April 30, 2025 • 25 mins
What does “biohacking” have to do with dentistry? For Dr. Peter Dinh, figuring out the root cause of his low energy and burnout changed the way he felt in his body and in his practice.
In our conversation, he shares how functional medicine helped him heal hidden issues like leaky gut and low dopamine, improve his mental and physical health, and show up better for his team, his family, and himself. We also talk about the stress of practice ownership and how biohacking can help you treat common problems like anxiety, apathy, and trouble sleeping — making it possible to lead without burnout and build a healthier, happier practice.
Topics discussed in this episode:
- The hidden health effects of practice ownership
- Underlying causes of fatigue, mood imbalance, and burnout
- Healing through functional medicine
- Reframing work, stress, and success
- Unexpected benefits of biohacking
- How personal healing makes you a better leader
- Balancing practice ownership and personal health
Connect with Dr. Peter Dinh:
Website: https://www.guthormoneclinic.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gut_hormone/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheGutHormoneClinic
Email: dinhpeterdds@gmail.com
Text us your feedback! (please note: we cannot respond through this channel))
Check out www.relevanceonlinemarketing.com if you want to get the same great marketing results as Dr. Etch. Mention DPH and get your first month FREE!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
You know we talk a lot about practice growth on
this show, but today we're goingto lean into personal
development, because it's soeasy to feel drained and stuck
and just disconnected from ourwork or our team and, honestly,
from ourselves.
This is exactly where today'sguest, dr Peter Dinh, found
himself.
Not too long ago, he startedlooking at why is his energy so
(00:24):
low, why does work feel so heavy, and what was really behind his
burnout.
And what he found not onlyhelped him feel better, but it
completely changed how he leadsand works in his practice.
He's going to share all thatwith you today so that you can
get to the bottom of what mightbe causing you burnout, so you
can fix it and change your life.
You are listening to DentalPractice Heroes, where we help
(00:50):
you create and scale your dentalpractice so that you are no
longer tied to the chair.
I'm Dr Paul Etcheson, author oftwo books on dental practice
management, dental coach andowner of a $6 million group
practice in the suburbs ofChicago.
I want to teach you how to growand systematize your dental
practice so you can spend lesstime practicing and more time
enjoying a life that you love.
Let's get started.
Hey, welcome back to the DentalPractice Heroes podcast.
(01:15):
I'm your host.
Dr Paul Etcheson Got a veryinteresting guest on and man, we
got a cool topic today.
We're going to be talking abouthealth and functional medicine
and just being the best personthat you can be, because we
always want to be the best right.
That's why we're listening topodcasts.
I got a multi-practice owner, a2014 VCU graduate.
He is a health coach.
(01:36):
He's working with a functionalmedicine practice, does all
sorts of biohacking stuff.
Just happy to interview youtoday.
Welcome to the podcast, drPeter Dinh.
What's happening, peter?
How's it going?
Man?
Thanks for having me.
Yeah, dude, I'm excited.
I love this biohacking stuffand the more I read about it,
the cooler it is.
How did you get into not one,but two practices?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
It started in 2017 for me, and so bought my first
practice in 2017.
Had a lot of struggles at thebeginning.
I had a lot of guilt going intoday to day practice, just like
I felt like I wasn't doingenough and I just felt like I
was avoiding a lot of the hardwork and I couldn't put my
finger on it.
I always had things like focusissues.
(02:19):
Apparently, there's a lot ofcool things that you can measure
to figure out why that is, andso I just kept hitting a wall
and trying to grow my practice,and so my go-to was how do I
level up myself to grow mypractice?
And so I got into thebiohacking stuff.
I woke up at four o'clock, didall the things that you read
(02:40):
about cold showers, journaling,meditation, you name it
smoothies.
So I found out that my lowenergy and high guilt was
reduced when I did all thesethings.
My plan was if I optimizemyself, my team is happier, they
work harder and the practicegrows that way, and so, over
time, I bought the secondpractice.
(03:02):
I was like, oh, buying 10offices in 10 years, sell it,
roll it up Like that's the gameplan, right?
But I guess it kind of fits,let's just do this.
And so I bought that practiceand just I would run into the
willpower issue.
I would avoid like looking atmy numbers, I would avoid having
difficult conversations andthat started to build over time
(03:22):
and it was challenging to managemy team.
And so fast forward to thefuture, I met a person named
Alistair, someone that we sharea mutual friendship with and
gave me a lot of insights andadvice about how to optimize
myself.
So that kind of started thejourney of it all.
I realized that the journey of10 practices in 10 years was not
(03:43):
necessarily my dream goal.
So I created a lot of time.
