The Ladder Is Leaning Against the Wrong Wall

0:00So welcome to the Foundation Dental podcast. I am your host, doctor Jim Arnold, and I am particularly excited to introduce my awesome guest today. She is really impressive and, somebody who I've gotten to know this year and really have a lot of respect for. But I'm gonna start with a question. So what do you do when your own child can't breathe at night and everything you learned at dental school suddenly feels inadequate? For today's guest, doctor Sonia Reddy, that question became the catalyst for reinventing her entire practice and eventually founding Flow Academy to help other dentists do the same. Sonia's built a multi site practice centered on airway health, sleep optimization, and integrative wellness.

0:39She's also a leadership coach who helps successful dentists stop burning out behind the scenes. And she's part of our Foundation Dental Alliance and Luxury Dental Retreat faculty, which means she's someone I trust completely when it comes to combining clinical excellence with strategic growth. This conversation is about a lot more than dentistry. It's about identity, resilience, and what it really takes to build something sustainable. So, Sonia, thanks so much for being here. I really appreciate it, and I've been looking forward to this conversation for a while. Me too, Jim. After February, I think we met this year in February, and we had some great conversations. We decided we're gonna do a follow-up, and here we are today.

1:17I'm so excited to make this happen. Yeah. No. I'm I'm really excited about it as well. And as I told you in our little pre pre interview chat, you just I'm blown away by the number of things that you do and how you find balance with all of that. But, man, Liz, I wanna go right back to the beginning and and just I wanna ask you about because I don't know the story. The the story about your your daughter's airway challenges and just kinda what was going on and what did you do about that? I'll I'll start from, like, you know, since I I was in Wall Street in the beginning, and then I changed my courses course from Wall Street to medical field and healing because I had come from a family of doctors, and I saw a lot of exhaustion when I was in Wall Street.

2:04And I was a I investment banker. I was in mergers and acquisitions. And after three years of doing that, I just realized there's just so much more in terms of healing that I can do because I had a lot of compassion for that. So I changed my field into, you know, stayed at Starbucks at night and studied and got into dental school right in NYU because I didn't wanna leave. So I only applied for one school, and I got into NYU. Nice. And I felt like the hustle, like, the success, like, everybody was showing me was not leading to fulfillment. So I really thought, you could this is my path in healing, so this is gonna lead to fulfillment along with the success. So when I graduated, I thought this was it. Like, I'm like, I have it.

2:50I have everything. I'll go practice only to find out there's just so much more to be learned, right, in terms of business, in terms of just even sleep apnea was not even touched upon, like Invisalign, ortho, jaw expansion.

3:05So just went right into, like, turning into, you know, a lot of CE courses, meeting amazing people like you. And I was I was struggling as I was a practice owner. I had my daughter at the same time. You talk about balance. I felt like there was no balance. Right? And no one gave me the advice. I wish someone was there to give me an advice of, like, what phases how do I integrate your life into your career. Right? Right. You don't know what what you're doing. So I feel like I fell right into it where I had my practice. I find out I'm pregnant with my daughter, and she she is, you know, a lot of good things. Like, she's so independent from from the beginning. So having a practice on a child, it's it's a lot of juggling, lot of guilt, mom guilt that I went through that I wish I could look back and kind of balance better.

4:03And that's what I coach my dentist on, like, do we balance that so we don't fall behind in life because you're going ahead in career or vice versa. And at the same time, my daughter I saw her breathing through her mouth a lot. Mhmm. I saw her, like, when she woke up, she just her bed was a mess. Like, she would sleep in one direction, wake up in another direction. Whenever she was next to me sleeping, I just could see her struggling, grinding. And I just knew it was not normal because no matter how long she slept, she still had the under eye circles, like, pretty bad. And I knew she was struggling and I just didn't know what. And I among my courses, I went to sleep apnea training and I saw things that I could not unsee and I knew I had to fix it, you know, but she was around six to seven.

