88. Creating the Career You Always Wanted as a Physician Entrepreneur | Nneka Unachukwu, MD

Hello everyone, I'm Dr. Darsha, and I'm Dr. Altamash Raja, and welcome to Medicine Redefined. A podcast where we will explore the often overlooked but necessary components of health, what we consider to be the fundamentals. We will investigate topics and practices that can give you and your patients the best chance to optimize a healthy lifestyle. It's time to move the needle forward and put the health back in healthcare. Peter Drucker, the great change management thought leader, once said that the entrepreneur always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity. Well our guest today is Anika Una Chukwu, who also goes by Dr. Una. When practitioners think of a physician entrepreneur, Dr. Una is someone who immediately comes to mind. Dr. Una completed her medical degree in Nigeria. She is the founder of Ivy League Pediatrics in Georgia, and that practice has been voted as the best of Gwinnit. But in 2016, Dr. Una came to a realization that healthcare was rapidly evolving and that she wanted more. She took a leap and created Entry MD, a platform to help other physicians create the lives that they always wanted. Knowing that there was zero business or marketing taught in medical school, she built the Entry MD business school to fill that gap. She authored the book Entry MD, which lays out the steps and mindset shift needed to become a physician entrepreneur. In this episode, Dr. Una talks about her background, her setbacks, and the mentality shift it took to believe that she could build a successful business. We even delve into the system she uses and how she thinks about concepts such as failure, success, and time management. You may want to grab a notepad for this one because Dr. Una brings the energy, the excitement, and the knowledge. Enjoy. All right, welcome back everyone to another episode of Medicine Redefined. We have none other than special guests, Dr. Una, how are you doing? Thank you so much for joining this show. I'm doing great. Thank you so much for having me. I've been looking forward to this. Yeah, absolutely. Likewise. So I read your book Entry MD, and to start off, I will say I was very surprised by the fact that you kind of started all this in 2016. I mean, I've been following you now for about a year or two, and I was under the assumption that you've been doing this maybe for 10 plus years with everything that you've started, how confident you are, the amount of networking that people have achieved through you. I was like, whoa, 2016, that's only six, seven years ago. So I want to delve into that. Let's do a deep dive right in. Tell me a little bit about your medical background, how you got into pediatrics, and then what kind of made you, what was that conversation you had in your head in 2016 to say, hey, I kind of want to take this to another level. Yeah. So I went to the University of Niger for medical school. That was my theme. I bring that up because while I was in medical school, people were like, so what do you want to do when you're done? And I'm like, I'm not sure, but I know I don't want to be a pediatrician. And so all my classmates are very amused, that's where I ended up with, you know, I wanted to be an OBGYN, that was my first choice. But I went to medical school under the European system, which means there's a hierarchy of sorts. And so no attending is doing 24 hour calls or overnight deliveries or anything like that. And so for me, as, you know, when I found out the way the system works in the US, I was like, I have nine lives going on at the same time. I can't be doing nights forever. And but I really wanted the mommies because I had, they're the group of people I had the most compassion for, right? And there's a lot of vulnerability around GYN problems or infertility or being pregnant. And you look different every morning and things like that. And so I was like, so where can I still get the mommies? And, you know, with pediatrics, I was like, you know, yeah, I can still get them. And I don't have to work, you know, 24 or seven. So, so pediatrics became my choice. And which was great for my patients because, you know, they had me as a, as a doctor and the mom had me as a, you know, not their doctor, but like their partner as well. So, so that's a lot of fun. So that's how I ended up in, in pediatrics. And right after my residency training, I went to Newark, Bethesua Medical Center. That's why I did my training in New Jersey. And you know, I got my first attending job, which was, you know, really cool. And you know, the buck stops with me. I'm writing all my prescriptions. I'm doing my thing. But I still remember seeing my first patient. And it was very anti-climatic, right? Like I was like, I'm a big boss now, I'm doing all the things. I saw the patient, gave them their script, told them I had to follow up, walked out of the room, like a boss. And I was like, so then I just do this over and over like I do this 25 times a day for the rest of my career. I was like, there has to be something else, right? Because if you think of us as, you know, in our training, we're always aspiring for something, right? I'm going to get into pre-med. Then I'm going to get into med school. Then I'm going to get into residency. Then I'm going to do fellowship. And like there's something. And so I was like, everything stopped and I didn't know what to do myself. And so that's when the whole itch of there must be more started. I had no idea what more was. Like there's no way I could foresee what I'm doing now. It was just like, there has to be something else. And then I had the opportunity to start a practice, because I'd been in the practice I was at for a year. My boss gave me a contract. He's like, here, you know, a five year contract, I was like, oh my gosh, you know, I'd been married for three years. I had been in just finished residency for three years. So my definition of eternity is three years, you know, it was three years at the time. And I was like, so five years, I was like, but you know, but I was moving. So I was like, I'm not, I'm not going to be able to stay anyway. And he was like, so start your own practice. I'm like, nobody starts to practice 15 months out of residency. Like that's not how this works. And he's like, well, you know, and I was pregnant at the time, right? Like I was between being a newbie and being pregnant. And it's like, you're doing everything you would do here. You know, and because I'm a big believer in the law of the extra mile, so I did a lot of things I didn't have to do. And it's like, you're doing everything here. And you know, you have the baby and the practice will be slow and the baby will grow and the practice will grow at the same time and you guys will all be good. And so that's my ignorance is bliss story because, you know, I was like, yeah, why don't we do that? And so, you know, ultimately, we started the practice. And of course, in my first week, I was like a deer caught a headlight because I only knew, I knew about being a good doctor. I didn't know anything about the business side of medicine. So I'm like, I have to figure out what EHR I have to pay for the EHR. I have to do payroll. It will profit in a law statement. What is that? Like all these things. And then I have to market myself, you know, because I was an introverted introvert. I was not going to be introducing myself to people and tell them to send me their patients, right? I was going to practice good medicine and they will come. And so I remember being so terrified and I couldn't back out of it, right? I'd sign these leases. I had contracts with insurance companies. Like I couldn't