I hired a bunch of associates,got myself out of the dental
chair and for about a year and ahalf two years I worked one day
a week and obviously duringthose times I didn't make a ton
of money but I had a lot of timeand so I really looked inwardly
.
I did lots of walks to reallytry to find out what I enjoyed
Freed up.
(04:03):
My wife did lots of walks toreally try to find out what I
enjoyed Freed up.
My wife my wife is an internalmedicine doctor and because I
had freedom, I helped her starther own journey of learning
about functional medicine, wherewe find the root causes of
diseases, and so, obviously, asshe gained her mastery of or
learning, rather, the beginningof her journey, I was one of her
first guinea pigs.
So we did a bunch of testing andwe found out that I was missing
(04:27):
a portion of the gene thatallows you to recycle dopamine
efficiently.
We found out that the speciesof bacteria that was in my gut
that I was lacking didn't allowme to produce dopamine very
efficiently.
We found out I had leaky gut,had some mild allergies, and so
as we started to dial in deeperand solve some of these issues,
(04:49):
like yeast overgrowth, forexample, it just got easier.
It just got way easier.
I was able to control myself alot more.
When I came home from work, Iwouldn't feel burnt out.
I would look forward to seeingmy family versus wanting to
avoid them.
So that's kind of like thestart of it all of me getting
into this whole field.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
But take me back to the time when you there's
something wrong, something'smissing.
I mean, you mentioned feelingguilty at your practice.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
I come from a heritage in the Asian culture,
the Vietnamese heritage of yougotta get age, you gotta work
hard, and so I always had thissense of guilt of not doing
enough.
And part of that also stemmedfrom my academic journey.
If you want to go back evenfurther, I got rejected to 39
dental schools.
Every academic test that I tookI had to take three times, so
(05:36):
that basically created a lot oftrauma for me in a way.
This idea that you can work atyour 100% and it's still not
enough, like that was, reminded,ingrained in me in high school
and while in dental school I wasfailing the first few classes.
So I was studying every secondof the day and I still was not
(05:57):
able to pass some of the classesat the beginning.
And so this idea that you cando everything in your power to
try to get to your goal, it'snot enough.
And so this idea that you cando everything in your power to
try to get to your goal, it'snot enough.
And so, just like inception,that idea was planted within me
during practice ownership You'renot doing enough.
Like you cannot fail, like thestakes are high, you have a
family to take care of.
Everyone's saying oh, if you'regoing to business ownership,
(06:21):
you're going to be a coldhearted capitalist, you're not
going to care about family, youshouldn't own a business.
So there's a lot of thingsriding on it, you know, and so
that guilt kind of stuck with me.
And over time you learn as anentrepreneur that you get
disconnected from your feelingsa little bit.
You kind of go down a pathwhere there wasn't a lot of
purpose for me.
I was disconnected to purpose,and so that's the root of it at
(06:44):
all.
And then you combine it withlow dopamine, low serotonin.
You don't have the positivereinforcement loop of like, oh,
I won this game, I feel good,let me keep going on that
journey.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Yeah, I mean, I could totally relate to that.
I feel like I did that for somany years and for me it was
like this workaholism and peopleare like man, how did you put
so much time in your practiceand I tell them, it just came
easy.
I was drawn to it Like I wasgetting those dopamine hits, but
at the same time I was likecompletely neglecting like all
the relationships in my life,you know, and when I had time
(07:20):
for those relationships, I wouldbe drawn back to the practice
because it was like it was mycomfort zone and it was like
what got me up in the morning.
Do you remember when you madethis transition and you started
pulling yourself out or startedadding associates?
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Yeah, I think it was.
I'm going on this journey andsome of my friends would ask me
why are you doing all this?
I'm doing this to create thisideal utopia of infinite money
and infinite time, right?
And one of my friends asked mewhat's stopping you from doing
(07:54):
that?
Now, it was really thatquestion of like you chose to go
on this journey to buy 10offices in 10 years.
You're not enjoying the journey, you don't know why you feel
obligated to do so and the goalthat you want.
This time factorair.
And he was just trying toconnect me to feelings, connect
(08:21):
me to what I do truly enjoy, andthat there exists another
option of enjoying the journey,even though you know we kind of
get into this like, ah, we'regoing to sacrifice ourselves, go
through the grind, it doesn'tmatter about the journey, let's
just, it matters about the endpoint.
And so I just wanted toexperiment, I wanted to see what
that was like, and so, as I gotinto it more and more, the
(08:42):
dental practice slowly becamenot only like an asset that I'm
working on, but it became Ireframed it for myself,
unintentionally, really as likethis dojo of a place where I can
learn leadership, how to takecare of myself to the highest
degree, to do public speakingwhere I can learn numbers.
And once I reframed it likethat for myself, things just got
(09:03):
easier.
I got started to enjoy thingsmore.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
It's amazing man.
