Meet Dr Tony Ebel & His Chiropractic Mission

Matt 0:01

Welcome to Adjusting the Mic. I'm Dr Matt Sherson, and today we're joined by Dr Tony Ebel, amazing chiropractor, pead specialist. Tony, do you want to talk us through what you do on a day- to- day and how you got into chiropractic?

Tony 0:13

Oh, it depends on the day, honestly. No, the best main part of my day-to-day, which is the catalyst to the other days. I am a practicing pediatric, prenatal, and family chiropractor. We love to clearly define the work we do as principled, subluxation-based, neurologically focused. And that's a mouthful, but we always feel it's important because it just makes sure that everybody focuses. Okay, this is chiropractic in its fullest expression. So practice in the suburbs outside of Chicago. We've got an eight-doc team and been in practice for 17 years. We have a full family wellness. You got patients who have been with me from the beginning, you know, getting checked and cleared weekly. And then we have what's called a perfect storm neurological intensive programme where patients come from Dubai and South Africa and all over the place. So that's my day-to-day slaying subluxations, deal and hope, leading my team. I'm in there Mondays and Wednesdays, sometimes a little bit extra. And then Tuesday, Thursdays, and Fridays, I'm teaching through our PX group. So we have a certification program postdoc with Life University. And then I have a podcast called the Experience Miracles Podcast, where we take this work to the world. So we have one for chiropractors too, but the one I'm most obsessed with is we call it the pull strategy. Moms are up late at night searching, scrolling, praying for someone to tell them the truth. And you can't have a root-cause conversation without subluxation. And so we've just built this massive platform that um it's working. It's working. So I got to come over here to Australia and now be here in Auckland to get our first international certification. And we have over a thousand docs now certified across the world. And it is just on fire because I'll leave it with this. It's an unfortunate reality that there's this many kids sick, but it's an unbelievable, never been seen before opportunity for nervous system-focused chiropractors because the nervous system is trending. Dysregulation, cold plunging, you know, deep breathing, oora rings, and whoop. The world's finally have BJ said it. They're finally having our freaking conversation. And we, if you're principled and nervous system focused, you don't change anything. You just get louder. And I'm a wee bit loud.

Matt 2:25

Why Family & Pediatric Chiropractic Became the Focus

Matt 2:28

Well, sounds like you're living the dream. Amazing. Was there a moment in your chiropractic journey where you went, family-based practice is the thing for me? This is what I love. This is what I want to do.

Tony 2:39

Yeah, I gotta, I you could look at it as a late head start because I would have loved to be like one of our club PX students now. You know, they can know this stuff from the beginning. Two weeks before I graduated from Palmer in 2007, uh, my beautiful baby girl, our oldest, I'm a dad. Actually, my number one most important job day to day is to be an incredible husband and father. So our oldest was born two weeks before I graduated. My entire training to that point, subluxation-based, insight scans, gonstead doctor. But I love sports, you know, I'm pretty standard story, you know, sports chiropractor and wanting to do that sort of stuff. And two weeks from graduation, I'd already signed the mortgage. I bought a building, took out a bank loan, so I was half a million invested. PWC is the name of my practice. Most people would think the P is pediatrics. It's not. It's premier wellness chiropractic. I was gonna be a chiropractor for everybody. Wellness, subluxation, you know, awesome model, you know, but not new or novel per se. And then when Addison was born, as happens when you become a parent, I was like, I don't care about anything else other than this. So I started training the day after I graduated. God has just blessed my path the whole time. Graduated on a Friday, and I signed up for the ICPA back home certification, Dr Jeanne Ohm. I was in her seminar Saturday morning after graduating on Friday. So I don't think I could have screwed this up if I tried. And then the real catalyst, the one that probably most people listening would know more. So, and then two years into practice, I'm figuring out all this perfect storm stuff. I have a very pattern recognition brain. I can look at a lot of things happening and see a through line. I'm an Iowa farm kid, so I can simplify the complex. And I'd put together this whole perfect storm about birth trauma and how subluxation is not just toxins and certainly not just genetics. And my son, Oliver, was born with a traumatic birth, and he is a full miracle now. I'll speed to the end. You know, helicopter ride from one hospital, not supposed to make it to age one, having seizures, EEG, you know, Imran would have looked at his EEG and went, you better adjust him three times a day. And I did. And he walked out of the okay, he didn't walk out. That would have been a freaking man. A six-week old fractic kids. Actually, that's too soon. It would have screwed up his development. Anyway, he rolls out of the NICU six weeks later, perfect EEG, perfect MRI, and when medicine's like spontaneous recovery. Spontaneous? What are you a dump? You know, medical doctors, they can't even, they have to sound smart. So Oliver is just this unbelievable miracle man. And so I was already going heavy into pediatrics at that time. I have not looked back since. That was the finishing touch.