4:54Okay. And I felt like I caught her at the right time. Even her teeth were coming you know, when teeth were coming, they were not in the right place. So I started to wonder why are, like, some are grown with you know, come with perfect teeth and perfect breathing and others didn't. And that's when it hit me. This is sleep apnea. And kids could have it too. Who knew? Right. Right. I never knew that. Yeah. I I didn't once upon a time either. It's it's really remarkable how prevalent it is in society. And, I mean, it it seems like up until about ten years ago, people didn't talk about it at all. And, I mean, now I I don't know what the stats say today, but at one point, it was twenty seven percent of adult Americans are suffering from some level of sleep disordered sleep and breathing disordered sleep.

5:41And a lot of people die of natural causes are dying of sleep apnea. Absolutely. I had my grandfather pass in his sleep, and no one knew. He was struggling with, you know, breath for a very long time. And this is also genetic. You know, sleep apnea is also genetic, and lot lot of people don't recognize that. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, so you went from, like, my daughter can't breathe at night to all of a sudden starting or developing the flow method and then the flow academy. Tell me about that. How did that how did that all come about? That's really So, you know, I was already, you know, helping my patients in my own practice. And in, you know, in between all of that stuff, my dad was struggling with sleep apnea.

6:25So I just knew if I knew two of my really close family, there's so many people out there, and we need to help. And I started doing that in my practice, helping a lot of people, but I just knew everyone I talked to, like, at a party or, like, my neighbors, they all had somebody, and they all knew they were tracking with the, you know, sleep ring and but none of them knew how to fix it.

6:49So I think that's when this whole Flow Academy came up is I need to get to more people than just my practice, you know Yeah. In my practice. So that's when I started creating more information about this, getting just bringing awareness out. So the Flow Academy it's gonna be more AI integrated diagnostics for people and not just diagnostics. Like, give them some kind of path in terms of how do you go fix it. Right? A lot of them are like, yeah. I snore at night. So what do I do? You know? Right. Right. Okay. Get diagnosed is one thing. And what if they don't want a appliance, like CPAP appliance? They're like, oh, if they thought about having a CPAP appliance, they don't wanna go get diagnosed because they're like, we're not we're not wanting it.

7:33So we have some dental solutions. Right? We have some dental solutions. It could just be a tongue tie that never got fixed. So the tongue is not resting on the roof of the mouth, hence, falling behind and causing the snoring. So we could just fix that, help them with the breathing a little bit, maybe myofunctional therapy, and they could be done or even lasers on the throat. Right? There's so many modalities of treatment. Piece of plastic is not gonna do anything. Right? I could put a piece of plastic and call it a snoring appliance. It's actually if you don't diagnose this properly, it's gonna block your airway. And then they put it out out and they're, like, never using it. They paid thousands of dollars for that stuff.

8:11Yeah. So I think proper diagnosis is number one. So the Flow Academy is for proper diagnosis. Even if I cannot do it in my office, I am part of a a company where we're, like, streamlining people. Let's say I have people calling from I'm on social media a lot. I'm on radio, TV. So if you were to call me, Jim, and you had no idea how to fix this and from Chicago, I could help you find a dentist near you, You know? Go with somebody that's aware. Just a lot of people are treating sleep apnea, but they really know the biology of how to fix this. Right. Right. I I think that the majority of dentists who think they're treating it are just making snore snore snore guards or sleep appointments, and and it it is.

8:56It's completely inadequate for the vast majority of cases. So it's great it's great that you're doing this, but, honestly, you're doing so many things, Sony. I mean, that's just like that's a big thing. I mean, training dentists so that they can also provide those I mean, let's be honest, life saving procedures to people. But a lot of dentists, you know, they they maybe don't wanna learn. They don't wanna do something new. They're kind of in a rut. They're just kind of doing their thing. But I I wanna kinda segue on that note to, like, just kind of a dentist burnout. It's like an epidemic in our industry, and I don't really understand it. Because when you've got so many opportunities to grow, so many things that you can learn, so many different ways that you can practice dentistry, kind of like you found.

9:42Yeah. Like, what do you what do you think the main cause of that is? I mean, I and full disclosure, I've been there. Like, I have been there. And for me, it was usually, like, taking on too much, you know, at the same time. But what do you think the the real reason is for most dentists? I think we're all climbing a ladder that may be leaning on the wrong wall. And the reason I say that is I think everyone when they graduate, you know, you are a dentist, they're all everybody wants to be a cosmetic dentist or so they take all these courses everybody's trying to do, implant dentistry.