I love that, and it's such agood mindset shift for so many
dentists that are just feelinglike they're grinding all day
and wondering why it's notcoming easy to them.
When I was in dental school, Idid really good in undergrad and
it came fairly easy to them.
When I was in dental school, Idid really good in undergrad and
it came fairly easy to me.
But when I got to dental school, I was going home studying
morning till night and I wasbarely pulling C's and D's.
(09:28):
It was as good as I could doand there was so much identity
crisis wrapped into that.
Maybe I'm not good enough to behere.
I'd never framed it as like,hey, I'm learning to struggle,
I'm learning to be resilient.
Now talk about.
What is your practice life likenow?
Because I want to talk aboutthe biohacking and all the stuff
that you found out as youstarted to work on yourself.
(09:50):
But what does it look like nowat the practice for you?
How involved are you?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
We recently expanded one of the practices from 5 Ops
to 12 Ops.
Now I'm at two to three days aweek, kind of want to ramp it up
.
We made large investments tokind of get to that next level
of practice ownership, to have alittle bit more associates, to
move away from risk.
You know, with the newassociate they take on a lot of
(10:15):
the fillings.
You start doing the complexstuff.
But now as we're ramping up Ido about two, three days a week
and I'm looking to probablyscale back to one day a week as
I make the transition over tothe functional medicine practice
a little bit more.
I just love the biohacking stuff.
I love solving those problemsbecause we're finding out
there's so many people thattolerate their health condition
(10:38):
and I was one of those peopleand I didn't know what was
possible, how I could feelthings like autoimmune diseases.
Conventional medicine doesn'thave an answer for it, and so we
typically fix low energy, sleepissues, anxiety in a mood
imbalance and then gut problemsand I had all of those things
(10:58):
and so solving those problemsonly leveled up my own life, but
it really resonates with me.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah, and these are issues that everybody's going
through.
So talk to me about how do youguys make the assessment, what
is this process and what kind ofthings are you looking for?
Enlighten me on this new typeof medicine, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
So my wife owns the Helamed Functional Medicine
Practice, so she's been veryfortunate to be able to work
from home and basically send allthe testing to people's homes.
So, for example, if you havelow energy, right, there's
different kinds of possibilitiesthat you have low energy.
Do you break down proteinscorrectly?
(11:38):
And we don't really look atthese things.
How efficient do you break downyour fats?
Is it your interpretation ofenergy that is a little bit off?
Aka, you feel like you have lowenergy but really you just have
low dopamine.
You can't get yourself to dothe things that are hard, and so
there are different tests thattest for that.
So, basically, stool testing,urine tests, blood tests help us
find these things, the normaltests that test for that.
(12:00):
So, basically, stool testing,urine tests, blood tests, help
us find these things, the normaltests that we all know about.
They're so outdated.
There's super new tests outthere and we're just not taking
advantage of it.
So, yeah, I was in one ofFaustine's masterminds.
Faustine, my wife, one of hermasterminds and I was blown away
that, in the cohort of theirorganization of functional
(12:20):
medicine doctors, 70% of peoplethat report higher than normal
anxiety is due to yeastovergrowth.
And I was like wait, I musthave heard this wrong.
I'm not a numbers guy, but Iknow numbers enough to be like
70% is an absurdly high number,and so if we believe that to be
(12:40):
true, or if it's possible thatthat is true, the way we're
practicing medicine as a countryis very incorrect.
A lot of it is diet andnutrition, and so
philosophically, in thefunctional medicine world,
there's two ways to at leastfrom my lens there's two ways
you solve disease.
One you optimize the body'shealing potential, or you find
(13:03):
out the root causes of disease,and so with these tests you
basically get a lot of thebiochemical reactions that go
through the body.
So, for instance, if you're notable to connect to fulfillment,
you don't feel happiness a lot,you always feel like you're
crashing.
You're looking at themetabolites of serotonin.
So once you have the guide map,it's kind of a clear cut
pathway to how to help yourself,and so a lot of it's diet.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Give me an example of something that you were
experiencing and what you foundout and how you treated it and
how you feel now.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
So we did the oats test.
For me it's called organicacids test.
Before that I shared with youthat I had focus issues right.
I didn't know at the time.
I also my operating system wasthat of obligation.
I didn't operate under desire,right.
If I wanted to do something, itwas really hard to get the
thing done right.
But if, like, things werehitting the fan and I had to get
(13:56):
it done, I got it done andthat's just the way I assumed my
normal function and so I wentthrough the testing.
One of the tests was the Oatestest.
We found out that I had yeastovergrowth.
I had leaky gut.
There's a test that allows youto measure that by measuring the
zonulin levels.