back out of it. And I remember, you know, reading, you've read the book. So you heard me talk about this line, just one sentence that you really changed everything for me. Brian Tracy was, you know, in his book, he said, all business skills are learnable because I was like, all these guys are out here. They're great at private practice. I suck. That was my conclusion. And I was like, wait a minute, like I may not know everything, but I am a physician. If there's anything I'm good at doing is learning like that. If that's, if that's what I need to do to get these business skills, I'm golden. And so that's when I fell in love with entrepreneurship and started learning the skills. How to market? How to sell? How to hire? How to fire? How to build company culture? Profit and law statements. The whole nine yards. And so I was doing that and build a practice practice became very successful. I was working four days a week. I was a hip. But in 2016, I had one of these pivotal, defining moments. And I remember being in my study and I just had this knowing that medicine as we know it is gone, right, like it is gone and it's never coming back. And if all I know how to do is just doctor and walk away, that'd be out of luck, right? And the way, you know, when I talk about it, it almost sounds a little morbid because it's like a blood bath is coming. So that's the, that's the sense that I had then a blood bath is coming and you have to be ready. You have to retool yourself. What if you couldn't see patients the way you see them now? What would you do to still be able to have a meaningful career, still generate revenue in all of those things? And so that's when I was like, okay, you know, and literally I'm so green, I'm like people speak and they, they build careers that way and people are consultants and all of those kind of things. And that's when I started retooling myself, you know, but I am this kind of person where I'm like, if it's going to affect me, it's going to affect, yeah, I started looking. I'm like, there's a million physicians, this is going to affect a lot of people. And so that's when I started embracing all of that and kind of helping people to retool themselves. Well, and that was the foundation for Entrambi then start till two years later, but that 2016 was just a very pivotal moment for me. Yeah, I'm curious to know you, you say you're an introvert, but a lot of what you do as Entrambi is extroverted, right? I mean, it's not going out there networking, having a business school, teaching other people, kind of following some of the footsteps that you've gone through. How did you transition from that introvertedness over to the skill of extrovertedness, or are you still an introvert, or are you still an introvert, I'm such an introvert. So I think for me, it came with a different understanding of who an introvert is, right? So my old interpretation was an introvert is somebody who is socially awkward and they're shy and things like that. But then I continued digging into it and I found out that really an introvert is somebody who draws strength from solitude, right? So if I show up in a social situation, I can do what I need to do, but it's ultimately draining for me. As opposed to an extrovert who the more they have got people, the more energy, and you like all of that kind of stuff. And so when it comes to being able to navigate social situations, being able to dominate on stage, being able to network, those are skills. That's not a personality type, right? And so I can be an introvert and dominate on stage and network and all of that. But I recognize, I'm very clear that where I recharge is in solitude, right? And so when I'm done, say I did a big event, a three day event, a retreat or something like that, when I'm done with that, you best believe I'm not talking to people for two days, like I'm like, well, I'm going on my long walks, I'm, you know, get a nice book sit by myself. I'm not scheduling meetings right after that because I know I recharge in solitude. And it actually brought me to a place where I see being an introvert as a superpower, right? Because I recharge in solitude also means I'm a deep thinker. I do some of my best work when I'm by myself because I, I'm a deep thinker. I can, I can pull out answers to problems. I can navigate, strategize, do all these kind of things because I'm a deep thinker. So I don't see it as, I used to see it as a handicap. Like all my life would be so much better if I was not an introvert. But now I see it as a superpower. So I learned to network. I learned to know how to communicate a message on stage. I learned, like all of those things are learned, they are skills. It doesn't matter if you're an introvert, an extrovert, you can thrive in those situations. So I'm still 100% introvert. Right. And I'm sure you've learned over time to schedule in that me time, right? Because the more you can recharge the better your speaking engagements will be, the better you can show up for your clients and other physicians out there. And I think that's a very important point that the audience should learn. Especially if they are introverts is that, you know, a lot of people will think, man, well, I'm just starting out. I'm going to have so many things to do. I always have to be on the road, sure, but it's okay to rest. And I think we live in a culture where we shame a lot of the times. And if you're resting, you're not doing something. But hey, there's a lot of power. Like you said, especially with a thinking and the creativity that comes, comes with it. I'm glad you, I'm glad you brought that up. Because, you know, when the, for instance, if when I have three day events, I would typically go to the, to the location or sort wherever we're having the event, the day before or two days before. And I'm by myself, like, because I'm like, I cannot, this, I cannot spend this energy till it's time to spend this energy. So I'm by myself here, people like, oh, can I meet up with you? I'm like, absolutely not. Because I don't, I need the energy to run for the three days. And if I start hanging out and all of that stuff, I know, I'm just like burning, burning a candle, like, you know, and so yeah. So I, I scheduled, I'm very intentional about it, protecting my energy before I have to go do something that an extrovert will thrive in. For sure. Yeah, there's a lot of power in that, absolutely. When we, when you first started talking out about your journey, you talked about knowing that there was something more, right? And I think in your book, too, you talk about where can you create value, right? Where's the thing that as a physician, your skillset, where do you want to help? But I also think there has to be something intrinsic, right? That, that you gain out of that. What was that for you? Was there something internally, you know, rotating inside of you that were like, this is why I want more something that was cortical selfish, I guess? Yeah, so for, I think, and this is, this is a great question because it's, it's very different for everybody and the self-awareness, the awareness of what that is is really critical. For me, my biggest driver is becoming the best version of myself. Like, if there's anything that I don't want to use the word terrified, because I'm not necessarily terrified about it. But if there's anything I think about and I'm like, I don't want to have to live with that regret, I don't want to be 90. And think about all these things I could have done, because you know, I don't know if this has happened to you where before an exam, you convinced yourself that you didn't have time to study on all of those things. And the second you showed up to write, you're like, you