A (2:30)

There are so many ways to keep your practice organized, but TherapyNotes is by far the best. They're easy to use, secure platform, lets you not only do billing, scheduling and progress notes, but also create a client portal to share documents and request signatures. Plus, they offer amazing unlimited phone support. So when you have a question, they're there so you can get help fast. Get started with TherapyNotes today, trusted by over 60,000 professionals. Go to therapynotes.com and enter promo code PPS, as in Private Practice Startup and you'll get two months for free. Also, you can listen to episode 54 where we interviewed Brad Pleiner and took an in depth view into their ehr. So let's get started. What's up, Buck?

C (3:14)

How are you?

A (3:15)

Good to see you.

C (3:16)

Good to see you too.

A (3:17)

Thanks for being here.

B (3:19)

So I'm really excited about this podcast because I know that your podcasting folks had reached out to us. And one of the things that was very interesting to me is that you're a surgeon by trade and at one point in your story, and you'll share your story like you decided to kind of go on the wealth journey, or maybe you've been on the wealth journey for a while. And I know you know, our audience is comprised of folks who are just starting up in private practice and then we have people who've kind of mastered their private practice and they're looking to scale whether it's online or through wealth building. And I know, and Kate and I have actually been doing a lot of more money mindset conversations. And this is just one of the areas that I'm passionate about. So when I'm not doing private practice, when I'm not doing the private practice startup, I'm talking about investments and real estate and things like that. So I'm really excited about this. So we just thank you for being here.

C (4:08)

Yeah, thanks for having me.

B (4:09)

Yeah.

A (4:09)

This podcast tickles your fancy, right? It's right up your alley.

B (4:12)

It does, it does. We've had a few podcasts on taxes and things like that. And usually during the podcast I start to see Kate kind of like list away. I'm the CFO of our company and she's the.

C (4:23)

Got it.

B (4:24)

Yeah. Because I hate tech.

A (4:25)

I'm totally down with the wealth conversation. Taxes that dismiss us for me.

B (4:29)

But yeah, share a little bit with us about like your journey. Like, how did you get to be where you are today.

C (4:38)

Circuitous route. I started out, you know, just as a good student. You know, I think that decided in college at one point that I wanted to go to medical school. So, you know, got good enough grades to do that, and then went to medical school and decided I wanted to, you know, I got really into the academic side of things. So I actually, you know, was publishing lots of papers, was writing book chapters, etc. Wanted to be a neurosurgeon because that seemed like the, you know, the top of the food chain, and it stroked my ego. And so that's where I started and started a neurosurgery residency at the University of Michigan. And after a couple years, realized that I didn't like the lifestyle as much, which actually was an important revelation, I think, that a lot of people don't kind of let themselves have, and switched over to other surgical training that ultimately led me towards plastics. And so I finished that. Those kinds of surgical things in 2008, but was still pretty academic throughout this. And then in 2008, had an AHA moment, like a lot of people do, and they pick up a Robert Kiyosaki book. Mine happened. You know, I finished my training and we had graduation, and the next day my wife and I got married, and then we went on our honeymoon to Puerto Vallarta. And I had never even. I never heard of Robert Kiyosaki or really thought about reading any financial book, but I accidentally stumbled upon it in an airport in Puerto Vallarta, and there was only, like, three books in that bookstore, and two of them were with guys with long hair and no shirts on. Those. Very interesting.

A (6:45)

You were destined to read it.

B (6:46)

So what did you read first?

C (6:48)

I read Cash Flow Quadrant, which was actually. Which was the right book for me to read.

A (6:53)

You know, I thought you were asking about the romance novels as opposed to.

C (6:58)

Right, right. Yeah.

A (6:59)

So which one did you check?

B (7:02)

That's funny.

C (7:03)

So that that kind of was, for me, was a very. You know, a lot of people talk about, you know, people who are Kiyosaki people. You know, people who've read the book and have been inspired, always have their purple book moment. And for me, it was like a lightning bolt. And the reason being that throughout this entire academic journey of being a good student and successful and everything, it had never occurred to me that I could be an entrepreneur. Never. That was not even part of my reality. It was like a different world that I never even thought, well, gosh, you know, this is something I could do. And that was the framework Shift for me, that really just changed everything. And so I ended up starting my own practice. But I kind of held to those principles and started as a business with the intention of phasing myself out, which I did after a few years, and then started another business and then phased myself out and started another business. Then I started making a fair amount of money, and then the principles of investing very much. I wasn't going to go do what everybody else did, which was hand their money to a wealth manager, because at this point, I had Robert's wisdom and also realized that my dad was a real estate guy and I never wanted to do what he did. But I also, you know, I lived with a fair amount of privilege growing up, so it obviously worked, and I was not afraid of that world.