Zonulin is a component of theinner lining of the gut and so
if you're shedding a lot ofinner lining of the gut Test
(14:18):
shows high.
That's not good.
You have leaky gut.
Okay, I was tired, but I didn'tknow I was tired.
I only know that now because Ihave more energy.
Then I also had dysbiosis, whichis I had a lot of bat bacteria
and I was like missing like nineof the 12 or something like
that Good gut bacteria in my gut, and so some of the gut
bacteria recycles things likeyour neurotransmitters or
(14:41):
estrogen, like, imagine if youdidn't have that and you're a
woman, for example.
Like how much would that affectyou?
And so, within that process, Itook a number of supplements.
I went on a kill protocol tokill the yeast.
In order to kill the yeast forme, we went under a high
concentration of garlic extractand a high concentration of
(15:04):
oregano extract, because thoseare natural killers.
And so philosophically at least, the way my wife likes to
practice functional medicine,she recommends things that the
body naturally breaks down.
Once the kill protocol was done,I immediately noticed after
three weeks that and it soundslike really woo-woo-y stuff, but
(15:24):
color's more vibrant I startedto have a better connection.
It's going to sound weird.
Hopefully I'm not crazy.
I had a better connection to myinner voice, so self-awareness
started to tick up.
I noticed that when I got home.
Wow, I really look forward toseeing my family now and I can
just see them and be fine.
I used to.
(15:45):
Whenever I have social events,it's very stimulating for me.
I'm actually like an introvert.
I noticed that I could have asocial event and then the next
day I could be very productive,and so things like that were
what showed up for me, and so itwas like a sixth sense kind of
turned on.
I started to enjoy my hobbies alittle bit more.
I started to drop bad habits.
(16:06):
It's almost like my emotionsdidn't have memories in a way.
It's kind of hard to explain.
If you don't have a strongconnection to your emotions, you
don't remember the bad thingsthat keep coming up for you.
So like negative habits, right,like bad habits, if you're
really connected to it, yourealize, okay, if I drink that
drink, I'll feel crummy the nextday.
(16:26):
If I feel crummy the next day,I won't be productive, I can't
take care of my family, right.
For me that entire loop wasnon-existent, and so now that I
had more self-awareness,stronger connection to
fulfillment, I'd be like huh, ifI drink that drink, I know that
feeling of feeling bad.
I don't want that feeling offeeling bad.
(16:48):
Therefore I'm not going to dothat thing because it feels bad.
So that's what I mean by myemotions didn't have memories in
a way, like that was.
It's all kind of trippy.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
I feel like there's a lot of to behavior, that it's
like we all have free will.
You know, and I think mostpeople would agree that we have
free will, but I think there'sso much physiologically
happening that really kind ofdistracts from that free will.
But I will tell you, as somebodywho was a very heavy drinker
for a very long time is aroundman, maybe four or five years
ago I got to a point where Irealized I was just getting
(17:21):
really blackout a lot and when Islowed it down I was like I got
to do something.
I didn't completely abstain, Idid for a little bit.
It took so many years to buildup and once I got out of that, I
felt so good that when it camedown to time to go out drinking
with friends, instead of having16, 20 drinks, I'd have like
(17:43):
four at max because I didn'twant to feel that the next day.
And it's almost like I had togo through that to realize that.
But that's what I'm almosthearing you saying is that these
things that you know are goingto make you feel bad, you don't
want to do them anymore and youstart taking your health and
more priority, which I think issuch a cool thing.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Absolutely.
I mean, being a dentist andbeing an entrepreneur is so hard
and I really feel for thedentists that are out there that
don't have the space to processthese things.
Our neural pathways, we'readdicted to our past self, you
know, and you need, almost likea violent act to have change, to
have emotional memory in a way.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Well, talk about how you were kind of frustrated with
your practice life.
Can you explain to like howmuch was just making the
organizational changes at theoffice versus how much was
making changes in your healththat led you to this outlook and
where you're at today?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
I go back to the original core.
There's a quote that I live byand it's the one that is
response able is responsible.
It's something that my mentorhas shared with me, and so, as I
walk through the practice, Inoticed that I have the luxury
of really working on myself andhaving a lot of self-awareness
(18:54):
and knowing how I come off andknowing how the practice moves,
based on me being the bottleneck.
And as I start to develop thatsense of feeling good, I start
to really pay attention to howothers feel good, like what were
my last three interactions withevery single team member.
(19:15):
And then, as I was reflected,I'm like, especially at the
beginning, a lot of them werejust like criticism.
A lot of them was like thisneeds to be better.
You know, some sort ofmanagement conversation to
optimize something.
And as I was seeking feelinggood, or wanting to feel good
about my day-to-day, and as Iwas going through that journey,
(19:36):
I was thinking about my teammembers how can I make them feel
good day to day?
