Myo Life

Transcript

Hey, I'm Carmen and welcome to Myo Life. That's short for my Outrageous Life, which is exactly the kind of life I get to live since I found the courage to ditch dental hygiene and build a life I'm bonkers about as a myofunctional therapist and entrepreneur. Here you will find all the things myo business and how to build a life that you, too, are bonkers about. I'm very happy you're here. Shall we dive in? Well, hey there, my friend, and welcome back to the Myo Life podcast. I am looking forward to today's conversation.
Does this sound familiar? You've been waiting for the right time, the right plan, the right certification, all of those things. Everything's perfect before you start your myofunctional therapy business, and now you find that it's been months or even years that have gone by, and you're still stuck. I see this all the time. There is no perfect time. It's a lie that your brain tells you to keep you safe, to keep you comfortable, and the longer you wait, the harder it gets. The number one mindset shift that you need to start strong is to get out of your own way and to start before you feel ready. Messy action is the name of the game, and today I'm breaking down exactly how to do it. So let's talk about why waiting for perfect, whatever that is, is going to keep you broke.
So you're probably noticing a theme with this batch of podcasts, and it's because I have so many coaching clients that are saying I don't know where to start, I don't know what to do, I don't know how to get moving. Perfectionism is alive and well, especially in the lives of dental hygienists. Remember, perfectionism is procrastination in disguise. You're telling yourself that you're getting ready, but what you're really doing is avoiding the uncomfortable, messy, sometimes awkward work of just freaking starting. Maybe you've convinced yourself that you need one more class before you can help people, or that your website needs to be perfectly polished before you can book clients. Let me tell you something—that's a lie. Your brain is feeding you a line of BS that is trying to keep you safe. Perfectionism is not about high standards. It's about fear—fear of failure, fear of judgment, fear of putting yourself out there and hearing crickets.
The important thing that I want you to know is that nobody builds a business from the sidelines. You have to get on the field, and I am meeting myofunctional therapists who have taken their training years ago, months ago, and they're still staying safe on the sidelines. They got to get on the field. You have to learn by doing, not by thinking about it. I don't want you to spend months and years consuming courses, reading books, making plans. None of it is going to replace the actual experience.
One of the examples that I give to my students is think about the first time that you rode a bike. Did you read about riding a bike? Did you read about learning how to balance? Did you watch endless YouTube tutorials on how to bike, how to balance? No, you got on the damn bike, you wobbled, you wrecked, you fell, you figured it out, you put a bandaid on, and you got back up. Your business is the same.
I want you to stop convincing yourself that learning equals progress, because progress comes from action. That is a real problem, especially for myofunctional therapists that have taken other courses. They just can't apply what they have learned because they took a program that did not teach them a repeatable process or a step-by-step process, so they just can't put it into use. It doesn't matter how many letters you put behind your name or how prestigious the program was, if you can't use the information, it's pointless. You have to take action.
Now let's talk about confidence. A lot of people think that you have to have confidence to move forward, and this is a myth. You don't wake up one day magically feeling confident enough to start. That's not how it works. Confidence is built. You take action, you survive it, you gain confidence, then you take more action. You hear me talk about this in my social media or other videos. We make decisions, take ugly, imperfect action, evaluate, and then take more action. We don't keep going back and making the same decisions. We don't change our prices. We don't change who we're working with. We just get better with the decisions that we have already made.
Think about the first time that I did an Instagram live or a Facebook live. Yes, it's awkward. Your first client consult is going to feel clunky, but guess what? You'll be better the second time and even better the 10th and the hundredth. Confidence is just evidence that you've done something before, and the only way to get that evidence is to do the thing.
Now, one of the things I tell my students when they're trusting the process that I teach—because remember, in the Ditch Hygiene Academy I lay everything out, therapy templates, a repeatable process—is that each time you do it, it just gets easier. Each time you do a free assessment, the next one is easier. It really is like riding a bike. I haven't done a complimentary assessment in years, and I could do one tomorrow and blow their socks off because it is like riding a bike. You just get better and better.
The same with your first exam. The first time you do an exam, it's not going to be beautiful, and that's okay. As long as you accomplish what you've meant to accomplish, you're going to be better the next time. The same with therapy. When I first started my therapy business and I had my first client, I literally had a sticky note that had broken down the minutes, what I should be doing each minute so that I stayed on time, and it also had a list of the exercises that I was going to teach. I didn't know it, but once I did it that first time, I had evidence that A) I could do it, B) it wasn't as bad as I thought, and C) I was able to get better and better.
Every successful business owner that you admire, myself included, started out being awkward. We all had that figuring-it-out phase. Nobody was handed a blueprint. Well, if you're in the Ditch Hygiene Academy, that's as close to a blueprint as you're going to get. But my training program didn't teach me any of that stuff, so I couldn't wait for things to be perfect. I had to just get started.
If you think you need more time, more prep, more experience before you start, I have to tell you that mindset is keeping you stuck. The only way through to the other side is by going through it. You have to be willing to be a beginner. You have to be willing to take action before you feel ready.
So here’s your challenge: Pick one thing that you've been avoiding because you don't feel ready, and do it today. Don't overthink it, don't perfect it, just start. And just remember that the longer you wait, the harder it gets. Start today, start messy, and figure it out as you go.
You can find me on social media. Tell me what you're committing to working on. I want to be able to cheer you on, and I want you to imagine where you're going to be six months from now if you just start today. Imagine where you're going to be if you keep moving. Super exciting stuff. That is a wrap, my friend. If this episode lit a fire under your booty, please share it with a friend who needs to hear this. And if you are loving the show, leave a review. It helps more people find us. Now stop waiting, go make moves, and get busy building a life that you are bonkers about. I'll be back soon, my friend, with more myo-business goodness. Bye for now.