Practical Tips for a Profitable Dental Life and a Balance Life with Dr. Jay Grossman

Hi everybody, I'm Dr. Sanda Moldovan, periodontist and nutritionist. Welcome to the Holistic Dentistry Podcast, the show that gives you the tips and tools to detoxify your mouth for a healthier body as we explore together the root cause of disease. Remember, you're not healthy until your mouth is healthy, so take care of it in the most in a natural way. Everyone, I'm your host, Dr. Sanda Moldovan. Welcome to another episode on the Holistic Dentistry Podcast. I'm super excited to have my dear friend, Dr. Jay Grossman, today to chat about his book, Essential Pillars, which I have right here. And this is a great book that talks about holistic lifestyle. And I say holistic with a W. And there's so many great messages in this book for any dentist that's and for anybody who's looking to have a balanced life. So Dr. Jay Grossman, welcome to the show.

Well, thank you for having me, Dr. Sanda Moldovanova. It's great to see you.

Great to see you. And, uh, you know, I, I used to see you every day because I worked in your practice for many years.

You did.

And yeah, I, I, you, you've been a great mentor to me learning life's lesson, and I wanna thank you for that.

Pleasure.

And, um, When I started working in your practice, I wanna say, God, how long ago was that? 20— 2003, 2004?

Something like that.

Something around there. Yes. You were at that point such a good listener, you know, and that's something you mentioned in your book actually. You feel listening in communication is a lot more important than talking. And you always listened to my struggles and you always gave me great advice, like which direction to go, like taking Landmark Education and really learning more about myself. But you did it in a gentle way. You know, so I really appreciated that. Yeah. So, so, but let's talk about you because, you know, you're so accomplished in so many ways and it's better reading. I mean, your bio is like several pages here and you have a practice in Brentwood, California, and you've had that practice now over 20 years. So it's a multi-specialty practice. You started a nonprofit called Homeless Not Toothless. How many years now with Homeless Not Toothless?

33 years ago.

33 years ago. Amazing.

Yeah, the practice is 34 years old and I started the nonprofit about a year into my practice.

Yeah. Amazing. So you're a leader, you're a business owner or an owner of a nonprofit. You're a husband, you're a father, you have so many aspects to your life into which you talk about a lot in your book. It's, how do you do it all? That's really the question. How do you do it all? And every time I talk to you, you're still so calm about it. And I think a lot of dentists listening to the show or anybody who's an entrepreneur can relate to how hectic it can get.

Sure.

So, I mean, we all really want to learn from you. How do you do it? How do you balance things? Because that's one of the challenges that a lot of us are struggling with, including myself, to balance everything in life.

So let's do that.

Sure.

I would say there's a really simple answer to that. And I could actually tell how committed somebody is to balancing their life by taking a look at their calendar. So And when I look at their calendar, I will see whether or not they have time dedicated on a weekly basis. And this is important, Sanda, on a weekly basis, not like when there are no patients coming in and there's, you know, an opening for a few hours, but literally planning time to work on their fill in the blank, their business, their relationship, their finances, their philanthropy, their health, their nutrition, whatever it is. If there's not time dedicated to work on that particular pillar, then I would say they're, they're, they're really rolling the dice and it's a gamble to whether or not you're going to have a breakthrough. One of the things that I liked in your introduction, you said, we're gonna talk about the holistic aspect. And you said holistic with a W. If I had to come up with a word that defines holistic, the, the word is whole. W-H-O-L-E. To me, that is crucial to absolutely everything in life. To me, the word holistic is everything together. In medicine, dentistry, I'm looking at the entire body system, and that's something that, that you and I have worked on for, for decades right now. Somebody comes in with a problem, they go, it hurts, or I have X happening, and most practitioners want to be the hero and put out the fire. And they're looking very myopically at that particular area of the body where it hurts. But if you're looking at this holistically, you definitely need to step back and take a look at the entire— and I would say that that is probably the most important thing for having a more relaxed, fulfilling life is to actually be looking at the entire system, including working on your relationships that are important, working on your Physical health, if that's important to you, I think that should be important to everybody because obviously, regardless of how successful you are in your business, if the body's not healthy, you're not going to have the time or the ability to enjoy it.

Yeah, so true. So looking at this, you know, whole life, right? Not just career. What finally made you sit down and actually write Essential Pillars and who did you write it for?