B (8:46)

So, you know, it's interesting as you share your story, and I'm sure a lot of our audience can relate, especially those kind of, like, new in a private practice, especially in the world of therapy, is we've been laden with these, like, messages of, you can't make money in therapy. You know, you should work at, you know, if you're a registered intern, right. That's our process before we become licensed. Well, you should work in community mental health and things like that. And, you know, when I was in school, those for sure were the messages. And nowadays registered interns are going more and more in a private practice straight from grad school. So the idea and the ability to become an entrepreneur is the thought process. Like you're saying, it wasn't even part of your reality. Yeah, I just think it's so cool. I mean, just culturally and where we've come, and especially with the Internet and things like that, there's so much more possibility. But I like that you said you need to have this awareness.

C (9:33)

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, and actually talked about, you know, the nice thing about having my own podcast and building my. My own tribe was that I got to ultimately, I got to meet Robert Kiyosaki and had him on the show and spent a lot of time with him and, you know, some meetings and stuff. And I told him this story about, you know, what happened. And, you know, I said, you know, and it just made me think that, you know, the funny thing is that the more more successful you are in academics, the more successful you are in the traditional paradigm of education because you're constantly getting this Pavlovian feedback and these dopamine hits of success, right? You're constantly looking for that pat on the back, and you keep getting It. The deeper you go down that hole, the more difficult it is to actually see that there's a world outside of it, which is. Which is entrepreneurship. And so. So the irony is, and I see this all the time now, and you know, with friends who've been extremely successful and even those who went to business school, they're. They're ultimately just looking for a job, right? They're just looking for a job because they just want someone else to tell them what to do, because they're really good at doing what people tell them to do, to follow the curriculum, so to speak. And so it's ironic, but it's true. The more successful you are, the more difficult it is to become an entrepreneur.

B (11:10)

Interesting. I thought it would be maybe like inverse, because I see, like, especially for professions that have to go to school for a long time, is there is that discipline, right, like meeting deadlines, the discipline of studying, reading, writing, and things like that. And, you know, I always look for the. Where do you have those skills already? And how can we apply that to entrepreneurship? And especially for therapists, like, one of the things that we talk about all the time is therapists have amazing marketing and sales skills. They're just not aware of them because they think that exists in the four walls, you know, in a couch with a client.

A (11:42)

In the clinical space.

B (11:43)

In the clinical space. You know what I mean? So we talk about all that, and we like to kind of pull what's working already. But that's an interesting thing. So share with us about your wealth formula.

C (11:54)

Yeah, Well, I mean, I think it's the wealth formula. There's a couple components to it. And one is, first, there's math. Right? The math is actually pretty simple. I think it's. Ultimately, wealth is a product of, you know, it's a product of actually investing, putting money towards making more money and then. And then velocity of money, which is basically how quickly you get your money back from your investment and then redeploy it and then the use of smart leverage. Those things are pretty straightforward. I don't need to probably get into them too much. But I think if you look at just about anyone who's gotten wealthy from investing, those are the components of wealth right there. But beyond that, I think there's other things to consider that are important. And one is, what is the paradigm of investing that creates true wealth, creates a lot of wealth. And if you look at, again, going back to the way we're trained in conventional financial wisdom, we're not really trained in conventional financial wisdom. In fact, what happens is we go through school and we have a curriculum. We follow again. This goes back to the good student. And then we finish school, and then we're looking for people to tell us exactly what to do in things that there's no longer a curriculum for. And one of them is how to invest your money. So if there's no curriculum, you end up defaulting to conventional wisdom. And conventional wisdom in finance is basically dictated by Wall street. And Wall street says to invest your money in stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. The problem is that conventional wisdom, as you know, is often wrong. You know, the world is not flat. Indeed. You know, there's a, you know, back. This is a. One thing that I remember, you know, back at being a kid, I remember, and you guys probably remember this too. On the wall of every classroom, there was a food pyramid.

B (14:12)

Oh, yeah.