Matt 5:08

Quiet Miracles, Care Planning & Chiropractic Results

Speaker 3 5:09

Speaker 3 5:09

It's nothing like a personal experience and touching that genius that is the body. Like innate at work.

Tony 5:16

And there had been, you know, the blessing between Oliver, Addison, the oldest, and Oliver. She's the opposite of the perfect storm. She had vital health because of the principles, right? Applied ahead of time. Those are the miracles, the ones that don't have to go into the storm and come out, they're even better. And then that time too, I had started taking on 19-year-old, 21-year-old patients. And so it wasn't a complex thought exactly. It was like, well, if they're getting better and they've been subluxated for 20 years, I think Oliver's gonna be okay. Let me just put my head down, get to work, and see what happens. And that's chiropractic.

Matt 5:46

A lot of our students always like, I hear these amazing speakers come in and say, I had this miracle or that miracle. And it's actually the quiet miracles. It's the people who don't need that medication, don't have that crisis, as you've said, that makes a difference. Um you touched on the fact that you're training chiros now. How much do you believe that having a good handle on how to manage a full spectrum of practice members is important?

Tony 6:11

Thank you. Care planning is everything. It's the most boring, I always I always say it this way, brother man. It's like uh I have this big Facebook group with 5,000 chiropractors, pediatric chiropractic today, or whatever it is that I've been leading and running for a bunch of years. If I were to go in there and be like, hey, we're putting on a new seminar and you know, you click the option, chiropractors, of what you want to learn from me. If I put marketing, tons of clicks. Adjusting, you know, I got a new technique. You know, let's go move some stuff. Uh adjusting or systems would probably go business systems. People be like, I love systems, I need systems. If I put care planning on there, a little old D, like two people are gonna click on D. You want to know what the entire flipping algorithm to miracles is, and you guys are researching it here. I just spent all morning watching it. And the more data you get on more better, there's some Iowa English for you, more better chiropractic, the more you know that more is better. And so care planning is worth its weight in gold, Bitcoin, and freaking beach real estate in, you know, the Gold Coast. Because the truth is, you can be a legendary adjuster, you can have all the techniques, and I do. I use a multitude of techniques. I base them based upon the subluxation pattern the kid needs. Care plan, you miss the care plan, you missed the miracle. Yeah, that's everything.

Matt 7:27

As we know,

Why Chiropractors Lose Confidence (and How to Fix It)

Matt 7:28

there's no process, it doesn't take time. Yeah. You need to make sure you have that locked in. And I suppose would you say that that's the best message that you would say to maybe a new grad?

Tony 7:37

It's my reality cry.

Matt 7:38

Yeah.

