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The Long Way Around · Death Before Decay

• speaker-0: Check. Check, check, check. Can you hear me? Yeah? I think so. Okay. speaker-1: All right. I had to get a little something in my speaker-0: You had a rumbly in your tumbly? speaker-1: Nobody nobody likes to be hangry. speaker-0: Absolutely not. speaker-1: All right, and you can hear me pretty well here. I'm gonna get nice and comfortable. Hey, cool. We both got our ⁓ legs crossed here and all right, one sec here before we really start. speaker-0: Right on. Okay. speaker-1: Yeah, let it out, let it out. speaker-0: Okay. ⁓ speaker-1: Okay. ⁓ phones are off, like all those things. The do not disturbs focus. Well, I'm focusing until six AM tomorrow. speaker-0: What's the six a.m.'s one? speaker-1: When the focusing mode goes off. speaker-0: ⁓ on your phone? Yeah. I thought you meant mentally and like you're in a metaphysical sense or psychological sense. speaker-1: ⁓ no. Okay. All right. ⁓ yeah, let's ⁓ so give us a little bit of space and then you will go into it. speaker-0: All right, welcome to the Death Before Decay podcast. I'm Dr. Elliot Hummiston. I'm here with my buddy John Erline. ⁓ super producer John Erline. And thank you. ⁓ this show is about confidence, craft, and building something real in dentistry, in business, and in life. And then this season is brought to you by Taylor Drive Dental Care. So thanks everyone who's listening to this. ⁓ this first episode is just about kind of introducing ⁓ the concept of the show ⁓ where we wanna go with it. It's kind of a big open canvas for us right now. It's ⁓ it's kind of become a passion project for the two of us, I would say. speaker-1: Yeah, we've been talking about it for quite a while, like individually, the the whole podcast concept. speaker-0: Absolutely. I mean we even decided to do like pilot episodes playing around with everything. speaker-1: We did, we totally played around. It a lot of fun. Yeah. And you know, we're at that point in our journeys where you gotta play around a little bit to work out the kinks and now we're feeling a little bit better about where we're speaker-0: And the big goal for this is for it to be fun and and and be a project that we can be we can enjoy putting the work into. So speaker-1: So okay, I know that you had a lot of ideas around like where you wanted to start episode one. Right. So I'm gonna kinda nudge you. Okay. I'm nudging. So episode one, the first episode. Yeah. How did you wanna kinda walk out there and start to let people speaker-0: Not I mean just yeah, kind of like throwing out there so I there'll be some people who are listening to this who are friends of family. There might be patients or or peers that are listening to this and I think I just wanted an opportunity to ⁓ I guess in this first episode talk about who I am outside of dentistry. ⁓ dentistry's a big family tradition for for us. ⁓ my dad was a dentist, my great grandfather was a dentist, I grew up around dentistry, but I've done a lot in my life outside of Dennis Street, that's for sure. ⁓ my path was definitely not your typical path down that road. And you know, I I lots of martial arts, lots of art and ⁓ performing stuff. But speaker-1: But I know music? Yeah. So like outside of like so when you were a teenager, you mentioned something to me about what kind of a like a an ⁓ the nineteen nineties MTV generation Elliot Huddleston, not Doctor Yet, but like so what kind of so like in the nineties, let's start there. Who was that guy? Yeah, who was that guy? speaker-0: A total absolute like just like speaker-1: Don't be hard on yourself. speaker-0: But it was I was a nerd. I was just a dorky kid, pretty sheltered, homeschooled at times. You know, grew up in a in a Christian, ⁓ Midwest family, pretty much the same as everybody else, ⁓ in this area, I would say. ⁓ I had a pretty typical childhood in a lot of ways, you know. ⁓ I mean we w running around on Lake Michigan again, running around the woods with my friends, biking everywhere. speaker-1: ⁓ god, yes. Biking. I mean it really is like, you know, like sorry, I'm not trying to digress, but those little tangents are that just part of the story is part of journey. But like, yeah, man, like you saw bicycles on front lawns. All the time. You do not see that. speaker-0: Part of the story, part of the No, and like I mean, we would figure out how to get to Walmart, like which way could we get there with the most sidewalks and you couldn't get the whole way there. But if you were gonna pick up your like Star Wars action figure that week, mom and dad weren't gonna take you to get it, so you just got it yourself. speaker-1: Yeah, exactly. And that whole problem solving. Yeah. Figuring it out like was a motivating factor for you. speaker-0: For sure. Absolutely. Like I had a a core group of friends that I'm still close with today and we were always coming up with dumb projects or things to do because I mean, we were it's the generation where we had s some semblance of supervision, but we were allowed to kinda go out and do our own thing for a lot. ⁓ so I got into I think it was towards the end of the nineties, early two thousands is when I really started like speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: I remember do you remember that like they would come to the middle schools to do like anti-drug talks there and Pepsi did one? Do you remember that? Okay. Well Pepsi would come in and they would do this big show at Horace Man Middle School. And I'm sitting in there, I was homeschooled the year before. ⁓ because I I was a I got into trouble at the other middle school the year before that. Yeah. It's badass. Yeah. and speaker-1: Dare? Pepsi did one. Okay. I remember Dare. Okay. speaker-0: I'm sitting there and a POD and Lincoln Park music video are playing there. And up until then, all I listened to in my family was like oldies and the Beatles and Weird Al Yankovic. And then I heard new metal and I'm like, ⁓ like I think I had like a psychological change on that day. speaker-1: Is this very similar to like in Back to the Future when Marty McFly like busts out like that new music? speaker-0: I think it would be like if there was one person like impacted for the rest of their life, probably 'cause it's like a visceral memory. And that's when I became like really like, dude, I wanna start a band. Like that's what I wanna do. Like I wanna be Chester from Lincoln Park. speaker-1: But you but you you identified like a certain style that you gravitated towards after really only being exposed to older music. Yeah. speaker-0: Like the angry white boy music really spoke to me. Okay. speaker-1: Okay. Did Eminem show up at all or he's pretty angry. speaker-0: was but my parents had such a lock on like the television and stuff like that and what Lincoln Park POD and those other bands did that was smart is they didn't have the parental advisory sticker on their album so I could pick it up. Yeah. So yeah ⁓ MM definitely I thought was cool but it was not it was not accessible to me. Like I couldn't even watch MTV at home. I had to like go to my friend's house or do you remember like Kazah and like Napster and all of that? speaker-1: ⁓ yeah? ⁓ my god. Yeah, it's funny, oddly enough, my my father would despised it when I watched Married with Children. And I was like, why? 