C (14:13)

And the food pyramid said that you were supposed to eat, like, mostly starches. And there was, you know, you just kind of work it up and at the very. There was fat. But what we know now is very different from what that food pyramid looks like. In fact, I remember in fifth grade, my teachers saying, can anyone say, what do you think the perfect food would be? No one raised their head. And he said, pizza, of course, right? You have bread, and then you had your tomato sauce, and then you had your cheese for your dairy and a little bit of meat. It's perfect.

B (14:49)

Some people are feeling totally validated right now.

C (14:51)

They're like, exactly, exactly. And if you look at the food pyramid, that's a perfect food. The problem is that that food pyramid was created in part by. It was based on a Harvard study at Harvard Medical school in the 50s that unfortunately was funded by the. By the sugar industry. There was a strong. There was a strong bias there because the sugar industry did not want to show any correlation between cardiac disease and sugar. So came the food pyramid, which neglected to talk about the importance of simple sugars, inflammatory things that result in cardiac disease. The point I try to make, the point of this long, drawn out story, is that, first of all, conventional wisdom is often wrong. And conventional wisdom can often actually be dangerous. It can be dangerous to your health. Conventional wisdom can be dangerous to your financial health. And that conventional wisdom can also be dictated by special interests. Now, of course, now if you look at it from the standpoint of financial, conventional wisdom, stocks, bonds and mutual funds, Wall street is a special interest. And Wall street gets wealthy on the backs of everyone who's investing that way. I'm not asking people to completely change the way they Invest. I just want people to look at it for what it is, which is, listen, what do we talk about when you and I know you're interested in real estate, for example, what do the financial advisors and such call real estate? They call it an alternative asset. Alternative. Now so you guys are psychologists, right? So what words come into your head? What do you think about when you hear the word alternative? Well, you start to think maybe blue hair or maybe a nose to your nose ring or something like that. You know, something that is just not something that everybody should do or everybody socially acceptable, whatever. And that is a. That's on purpose. It's on purpose. It's not. These words are not there by accident. Alternative assets, the things that they talk about with real estate or precious metals, these are the things that have been there for thousands of years, well before the New York Stock Exchange, but yet they are alternative. Mainstream is paper and derivatives. That's my shtick.

B (17:45)

As our audience. Like I was saying is some folks are coming into private practice and maybe they've had a retirement fund or 403 with their non profit or something like that and now they come in a private practice and they're worried. You know, they're worried because, well, I got to get clients and then, and then that like maybe retirement's like an afterthought or investing and stuff like that. And like you said, like you're not asking, want to like change what they're doing right now, but what are some things that going from. And like you're saying from that disciplined mindset of do this, do this, do this to an entrepreneur in private practice and not having. I don't want it to be like the afterthought, like how do I invest in for myself currently and in the future. But like what are your, what can you give people in that position of starting a business not having the funds. But what should they be thinking about? What should their projections be? What's important for them to know?

C (18:38)

Well, I mean I think that, listen, I think it's, you know, one of the problems in this situation when you're first starting out is that, you know, that equation that I use the math requires money to invest and so it's hard. One of the things, whenever people read the Kiyosaki books, they think you have this moment and you just see the excitement. They're like, I'm gonna retire in five years, I'm just gonna buy a bunch of real estate. But unfortunately it requires a little bit of money. So I think the challenge is trying to figure out where that money comes from. And I think, and that it is simplistic as it sounds, I think that that's something to focus on. I mean, I think there are ways in anybody's these days, as you know. And I think you mentioned something about this earlier about online type businesses, etc. I mean, you have a lot of skills that you have that are highly marketable in more ways than just therapy and like online, whether it's coaching, whether it's, you know, online forums, et cetera, et cetera. I would focus on entrepreneurship first to create more money and then, and then figure out the investing part. Now with the caveat that a lot of what I find, and I was guilty of this to a certain extent myself, is that a lot of entrepreneurs initially, when they start making money, they kind of, they get super excited and they will, they'll keep dumping it back into their business sometimes, and which is great. And I did the same thing. But the only problem is with a business, what happens is the more you feed it, the more it'll eat. And it's like a teenage boy. That's right. That's right. I mean, I used to be one of those. And, and so you have to be very careful to set aside that money. And you know, that whole saying about paying yourself first, it's very, very true. I can't tell you how many people I know who have very successful businesses, but they're just so, you know, they're, they're, they're knee deep in those businesses and all they need is to have a couple of bad months and they're in big trouble. So I think the idea of, you know, setting aside some things to say, you know what? I need to create more than one leg on this stool to keep, you know, keep me afloat long term and keep that perspective.