10:16Really not asking what type of practice do I wanna have. Right? What is the practice you wanna have and just hone in. Just because we're moving so fast doesn't really move the needle. Yeah. So I really think the burnout comes from could be some external pressure of, like, oh, you know, if I'm not in the latest and the greatest, I'm obsolete. And we're dentists, so we are obviously in the top of the you know, in our academics, in education. We're competitive and also collaborative, but we really don't wanna be I think majority of us are like, oh, I don't wanna be left behind. If veneers is a new thing, I wanna learn that. So we're just running in circles a lot. And I think part of it, there's just one I mean, there's just one side of the story is we're running in circles, trying to do new treatments, trying to learn new treatments, and implementing our offices.

11:06And, you know, our team is not probably catching up, and it's just coming out a lot on the leaders. We're not really learning leadership skills. We just know how to Right. Do dentistry, how to be a CEO of your practice. Right? I didn't know that. That that's exactly right. And I think that there's a real movement in that direction. At least in my world, that's one of the things that I really wanna coach Dennis on is is really thinking of your practice as more of a business and making decisions as a CEO rather than just an engineer working with your hands.

11:37And and I I've always suspected that that's part of the problem. It's just to come out of dental school without the leadership skills, you don't really learn much about communication. You don't learn how to run a business. And so I always feel like dentists sort of flail around, you know, just trying to master the the clinical while all that other stuff is just kinda pushed to the side, but in reality creates can create a lot of stress.

12:01It's not stressed in dental schools to your point. Right? I remember having a business side of dentistry as a one course in the end, and it was, like, a minor requirement. So all of us skip that to go do dentistry. Like, we had requirements. So I'm gonna do one more root canal. I'm gonna do one more complete denture. And if who wants to understand the business of dentistry, doesn't funny. You know, now that you mentioned, I think maybe we did have a class like that, like, a million years ago. But Yeah. I do remember it was, the blow off class because you had all this other stuff that you really needed to do and business. I mean, jeez. I'm just trying to figure out how to cut a tooth. And it's a final year.

12:40Right? Like so I think what we need is we need dentists like you and me, Jim, going out to schools and telling them how important it is, the real world. Great. You're seeing right now, what you're seeing is finish your requirements, get good at your scale, but what is the real world out there feels like? I didn't know how to how it is to work eight hours a day. Right. I was working I was doing one patient for four hours in dental school in the morning, and I went back completely exhausted, tired. God. Yes. You know? And then my first job, I saw probably 25 patients during the day and talk about exhaustion. We're not ready for that. Like, no one transitioned me. I went from one patient a day to 25 patients a day just thrown in.

13:26I mean, talk about depression, stress, you know, burnout, like lifestyle, like you know? Yeah. And I know I get messages from a lot of dentists. They're like, how do I go from, oh, I'm married. I have a four four month old, and now I wanna build five practices. Can you help me? Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. So we're all ambitious. Great. But there has to be a step and a ladder and, you know, how we progress. For for sure. And and, you know, as you alluded to, we're we're kind of we're type a personalities. You know? Yes. Generally speaking, high achievers, and we wanna do everything, you know, not just, like, a little here and there. We wanna do everything. You know, one of the things I love about kind of your philosophy and one of your expressions is Seth, I think it's you you are your great your own greatest asset.

14:12Is that something that you say? I love that because, you know, that's just along the lines of positive self talk and, you know, like a mantra. And and tell me about that. Where how did that come about? Are are dentists pretty receptive to that concept? It came about after struggling a lot and putting myself in the in the end. You know? Yeah. My practice, my employees come home, my my kids, my family. Everybody else came first, and I was the last one. I was burned out. I was grumpy. I didn't have, like, you know, good relationships in terms of Right. You know, how I showed up. So then I started taking care of myself. I'm like, this is not filling my bucket. Right? You can't pour from an empty bucket. So we have to have good connections, and I should be able to, you know, have five gyms like you where I can call and be like, I'm exhausted.