Yeah, I originally wrote it for myself. I was taking extensive notes from continuing education courses, both in and outside of dentistry. And I realized, you know, there's some really interesting information here. And, and it took me 20+ years to read 500+ books and, and sift through it and pull out the parts that I thought were the most important. I go, most people don't have that time or commitment. What if I took all of this information that I gathered and synthesized and put together in, in a fairly simple manner? What, what are the essential pillars for life and the essential pillars, meaning what's going to make your life extraordinary. And extraordinary in my world includes 3 essential pillars, which is what, what I dive into in the book.

I love it. Let's talk about those 3 essential pillars, all starting with a P coincidentally. And I, I love that you simplified for everybody. I wanna say your book is very easy to read and that's what we want, right? Especially people that are very busy. We want something that's quick, good practical tools that we can implement. So, The 3 Ps, prosperity, right? People, right?

Prosperity, people, and personal, right?

Yes.

So I wouldn't say it was coincidental. I actually took, it was the longest time was to come up with what those 3 Ps were. So I wanted, I wanted 3 essential pillars because first of all, I wanted it to make it easy to remember. And then I decided, all right, let's be a little kitschy and let's come up with, since pillar starts with P, let's come up with 3 Ps. So to me, I have it that prosperity, people, and personal are, are essential. And I think everything, or nearly everything in life could fit into each one of them. For example, the, the, the first P is prosperity. So you could easily call this the financial pillar. And all I say in the financial pillar is that more money has to be coming in than it's going out. That's the essence of it. I'm not saying you have to make $100,000 a year or $100 million a year. I really don't care. I, I think one of my favorite expressions when it comes to money, when, when people start talking about, hey, I made X number of dollars last year, they're talking about their gross, their top line revenue. I couldn't give a rat's behind as to how much somebody pulls in gross. I only care about what's left over, what the net is. So even if you're making $10 million a year, and I think you would, you would probably agree that to make $10 million a year in dentistry would be an extraordinarily rare practice. And I've met several people that have made that, couldn't care less what their gross is. What the line is that I love is the gross, meaning the top line income, the gross feeds your ego. The net, what's left over, that feeds your family.

I love that saying.

And to me, it all has to do with what's left over. So when, when I coach dentists in particular, and that tends to be my forte, I mean, I've, I've had the privilege of coaching over 1,000 of our colleagues in their, in their practice, and very few people were outside of dentistry because, you know, I don't necessarily know that as well. I have found that the vast majority of practices fall somewhere in roughly the 70% overhead range, excluding, excluding their salary. So as you know, most practicing dentists who would hire an associate will pay somewhere between 25 or 30% of their production for working as an associate. So if that's the case, if they have a 70% overhead, you're paying 30% to the associate, there's nothing left over.

So true.

And the 30% that our colleagues are making is a very healthy, income. So you take an average dental office that's doing about $1 million a year. If the dentist is pulling in $300,000, that's fantastic. However, looking at it from a business standpoint, I'm not impressed because you can't replace yourself. If you wanted to step away, you're going to be giving away your 30% to the dentist that comes in. So having an office that functions at 50 to 55% overhead is the game to play in dentistry. And since I don't know other specialties outside of dentistry nearly as well, I tend not to coach people outside of dentistry 'cause I don't necessarily know what their, what the average overhead should be in their particular field.

From what I know, around 70% is what most practices have in terms of overhead. Do you think it's realistic for us to achieve 50 to 55% overhead?

Yeah, I'm playing for that on a regular basis.

Amazing. So what is one tool that dentists can take away from this conversation and look at in order to increase their profitability.

Yeah. And I talk about this extensively in the Prosperity Pillar, and that is you have to know your numbers. Have to, have to, have to, have to. No ifs, ands, or buts. So I list what all the expenses are for most people to have in their life, and you've gotta fill it in. You have to look at your profit and loss statement. I look at mine on a weekly basis and certainly at the end of the month to see what we're doing. And the most important thing about looking at that, Sanda, is not what the number is, but what the percentage is as it relates to the gross.

Yeah.

