Posted on May 3, 2019

Let’s be honest. Being a dentist is an extremely challenging and a very difficult way to make a living. Now, add to this the influence of inflation on overhead, decreasing support from insurance plans, increasing competition from corporate players, and the need to stay abreast of current knowledge and trends, and you have the making of a perfect psychological storm, hence the need for an unusual level of psychological resilience to prosper.

And for most of us, our level of resilience waxes and wanes based on how well things are going at the office, in addition to how well things are going in our personal lives.

When things start to trend in the wrong direction, and we are tired and distracted, it becomes much easier to beat ourselves up, because we lose prospective. We start to think that we should be perfect. We start to think that every decision we make needs to be right. We start to think that our hands need to flawlessly perform perfect preparations, create perfect impressions, craft perfect provisionals, and facilitate the fabrication of perfect crowns, perfect appliances, perfect photographs -perfect everything. And all done with a sincere smile and the poise of a top level communicator.

Let’s admit it. Such expectations are not realistic, although as goals they are totally valid. And because perfection is unrealistic, while the need for near perfection is real, it’s easy for us to become conflicted.

How do we know when we are conflicted? When our self-talk becomes self-abuse. When we start berating ourselves like our most feared dental instructor. When we start giving ourselves a failing grade at dentistry and at life.

How we think about ourselves, influences how we think. And how we think influences our behavior and our performance, and then our performance influences how we feel.

It’s all connected. And if we left dental school feeling less-than and inadequate, it’s a self-defeating mindset which is both easy to acquire, and hard to shake

If this is an all-to-familiar experience, I would like to suggest to you that you start to pay more attention to how you talk to yourself, and then allow yourself to objectively observe those messages. Where are these thoughts coming from? Why are you doing this to yourself?

And when you make this kind of analysis, you will always arrive at the same conclusion- fear. Fear that you aren’t smart enough. Fear that you aren’t skilled enough. Fear that you don’t have the personality to be successful. Fear that you don’t have enough money. Fear that you are falling behind your peers. Fear that you are failing your patients. Fear that you are failing your family…your spouse…your church.
And you can easily see that this self-created list is endless.

Worse, it’s not true.

The truth is that you are doing a good job most of the time. The truth is that most of your decisions are solid. The truth is that you will have enough money. The truth is that you are just fine and have huge potential- but just don’t like to admit it to yourself.

If realizing this version of reality is difficult for you, it may be because you don’t think you deserve that level of self-respect…you may be too weighed down by shame. And by shame I don’t mean “I feel bad because I made a mistake,” rather, “I AM a mistake.”

And that is a mistake, because what we do is not WHO we are, rather we do is only a reflection of WHERE we are at any given moment. So you need to develop some strategies which will help you to turn this corner, and become more kind to yourself. Because it is only through being kind to yourself that you will have the capacity to learn your way out of – and away from- of your current challenges and thus change the trajectory of your life.

Reflecting and recalling things you appreciate about yourself isn’t always easy, but the more you practice it, the easier it becomes – and it’s where you need to begin. Once there, you’ll begin to see you deserve to be spoken to more kindly – that you deserve to be spoken to in the same way you speak to your closest friend.

Next, consciously surround yourself with people who lift you up and who do not judge you. This can be a study club, church group, or some other social situation where you can step out of your role of trying to carry the whole world in your shoulders, and just be yourself – the real open, honest, you. Then observe how differently you feel about yourself. Observe how much more valued you feel. Observe how much more capable and helpful you are.

Sincerely hear the compliments others give you and then build upon them. Often times, a kind word from someone who loves and trusts you goes a long way. Their perspective can also help shed some light on qualities about ourselves you have previously dismissed. And if you have those words in writing, you can pull then out and reread them whenever you feel down.

Become more curious about what triggers negative thought spirals. We get emotionally triggered by all sorts of things—words, actions, decisions, comments, and so forth, as they trigger negative memories which may actually be distortions – perceptions of a child or young adults who had no capacity at the time to fully understand what just happened to them.

Focus on being kind and helpful others. In dentistry, we are in a unique position to help others in ways which can literally change the direction of their lives. But that is only possible when we know people well, listen intently, and craft our solutions in the most helpful of ways.

