EP053: The 21 Principles of Success for Practitioners with Sachin Patel

Welcome to the Perfect Practice Podcast where we share the most innovative strategies to help you build a successful functional medicine business, attract your ideal patients, serve your community, and get paid what you're worth. Each episode is packed with practical steps that you can take to immediately grow your influence and serve more people. Our mission is to share golden nuggets from successful practitioners, technology experts and innovators from around the world. Your host, Sachin Patel is a functional medicine and success coach, international speaker and best selling author. He's calling in all his favors to bring this information to you so you can create your perfect practice.

Hello and welcome to today's episode of Perfect Practice. Today I'm going to be discussing the 21 principles of success for functional medicine practitioners. Many of these principles come from the experience I've had coaching hundreds of practitioners over the years and also surrounding myself with some very influential and successful entrepreneurs from a variety of different industries. One thing I've learned is that both success and failure leave clues. So today what I hope to share with you are the principles that can help you succeed. And these principles come from again, being around people who are very, very successful, but also being around people who just don't seem to have what it takes. Now that doesn't mean that they're not capable of what it takes, but the lessons that I'm going to teach you today, or the lessons that I had to teach them and the challenges that they had to overcome in order for them to feel that they were making the impact that their mission deserved. So first and foremost I want to mention, you know, this, I want to say that none of this is any particular order. So whatever resonates with you, it resonates with you. It's going to speak to you. If there's something that you need to do, it's going to speak to you. Some of the other stuff may not necessarily resonate because you're already doing those things and I hope that you're doing all of these things because guess what, the world right now needs functional medicine and lifestyle medicine practitioners to be extremely successful. So let's get into this. I've got a lot of great content to cover, but I'm going to also try to keep this very to the point because I think these principles are going to be self explanatory for the most part. So first and foremost principle for success is to collaborate, not compete. If we all work together and collaborate and share our best practices with each other, and share what's working with each other, guess what? We can advance this profession so Much faster. But if we compete with one another, then guess what? It's going to take so much longer for us to advance, and so much suffering will take place as a result of that. Not only personal suffering for the patients that we try to help, but also our businesses will suffer because it'll take longer for all, all of us collectively to see success come to fruition. So what I encourage all of you to do is focus on collaboration. That's principle number one. Principle number two is to be your authentic self. You know, there's so many people that we can model, and there's so many successful practitioners out there. There's people crushing it online. There's people doing well in their private practices. What I would encourage you strongly to do is be inspired by those individuals to know that success is capable. But I want you to keep in mind that they're successful for a reason. It's because they're passionate about the message that they're sharing. And that doesn't have to be your message. Your message is something that's unique to you. So be authentic. Be yourself. And when you're yourself, you can fully express your unique abilities. You can fully express your unique personality. And you're going to attract people who want to be in that energetic space. Nobody likes an imposter. So make sure you're yourself, and that's going to advance you so much faster. Principle number three is to be able to share stories. One of the things I encourage you to do is get really, really good at sharing stories. And if you have kids, kids are great to practice with because they love stories. That's how the brain is actually wired. So get really good at telling stories, because that's going to enable you to communicate with your patients, and it's going to be to allow you to market better. My friend Joe Polish taught me that marketing is essentially storytelling. So the better you get at storytelling, the less you have to sell people, the less persuasive you have to be. The story does all of that for you. So make sure you're learning how to tell a story. Follow the Hero's journey framework, because that's going to give you the best framework to be able to articulate your story and get your message across. So principle number three is to share stories instead of sharing facts. A lot of us as practitioners want to share facts. We feel like we have to prove ourselves to our patients and to our prospective clients. But here's the thing. You really don't have to prove anything except that you care and that you know what you're talking about and that you've helped other people. What's more important than facts is stories that you share of how you've helped other people that resemble the potential patient that you're trying to help. Principle number four is you want to make sure that you're resourceful. People who are not resourceful generally tend to advance so much slower in their practices because they live in this constant state of imposter syndrome. They