were tripping, you should adjust that, you know, you know, right? That feeling before an exam, I may not be too offended with it, but I don't want to have that feeling when I'm 90. I don't want to feel like that all these things I really could have done, I just made excuses on all of those kind of things. I want to get to where I'm 90 and just smile and go like, I did it all. And I'm like, all the extra time I have on Earth, I'm just spending, being a blessing to the world before I leave. I want like, when it, when I die, they put my body in the ground, it's truly an empty carcass. Like there's nothing left. That is the biggest driver for me. And so, when I was, you know, doing what I was doing in my practice and all of that stuff, and I didn't have anything else to aspire to, I was like, that's a problem, because there's so much more locked up in here. And I need to get all of that out before I leave. Right? And so, so that was a really big driver for me. And entrepreneurship then became a gateway to that, because once you can work out, learn how to build a business system, you can put it around whatever it is you want to do. It is the ultimate platform for massive impact and creating financial and time freedom, right? And so that, so it became a tool that gives me the opportunity to become me. So yeah, that's, that's my driver. Preach, doctor, and preach. I love that. I think about this all the time. When I'm on my deathbed, where are the things in the current and the present moment, what I regret, right? And I think that's such a huge drive. I mean, my social needs all that are also about like being the best version of yourself. And just, you know, at the end, if you can bring out that towel, you want to get every kind of last drop out. So I absolutely love that. With that being said, every great story has challenges, right? That you have to overcome things that you've gone through. And you, you talk a little bit about that in the book as well. But if you don't mind going through some of the biggest ones, let's talk, let's start with getting started. Was there something that kept holding you back or for you? Was it, you know what? I'm just going to go and get started with this entrepreneur. No, oh, no. Like, now I'm a lot more like, yeah, let's do it. What do we have to do? But I'm 43 years old, right? Like, it's a little different. But then, I mean, my, the biggest thing was fear. I was scared of everything, right? Like, I had this, you know, I had the fear of failure. And it was so bad. Like, this is not going to work. Patients are not going to come. I was afraid of hiring people because I'm like, who want to follow you? I didn't even hire, if you can believe this, I didn't even hire an MA or a front desk person in the beginning. Because I'm like, who want to follow me? Like, so you understand how bad it was, right? And so, so I had an alter ego. Her name was Ella, right? So I answered my own phones. Thank you for calling Ivy League Pediatrics. This is Ella. How can I help you, right? Like, because I was it. And then I bring the patients in. I work them up. You know, I'll see them as the doctor. Then I'll give them their shots. And it was crazy. I was so scared of everything. I was scared of running out of money. I was scared of everyone's perception of me, right? So when it came to, oh, your pediatrician, go meet the OBGYNs. Tell them you're the new doc in town. And all that stuff. And they should send patients to you. I wouldn't. I was terrified of everything. It was so crazy. I cannot even believe how, right? But I'm a real Enneagram Sixer, right? Preest, traumatic stress disorders. I can imagine everything that could go wrong. But I was terrified of everything. And I think, you know, one of the gifts that entrepreneurship gave me is, especially in private practice, you know, you can't. It's hard to withdraw. You already have all these responsibilities. You'll have these all these bills. And so you're more inclined to figure it out. So it was being stuck that kind of made me go like, OK, let me, yeah, it was almost like my back was against the wall. Let me figure some out some things out. But I was so afraid of everything. And I'm sure there's somebody who's listening right now. And they're afraid. You know, when I ask what stops doctors from saying, you know, it's fear of failure. For some, it's fear of success. For some, it's that you have all these student loans. What if it doesn't work? Oh, it's a lot of fear. The fear never goes away. I have talked to people building $500 million businesses. The fear never goes away. And so it is our relationship with fear that changes. So my relationship with fear changed. Whereas like, I interpreted fear as this is an indication to stop. This is an indication you shouldn't do this. That was my understanding of fear. Like, you have the edge of the cliff. Fear is like, don't fall off, right? But this fear is a little different. This fear of stopping your tracks every single time. And so I refrained it. Whereas like, you know what? In my comfort zone, I feel no fear. But there's nothing magical that happens in a comfort zone. There's nothing new that happens in the comfort zone. There's no progress that happens in the comfort zone. I mean, even if you're lifting weights, when your trainer notices you're comfortable, they add on more weights. Because there's nothing to be had when you're comfortable. And so every time you get to the edge of your comfort zone, fear shows up. He's like, no, stay in the comfort zone. You're a two-year-old. Keep your diaper, like all of that stuff, right? And so now fear to me means you're about, you're at the border of your comfort zone. And you're about to leave your comfort zone to go to the place where all the magic happens. So I feel the fear and still go ahead, right? And so I'm saying that. So if you're listening and fear has stopped you, it will always be there. If you're waiting for it to go away before you do stuff, it will never go away. Even if you feel like, no, I've overcome some fear. No, just add a zero or add a new layer. You'll find out that it's still there. It's still going to tell you're crazy. Don't do that, right? And so it just means, so when I feel fear, excitement follows because it's like something good is about to happen. And I finally got to this point, so this was in 2021. I finally got to this point where I'm comfortable being afraid. Like you practice long enough, you get there. I'm comfortable being uncomfortable. I'm comfortable going, wow, this is something new I've never done before and I feel afraid. I'm like, yeah, let's go do it, right? It is a wonder, if you practice long enough, you get there. It's a wonderful place to be in because fear and magic go together. Yeah, they do. It's kind of funny to me to think about the concept of fear, especially for doctors, right? Because we have such a long road. And everything is almost fear-based. You go from pre-med to medical school and how many firsts your medicines are freaked out about, oh my god, how hard is this going to be? What am I going to do? Then you get into internear. And man, I remember two years ago, I was like, I know absolutely nothing. Everyone knows more than me. What am I going to do? Then you go into like, went from internear to PM&R. Oh my god, now it's something new to learn. So we're almost always in this uncomfortable zone. But it's like you said, it's hardwired in the human brain to always just be stopped in your tracks, right? And I can only imagine once you're attending, you now have a choice. Do you want to keep pushing the boundary and keep learning? Or do you want to kind of just stay in your comfort zone, see the same old