So I've been reading about expansion vs contraction in the E-Myth Chiro and I just can't seem to get this concept except to know for certain that I am in a state of contraction. When he describes the 2 states I can picture them clearly and feel where I am. He says that just by being aware of the state you are in can liberate you from it. But I can't see how I can choose to be more expansive. I don't feel resistant to change. I will change anything I need to see results. Any thoughts?
Expansion vs. Contraction
(22 posts) (10 voices)-
Posted 1 year ago #
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Anonymous
UnregisteredThis post is the first breath of your current expansion. You reached out to people you trust and who you know will encourage your growth. See? You chose and then you expanded!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Welcome to the journey of expansion Dr. Kelli! A state of contraction is fear based and makes everything about you. Expansion is when you make things about others. In your post you used "I" ten times. What was especially contracted was the sentence "I will change anything I need to see results". When you read that again, does it sound patient centered (expansion) or doctor centered (contraction)? If your current thinking is more concentrated on yourself, and what you can do to gain a benefit, or the more common, what can I do to prevent a loss to myself, you may further contract. The first step that I learned was to be thankful for what I have. The Universe will not give you more if you are not happy with what you have...expansion. The next step is finding ways to serve others (without an agenda). This is what I believe is the biggest step into expansion. Be careful that you are not expecting to get something in return. Have faith that if you do the right things, for the right reasons, everyone will benefit...and that may eventually include you. How can it not? When you lose your agenda and start making it about serving others, it is truly amazing how your energy will change. As Dr. Zachary said, "this is the first breath of your current expansion". Now keep the expansion going! Call Dr. Sea about this, I know he is an expert at this. He has spent over 10,000 hours working on it with me alone!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Rich, one of the best posts I've read. Kelli, you can let that sting a bit- then contract or expand. The choice is yours.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Great points Dr. Rich. Dr. Kelli, Dr. Frank often says, "Focus on results, and you won't change. Focus on change, and you'll get results." When I find myself heading toward contraction, feeling fearful, I stop and remind myself why I'm doing what I'm doing. I'll repeat, "I'm here to change millions of lives" mentally to get back into a more useful state. It's that attitude of being on purpose that will help you expand. Fear only perpetuates the contraction.
It's a journey, and I am by no means a master. Keep your foot on the gas!
Tony D.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Thanks guys, found a lot of wisdom here and did some brainstorming. Realized I was blaming my patients for my shortcomings as a doctor, entrepreneur, and manager. Looking at stats and numbers before and during patient care instead of focusing on the patient. No wonder, huh? Doing the exact things that cause me to feel fearful at the beginning of my day instead of things that put me in an attitude of service and love. Some new rules for my office.
1. I only review stats and accounts at the end of the day or even better, the end of the week.
2. Start my day by reviewing why I'm really here (and any other time I start feeling contracted)Thanks!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Rich, I told you at Brain Spa you had got way smarter - what a great post! Dr Kelli, what I found really useful with this concept were the adjectives - simply ask yourself how are you feeling? In other words are you afraid or joyful, skeptical or curious, suspicious or open, resistant or willing! This is where your self awareness comes in handy but awareness is only one thing self regulation is the next thing and the best advice when you identify your contracted state is ........... STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT!! I know that sounds trite but honestly that is what it takes! Identify your attitude and then change it!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Dr. Kelli, if the numbers stress you out right now, I'd suggest reviewing them on Saturday. That way you have a solid couple of days to process it before being back in the office again. Just a thought.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Another angle to look at this is a long the lines of what we discussed in the Management pod on thursday about the 3 roles we have to play namely the entrepreneur, the manager and the technician! The reality is there will always be some degree of conflict especially between the manager and the technician because of the disparages in their roles! The manager wants perfection and order whereas the technician just wants to adjust! This can create an enormous amount of conflict, so how do you cope with it, just accept that comfort is a thing of the past; you will always be faced with problems and anxiety as you grow! So get used to it but take a beginners mind (or a state of expansion) and ask how can you improve or what systems can you change to help bring the entrepreneurs dream (your why) to fruition! Which is in direct contrast to the other route where you adopt that fearful contracted whining state which just turns in to a self predicted prophecy!