feel like they've got to know everything before they can help people. And one of my friends, Jaz Jaj, who works for Deloitte, taught me is that it's not about just in case information. What's more relevant now than ever is just in time information. And so here's the thing. You're only a few minutes away. If you have the right tribe and if you have the right resources, you're just a few minutes away from finding whatever answer you're looking for. So you don't have to know everything. You just have to know where to look when the answers are required. So make sure you're resourceful and you have access to the information instead of pretending like you know everything you know. One of the things I'll tell clients is listening. I don't know all the answers. And I would highly encourage you to reevaluate working with someone who thinks they have all the answers. You're unique. Your case is unique. What I've learned is unique to me, and I will continue to learn new information as we work together. So my commitment to you, Mrs. Jones, is that I will always find the best answer for you, and I will always evaluate your case to make sure that that's the best answer for you. And that does a couple of things. One, it takes so much pressure off of you having to know everything simultaneously, and it also ensures the patient that you're going to do whatever it takes to get an answer for them. And you're not just going to shoot from the hip, that you're actually going to evaluate and investigate and articulate to them what exactly it is that they need to hear. All right, next principle. Principle number five is people who walk the line fail. And so what I want you to be is highly, highly polarizing. And what that means is you choose a side of the line. So you have to stand for something and you have to stand against something. People want to know that. You know, one of my mentors, Russell Brunson, taught me that you've got to have some sort of polarization in your marketing. People have to know if you're a friend, a foe, or if you're not, and if you are a friend of theirs and you have a common enemy, then you're going to build a bond so much quicker. Okay? So having a common enemy builds a bond. And that's not to say that you have to throw anyone else under the bus, but pick a side. Understand the side that your consumer is on and pick that side. I mean, of course it has to be authentic to you. People who are plain vanilla, who don't articulate their message, who are afraid of offending people, they don't succeed. And so a key principle to your success is pick a side and polarize your audience. The people that agree with you will do business with you. They may refer others to you, but the people who don't agree with you, they're never going to do business with you. Right? And so we want to be able to fully, authentically express our value system and our belief system so that people can pick a side. And hopefully the right people, the people that we want to work with, choose us. Principle number six is be decisive when you know what you want. And so one of the first exercises I do is I have my clients do a dream day exercise, and I have them build out their perfect day. And by building out their perfect day, they know exactly what it is that they want. So it becomes really easy to say yes or no to things or opportunities or situations or circumstances when you know what it is that you want. Just like it becomes really easy to take a left turn or a right turn or go straight or take the off ramp or on ramp, whatever the case may be. If you know where you want to go and your GPS is guiding you, when we know what we want, it takes the emotion out of things. Because now we know that something is moving us in the right direction or in the wrong direction. And we can take massive action and swift action, which is very important. So number six is to be decisive. Principle number seven is you have to give more than you expect to receive. So one of the principles of nature is the 9010 rule. We should give more than we ever expected in return. And if we take it to a whole different level, my value system is that I should just be able to give and not expect anything in return. So one of my favorite books is the Bhagavad Gita. And in the Gita, one of the things that it teaches is to give without any expectation. So if you can get into that spiritual space and you can give without expectation, then you're going to be in a much better place. Because all you can do each and every single day is do your best work. And so if you give the best of yourself every single day, you leave it all on the table every single day, then guess what? You're going to see some massive success. And it may not happen immediately, because think about it this way. If I plant a seed today, I'm not going to bear the fruit of that seed the same day. It might not even be the same month. In some cases, it may not even be the same year. But if you nurture that seed, it will eventually bear fruit. So there's a time gap in between what we put out there in the world and what we then receive. Now, there's different ways that we get paid. Only one of those ways is money. Another way we get paid is opportunity. Another way we get paid is by circumstances. The right people showing up, the right parking spot showing up, you know, not getting caught in the rain, you know, getting that green light, you know, those are the type of things that you want to also pay attention to. Because the currency of the universe is not cash, right? It's not money in your bank account. That's a human structure. The currency of the universe, when you do good, when you put good out into the world, is to compensate you in more ways than money. We