I remember having a conversation at a seminar with my dear friend Jim Sigafoose. He said it best when he was at his first Parker seminar as a lonely, underachieving DC.  When asked how he was doing in practice he would say, truthfully “I’m seeing 500!”  Although he was actually adjusting a fraction of those 500, he was “seeing” them.  He never lost the vision of where his practice would be one day. The rest is legendary.

When you awaken to start the next practice day, you have a choice as to how it will play out.  It will either drive you(nuts) or you will drive it.  Most DC’s chase a dream of more, more and more rather than realize that there are production limits to the system you have set up.  So often DC’s read about monster practices that can occur overnight with the right marketing etc..These are probably the same DC’s addicted to infomercials or MLM schemes.  The reality is that the practice you have is a perfect reflection of your level of clinical and management skills combined with entrepreneurial expertise.

I suggested that compression of the schedule was a good starting point.  Even if you are seeing a few patient visits in the hour or in the morning, schedule them all in the same slotted time frame.  This gives the perspective of a full practice; it creates a buzz of momentum in the flow and most of all it frees the day up for you to spend the time entrepeneuring. This simple cluster booking saves you the indignity of waiting for the one patient.  Remember that an efficient appointment book is scheduled horizontally and then vertically.  I created the ABC’s of staff responsibilities, where A stands for Appointment book management. I will review these ABC’s at a later date.

Once the cluster booking has been firmed up, it’s time to literally go to work.  Servicing the patient is the easy and straight forward stuff for us.  It’s the allocation of time and energy to be the CEO that needs to be learned and implemented.  I suggest that you agree to work at least 40 hr a week until your plate is full.  Not that hard a request.  If you do the math and allow for missed appointments and slow times you would only need to, at most, invest 27 hours in adjusting, examining and reporting time to see 250 pv/week.  That leaves a full 13 hours to be the CEO(Creative Exceptional Organizer)(DF’s acronym).  Sadly most DC’s see the 27 hours and book a play date instead of working their plan for the other 13.

I know this sounds pretty Dad and Mommish…put the nose to the grindstone but there is a reality of getting paid for the system that you create and manage. I once trained with a hedonistic coach who was all about maximal efficiency and minimal hours. My practice languished for some time until I reorged the schedule.  Let me just say from business experience, and I know billionaires who gladly put in 60 hour weeks; work should feel like play, so learn to love the business as much as you love adjusting.

 Interested in learning how to be great in practice and create your own Greatness Action Plan? Book a free consult time with docfletch.  Fill in the Mind the Gap info and send it through.  You can also just call Linda at 905 831 9696 and she’ll set aside 20 uninterrupted minutes to have a chance to chat about coaching and growing the practice.

The post today will be of a practical vein as most of the docs that I have worked with recently need an update on the discussion of the GAP.  As you know, my coaching program is styled after that principle hence the name, GAP Coaching.  Remember that GAP is a derivative of Selye’s original concepts of General Adaptive Syndrome.  At Total Solutions, we reorganize the GAS to become the GAP which now stands for General Adaptive Potential. 

In essence, we all operate within boundaries. Thankfully they are not rigid like a set of train tracks but rather flexible and responsive to life’s nuances.  If we look at the opportunities of living big and living on purpose then we would be well served to widen the GAP as often and as much as possible.   As A Dr. Beatrice Berry puts it,” When you walk with purpose you collide with destiny.”

The lower boundary of the GAP represents entropy.  It’s where life energy has depleted and the rigors of daily living have taken such a toll that the GAP is narrow and the dis-ease is the norm.  The lower boundary is where failed decisions come to rest.  The net effect of persistent dis-stress pushes the patient or the person closer to that lower boundary. The lowest level that can be reached is when life energy, the elan vital, can no longer be expressed and death ensues.

The upper limit is actually limitless.  It represents the opportunity of expressing human potential at its nadir.  This boundary is self and evolutionarily imposed.  We mere mortals live with glass ceilings where we can envision what lies beyond but feel the constraints of self imposition.  Who knows when the next barrier to human performance and creativity will be shattered?

At each station in life we develop a state of ease that “fixes” these boundaries.  These set points become our relevant and dominant perspective.  We activate our neurology to allocate a state of ease where physical, mental and biochemical stressors are viewed as eustress (beneficial to growth and maintenance). What is one man’s poison is another’s pleasure.  We operationalize our tasks to use enough stress to get pleasure and enjoyment in life which may or may not be enough to “raise the bar”.  Eventually, we accept these limits until creativity and purpose push us to expand.   So long as the added stresses are deemed to be advantageous to our future well being, the body-mind deems these to be eustress, thereby expanding the limits.  When unintentional stress is applied, a downward force is activated and the GAP begins to close.   This can be from any one or all three dimensions of stress, simultaneously, instantaneously or insidiously.   Regardless, the perspective is altered and what used to be tolerable now changes to aggravating as the upper limit slumps.