Choosing to switch our focus from “What’s wrong with me?” to “How can I help others?” is tremendously powerful as well. Helping others in deep and meaningful ways actives the dopamine pathways of our brains and therefore helps us enjoy what we are doing more and more.

By giving back kindness, understanding, and compassion to others -even in tiny ways-you will begin to better see the positive impact you have on others. You will start to realize that you do matter and that you are valued. You will start to see that you are worthy and deserving of love, including your own.

Finally, realize that everything is relative, and everyone has their own struggles, with many having struggles which are much worse than your own. When we start to see others in this more accurate light, we can simultaneously see our current struggles shrink in comparison as well as better understand the fate of our common humanity.

Paul A. Henny, DDS

Posted on May 1, 2019

In life, when it comes right down to it, there are no failures- only outcomes, with some outcomes certainly more satisfying to us than others.

We can learn from both…but only if we choose to grow intellectually and emotionally; meaning that if we keep what we perceive as a “failure” within the proper context it becomes a life lesson which can make us wiser, and not just another loss or a defeat.

When we strive to avoid failure (M. Scott Peck MD referred to doing so as the greatest sin – laziness – represented our refusal to grow toward our God-given potential), we are choosing to repeat only that which we know to be comfortable, safe, and predicable. We put ourselves in a box, and then resent being so restricted. We fabricate our own limitations, and then start to believe that they are true. And from there, we are only half a click away from perceiving ourselves as being a victim, which cleverly disarms our willingness to keep trying by justifying our failures.

Repeating old habits of thinking and functioning does have value as it makes things more predictable on the short term, but doing so can also shelter us from experiences which could dramatically shift our paradigm and therefore catalyze deeper understanding. Hence, habitual repetition of old habits can in some ways be a form of neurosis – a dysfunctional need to try to control the outcome of everything around us – which in turn limits new learning and personal growth. Hence neuroses = antigrowth = lack of positive adaptive change = stuck = desire to control even more things = doom loop.

As healthcare providers, the challenge lies in finding a balance between internalizing the precise habits which render out success, while remaining open to the fact that our current level of knowledge and understanding will likely become insufficient over time to sustain our success.

The simple truth is, if we are not failing on occasion, we aren’t trying hard enough to be successful. And that “success” and “failure” aren’t two ends of a bi-polar scale which should be judged, rather they are part of a natural cycle consistent with how we learn. By embracing these truths, we can become more comfortable with our failures over time, recognizing that they are necessary for our growth, while no longer interpreting them as being signs of personal failure and inadequacy.

Paul A Henny DDS

Read more on CoDiscovery.com

Posted on April 30, 2019

The vast majority of problems we face each day are small in scale, and have little impact on us long term. The grass needs to be mowed…Jenny needs to be picked up after ballet practice…there is a ten minute back-up on our route to work, and we are already delayed because we left the house late.

Many of these problems are familiar to us, along with how to best address them. So much so that we create routines around them which become rather thoughtless…we go through the motions. And as long as we successfully resolve the problems, we don’t think much more about them.

On a neuroscience level, problem-resolution of this type is largely managed by the left hemisphere of our brain as well as our cerebellum – where thoughtless, repetitive behaviors are stored and executed.

And thoughtless is the key word here.

When new patients come to us with a problem…a broken tooth…sensitivity…a filling which has come out…and these problems have been managed in a reductionistic fashion in the past…”We can fix that for you”…”Silver fillings expand and make teeth weak”…”You need to replace that with an implant”… the patient often surrenders to the authority figure…”You’re the Doctor”…and makes a rather routinized, thoughtless decision to defer to the expert, do what their insurance “covers”, or do whatever they need to do so they can forget about the problem and move on to addressing the ten other issues on their mind.

This is how most dental decision are made. They are made based on convenience, immediate necessity, or cost. Much less frequently, are decisions made around the complex value we call “health”.

Yes, health is a value as well as a state of being. And it’s relative, as one person’s idea of health is another person’s idea of being out of shape, or on the verge of a disaster. The smoker who has not yet been diagnosed with cancer, often considers themselves healthy. The person with periodontal disease who still has teeth in their mouth, thinks they are doing just fine.

How do we help our patients make better decisions…decisions which are centered around true health…a “higher” value…instead of around “lower” values such as convenience, expedience, or cost?