call it karmic currency. So principle number seven is give more than you expect in return. And seven b is don't expect anything in return and be present for all the amazing things that are happening for you in your life. Next, principle number eight, get your hands dirty. People who watch from the sidelines fail miserably. You can't learn how to swim by reading about it in a book. You've got to jump in the pool and take massive action. And here's the thing, people are afraid of failing. But failure only occurs if we don't learn something from it. Sometimes what we describe as failure is just our expectations not being met. But that doesn't mean we fail. We've learned how to do something. We've developed a skill, We've perhaps increased our confidence. And I promise you, nobody's ever died from a failed marketing attempt, so to speak, in their functional medicine practice, or a failed messaging attempt in their functional medicine marketing strategy. So put yourself out there, jump into the deep end, learn how to swim. And I promise you that it's fun in the deep end. I promise you, you'll learn how to swim so, so much faster out of necessity. And when you get your hands dirty, when you get your feet wet. Amazing things start happening when you decide the universe conspires for you. Principle number nine. Charge what's fair. This is another area that I come across quite often when I work with my practitioners and the people that I coach or people I get on discovery calls with and strategy sessions with. People don't know what to charge. Now, here's one thing that Joe Polish taught me, and that is the only person the price matters to is you. You've got to feel good about what you charge, but you also have to make sure you charge what's fair to you, what's fair to your practice, and what's fair to the patient. You've got to charge what your experience and time and knowledge and training is worth. And you've got to also charge for the training you plan on taking in the future, because we've got to fund our continuous learning. You've got to charge what's fair to your practice so you can stay open. Of course, you want to be around for six months when the patient needs your help. And you also want to be able to pay your staff a fair to above average wage because we're doing amazing work with our patients and our clients. And also our team deserves to be able to fully express themselves, and they deserve to get paid what their energy and effort is worth. And also you want to make sure you're fair to your consumer. Now, when you charge too little, that's a problem. And the reason for that is because you can't blow the socks off of your clients. When you charge too little, then you can't create the unique experience that you want to create for your consumer. So being able to charge what's fair is really important because you need to charge enough so your consumer pays attention. If you charge too little, people don't listen to you. Let's face it, it's human nature. If something's free, people don't attention. If something's too expensive, then the expectations of people get too high. So find that delicate balance. And I've done a whole presentation on how to pick the right pricing for what you're charging. But charge what's fair. Okay, I'll never tell you to gouge people, but I do want you to make sure you're not gouging yourself. Principle number 10. People who operate out of love tend to be far more successful than people who operate out of fear. So you want to make sure that you're creating the right vibe in your environment. And by operating out of love, the love for your work, the love for your patients, the love for your community, you know, the love for the art of, you know, functional medicine and lifestyle medicine. That type of resonance is going to attract a different type of person. It's also going to help you create a different level of work. So you have to love what it is you do. You have to love your practice. You have to love your patience. And here's the thing, if you don't, then you need to reevaluate the way you practice. You need to reevaluate the type of work that you're doing. Because if you don't do this out of love and love doesn't permeate in everything that you do, then success is certainly not going to follow. When people love what they do, success follows them. They don't chase success. Principle number 11, be consistent. Consistency is what carves canyons. So be consistent with whether it's your newsletter, whether it's your social media, whether it's the emails that you send out to people, whether it's the growth strategy for personal growth that you have in place, or whether it's exercise, whatever it is, if it's important to you, be consistent. That's one of the things I've noticed is people who are really successful are consistent. They're relentless, as Tim Grover would say, who's also one of my mentors, and he coached Michael Jordan. So he has given some deep insight into what it takes to be relentless and the type of attitude that it takes to be someone like Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant or D. Wade. These athletes have a certain way of really approaching and attacking everything that they do, and they do it so, so consistently. So someone like Michael Jordan consistently practiced more than everyone else. Kobe Bryant practiced three to four times, separate times a day, and so he practiced two to three times more than the rest of his colleagues would. And he did that consistently over and over and over. So being consistent is really, really critical to your success. Principle number 12, focus on what it is that you want to create, not how you're going to create it. You know, in one of my episodes, episode 