We started working on positivesevery single day and you start
to realize, like in our morninghuddles, where it's like you're
supposed to share a positive,some people will share negatives
, and it's like, huh, that's aninteresting observation, and so
focusing on that allowed me toask more questions, to help
(19:56):
people own their problems more.
Create an environment where theywant to do the work, versus
they're doing it because I toldthem to do it, because if I tell
them to do it, they're onlygoing to do the things that I
tell them to do, versus solveproblems that I didn't even say.
So, creating a true businessand becoming a true leader that
goes on the journey with my teamand allows them to have their
(20:20):
wins and I celebrate their winsand they can feel pride and get
connected to pride.
So for me, it was very muchlike the feelings side of things
, and once I focused on that, Ididn't have to do as much.
The practice naturally gotbetter.
You know, people solved theirown problems without coming to
(20:41):
me, and so I started to enjoythe whole thing more.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
It's intentionality.
I mean, it's like you'regetting very intentional about
creating the experience that youwant and I think we could all
learn a little bit from that.
But is there anything that youlook back like early in your
career, like from right when yougraduated, when you first
entered into practice ownership,that you kind of look back at
now and you're just like I justcan't believe I did that.
Speaker 2 (21:03):
I guess just the idea of like grinding it out I think
I was just so hardcore in like,if you want to be successful,
by your own definition you haveto sacrifice and you have to
suffer.
You're not supposed to enjoy.
And I think, as entrepreneurs,when you sacrifice, if you
(21:23):
really think about what you'resacrificing, you realize that
that sacrifice is truly notworth it.
And for me it was health.
For me it was that fulfillment.
But now that I'm a little bitolder now and I have just a
little bit more gray hairs, Ijust see that if you extrapolate
your life out into the future,to the 60, 70, 80, 90, 100,
(21:45):
whatever right Health starts tobecome the most important
investment.
And that sacrifice especiallyseeing patients and other
entrepreneurs sacrifice theirhealth it's like wow, that guy
didn't sleep for like threemonths and something's wrong.
You know like when are we goingto address these things?
And so, being hyper connectedto that and then looking back at
(22:09):
those days that I made thesacrifice, I just think there's
a better way.
Try to follow the fulfillmentpathway.
You can go through the processeven faster and enjoy the
process.
I think you could waste a lotof time going down the wrong
path, your own journey, whateverthat means.
(22:31):
So climb the right mountain,follow your heart, follow,
follow what feels good.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
That's great advice man Don't ignore it.
I love it.
So if people want to learn moreabout, like, how can I get
tested, how do I find out if mygut biome is all good, like talk
about that, where the listenerscan reach out to you there and
find out, get some help in thatregard.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, you can find us at guthormonecliniccom and send
us a message through thatplatform, my us a message
through that platform.
My email is dinhpeterdds atgmailcom.
You can email me.
I have a YouTube channel.
I have the Instagram channeltoo, if you want to look me up.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Awesome, That'll all be in the show notes listeners.
So, dude Peter, thanks so muchfor coming on.
Man, I think you've got so muchwisdom and it's been beneficial
for me to hear your story.
I mean, honestly, I can relateto so much of what you're saying
and I've never went down thisfunctional medicine hole before,
or at least not with myself andI'm interested to see what I
find.
But I think you've got just awealth of wisdom and I think
(23:31):
you've talked to a lot ofdentists today that are thinking
well, man, maybe I need to dosome things a little bit
differently now.
So thank you so much for comingon the podcast, man.
Appreciate it, You're welcome.
You know we talk a lot about practice growth on
this show, but today we're goingto lean into personal
development, because it's soeasy to feel drained and stuck
and just disconnected from ourwork or our team and, honestly,
from ourselves.
This is exactly where today'sguest, dr Peter Dinh, found
himself.
Not too long ago, he startedlooking at why is his energy so
(00:24):
low, why does work feel so heavy, and what was really behind his
burnout.
And what he found not onlyhelped him feel better, but it
completely changed how he leadsand works in his practice.
He's going to share all thatwith you today so that you can
get to the bottom of what mightbe causing you burnout, so you
can fix it and change your life.
You are listening to DentalPractice Heroes, where we help
(00:50):
you create and scale your dentalpractice so that you are no
longer tied to the chair.
I'm Dr Paul Etcheson, author oftwo books on dental practice
management, dental coach andowner of a $6 million group
practice in the suburbs ofChicago.
I want to teach you how to growand systematize your dental
practice so you can spend lesstime practicing and more time
enjoying a life that you love.
Let's get started.
Hey, welcome back to the DentalPractice Heroes podcast.
(01:15):
I'm your host.
Dr Paul Etcheson Got a veryinteresting guest on and man, we
got a cool topic today.
