmpo Lake Como Sir Richard Branson Dr. Mehmet Oz Forbes Business Council Two Comma Club Award Frank Kern Ritz Carlton Four Seasons Vikram Raya, M.D. Mount Kilimanjaro Oura Ring Dave Asprey Ben Greenfield   More about today’s guest Vikram Raya, M.D. Vikram is a trained cardiologist and functional medicine physician. He is an international speaker, high-performance coach, and real estate expert. He founded Vitology, a cutting-edge institute that helped reverse cardiometabolic disease and optimize vitality. During his decade-long time as one of D.C.’s prominent cardiologists, he specialized in heart failure transplantation, preventive cardiology, heart catheterization, and pulmonary hypertension. He has been active in multifamily real estate since 2015 and is a Founding Partner and CEO of Viking Capital Investments. As a real estate private equity firm, Viking Capital is approaching 5,000 units and $600 Million of assets acquired. Vikram was elected into the Forbes Business Council and was Commemorated by U.S. Congressmen Tim Connolly and Don Beyer in the Congressional Record for Excellence in Entrepreneurship. He has helped high achievers, doctors, and other professionals around the world achieve ultimate vitality, financial abundance, and a bulletproof mindset through his coaching, Limitless MD. He recently gave a keynote lecture at the CNN Headquarters in Atlanta with Dr. Mehmet Oz on entrepreneurship. He also is the recipient of the prestigious Outstanding 50 Asian Americans in Business Award on Wall Street. Most recently, he's made the Inc 5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S. Follow Dr. Vikram's wonderful work at the links below: On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Vikramrayamd On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vikramraya On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vikramraya/ Website for Limitless MD: http://www.vikramraya.com Website for Viking Capital: http://www.vikingmultifamily.com   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Sachin Patel and Aron interview Natalie Morse about her practice, and some of the hard things about running a practice, including “entrepreneurial injuries.” Natalie’s key to success is recovery through sleep and self-care. They explore Natalie’s framework to attract new clients to her private Facebook Group, using Reels selected from clips of her weekly Facebook Live sessions in the Group. The first Reel she made had 3,000 views overnight and 250,000 views within a week, leading to 1,000 new members of her Facebook Group. Natalie explains how she moves the clients through her scalable system with a five-day diet challenge, leading up to a six-month health program. Natalie has fun with her engaging videos. A Reel has staying power and if it links to a Facebook Live video, that video continues to get views. Natalie mentions the automation software that saves time in the process Listen in for coaching on setting up a framework to build your client base without paid advertising.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Sachin welcomes and introduces Natalie Morse, a mentor within the Perfect Practice community, and welcomes Aron, a practitioner.   [2:23] Natalie’s “why” is helping people get healthy from the inside out, with what they need, more than just a pill for an ill. Natalie is a national-level triathlete. She compares running her business to her sport. She keeps a training plan and a recovery plan.   [5:03] Sleep is an important part of recovery. Even a 20-minute nap during the day will help you. Wind down your activity for an hour as you prepare for sleep. Self-care is important, too.   [7:33] Aron used to train for Marathons and didn’t worry about recovery. Natalie recommends not training to the point of injury. Our bodies wear out if we don’t allow recovery. To recover from burning the candle at both ends takes time and patience.   [10:26] Natalie describes her entrepreneurial injury, a lack of creativity. If she has been pushing too hard, she can’t create and the ideas don’t come. Aron says his injury is feeling discouraged for too long when something doesn’t work. Sachin’s injury is procrastination due to perfectionism. Sachin consolidates the entrepreneurial injuries into a fear of success.   [15:49] Natalie shares her method for increasing her client base by 1,000. She posted a 25-second Reel a few weeks ago. It hit, and within a week, she had 1,000 new people requesting to join her Facebook community group.   [16:16] Natalie keeps learning. She tries new things and sometimes they work and she notices patterns. She tells how she came to make this video. She started with a Facebook Live in her private group on a hot topic, gall bladder, to answer questions that had been coming in. She had her assistant pull a clip from the video, using Canva.   [17:56] Natalie put in a call-to-action and published the video to Reels. She has been doing this for a while and she knows what plays with her audience. The call to action was to watch the full video on her Facebook Group. She went to bed on a Saturday night and overnight it had had 16,000 views with 250,000 views within a week.   [18:52] Sachin emphasizes that Natalie is special, but anyone can follow her framework and get results. [19:27] Natalie’s Reels are in selfie mode. She has fun doing them. She does a mix of content styles so her audience won’t get bored. She tracks what content gets more engagement and followers. Sachin stresses to be real to who you are when you make a video. Find what works for you and have fun. Short-form content seems to hang around longer than longer videos.   [23:23] Sachin points out, you have a group that has come to watch your video because they have a specific problem, and you can keep them engaged by doing a webinar on the issue for them or a master class, add a call to action, such as a seven-day meal plan for the problem as a bonus gift for attending a live webinar until the end. Offer a supplement solution for purchase.   [24:55] Offer a way for people to work with you individually or in a group to solve their problems. You already have a solution and you are building the bridge to get them to it, delivering value along the way.   [25:28] The next thing on the calendar for Natalie is a Five-Day Challenge for all the new people in her private group to give them immediate wins while she builds the relationship over the next few months.   [25:55] If you can lead people to the reality that their symptoms are the last thing to show up and the first thing to go away, then they’re willing to go deeper with you. There’s more healing that needs to take place. It’s not just the end-stage symptoms you’re trying to get rid of, but working together you can go a lot deeper.   [27:03] Natalie’s challenge is about weight loss. People will lose some weight in five days, and she expects some of them will want to sign up for a full program for three months or six months.   [27:47] Aron remarks on Sachin’s entrepreneurial advice given in this episode and that he appreciates being here.   [29:56] Sachin asks you to consider what one 25-second Reel could mean to your business. Experiment to find out what’s resonating with people. You will find a captive audience with a problem and a scalable solution, such as a seven-day diet, a product, and a group commitment, to help them solve the problem and get better. You can be helping people while you sleep!   [31:09] Sachin shares a document on-screen about a five-day challenge. A client loses weight in a five-day challenge, but without the right support system, they will stop it because they don’t have a map, a guide, or a community. Sachin walks through the document. As you go through a challenge, walk the client through the next stages to get them climbing to the mountaintop.   [33:55] Natalie’s questions new members of her Facebook Group answer: 1.) “Would you like a copy of my free guide by email?”, 2.) “What are the top things you are looking for help with for your health?”, and 3.) “Would you like a call from a member of my team?” The answers go to Google Sheets via Group Leads and coordinate with ActiveCampaign.   [37:06] Natalie explains how she justifies paying for a specific software package like Group Leads. First is the time savings and solving other friction points in your business.   [38:45] Aron and Natalie discuss nurturing and building a relationship within a group. Her Virtual Assistant puts up helpful content in the Group every week. Natalie tries to go Live on the Facebook Group once a week. The Five-Day Challenge will be hosted in the group in a couple of weeks.   [40:45] Natalie tells of her process for sourcing a virtual assistant. One is a past client of her course! Another is a friend! They have learned together as they go. One VA has made a business out of it for herself. They have grown and blossomed through the process.   [43:16] Natalie tells what she will be presenting at Perfect Practice Live: how you create and use a lead magnet!   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Natalie Morse Genius Network Facebook Groups Facebook Reels Canva Fullscript Google Sheets Group Leads ActiveCampaign   More about today’s guest Natalie Morse Natalie Morse is a pharmacist and functional medicine practitioner living in the southernmost part of Canada, Leamington, Ontario. She is the mom of two “tween-age” boys. Her happy place is the trails at Point Pelee National Park, or soaking up the warmth of the sun on a beach.   A former pharmacy owner, she now operates her business from her home office. She loves the midday sun breaks and meeting her sons when they get off the bus from school.   