patients as you want? But this concept of fear of success, you know, a lot of people understand fear of failure. But how would you navigate the fear of success? And from the people that you've talked to, what is it exactly? Yeah, so that's one that took me by surprise. I did not know it was a thing, right? And I had a client and she would constantly get up to a certain point in sabotage, like get to a point and quit. And I kind of figured I'm like, you know, and then and so one day she's like, you know, the truth of the matter is, I am terrified of succeeding. And like I said, it was a very new concept. So I'm like, so why are you afraid of success? She's like, if I succeed, then it means I have to give more time to my business. And I have less time to spend with my family. And my priority is my family, right? I've seen versions where people like, if I succeed, then I become the bad guy. You know how the movie is always paid? The businessman is always the bad guy, right? Like, you know, the evil empire and all that stuff. So it's like, when I succeed, I turn into that, right? And doctors, we are helpers are hard. We want to change the world. We want to have impact. We don't want to be that. That not meaning an entrepreneur, that meaning the way Hollywood projects entrepreneurs, right? And so, so it comes from things like that. Like, who will I become? What will life look like when I do succeed? Right? But again, like the fear of failure is completely baseless. You know, like one of my clients who is terrified of it, now she's, I mean, she's grown her business almost 700% since then. And she has more time. And she's with her family more. And she could drop things at the top of the head and go be with them, right? It's just, they're all lies. You know what I'm saying? I think at the end of the day, they're all, if you sit and think about it, if my business thrives, and that means I have more revenue. And with more revenue, I can build a bigger team. With more revenue, I could, I have the freedom to work on my processes, right? So things are a little more streamlined. And if I have a team and my process is a streamlined, then I can take time off. And if I can take more time off, I can be there with my family more. Like if you trace it all the way, it doesn't really make any sense, right? And when people like, it will change me, money never changes anybody. Money doesn't change it amplifies, right? And so if, if at your core, you're the person who wants to help people, you're the person who likes to spend time with your family and all that stuff, money just gives you the capacity to do it on a bigger scale, right? And if you're the opposite, it just funds that. It only amplifies, it doesn't change you, you know? For sure. And this is why I think it's so ridiculous that money is, quote, unquote taboo in medicine, right? When somebody says, oh, don't judge me, but I do want to make this certain amount. And I say, well, you should speak that out loud, because with more money, you can do more things. And like you said, you can amplify and create a domino effect and actually create more value in the end. And to touch on kind of the point about failure success, I mean, I see it all the time when I talk about people who, you know, they know they need to lose weight. They maybe want to lose 20 pounds. And they know it's going to be hard work, because they know what's what it involves. But they think once they do it, they're going to have to keep doing the hard work. But they don't realize that they're going to evolve as the journey goes on. And it's going to be a new normal for them, right? And I think that's the perspective people need is that new normal will continue to evolve. So I absolutely love that you talk about that. I want to talk about how you balance, right? Because it's not easy having a private practice, transitioning, having a family, and then, you know, still living maybe more than nine lives like you do now. So how do you balance everything, especially with patient care? Well, so the concept of, okay, so I'll talk from my perspective because there are a lot of things I do. And, you know, I'm going to stop here to paint a little bit of a picture. So people understand that this can be done, okay? So I have, I have my private practice that I run. I have on TMD, which is, you know, which is a company that's all wired to help doctors learn how to build profitable businesses. In that container, there's a business school, their books that I write, there's the podcasts that I run, the speaking that I do, and all of that. I've been married for 16 years. I have four children. Two of them are homeschooled. I co-pasta church with my husband. So it's not like we can't solve it. Like it's, it's a lot of things. Yeah. Okay. Now, the concept is, if you are going to add on things, this is the biggest thing for me. If you're going to add on things, you need to take off things, right? And so trying to, if you're, if you're like, oh, you know, I work a job or I run a practice and things like that, I want to build this other gig, I want to do this, I want to do that. The question what then comes off your plate? Because we are very good. We have a system of delegation in the hospital and in practice and all of that, right? We don't do the front desk stuff. We don't do the MA stuff. We don't do the building stuff. We don't like this. We don't do the PR stuff. There's so many things we go in and we do what only we can do. But when it comes to life, then we try to do everything. Like, nobody can do it like me. But I'm sure you can take better vitals than your MA, but you don't do it. You know what I'm saying? You don't do it. And there's a reason why. And so when you think of it that way, I have a team for my personal life. I have a team for every single business I run. And so I'm not recommending this. This is what I do. Like in terms of the task, I don't do laundry. I don't cook. I don't clean. I don't go shopping. I don't even go shopping for my clothes. Like I literally will have an event and my person will go do all the shopping. She's like, these are five outfits you can wear. I was like, I like those three. I'll take it the end. That's the, that's, you understand what I mean? Because there's no way to run five companies. And do, you understand what I mean? Now, some of them say I can never give up cooking. Cooking is relaxing for me. Do that. It is not relaxing for me. So, and then it go, right? But on a personal side, all of that. And then even when I started my practice, again, this is something I learned from Brian Tracy. If someone comes in, even with the thinking, I delegate the thinking. So, someone comes and say, oh, we're having this problem with this patient. What should we do? I'm like, what do you want to do? Well, I don't know. Well, think about three things you can do. Come tell me. And I'll tell you which one makes the most sense. Right? Like even with that, like I'm not, you know, he calls it keeping people's monkeys. Like you come with your monkey. I'm like, don't put it on my desk. You hang on to your monkey, right? And so that way you have your, you have the people who work with you are also doing the thinking, right? Because that's mental, that's mental clutter. You see what I'm saying? And, you know, of course people like, well, you know, people, their issues, if I work with people, then I have to manage them. I don't do people. There is no way to have a massive impact without doing people. It's just impossible. Okay? And so the way I think about people, I think of them like antibiotics, right? I'm like, you know, they'll fix your ear infection. They might give you diarrhea, but your ear infection will