So for example, if we're looking at, at your staff excluding doctors, your staff overhead should not be more than 30% of your gross. So that's a very easy thing for QuickBooks to calculate. You run P&L and you have it run the P&L with the percentage of gross and it does the math for you. And knowing what each line item is is crucial, whether you're a dentist listening to this or whether you're another entrepreneur, there is an industry norm and you have to look at that. So I look at it every day and I have like last year, I think I filed 11 or maybe 12 tax returns. So different businesses, each one of those businesses has a different percent allocated to a given line item. You have to know what the industry norm is. Otherwise there's no game to play to say, how can I beat that? How can I, how can I come in under that so that I'm actually profitable?

Yeah. Absolutely. Know your numbers. Now I wanna step away a little bit from the financial discussion, more into your, your personal life. And I'm just curious, what is that one story from your own life, a defining moment that you wanna share with us that really changed your trajectory and where you were going?

Yeah, I would say, I would say the story that I don't wanna share with you, so I'm going to share it with you because it's the one where it it had the potential for the largest failure in my life was at the beginning of my practice. And of course, the beginning of my relationship to my wife, we already had 3 kids. We decided, my wife and I decided that she was going to be a stay-at-home mom. She's a psychologist by trade. She's got her doctorate now in psychoanalysis. But at the beginning, she and I both agreed that we wanted her to be the stay-at-home mom and I was going to be the sole breadwinner and I was going to support the family. And in the first 10 years of my practice, I was averaging 85 to 92 hours a week. So 6 days a week, you know, 10+ hour days. And I remember coming home, it's Saturday night. I'm absolutely exhausted. It was a 92-hour week. And as I put the key in the door to open the door, I was so excited about my fantasy was my wife was going to meet me with a martini and slippers in her hand, and the kids were going to be asleep and we'd be able to have a date night. But instead, the kids were absolute terrors that day. They weren't in bed. The house was a mess and my wife hasn't taken a shower yet. And she said, I don't think this relationship's going to work. It was the first time that I took a look at the possibility of actually being divorced, you know, like, like how, how am I going to keep this relationship together? And I said to her, I don't understand. I just worked my butt off so, you know, we could have money so we could have food and a house and so forth. And she turned to me and she goes, but that's not the only pillar in life. And that's not what I married you for. So I came to the party with a strong understanding or desire to learn and get mastery around the finances. My wife, that was her weakest pillar. She didn't know anything about finances or life, but she knew a whole heck of a lot about the people pillar, which is the second pillar. And in, in my book I talk about, and one of the reasons I come up with 3 is because I think about 3 as a 3-legged stool or as a tripod. You take away one of those legs, or if they're uneven, things are out of balance. They're outta sync. So my wife was like, I want a relationship with you. I wanna know who you are. I want there to be happiness and great conversations and romance and trips and travel and great dining experience. And she goes, And if you're not around, that's not a relationship. So what I discuss in the People Pillar is that it's crucial to have deep, authentic relationships. And that doesn't mean it has to be a spouse and it doesn't have to be a significant other if that's something that you choose to do. Everybody needs to have people in their life that they can rely on, that they can count on, that they can be honest with, that they can have integrity with, that they can be held to account. To. So that to me was probably one of my biggest failures at the first, the first decade of my relationship. Now, with that said, this summer we'll be celebrating our 39th anniversary. And I think that is probably one of my biggest achievements in life is that not that we're celebrating it, both of us are celebrating it, enjoying that we're still together and still loving each other and still enjoying what life has to offer now that we're both in our 60s and we're both looking at slowing down a bit on building the financial pillar because fortunately we've had success with it. So we travel a lot and we're committed to going internationally every single year and doing that for 3 to 6 weeks overseas, like really fun, exciting trips. So the people pillar I think is equally as important to the financial.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, congratulations on your anniversary to come.

Thank you.

39 years. It's amazing. And I'm glad you brought up this point because I think as a dentist owner, I can relate to that. I can easily fall into working and thinking about more ideas and doing marketing and talking to our dentist associates and having meetings with the staff, and I literally can wake up thinking about work and I can talk to my husband about work, but I have to reel myself back. It's so easy to fall into that trap. How, so from 90 hours a week, like you said you were working, and I know a lot of dentists listening to this can feel that pain, and especially today it's harder than ever to maintain that overhead because things have gone up in price and, you know, they're, they're feeling more pressure at work. How, how do you, what advice do you have for those people listening saying, you know what, That's me. How do I reel back? How do I, like, take time away from work and start, you know, focusing on my relationship?