 Stress is cumulative by nature and design and so if unmanaged or emotionally charged, a snowball effect begins.  But something worse is at play. This snowballing isn’t linear.  As stress affects the processing in the neural core and perceptions are altered, the original tranche of stress becomes another stress to deal with.  This snowball is rolling downhill, gathering speed and overcoming the inertia that has taken years to develop.   This is now an exponential problem. That is verging on “out of control”. 

Somewhere along this chain of events, the body-mind recognizes this altered state and begins to produce defensive strategies.  This guarded response is to protect and alert the stress owner that something big is amiss.  Sadly the owners are rarely tuned in to their bodily state. In effect they are disembodied.  This shift from stress/ eustress to distress creates a measurable response that we term the subluxation.  It is identifiable through its spinal component, the vertebral subluxation in ways that chiropractors are trained to analyze.  For this reason, we can apply the results of the scanning technology to the concept of GAP.  WE can use the combined score of an NSFi to represent the width of the GAP that a person is operating through at the time of exam.  We can identify where and how deep the stresses( distresses) are being stored and to what extent they are altering the health of the patient by reviewing the thermal scans.  Algometry allows us to measure the sensitivity of the inflamed, upper tissues while inclinometry detects the global guarding associated with subluxation.   Dysponesis is a state of total energy inefficiecy and can be identified through sEMG readings to understand the failing state of energy management in dis-ease.  Finally the HRV is a point of reference for the doc and the patient to see how the narrowing GAP is affecting the patient’s ability to adapt and “dance on the head of a pin.”

As you can see, the goal of the chiropractor is to “widen the GAP”.  Innate allows us to have a GAP and Innate is programmed to widen the GAP so that we humans can accomplish our purpose and destiny.   If distress can narrow the GAP then adjustments can jack it open.  Keeping it open and pushing the boundaries is a combined effort of purpose, chiropractic and hygienic decisions.  I registered the website, www.widenthegap.com for some future project that could inspire, teach and train the world how simple it can be to take charge of one’s health, perspective and future.  Send me your thoughts on how this may look and we can collaborate on widening the gap in our communities. 

So, all of the airports and recycled airplane air have narrowed my GAP.  Writing to all of you has begun the process of easing the downward push on my system.   The healing is in play.  Use the GAP wisely and train your people how good it is for everyone to get “gapping”. 

DocFletch blogs are shared around the world.  Pass on the link and let the scanning and chiropractic communities know that this is the destination to learn and grow as a chiropractic warrior.  I invite all of you to drop me a line in the comments section or do as many do and write an email to docfletch@docfletch.com.  Let’s widen the GAP one patient and one family at a time.

I remember when I hired my first coach, he asked me whether my desire was to work with a coach or a consultant.  Truthfully, I didn’t really know the distinction between the two.  I was at a time I my career where I was searching for growth and simplicity all wrapped into one.  I knew that to grow emotionally and productively that I would have to slay some of the sacred cows that held me back in practice but I really didn’t want a plastic, Rah-Rah, approach to number growth. My situation was a little bit unique as I was at a transitional time where I had already achieved a substantial practice and was searching for the “what’s next?”  However, I soon realized that the process of change was the same, regardless of where you were on the continuum.

I had committed to the coach and his success without really thinking through what context I would be coached or consulted through.  I had thrown my trust in him and here he was asking the question that would really frame our experience.  What was the difference?  As I would come to learn and experience through that relationship and through the training and the thousands of clients I have worked with is that there is an absolute necessity to blend the two concepts rather than keep them separate.

The joy of being coached is the inner exploration of what drives you.  The joy of consulting is in creating a unique, personalized framework that optimizes the expression of your passion to serve.  Coaching is process that unlocks talent.  Consulting is using best practice procedures and implementing them through leadership and management. You have to know yourself and have enough self esteem to spend the time, energy and focused commitment to make your system come alive. The passion for your services to be displayed and utilized in the marketplace should be strong enough to drive you to make the tough choices and the systematic changes. 

A coach’s responsibility and skill is probably best described as being a trusted advisor.  The trust comes from the ability to do that unlocking and nurturing of the innate talent.  The advisor describes the “walk in my shoes” concept.  Experience is such a good teacher and coaching should bring enormous experience to the table:  experience in management modeling, experience in relationship building, experience in personal foundation development and experience in creating success strategies.  

This distinction between coaching and consulting is relevant every day in our lives and in our practices.  I believe the mission to become the patient’s trusted advisor is the far reaching goal in the relationship.  Contrast this with the dispensation of medical advice that we see all too often in walk-in clinics. The “don’t bother me” approach reduces the service session to a technician experience for both the provider and the patient.  Developing the role as a trusted advisor takes a bit longer and a lot more emotional connectivity but the rewards are exponential.  Coaching your patients towards wellness decisions and standing by them when they falter is why we give of our time.  Just think of the untapped talent and potential that a coach could unlock and nurture vs. being their health care consultant. Ask yourself how big the fellow within really is.

We are only gifted a short stay as practitioners in this wonderful playground known as career and practice.  The time flies by and although the lessons are in the mistakes, there are so many tolerations and repetitions that slow us down and waste life energy.  Coaching with a trusted advisor can make the difference. 