That is only possible through a facilitated relationship designed for people to learn more, assign new meanings to what they are learning, create new beliefs about what is possible -or likely- and establish the motivation within themselves to do something about it.

In other words, behavior change occurs through a relationship which supports values clarification, prioritization, and execution.

And that takes time.

That takes patience.

That takes clarity of purpose.

That takes a commitment to help patients develop a new perspective and vision about their likely and preferred future.

Bob Barkley called this type of process ”Codiscovery,” where he strategically, moved patients out of their left hemisphere way of thinking over to their right hemisphere, – the place where visions, meaning, and creative problem-solving happen.

In this way, Bob transitioned HIMSELF from being just a problem-solver, and “Mr. fix-it,” into what he liked to call “a success planner,” who would then help others gaze off into the distant future, and then encourage them to use that vision as a source of motivation to make changes in their beliefs…to make changes in their behavior …to make changes in their health…and to make changes in their life.

Paul A. Henny, DDS

Read more on CoDiscovery.com

Posted on April 28, 2019

Many of our patients come to us feeling inadequate, feeling less-than, feeling like they should have done more, feeling like they are in an un-recoverable situation, and therefore feeling ashamed.

Shame represents the most powerful of our negative emotions. So much so in fact, that it can shape our entire life and our daily behavior. Shame is so painful to experience that most of us will avoid it at all cost, and as a result, we will fail to learn that our shame is almost always based on a distorted perspective, and it therefore does not represent reality.

Most patients come to us with an expectation of being judged, and of therefore feeling flawed and inadequate. These feelings often trigger shame, and shame shuts down their ability to learn and make better decisions – values-based decisions, instead of fear-based decisions.

Shame is driven by memories, which are linked to powerful feelings – feelings which are quite painful. Most of these memories are held in the left hemisphere of the brain, and are stored there out of context, recalled, and then linked to new experiences. In other words, our new experiences trigger old feelings based on old memories. And these are unproductive feelings -feelings of helplessness and hopelessness. Feelings which imply that the same negative things are going to happen over and over again, so why even try to change anything? Why not just surrender? What not just “have them all taken out”?

This is how the brain works, because the brain’s primary job is not to make us happy, rather it is to protect us so that we can live for another day. So, you can see here that often times the brain’s attempt to help us -hurts us, particularly when we need to be making significant, more health-centered course corrections in our life.

Helping others make complex decisions with regard to dentistry, therefore requires us to first and foremost move people past their current level of understanding and perception, and toward a vision of something new and better. And on a neuroscience level, this means moving them out of their left hemisphere where all of the negative emotions and memories are stored, and which are holding them back.

Bob Barkley designed CoDiscovery to do just that – to move people away from “deductive thinking,” to “inductive thinking.” And inductive thinking happens in the right hemisphere, and is narrative-driven…more specifically self-narrative driven.

What’s an inductive self-narrative? Today, we commonly call that a “vision.“ Bob liked to call it ”future focusing,” a term he learned from Ben Singer.

So, the game if you will, is to move people past their shame, past their distorted perceptions, past their incomplete version of reality and into a mindset which envisions something better – something they can co-create, something which is congruent with their values-driven self-narrative, and based on reality.

How to do that is exactly what we will be talking about at the next BBSC meeting in DC.

Paul A. Henny, DDS

Posted on April 27, 2019

Short-term profits have rapidly become the new coin of the realm in dentistry. And increasingly it’s a transaction in the form of implants.

Almost weekly know, I am meeting face-to-face with a person who wants implants and knows nothing about them, had some placed in a quick and unplanned fashion, and/or has some failing implants.

Marketing.

Tooth-in-a-day.

Smile-in-a-day.

What a great concept…

except when it’s not.

Except when it may be harmful in the long run because the person’s occlusion, bruxism, or smoking habit is so self-destructive that the implant(s) will never survive it.

Everyone it seems, is now an expert on implants or wants to be, but only a few have the analysis, technical and communication skills to perform the procedure well, and fully inform and prepare the patient for what they are actually getting into.

One and done?

Not likely.

But that is what is implied over and over to a person in crisis, has a trusting nature, and just wants to get on with their life.

Implants are being placed in people’s mouths with poor hygiene and with no habit or intention of keeping the maintenance visits.