Sure. So I would say that for the first 5 years of a dental practice, that working 5 to 6 days a week does make sense because you need to build up the clientele. But coming from 5 years and going forward, I really don't think a dentist should be working more than 4 days a week. And I could give you an endless list of reasons, everything from their personal health and well-being and their back going out to to, you know, the toxins that we're exposed to from all the crap that we're removing from patients' mouths, right? I think there's a huge issue that we could talk about on that front. But much more importantly, when we take a look at my prior comment about taking a look at somebody's schedule to see how committed they are to actually resolving, fill in the blank, their finances, their relationships, or their personal life, I right now, work Monday through Wednesday and I take Thursday through Sunday off. And the biggest advantage of that is that Wednesday night, my wife and I head up to our ranch in Northern Santa Barbara and we spend 4 days there. And we do this 3 out of 4 weekends out of the year. And this is a time for us to be together. Now we could still be working on other things. We could be working on our business. We could be working certainly on our relationship. And we could also be working on that third pillar, which is what I call the personal pillar. And the personal pillar basically encompasses everything about you as a person. So this is an endless list, but everything from health to nutrition, to diet, to probiotics, to water intake, to, to exercise, to nutrition, to spirituality, to anything that has to do with making you a happy and healthy person. So when I look at my schedule, because this is something I teach, I, I offer courses on this and so forth. I show people my schedule and on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, there is time put aside for building each of those pillars. And it's, it's a substantial amount of time, Sanda. Like, you know, I put in 4 hours, 3 days a week to each of the pillars. So you've got to find time for doing that. And I think that, that the comment that I made about you've got to put this in your calendar and you put it as a repeat event and you make sure that you are committed to doing it just as you're committed to seeing patients at 9:00 on Monday. You got to be committed to CEO time, to building your business 4 hours a day, 4 hours a week, 4 hours a week to what can I do to have an extraordinary relationship with my significant other, to 4 hours a week to what else can I incorporate into my daily or weekly routine to make sure that my body's healthy?

Yeah, absolutely. That's great advice. Anybody can sit down, get a piece of paper and write down, okay, what's important to me? And how can I spend those 4 hours for the next week and just book 'em on the calendar? You mentioned courses and coaching for dentists. Tell us more about that.

Well, and when I, when I wrote the book, what I realized was that there's actually a formula that I put in there, not really realizing that it was formulaic, if you would. And then I had people coming to me and says, that sounds great. How, how do I jumpstart that? So I started bringing people up to my ranch, you know, on an individual couples or, you know, You know, the, the, the place is 20 acres, so it could hold quite a few people and it could sleep about 20. So there's, there, there, there are events that I've done up here and I run them through a 2 or 3 day course where we're actually going through each of the pillars. Now, the real fun part, because when I started looking at that, I didn't want to just have another business that was gonna take me away from my family. So one of the things that I started realizing was when I look at the 3 pillars, my forte is the financial pillar. So I started teaching that. My wife, who's got a doctorate in, in psychoanalysis, analysis is great on working at the people pillar. So she teaches that aspect of it. And then my youngest son Ari, who's now in his late 20s and is a bodybuilder, fitness trainer, that's the perfect person to actually be teaching exercise and nutrition and so forth. So the business pulled together, if you would, as now a family-run event.

Love it. I was so impressed to see a picture of Ari in this bodybuilding, uh, you know, stage Right.

You remember, remember how large he was as a, as a young person? I mean, he was literally obese and now, you know, he's, he's, he's a fit fighting machine. So go figure.

Yeah. I mean, he's a great example of what we can do if we put our mind to it. So I know the rate of suicide in dentistry is, I think, were we number 1 at some point on the scale?

We were, we just went to number 2. Interestingly enough, veterinarians took the number 1 spot.

What? Why?

They get to take care of yummy animals all day. They lick them and kiss them and so forth. I mean, maybe they get bit every now and then, but you and I get bit every now and then.

It's like, exactly. It's still, it's still crazy to think that there's so many suicides in dentistry. And, uh, you know, I've had a couple of friends, uh, actually last year, one of my mentors in Germany in his mid-40s, he committed suicide and he was a great surgeon.

Do you know why that is? Or do you have a sense of why that is?

I think it's the stress we put on ourselves as entrepreneurs and business owners. And not stepping back to look at the big picture. And really, I think him, he was so focused on success and that, you know, just the one pillar where the other pillars I feel are broken. So, in my opinion, I make— yeah.

