Picking up where one leaves off…

Posted on January 18, 2011

Have you ever had a friend come back into your life after an extended period? I have. There’s the initial excitement over having found them or having been found and reconnecting… We laugh about some of the good times, maybe remind one another of some long forgotten event, then catch each other up… It’s almost as if nothing has really changed; still friends, but life goes on…

That’s how this blog is.

It was my intention to fill you in on how I like to ‘back out’ goals and dreams from their endpoints, right back into real time today’s world – so I can make small, manageable changes in course today, and help myself to make that dream a reality.

Yet, when it gets right down to it, sometimes it’s more in the ‘doing’ than in the ‘telling’. And, that’s where I have been.

My long term goal with YPJB is to create a fundamentally passive business where I can help others in my field or the associated fields streamline, cut through their own ‘red tape’… not based upon my brilliance or excellence, but based upon my own mistakes and how they shaped me. Certainly, if I can help shortcut anyone’s path to their goals, I want to help. I am aware of the ‘Journey not Destination’ philosophy, but heartily believe that we do have many choices along the journey – why not learn from others?

I found that when I re-entered the profession on a nearly full time basis, my desire to write was lessened. I am not naturally inclined toward blogging, or for that matter journaling. And so, I chose to do other things. It was easy.

Here I am though, adding a blog post, and I think it speaks directly to the subject of Practice Management. That is to say — the easiest thing there is to do, is just ‘do’… do whatever pops up in front of me at any moment, and take care of it. What’s not so easy is to stretch beyond that and put a little effort into something new.

I suppose that if the demand for this particular service was high, and if simply creating a web presence and combining it in a simple way with social networking, then I would be ‘called in’, so to speak. This is not the case, or at least not at the present time.

Let me wrap this free flowing entry up for this day, and say that my dreams and goals are alive and well. I have been pursuing them as I began to describe. And my desire to help you, and others is still alive and well, just waiting for the opportunity.

BK

Filed under: Explanatory, Practice Management

Building Blocks of Creative Visualization

Posted on April 14, 2010

Last time I began to break down how I ‘think’ I might be able to achieve my long term goal of being an 80+ year old, healthy guy, participating in a 5K run, surrounded at the end by loved family and friends. I started with ideas about how I might live today, and in the coming weeks, months and years which will positively impact the likelihood of this happening in the area of health.

Today I’d like to begin a discussion on managing my finances – in the here and now, and into the future – and how that, too might play into the likelihood of achieving this goal.

Our country has been struggling visibly and audibly for 4 years due to issues relating to the way our country spends, the way it saves, how profits are generated, and what can happen when markets reverse. There are remarkably important parallels that need to be drawn on a personal level – if you are ready for that. The one repeating basic philosophical tenet I have discovered through trial and error which works in my life is ‘to be fiscally conservative’.

Being fiscally conservative would mean the following:
- Buy items with cash
- Work to pay off any loans, beginning with the highest rate of interest first
- Strive mightily to fend off impulses leading you to participate in the bigger, better, more more more phenomenon.
- Improve or leave relationships which place unnecessary financial stressors.
- Save the maximum amount you are capable every year
- Pay your taxes, on time.
- Set aside money for fun times and diversion – and pay with cash
- Zero out credit card balances at the end of every month.

That’s for starters. The objective is to keep more than you spend. I know many people who prefer to live ‘on the margin’ and put their borrowing power to work. That’s a great philosophy in a growing, bustling economy for someone whose stream of income is beyond reproach. The downside is that in a reverse, you will be trapped upside down, holding nothing but debts.

For me, in order to reach my goal – I realize I need to be at a completely debt free place, and to have saved enough over the years in order to be living off my fixed income for whatever I want. I have heard it said, and I hope it’s true, that as we get older, we have had more, and we have done more, and we end up wanting and needing less. That will simplify the equation…

That’s all for today. We’ll talk more about reducing debt, saving, and earning over the next few installments.

Filed under: Uncategorized

Breaking it down… beginning with the end point.