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Great thread. This dynamic is really at the heart of what is the greatest challenge for all of us. Keeping focus on the purpose in the midst of our day to day realities. We all have a different realty so it understandably plays out differently in each of our live. As Ed mentioned, the pod plus Dr. Sovinsky's recent recording with Michael Gerber really hits home with regard to keep our multiple personalities addressed. For the technician, I would suggest just keep dialing in on improving your technique, then just tell the technician to shut up and do their job. :) Of course you can't have purposeful practice to be able to improve your technique if you are not focused on the patient in front of you. So when you are the technician forget about the bigger picture. Get "lost" in the moment with the patient. Completely different feel to the encounter, and part of being focused is dialing into what their needs are today and addressing them so it should translate to being more efficient to boot. For the manager, set aside a pocket of time each day to work on the systems but try to restrict it to a set time so that your brain knows that there is a time where that stuff will be addressed and it is a process not an event so if you make consistent improvements daily you will go very far over a period of time. Last is the entrepreneur of course that should not really be last, they need to be first! None of the work that the other two need to do will sustain in effort and energy unless there is a higher purpose outside of our personal needs, desires, let alone fears to be the fuel source that gets you going on the days you don't feel like it or get you going when you review the numbers and not worry about them because the numbers are NOT your purpose. That is why numbers don't work, they are our personal goal, not our impersonal goal. So, from what I am slowing starting to understand better, the entrepreneur just wants to grow. That is it. If you see 25 people in a week then if things go up steadily and you are hitting fifty then simple enough. Keep going. If you are seeing 500 a week then the entrepreneur wants bigger. But for the sake of creation, not for the sake of money or status. Not that we need to shoo those away but the not THE drive. Numbers reflect the past and the entrepreneur is always looking forward. What worked what did not, good or bad, it is just feedback. Our major benefit is that we have the coaches as managers as well. They help to point out the changes needed. I think where we all differ is in the other two categories but by far the entrepreneur. To the extent we are learning to tap into that aspect of our role is the key to driving the others and therefore the key. We all get the systems in the first few months with DCM. We are all the same. Technique counts but most patients don't know the difference between good and great so not the major factor. That leaves what drives the discipline and urgency and drive to do all that needs to be done? The entrepreneur. But only with a clear mission and purpose that can be reflected on daily to get the other two to get it going.
Have not had a post like that in a while, thanks for the motivation everyone. :) It was good for me.Dr. Kelli, I echo Dr. Davis, with once a week for stats on Saturday and do your 7 accounts then. Then turn your focus back to what changes are you going to make next week, with the help of the coaches. I will come home and Karen will ask with the same intent of "How was your day?" "How many people did you see today?" And she always finds it funny when I answer "I don't know?" I don't really avoid looking at the book each day, I just don't care that much. I am more dialed into how the day felt and flowed or did not flow and how, good or bad, and what are we going to work on tomorrow. The periods of time I have locking into that mode have been my greatest periods of growth. Focus on change, not results. results will only bring fear if they are low or complacency if they are high. Unless we are really business mature about it and none of us are that mature yet. So why look at them all the time? What is the benefit. If you do it when you do the 7 accounts each week you will find out. And it is not like if you saw a certain number on Tuesday then you can change Thursday based on a stat. It is where we place our attention is what counts. Last you NEED to believe that you will succeed and it is only a matter of time. If you can't believe it you can not achieve it, so make sure you get your head around the FACT that all of this is very possible and more than one person has done it to prove it. We can all do it.