Tony 7:38

And here's the extra credit on that. What is really a trapdoor? Oh, it's all over in pediatric chiropractic, especially. And it's not beholden only to pediatric chiropractic. And again, you guys have a bit of a utopia around here. So that's good. Stick to it and spread it across the oceans with us, please. When you don't have enough faith and conviction in chiropractic care planning and case management, you add to chiropractic. And people will sell you these devices, these machines, these therapies, these modalities as, oh, this makes you advanced. No, it makes you not as skilled at chiropractic. It dilutes and distracts innate instead of focuses and makes innate more efficient. And so if you wuss out on the care plan and you wuss out on adjusting, you kind of get this false sense of security by adding other therapies and endeavors. And I bought just enough of that because I got all these certificates. You know, you're a student, you're young, you're like, I don't know. Let me go get more letters. And um, mine, anyways, which is why we built the PX certification to be the antithesis to all that. Mine took me sideways, not forward. And my clinical results, my first three years of practice, all I knew how to do was find subluxations and give real care plans. And the results were, and I was brand new. So I wasn't as skilled as an adjuster. Reps are reps. I was good, but I'm not where I am now. And then years three to five, I started to get all this integrated, functional before it was cool. And I use insight scans. So I use objective functional measurements to know whether my kids are getting better or not, not just symptoms. My results plateaued and got worse the more I added. And it was the greatest clinical experience for me. And I think I'm valuable to the chiropractic profession to say this isn't my theory. I've got data on the insight scans that can say the more we added in, we got in the way of chiropractic. And um, once we learned that, saw it with clarity, we turned it all off. I actually doubled my care plans again, and away we go. Yeah. Miracles.

Matt 9:29

Yeah. Anytime we try to bring our educated brain into that innate brain equation, just get out of the way.

Tony 9:35

BJ was then like I could have told you that.

Matt 9:37

Doesn't need any assistance, just get out of its way. Yeah.

Tony 9:40

Yeah. I say it now and I'm like, how did I not know? This is why education matters so much that education stays principled and focused. If you pay to go learn X, Y, Z from someone else, you feel compelled to deploy X. And I don't, I love that. The only way to know is to go. That I found out, but I didn't like the results, but at least now I can spend the rest of my career not wondering, knowing.

Matt 10:02

Yeah. It's one of those things where, and you probably touched on it quite well, that's certainty through credential. Like people are trying to gain certainty when really it's a matter of just taking the time, doing the numbers, doing the reps.

Tony 10:15

Get the best mentor. Our certification program is only 80 hours for a reason. All the other ones are like 200 to 300 for pediatrics. You only need 80 hours to know what you need to do. If you're not filling it with therapies and modalities and everything else, you what's the rest of the hours for? But mentorship, reps, and real life practice experience is worth its weight and goal.

Matt 10:36

What do you think the main reason is why people are nervous by being new chiropractors and nervous to have young children, babies, infants in practice. What do you think stops

Communicating With Parents & Building Trust With Families

Matt 10:46

them?

Tony 10:46

Communication. Not adjusting. Um the docs listening, you need to know you are closer to world class with your adjusting skills. You got to know what you're doing. But I think it I would trust innate a lot more with a well-trained chiropractic adjuster to work on it, kiddo. It's the certainty and the communication that is often lacking. And if you lack certainty and you lack a communication, talking to moms is vividly different than talking to an adult about their own, you know, health. It just has to be so much more compassionate, empathetic, authentic, you know, deep. You got to really know your stuff. Some of them are analytical, but you just got to be able to go there and explain it and own it and speak from your toes, not your heels. And I find that what really holds chiropractors back from seeing kids, it's their lack of certainty and communication. You fix that, adjusting and care planning becomes a whole lot easier. Because if you are going to tell the mom the truth about a care plan, two times a week for six weeks, you should have been done with the flip phone, honestly. And um it's it's like dial up internet, just to give you one more analogy. It's not enough. Not with how subluxated kids are from the perfect storm, prenatal distress, birth trauma, toxic overload. But to sit across the table and say, we need to adjust your kiddo twice a day for the next two weeks, then daily for four weeks, then three times a week for 12 weeks, and then two times a week for 12 weeks. So that's going to be 96 visits and $7,000. That takes a different level of certainty and communication.