'Cause you're just like him? Cause you sit and watch TV with your hand on your pants. speaker-0: Ha ha ha. Dude, I started like because I had such bad insomnia for my ADD and depression medications, I'd stay up watching Nick at night and my mom found out that I was like watching Cheers and like all in the family and married with children. She's like, I don't know if you should be watching that. I'm like, why? Like, no one's swearing, but like they're not showing anything grotesque. There's just some like lew jokes here and there. And trust me, I'm hearing worse at school. speaker-1: So then that's how they were able that's how you were able to get MTV in the house because they're like, Well, he loves music, right? So now that you figured out that like okay, I like the angry white boy music that you said. So like, okay, you mentioned a band. So tell me more about that. How'd that all come to be? speaker-0: Well, when I was in high school I went so I also go to s I would go to summer camp for a couple of weeks every year and you'd get together with a g bunch of guys. It was a YMCA camp again, typical like ⁓ Christian upbringing type of situation, but I loved that place. And there would always be guys, you'd come in and the big C D album would be there. And I remember the first time I heard Thursday and a newfound glory was the summer after freshman year of high school. And I think that really solidified it because at that point I had only had like had like five albums that I listened to on repeat basically. ⁓ and I discovered emo and metal music more. And I picked up a guitar and started teaching myself how to play. And I was always like the guy who needed a project or a group of people to work with. Like I'd been through like so many different leadership camps. I was an Eagle Scout, like putting together things and like guiding myself. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: To an ultimate goal just came kind of naturally to me. So I just started jamming with anyone that I could, and we like put together a band, and we were awful, and we placed last at Battle of the Bands. This was senior year, I finally got it together. But the end of high school was like a really tumultuous time. Like junior year, I was ready to go to college. And then a bunch of stuff happened, like personally, and like socially for me, like including getting together with a group of guys and playing music for the first time, that I really wasn't ready to go to college. But I'm the oldest kid and that wasn't a negotiating whole point. speaker-1: Right. Yeah. I mean that was kind of the stereotype, right? Like you you went to college after high school. Yep. It was it and I would say like now nowadays, you know, like I think it's kind of encouraged to take a step back and try to think about your future and there's there's better ways to do that. But you know, like so you felt pressure. speaker-0: I did. And so I'm the oldest oldest of four, you know. Both parents have, you know, ⁓ high education. ⁓ I had scholarships going for me, like academic scholarships to a couple of schools. There was just this like, why aren't you like you obviously have to go. So I went, hated it, ⁓ got really depressed. All I did was sit in my dorm room and try to write bad music. And I ended up coming back for a spring break. And my band had like kind of the guys from that band have created a new band. And I did like two songs with them at the Battle of the Bands again that year. Like, man, I really want to do this again. So I dropped out of school. My girlfriend was back here too. I was going to school out west and we bought a Crappy Van, we wrote an album. It was like seven songs. ⁓ we learned a handful of covers, like I think two or three, but we hated. Like we really didn't like playing covers, but if we needed to fill out a set list, we would add one or two. And that was back during the MySpace days where like if you wanted a tour, you had to figure it out yourself. There was no apps or AI or anything like that. So I'd spend hours on MySpace just typing in different zip codes in cities that I knew had speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: Some sort of music scene. Because they used to have that to search for shows you could type in a zip code. So then I'd find out which bands were from that area and I would send hundreds of emails. And we would book a tour, we'd go out for a week or so and come back. and it was a freaking blast for about four years. We did that for speaker-1: Right. Wow. Four years? So you guys were touring? speaker-0: Not constantly. speaker-1: But enough to be like I Hey, what's up? speaker-0: We played like I think I talked to one of the guys recently and he figured out that we played like an average of forty to forty-five shows a year. So there's probably. Yeah, all over the country, a lot in Wisconsin. ⁓ Fond du Lac and the UP were like the two places we would play the most. ⁓ we would go out for like three or four days too, whereas like, okay, we got booked Thursday, Saturday and ⁓ Friday and Saturday. speaker-1: Wow. So close to two hundred shows. That's incredible. speaker-0: So we'd get in the car Thursday, go play the first show, sleep in a someone's house or in a Walmart parking lot, go to the next show. ⁓ you know, it was it was so much fun. It smelled awful, but it was so much speaker-1: You you know, you learn a lot about people when you spend a lot of time in tight quarters. speaker-0: Yes. It was always funny when we would be gone for like a week and a week and a half and we're stuck together. We would go home and not see each other for another like two weeks. Like we didn't like no one was eager to practice, nothing like that. And then we'd all of a sudden we'd be come back together and just be as tight as as can be. But you know, ⁓ when it came down to it, we weren't that good. And my dream of it becoming a profession really got speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: Jaded when I saw a couple of guys that I looked up to signed bands. Like they had what I wanted, I thought, but I knew them personally, so I also saw their marriages fail. I saw that they were touring ten to eleven months out of the year just to make ends meet. So they didn't have an apartment. They didn't have any semblance of ownership. And they also some of them were just becoming like really like repressed in their like maturity and development. Like speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: that like cliche of guys in their like mid to late twenties going after teenage girls. I think it comes from the fact that we like when you're on the road that much and your responsibility is just getting up and performing, I almost felt like it like tamps down our our ability to like grow mentally at ⁓ and I realized that that just really wasn't what I wanted in life. ⁓ what I did want to do and it had always been an idea speaker-1: Yeah, I can see that. Mm-hmm. speaker-0: And had always been a goal was I wanted to be a dentist. So ⁓ I kinda retired from that, whatever you wanna call it, because I was never making enough money to call it a job. speaker-1: you you you matured, you you went through the band thing, you did it. Four years and almost two hundred