be gone. You know what I mean? So they may come with some things and it just goes with the territory. But the more people you have on your team, the more balance you can have. That's on one side. On the other side, the clearer we are on how we want our whole life to look. So, you know, when I teach about this, I talk about the nine areas of life. The clearer we are on how we want our whole life to look, the higher our chances of actually accomplishing them. You know what I mean? Like, so you're like, you know, I want my family life to look like this. I want my health to look like this. Like, there are goals in all of those areas. You're not going to work on all of those areas the same way every single day. Well, over the course of a year, you can, you can batch some of the things, right? Like, think about fun. You're not going on vacation every day, but if you schedule those and put them away, you don't have to walk around thinking, oh, I never get to go on vacation or whatever. Like, you don't have to think about that. If you, if you're like, this is what I want my health to look like, I can fit it into your morning routine. They don't have to think about it. Like, as long as I'm keeping up with my morning routine, I'm moving forward with that, right? For me, because I'm so type A, I even have, you know, I even have my kids time scheduled, right? You read the books I call it Me Tweet, like MTWK, which is meaningful time with kids. And so that has to work. Oh, I'm not spending time with my kids. No, that's scheduled. So I have this time where I hang out with them. So even if I'm busy and all, I know that I'm investing in my relationship with my kids. Every Tuesday, I have date night with my husband, right? It's a non-negotiable, except somebody's out of the country or whatever. So I know every week my marriage is being worked on, right? So the clearer you are and what exactly it is you want, and you start scheduling them, right? It doesn't, it's some people think it's supposed to be spontaneous in the movies, not in real life. You know, you schedule all these things, then you'll find even though you're doing a lot, and you have some seasons where you're working really hard on the job or the business or whatever, ultimately, every aspect of your life is moving forward. You know? So yeah. Yeah. Well, I don't even know what to add on to that. Everything I like totally agree with. I've given so many talks on just kind of exactly what you're saying. I mean, I just wrote a Twitter thread actually about, you know, six different lessons that you can learn while creating. And one of the lessons that I've learned is that energy leads to endurance, right? And if you really want to last long, you have to be energized. But those things that drain your energy, you have to outsource, right? I mean, and I think that's probably an issue a lot of doctors might have just by our training is, no, I'm probably the one who knows best. So I'm going to handle it. But you have to learn to let go. And even though that quality drops a little bit, whatever, at least you get to focus on your domain. And that's going to be your money maker. That's what's going to energize you. And that's what's going to keep you going. So I absolutely relate to that. Now, I'm just trying to gather my thoughts here, because you said a lot of good stuff there. Yeah, and then even with categorization, I've gone ask, how are you reading? How are you doing these things? And I tell people, you're looking at it from a one-week window on my life. And while you see that, okay, I read like 10 books over the last three months or four months, and I've done this and that, it's a little bit every day. Like you said, you just kind of schedule it in. I probably only read 10 pages a day. But over time, these cumulative effects of the meditation of reading, of working out, add up. And then people look at the results, right? I'm sure when they look at you, they're like, oh my god, you're doing all these things. But it's all cumulative. I'm sure you didn't add five things all at once. You kind of slowly had to add that in, get adjusted to it, optimize that one thing. And then you said, okay, this is good. And then you start to tweak it from there. So yeah, I think people really get thrown off by the big picture, right? Like, how can I do all of that? But the thing is, we have this gift. Sometimes we forget that it's a gift. And it's a gift called the day, right? Every 24-hour block is a gift. And if we can treat it with the same respect that a savvy investor treats, you know, the same kind of respect a savvy investor will give money, then we can start creating lives that are masterpieces, right? Because sometimes I'm going to have a great year. There's no such thing as a great year. You have 365 days. And if on average, you make those days great, then the year will be great, right? You can't capture a year. But you can capture a day. And you can, like, come here. I'm going to invest you. You know what I mean? Like, I'm going to put some meaning here. I'm going to put some exercise here. I'm going to invest in my relationships here. And then over time, you just end up in this place where you're like, I don't, like, I know how, but I don't really know how I got here. I am so fine. And so this is what puts it within reach for everybody. You don't have to have a phenomenal year. You just have to make a commitment to the day. I'm going to have a phenomenal day, which means I'm investing the day, right? Because you can waste the day. You can spend the day. You can invest the day. And so you put things in the day that will give you the outcome you're looking for tomorrow. Once you do that, it was a great day. Doesn't matter what the day looked like. Can I give you an example? Let me give you an example. Yes, please, yeah. So I, I, okay, so I was a worried word. I was afraid of everything. Remember, right? So, and so I used to be afraid of, you know, how my life will turn out. I didn't have a great day. Like all those kind of things. Like, am I going the right direction? All out. And I realized that I don't have to determine what my day was like by how I felt about the day or what happened. Or if there was a distraction, there was a challenge of those. A problem is what did I put in the day? Did I put something in the day that will speak tomorrow? Right? And so that's, you know, as it was around that time, I came with a concept of the daily five. And so, so this is what it is. I have set my goals. I've decided, you know, like, okay, so for me, top and priority, you know, my spiritual, my relationship with God, right? My relationship with my family, my health, my personal development. Because if I'm getting better, everything is getting better, right? And things like that. And so I said, you know what? Every day, I'm going to take time to pray and meditate. Every day, I'm going to take time to exercise. It can be 20 minutes. I don't care. Every day, I'm going to read like you. It could be 10 pages. I don't care about it. Every day, I'm going to read. Every day, I'm going to listen to a podcast, right? Every day, I'm going to review my goals, okay? And every day, I'm going to spend meaningful time with my kids because I have no interest in building a phenomenal business and touching the world and losing my kids. No interest whatsoever. And so I know I call it day five, but it is 16s. Then the thing is this, no matter how crazy a day is, if I pray to meditate it, if I exercise, if I read, if I read a podcast, if I listen to a podcast, if I reviewed my goals and I spent meaningful time with my kids, guess what? I has set the stage for a better tomorrow, no matter how bad the, you know, bad