Implants are being placed before any occlusal analysis, or true informed consent.

But look at our production numbers! Now we can go on a Caribbean cruise together and learn more about stem cells!

Reductionism in implant dentistry’s now mainstream and Carl Misch has to be rolling over in his grave.

Seth Godin says:

“There’s always a shortcut, a rule to be bent, a way to make some more money now at the expense of the people around us.”

My oral surgeon is no longer touching implants placed by other people, and my periodontist is growing weary of bailing other people out of their bad decisions, as it’s consuming too much of his time and distracting him from being productive.

All of this is leading us towards people having greater and greater frustration toward dentists and dentistry, and the wrong direction in too many cases.

Fortunately, if you have the trust and relationship building skills, you can help some of these people out -at least the ones who can afford the revision, the dramatic change in course, and a different treatment philosophy. The rest -the ones who couldn’t really afford the implant(s) in the first place, but were talked into it…they’re screwed.

And angry.

And might be sitting in your chair on Monday.

Paul A. Henny, DDS

Read more on CoDiscovery.com

Posted on April 25, 2019

I just learned that one of the greatest influencers of my life passed away yesterday. His name is Bob Sweazy. Perhaps you too have had a person like this unexpectedly enter your life – and change it forever.

I met Bob when I was just a few years out of dental school. At that point he was fifty, while I was thirty. He had already been “retired” for ten years after becoming a millionaire by the age of 40. Boredom soon set in, so he decided to “do something else,” because it was completely impossible for Bob to sit at home and read, and review his past victories.

Bob was born on a small sharecropper’s farm in Perryville, Ky. Little did he know that he would eventually become my lifelong inspiration and my hero.

Bob spent one year at the University of Kentucky before leaving due to financial hardship and an employment opportunity to work at a new hotel chain called ‘Holiday Inn.’

The job- doorman. Bob had this smile and energetic interest in virtually every person he met. He always looked for the positive and the potential in people. And as a result, he worked his way to the top of a corporation which owned 30 Holiday Inns up and down the east coast.

This job required Bob to travel frequently all over the country by private jet to do business with high powered bankers and other wealthy and influential people. Being a small town boy, with no exposure to how to function in such circles, Bob taught himself how to do it. He learned how to properly address and connect with people of power. He learned how to function at a table with white linens, four forks, and four wine glasses. He learned how to walk into a room full of multimillionaires and take control of it, not by trying to impress everyone, but through his love.

When I met Bob, he had recently opened a ultra-fine tabletop and accessories store in Lexington, Kentucky. It was called The Galleria, where he took all of his knowledge, experience, and love for people and created a store which in many ways was more attractive and service-oriented than Tiffany’s in Manhattan. By doing so, all of the ‘horse-people’ flocked there, as they had farms in greater Lexington as well as New York and Florida.

At the Galleria, the gifts were so elaborately wrapped that people would bring presents they had bought at other stores, and would pay Bob’s staff to properly wrap them. You can only image what they looked like.

Bob and I became close friends, spending many, many hours together talking about life, business, and people. And the one take-away that I can share with you is that you have to learn how to look for the best in others as well as how to cultivate it.

Our friendship eventually led to our opening a store together – The Galleria Kitchen Shop. Bob gave me full reign, so we went to the great markets in NYC and Atlanta to merchandise the store. I designed it, and managed it simultaneously while also running my fledgling dental practice upstairs. And it was a huge success- enough so that I almost quit dentistry.

Then this thing called the internet came along…the ultimate disruptor. And people started to look but not buy. Rather, they would learn from us why a Henkel knife was the way to go, or All Clad, or whatever, and then they would but it at Williams Sonoma on-line.

Over time, we could see the writing on the wall. And both stores were closed at that location. Bob moved the Galleria two times to have moderate but waining success. Eventually he closed it entirely, and I went on after being inspired by my exposure to Avrom King’s writing and Bob Barkley- infused with the person-centered approaches I had learned from Bob Sweazy, to practice the way I do today.

Bob next went into selling real estate via all of his social connections, with the top firm in Lexington. He worked -because he love being with and helping others -up until last year, and turning 80.

I share this with you because I feel the need to point out that we all have the opportunity to be the Bob Sweazy in somebody else’s life.