shows is pretty incredible. Yeah. ⁓ okay, so touring my one question bef if you're gonna move on, because I know you meant ⁓ mentioned dentistry, but What was your biggest takeaway from the tour? Like that you still use today? speaker-0: ⁓ you cannot plan for every every little aspect of what's gonna happen. You cannot cover as much as I overthink things, I cannot plan out every detail of of how anything like that is gonna work because when it comes down to it, I was working with a group of people and people are not perfect. Everybody has their strengths and weaknesses and I cannot force someone to have the same ideals and motivations that I do, and that's okay. It's totally fine. Because everyone has different strengths. And I think that was like something that I needed because I've even seen it now in my profession. Like my colleagues or people that I've had work for me in the past get really frustrated when they can't just make someone do it the way they want it done. And they can't like force someone to have the same like Objective, like why why do they think like that? I'm like, well, that's just how that person thinks. Now we have to find out a way to like meet them on their level. So yeah, I think just like learning when it comes down to it, like doing music, I learned how to like cover my butt to make sure that we got paid. And I learned how to work with a ton of different types of people and not have the same and also find the types of people that I liked to work. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Agreed. Mm-hmm. Yes. You know, that's a the that that is a very so I learned that like even as you as a business owner and someone who manages what do you have, twenty twenty plus employees. You got about So like making sure that those individuals are a good fit in addition to having the skills that you need speaker-0: That's real skill I'm developing. Yeah, somewhere around that. speaker-1: is very important because like you can have the skills but like man you could suck. Yeah. Like so back to your band, right? Like, dude, they're a great drummer, but toxic. speaker-0: Yeah. ⁓ I d and one other yeah. I think one thing that I lear I probably should have learned during that time was not to tolerate toxicity and not to become toxic myself too. I think that learning that came after dentistry. After after touring. speaker-1: It's a journey. It's a journey. It is Okay, so and I kinda stopped you there, but you were you were gonna kinda say how okay, the band thing stopped, but still a lot of love for music. For sure. Then you had a pivot point. speaker-0: Yeah, I mean I got married like pretty young. you know, girlfriend I'd been dating for many years. We're actually having a baby soon. We've been together for almost twenty years. speaker-1: And I am so excited for you. speaker-0: Thanks, man. speaker-1: Because because now you're you're gonna start to understand a lot of other things on a different level. And I I have questions formulating around like, you know, okay, so you you're like, well, you know, typical Midwest, you know, family expectation to go to college, got a love for music. How would now that you're gonna have a child of your own, I what would you say to them? speaker-0: I mean to me like I look the every person is so different. Like my mom always goes back to ⁓ like I've she'll we'll talk about our upbringing and ⁓ my siblings will be like, ⁓ we had it so tough or this or that. I'm like, you guys were the youngest. Like mom and dad were experimenting on me. You know what I mean? and my what my parents did a really, really Awesome job of doing was teaching me to have a high expectation of myself and to not make excuses for it. ⁓ I have you know, I've got bad ADD, I've got mental health issues that'll come up at times, and not once would my parents ever tolerate that as an excuse. So, you know, I failed the test because I've got ADD. Yeah, that wasn't going to fly. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Right. speaker-0: And I think that's something that I wanna carry on for my kid. It's just this like high expectation of like, hey, it's gonna be a hard thing to ⁓ accomplish at and you're gonna fail at times, but it's about getting back up and pushing yourself forward and learning from it. ⁓ speaker-1: Mm. speaker-0: And may Maybe not I don't want them s I don't want to be like be a sore loser, but also don't be comfortable with failing. Be comfortable with learning from failure. Should still have an emotional response when things don't go when you know you you don't win a martial arts tournament or like you you worked really hard for something and it didn't work out. But what did you get from it? speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Agreed. speaker-0: Is that like moment afterwards? Like I always felt like it's good for someone to have an emotional response. But then what did you w where what do you do after that emotional response is done? speaker-1: Yeah. ⁓ I think people really need to embrace failure in a d in different ways because like, you know, what th those feelings of like when you're uncomfortable and you go into a situation and you're like, ⁓ my god, I think I'm gonna fail, that's when you're growing. Yeah, right. And like I think a lot of folks get like turned off by that because they don't wanna fail and they start to catastrophesize like in their head, like ⁓ you know, this is me up on stage with my pants down if I go you know, like Yeah. speaker-0: Right. And you know, I think that ties into like how I got into dental school too, because if my parents hadn't had taught me, you know, that it's okay to just like move on. And, you know, it's not like they put a ton of pressure on me. My dad even thought it was weird I wanted to become a dentist. He's like, Are you sure? ⁓ But you know, I it was a college dropout. I did not realize how much that would impact my ability to get into dental school. Because they the way that admissions work is if you're a dropout, it counts as like a full year of F on your report card. ⁓ And so they recalculate your DPA with that. So I'm like I graduate with a you know a A A minus average with a bachelor's degree in chemistry and biochemistry and they won't even look at me. ⁓ and I was denied two years ⁓ getting into dental school, but I knew it was what I wanted. speaker-1: Wow. Wow. speaker-0: I knew that I was on the path to making it happen and I knew I had to pivot. So by the time the third time came up, I was in grad school. I'm like, what am I gonna do if I don't get in? First batch of acceptances don't come in for good for me. I didn't get any in that in that first couple of weeks. And I'm already starting to pivot my plan on how do I still make it happen. ⁓ so like just kind of like latching onto that, I think it was just really like I think it's a a thing that I like grew up and I learned from just that grit of You know, I I see skateboarders do it a lot. Like have you ever watched that s the guys on a skate park and they're falling over and over and over and over and they're getting up again and doing it over and over and over. That's the mentality that I'm talking about. ⁓ Yeah. speaker-1: Yep. I like that. Yeah. I like that. I mean and that's I think the attractive part about failing. speaker-0: Yeah. I mean, I remember sitting at Marquette's interview for the third time and it's going, I don't even know what you want me to say, but I obviously want to be here because this is my third time interviewing with you. And for years I had thought I'm gonna go to Marquette dental school. I thought I'd go where my dad and great grandfather had gone, Iowa, but they were the first people to deny me every year. So third time comes around and I'm I'm twenty s I'm about to turn twenty-seven. ⁓ speaker-1: Mm-hmm. ⁓ speaker-0: I know most of the incoming class is gonna be between twenty one and twenty-three. So I'm already a little older. My experience in life is way different. And I'm like, screw it. I'm gonna rather than apply to a narrow band of schools, which is what they traditionally tell you to do, I'm gonna ca I'm gonna find out every single school who claims to have a holistic approach to acceptance. And I applied to I think speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: seventeen schools that year instead of six. Wow. And you have to pay for every school that you apply to. ⁓ twice sometimes. Sometimes you have to pay for the fee through the like the like federal regulated gating group and then the school will also charge you a hundred dollar fee. So I go through all of this, I get calls from Indiana, Roseman in Utah, and I get a call from speaker-1: Right, right. speaker-0: Creighton in Nebraska, but I never interviewed there. ⁓ anyway, I remember just sitting studying for a neuro exam for my ba a masters and just seeing it was like February, just seeing the pop up from Indiana University that I had gotten in. And just the like that like feeling of relief like I made it over the hump. We're there. I'm gonna be good. Yeah. Was like It's that that I think it's that zhuzh that feeling that I'm constantly going for in life. But that one was a huge one for sure. ⁓ I got into a couple of other schools. We ended up going to Indiana 'cause that's w ⁓ where we had some ⁓ some mutual friends. So speaker-1: ⁓ Bloomington's a great area. speaker-0: never been to Bloomington. Indiana University Dental School is in Indianapolis. yeah the med school and the dental school are in Indianapolis. I have an IU degree and I've never been to IU speaker-1: My brother sorry, my brother lives there. speaker-0: Does he? He does. Yeah. I'm a fair weather fan too. Like I was up really excited when they won the N C double A championship this last year. speaker-1: Yeah, you only watch her again. Yeah, like for three T Hoosier. Yeah. Go Hoosiers. Right. speaker-0: So I mean dental school sucked too, don't get me wrong. speaker-1: Why did it suck? Were you challenged? Like very much. Was it the skateboard thing? Like falling down, getting up, falling down, getting up. speaker-0: ⁓ yeah, but like I was getting hit by a truck in between each time I was getting up. ⁓ like there was a lot of things that went on during dental school. So I had just finished a master's degree in medical physiology, which covered a ton of the stuff that I would see in dental school. So I got in there and I was clicking on all cylinders without having to study much. I wasn't like the top of my class, but I was I was doing fine. ⁓ speaker-1: Okay. speaker-0: in the didactic and academic stuff. But when it came to the ⁓ the lab stuff and working with my hands I was doing really good. So you know, you know, the the B student in in class and the A student in the lab. And then All of the stuff that I had learned ⁓ so I didn't develop good study habits and second year comes around, which is the hardest year. And I didn't know what the heck was going on. Like I got buried really quickly. and ended up having to do what's called remediation, where it's like, hey, you didn't do well enough in this class, you have to do some sort of activity to prove that you understand the core material. So, you know, the the the term of like Cs make degrees doesn't really apply in dental school or medical school. You even if you If you score a C or a C minus, you still have to prove that you understand the material and that the test didn't you just the test wasn't able to reflect that. ⁓ but it's looked at as a bad thing by administration, and a lot of the teachers look at it as part of the process. So I'd have a teacher who's like, hey, I want you to remediate this part of it. speaker-1: Got it. speaker-0: We would either have a one on one conversation where we would talk about the concepts. And if he felt that I understood it enough, he'd move me on, or I'd have to do like a research paper. So I had to do that a few times. and I being a person who likes to challenge authority, probably when I shouldn't, was part of a student group that was really trying to improve the quality of life with dental students. speaker-1: Mm. speaker-0: To the point that I ran my mouth towards administration probably a few too many times. It was very passionate. ⁓ our class president called me the pit bull. speaker-1: Well, I would call that pattern. speaker-0: Yeah, well what what it came down to is I told a certain administrator that he was more concerned about his own resume than he was the students and he tried to have me dismissed that year. Yikes Yeah. ⁓ didn't go anywhere. But that was that was probably like the most stressful time. I got through that and then COVID hit. So we got kicked out of the clinic and I had to come back and just feeling behind, like how am I gonna Came back from clinic from COVID. So they they sent us home for three weeks, or said three weeks. It was three months. And they said they had everything planned out for for the students to to succeed and they didn't know what they were doing. They had focused on the first and second year students instead of the fourth year students. ⁓ I remember being really confused about that because they told ⁓ told us specifically that we're concentrating on you guys graduating, the first and second year students we have four years to catch up with. Well that that didn't translate. It was completely backwards by the time we got up there. And so I was like, okay, screw this. The rules don't apply because they're not even following what they're saying. I am going to look for every single opportunity to come out of this program with ⁓ a level of experience that's not impressive for a COVID year, but it's impressive for any year. So I was hanging out in all of the specialty departments. If I didn't have speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: a patient, I would pull out a fake jaw and work on teeth and get feedback from our attendings. And I really lucked out in having some awesome mentors and clinical staff that would work with me and help me ⁓ succeed. So by the end of it, I think I was like in the top two percent of the clinic, if not top one percent. ⁓ I was awarded the ⁓ restored a dentistry award that year and I had done four to five times as much dentistry as my other classmates. There to the point that at times I felt bad. It's like, you know, I could be handing some of this off, but my attendings were always like absolutely not. Like you have the opportunity to get this. You should be capitalizing on it. And yeah, I got out of dental school and thought it would be easy from there too. I guess it's just ⁓ maybe that's a bigger