the day was. And so it put me in a position where every day I can end the day going like, what a day. Even if it was challenging because I'm like, I have invested a portion of this day that will make my tomorrow even better. Right? And it's within reach for everybody. Everybody. I love that. Yep. And the other thing that I want to talk about here where you just mentioned kind of having five, six things is people are so afraid of taking out goals which you just mentioned, right? And you have to take something out. So one of the strategies I used to implement was biting off more than I can chew purposefully. And then I would look at the things that I would just would not pay attention to. So for the longest time, I was like, you know what? I need to get back to learning Spanish. I wasn't to put it. I would do it sparsely. And you said, I said, why am I wasting my time and my mental capacity on this? I'm going to remove it and just focus on the four other things I know I'm going to do and can get better at, right? So I think that's also just a really big point that you just talked about. You did mention about looking back and seeing the older version of kind of yourself looking now and just saying, wow, we come so far. And I think too often we look back and give our older selves advice, right? Which I don't think really does much sometimes. But I think there's a lot of power in our older selves looking at who we are now. Even when we feel like maybe we haven't accomplished much. What would the old, you know, Anika in med school and then the Dr. Unan residency say now to the present Dr. Unan? I think that version, that that version will say just be fearless and do it all. They'll hold anything back, like nothing, nothing, don't hold anything back, just give it all. And the thing is this, I don't, I don't do regret. Like because that's like spending time on what you didn't do yesterday or wasting extra time today, right? Like I don't do regret. But what I do is when I find something that I would have been great for me to have done or I should have done and I didn't. And I'm at this point where I could let myself go to regret. I turn to people who are at that stage and I help tons of them not make the same mistake. And then I'm like, Ha, ha, nothing to regret. I turn that into miracles for other people, right? Like that, that's the way I think about it. So that version of me, that version of me would be like all this fear thing we did here. That was, that was totally useless. Let's, let's not do that again. Let's not do that again. So let's get into strategies, right? So you, you got the book on Tram D, got it right here. You now have a business school as well. What's the business school about? What is, what can people expect if they want to join that? Yeah, so the entrepreneur, and thank you for getting a copy and reading and posting on social media. Like I appreciate that. Sure, I'll be doing a book review too. I'll be, there'll be a book review seen on Instagram. Oh, wow. Yeah, thank you. I truly appreciate that. So the on Tram D business school really is, is my best effort to do what I, I know needs to be done for physicians. We did not get a business education. And it's not like it's a conspiracy or anything. But we have a lot of benefits because of the kind of education we got. But we also have a lot of disadvantages, right? Like putting ourselves out there and networking, all the, it's like, yeah, we are professionals. We don't do that, right? Like, so we have this whole big disadvantage thing going on. And so my, my thing was I wanted to be able to help doctors build six, seven, multiple seven figure businesses. Because we've been sold that we're not entrepreneurs. We can't do that. If you want to do that, that's bad. We've gone to the dark side, all those kind of things. And so the on Tram D business school is a business school designed for the physician who wants to build a six, several multiple seven figure business. And it is not about a certificate. It is not about learning and all the stuff. It is not about curriculum. It is about learning enough to do and create the results. That's it. That's what it is. And so it's a year-long program. People learn about branding, marketing, selling, building up their programs, building a team, all of those things. And we've had it now for two and a half years, which is so exciting. We've had over 200 doctors go through it. And really to watch people break this six-figure mark, seven-figure mark, multiple seven-figure mark, is like unbelievable. Unbelievable. Like it's wonderful. That must be amazing. Yeah. So I was going to ask you the question in terms of kind of, where do you recommend people start? But that might be too general, right? So let me narrow it down. So I believe we have a new generation coming up in regards to residents and pre-meds. Trying to understand, hey, like I want that flexibility, I want that autonomy, that financial freedom, travel freedom, and maybe starting to build that way. But like you said, we're not getting any of that education. And it's very tough when you have such a huge workload to delve into those topics and really learn it. Where do you recommend, let's say, a resident like me start, who already has a vision of kind of doing something like you in terms of entrepreneurship? Yeah, so there are a number of things. Let me break this up. So the first thing is to understand that you already have a business. Your business is your brand as a physician, OK? And people are like, no, I don't have a business note. This is the reason why recruiters reach out to you like, oh, send this to your friends that take an advantage of your network. They know your value, but you don't. Right? This is the reason why they say, oh, we come and speak over here. We only do a site. We'll pay for your transportation here, but we're not paying for anything else. They know your worth, right? But the thing is that we don't. So we get taken advantage of all the time because we have this gold mine that we don't know anything about. So your brand as a physician is your first business, OK? So you start off with this thing of, I am the CEO of Dr. Me, Incorporated. Do you see what I mean? That's the starting point to understand that you're not handicapped, you're not without a business, you're not none of that. You have one, you may not just have paid any attention to it. OK, so that's the starting point is that understanding. I am a CEO. I am the CEO of this. I may have not taken my business seriously, not even realizing it was a business, not realizing I'm a CEO, but now I do. That's the starting point. Now, the second thing is understanding the power of your network, OK? There will probably never be a time when you'll be around as many doctors being in so many hospitals and all those things now, right? There will probably not be another time in your life. And so, you know, this is one of the things I could regret. But see, here I am talking to hundreds of people, right? Tell them, you're telling them about this. I don't regret it, right? But your network is your network, OK? And as physicians, we're so used to being around ourselves that we think we're not exceptional, we're not unique, we're not cool. But if you think about it, we have 350 something odd, million people in the US, only 1 million of them are physicians, which means if you divided the population equally, and you put 300 people in a room, there will only be one physician. We're kind of cool, OK? And if you think about it, how many times would you have three or four people standing together and collectively, their salaries are over a million? Do you see what I'm saying? It's not many places you can