15:03What do I need to do? You know? Surround yourself with mentors, just people that are more successful than you, but somebody that understands the balance. Right? Comes from a place of you're fulfilled. Sonia, do this and don't worry about it and knows when he needs to, you know, push me. So I think finding the mentors that really understand where your light is and pushing them in the right direction versus, oh, there's a secret sauce. Keep keep juggling. Keep running. I don't like that. Boy, you know, that's I think that's really insightful, Sonya, because, I mean, that's what I always did. I was always looking for something else. And I I I I tell this story a lot, but but when I was a young dentist, at one point, I had literally 17 mentors.

15:44Like, I had them all on a piece of paper. I had their name and what I wanted to learn from them because I Wow. Of them as real experts doing certain things that I wanted to do. And and I think to some degree that was a real positive, but I was. I was always chasing, like, that next thing that next thing, and none of those mentors talked about life balance. None of those mentors talked about prioritization and, you know, optimizing, you know, your life and making sure that your relationships are on point. It was all professional development. And and again, there's nothing wrong with that except when you do it to the exclusion of all that personal development that's so important to us as humans. Right?

16:25Absolutely. That made me realize that I am my greatest asset. I'm gonna invest in myself, not just career wise. Yeah. And I'm not talking about, hey, Jim. I took a massage day today. That's my, you know, care. That's not I'm not talking about external. Are you taking about taking care of yourself internally? Right? Do you feel fulfilled? Do you feel like you're pouring from a full cup where there's abundance in you versus, oh, Jimmy's doing one thing more. Let me go do five more things and up him. Right? That's not a you're not coming from a place you're coming from a place of lack. So how do you feel fulfilled inside? You know? And I'm not talking about getting your nails done or a massage or going to a sauna.

17:06Right? Like, those are external. Like, it feels good for the moment. Sure. Well, you know, it's it's interesting you you mentioned that because, I mean, we are all kind of looking for that, that magic bullet, and what's it going to be. But you're right. It's really about investing in yourself. And then not not just financially, although financially investing in coaches, investing in mentorship, investing in, you know, personal growth, all super important. Some of the investment is also just putting time into yourself. You know? And and I know during our chat before the interview, I I mentioned that today was a four hundred and fifty fourth day in a row I've worked out. Well, you know, that talk about putting myself first and putting my health first.

17:43In addition, you know, I I meditate almost every day, and I try to journal every day and, you know, really focus on gratitude and those kinds of things because, you know, we go through the highs and lows in life. And, you know, one of the best ways to kinda come through that is to start focusing on on yourself and on how can I make Jim a better Jim? How can I make Sony a better Sonya? Right? I mean and and it are are Dennis pretty receptive to that? Have you been able to get good results with your clients? I feel like there's more you know, the the shift is changing. Right? Like, I think people are getting more aware because what they're doing is not working. Right. And we know, like, you know, there's only there's a ceiling once you go there and then your, you know, your personal life is falling apart.

18:31I think we talked about this. Right? It's falling apart. You're escaping more and more into career because personal life is falling apart, and it's not giving you any happiness. So people realize that there's gotta be some work that has to be done with our mindset, you know, with our physicality. I mean, you're one of those. It's like fifteen months in a row, you have not missed a day. Like, I mean, you know You know what? I I I I'm proud of myself, you know, and and I feel good. I feel good. Proud of you. Thank you. No. I appreciate that. Feel good physically. Feel good. Lot lot better mentally too just having spent that time. Did you say you healed your sleep apnea too by this workout? Yeah. Good good memory.

19:13Forgot I I forgot about that conversation, but you're exactly right. You know, I mean, I I was overweight, and it's incredible. Once I dropped under a certain level, all of a sudden, everything just just cleared up. And, you know, and and I I was aware of that, and I was relieved because I I didn't really wanna do anything else. You know, why not just get healthy and, you know, have that take care of the issue for sure. So another thing that you've done in addition to all the other things is just kind of tell me about your med spa, you know, kind of project and how you've been successful with that where a lot of dentists, you know, they try to get into it, and it's almost more of a gimmick than it is something that is all about, you know, kind of full body health.