Create a GAP( Greatness Action Plan) and bridge the gap between where you are and where you know you will be. Call in for a free consultation to see if GAP Coaching is for you.  We now offer extremely affordable monthly coaching plans and of course can customize the experience to meet your needs and desires.     

I’m sure you are getting the picture.  Care plans are, at best, a defensive strategy that helps the innate ability of adaptation and expression of potential come alive.  Like pulling weeds or managing the “perfect lawn” we make a commitment that has no definitive ending.  Biology does not embrace a sprint to the finish line.  It’s a marathon that fluctuates within the GAP with the goal being to stretch the high limits without plumbing the lower ones.  

Weeds indicate an unhealthy or less than optimal terrain. Pasteur labored over this notion and finally relented on his deathbed when he stated (sic)”  It is the soil not the seed”  in reference to pathogens causing disease. Weeds and subluxations emerge to our attention long after they have begun their journey.  By the time we envision them on scans and certainly on later stage diagnostics like x-ray, they have become a cause as much as an effect. They are part of the fabric of daily living or lawn that we must tend to.  I remember reading a National Geographic article that had a fold out section of NYC now and what it would look like after a potential biologic warfare event had taken out all the mammals(humans included).  In a very short time frame the weeds had won.  The entire cement infrastructure was crumbling as the weeds infiltrated and grew relentlessly.  They shattered the hard structures as they allowed water and other pathogens to seep in.  It wasn’t long before the host was compromised. Think of the consequences of leaving weeds untended in our patients. 

Let’s face it.  It’s so much more fun and fulfilling to plant flowers than to pull weeds.  However, what we know is that the ideal garden has to be prepared first and then tended to.  Your care plans must be designed and adhered to if the weeds are rooted out.  Only then can the flowers that we call wellness strategies be planted successfully.  Use the scans to check your progress and to inform the patient of their successes.  This is the essence of my Path to Wellness care plan model. Release is an essential component before the Rebuilding is set up.  Revitalization is the reward for the efforts of the first two stages.

GAP Coaching offers relevant and exceptional training to help you transition your practice from spine care to wellness.  Its straight forward and successful.  We not only help you weed your garden but plant the right flowers that are weed-resistant.  Write me at docfletch@docfletch.com with your thoughts and book a time to discuss your practice direction and growth.  I love hearing stories from the field.

Because of chiropractic’s universality, most scientific methods that detect physiologic shifts away from or towards more balance, symmetry and efficiency are valuable tools in observing the benefits of the adjustment.  When we focus in and look at these physiologic shifts through neural function, the specificity of chiropractic is most visible. Tie this together with sound biomechanics and biochemistry and we have a construct that is mostly complete, except for “that something extra”.  As Steven Covey discussed, there is a millisecond that exists between stimulus and response and in that time we define our humanity.  This is where free will mixes with Universal and Innate intelligence. 

In simplest terms, we heighten the recovery response.  The ability to bounce back from minimal or major interference is the hallmark of a well person.  Stress is natural and endemic.  Gravity exists as do memories and patterns of inefficiency derived from years of compensation and neglect.  Mixed together, the body reacts and responds to manifest subluxation patterns.  These persistent disturbances affect the neural processor and spill over to affect all body systems through the autonomic and motor imbalances.  If we add in the immeasurable impact on potential and socialization, we recognize that this combined state of well being is dramatically at risk.  Like rust on your 1979 Porsche, subluxations just eat away at the perfection that once was.  Slowly, these subluxation erode the patina of the original work of art until finally your health is just a project for some car hack known as a therapist or allopath.

The only consistent model that defines wellness so easily, in my mind, is the GAP.  If we recognize that life has limits genetically, environmentally, socially and most importantly, self imposed, then we come to a realization that it is better to live in a wider GAP than to feel the compression of narrow parameters.  The super skill of any wellness practitioner is to identify the primary and other subtle drivers that are narrowing the GAP in our patients.  Most clinicians can detect the obvious but as always the next question remains.  What do we do about it?  This is where chiropractic stands alone and can define itself in perpetuity.  We OWN the principle of subluxation but better than that, we have spent the past 114 years developing sophisticated methods to release these core tension patterns known as subluxations.  No one else cares about them like we do and only when we tie the hip bone to the universe do we really become relevant to mankind. Does the world really need a better group of exercise therapist or nutritionists?  Perhaps.  But the gaping void facing humanity is neural distress in the manifested form of subluxation.  Our GAP’s may be narrow but the hope that can be accessed lies in the determination of a strategy to release and rebuild neural core efficiency.  Who knows, we may even get our communities to realize the value of natural revitalization as the GAP grows wider and wider.  

Docfletch offer his opinion and expertise in widening the GAP through the docfletch.com website.  Coaching towards a wider experience is available to those who would love to explore being truly happy and wildly productive in practice.  Learning to “Love what you do and do what you love” is a foundational principle in GAP Coaching.  Call or write me at docfletch@docfletch.com  to explore these opportunities.