walk into that and like that. And so we are in this amazing place, so build relationships. Even if you're like, I'm introvert, I already told you my introvert story. That's OK, right? But build those relationships, build those networks because everything you need is three or four people away. So the more relationships you have in your life, the better for you because everything becomes an email away, a text away, a DM away, phone call away, a visit away. So don't take the relationships around you for granted. Yeah, you walk into this program director, this CMO, there's that build all those relationships, those are doors you will need. Social capital is more valuable than financial capital. Relationships will open doors for you, that money will never open for you. So when you walk around, understand that you are, like you're in the midst of greatness, OK? Build those relationships now that you don't need anything. So it's genuine and all of the stuff. So when you do need something, it's a friend asking somebody for a favor, right? OK, so that's the second thing. The third thing is you must get a business education, must, OK? And I can confidently say must because it's available, it's accessible, you can get it. Now, when you're in residency, your number one goal is to get out of residence, OK? So which means that's the priority. That's the priority. So I'm not saying put this ahead of that, right? But then again, there's simple things you can do. There are podcasts like we're having this conversation here. My podcast, the on-training podcast, is all the business of medicine. So even if you're like, this is going over my head, I don't have the time, whatever. There's short episodes just sit and listen, just make it part of your habit because it will rub off. You just need to immerse yourself in it, right? How do you learn Spanish? I mean, you can go to classes or you can go live in Spain for two months, right? And then you pick it up real quick. And so you want to immerse yourself in that. There's an on-training method book, it's a 16. We call it a $16 MBA. So we call the podcast a free MBA. This is a $16 MBA. And then as you get further along in your journey, there are other things you can do, like the business school or any other thing you choose to do. But this is a place that you can start from. But you have enough to start on your brand, build your network, get a business education. Love it. Love it. Man, this is so good. I mean, this is very inspiring for me. A lot of times when I think about how I want to end up and what I want to do, you're right. It's the business stuff that's kind of scary. It's like, oh my god, how am I going to learn all this? But then you go back to what you said about Brian Tracy. Everything is learnable. And if you're a doctor, I mean, that's one of the hardest things you can do. We learn so much. What's one more? And so that's really inspiring to me. And when I'm thinking about this and I get into the dumps, I'm like, you know what? I just read Dr. Luna's book. She did it. And she made it manageable, so I can do this. So thank you. You can totally do this. Listen, when I was at your stage, I didn't even know what a podcast was. And there is no way I would have done a podcast like impossible. So you're like, light years ahead. You're going to make what we're doing look like as a child. You're like, you remember in the old days, like, Dr. Luna, what they did? Because you're going to do, you're going to do really amazing things. Like really, really, you're onto it. So, so yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I appreciate that. I do want to ask you. So I had some people, I got some questions from other people. And one of the things they want to know is, where do you see the future of kind of health care going? Where are the biggest opportunities that you see physicians should really focus on? Yeah, so the direction of health care, if I were to predict where it's going, I'll tell you, I have no idea. And I don't think anybody does. Because there's so many moving parts, right? But what I do know is that this is an opera, there is a huge opportunity for physicians who will pivot, physicians who will retool themselves, physicians who will position themselves to be the answers with what is coming. I think between, you know, insurance companies and dwindling reimbursements and the amount of burnout, I mean, like in the last year, 100,000 physicians left the workforce. If you can conceptualize that, that's 10%. If you can conceptualize that, right? That's why I said nobody knows. Because there's something happening and, you know, but the thing is not so much the details of what is happening as it is, are you positioning yourself to be the answer then, right? And I think to thrive then, we do have to have business skills. We do have to know how to negotiate. We do need to know how to compete with other business skills. We do have to know how to sway public opinion with our communication. Like these are all things that we need to learn. So I think the safety net is not holding on to this is the way things have always been. I'm just gonna go, I'm gonna get a job. There's nothing against a job and I'm not advocating people leave medicine. That's not the point. The point is acquiring the business skills. Say, oh, I just see patients till I die. What if that changes so much that that's not the vehicle anymore? When you have, when you understand and you acquire business skills, you put yourself in a position where no matter what happens, you can pivot, you can adapt, right? You can change things, you can monetize, you can do all of that. So you'll be fine, right? You build your brand because what if healthcare looked different? What if it was more of a cash model? What if it became more of education? Like what is it? We don't know. But if you learn the skills, you'll be able to thrive no matter what comes, right? So for instance, a pandemic came and thousands of private practices went out of business. And what we were agile and ready and we were not a practice where we owned a job. We were a practice that was a business system. And so we just took a lot of the online, the things that worked in the online industry and pulled it into the private practice. And 2020 was a better year for us financially than 2019. Do you see what I mean? Could I have predicted there'll be a pandemic? There's no way I could have predicted that. But was I ready for the pandemic? Oh yes, I was. Do you see what I mean? And so if we acquire that, we can walk into the uncertainty with certainty. That will be fine. Yeah. Yeah, being prepared, right? Yeah. Love that. Yeah, absolutely. So to my understanding, January 17th, we got a new book coming out? Yes. Oh my goodness, I'm so excited about it. Okay, so I, so for the Entremby Business School, one of the things I like to do is, sets the doctors in the school up to experience paradigm shifts, right? Like where identity shifts and things like that. And so I was like, hey, so how many of you have always wanted to be authors but you've never written a book? I'm like, oh my goodness, me. How do you know? And stuff like that. And I was like, so we're going to do a collaboration book. And so everybody gets to write a chapter on their journey as an entrepreneur. And the motive behind it was this, when I started off, now when I started off, there was Facebook, but there were no Facebook groups, there's no that button, like it was very immature. And so it was a very lonely, very lonely journey. It had nobody to ask questions or anything like that. And so I would Google, like physician entrepreneur or physicians in business, kind of looking for where are these people? So