Matt 12:09

Definitely. How much does the structure of your practice make an impact on that?

Tony 12:13

The brand. Moms won't buy from posers. Sorry, I've given it my full, I'm giving you my full scope of this. They won't buy from dabblers. They won't even call. You won't know that they're not buying because they're not going to even, you know, send an inquiry in, right? They're just going to scroll on by. Moms choose differently. They choose more slowly and they choose with more. They on YouTube, one of the first videos that was ever on YouTube, but with my name on it, I think this always illustrates the story. I actually was blessed like five, six years in. I got to go back to Palmer, my almond moderator, and give the commencement address. Somebody recorded it and put it on Facebook. I had a mom whose little baby girl Bella was having seizures. She came in for a day one. She goes, I watched your commencement address. I was like, that's not even for you. That was for chiropractors. Point being, they will research to the hilt. Back pain patients, they're not going to do that. They're going to kind of go for what's convenient, what's close. You know, moms will only go for expertise. So I think your brand, digitally, your team, who are your CAs, your office vibes, your flow, we call it the patient experience and the patient education is kind of our catch-all terms for this. It matters massively to give you a shot to serve the kid.

Content, Branding & Building Demand Before Patients Walk In

Matt 13:27

There's a lot of a move online. So a lot of online stuff, videos, YouTube. You talked about the commencement address. Instagram, all those things. How much do you feel just direct patient communication, maybe from say an old school health talk to a lecture in your own practice? How much difference does that still have?

Tony 13:46

I will answer more aggressively to the digital media content answer than perhaps anybody in chiropractic, because I I get to be the benefactor of it. So we crank out, I now have three studios. I have one on the farm. I have this guest house sort of thing that we turn into a studio. I have one in the practice and we have one. And we bought another building and we put in for PXHQ. And I just crank content. And the benefit of that, now I crank it for PX Docks. Our our platform, so the PX Docks website, wwwpxdocks.com, and our Instagram, Facebook, and the Experience Miracles podcast, they all funnel not just to my brick and mortar, because moms are listening from Dubai. So what good does that do? And so that's our directory. We're the first directory that actually has traffic. Like there's chiro directories, but what does it matter if nobody's searching for it? So, anyways, I needed to create the demand. Where I'm going with this for the individual practicing person, like, because it's hard for us to find time to make content. It's freaking hard. I would prefer to give a completely different. I love swimming, I love golfing, I love mowing. I would rather not go in the studio, most days. I know I look like I'm like happy go podcast cranking guy. I'm a little begrudgingly in there most days, except for the mission. Now moms are coming in and they're not saying, hey, my child has autism. They are writing on the paperwork, my child has subluxation, nervous system dysregulation, and I would like you to activate their vagus nerve and regulate their nervous system. When you swim upstream and crank educational content at that level, they pick up what you're putting down. And then your day one, your day two, your conversions, your table talk, your brand. The dream you want to have inside the four walls of your practice, you actually fix it first outside. And a lot of people are waiting to have that more neurosubluxation-based conversation on the inside. You got a lot of work to do to take them off the medical bus. I just started cranking content, and it's been the greatest. I don't even know how to answer. I don't know if I'm doing a good job with this answer because it's this dream existence. Because I hate talking symptoms. I hate talking conditions. Because that just limits a kid. It doesn't give them their potential. And now I have, you know, and I've been cranking for years. And now these patients are coming in and they already know about the principles of chiropractic. They know how we roll. I just feel like I'm so much more in my chiropractic congruency. And it honestly came from cranking content.

Matt 16:06

Yeah. It's and it's not a passive process. This is not just putting an ad out and getting them to come in. This is actively speaking your truth.