42, in the mindset Mastery episode, I talk about this in quite some detail because most people get caught up in how they're going to get something done. And when you get caught up in how you're going to get something done, guess what? You're not doing it. Because chances are the how is something that escapes you or is beyond you when you focus on what it is that you're trying to create, and then you open yourself up to the possibility that other people can help you and support you. Then guess what? You can move so much faster. There's no such thing as a self made entrepreneur. Every successful entrepreneur has had people help them along the way. And they've used vendors, they've used services, and they've done that by focusing on what it is they want to get done and letting other people worry about how it's going to get done. Principle number 13, be very, very open to growth and failure. So in order for us to grow in some regards, we have to fail. If you hit every single benchmark that you set for yourself, if you hit every single goal that you set for your, you're not aiming high enough. Okay? Vishad Lakhiani taught me that 50% of what you do should fail. So your goals should be so ambitious that half of what you do fails. Now that means if you set an ambitious goal of, let's say 60 new patients this quarter, and if you get 30, that's probably what you were going to get anyways. Now if you set a goal for 30 and you hit 30, well that's great, but you really haven't stretched yourself. You've accomplished something that you set out to do. If you set a goal out for 60, you might even hit 45 or you might hit 50, but you've certainly stretched yourself. And some of you might consider that a failure, but it's not because you grew more than you would have had you set a lower goal and accomplished it. Principle number 14, focus the now and stop worrying so much about the past. Because your past shouldn't define you, it should refine you. And stop worrying so much about the future. Unless in your mind you can paint a more beautiful future than what you have in this present moment. You know, the mind is either a weapon or a tool. It's a weapon if we dwell on the past in a negative way or we create a negative future. It's a tool. If we can use our past as a resource and raw material for creating a better future. And that's a Dan Sullivan principle. So focus on creating a beautiful future for yourself, but also remember to focus on the now. Principle number 15, get help. Okay, so trying to do everything yourself is going to overwhelm you. It's going to be a very daunting task. It's going to be very difficult to get anything done. It's. If you're trying to do all the work, you need to focus on your zone of genius. You need to be focusing on your message. You need to Be focusing on your clinical skills. You need to be focusing on the existing patients that you have. You should not be building your website, you should not be doing your automations. You should not be a Facebook ad agency. There's people that do this for a living. Just like you do functional and lifestyle medicine for a living. There's people that do Facebook ads for a living. So guess what? But imagine them trying to be functional medicine practitioners, how disastrous that would be. So you've got to have the same mentality when it comes to helping, finding help for your business. You've got to find people that are going to help you grow. And you can grow so much faster. Trust me, I'll be the first one to admit that if it wasn't for me getting help, I would not have anywhere close to the results that we have. And I still see an even brighter and more amazing future for our practice and your practice, because we're going to continue to get help from other people. It's when we hired professionals that we started seeing exponential growth in our business. Now, principle number 16 is to use the circumstances in your life to inspire you, not to demotivate you or to use them as excuses. So let me give you an example. Some people will use their children as an excuse. Instead of using their children to inspire their work ethic, they'll use their children to dial down their work ethic. Instead of people using their crummy financial situation as an inspiration or motivation, they'll use it and weaponize it against themselves. So how we think about things is very, very important. So the things that should drive you and motivate you, make sure that those things are not the excuses that you use that prevent you from taking action. Principle number 17, people who are outside of their comfort zone are the ones that grow. You know, your dreams go to die in your comfort zone. And so it's very important that you stretch yourself, that you put yourself out there, that you do things that make you a little bit uncomfortable, a little bit scared, because that's when you grow. And the reason you grow is because you realize that it's not going to kill you. It's only going to make you stronger and better and wiser and faster and smarter. And so when you outside your comfort zone, you're going to be growing at a much faster pace than everyone else who's in their comfort zone, who isn't really stretching themselves, who isn't pushing the envelope. And of course, everything you do should be totally legal and kosher, not telling you to do anything illegal. But you should be outside of your comfort zone, at least for a percentage of your day. And that enables massive growth to take place. Principle number 19, you know, don't work too much, okay? Find the right amount of work and life and exploration balance. So one thing I teach my clients and I want to get across to you, is that most of your growth is going to occur in the