A (21:16)

We're big fans of profit first, so it would be good to add a link for that podcast episode in the show notes. We'll do that for you guys here. And that's something that we've been using in the private practice startup and are encouraging private practitioners to use that so that you can profit first in your business and pay yourself first and, you know, have more money to be able to invest.

B (21:39)

And that's really important. And I know for me, about like a year and a half ago, I went and did a millionaire mind intensive and you know, they talked about the jar system or the envelope system and you know, part of that, your financial freedom account. Right. And so money, it's supposed to be 10% of my money. But I'd like siphon as much as I can in there because that's the investment money, and that money is only used for passive income vehicles. And that's the stuff that. That begins to create wealth while you're still working. And I love buck that you say. And I'm wondering if some people are listening to this podcast. And it's like, I actually just started Spanish lessons yesterday, and it's one of those things where your brain just stops working. And I'm hoping as the information is seeping in, you're hearing it, but you're like, I'm not really sure what I'm doing or whatever. But this is good. And what's really important about this is you might remember this conversation. And Kate and I do talk about. And we talk about this in our E course in regards to the money mindset and really make. A lot of times people come into private practice and they think like, okay, well, I want to make this much money, so I need to see these clients. But you want to make that much money. But how many vacations and holidays do you want to take? What do you want your schedule to be? Like, what do you want to put away for retirement Investment? What if you get sick? What about an emergency fund? So then you realize, like, well, maybe I'm not charging enough. Right. And I like how you're talking about that is you don't want to just think about what you want to make. And, you know, oh, you really wanted that leather couch. Now in your office, it's, are you feeding yourself first while you're also doing that? And always keeping in mind paying yourself first. Yeah. Kate talks about profit first, and we switched to that actually over a year ago now, so jokingly. But I am the CFO of our company, and Kate loves when it's bonus time. We do quarterly bonuses, and each time it actually increases, which is great. And she's like, hey, bonus time. I'm like that, too. But I already know what's going on and what's coming. So it's not as exciting.

C (23:28)

Right.

B (23:29)

But it's all essential. And really, you know, I remember the days, you know, talking about, you know, being a kid, where my dad would take us to the bank every Saturday to deposit our money. And now it's like, I have, like, one bank with nine different accounts, another bank with, you know, five different accounts, and. But really being able to put your money in different places so that it will work for you.

C (23:52)

Yeah, yeah. It's just really important just to not Forget about that part. And I mean, I have to just, you know, you look at people who are making what I think most people would consider a lot of money. You know, I have doctors and stuff in my investor groups and stuff who are making, you know, to maybe 250, 300, $350,000 a year. And they've been doing that for, you know, 15, 20 years. And it's remarkable how little they have in terms of their, their net worth. It just is just unbelievable. And the, and a lot of that is, of course, that we have a natural tendency to, as people who, you know, during school, you have no money whatsoever to, you know, as soon as you start seeing money, you increase your own overhead to match the increased revenue. Right. So, so that you keep your profit margin about the same even though you're making a lot more money, your personal profit margin, because you buy your fancy car and you buy your fancy this or whatever.

A (25:02)

I work hard, I deserve this mentality. Right.

B (25:05)

I think she's relating to her own story as you talk about this, right?

C (25:08)

Yeah, yeah, that's, you know, I mean, but it's also because again, when you go back to what you're quote, unquote, supposed to do, I mean, you're supposed to be contributing to whatever IRA or 401k or whatever you are. And if you're just doing that and you're doing nothing else, I mean, that's what these guys, women and men and women have been doing. And it's not working. It's not working because if you look at your typical, let's just look at your typical 401k, your Iraq that they're invested in, usually a portfolio of some kind of mutual funds. Mutual funds sound like they're adult, they're grown up type things that you ought to be doing. But you look at the last three decades, they've been growing at an average of about 3, 3.5%. You take that and then you tack on the fact that you get about 2% inflation per year. It's growing at about 1%. And 1% means that you double your money every 72 years. That's not enough.

B (26:20)

Every 72 years.