Let me expand on that, cuz I think, I think you're, you're, you're, you're, you're spot on. And I think there's also perhaps, perhaps another addition to it because the part about the stress we put on ourself as entrepreneurs, I think is 100% accurate. But then the next question I would say, but there are a lot of other people out there that are entrepreneurs, why are they not in the suicide rate? And I think that has to do a lot more with how people need to be in college to get into a dental program. And as you know, it's ridiculously competitive to get into dental school, just as veterinary school. These are the two most difficult professions to get into. So I believe that most of the students that are going to veterinary and dental school are, are solo, soloists in their life that they study by themselves. They don't have a very large network of friends, and they're not willing to share their study techniques because they're so competitive and they're so much interested in getting into the two most difficult programs, veterinary and dentistry, that when they enter dental school or veterinary school, they don't know how to share. They don't know how to build relationships. So that entire pillar isn't profound. It isn't strong enough for them. So I think it's not coincidental that veterinary school and dental school, being the two most difficult professions to get into, have the highest suicide rate because the students, doctors that are, are in those programs just don't know how to be related to other people. And, and because they feel alone, I think that's where the suicidal tendencies are, are exaggerated.

Yeah, that's a good point. And I agree with you. I think having them work with a coach or a mentor, and we all need mentors through life. I I've had so many different mentor, mentors in my career. It's super important because being in that situation where all you know is how to read books and how to not really connecting with people, we need a mentor for that. Let's talk about concierge dentistry, cuz that's something that your practice is concierge dentistry. Even from 10+ years ago when I worked there, you had that term concierge dentistry. How do you describe it to someone? We have concierge medicine, which is definitely a lot more popular now, but not concierge dentistry. So how would you describe it?

[Speaker:Dr. Sanda Moldovanovan] So unlike our colleagues in medicine where perhaps the physician will go to the patient's house, that would be more of a concierge form of medicine. It's, it's very difficult to do that in dentistry, although I certainly have done that. So we, we have some equipment that could go to a, a person's house, especially if people are invalids or they're, they're really challenged with going. But like the, the original way of taking impressions, for example, with goop, not the easiest thing to do without, you know, suction, but now everything's digital. So, you know, you could actually carry a digital device with you, but I wouldn't do a crown prep, for example, you know, or a surgical procedure in somebody's house.

Yeah.

But with that, I changed the name from my name to Concierge Dentistry for a few reasons. First of all, I, I was working on, on deflating my ego and taking my name off of the, off of the wall. Because, you know, first of all, it, it's not just me. I've got a bunch of associates there. So having the practice named after me was a little egotistical. And I also wanted patients to get the understanding that I'm going to run my practice from a fee-for-service basis and not deal with insurances or the, you know, the, the restrictions and, and so forth that insurance companies have. And I'm gonna be treating one patient at a time. I'm going to be giving them a concierge experience. I'm gonna be giving my cell phone numbers out. I'm gonna giving them the ability to text, to be able to schedule appointments or do online appointments or what have you. But I wanted to be more of the old school type of, of doctor who had a black bag and used to go to people's, you know, house to, to do the, the examination. I wanted them to have that experience in my office. And one of the things that, that we're committed to is that people are seen within 10 minutes of walking in, even if they're early. So we have to allow for that. We have to leave an extra chair as an overflow chair, which obviously has a cost associated with it, just to make sure that people are not sitting and waiting in the waiting room. So I really like the phrase concierge, and I like everything that it brings with it. And I think patients who are especially committed to being a demand for being seen on time and having quality care and being treated with, you know, respect love the fact that they could come in, be treated with respect, have some of the best dentistry done to them, and get out in a timely manner. Time is, is very important for most people.

So in other words, you elevated the patient relationship basically, not just, you know, a number, like go and quickly, you know, seeing usually a lot of insurance dentists will see like 5, 6 chairs in a row because they have to in order to meet their overhead. But you're really elevating it. This is, we're talking about fee-for-service practice to really have the patient feel taken care of and supported throughout the dental work.

Exactly.

Yeah, I agree with you on that. That's the way my practice is. I want to have that relationship with patients. Like over the years, I'm sure you've seen families, you know, grow together, their kids grown up. Do you think that relationship now has changed the way we should have relationship with patients?

More— Expand on that. What do you mean by that?