lesson is that the grass is not greener on the other side. speaker-1: Mm. ⁓ Never is. speaker-0: No, you achieve one like you achieve one goal to move on to the next thing and the next thing is gonna have just as many issues as the last speaker-1: So okay, just a little bit of a recap. Yeah. Because we're going over Dr. Elliott's journey here. ⁓ started in the Midwest here, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, right? And then ⁓ you know, music was a passion, but then understood that hey, not the career that's gonna work for you. And then then you went into the dental school program or you College and dental school. Yeah. Graduates and then you said I came back. speaker-0: Yeah. So speaker-1: So say more about where did you go back to speaker-0: We we came back to Sheboygan where my wife and I grew up and met. ⁓ that wasn't originally the plan. ⁓ I knew enough about myself and my f relationship with my father that I knew that working with for him or with him was probably going to be a tumultuous experience. ⁓ I loved my dad ⁓ and we worked together fine. ⁓ but speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: I knew I didn't want to work how he did. I wanted to do more rehabilitative complex dentistry. I wanted to get more involved with surgery and implants than he necessarily had. And I our standards were just different. My dad is a w ⁓ was and still is a really good bread and butter dentist. ⁓ and there are certain things he does very, very well that things that I don't like to do, which is nice. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: ⁓ 'cause he can do ⁓ and I don't have to. But speaker-1: Okay, so your dad so your dad is working with you at the practice? Okay. All right. speaker-0: Yes. Yeah. So he did and then he did and now he is again. Okay. Doctor But ⁓ I was shadowing during dental school again, grabbing any opportunity I can, I found out who are like the guys running small, like just ⁓ fee for service practices, meaning they don't take insurance. ⁓ they're only do and they're doing like like wild stuff, like speaker-1: Doctor Dan. Doctor Dan. Doctor Dan. Uh-huh. speaker-0: They're rebonding cracks and teeth, which is super difficult to do. One of the guys I shadowed the most, ⁓ was doing everything under microscope. So I learned to use a microscope, just shadowing with him. ⁓ and a lot of dentists don't know how to use them ⁓ efficiently. And I won't say I'm great at it or anything, but I'm better than a lot. And it's like this is what I want to do. And I even mentioned to his his ⁓ Office manager, 'cause it's his practice was small. He had one hygienist, two assistants and him and his front desk and an office manager. He was like, I'm gonna be applying, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah. And she's like, Don't apply, you're gonna come work here. Yeah. Yeah. So we were set. I thought I'd work for him. He wanted me to go work corporate and get my speed up and things like that. And I was like, No, man, if you want me you you you take me now. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: and we were kind of working things out. I could tell that he wasn't quite ready for an associate, so I wasn't sure how that was gonna work out. The job was pretty much lined up and I had a couple of other offers. COVID hit, COVID kills my mom's twin sister, kills my gr ⁓ grandmother. So sorry. Yeah. It was it was a rough time for everyone. ⁓ but to lose family members. And be working in healthcare at that time and seeing how many people were getting sick. My cousin is a respiratory therapist, so she was intubating people every day. ⁓ It just changed how we looked at everything. The whole idea of living six hours away just really didn't appeal to us anymore. As much as we didn't want to move back to we were really enjoying living in the city. We wanted to start our lives up again where we had, you know, met. So we moved back to Sheboygan after dental school. speaker-1: Okay. Yeah. speaker-0: Yeah, and ⁓ I worked for my dad for a couple of years. He he had some health issues, I pretty much took over the practice early on. ⁓ bought it in twenty twenty-three. so it's been three years now of owning the practice. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. And so but you so basically this is the very classic old school and new school dentistry. I mean i it it really is, right? Because just getting to know you and and the technology behind dentistry today and how you've implemented that. speaker-0: Yeah. Right. When it when I got back, I knew there were certain technologies I wanted to bring in. Specifically there was a system called the Prime Scan and Prime Mill, which is a digital scanner and milling machine to make your own crowns and do really the foundation of what's digital dentistry was. And I was fortunate that my dad was kind of a big gadget head for a very long time. He would he wanted to buy everything. So they had had some experience with older scanners and milling machines. They just weren't as efficient as what I wanted. ⁓ and my dad was a very much, you know, treat the tooth by tooth ideology. And my education and my continuing education after dental school, I think I'm over three hundred hours at this point. ⁓ was all about treating the whole whole mouth and then which turned into the how does the mouth affect the system of the body ⁓ when it comes to airway. speaker-1: Well speaker-0: ⁓ GI issues, everything. speaker-1: You know, one thing that people don't really ever say is you know, this is the first entry point into your body. speaker-0: Yeah, yeah. breathing and eating and drinking all the mouth plays pretty much the primary role here. Yeah. So I was talking to ⁓ a physician about that and he's like Yeah, for people to stay alive their mouths need to work. So your job is much more important than people give you credit, and I think you very much. I appreciate it. ⁓ speaker-1: That's right. speaker-0: So, you know, our our ideologies weren't lining up, but I was he was sick. I was like, look, I wanna make this investment. I'll put it under, you know, my credit, but I'm keeping the profit. He didn't like that. So he ended up right ⁓ doing the financing for it. ⁓ And it like we hit the ground running. We implemented things immediately. We were doing Crown's same day where it was just a pipe dream before. Like we could do them, but not as efficiently. Creating systems, training the staff appropriately. ⁓ and that's where it took us to the next level. You know excuse me. My dad loves doing dunchers in wax. But because you can manipulate everything in the wax, like in your hands. I hate doing it. Like I want a speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: 3D printed model that I can grind into the shape that I kind of want it and then scan it back into a digital environment and remanipulate it. speaker-1: So you have more precision. speaker-0: In a way, you can be really precise with analog methods, but it ⁓ I can't be. Maybe I could if I put the time in, but I can be more precise now and faster with the digital method. Like we can turn over a denture faster than my dad can. ⁓ I remember the first time he got a 3D printed like mock-up, he looked like someone had kicked him in the nuts. He was so upset. He's like, Where is my