Tony 16:13

You should not run ads. You should not waste any of your money until you've proven it organically. So all the social media platforms now are on an interest media. And so you could have 200 followers, but if you make a piece of content about the vagus nerve that goes viral, the algorithms are different now. Your following size doesn't matter. Actually, anybody listening right now who feels like they're late to the social media game, you're actually completely upside down wrong in a good way. It's changed now. You can literally start, scratch, and crush. Our platforms have gone off in a couple of years. And to that, parents are searching, people are searching for the nervous system. It's trending. Now they're buying infrared saunas for $10,000. They're putting in cold plunges. I'm pretty sure they'd rather just pop on your table for a three-minute adjustment and freaking be good with it. You know what I mean? Then have to whim off than ice bath.

Matt 17:00

I know I definitely approve.

Tony 17:02

Dude, I make fun of that stuff all the time with my patients. I'm like, well, you could, or you could just come in here Tuesday at three and you know get more neurological healing in three minutes on my table than you could, you know, sorry sunlight and saunas, but uh, you know, it's just true.

Advice for New Grads: Reps, Mentorship & Finding Certainty

Matt 17:17

Yeah. And again, I suppose that my main sort of thing to any student coming out is they are scared. This there's a fear about I don't know enough to go out there and say the message. So what advice would you give someone perhaps who's a new grad, who's like about to go into practice, has a really strong philosophy, but is maybe scared that they're not the one that can deliver it. What would you say?

Tony 17:38

Good question, brother. So I had the best mentors, and and they were aware of this, and I was this, we all are, and we're a student. And so my mentor, Dr Cody, he told me this parable, uh, and he's not with us anymore, but he was genius. And he was a wizard, like Dr Fletcher level adjuster, you know, like just elite of elite. And Dr Cody used to say the coolest freaking thing about chiropractic is that if you suck at it, 80% of people get well. Their nervous system is so desperate to be free of subluxation. And he would usually give like a little specifics. He was like, and if you can just clear atlas and you can just clear sacrum, you can get 80% of people better. But the the per the point of the parable for Dr Cody was not to stay on the 80%. And he said, then as you get reps, which is about the only thing you can really do. Now you guys run the clinic a whole lot better here than other schools, so that reps are legit. And then as you get reps, you get up to 85, 90, 95%. And he also would use, and then he said, and then when you're a masterful clinician, 95% of your patients respond. And he did not mean symptoms. He was an insight scanner, he meant functional. They're probably gonna have their symptoms get better. And that's awesome. We can celebrate with them, but this is a chiropractic criteria. And then he always, I think he always was pretty clear on teaching me the 95% to let me know that there is limitations of matter. And some patients are gonna optimize and get them to that amazing place. They're still better off, you know, because they would go down the hill instead of up. And that never left me because I was, I spent six months interning with him, masterful condition, you know, taking on the toughest of stuff. And then bam, my clinic's open. And it's me doing the adjustments. And uh I remember, especially that question now today, I remember that first six months really leaning on how fast can I close that gap from 80 to 95%? And students listening, well, that's why you train your face off. Get up early and go to those clubs, go to those seminars, get a mentorship where you get reps. You can it, the the speed with which you achieve 95% effectiveness is up to you.

Matt 19:34

Yeah. It's one of those things paying your bills versus excellence. So, how much does your vision that you have, and I don't know if you're willing to share your vision, make a difference to you in motivation, but also inspiration?

Tony 19:48

All I am CVO of my company's chief visionary officer. I am definitely not in charge of organisation. I will probably forget my passport and have to like swim home. Um, I is I'm so bad with organisation, but I love vision and I love strategy, and then I'm a galvanizer. God made me here to bring it forth. So our vision for PX Docs Network is to put pediatric, perinatal, and family chiropractic, nervous system focused, subluxation-based chiropractic, as first choice for millions of families. Not second, not last, or worst, not never. And we've been climbing this ladder where I got into practice. We used to joke, welcome to last resort. Now, parents are really against medications. It's really freaking cool. But you know what? They're taking probiotics and supplements. They're doing that before us. So we still have plenty of work to do. So that's the mission of the platform, the experience miracles. Now, the training. So if I'm gonna pull that off, then that actually, because a good vision sets up your mission, which is the work you need to do to get it done. So my mission with NPX is to train and equip 10,000. By the time I'm here, I want to have 10,000 doctors on our directory. And that's not because I know you and we're friends, we went to the same school. You got to earn your way on the directory. You got to be certified and go. Because if the first thing works and we get the message out, who are they gonna go see? And that responsibility, if I'm the one telling the parents on the platform chiropractic can do this, I need to make sure that I send them to a chiropractor that I trust to deliver the goods.