I can find them and meet them and ask them questions and stuff and I couldn't find them. And so I'm like, now these 47 doctors get to share their journey as entrepreneurs because in 47 stories, every doctor can find themselves in a story. I can say, I've been looking for more, I couldn't define more, but that's more, that's the more I've been referring to, right? And so we have that, we have 47 collaborating authors, it's called Made for More, which is physicians, we're amazing, but we're made for more. And so yes, January 17th, it goes live, and beyond excited. And so we're gonna have 47 newly minted best selling authors who are physicians. Amazing, this will be on Amazon. This will be on Amazon, Barnes and I will anywhere books are sold, yes. Cool. So I'll be sure to put a link to all your networks, all your socials as well as the upcoming book in our notes. I do wanna ask Dr. Uno, what's next for you? Do you have any goals for 2023? Oh, I have a lot of goals for 2023, but as far as the physician community is concerned, from the beginning, I've been shouting for the rooftop that I wanna help 100,000 doctors figure out how to build profitable businesses, so they can live life and practice medicine on their terms. And this is the year where I'm really committed to doing that, like through the podcast, through the books. And because I know, I've studied movements, and they say if you can touch 10% of a community, then can shift the culture, which is what I want. I want us to realize, we're not handicapped, we don't have to live with the burnout, the loss of autonomy, hating medicine, all that. We don't have to live with any of that. We can take the control, right? We can take it back. And so that's my big, that's my B-Hag, my big Herodation of School. And then for the business school, really to fine tune the product, so we're able to get people even bigger results. So that's kind of, that's kind of what I'm working towards. I'm gonna be spending a lot of my energy doing in 2023 and we're gonna hit it. I'm excited to follow your journey. I'll be staying updated. So awesome. Dr. Nguyen, where can our audience find you? Who are the best websites or? Yeah, so first of all, you're on a podcast platform. So you can just hit the search button on TREMD. So that's ENTREM, Amazon Mary D is in David on TREMD. And then my website, which is on TREMD.com, there you have access to even the podcast. And then social media channels and the books and everything we do. And you can always find me on Facebook, I'm a teenager, I'm in the DMs. You can reach out, let me know this was amazing. And we can connect that way too. Awesome. And once again, for the audience members, we're gonna put all that down in our show notes for easy accessibility. Dr. Nguyen, I wanna thank you so much for coming on here. This has been such a comfortable conversation for me and like-minded people, I mean, everything you're saying, I'm just like, yes, yes, yes. And as an extrovert, this is like a dream come true in a way. And I'm just like, we're talking about everything I wanna talk about. This is awesome getting pumped up. But thank you so much for scheduling medicine redefined in your schedule. So truly honored for that. Do you have one last question for you? Usually we ask the guests, how do we put the health back in healthcare? But one of our interns actually had a question for you specifically, which is kind of related to it. So I'll read off his question. So he says, as an undergraduate student working with physicians currently, I experience first and how taxing and draining practicing medicine can be. Every shift, I hear a new situation that seems to push the attending physicians farther away from continuing their careers. And even more importantly, I rarely hear any situation that pushes physicians to continue their careers. How can we change the narrative around practicing medicine from focusing on the negative situations that push doctors to quit to instead positive interactions to keep them going? That is, I mean, that is sadly a very accurate description of, you know, what is going on and all of that. And I really do think, you know, if you think about doctors and you think about patients, there is a doctor patient relationship, right? That's the direct thing that happens. But now we have the doctor administrator insurance company big farmer that are a relationship, right? You see, there are a lot of people in between. And I think, you know, we didn't mean to, but in the evolution, we let go of our leadership. We let go of being the decision makers. We just show up to just take care of the patient and walk away. And I think that's part of what created this whole thing that we experience. And so the more as physicians, we go back to being in charge, and being in control, and saying no, and creating boundaries and all of the more we learn that, which stems from becoming the CEO of you, right? Because then you negotiate for your company. So someone says, oh, we want you to be on this committee, but there's no reimbursement for it, but it'll be great for the patients as a business owner, you can make a business decision that we're not going to do that. Do you see what I'm saying? As opposed to what we do now. And so the more control we take back, the more we choose to lead the healthcare space because it is a doctor-patient relationship. The more we own our brands and own our worth, the more we build our own system, so we build private practices that work, the more we do that, the more we shift the culture, the more we shift, the more we can define, right? The way our work should look, the what our worth is, the experience that patients should have, we need to get back into control. We gave up so much of it. So much of it, and that's kind of what put us in this position. Now, medicine is fun. Is the system around it that has made it what it is? We can work on the system and reverse it. Will it be worked, yes? Will the pioneers have to go through a lot to pull it off, yes? But once we do, it'll be so much better for everybody else. We need to take back control. That's what it is. For sure, for sure. I totally agree. Beautifully said. Thank you so much, Dr. Runa. Absolutely. And I just want to say this for everybody listening. Please subscribe to this podcast. I'm amazed that you're PGY3 and you're doing this and bringing us such incredible value and super happy to support your journey in any way, in any way you need to. But guys listening to this, subscribe, share it. Yeah, you're doing it for free. This is how we pay you back. So yeah. Yeah, thank you. That means a lot going for you. Thank you. Thanks so much for listening to this episode. Be sure to check out the show notes to see all of Dr. Eunice resources that will include her website, her business school, her podcast as well as her book, and the new one made for more that is coming out very shortly. I want to thank our team, Herita Yebori, Iman Bashiri, as well as Ethan Zhu, for the production of this podcast. And if you enjoyed this podcast or you know other physicians who might as well, please share it their way. And be sure to leave a five star rating or whatever platform you're listening to so that we can get this show into the hands of others out there. And of course, our medical disclaimer, everything in this podcast is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute the brightest of medicine and we are not providing medical advice. No physician, patient, glacier, is formed and anything discussed in this podcast does not represent the views of our employers. We recommend that you seek the guidance of your personal physician regarding any specific health related issues. Thanks.