19:58Tell me about that. And and When I started, that's exactly right. Like, I wanted the full body. Like, it's still my passion. Sleep apnea affects everything. Right? Your Right. Reproductive system to your weight, to your confidence, to your, you know, heart, to your ENT stuff. So I knew I wanted to do whole health. So I started off with that. Like, I started with a small sauna in the office. Where are people? Yeah. It's like, you know, the sweat it out, the sauna, like, you sit and you get zipped up. So I started with that because I was like, okay. I was doing this when I we're taking the silver fillings out in a smart way, and I was like, have them go sit in that sauna, kinda spread it out. We, you know, remove the toxins.

20:42And people loved it. The reception you know, people really enjoyed it. And I was taking supplements. I was taking sublingual supplements. So when people asked to me, hey, doc. You look amazing. You look more skinnier. I don't know. Every time people came in, they're like, oh, you look super fit. And what's what are you doing? And I'm like, I take this supplement and I work out. And they were like, can you show us? You know? So I think it started with patients asking me for it, and I'm like, alright. I'll bring it out. And then so I had that supplement. And then one led to another. We were doing PRF. Right? We you know, with the implant, we were doing PRF. So they wanted PRF. So one of my assistants wanted to do the RN stuff.

21:21So it kinda fell into place. It's more organic more than, like, oh my god. I'm gonna create this beautiful, like, commercial med spa. I was never commercial focused. I'm still today. I'm more, like, more creative person. So if you tell me think about how you're gonna make a $100 extra, it's gonna be really difficult for me. But if you say, what are your patients asking for? What do you think is gonna work? I know that. I know my patients. You know? So that's how it happened. Oh, that's really cool. And is that something that you also train other dentists to do? I mean or is that part of your coaching? Absolutely. I I started, like, talking about it just like I'm talking to you. I had some really big names in dentistry, like, call me and say, hey.

22:00You know, I'm trying to implement. And I was able to find a kinda sweet spot between finding RNs to, like, having my friend who's a physician onboard so they can communicate. We were also doing some IVs, you know, the health IVs. So it just so I'm like, alright. I'll make a course, and I'll start, like, you know, talking about it more. I I haven't, like, still uploaded that yet because I'm like, I wanna focus on sleep apnea. But now that you brought it up, I'll probably switch it in the next few months and start talking about it. Oh, that that's awesome. I think I think there's a big I think there's a lot of interest in it right now. And, you know, again, why not fast track success, imitate genius as opposed to trying to reinvent the wheel?

22:45So I love that. That I think you'll be really like Tony Robbins. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Tony Robbins of dentistry, Jim. Wow. High praise indeed. So, yeah, proximity is power and all that good stuff. So, you know, back to you mentioned sleep apnea again. Back to that, I mean, I think that a lot of dentists look at it as kinda a niche thing, like a specialty thing as opposed to something that just every practice should address, especially when we talk about the numbers we mentioned earlier. You know, if twenty five to thirty percent of American adults are suffering from, you know, breathing disordered sleep, why why aren't more dentists just embracing it and making it sort of a central a central service within their practice?

23:28I'll I'll answer that in two parts. Number one is there's thirty percent of the people having obstructive sleep apnea. Eighty five percent of the people are going undiagnosed because physicians are not diagnosing it, and dentists are more focused on, hey. You come from a hygiene check. Let's take care of it. Yeah. And also, I've talked to some offices that said the minute they start talking about sleep apnea, even the patients are like, you're a dentist. Why are you discussing sleep with me? Like, is this a new gimmick to make money? What is going on? Right? If we don't come from a place of like, hey. ADA recommends for us to screen for, you know, sleep apnea. This is part of dentistry because you guys come to see us twice a year at least.

24:09Mhmm. So this is what we need to do. And when you tell them from a place of responsibility, place of this is our territory, they immediately back off. Right? And I think majority of the dentists are, like, finding it hard because they're able to find a piece of plastic to put in. Right? The MAD Appliance, is mandible advancement device. But long term, they're finding it difficult because people are saying their bite has changed, and now they have to make wear a morning aligner. And after that, they're like, oh, we have this TMJ shoe. So now you you know, as a dentist, have you created it or have you exacerbated it? Right. Then there's billing issues as well. So I think what that's what I'm trying to do with my flow academy.