We can all make a difference.

Life is not about money, or status, or impressing others with what we have.

It’s about giving.

It’s about believing in others.

It’s about loving.

Read more at Codiscovery.com

Paul A. Henny, DDS

Posted on April 24, 2019

We all have a deep longing and need for meaningful interpersonal connection. And we all have a need to feel acknowledged, valued, and yes – loved.

We all want to feel significant, seen, heard, and understood. We all would like to know that we are not suffering alone, and that what we are experiencing and suffering-through is not entirely unique…that others have “been there,” and they have not only survived, but thrived as a result of it.

All of these feelings, needs, and desires are within us, however, in our fast-paced, high-stress, and impersonal culture, we easily forget. It has become too easy for us to assume that we are more autonomous than we really truly are…that our functional independence represents a higher virtue than interdependence.

But such feelings are just an illusion – and do not represent the truth. Rather, they represent a rationalization, and a distortion of reality fabricated by our mind to help us get through yet another lonely, disconnected day.

When we intentionally allow the time and create the space to connect with our patients on a deeper interpersonal level, we not only become more effective, but we also are honoring our true nature…we are acting more “authentically.” We are acknowledging that we are inseparable from others – that we all share our humanity, along with similar fears, concerns, doubts, and hopes.

Yet, the deconstructionist nature of our insurance-centric profession wants to pull us in the exact opposite direction. It constantly wants to draw our attention to the tooth and not the person…to the problem, and not how the person feels about it, much-the-less what they aspire towards.

Yesterday, I spent about an hour in conversation and examination…back and forth, establishing facts, relevance, feelings, and personal meaning, as well as the start of a vision. This particular person was a 70 year old realtor with significant occlusal breakdown and concurrent loss of vertical dimension. She had two implants placed recently by an oral surgeon who never looked at her occlusion holistically, and who told her she was “ready” to have them restored. And indeed, they could be restored, but their chance of survival is limited due to the very unfavorable forces created by her destroyed anterior guidance.

“I have never had this kind of conversation with a dentist before,” she said. “I had no idea all of this was going on, and how things were trending. My previous dentists (there were two who were co-treating her since she spends part of her year in California) told me I had a few problems which needed to be addressed, but I have never had the opportunity to understand things in this way, I am so glad you took the time to share this with me.”

This is a perfect example of the brilliance of Bob Barkley’s work. When this person had previously been told that “she had some problems,” and was handed a list of what “needed to be done,” -she shut down, as she had no capacity to understand the new information in any kind of relevant context. Instead, a fear-based barrier went up because she felt like she was functioning as an isolated individual, alone, inadequate, unarmed, and flawed.

This represents a natural response in our current culture of mistrust, as well as a growing problem within our production-centric (instead of people-centric) profession. And this is why the data show that case acceptance rates for comprehensive dentistry hovers at best around the 30% mark for most dentists.

Relevance is everything.

Meaning is everything.

Creative problem solving (“success planning” as Bob Barkley used to call it) is everything.

CoDiscovery is a brilliantly designed way to connect with people, gently lift up their level of awareness, as it allows them to explore the relevance of what they are learning. “When awareness meets relevance, we have the birth of a new belief through a change in attitude toward a problem,” Barkley said.

So, we are all need to be in the ‘new belief development business’ if we want to be successful at facilitating heath in others. And that is only possible by knowing our patients on a much deeper and significant level.

Paul A. Henny, DDS

Read more on CoDiscovery.com

PS: That hour with my patient yesterday was pure enjoyment for me, as I watched the light bulbs turn on.

Posted on April 18, 2019

Dualism- the cleaving into two from that which is truly one- colors our beliefs regarding health and illness. Consequently, we in the Western world attempt to understand the body as if it were in total isolation of the mind… we want to describe human beings – healthy or otherwise- as though they are functioning in isolation from the environment in which they have developed, are living, working, playing, loving and dying. These are the built-in and hidden biases of our Western medical orthodoxy, an orthodoxy which most of us heathcare providers absorbed during our training, and then carried with us into practice.

Gabor Maté, MD

The above is a quote which strikes at the very heart of Bob Barkley’s work…that the ‘dualism’ inadvertently learned in dental school, is ineffective if the goal is to create a practice full of successful, healthy and happy patients.