wax? Like speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. speaker-0: How am I supposed to do anything with this? And I get it where he's coming from. But it was definitely that old school versus like I don't want to call it like new school or whatever you want to call it. But when it comes down to it, dentist like medicine and dentistry, we are like gaining traction. They used to say ever if you every seven years, it's probably every three or four now. Like science has taken us to whole new heights. And what I like about medicine and s and dentistry. And I think it's something that people who aren't maybe in this industry or in this profession don't realize is that the things that we used to do weren't. The the like you know, a guy who's who's maybe not up to date on things, he's not necessarily dangerous. If he was really behind the times, he might be dangerous. Well speaker-1: But it's the service, right, and the comfort that I know you think. Yeah, right. If there was a better way of doing it, right? speaker-0: Right. ⁓ there's a constant like like my dad's always like, Why are you sell like I remember when I brought water picks in, we were selling them out of the office, and he's like, Well, they can't do as good as job as floss, and I'm like, Well, the research has now been published, it's had multiple studies, because one study does not make is not proof. You need hundreds of studies to prove something. And we can show that a water flosser being used in the correct method can be as effective as flossing. Like blue is mine, and he had a hard time wrapping his head around that. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: ⁓ so it's it's just things like that. Like just being able to pivot. And I think the hardest thing was after I took over the prox practice was I was like, Okay, here's now our standard. And my dad was like, Well, no, I'm gonna work how I've always worked. I'm like, No, you're working for me. This is this is what ⁓ we need to do. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. 'Cause every father wants to have that conversation. No, I'm sorry. You now work for me. speaker-0: Yes. Turns out he didn't like that. speaker-1: I I speaker-0: It it wasn't it wasn't out of any animosity, like it was a conversation that went back and forth and my dad went and did some awesome charity work for a year or two after that. ⁓ like helped out a lot of dentists who needed time off and things like that. And then last summer he was just tired of traveling so much and you know, we were going through a transition period at the practice. I was like, You can come work at at the office one day a week but you're gonna you gotta do things our way. Like speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: ⁓ you know, we can make some accommodations so that you're comfortable in how we do them, but like you know, we're not gonna be packing metal fillings. speaker-1: You know. Right, right. So because you know, it's a it's it's your practice now. Right. Right. And you're practicing dentistry the way that you want to, and you know, you've earned the right to not be told w what to practice, how to practice and what to do. speaker-0: Right. Just by the amount of debt I'm in from all of this, I have the right to say how I'm gonna do it. speaker-1: Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Okay, so three years in that you've been there now. I've well owned it. Sorry, owned it. Owned for three. So as a business owner, I think my ⁓ my first curiosities go to I wanna go back to like that whole skateboard thing that you talked about, that falling down, getting up, falling down, getting up. So like as you know, other other aspiring dentists speaker-0: I've there for five for three. speaker-1: You know, what in in the first three years of ownership what would you tell another dentist that was, you know, you three years ago before you owned it? What would you be like you need to know this? speaker-0: ⁓ I think being like you right away you need to be ready to that you're gonna screw up 'cause it's gonna happen. Yeah, just you know, yeah, have a backup plan, be ready to pivot. and I think you need to like look at yourself and figure out what sets you apart as a human being, as an individual, and is that cohesive with the type of dentist you're trying to be? speaker-1: Belfast. speaker-0: Now, if you're trying to be, you know, and if you're trying to be the guy who, you know, I want to be the guy who goes on like motorcycle rides and I travel a lot and I, you know, I I go to my job and I really enjoy it, but then I go home and I have a completely separate life from that. Okay, you're gonna as long as you enjoy bread and butter dentistry, you're gonna be awesome at that. Because You're not gonna have to deal with the calls on the weekends as often. You're not gonna have to deal with the complexities of cases not working out and having to work more to pick it figure it out. ⁓ and there's a ton of people who need that, and that's totally great. But for me, when I looked at the things that I like about art, I like about sculpture, I like about you know, I mean I loved Working with 3D printers before I got out of dental school, I had built several and now I have three in my office. So it's like my hobbies got absorbed into what I do for a living, and it's awesome. ⁓ but that meant that the brand of the business really had to reflect who I am as a person too. ⁓ you know, I am I want to please people and I want people to feel comfortable and I want people to feel confident in the dentistry that they're getting. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: And I'm I'm also comfortable with myself and realizing I don't need to be the dentist for every person. And maybe that's something that I would say to every practice owner, like first getting in. You do not need to be the dentist for every single patient. It is okay to just step away and say, Hey, I'm not the right guy for you. I'm not what you're looking for. You don't need to compromise who you are for any of your patients. Now you need to give them grace, like speaker-1: Mm. speaker-0: It's still our obligation and our duty to help people. But if somebody is making your life miserable by coming in and you have du you have done enough and you're the person who has to decide what enough is to accommodate and try to appease that person, but it's still not working, it's okay to be like, look, you can go find somewhere else to go. And speaker-1: So knowing knowing who you are, not having to say yes to everything. Right. And knowing that it's okay to to just like you said, it's okay to say no. speaker-0: Yeah. Be confident in who you are too. Like confidence is like huge and it comes from so many different speaker-1: I I feel I feel that. I've had to do that where, you know, you have to find a nice way to to walk away. Because you like you said, you want to do it with grace. You don't want to burn any bridges. But I think that does show the maturity and of your journey, right? Like you're you're constantly evolving as a leader, as a business owner, as a dentist. speaker-0: Yeah, I don't think I'll ever be satisfied sitting still. speaker-1: Yeah. I'm not either. speaker-0: You know, I think it's the A D D maybe. I don't know. Or it's just the the the