Posted 1 year ago # -
This is an appreciated string. I went back and reviewed the EQ audio and related it to contaction vs. expansion. Many have imbibed in the toxic cocktails Dr. S. mentions. Toxic scripts, like not looking at stats, are an example. The reactions caused by them are contactive in nature and can take one off course to a dissonant mood that others feel and stalls our purposes. We are fotunate to have been give tools to help ourselves and others who are willing to share here.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Actually Chris your post just triggered something else and not just on number stalking - when you mentioned Karen asking how many had you seen! In the past for me this often triggered an emotional response which was entirely dependant on a number - now I am sure that most of you could not possibly be as immature as that but.... could you? In other words my day was made or broken by the stats so I was either happy or pissed off, I either praised or chastised myself! I was only as good as the number I saw! And this I can assure you is an incredibly tiring and contracted mindset. It leads to such an emotional rollarcoaster that you just simply cannot sustain it. Yet if we are serving unconditionally we should be able to answer that, not with a number but with the following - I SAW and HEARD every single one of them! Now when you can truly look back on your day and answer like that, then you know you are well on the way to satisfying/fulfilling your Dream! But even if you cannot answer I saw every single one of them, you can still adopt an expanded mindset by determining what areas you need to improve in to help you achieve that goal! So it comes back to another cliche - respond not react!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Ed you triggered something back. :) One tweak to what you said at the end. BTW, everything you described was me as well, at least at some point and still on my weak days. Not necessarily a weak in numbres day, but more so a weak in vision day. The key, from what I am currently working on, is to have an impersonal higher goal. So maybe a self check for us all is to phrase things as "the Dream" vs "your (my) Dream"? For instance the Dream can be to provide hope and opportunity to all those patients out there that have been told by their MD's that there is nothing else they can do for them. And they often, and understandably, end up taking on a mindset of acceptance and management of their health issues. We have all met them, and shown them that their are other options alot of the time. So through chiropractic they can get their hope back and then their health back, or at least improved, or at least another look from a different angle. Now the hard part is that it is (our) Dream but nothing in there mentioned stats or money or basically any personal dreams. You may have intended "your Dream" to mean that, semantics and all, but it lit a little lightbulb. So it is my Dream, but it is to create on office for them, for their benefit. And in order to support the Dream, I need to be on time and have clear financial policies, and meaningful exams and daily encounters. Because especially for this group they have often been "everywhere" and tried "everything" and have begun to believe that there really are no answers. Let alone probably spent alot of money in the process. So if my office's systems are not flowing well then they will likely have a low tollerance for negative experiences and follow through is less likely which will not support the Dream... for them. I am currently working on clarifying the Dream for myself. But we are the creators of a solution to a problem. We each just need to pick a specific problem we want to fix for others. The Whitakers started a thread a ways back about sharing a big dream and theirs were along these lines. Even though it was just a few months ago, I could not get into it. Too lofty for me, not practical enough. That is slowly changing, and another example of why they are just a bit further down the path than myself at this time. That also provided a piece to this impersonal dream puzzle for me so thanks you guys. Great example of others thoughts triggering more of our own and back and forth it goes and grows. Sweet!
Posted 1 year ago # -
I am not quite sure what you mean with the differentiation between my and the, unless it is to highlight the difference between the impersonal and personal and absolutely i agree. However each and every one of us has our own independent dream and vision. And whilst ours will all be pretty similar because that is what makes us gel, as we are if you like kindred spirits, they are still different. But absolutely stats and numbers don’t come in to this, as our vision should be bigger and broader than that. Yet whilst our dream is impersonal it is if you like still ours, if that makes any sense. But as you say semantics aside this is the importance of those three roles! And as Dr Sea mentioned a couple of months ago, we need to spend a certain amount of time looking at each area. This is why this type of post is very useful. It is also crucial to realise that the entrepreneur has different sides to it too, it is not just the dreamer; the thinker, the leader and the story teller are absolutely essential as well as they help bring things in to reality. For instance how often do you come up with an idea/dream yet absolutely nothing happens or arises from it. Well that is simply because the Thinker and its compatriots have not been stirred! The thinker if you like asks or says how something can be done, whereas the manager and technician merely ask what needs to be done? Which is why Michael Gerber continually refers to us doing it, doing it, doing it? It is very easy to let the technician and manager take over and that squashes the dream. So when you find yourself contracted it means you are letting either the manager or technician totally dominate and that is not healthy. You need to see things not as an employee but as an entrepreneur!
Posted 1 year ago # -
You pegged it Ed. That is why I threw in that I was not speaking to you in some sort of corrective sense, more so just thinking aloud, as I have been known to do and that "your" just triggered it for me. I believe I am attempting to make something really outside of me to where I am more the lead participant in a project as opposed to it being "my" project. But in the end it is my project, as you said. Playing mindgames with myself over the impersonal vs personal thing. By trying to really view something as outside of me and not about me and keeping it at arms length to almost convince myself of the impersonal nature of it. I have a few patients that do some pretty big stuff, but one that stood out to me in particular that was so humble when I complimented him on a charity event that had just occured that far exceeded anyones expectations. And he could not bring himself to even accept an inklng of the credit. It was interesting. Not that I expected it to be all about him but instead of even a "Yeah, we really did great." It was "They all did a great job. I did not have much to do with it." When it was all the guy was talking about for a couple months leading up to it. He had alot to do with it and yet he was very sincere when not accepting any credit and deflecting it to others. Maybe it was the humility part that was hard for me to understand. :) It was a walk in D.C. for Parkinson's awareness where they intially hoped for 1000 people and ended up with about 2500. And he is the head of the Washington, DC chapter which is the chapter being in Washington, DC and yet he did not do much. Sure.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I’ve been so stuck in practice past, angry about the past, that that I can’t even see the future of Family First Chiropractic. So the question becomes now, NOT how do "I see" hundreds of people a week, but how to reach out to these people and share with them another way to live? That pain and disease don't have to be inevitable or "normal" to them.