We're going to be talking abouthealth and functional medicine
and just being the best personthat you can be, because we
always want to be the best right.
That's why we're listening topodcasts.
I got a multi-practice owner, a2014 VCU graduate.
He is a health coach.
(01:36):
He's working with a functionalmedicine practice, does all
sorts of biohacking stuff.
Just happy to interview youtoday.
Welcome to the podcast, drPeter Dinh.
What's happening, peter?
How's it going?
Man?
Thanks for having me.
Yeah, dude, I'm excited.
I love this biohacking stuffand the more I read about it,
the cooler it is.
How did you get into not one,but two practices?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
It started in 2017 for me, and so bought my first
practice in 2017.
Had a lot of struggles at thebeginning.
I had a lot of guilt going intoday to day practice, just like
I felt like I wasn't doingenough and I just felt like I
was avoiding a lot of the hardwork and I couldn't put my
finger on it.
I always had things like focusissues.
(02:19):
Apparently, there's a lot ofcool things that you can measure
to figure out why that is, andso I just kept hitting a wall
and trying to grow my practice,and so my go-to was how do I
level up myself to grow mypractice?
And so I got into thebiohacking stuff.
I woke up at four o'clock, didall the things that you read
(02:40):
about cold showers, journaling,meditation, you name it
smoothies.
So I found out that my lowenergy and high guilt was
reduced when I did all thesethings.
My plan was if I optimizemyself, my team is happier, they
work harder and the practicegrows that way, and so, over
time, I bought the secondpractice.
(03:02):
I was like, oh, buying 10offices in 10 years, sell it,
roll it up Like that's the gameplan, right?
But I guess it kind of fits,let's just do this.
And so I bought that practiceand just I would run into the
willpower issue.
I would avoid like looking atmy numbers, I would avoid having
difficult conversations andthat started to build over time
(03:22):
and it was challenging to managemy team.
And so fast forward to thefuture, I met a person named
Alistair, someone that we sharea mutual friendship with and
gave me a lot of insights andadvice about how to optimize
myself.
So that kind of started thejourney of it all.
I realized that the journey of10 practices in 10 years was not
(03:43):
necessarily my dream goal.
So I created a lot of time.
I hired a bunch of associates,got myself out of the dental
chair and for about a year and ahalf two years I worked one day
a week and obviously duringthose times I didn't make a ton
of money but I had a lot of timeand so I really looked inwardly
.
I did lots of walks to reallytry to find out what I enjoyed
Freed up.
(04:03):
My wife did lots of walks toreally try to find out what I
enjoyed Freed up.
My wife my wife is an internalmedicine doctor and because I
had freedom, I helped her starther own journey of learning
about functional medicine, wherewe find the root causes of
diseases, and so, obviously, asshe gained her mastery of or
learning, rather, the beginningof her journey, I was one of her
first guinea pigs.
So we did a bunch of testing andwe found out that I was missing
(04:27):
a portion of the gene thatallows you to recycle dopamine
efficiently.
We found out that the speciesof bacteria that was in my gut
that I was lacking didn't allowme to produce dopamine very
efficiently.
We found out I had leaky gut,had some mild allergies, and so
as we started to dial in deeperand solve some of these issues,
(04:49):
like yeast overgrowth, forexample, it just got easier.
It just got way easier.
I was able to control myself alot more.
When I came home from work, Iwouldn't feel burnt out.
I would look forward to seeingmy family versus wanting to
avoid them.
So that's kind of like thestart of it all of me getting
into this whole field.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
But take me back to the time when you there's
something wrong, something'smissing.
I mean, you mentioned feelingguilty at your practice.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
I come from a heritage in the Asian culture,
the Vietnamese heritage of yougotta get age, you gotta work
hard, and so I always had thissense of guilt of not doing
enough.
And part of that also stemmedfrom my academic journey.
If you want to go back evenfurther, I got rejected to 39
dental schools.
Every academic test that I tookI had to take three times, so
(05:36):
that basically created a lot oftrauma for me in a way.
This idea that you can work atyour 100% and it's still not
enough, like that was, reminded,ingrained in me in high school
and while in dental school I wasfailing the first few classes.
So I was studying every secondof the day and I still was not
(05:57):
able to pass some of the classesat the beginning.
And so this idea that you cando everything in your power to
try to get to your goal, it'snot enough.
And so this idea that you cando everything in your power to
try to get to your goal, it'snot enough.
And so, just like inception,that idea was planted within me
during practice ownership You'renot doing enough.
Like you cannot fail, like thestakes are high, you have a
family to take care of.
Everyone's saying oh, if you'regoing to business ownership,
(06:21):
you're going to be a coldhearted capitalist, you're not
going to care about family, youshouldn't own a business.