mentality that I grew up with. speaker-1: I was thinking about this the other day, like if I don't like have something to work towards, like I get bored. Because like sitting down and watching T V is not my idea of a good time. speaker-0: I know. I mean it was like a big discussion with my wife Des Like it's like why are you doing this podcast? Why are you doing more work? Like you're you're trying to take time off of work. And I'm like, this isn't work to me. This is something that I get to do with my buddy John. We've we've a we've created like a a goal in mind. And if with it's still fun at the end when we achieve that goal, we're gonna keep going. and you know, why do I the or the question will come up, why are you traveling for C E so much? I'm like, I wanna be better. I wanna I want my next case to be better than my the one I had previously. speaker-1: That's great. I I feel that. Like I'm never satisfied. You know, you always want to like keep things fresh or you you know, you're just you're we're very similar in like, okay, I did that once. I know I now need to do it a hundred more times, I'm willing to do that a hundred more times, but I'm already thinking about the other thing that I want to do next a hundred times. speaker-0: Yeah, and I think I've talked to you about the idea of like having a toolbox that I work with. Like I don't know if I could ever focus on one procedure to be considered the guy for that procedure. ⁓ like veneer preps. I'm in my opinion, I'm pretty darn good at them at this point, and I can create beautiful smiles with that skill. But I'm no Dr. Oppa who's a big speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: Instagram influencer. ⁓ big. Yeah. Like he's the celebrity smile guy. I mean what he can do, I don't know if I'll ever get to that level. ⁓ but I I'm really good. But at the same time, he doesn't do implants, he doesn't do Invisalign, he doesn't do any of the other stuff. He has one skill and he'll talk about this that he's really, really good at and he focuses on that. That doesn't work for me. I want to be the guy who's like pulling out the different tools, the different skills that I have. To create an amazing outcome with everything. speaker-1: Right. And that's where you are on your dentistry journey right now. Yeah. And you know what? I'm sure if you were to sit down with Appa, he might be like, I was here too. Probably. You know? But he maybe got to a point, like what you and Deser are saying, like you can't be the the every dentist to everyone. Yeah. And I think like what you've learned too, to say, Hey, maybe I'm not the right dentist for you right now. So but then like you continue to refine your craft and then you do become that expert that people seek you out for doing those larger transformations. You know, before when you said ⁓ it really resonated with me and what I appreciate about you is you aren't just thinking about the one tooth. You're thinking about all the teeth, and if you do this to one tooth. then it's gonna impact something over here. And I have to think through that. speaker-0: Right. It's like ⁓ Like I I don't know why I always come back to this, but it just makes sense to me this metaphor of like tuning a precision car. If you change one thing, it's gonna affect other things. ⁓ because an engine is a chemical and a mechanical system. You've got combustion, you have to have the right mixtures of things for everything to work, but everything mechanically needs to be precise too. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: And the mouth is the same way. Like it's a biochemical and physiological engineering. How the teeth move together, how they come together, how your saliva impacts your teeth, how the tongue and the airway affect the teeth, ⁓ what you know, adjusting one tooth could do to the joint. It's all it's all like an intertwined process. And speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: It's what I love. Like if it was as simple as just fixing one tooth, I don't know if I would enjoy dentistry as much. And the other thing that comes with it is I get to be a business owner. I get to have my own brand. ⁓ it's chaotic and stressful at times, but I I have an amazing team that backs me up on that execution, including my buddy John here. And we've created something I think speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: really cool for this community that I don't know if we had before. And if I leave a small mark on the community that I grew up in, ⁓ the I find that really satisfying in creating a place where people ⁓ who have, you know, are in net we're we're not in network with a lot of ⁓ with every dental insurance company, but we're in network with the big ones. And we provide like high tier fee for service dentistry. the same to the people on insurance as we do to the people off of insurance. And I don't know if the community had that. They may have. I don't know how every ⁓ office's business management worked, but I think that's what I was looking for when I decided to come back to this community of like, Hey, I'm gonna create a practice ⁓ that, you know, stands out in Sheboygan and because I want to stand out. I I that's what I wanted. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And I'd say you're doing it. Thanks. Yeah. Appreciate it. speaker-0: Like I could go set up in Milwaukee or Chicago and I would be like half of the practices in those areas. And ⁓ that's okay, but I wanted to do it in my community. You know, well, I live eight minutes from my practice. I I like I live in the neighborhood that I was like causing havoc in as a child. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. But I mean like you need to you know ⁓ I think you just need to accept that Sheboygan County needs a forward thinking modern day dentist like yourself so that the people can get the efficient service, the same day crowns, you know, like the using the technologies for precision, like the three D scanner, you know, like to make the molds, like that that technology's really cool. speaker-0: And I think I'm seeing it get embraced more too, like when I had the opp opportunities to speak and talk to dentists in in my area, like they seem to be like embracing it more too. And I don't know if I'm not gonna say I had any impact on them doing that, but like it was it's cool to be ahead of the curb slightly. speaker-1: Absolutely. And I I I would say you're probably not giving yourself enough credit. You definitely inspired other people because, you know, I know I know you what I think is cool about you too is like you have a community over competition mentality with other local dentists and like you guys talk and you know you'll talk shop or you talk personally, but like you know, a testimonial from someone that's trusted is only gonna help. Right. Right. So like if you have another dentist in town and they were like, Hey man, I wanna get I wanna I wanna get into this, like you'd be like, How are you not? speaker-0: Yeah, I mean I I get it a lot from like my classmates, I think. And it's interesting learning from them too, because so many of my classmates are business owners, aren't practice owners. So a lot of the softwares and things that they're working with that I haven't had a chance to dip my toe into, specifically AI systems yet, because I've just been so busy developing my brand, my business, and where I want to go with things. ⁓ it's been cool to like hear what their experience is too, because I'm getting input from them. But yeah, I mean I think I think we've we've kind of introduced that this podcast is and who I am, like like what you know. ⁓ we're speaker-1: there's a lot more to to uncover, but I think, you know, understanding your journey is cool. Everyone's got a story. speaker-0: Yeah. I mean when it comes down to it, I think the reason like we're gonna have some guests on over the next couple of weeks if you stick around with us, ⁓ some local business owners, some friends of mine, ⁓ just talking about like the confidence that we can bring to people. Whether that's through an amazing dish of food, ⁓ whether that's through dentistry, whether that's being a dental adjunct, whether that's through fashion or skateboarding culture. Like we're gonna be talking a lot about that stuff. speaker-1: Marketing marketing and creative work. speaker-0: Maybe. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. But just talking about how we can bring confidence to people and ⁓ how the entrepreneurial spirit for a lot of people plays into that. ⁓ but I mean for me why this podcast exists is it's a an opportunity and an outlet to be creative and be ⁓ and present ideas to people and hopefully entertain people because I do like to entertain. I really miss that from music is getting on stage. And I had s early on I ha had a bunch of opportunities to speak at different dental events and that's slowed down a little bit. I think that comes in ebbs and flows, but this is my opportunity to do that in a different media format and in a different way. And maybe just maybe this becomes something bigger and that where I can have the opportunity to, you know, mentor some people and go from there. speaker-1: That would be fantastic. And like you, I feel very similarly. You know? That's ⁓ And it's cool to it's it's cool to wanna create a platform or a safe space, you know, to to do things a little bit differently like this, right? Like whoever would have thought, right? Right. A marketing dude and a dentist would sit here and start talking about stuff. speaker-0: I think that also ties into why this podcast exists because you and I, when we first started developing my brand, and I think we'll dive deeper into that into another episode here, was you were the headshot guy. So that's act ⁓ you know, that's one thing we didn't hit on. How did you and I meet? And should we ⁓ is it should I tell it? speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, well I mean just full disclosure our my our clothes were on no alcohol involved. This is purely organic. Okay. speaker-0: Yes, they were Yes. Yeah, okay. Okay. All right. patient was in. She was like, I've ⁓ your headshot outside is alright. ⁓ I was on like a sign somewhere. ⁓ but it doesn't look like you. You need to go get your headshot retaken with my buddy John Erline. And I'm like Alright, who's who's who's this guy gonna be in Sheboygan? Because I was I had my nose still stuck up in the air a little bit coming moving back from Milwaukee and then Indianapolis. and I Gave you a call and I think you were kinda confused at like how I got your number, it almost seemed like. speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah, I remember being like, Whoa, what's going on here? speaker-0: 'Cause I think I even said right away, I like, I want to talk about branding. speaker-1: There there brand yeah, it was beyond the it was beyond the headshot for sure. you you kind of gave me a download of like who you were, and I was like, ⁓ okay, I know Dr. Dan, so now I now I know his son. Okay, cool. So then I met Dr. Elliott, get some headshots done, but then it it turned into a much more larger conversation through time, and then ⁓ realizing that the brand speaker-0: I did some headshots with speaker-1: was a little inconsistent, right? speaker-0: For sure. And you were going through a transition in your life. And I was becoming a practice owner that wasn't happy with the branding that I had worked on with other groups. And there's a lot of really great dental marketing groups out there that you can work with that will new owners. You sh i it you should. You should work with a group that knows what they're doing, but you don't have to stay with them forever either. And what I was realizing was I had gotten what I needed from those groups, but it wasn't speaker-1: Mm-hmm. speaker-0: Reflective of me. I wasn't happy with how my practice at the time was being reflected. ⁓ whether that was, you know, inconsistencies with marketing, staff, that type of thing. It just wasn't me. And I wanted it to be me. And so you and I sat down and we started talking about branding. And one thing I just talked about like what would I would do to change someone's confidence, and you kept relating it back to headshots. speaker-1: Yeah. Yes. We do we do the same thing. We do the same thing just differently. You know, there's we both have a client or patient. Yeah, our goal is the same that we want the client or patient to most importantly feel comfortable. Right. Right? Like we want to have a space that's, you know, not over stimulating and being able to meet them where they are. speaker-0: Our goal is the same. speaker-1: Because for dentistry, you know, a lot of times people are showing up because there's either maintenance that needs to be done or there's a problem to solve. speaker-0: Right, and they expect to then they have a expectation in their head that isn't maybe necessarily true. speaker-1: Mm-hmm. Correct. Right, yeah, there's a lot of the you know, people get worried or they catastrophosize and you know, they create things in their head that just aren't real. And they you know so anyways, so anyways, we what we do is through tr small transformation or you know, professional headshot photography, our goal is the same is that people leave, you know, feeling more confident or they're happier than they walked in. Hopefully they left with all the teeth in their mouth that they walked into the practice with. And I'm one of those people that I walked I walked out I walked out of Dr. Elliott's office with with less teeth than what I walked in. But it's funny. It wasn't. No, it was my fault. Because speaker-0: That does not always happen on Yeah, I thought I just introduced speaker-1: It's a deep dive because we went through a whole thing and I think that's a nice little hook for maybe the next one. speaker-0: Yeah. So yeah, ⁓ thanks for joining us today. ⁓ when it comes down to it, this is the ⁓ a podcast about creating confidence, about discussing the entrepreneurial spirit and just telling some really great stories about people's journeys. ⁓ we've got some really cool episodes and guests planned coming up here. I hope you enjoyed us ⁓ just chit chatting. and we'll see ya next time. speaker-1: Alright. Hey, thanks so much for having me. Always always fun being here. Yeah, bye. And if y'all been thinking it I do look and sound like Seth Rogan, and it's okay. I hear it all the time. All right, everyone. Thanks so much. Thank you. Bye bye. Bye. speaker-0: He does. Yes. speaker-1: That's good. That was good. That was fun.