white space. So a lot of times we get stuck and we think, you know, the word business is pronounced busyness. And those are two different things. So working on your business doesn't have to be you grinding it out on your desk. Some of the best solutions I've come up with and the best ideas I've come up with have actually been while I'm on a walk in nature, or while I'm playing basketball with my son, or while I'm walking at the mall. So creating white space in your life is very, very important. If you're working all the time, then you're probably working on something that is reactionary. And so you're actually coming up with an idea, and then you're working on putting that idea into implementation. But you don't create ideas while you're working on them. You create ideas in the white space. So the white space for you could be going for a run, it could be going for a walk, it could be spending time in nature, it could be meditation, it could be going to the grocery store, it could be spending time with friends. We need all this. And when we're in our creative genius and when we're in our right brain, that's when we come up with our best ideas. So make sure you're spending time with the people you love, doing the things that you love, and following the pursuit of your hobbies and things that you love doing aside from working. Like, I get it, you love your practice, you love your patience. But if you really want to help them, make sure that you're pursuing a hobby as well, because that's when you're going to come up with a lot of your great ideas and inspiration. Principle number 20, be decisive. Okay? So decisiveness is very, very important. And you want to make sure that you're deciding to win. So, you know, not just being decisive, but what are you deciding you're going to do? Are you going to decide that you're going to win, or are you going to decide that you're going to fail? Because ultimately the outcome is based on whatever it is that you decide. So, you know, there is no try. As Yoda would say, you must Do. So get out there, make a decision, decide that you're going to win, and put all your effort into it. That's what successful people do, is they decide they're going to win, and they do whatever it takes to make sure that they win. All right. Principle number 21 is solve other people's problems first. You know, as a business owner, the reason your business exists is to solve other people's problems. Many business owners, I find, are too busy trying to solve their own issues. Zig Ziglar said it best. You can have whatever it is you want in this world if you help other people get whatever it is that they want. So in your business, the reason your business exists is because other people have a problem and you have a solution for those people. If you put those people first, I promise you that a company will win always. Your business will always win. If your customers want you to win, if you want to win for yourself first and you want to serve yourself first, and your business is so you could have that nice car or a nice house, and there's nothing wrong with that. But that's not the primary reason your business exists. Your primary reason your business exists is to help people solve their problems. And if you help them solve their problems, they'll fund whatever dreams you have because you made their life so much better. So Those are the 21 principles of success. And these principles of success can apply to any business. And I've got one bonus recommendation for you, one bonus principle, and this is to invest in yourself. Investing in yourself is one of the greatest things that you can do. Now, how do you invest in yourself? It could be investing in training. It could be investing in mentorship. It could be investing in personal development. It could be investing in certain books or courses that you take. But when you grow, then everything else grows. I want you to visualize you as the trunk of a tree in order for the branches of that tree to grow. And the branches might represent your relationships, your business, your financial situation. Whatever aspects of your life that are important to you are represented as branches on this tree coming off of this trunk. And guess what? The branches can never grow bigger than the trunk itself. So if you want the branches, and really, if you want all the branches in your life to grow, and you want to have the best life possible, then guess what? You've got to grow. That trunk has to grow. Because nature, Mother Nature is so smart, she'll never grow a branch bigger than the trunk. So you decide how successful you want to be by growing yourself, by investing in yourself by taking the training, by getting the mentorship, whatever it is that you need to go to the next level, make that investment in yourself. I hope these principles helped you. I hope there was a few nuggets in there that nudge you to take some sort of action. I know that you feel this way. The world needs us now more than ever. And these guiding principles are going to help you become a much more successful practitioner. Whatever level of success you have, I promise you, there's always another level. So here's to your growth. Here's to your success. With love and gratitude. This is Sachin Patel. I hope you have an amazing, amazing rest of your day. If you found this to be beneficial, then please share this with other people, because I feel that more practitioners need to hear this information. And if you agree with the value system that we have and you want to share these principles with other people, then I would be so honored if you would do that and help spread this message. I love you. Thank you. Have an amazing rest of your day. Bye for now.