Matt 21:21

Yeah. So if um Grant was hearing this today and went, this is what I want. This sounds like something I would be interested in. What would be their first step?

Tony 21:29

So I would put you to your heart and then your head. So the Experience Miracles podcast is my parent-facing podcast. And it's actually great training for a chiropractor too, because it's me communicating to them. And if God's given me a skill, I mean, I can I can slay a subluxation. I can just look at a colicky baby and they'll take a dump and sleep through the night. That's that subluxation will run away. Um, but so I can adjust like a boss. But God did make me a communicator. So that's a great training. We have another podcast called the Family Practice Podcast, and then our training, thepediatricexperience.com. We have online digital training. Somebody can tap in right now, literally listening to this and take their certainty in their clinical skill set. And we do not have the dates yet. I don't know. Maybe by the time the second comes out, I'm going to work with Dr Kelly and your crew here. I am coming back next year to do the certification here in New Zealand. We got to get it done. And uh because what I didn't know, I think I did, but you don't know until you're here. And this isn't just preaching to the choir. It's just real. I've I've been everywhere. You guys are already on second and third base. That seminar I just taught in Adelaide, because we ACC and a lot of new most mostly NZCC grads. I had to work harder because they were asking better questions than I'm used to. That seminar made me work because these are already principaled, they recognise patterns, they are used to multiple techniques. They they have the insight scans in the clinic. It's the coolest freaking thing ever. So if you're already ready to gung-ho, get online, join the online membership. But if um I'm coming back, I'm coming here again.

Matt 22:55

Awesome. Well, we'd love to have you back. The next thing is we'll move a bit off this track. Something a little different. Definitely self-education is really, really important for chiros. And we have a lot of chiropractic education, part of this podcast and some of the other facilities we have here. My question to you is in terms of a non-chiropractic, maybe business-related podcast or book or information, is there something that you would recommend that maybe new grads, maybe existing grads who are struggling a little bit in practice, something that would help them to focus in that field?

Tony 23:24

I'll give you a tree. My favorite leadership podcast is Craig Groeschel leadership podcast. I am a kingdom-driven, faith-driven um human. And so Pastor Craig's podcast is one of my favorite leadership podcasts. John Maxwell's uh, you know, leadership podcast is amazing too. And every book. So I study leadership. My percentage of self-study right now, which I've always done this with my life, is leadership is now my tip of my spear because I have um teams of 40, 50 that that I'm called to lead. So if you're if you're feeling you do have associates, you do have CAs, and now you're like, oh my God, I have a new job called leadership, and I didn't know I had this job. This is chiropractic life. First, we're like, let me figure out how to adjust. And then you're like, I can adjust. How do I figure how to market? And then you know, and then you're business, and then you're not even done. And then leadership is harder than all of those put together. And uh, so leadership would be Craig Groeschel, John Maxwell. Marketing, if you're struggling to get the message out, I really love the books Zero to One by Peter Thiel. I really love Blue Ocean Strategy, it's phenomenal. And then Double Double is another book that I love. Now, if you feel like you yourself are not focused, not productive, there's a book that changed my life called Willpower Doesn't Work by Benjamin Hardy. Because a lot of us chiropractors are typically we're cut from a cloth of grit. We should. That's good. Entrepreneurs are cut from a cloth of grit. And I'm ADHD, so I had to really organise my life to find efficiency. And willpower doesn't work is just this great book by Benjamin Hardy that teaches you how to do that. And then marketing, if you want to know how to market your practice, honestly, like if you're struggling to get newies, is what they call the new newies? If you're struggling to get newies, follow our the Family Practice podcast. Just model what we're doing because we're in the same business. So I could send you to a Gary V or Hormozi, but I suppose we would be the Gary V or the Hormozi of our specific industry. I've never given that answer before. I don't like talking about myself a whole lot. Um but yeah, we could serve you well there.