On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/natalie.morse.54 On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nataliemorsecfmp/ On Linktree: https://www.linktr.ee/nataliemorse/   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Sachin Patel and Joanna Sapir take you through a framework that she uses with her clients to help them attract their dream clients. Joanna tells how she went from schoolteacher to gym owner, to practice adviser and coach. She developed her business knowledge into a system for growing a practice successfully and realized she could coach others to grow their practices. There’s a big difference between selling clients a session and committing them to a program to meet their health goals. You don’t have to serve everyone, but you do want to serve the clients you can help get the best results. Joanna’s system helps you to move clients through five phases of sales to onboarding and she has advice on how to keep a client on board. Listen in for encouraging advice on setting up your program for success.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to Perfect Practice. Sachin introduces the conversation for today, about the framework Joanna Sapir uses with her practitioner clients to help them attract their dream clients who are committed to the care they are providing.   [1:33] Sachin welcomes Joanna to the episode. Joanna tells how she became a practice advisor and coach. It started with opening a gym and strength training center, with no business knowledge! So many practitioners want to help people but they don’t have a background in business. Joanna’s gym took off fast. She was also a single mom of two young kids at the time.   [3:50] Joanna had become sick from the stress so she decided to learn everything she could to build a sustainable business that she could sell and have exist in the community. It was a smooth transition from there to what Joanna does today, mentoring other practitioners to build their businesses. She helps practitioners to do what they do sustainably and profitably.   [6:59] Joanna assures the listener that you can serve your clients deeply, you can make enough money, and you can have time for your self-care and your families. It is possible with the right systems and structures in your business. Sachin tells how he shuts off entrepreneurship at 5:00 to focus on fatherhood for his son.   [8:29] Joanna teaches her clients: You don’t need to work with everyone, just those who will benefit the most. When you know who your perfect clients are, design programs for them. Marketing and Sales are different and you need a process for each. Build a relationship and assess the needs through a sales process so you can direct them into the right program.   [11:52] Joanna discusses the scarcity mindset that motivates practitioners to take on clients for the money that are not good fits. There’s also a sense of worth and love from being needed and helping people. Instead of trying to serve everyone, think of your three clients that got the best results and look for the patterns. When you’ve had many clients, check the data for patterns.   [14:51] Sachin shares an exercise from Frank Kern: If you only got paid when your ideal client got a result, and not before, how would you choose the client selection process? The better results we get for people, the more confidence and certainty we have.   [18:13] A program is a commitment to take a journey together, not deciding on one session at a time. It changes so much about the energy. It’s how you serve your clients more deeply. Joanna tells how she helps practitioners design programs. Reframe it as a journey to reach goals, not a package of sessions.   [22:22] How does a practitioner know what programs to offer? Joanna explains how to offer different modalities for clients, but to start with one program for that one ideal client. One-on-one, there is always room for flexibility as they go. Design the program for what they need and develop the marketing and sales systems after that.   [24:45] How do you get a program payment from someone who is used to paying for one session at a time? The key piece is the sales system with an in-depth consultation, including an assessment. In a program, the payment happens, so the people show up and do what they’re supposed to do!   [31:12] Sachin makes the argument for why case fees or program fees are the way to go for practitioners. He compares it to an all-inclusive tour or roofing a home. You pay once and you don’t worry about paying every day. A program can be a one-on-one or a group program.   [32:59] Joanna explains how marketing and sales differ. There is more to business than marketing. Marketing gets attention. Sales is the invitation to have a conversation about working together to meet goals.   [36:33] Joanna outlines her five-stage sales system for brick-and-mortar practitioners. It’s critical to go layers deep to find underlying goals and build a relationship. If they’re a good fit for you, you will have high conversion rates in the process.   [40:55] Joanna has her clients design an onboarding process with multiple touchpoints. It looks different, practice to practice. Onboarding transfers into Client Experience and Client Results including help between sessions. Sachin talks about heading off buyers’ remorse and cites Joey Coleman’s book, Never Lose a Customer Again.   [44:04] Follow Joanna on her podcast, and check out her free Masterclass link below for Perfect Practice listeners.   [45:39] Joanna’s last thoughts: Make it a win-win with this system!   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Joanna Sapir Frank Kern Never Lose a Customer Again: Turn Any Sale into Lifelong Loyalty in 100 Days, by Joey Coleman   More about today’s guest Joanna Sapir My calling has always been to teach. I have a Master’s Degree in Teaching and I was a high school teacher and teacher-educator for a decade.   I founded, grew, and eventually sold a brick-and-mortar athletic training and wellness coaching business. That's where I first earned my business chops.   Through multiple careers and phases of life, my purpose has always been the same: to help other people become agents of change in their own lives and the world. I work with practitioners that love helping their clients get real results, are excited by their work and are seeking actionable steps and proven processes to increase their income and impact now. I will help you each step of the way in developing a plan — from choosing your pricing and membership models, to marketing language, to a sales process for getting new clients.   Podcast: The Business (R)evolution for Practitioners Website: JoannaSapir.com/clientchampion FREE masterclass for listeners! On LinkedIn: Joanna Sapir   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Sachin Patel and Dr. David Bennett discuss the whys and hows of short-form video, including where to view it, how to plan your content, what equipment you need and accessories you may want, how to edit the video, and where to upload it. Dr. Bennett’s first TikTok video went viral. Now he has millions of viewers, which translates into organic growth in his practice. He gives practical advice for getting started, and he offers a course for practitioners who want to create short-form videos effectively. Sign up for the course from the link below and he will include a 30-minute consult with you to start you on solid footing.   Key Takeaways: [1:02] Sachin welcomes listeners to today’s episode with his friend, Dr. David Bennett. Sachin and Dr. Bennett graduated in the same class in chiropractic school. Dr. Bennett is a part of the Perfect Practice mentorship and a Council member who advises other practitioners.   [1:30] Recently, Dr. Bennett embarked on a journey to learn and master short-form video. He started with TikTok videos and has had millions of views, generating additional income for him. Do you have to dance or sing for your short-form video to take off? Dancing and singing are optional!   [2:32] Don’t put detailed explanations into a short-form video. People have short attention spans. Hook people in the first few seconds so they will watch to the end of your short-form video. Dr. Bennett was inspired to try TikTok after listening to a webinar on reach. His first video went viral, with five million views! He realized the short-form video was a “must” to get such a reach.   [6:56] After putting up short-form videos for six to nine months, Dr. Bennett started seeing an impact on his bottom line. You are turning an audience of people who have no idea who you are into a following of people who know, like, and trust you through your videos. The platform tells your followers when you add a new video.   [8:54] Dr. Bennett keeps a notebook to write down blurbs for video. One blurb makes one short-form video. Grab your phone, film it, and you’re ready to go.   [12:13] Don’t worry about the numbers; they’ll come. You sort of start chasing the numbers, the likes, the follows, versus “Hey, I want to get this information out there to somebody who wants to hear it.” Pay attention to the comments when they start coming in and reply to them. On some platforms, you can film your reply to the commenter.   [13:49] Dr. Bennett shares his short-form video work process and the video editing software he uses. He pushes the video from his phone to each platform instead of sharing it from TikTok, so he doesn’t get a TikTok watermark on his Facebook video. The platforms are making it easier for you to get your message out.   [15:13] Dr. Bennett’s first video was done “as a whim.” showing a model of five pounds of fat. It got 200K comments. Dr. Bennett has just crossed 200K followers on TikTok. Some followers have signed up for his programs.   [16:23] Dr. Bennett shares view statistics from January 1 to March 1. His videos on TikTok received 4.6 million views. His profile views for the 60 days were 203K. His bio is a LinkTree link. Those click-throughs increased Dr. Bennett’s Lead Magnet signups by over 1,500% from the prior 60 days.   [18:28] Dr. Bennett just experienced a drastic drop in views. TikTok had basically closed off his audience. But those who had clicked through and signed up for Lead Magnet were on his mailing list. The key to organic growth is taking viewers from the platform and moving them to your list.   [20:39] Dr. Bennett used to run an ad on social media to get clicks to Lead Magnet. He has dropped the ads because he gets better success organically from TikTok.   [21:42] Sachin advises you to get a good book on a topic in which they are experts, go chapter by chapter, and pick up factoids that blow your mind to share, with due credit, in the short-form video.   [22:50] Short-form video is no more technical than using your phone to take a video of your kids. It doesn’t have to be perfect, with perfect lighting. You can be careful about reflection off your glasses, but Dr. Bennett doesn’t worry about that anymore. The content is the key. One video can lead to many more related videos due to audience response.   [25:17] Dr. Bennett doesn’t write copy to put on the platform for his short-form videos. He would rather viewers click on his LinkTree than click to get a description of the video. He does include the right hashtags for the algorithm to categorize the video and push it to the right audience. For some of his videos, he writes a script with keywords, just for his use.   [27:38] Dr. Bennett developed a five-module course of video training. He shares a tip from it: go get a username on every social platform, even if you don’t use it. You want to have the same username across as many platforms as possible. Each of the five modules of his video training should take you less than an hour to do. Each video is under 10 minutes.   [32:45] Should you keep a personal TikTok account separate from your business account? Dr. Bennett shares his suggestion. He also points out that business accounts have more analytics.   [34:48] As a listener of Perfect Practice, when you sign up for the five video training modules at Growmypractice.krtra.com/t/bvutQZmxL1dT, Dr. Bennett offers you a one-on-one 30-minute consult at no extra cost. (Don’t click the option for the one-on-one consult; Dr. Bennett will know you’re a listener from the link in this text).   [35:41] Sachin wants to know what you should do if you have multiple contributors to a business channel? It varies. Limit who can post on your business page. Sachin is excited to take the video training modules and open his TikTok account! He encourages all of you practitioners to do the same!   [38:21] Dr. Bennett advises you to start going on the social platforms and look at the options, Reels on Facebook and Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live David Bennett, CFMP Metabolic Body Reset TikTok Facebook Instagram YouTube LinkedIn CapCut LinkTree Izabella Wentz’s book on Thyroid Disease Dr. Datis Kharrazian’s book on Thyroid Disease MeWe MySpace Pinterest   More about today’s guest Dr. David Bennett Learn how Dr. David Bennett is successfully using short-form video to successfully share his message. Dave has had over 4.5 million video views and literally thousands of personal messages flooding his inbox. He has also put together a special training to share with you exactly how you can do it as well. Register at this link and get a 30-minute coaching session with Dave to jumpstart your success:Growmypractice.krtra.com/t/bvutQZmxL1dT   On LinkedIn: David Bennett, CFMP On TikTok: David Bennett Metabolic Body Reset On Facebook: David Bennett Metabolic Body Reset On Instagram: David Bennett Metabolic Body Reset On YouTube Shorts: David Bennett Metabolic Body Reset On LinkTree: David Bennett Metabolic Body Reset   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done

Sachin Patel and Dr. Buddy Touchinsky discuss a range of topics relating to functional medicine, self-care practices, being supported and mentored, mentoring and coaching others, and personal growth. Dr. Touchinsky is creating a direct primary care functional medicine practice that is independent of insurance, and while it is breaking new ground, it is very tough going. He is making a difference in his small-town Pennsylvania community. Listen in for counsel on showing up even in the hard times. You never know who will stand up to support you if you ask for help.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to today’s episode! This is a special interview with Sachin’s friend, Dr. Buddy Touchinsky. Sachin and Dr. Buddy went to chiropractic school together. They are also both functional medicine practitioners and entrepreneurs trying to innovate in the healthcare space! Today, they talk about mentorship!   [3:00] When Dr. Buddy Touchinsky came out of chiropractic college, he didn’t know what he didn’t know. Coaching at the time consisted of expensive practice management companies with rigid programs.   [4:14] At first, Sachin wanted to do things his way. Asking for help was seen as a sign of weakness. Sachin recalls how his mother would just assume he knew how to do everything. Now, he believes it’s always great to get help from people who are just a few steps ahead of us.   [5:54] Sachin hired Dr. David Singer, went to one of his trainings, and was hooked on the idea of being held accountable. If it wasn’t for training on how to charge for a package of care, Dr. Patel might still be charging visit-by-visit. That tool changed his belief in himself.   [6:59] Dr. Touchinsky tells of his first experiences charging for a package of care. He discounted his services to get more patients. He had some success and noticed that the patients were there to get better. They had buy-in.   [8:25] It was a big milestone for Sachin to be able to attract the right person, who is investing in themselves, and trusting and investing in you to get them where they want to go with their health.   [9:02] Dr. Touchinsky came out of chiropractic college ready to work on sports injuries, back injuries, and spinal manipulation. He noticed that patients with back pain usually had more health issues. Before he heard of functional medicine, he started to dabble in it. He picked up Integrative Orthopedics: Integrative, Nutritional, Botanical and Manipulative Therapeutics, by Dr. Alex Vasquez and studied the science in it.   [10:25] About five years into his practice, Dr. Touchinsky saw he was overweight and felt out of shape so he did a metabolic reset. In 21 days he lost 21 pounds, was sleeping better, thinking more clearly, getting his files done on time, and feeling better.   [11:21] Dr. Touchinsky decided to test out the reset on a small group of patients. He picked a cohort of five people that he put on a program. They all got great results, too. He wanted to get this program to more people, so he dove into functional medicine, and signed up for FMU. About halfway through, he still wanted to know how to spread his influence to the masses.   [11:59] Then Dr. Touchinsky saw an old classmate, Dr. Patel!. Sachin was talking about all the things Dr. Touchinsky wanted to hear about and that people needed to hear. Dr. Touchinsky got together with Dr. Patel to learn more and became an active member and now, a coach, in Dr. Patel’s community.   [13:21] Others have helped Dr. Touchinsky along the way, including local Rotary and other group meetings. He finds that everybody he meets has got something going on. You see all the smiles on social media, but meeting people, you see into their real lives. Nobody’s perfect and we all work through our stuff.   [17:13] Sachin says joining groups is always a great reminder that everyone’s human. We all go through stuff, and we can help each other, either to prepare for going through it or because we’ve been through it. Never struggle alone. Join a group like Perfect Practice or another group of like-minded people.   [18:26] Sachin thinks of a mentorship or a coaching program as a time machine. Join a group of six 29-year-olds and you’ve got 180 years of life experience and thousands of experiences these people have been through. You’re tapping into that. With all the wisdom others have poured into them, you have essentially an infinite reservoir of knowledge and wisdom.   [20:15] Dr. Touchinsky also has a health food store, and a metabolic reset group. Now he is shifting into direct primary care. COVID-19 shut down the functional medicine and chiropractic practice for a few weeks and then they opened up slowly.   [21:51] The shutdown gave them more time to think about alternative ways of helping people if you can’t see them in person. Dr. Touchinsky tried James Maskell’s The Community Cure, and a test group in 2020 went well. Groups are powerful. Dr. Touchinsky wants to get more people back in person.   [24:02] Dr. Touchinsky started a functional medicine family practice that is more proactive care, building healthy habits, than reactive and community-centred.   [27:32] Dr. Touchinsky hired a consultant to help him set up a direct primary care functional medicine practice but this is a new business model! Dr. Touchinsky is creating his own thing. Having a coach and mentors helped. Without them and his self-care, he may not have made it. Now he can move forward to better things and grow his practice.   [30:01] Sachin compares a mentor to a personal trainer. The trainer spots you while you lift, but you have to do the work and lift the weight, but the trainer gives you the 5% lift to make it. Carrying a bigger load is where the growth takes place. Mentors and the community give an emotional lift.   [31:39] If you don’t show up, even when it’s toughest and you don’t want to show up, you don’t get the support and you won’t make it through. Sachin says vulnerability is a superpower! It’s the stepping stone to the next level of your personal character development.   [33:59] Sachin cites Simon Sinek, “You will be shocked at who and how many people will come to your rescue if you simply ask for help.” People are waiting in the woodwork to jump in and be supportive of others. People don’t aspire to be perfect, they aspire to be human and vulnerability is part of the human experience.   [36:57] Advice to any who are struggling and feel alone: Step back and look at the big picture. Remember the people you’ve helped. Be with your family. Keep showing up and plugging into your groups, and get help. Self-care. Keep investing in yourself. Keep going to the sauna and exercising. Get your sleep. Stay hydrated. Eat healthily.   [41:48] Sachin has taken a cold shower every day this year, and every day, he still dreads it but he feels good afterward. In the cold shower, Sachin practices slow, steady, box breathing, and rotating in the shower with each four-second breath in, hold, breath out, and hold.   [43:05] Dr. Touchinsky's professional goal is to prove that there’s a model for healthcare that is fun, exciting, and relaxing for the providers, and that benefits the patients as well. He explains how patients access his direct primary care model that does not rely on or use insurance.   [45:22] Dr. Touchinsky's personal goal is to set these practices up in a way where he has plenty of time for his family and himself. He and his wife are going to Italy soon, and he'd like to travel more often and invest more money in experiences with his family rather than material things.   [46:39] Sachin thanks Dr. Touchinsky for his time today and being a member, council member, and coach at Perfect Practice. He invites Dr. Touchinsky to share his closing thoughts.   [47:23] Dr. Touchinsky shares his blue-collar background and says none of this would be possible without seeing what others are doing for him through groups and mentorship. [49:26] Sachin signs off with a definition of LUCK: leveraging and understanding critical knowledge. If you can leverage and understand critical knowledge, you’re LUCKy!   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live Integrative Orthopedics: Integrative, Nutritional, Botanical and Manipulative Therapeutics, by Dr. Alex Vasquez Functional Medicine University Rotary International Lions Club International The Community Cure: Transforming Health Outcomes Together, by James Maskell BluBlocker Oura Ring Genius Network Simon Sinek Mindshare What the Heck Is EOS?: A Complete Guide for Employees in Companies Running on EOS, by Gino Wickman and Tom Bouwer   More about today’s guest Dr. Buddy Touchinsky Buddy Touchinsky, DC, CFMP has been serving the community of Orwigsburg professionally and personally through local leadership roles for 15 years. He is married to Susie, and they have a daughter, Megan.   Dr. Touchinsky is a chiropractor and functional medicine practitioner with a focus on creative solutions and innovative methods to help people solve their problems and maximize their health. It was in his chiropractic practice that missing links within the full health of an individual became apparent. Many of the patients he treated were dealing with issues caused by poor diet, lack of exercise, inadequate sleep, and other lifestyle-related factors that the traditional healthcare system was not addressing. This led Dr. Touchinsky to study and become certified in functional medicine and to develop a team of like-minded practitioners.   On Facebook: Dr. Touchinsky On Instagram: @drtouchinsky On LinkedIn: Dr. Touchinsky   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com To set up a practice clarity call and opportunity audit   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyr

Sachin Patel and Dr. Drew Taylor discuss Drew’s early foray into medicine when he shadowed an orthopedic surgeon doing total knee arthroplasty, Drew’s interest in following his father into baseball and medicine, and how Drew earned his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering. With that background, Drew started Acorn Biolabs, a laboratory that helps you cryogenically store young stem cells from your hair follicles against a future time when medical advances will allow you to use the stem cells to create new skin, tissues, and organs to prolong your life.   Key Takeaways: [1:03] Sachin welcomes listeners to today’s episode! This is a special interview with Dr. Drew Taylor, a serial entrepreneur and professional athlete, who is helping extend people’s life spans using hair! Dr. Taylor plucks hair and freezes it cryogenically in a Toronto lab to preserve stem cells for future needs.   [2:47] Dr. Taylor tells the story of his interest in biomedicine and longevity. He picked total-knee arthroplasty for his seventh-grade science fair project. He was permitted to scrub in and shadow a surgeon to observe a total knee replacement surgery. The next day, he accompanied the surgeon on rounds and watched the patient stand up out of bed and embrace the surgeon.   [4:54] Drew talked to the surgeon about witnessing this emotional experience for the patient. The surgeon told him that the metal and plastic parts will eventually wear down and the patient will be back for revision surgery. The surgeon predicted that in the future this operation will be done with the patient’s cells to replace cartilage, bone, and tissues.   [6:23] Years later, Drew worked at the same hospital on a biomedical skeletal tissues engineering team with the Division of Orthopedics, trying to engineer joints for patients on demand. It was his science fair experience that led him there.   [8:42] Drew attended Baseball Spring Training after college but he was injured before the regular season, so he never played in the Major Leagues. He played for both the Blue Jays and the Phillies on their Minor League squads. Drew became a Ph.D. student in biomedical engineering at the University of Toronto while he played baseball.   [11:22] Drew explains stem cells. The embryonic stem cell can form any cell. They are pluripotent. Other stem cells have started to develop but can still become one of several cells. They are multipotent. Technology takes time to develop to a level to benefit people.   [16:36] Drew’s company Acorn Biolabs focuses on giving clients access to their cells. Taking donor cells always carries a risk of rejection or tumors. The patients receiving their cells is always the best choice.   [18:19] Acorn Biolabs collects cells from clients while they are younger. Younger cells are better than older cells to leverage for the rest of your life. Sachin points out that nothing can fix your body better than it can fix itself.   [22:04] Drew addresses how and when it is best to harvest cells. Acorn harvests hair follicles, which have thousands of stem cells. The quality of the hair follicle begins to decline as early as in the twenties. About 50 hair follicles are plucked per client and placed in a solution.   [24:59] Drew explains the process for protecting the harvested cells for transport and freezing them to -190 degrees Celsius for when you need them in the future.   [27:50] Acorn Biolabs has some amazing methodologies they use to develop different cells you may need or the frozen cells can be sent to the laboratory of your choice. Drew lists some of the products the cells can produce.   [31:22] Drew shares an example of a use case in research and development: creating your pancreas islet beta cells to produce insulin for type 1 diabetics. This project will take years before human application. Other use cases are closer, such as producing collagen to deliver to the skin. Hair regrowth and wound closures are other potential use cases and sports injuries.   [34:05] Drew’s brother is a type 1 diabetic. Drew made sure his follicles were banked as quickly as possible so he would have his youngest cells cryogenically preserved and available. Drew believes in his brother’s lifetime we will see these things made possible.   [34:41] Drew addresses correcting problems with auto-immune diseases. Auto-immune problems are multi-layered and will take time to solve. Gene editing technologies like CRISPR can help eliminate some problems. Three-D printing of organs is on the horizon.   [37:13] The biggest ethical considerations have been mitigated. The new technologies do not use embryonic stem cells. We can reprogram your cells. The importance is in intercepting your cells at their best.   [39:11] It’s difficult to predict for any individual at what age cells are not viable. Acorn Biolabs does not put a cut-off age for individuals to harvest their cells. The younger, the better.   [41:51] Drew says there’s a law of diminishing returns in working to maximize your health through lifestyle changes before harvesting your follicles. We are always getting older. Don’t wait too long. Sachin’s lifestyle health programs last 10 to 12 weeks, so you can do both.   [44:46] Drew shares how people can get in touch with Acorn Biolabs for more information.   [45:39] Sachin thanks Drew Taylor for this dialog, invites patients and practitioners to consider this process for themselves, and signs off until the next episode.   Mentioned in this episode Perfect Practice Live University of Toronto Toronto Blue Jays Philadelphia Phillies Stem Cells CRISPR Tissue Engineering Technologies   More about today’s guest Dr. Drew Taylor Acorn Biolabs: Acorn Biolabs Dr. Drew Taylor on LinkedIn: Drew Taylor Dr. Drew Taylor on Twitter: Drew Taylor   More about your host Sachin Patel How to speak with Sachin Go one step further and Become The Living Proof Perfect Practice Live sachin@becomeproof.com   Books by Sachin Patel: Perfect Practice: How to Build a Successful Functional Medical Business, Attract Your Ideal Patients, Serve Your Community and Get Paid What You’re Worth The Motivation Molecule: The Biological Secrets To Eliminate Procrastination, Skyrocket Productivity, and Get Sh!t Done