Yeah, so in the past, I think in dentistry, we were a lot more focused on relationship relationships. And as the insurance companies kind of took over, that went more into a, like, how many patients can you see a day? Now, do you find, like, that's changed? Like, obviously we're in a different category as we're fee-for-service, but are people expecting something different now going to the dentist?

Well, it's an excellent question. I think that, that a lot of it really depends on how the dentist wants to practice. I think there's still ways of being profitable, and having a lower stressed environment, even if you are seeing insurance patients. I think it ultimately comes down to having systems in place that allow you to be as efficient as possible. And one of the things that I, I'm a huge stickler on in my book and in my coaching is to ensure that people have written operations because without that, I just don't see how you could be efficient. Efficient and therefore profitable. And if you could be, be efficient, then you could start giving patients regardless of whether their insurance, even if they're Medi-Cal, you could, you could find ways of still being profitable, but you have to be efficient and you have to know your numbers.

Yeah. Now I want to hop back onto root cause versus symptom care, because you do talk about this and you emphasize like a more integrative root cause approach, which as a doctor, that's what I'm all about as well. Can you share an example from your practice where addressing one of the these pillars transformed a patient's health, like beyond dentistry?

Sure. Like, you know, I think about one of the most common areas of the mouth that people come in with symptoms on, and that happens to be the maxillary posterior region that lies right on top of the sinus. And how many times people come in saying, I have pain here, I have an infection, or I need a root canal, like they're already self-diagnosed, yet they're not necessarily looking from an ENT standpoint at what's going on in the maxillary sinus. And we take a scan and we could see that one or both of the sinuses are filled up and they're, they're not doing anything from a medical standpoint to actually do things as simple as using a neti pot or, or, or using salt and, and, and saline on a, on a regular basis to clean out their sinuses, which is something— this one of my favorite stories, my, my grandmother who lived to 99 and smoked 2 packs of cigarettes a day, right? Like, like this, this, this tiny little Russian immigrant at the age of 1, she came here, right? The reason, she goes, the reason that, that, that smoking didn't kill her and she lived till 99, where she goes, I, I put, I put salt up my nose every day. I go, what, what do you do that for? That's the craziest thing ever. And then when I think about how many maxillary sinusitis I've had, or, or my kids have had, and you go to the doctor and they say, here, here's, here's some Ocean, which is salt water, and just use it on a regular basis and clean it out. So I take a look at, at how the overlap is between us and so many of our medical colleagues, I think it's crucial to be looking at other things. The other area besides sinusitis that I think I see on a regular basis are people that have a bad taste in their mouth, and yet they haven't looked at their gut health, right? They haven't taken a look at what they're eating, or they're not taking probiotics on a regular basis, or they're not taking, you know, pickled, you know, kimchi and things like that to actually, you know, keep the microflora, you know, balanced. And they'll go to the doctor and they'll get colonoscopy or an endoscopy, but they're not looking at what's causing that. And I think that those two things are probably the most prevalent in my practice that are outside of dentistry, but have a profound effect on their holistic body.

Yes, absolutely. And, you know, it's exciting to see dentistry moving in that direction where we know more about this oral-systemic connection and, you know, looking at the bigger picture. Now, I wanna go back to your book because you talk about here habits, and I love that conversation because, you know, I feel habits make a big difference in success. What is one of your habits you feel like this thing absolutely, you know, makes the most impact for me on a daily basis?

Sure. So again, if you look at my calendar, you will see that from 5:30 in the morning to 8:30 in the morning, I have crossed out every single day and I'm committed to doing it 5 out of the 7 days, but I have it crossed out on my calendar every single day, taking care of the personal pillar. So that means I'm up at 5:30 in the morning. I'm always up before the sun comes out. I think there's a huge profound connection to actually seeing the sun come up. And, and being present even for a second to the miracle of this world. It, it's like, you know, we take it for granted that the sun's gonna come up and the sun's gonna set, but it's, it's still pretty tremendous to, to just see that happen. And I start the morning in my hot tub. So no matter where I am, I have access to a hot tub. The, it's, it's set to 103 degrees and I go in for many, many, many reasons. The, the, the primary one is that I've had more surgeries on my spine than I could count, and my body is ridiculously stiff in the morning, mostly because of how many artificial parts that I have. Now, I recently had a breakthrough in that, and I'm not willing to change my routine because I love being in warm water regardless of how cold it is outside and watching the sun come up. And while I'm there, I have my computer with me and I am working on my well-being. What do I need to be, do to be fit, to be healthy, to have integrity with my, my health and nutrition? I definitely take a look at my bank accounts every single morning and I make sure there's no surprises, that there's integrity with paying my bills and making sure there's enough money coming in for the anticipated expenses and then making the plans to ensure that. I, I then exercise and then I hit the sauna. And again, I'm in the sauna 5 days a week. I believe that sweating and detoxing through sweat is probably one of the healthiest things that we can do.

