How can you find what you’re passionate about and turn it into a lucrative side hustle that brings you joy and changes your life?
All dentists are capable of amazing things. This is true not only in the surgery, where they change the lives of their patients every single day but also at home among their family and their friends. Realising what you could achieve if you put your mind to it is the first hurdle that you have to overcome. When you see just how much growth you are capable of, you will wonder why you didn’t embark on your journey sooner.
So, how do you get started? There are three essential steps to unlocking your potential and accomplishing everything you have ever dreamed of…
First step: belief
Belief in yourself and self-confidence is the key to everything in life. If you really believe you can achieve something with hard work and careful planning, you will. To be successful, you first must have confidence in your abilities and dedication to your craft every time you take on a new challenge or push yourself to be better.
Renowned psychologist and former Professor at Stanford University, Albert Bandura, proposed long ago that self-efficacy drives everything from motivation to well-being and personal accomplishment in an individual’s life. He linked self-efficacy directly to one’s beliefs in how well you might succeed in a particular situation. In short, you have to believe in your ability to grow and triumph if you are to do well – it’s basically a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The same principles apply when developing any new skills. If you are learning composite bonding techniques, dental implant surgery or orthodontic appliances, your confidence in your clinical abilities will determine how quickly you introduce the modality to your practice and the quality of your outcomes. If you are working on your public speaking or other non-clinical skills, you must still believe in your ability to succeed. Should you decide to establish a side hustle or change the direction of your dental career, self-belief will be crucial.
Second step: finding your passion
Not many people immediately know what their passion is, and that’s OK. Most of us have to explore different areas and try different things before we find what we love. As a dentist, you will have worked in general practice before deciding whether to remain there or move into a specialist area. You will have gained experience in various disciplines such as endodontics, orthodontics, oral surgery or paediatric dentistry, and considered what you enjoyed most in order to shape your future career.
The same approach should be taken if your passion lies adjacent to or even outside of clinical dentistry – maybe you fall in love with teaching or mentoring? Perhaps you enjoy delivering oral hygiene programmes in the local community. You might uncover a new enthusiasm for business management or team motivation, speaking and lecturing, investment financing, writing books or marketing.
Whatever it is, you won’t find your passion without trying different avenues and pushing yourself outside your comfort zone. That’s why it’s important to attempt as many different things that you enjoy as possible before deciding what to focus on.
Third step: being proactive
Once you have found your passion, you have to do something about it. Being proactive is essential, but that doesn’t mean you have to do everything in one go. Plan what you want to do, as well as when and how. Consider how you might test your business model, whether by organising a small taster event, advertising on social media or speaking to your colleagues in practice. Give yourself a deadline for each stage in your plan and hold yourself accountable so that you stay on target.
The key is to physically do something and to do it this week. Allocate 10 minutes of your lunch break each day, or your commute home, or get up an hour earlier tomorrow to sit down with a cup of coffee and put a plan together.
Action points
- Plan to try three new things this month. Book a programme, join a class or schedule time to work on a prototype. Explore some areas you haven’t been exposed to before – present a lunch & learn to your practice colleagues, write an outline of your book, hire a workshop space, record yourself speaking.
- Decide if you have found anything you really enjoy doing and are passionate about, which you may want to explore further for a future business idea (these could be the new things you tried or others). Try them all in the following month. Record a webinar, create a business page on social media, make a prototype – just put your idea into practice. Promote it to your friends, family and/or colleagues, ask their opinions, see whether they would be interested in what you’re offering and if there is anything you could do to make your product or service more appealing. Use this to form the start of your business model.
Need help moving from this step to launching a full business that could double or triple your revenue while bringing joy to your life? Dr Mahmood Mawjee and The Re-Ignite Academy offers programmes designed to unlock and unleash your hidden potential to be the very best version of yourself.
For more information follow @thereigniteacademy or @mahmoodmawjee on Instagram or visit www.thereigniteacademy.com