So there's a lot of thingsriding on it, you know, and so
that guilt kind of stuck with me.
And over time you learn as anentrepreneur that you get
disconnected from your feelingsa little bit.
You kind of go down a pathwhere there wasn't a lot of
purpose for me.
I was disconnected to purpose,and so that's the root of it at
(06:44):
all.
And then you combine it withlow dopamine, low serotonin.
You don't have the positivereinforcement loop of like, oh,
I won this game, I feel good,let me keep going on that
journey.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Yeah, I mean, I could totally relate to that.
I feel like I did that for somany years and for me it was
like this workaholism and peopleare like man, how did you put
so much time in your practiceand I tell them, it just came
easy.
I was drawn to it Like I wasgetting those dopamine hits, but
at the same time I was likecompletely neglecting like all
the relationships in my life,you know, and when I had time
(07:20):
for those relationships, I wouldbe drawn back to the practice
because it was like it was mycomfort zone and it was like
what got me up in the morning.
Do you remember when you madethis transition and you started
pulling yourself out or startedadding associates?
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Yeah, I think it was.
I'm going on this journey andsome of my friends would ask me
why are you doing all this?
I'm doing this to create thisideal utopia of infinite money
and infinite time, right?
And one of my friends asked mewhat's stopping you from doing
(07:54):
that?
Now, it was really thatquestion of like you chose to go
on this journey to buy 10offices in 10 years.
You're not enjoying the journey, you don't know why you feel
obligated to do so and the goalthat you want.
This time factorair.
And he was just trying toconnect me to feelings, connect
(08:21):
me to what I do truly enjoy, andthat there exists another
option of enjoying the journey,even though you know we kind of
get into this like, ah, we'regoing to sacrifice ourselves, go
through the grind, it doesn'tmatter about the journey, let's
just, it matters about the endpoint.
And so I just wanted toexperiment, I wanted to see what
that was like, and so, as I gotinto it more and more, the
(08:42):
dental practice slowly becamenot only like an asset that I'm
working on, but it became Ireframed it for myself,
unintentionally, really as likethis dojo of a place where I can
learn leadership, how to takecare of myself to the highest
degree, to do public speakingwhere I can learn numbers.
And once I reframed it likethat for myself, things just got
(09:03):
easier.
I got started to enjoy thingsmore.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
It's amazing man.
I love that, and it's such agood mindset shift for so many
dentists that are just feelinglike they're grinding all day
and wondering why it's notcoming easy to them.
When I was in dental school, Idid really good in undergrad and
it came fairly easy to them.
When I was in dental school, Idid really good in undergrad and
it came fairly easy to me.
But when I got to dental school, I was going home studying
morning till night and I wasbarely pulling C's and D's.
(09:28):
It was as good as I could doand there was so much identity
crisis wrapped into that.
Maybe I'm not good enough to behere.
I'd never framed it as like,hey, I'm learning to struggle,
I'm learning to be resilient.
Now talk about.
What is your practice life likenow?
Because I want to talk aboutthe biohacking and all the stuff
that you found out as youstarted to work on yourself.
(09:50):
But what does it look like nowat the practice for you?
How involved are you?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
We recently expanded one of the practices from 5 Ops
to 12 Ops.
Now I'm at two to three days aweek, kind of want to ramp it up
.
We made large investments tokind of get to that next level
of practice ownership, to have alittle bit more associates, to
move away from risk.
You know, with the newassociate they take on a lot of
(10:15):
the fillings.
You start doing the complexstuff.
But now as we're ramping up Ido about two, three days a week
and I'm looking to probablyscale back to one day a week as
I make the transition over tothe functional medicine practice
a little bit more.
I just love the biohacking stuff.
I love solving those problemsbecause we're finding out
there's so many people thattolerate their health condition
(10:38):
and I was one of those peopleand I didn't know what was
possible, how I could feelthings like autoimmune diseases.
Conventional medicine doesn'thave an answer for it, and so we
typically fix low energy, sleepissues, anxiety in a mood
imbalance and then gut problemsand I had all of those things
(10:58):
and so solving those problemsonly leveled up my own life, but
it really resonates with me.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Yeah, and these are issues that everybody's going
through.
So talk to me about how do youguys make the assessment, what
is this process and what kind ofthings are you looking for?
Enlighten me on this new typeof medicine, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
So my wife owns the Helamed Functional Medicine
Practice, so she's been veryfortunate to be able to work
from home and basically send allthe testing to people's homes.
So, for example, if you havelow energy, right, there's
different kinds of possibilitiesthat you have low energy.
Do you break down proteinscorrectly?
(11:38):
And we don't really look atthese things.
How efficient do you break downyour fats?