If they want it, there is a healing place for them here. If they try it, they are already healthier. Like with expansion and contraction that we've been exploring here, if they don’t know or aren’t willing to listen because they’ve been brainwashed by society, they are contracted. Just by knowing there is another way, they expand their health potential. By trying it, they expand a little more and by adopting a chiropractic lifestyle, they expand their health potential beyond measure.I loved what Gerber said in that interview: It’s not about just making an adjustment to the spine. It’s about making an adjustment to their expectations about health.
Beginning to feel the strings loosening.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Numbers used to be a real high for me, when they were up. They became a real downer when they weren't any longer. Looking at it and figuring out what happened help alot. I threw-up a few times at the sight of what I was seeing; like what was I thinking or why didn't they buy my dream or some such nonsensical thing. Usually I did not think because I had no system(s) or the understanding of systems, I just copied systems so they were hammered on and became people dependant. People dependant systems mean the causative point of your business and dream is someone else. Oh My..
Looking tells the truth then we can go on and re-dream our dream and do the other 2 things we need to do, manage and tech. There wasn't anything wrong with our original dreams, other that they were too small or were ungrounded. Always have your feet on the ground of reality-----even if your ideas are in the clouds. Again, thank you all for this string. See you in S.Falls next month, my body was there last year but I will be there this year!Posted 1 year ago # -
Fairly new to the DCMentors and the posts and just browsing through and reading all the great comments... 2 weeks behind (or right on time). I believe there is some old neurology that hangs with us all. We are born and raised qualifying and quantifying. Much like the neuroplasticity of riding a bike... kinda of hard to unlearn. It's safe to say that if we contract around office numbers we are likely contracting around other things in life. Relationships, difficult situations, needed confrontations, financial issues and more. In contrast there are likely similar patterns of expansion. To easily set aside decades of learned behavior and response may be a fallacy... but changing focus is just a state of mind. My beliefs, is what you focus on is what you will have. Ever see or hear about that car wrapped around the only power pole in miles. It's likely the driver was staring at that pole and focusing on not hitting it rather than focusing on the wide open country to steer the car. Focus on patients, patients show up... focus on lack of patient, you lack patients.
Lastly, expansion usually, or should I say, always happens during times of truly letting go. A healthy realization is that you cannot control either expansion or contraction just your focus and the emotions that you attach to each of those.
Thanks for the learning...
Posted 1 year ago # -
Doesn't sound like you are too far behind. I love hearing everyone on this topic, because everyone has a slightly different opinion yet all right. I agree about the neurology, some are hardwired (because of their influences) to worry or to judge, or see the glass as half-empty while others are hardwired for seeing possibilities, for seeking wisdom, choosing to act, being persistent. The important part is that our neurology IS plastic and can change like any habit with the quality of the people we are around, the books we read, our conscious decisions. For me, I have to stay at it EVERY single day. It's not a natural thing.... yet. I do believe that if I make a habit of reading things that inspire me, surrounding myself with quality people that will challenge me to be great, (consciously focusing on what I want), that seeing possibilities, taking action, persistence, and therefore success will be also become habit and become subconsious. I thought everyone was telling me that I could just switch my thoughts by choice, and maybe someday that will be the case. But until it becomes a habit, I am committed to getting up 2 hours before my boys to set the mood for my day by reading, writing, dreaming, and planning.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Dr. Kelli, you are on fire! Thank you for being such an inspiration. No excuses, waking up early...reading, writing, dreaming, everyday...and to think, some of us think we don't have enough time for these important tasks. Thanks for keeping me on track!
Posted 1 year ago # -
It is inspiring and as I am sure you know Dr. Paul. The reality is that we don't have enough time to not do these things. I have gained more and more time back in my life the more I take the time to think and act. It is the opposite of what most people think. Kind of like the person that is too tired at the end of the day to work out. Hmmm, maybe they are tired at the end of the day because they don't work out. Same dynamic.
Posted 1 year ago #
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