Matt 25:26

Totally. In terms of your chiropractic life, have you worked as an associate before?

Tony 25:31

No, I started up so you know, farm kid. Uh, my wife's a first generation Chicago Croatian immigrant, her dad's an entrepreneur. So we were just, we got married in chiropractic school. We knew we were cut to open our own.

Matt 25:42

Just go straight into it.

Tony 25:43

Yeah. We have eight associates right now. We have some that'll stay with us forever. They're they're meant to be. Like Dr Matt's been with me for 10 years and teaches with me. And then we have this residency programme, internship to two to three years of training. And then you go, and it's a celebration. When they go to open their own, we're not, it's not, oh no, we don't like each other. It's we're throwing you a party, you're going to open to Colorado, you're going to open, and and they're crushing it. That's I feel like that's responsibility of me to be able to have that.

Matt 26:09

Yeah. In terms of advice, perhaps that you've been given by one of your co-operating mentors, was there one piece of advice that stands out that would be this is the thing that I want everyone to know?

Tony 26:20

Yeah. I feel like kind of all my mentors probably just said this to me in some form or fashion because I love to learn so much, I ask a ton of questions, which is a great place to be. And sometimes you just got to be done asking questions and taking trainings, and you just got to go do stuff. So my favorite phrase I live my life by is the only way to know is to go. Just take the action. Then you can end the debate because you're going to find out one way or another. You're going to do a bunch of stuff that you're like, that didn't work. And then that's good. You're done with it. And then you're going to do a bunch of stuff that's like, oh my God, this worked. That's me right now. My life is just like, holy crap, this idea actually worked. And it simplifies it. Because now I'm just going to put it on repeat, you know, and crank.

Matt 27:00

Exactly. It's one of those old phrases, action beats, um, was it action beats? I've forgotten planning. Yeah. Losing it. Action beats, planning every time.

Tony 27:10

And I enjoy planning, you know, but then there's a shot clock on it, and you're like, okay, let's freaking go.

Matt 27:15

So if some of our practicing chiropractors have been around maybe five, ten years. Getting into that just middle phrase of practice, maybe don't have an associate. Is there anything that you would advise them to be doing like on a regular basis just to stay switched on? To say focused?

Tony 27:30

Thank

Avoiding Cruise Control & Staying Fired Up in Practice

Tony 27:31

you for asking that question. Jeez, you hit a sweet spot for me, or probably something that breaks my heart and ticks me off. Avoid cruise control like the plague. When we get chiropractors on fire, students are easy to get on fire. Struggling chiropractors are easy to get on fire. Successful chiropractors are the ones most right to be picked off. When you have your practice and you can put it on autopilot and you've busted your butt to get there, I love that for you. I've never not lived a great life. I am with my kids and family and farm. I keep my boundaries. I've lived a great life while busting my butt. I am deathly afraid of cruise control. I'd rather have anything than being switched off or go to lukewarm. And so my advice to that, no, that's okay, we want to do that. How do you do it? Take on more challenging cases.

Matt 28:12

Right.

Tony 28:13

That is literally my clinical tip for that is sign up with us, take on perfect storm kids, take on cerebral palsy, take on epilepsy, take or whatever your specialty is. You have a different specialty. Get tougher cases, get louder in your community, and let that, the call to serve, keep you awake.