24:50It's like, if you're a dentist don't wanna treat this, great, but go ahead and screen it and send it. I'll find a pathway for you to send it to us. You know, you scan it, send it to us, and we are going to figure out they want a CPAP machine, we'll send them to physician. If they have additional stuff like, you know, nasal polyps or whatever, we'll send them to ENT. If they want a dentist, we'll find a dentist that's confident in training. You don't wanna be training? Great. No problem. You know? They're like, oh, it's another thing for me to train. I'm happy with doing implants in my practice. Right. And that's what we talked about. Right? Not everyone has to do everything. Yeah. There's no pathway now to help patients.

25:28Where do we go? We're not even screening. I see a patient that's having a heart attack in five years and, you know, getting away from his family versus me. I have done good by referring this patient out. Yeah. You know, it's a little bit of the that's not my job syndrome, I think, for a lot of people. You know, they're so focused on sort of traditional dental care, know, drilling and filling, doing root canals and whatnot that Absolutely. They just don't even think about it or wanna add that skill set. But in reality, it's probably the most important thing you can do as a dentist. Everyone should be screening it. Saving lives, but you're improving lives. You know? When people are sleeping better, their relationships are better, they're more productive at work, and they're just happier in general.

26:10Right? Right. So And single people are becoming, like, see meeting other people that are you know, and becoming more positive. I think if you're not sleepy, like, when is the time that you woke up grumpy and you wanted to do good in the world? Right? Like, even dentists themselves need it. Some of the dentists need it. You know? So we're we're gonna have to have another conversation about this, Sony, because I'm a terrible sleeper. I I don't prioritize sleep the way that I should. You're gonna you're you might pass out when I tell you this. Last week, literally, in an eight day period, I pulled five all nighters as I would Oh my gosh. Working and launching You're on sympathetic system. You need to get on parasympathetic.

26:48I know. Like, and relax and chill. I know. This whole vagus nerve stimulation so it actually pauses you. I know. Pause is important, Jim, because it doesn't let you it it actually gives you space and time to become so much better and, like Right. You know, come come out versus not sleeping. I mean, for five days, I'm sure you got a lot done. I I did. Did. I had a thirty nine hour hour period, Sonia, where I worked thirty five hours. I know that's not normal and it's not healthy. And I won't do it again, I promise. Now that we're having this conversation, I'm turning over Next time we have a conversation, I should not wanna I don't wanna wanna hear that for sure. I promise. I promise. So changing gears again Thanks for being vulnerable, by the way.

27:31I appreciate it. No. Absolutely. I think that a lot of a lot of entrepreneurs in particular just they they they prioritize work over sleep. And because I've always been able to get by with three or four hours of sleep, I, you know, I I get into that habit, and it's not good. Like, for me, six or seven hours would be incredible, and I'm gonna recommit myself to it. Now, again, thanks to you. You have inspired me. I'm gonna do it. So, you know, I I wanted to ask you also because I read about your the program you did at Wharton. I mean, how in the heck did you do a program at Wharton when you're writing all these other businesses? You're practicing dentistry. You're a mom. All this stuff, like, how in the heck did you fit that in?

28:17And and what was that all about? It's about, you know, the new innovation that so I'm spearing, like, some of the innovations that wanna come into dentistry, kind of a bridge between new technology that's coming in because I'm trying to find a new technology for the sleep apnea stuff.

28:33Okay. So I am in the forefront and meeting a lot of founders that are, like, helping I wanna make dentist life easy. Right? That's my goal. And so in that in that, you know, in that fight, like, I found a lot of struggle, a lot of founders that are doing really good stuff for dentistry, but they're not able to come outside. So I'm able to talk to them. I wanna help them, you know, fundraise, but I was not gonna be able to do without a background. Right? So Wharton Excel Entrepreneurship Acceleration Program, it's, you know, ten week program, pretty intense, but it actually made me connections. And and I'm able to now understand what's a seed round, what's a VC, what's an angel investor, how do you go to market with some of this stuff, and what kind of people to collaborate with.

29:21So this has been a tremendous experience. Yeah. Well, good for you. That's I mean, honestly, that's really impressive. And, again, like, how you fit all of that in is is sort of beyond me, but I'm I'm impressed that you did that. And sounds like it's gonna do a lot of good for you and for, you know, the dentist you serve over time too. That's cool. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. That's a goal is to help dentists as many as many as possible and help people breathe and sleep better. Well, you know, and that's why we're such good kind of partners with this whole Foundation Dental Alliance because, I mean, my my motto really is I wanna serve dentists from the day they graduate until the day they retire. And Exactly.