I agree 100%. We don't detoxify enough, most of us, but that's impressive. So 5:30 to 8:30, you block that time and do all these things. Yeah. Well, that's definitely not a tiny habit, but I love it.

It started off as a tiny habit, and I believe the book's entitled Atomic Habits. And he talks about at the atom level, what's the little tiny thing that we could do today and just keep building on it. And that's the way I eventually built my life around that. And everybody knows, my entire family knows that they're not gonna reach me until after 8:30 in the morning.

Amazing. I might take that habit and put it in my calendar.

You, you might. I will. Okay, good. Good for you.

Right now I'm an early riser too. You know, I definitely get up like at 4:30-ish. I, you know, I get up, I have a coffee, then Andy and I work out together a lot of times and sit in the infrared sauna, not till 8:30. I usually have to be, you know, out of the house at the practice around 7:30 AM. But, you know, I like this 8:30 cutout better.

Yeah. Well, what, what, what I, so, so here's the thing, Sanda Moldovanova. So, so, so let's, let's play with that for a second. So if I was coaching you, I would say that I wouldn't change anything with what you're doing, with perhaps the exception of the end time, because what I love is that you're waking up before the sun comes up, and I think that's brilliant. I love the fact that you and Andy are doing this together because that now builds on the second pillar, right? Which is the people pillar. You're being related to, you know, somebody that you're committed to. I love that. And I love the fact that you're doing the sauna. This was the breakthrough that I had. I came to my office one day and I put my hand on the, on the doorknob to open the door, and I noticed that the name on the door at the very top position was my name. And I said, I know that guy and I bet I could have a conversation with him and I could start seeing patients a little bit later so that I could have a prolonged morning event. I've seen your office and I've seen the name that's on your door and I could tell you the same exact thing. I'll give you her number, you give her a call and consider starting a little bit later or consider limiting your practice to 4 days a week.

That's a great idea. Yeah, yeah. I'm very fortunate to have an amazing team and associates that are definitely helping to make that happen. Now, another concept which I loved in your book, you called it failing forward, and you say failing and failure are two entirely different concepts. I would love to chat about that because I think some people get depressed and over being a failure just because they failed at something.

Yeah. So, so I love this conversation. I am fortunate that I, I get to teach the, the fourth-year dental students at UCLA. And just last week, somebody was with me and she is a fantastic dentist for a fourth-year dental student. Fantastic. And towards the end of the day, she went online and she found out that she failed the dental board. So she's gonna have to retake the test. And she lost it. She just, she was emotional. She was crying. She was upset. She goes, I am such a failure. And I'm like, wow, that's an interesting concept. So that, does that mean in your definition that if you fail a test, whether it's something that's as important as the dental boards or something like that, that, that makes you a failure? Or does it mean that you failed the test and you get to retake it again? And she goes, I'm a failure. And I go, interesting. Well, that actually sounds like you've been really hard on yourself because if you are not going allow yourself the humanity of being able to fail at something, learn from those mistakes, make the necessary steps to improve them, and expand yourself so you come out the other end bigger, better, smarter, wiser, then that's going to be a problem. And she stopped and she paused. And I said, and by the way, I would hire you in a second as an associate.

Amazing.

And there was this moment where she grabbed onto the concept of the distinction between between she failed at a test and that failing of the test does not make her a failure. I have it that you could only say you are a failure when you throw in the towel and you go, I am done. That is either failure or you are no longer committed to that conversation and you're calling completion and the end of that for your future, which is also a different distinction. There's nothing wrong with saying, you know what, I'm going down this road and I'm gonna keep working at it until I get there. And then at some point you go, you know what, I'm no longer interested in that. So to complete that and say, I'm declaring completion on the XYZ game, whatever that is, and moving on to something else, that to me is not failure. That's calling completion, having integrity with where you were intending to go, and now you have a new commitment. So I think that, that, you know, you, you've gotta have space in your life for not getting the results you want.