Matt 28:31

It's one of the things that we hear from a lot of chiros, and we talk about it is they've gone through practice, and it is, they just put their foot on the cruise control, let things just tail down, and then eventually, where's the energy? Building a practice is one of the most exciting times because you can see the growth happening. Maintaining a practice is one of the hardest things that you have to do. Back down the coal mine again.

Tony 28:52

It's like a relationship. It's being married. It's being a dad. You know, I gotta put in, I gotta put in more. I gotta put in more energy by a large margin for my 16 and 17-year-old to think I'm cool with them and then they didn't when they have three or five. You could default your way to cool. And so every relationship, the further it goes in, you keep putting energy in, you keep getting awesome. And and now, because I am so committed to continued energy and you know, not going on cruise control, yeah, the relationships are awesome, you know. But that is, if I have a calling right now in this season of chiropractic to speak to a specific cohort, it's that comfortable. Because then you'll get you'll start screwing around with Bitcoin and real estate, and that's fine. You're successful, but have your money make money. You'd kind of be dumb not to. But don't make that your that's not your thing. You're not a freaking real estate wealth strategist, you know, crypto expert. You're a chiropractic expert. Spend your life. You look around to chiropractic and the people we revere the most and the people who have the biggest smiles on their face at the end of their chiropractic life, they freaking stayed switched on for chiropractic the whole time. They didn't get distracted.

Matt 30:00

Yeah. I remember hearing something that Dave Rams, and you probably know Dave Rams is a famous finance guru. He talks about your job as your number one wealth-building component.

Tony 30:09

He's a perfect example. He's more switched on about debt 35, 40 years ago. His podcast, people still tune in. You know what he's gonna say. You log on to the Experience Americans podcast. There's 135 episodes, they're just 135 episodes about subluxation. I just called it, I just titled it something else to get people to listen, you know, but it's just me talking about subluxation and freaking over and over again.

Matt 30:31

That's it. You can never hear the message too many times.

Tony 30:33

Yeah, dude. People think you can and you can't. Not at all. Because the your 138th time talking about it is the next mom's first time ever hearing about it.

Matt 30:41

Yeah. And then you have that depth there for thssSem to refer back to. Now, one last thing. I really appreciate having you come to see us today. It was fantastic, Tony. Um, is there something you'd like to leave us with today, like a story, a message to chiros out there, something a call to action?

Tony 30:57

Yeah, I'd like to compel the NZCC grads and those of you that grew up with principal and insight scans and what you do, I would like to challenge you and let you know that it's not the norm elsewhere. And so I don't want to disrupt your comfort or your utopia, but I'd like to disrupt it enough to be like, serve, get louder. You know, like if the world knew that this kind of chiropractic was this effective and getting that much impact to happen, it would serve chiropractic in a large mark. So my call to action would be I kind of knew coming over here that you guys have things in a great place. And I'm sure I know I'm talking to the team. There's, I know there's a thousand things you guys are looking to get better at. And that that's awesome. That's what you do. But it's better here than everywhere else. And so if you guys, you know, if there's some of you that could get over to the States and start getting on to seminars, you know, and and just share, I don't have this formed up as you can tell exactly like what this would look like. But hopefully I hit a few hearts with this and just be like, could you get louder within the chiropractic circles that, hey, this kind of chiropractic is kicking ass and serving well. Because over where I'm from, it's pretty easy to lose out to the decompression and the shockwave and the white-labeled supplement salesman. And um, it's hard for a chiropractor to stay forward moving in the principle there. So we just need more case studies. Just like a mom needs to know that somebody like her kid got better. We need to know that there's more chiropractors like us doing well.

Matt 32:25

Awesome. Tony, thanks for joining us today. You're a legend.

Tony 32:29

Thank you, everybody. You need something, reach out on Instagram, Facebook, dig into the podcast. We're here for you.

Matt 32:36

Awesome. Thank you, Tony.

Tony 32:37

You got it, dude. You got it.