Posted on April 6, 2010

Last week I began this blog with a very brief discussion of visualizing an endpoint.  Right or wrong, it’s an excellent place to begin.  Yes, that’s right – begin.  Begin what?

Using the imagined, visualized, man-made endpoint is the starting point for a whole series of exercises.  The exercises basically are there to remind me of how to create / visualize / manifest / actualize any desired endpoint by breaking it down into necessary intermediate events which must happen in order to get where we want to go.

So using my example of being 80+ years old, appearing healthy and happy, participating in say a 5K run, and of being surrounded by family and friends who are happy for me, we can begin to break down how I might get to that point.

A first and most obvious point to consider is “Don’t Die”.  This is the point where I bring in the awareness that not everything I want to do is within my ability to control.  In the movie ‘Dumb & Dumber” there’s a great line: ‘Life’s a fragile thing, Harry.  One minute you’re chewin’ on a burger… then next you’re dead meat!’  And it’s true.  We don’t know how, when or where we’re going to die.  And I might not reach my desired endpoint because of that.  I do know there are certain things I have a little more control over, and because I now have an endpoint I desire, I do my best to change the things I can, because failure to do so will be the certain loss of the desired outcome.

I live as if I am going to make it.

In my case, we know that the major causes of premature death in our country are from preventable diseases.   Death from strokes & heart disease, cancer (of the colon), chronic respiratory disease and accidents, as well as adult onset diabetes are all controllable to a very large extent.  Therefore, again in my case, taking better care of myself by finding health care professionals who can assist me in lowering my cholesterol, blood pressure, and adjust my diet are not just words – they are tangible.  Becoming involved in a fitness regimen is another way I can positively impact the potential outcome.  Not texting while driving is another.  This list can go on and on.

And that’s really the message for this day.  Look at a desired endpoint, and then begin to break down the small blocks that can today be started upon…  Live as if the objective will materialize…

Thanks for reading.  More later.

Filed under: Business, Practice Management, Spiritual

What is your end point?

Posted on March 29, 2010

There’s a glib yet eerily prophetic saying that ‘those who fail to plan’ ostensibly ‘plan to fail’.

I tend to disagree, even though I am planner of goals…  It’s been my experience that planning (our lives, our days, our financial future, our love life, whatever, really) really does assist me in creating a new reality or a new direction (provided the caveat that ‘it is in the greater good’).  Not having an objective conversely does not mean we will not have a joyful life filled with successes – but only that for many of us, having a goal helps us to see tangible evidence of our desires becoming realities.  I envy those who seemingly live life simply and completely in faith without planning and goal setting, however I am not that person.  I am open and willing to become a convert!

With that in mind, I recall being asked, “What is your endpoint?”  during a coaching and practice management course I was involved with.  What kept coming to mind for me was that of being a healthy 80 year  version of myself, running a 5K, and being supported by my friends and family across the finish line.  It’s still a vision I hold for myself, and which never fails to make me smile.  I stated this endpoint, but unfortunately, I was chastised at the time, because the context of the question was to be within the constraints of the practice of dentistry. (Or, in other words, what was the apex of practice for me…)

I then re-thought the specific assignment, with my existing endpoint in mind.   And I was amazed at all that ‘I thought’ needed to happen personally and professionally in order to make that happen.

I plan to break all of that down over the coming blog posts.

However for now, for today, I ask you “What is your endpoint?”

Filed under: Practice Management, Spiritual

The Beginning

Posted on March 26, 2010

I am quite fond of “There is no such thing as an original thought” and with that in mind make no claim that my thoughts spring from some previously and heretofore unknown source.  What these brief articles will reflect is how my experiences and thoughts from real life daily experiences will translate into what I hope are broader applications for those of us in the daily living in a practice setting.

Please check back often, and thank you for joining.

William B. Klausmeyer

Filed under: Explanatory

Welcome to Your Practice, Just Better’s Blog

Posted on March 24, 2010

This is currently in the testing phase, but soon enough blog entries should begin appearing here.

Filed under: Miscellany