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Have Physicians Defiled their Focus?

Oct 04, 2022
A woman looking through a magnifying glass with a surprised expression on a yellow background.

Change obstacles fear visioning

 

I had an epiphany on the tennis court one morning.  

I was playing tennis, singles.  

I was losing 0 games to 3 games.  As I was waiting for his serve, I realized that when it was 40-15, I would say to myself 

“If I lose this point, I'll be down 0-4”.  

And for some reason, I asked myself.  

“Why am I thinking this way?”     

              

I didn’t want to think about losing but it seemed I was focused on it. 

I kept telling myself the score if I lost, which was what I did not want.  

Crazy!

 

So instead, I forced myself to do the opposite.

 

If I win this point, it will be 40-30. Then deuce.  Then add in.  Then my game!  

As I forced myself to stay in the mindset of what I wanted rather than what I didn’t want and what the score would be when I won the next point, I won more points.  

And I won the next 6 games and won the set 6-3.

 

From the completion of my residency, I have been disappointed by the prevailing negativity in medicine which focuses on morbidity and mortality over success.  A perfect result is considered the standard and expected but everything else is suboptimal.  Talk about setting ourselves up for failure.

 

 

Books like Think and Grow Rich and the Secret capitalize on the concept that I take actions which support my beliefs.  

 

What I think about, I make choices to prove myself right.  

So my thoughts are vital to my life and my future.

 

Patients typically come into my office with several complaints.  He can’t breathe through his nose.  He has a sore throat.  He gets sinus pressure headaches and has green thick postnasal drip.  

As I see them and treat them, they return each month so we can assess our progress.  

Inevitably, when he returns, the first thing he tells me:  I still can’t breathe through my nose.  Most patients will go straight for what is still wrong.  They always focus on the negative.

I have learned to go back to his last visit and review everything he told me.  In this way, I can remember and he can remember where we started.  It is so easy to forget.

How is your sore throat?  Better.  

How are your sinus headaches?  Gone.  

How is the postnasal drip? Much better.  

So, we have resolved the sore throat and headaches and your postnasal drip is greatly improved but we still need to work on your nasal congestion.  

I have found this re-direction changes everything to start from success rather than failure and work on progress.

 

What do you focus on? 

 

Do your thoughts support your goals and your dreams?

Do you want to focus on your gratitude and abundance or your complaints and frustrations? 

 

Do you focus on your past, who you are now or on your future?

Medicine is drowning in negativity.  

Beyond the next variant of the Covid, plummeting reimbursement, more and more governmental regulations, the undersupply of healthcare workers, and the devaluation of our time and expertise, it takes a superhuman, conscious, consistent discipline to remember we chose this profession to help and heal others and make the world a better place.

 

It is so much easier to be disappointed in what we are paid for a surgery or our time.  To be frustrated for not being valued or compensated for our immediate availability on call for our hospitals.  To feel like it is impossible to make every patient happy enough to earn a 5-star review even when our patient cannot tell us their medications or don’t follow our instructions!  

Sure, it is easier to focus on the negativity.  It’s everywhere. 

 

 

But where is that ever going to get us?

 

What I think about, I bring about.

 

I don’t want to bring about more negativity in my life.  Do you?

Instead, I force myself to redirect my focus to my success and work on progress.  

 

I focus on where I want to go because I know whatever I look for, I will find.  

 

Are you running away from what you don’t want 

OR 

Are you running toward what you want?

 

Are you focused on the problem or the solution?

 

Breaking Out of the Medical Mindset has been created to provide you solutions and alternatives to more of the same.

We offer a new focus so healthcare professionals can strategize the best options for today and tomorrow.

 

What do you want to focus on?

 

The BOOMM Course has modules on: 

  • your vision for a better future and 
  • celebrating your wins as well as 
  • claiming your power to redirect your focus and your future.

 

It is time to change your focus on a better future.

I’ll see you there.

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