Absolutely. You said that so well. Now, my last question here, cuz I don't wanna, you know, hug your whole afternoon here, but, uh, you know, these essential, three essential pillars, prosperity, people, and personal. How do you see these pillars shaping the future of healthcare and longevity, especially as more people shift toward preventative and holistic approaches?

Well, I think that the three pillars in and of itself are a holistic approach towards life, right? If we're not taking a look at whether or not we're making money so we could stay in business so that we could continue to care for patients and so we continue to pay our staff, then clearly we're not doing anything for ourselves. We're not doing anything for the other people that are important. So having, having financial conversations so you continue to be a healthcare provider or an entrepreneur, whatever it is that you want, is crucial. If you're not paying attention to the important relationships in your life, then I think you're gonna be quite miserable. Listen, I know a lot of people that are ridiculously wealthy, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars or more, and they're on, you know, their fourth marriage. They're divorced. They're absolutely miserable. They're not fun to be around because they're just cranky and they're one bite away from a heart attack. To me, that is absolutely not success, which is why I think the subtitle of the book was something like, you know, the keys to health, happiness, and success, because that, that you need all of it. You need to have the money coming in that supports your lifestyle and that supports the staff that you're committed to paying forever. You need to be healthy enough so you are around and available and vibrant and mentally able to handle people coming in with pain or with discomfort and hear and feel their pain and be able to relate to them. And if you're cranky you, or if you're worried about money, or if you're worried about your relationship falling apart, how do you stay present to them so that they— so you could actually be a doctor and heal them? And if you're not, um, intimate relationships with people so that you could be honest with them and tell them exactly what's going on and get some coaching from them on how to better yourself so that when the year is out, you could say, these are the areas of my personal life I've expanded. I think that we're doing ourselves and our patients a disservice and boy, would I love to see every doctor, not just dentists, but every doctor have these three pillars be the foundation of what they're committed to so that not only they're around as role models for, for ensuring that they are able to take care of their patients and, and their families, but also for their patients to see it so that the patients could model the doctor and live a life that's healthy and abundant.

Yeah, I agree. I hope this kind of teaching that you have in this book makes it to every dental school, because I think that's one thing that we're lacking as we come up through dental school, or probably medical school as well, is really learning balance. And I, I think it has to be taught early, especially to a lot of dentists out there. Like you mentioned, they enter dental school and they don't really have certain skills.

Exactly. And I could get how challenging it is when you're starting out and you just need to be in the practice every day, every hour for every single patient. But there has to be a time, and I think it's sometime after year 5 where you are absolutely taking time aside to work on the other pillars. And if you don't have the time allocated for it, I think that should probably be the biggest takeaway of our discussion today. If there's not the allocation of time, I think that those other pillars are going to suffer from it.

So everyone, I hope you learned a lot from this conversation. There were some aha moments for sure. Jay Wick, where can people find you? Find you?

So, you know, you could Google me, you could Google my name, you could Google Essential Pillars. You know, it's on Amazon. The, the Audible book, I think, is a whopping $3. It's— you make a dollar on the book. You know, I put it out there just to, to, to really have it as a, as a resource for people. And by the way, all, all the money, that whopping dollar goes all to my nonprofit. So it's, it's kind of a win-win there.

Amazing. And we're gonna put the link and the book that you can find on Amazon in the show notes as well. And, uh, Dr. Jay Grossman, it's been a pleasure. I really enjoyed having this conversation with you.

Same here, Dr. Moldovan. Great to see you too. All the best and thanks for having me.

Yeah. Okay, everyone. So thank you for joining us on today's show with Dr. Jay Grossman. Please, I encourage you to get The Essential Pillars. It's such a great book, whether or not you are a dentist. There's definitely a lot of practical tools in there for any entrepreneur and for anyone wanting to live their life more holistically. Until next time, keep smiling. Thank you so much for joining me this week. Please make sure you check out the show notes for any links mentioned in the show. If you like today's show, please invite your friends to listen as well. That would mean a lot to me. Do you have a question you'd like me to answer? Message me on Instagram @drsandamoldovanova. This is Dr. Sanda Moldovanova, and remember, Your mouth is the gateway to your health, so take care of it in the most natural and best way possible.