30:00Of course, you know, you and I have a lot of expertise. We've got a lot of experience. We've both done a lot professionally and personally, and we're maybe a little more well rounded than than some people in terms of all of those diverse interests we have. So, obviously, we have a lot to give, and that's awesome. But, you know, one of the beautiful things about what I put together is I've got there are, like, 20 of us, you know, who all have unique skill sets and are niche experts. And and so anyway, it's obviously, it's a passion among you. I love that. You know, having I wish I had this, Jim. I wish I had this when I graduated. Yeah. Right? I am so proud of you for putting everything together, and you put so much heart and soul into everything you do.

30:39I wish I had someone like you that I could just come right off with so many mentors on there and just plug and play. Right? It's like a kid needs homework help. It could be chemistry. It could be biology. You don't know what it is. So I could come out and have a different challenge versus my colleague that wants different things. So we're able to help them because you have so many, you know, expertise in there. That's right. And and again, that's that's why I was so excited when you said yes, you know, to coming on board because you have all these amazing things that you're doing and so much value to offer. So it's it's gonna be fun to watch that develop. But, you know, another, I think, passion of yours is sort of women in dentistry.

31:21You know, I when I went to dental school, I bet I bet it was 75% male, you know, maybe 25% female. But latest stats I saw said more than 50% of dentists graduating now are female. So so that's amazing, and I think it's good for patients. It's good for the industry, clearly. But do you think there's still, like, pressures and challenges facing women that maybe men aren't dealing with quite as much? I think, first of all, like, dentistry is an amazing field for women because we don't have emergencies. I never had to, like, go in the middle of the night and do overnight. Right? Like, so it's great. Among all the other fields, I don't know other fields because I haven't worked. Even as a nine to five in mergers and acquisitions, I just spend weekends.

32:09Like, you know, if the deadline is there, we're doing it. And if the server is down, you work weekend. You work at night. So I would say dentistry is great for women. I would always encourage people to come in. But I think, again, we have different challenges than men. I have to ask you if this is a men's world. Like, it I think it's a it's a man's world. I feel like we live in a man's world. I'll just say it. The reason I say that is I have met a lot of men that their wives are supporting them by by being there in the office. Right? Like, if the Mhmm. If he's a super dentist or whatever, he's doing implants, whatever he's doing, or he's in the back and the woman is in the front. So and women gladly take that role of, like, let me support my husband.

32:56I don't think a lot of husbands, depending on their up upbringing, wanna support their wives so much in their career, leaving their career. Right? Like, they have a decent job. They're not doing that. So then it comes to women to, like especially if we wanna own practices, are we raising our kids properly? Because family to me is super important. I'm never gonna, like, skimp on, like, making good home food meals for my kids or being there for their practices. I never skip on that. So having, you know, high standards for that and also high standards for dentistry, you're constantly juggling. Right? You're like, oh, am I gonna manage? Am I gonna treat patients? Am I gonna be there for my daughter and my son?

33:37So I think it's it's a lot to juggle if you don't have a proper support system. So when you get married, find a good co CEO. Think of it like less romantic, but more like who is my co CEO that's willing to help me through this journey? Right? Like, if I wanna step back, then he can go. You know? And but somebody's gotta something's gotta give in America, especially we don't have that much support system. It's so interesting, Sonia. That's a totally different take. Like, I've never I really never even thought about it in those terms, but but it is true. You know, it it it's becoming a little bit more common though for, like, the husband of female dentist to be in the office. I've I've come up that. Depending on the upbringing.

34:19Right? If they don't see it as a less masculine because they grew up in a family. Right. Right. In fact, you know, it's crazy, Sonia? When I was in Dubai in April, you know, I went to vet all the properties, vet the restaurants, make sure everything was gonna be top notch when we took everybody in August. But the second day I was there, I was going on, like, a VIP safari desert safari adventure. And when I got in the car, there's a driver and then there's a couple in the back seat. Well, it was a female dentist and her husband ran the office. And, oh my gosh, Romina and Juan Pablo have become great friends. Like, we had so much fun that day that I kinda canceled my plans the next two days and got to hang up with them.