C (26:22)

72 years. And so that's the problem, right, is like you, what we're starting to see is like, you know, the, the, what I'm seeing is that a lot of these people who've been really working hard and think they're doing what they're supposed to be doing, it's like a big sticker shock. They're like, oh my Gosh, you know, I'm. I'm 50 years old, and, you know, I've been working. I've been working for. I've been out of residency training or whatever for 20 years, and, and. And. And I have, like, no money to retire. If I decided I want to slow down, I just have no money. I just. I would last maybe two years.

B (27:06)

It's a scary thing, and it almost feels like unfair, like you're saying, like, you've worked so hard. And so, you know, as you guys listen to this podcast, wherever you're at, and if you are already investing in some way, awesome. And if you're not, we really want you to think about this. You know, my spouse and I, we often talk about, like, I wish I knew what I knew now. You know, 10, 15 years ago, I would have loved the opportunity to start investing earlier, but I didn't know the information. Right. Maybe this podcast is an introduction to kind of getting your mind going. And maybe check out the book Cash Flow Quadrant or even Rich Dad, Poor dad by Robert Kawasaki too. That's a great intro book. I've actually also read his Tax wealth book, and I have the ABCs of real estate on the way. I'm waiting for that to come in any day. I'm super excited about that. But, you know, this stuff is really important, and, you know, you guys do work hard. You guys work hard to make a difference in people's lives, and we want to make sure that you're making a difference in your own life, and that's really important. You know, most of us come into private practice because we want that dream, dream lifestyle, and part of that dream lifestyle is continuing the education and the education of, you know, how do I create this not only with my private practice, but in other ways as well? So this has been. I know this is a fun podcast for me because I love talking about.

C (28:18)

Well, asleep there at the start.

A (28:23)

I'm hanging with you guys.

B (28:26)

So. Fuck. What do you want people to take away from your message today?

C (28:31)

Well, you know, I think if nothing else, hopefully it's opened up people's eyes. And, you know, I like you. I would recommend reading. I think the Cash Flow Quadrant was really written for. And I can tell you that Robert Kiyosaki and I spoke to him about this. The Rich Dad, Poor dad was the book for the masses. Cash Flow Quadrant was the book for professionals. These were very intentionally written in the order that they were. They're written with increased sophistication. And so I would recommend that. I would recommend I mean, if, you know, I have a very simplistic book too that you can just download from wealthformula.com called Seven Secrets Paternal Wealth. And or you could also just text 44222 and type in wealth formula, one word and you can get that. It's a good place to start. Listen, I think what I would say, what I think people should get out of it is that no one, it's not a guarantee anymore. Right. We don't live in a world of pensions, you know, we don't live in the world of guaranteed income after we're finished working. And so this is really a, you know, something that you need to start thinking about when you're younger, if possible. Otherwise you end up being one of the doctors I'm talking about. And you have to think about not only today, but what you're doing to create some security for yourself when you're older. And, you know, I'm not talking about when you're, you know, 80 years old. I'm talking about even 10 years from now. Maybe you just want to slow down. Now is the time to start thinking about those things. Don't ignore them because no one else is going to. No one else is out there. No one else has your back. That's a misconception.

B (30:34)

Very true. Well, we thank you for being with us today and sharing your knowledge and wealth and that's so cool that you got to have Robert on your podcast. I'm sure that was such a pleasure and a joy. I'm a big fan of his as well. So thanks so much Buck for joining us today. And Buck had mentioned about his book and we're actually gonna put that on the Show Notes page so you guys don't have to worry about writing down the numbers or whatever you guys are doing. We'll put that right on the Show Notes page. So that's the best selling book, the Seven Secrets of Eternal Wealth. We'll add that link to the Show Notes page. So next week we're super excited actually about this podcast. We are inviting Melody Wilding back for round two. For round two. And you heard her on a previous podcast talking about pr. How to make your private practice PR ready. Yes.

A (31:20)

With that full title, we're going to be talking about imposter syndrome, though.

B (31:24)

So that's going to be a cool episode as well. So join us for that next one and of course, always hang out with us in Facebook. Look for the private practice startup and ask to be part of our community over thousands of therapists across the globe. So hang out with us there. We'll see you there. And thanks for allowing us to inspire you from Startup to Mastery Startup Nation. See you next time.

A (31:50)

Thanks for joining us on the Private practice startup. Visit theprivatepracticestartup.com for awesome resources, free trainings, attorney approved private practice paperwork, and so much more.

B (32:08)

Sam.