Foresee Failure to Overcome it!
Hey everyone,
I hope you have all had a great week! I am deep into spring break at the moment and dedicating a lot of my time to all the lecture content we have to learn this year, while also trying to make the most of the month of Ramadan!
🦷 Dental Diary
Taking a few weeks off from clinics for the Easter break has helped me prepare my strategy for getting through the coming exam season. There are a ton of lectures and tutorials for me to make notes on, learn and memorise, not to mention the odd assignment or two! With that being said I am trying my best to structure my work in phases and break up all the content into manageable chunks.
🧠 Insight of the Week
The insight of the week this time around is one I read about a long time ago, but only began to apply now!
To set some context, this month I am taking time to be more reflective and determine the direction I want to go in, both in and out of my career, and I found the importance of setting big, ambitious, astronomical goals. As long as the journey and the process mean a lot to you, and it’s one that you find fulfillment in, then aim as high as you like; shoot for the moon! The goals I am setting my sights on scare me a little bit, but I haven’t felt this invigorated since I decided to apply to study dentistry five years ago!
The real insight comes now; when working towards anything that means a lot to you, make sure that you can also foresee failure. Look ahead and think about what obstacles might you face on your journey to pursuing this goal. What could go wrong? Maybe consider journaling this down, because the next step is to try and solve this problem as if it has happened. This way, if this obstacle does materialise, you have the tools and strategies to deal with it. When doing this for my own goal, the first thing that came to mind for me was losing motivation. This goal is life-changing, and not just a little side project, so I have to be vigilant in following it, making sure that when the motivation for it (which is sky-high right now) does inevitably fade, I can rely on the skill of discipline, as well as try to design my environment in such a way that makes it easy for me to feel motivated, and make it more likely that I am in that state.
🎙️ Podcast Plug
This week I listened to an episode from The Diary of a CEO by Steven Bartlett. This is an old podcast I used to be a regular listener of a few years ago, but I tuned in for this episode because of the guest, who is Dr Layne Norton. He is an expert on nutrition and in my opinion, one of the few people worth listening to in the health and fitness space, because what he promotes is completely evidence-based. He is also a world champion powerlifter which resonated with me because powerlifting is often not associated with health and longevity, but he is an advocate for training hard, minimising injury, etc. The podcast delves into his backstory which took me by surprise and it was a fantastic listen all around!
Once again, if you can take a minute to fill out this survey for a project I am working on, that would be much appreciated! PLEASE CLICK HERE I am working on an educational product aimed at dental students and young dentists and I want to hear from you guys so I can give you as much value as I possibly could!
That's all for this week, I hope you guys have a great next week! If you are enjoying this weekly email thing I'm doing or if you have any suggestions, please let me know, my Instagram is always open if you'd like any advice! Talk to you guys next week!
Omar Tabaqchali :)