35:03But irony of ironies, you know, to your point, she is an incredibly successful dentist and businesswoman, one of the best dentists in this the country of Chile. In fact, she's she lectures on and teaches hands on courses in injectables all over the world. But Juan Pablo, he's a brilliant guy and must be his upbringing because he is, like, supporting her every step of the way, you know. And, anyway, it just to your point, I I think that it has been a problem traditionally, and hopefully, that's something that that gets better. I hope so. I hope, you know, I hope we have good supporting families so, you know, we can excel and, you know, and, you know, catch our dreams. For sure. So, you know, when you talk about, you know, building a business, you know, whether you're adding MedSpa, whether you're adding services like treating sleep apnea and all that kind of stuff, mean, scaling is always the challenge.

35:59You know, for for you, looking at scaling your business now, You know what mean? I know that you're you're training doctors and you're work you're coaching doctors and doing all these things. How do you how do you scale that? You know, when you look ahead and, you know, there's thousands of doctors who need to learn what you have to offer. They need to know what you do because you are somebody who can impact, you know, tens of thousands of of humans, you know, if you do get these doctors trained. How do how do you scale that? Like, what's what's your vision for that? Number one, we're doing evergreen courses. Right? Like, just if they don't get me one on one, it just you can review those courses, and we're also launching YouTube now.

36:42Okay. It's just, you know, in general, just to give some information. But if they wanna get really technical, they can look at our evergreen courses. Okay. And then just get an idea of, like, what it is out there. Just even get the basics going Mhmm. If you wanna impact. And then, you know, the it just train as I'm training other dentists, hopefully, they can help other people. And also, of course, be part of a group like you where, you know, you have 17 faculty, so we can filter out a lot of people. And not everyone needs me. Maybe some people need you and depending on what type of advice that they don't wanna implement sleep apnea and they don't wanna, you know Sure. From a man's perspective, you can coach them.

37:21You're doing that already. So I think we all have perspectives and hopefully, we'll have some leadership in dentistry that's so profound that we can hold each other. Yeah. All good. I I love that. I love that answer. And the fact that you have some online assets makes it so much easier to scale. You know? I mean, it's hard to get dentists to travel across the country sometimes. It's hard to get, you know, a thousand dentists in a room. But if you can have a thousand dentists, you know, taking your online course, that is massive value, and it could be done at their convenience. So, you know, what? I'll put in the show notes whatever assets I can if you have a link for people to go Perfect. To Yes. Just because I would love for for you to get really busy with that.

38:05So then Thank you so much. Yeah. Absolutely. So I know we're we're kind of running running short on time now. I mean, we could talk for another three hours really easily. But, you know, before I let you go, like, if there's one thing that you would want dentist listeners to take from our conversation, to take from just just you and your experiences, what what's the one takeaway that you would love for dentists to to have after this?

38:31I would say people over positions and time over money. Because our time is money, and it really focus on not just filling your calendar because there was a point where I just my calendar was like, this is not me. Who is this person that's working so much when you look from an outside? So I got a lot of joy when I trimmed my calendar and really focus on what moves the needle versus, oh, you know, everybody needs you. So I think time over money, like investing this one on one conversation to me is so much more important than me getting paid for something else and not really make a connection. And people. Right? Like, nurture people, help people. It's gonna come back thousand times more. Maybe not from Jim.

39:18I helped Jim today, but I come back I got comes back from somebody else. So I think just nurture people and time. Two things. I don't have a short term, like, mindset. Right? Like, I'm gonna just win everything. Just share the wins. I love it. I love it. That's so good. And and that's just so clearly been your mentality your entire career. And, you know, to start on Wall Street and then to, you know, get out and become a great dentist, then to change everything, you know, with, you know, with your practice, and then to share all of that with other dentists. And then to help dentists kind of get through or overcome burnout, it it's all just really commendable. And I'm I'm super excited for you, and it's clear that you love what you do.

40:02And, you know, thanks so much, Sonia. I really appreciate you talking with us today. Thank you so much. Look forward to catching up soon. Sounds good. You take care of yourself. Bye bye.