Is it your interpretation ofenergy that is a little bit off?
Aka, you feel like you have lowenergy but really you just have
low dopamine.
You can't get yourself to dothe things that are hard, and so
there are different tests thattest for that.
So, basically, stool testing,urine tests, blood tests help us
find these things, the normaltests that test for that.
(12:00):
So, basically, stool testing,urine tests, blood tests, help
us find these things, the normaltests that we all know about.
They're so outdated.
There's super new tests outthere and we're just not taking
advantage of it.
So, yeah, I was in one ofFaustine's masterminds.
Faustine, my wife, one of hermasterminds and I was blown away
that, in the cohort of theirorganization of functional
(12:20):
medicine doctors, 70% of peoplethat report higher than normal
anxiety is due to yeastovergrowth.
And I was like wait, I musthave heard this wrong.
I'm not a numbers guy, but Iknow numbers enough to be like
70% is an absurdly high number,and so if we believe that to be
(12:40):
true, or if it's possible thatthat is true, the way we're
practicing medicine as a countryis very incorrect.
A lot of it is diet andnutrition, and so
philosophically, in thefunctional medicine world,
there's two ways to at leastfrom my lens there's two ways
you solve disease.
One you optimize the body'shealing potential, or you find
(13:03):
out the root causes of disease,and so with these tests you
basically get a lot of thebiochemical reactions that go
through the body.
So, for instance, if you're notable to connect to fulfillment,
you don't feel happiness a lot,you always feel like you're
crashing.
You're looking at themetabolites of serotonin.
So once you have the guide map,it's kind of a clear cut
pathway to how to help yourself,and so a lot of it's diet.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Give me an example of something that you were
experiencing and what you foundout and how you treated it and
how you feel now.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
So we did the oats test.
For me it's called organicacids test.
Before that I shared with youthat I had focus issues right.
I didn't know at the time.
I also my operating system wasthat of obligation.
I didn't operate under desire,right.
If I wanted to do something, itwas really hard to get the
thing done right.
But if, like, things werehitting the fan and I had to get
(13:56):
it done, I got it done andthat's just the way I assumed my
normal function and so I wentthrough the testing.
One of the tests was the Oatestest.
We found out that I had yeastovergrowth.
I had leaky gut.
There's a test that allows youto measure that by measuring the
zonulin levels.
Zonulin is a component of theinner lining of the gut and so
if you're shedding a lot ofinner lining of the gut Test
(14:18):
shows high.
That's not good.
You have leaky gut.
Okay, I was tired, but I didn'tknow I was tired.
I only know that now because Ihave more energy.
Then I also had dysbiosis, whichis I had a lot of bat bacteria
and I was like missing like nineof the 12 or something like
that Good gut bacteria in my gut, and so some of the gut
bacteria recycles things likeyour neurotransmitters or
(14:41):
estrogen, like, imagine if youdidn't have that and you're a
woman, for example.
Like how much would that affectyou?
And so, within that process, Itook a number of supplements.
I went on a kill protocol tokill the yeast.
In order to kill the yeast forme, we went under a high
concentration of garlic extractand a high concentration of
(15:04):
oregano extract, because thoseare natural killers.
And so philosophically at least, the way my wife likes to
practice functional medicine,she recommends things that the
body naturally breaks down.
Once the kill protocol was done,I immediately noticed after
three weeks that and it soundslike really woo-woo-y stuff, but
(15:24):
color's more vibrant I startedto have a better connection.
It's going to sound weird.
Hopefully I'm not crazy.
I had a better connection to myinner voice, so self-awareness
started to tick up.
I noticed that when I got home.
Wow, I really look forward toseeing my family now and I can
just see them and be fine.
I used to.
(15:45):
Whenever I have social events,it's very stimulating for me.
I'm actually like an introvert.
I noticed that I could have asocial event and then the next
day I could be very productive,and so things like that were
what showed up for me, and so itwas like a sixth sense kind of
turned on.
I started to enjoy my hobbies alittle bit more.
I started to drop bad habits.
(16:06):
It's almost like my emotionsdidn't have memories in a way.
It's kind of hard to explain.
If you don't have a strongconnection to your emotions, you
don't remember the bad thingsthat keep coming up for you.
So like negative habits, right,like bad habits, if you're
really connected to it, yourealize, okay, if I drink that
drink, I'll feel crummy the nextday.
(16:26):
If I feel crummy the next day,I won't be productive, I can't
take care of my family, right.
For me that entire loop wasnon-existent, and so now that I
had more self-awareness,stronger connection to
fulfillment, I'd be like huh, ifI drink that drink, I know that
feeling of feeling bad.
I don't want that feeling offeeling bad.
(16:48):
Therefore I'm not going to dothat thing because it feels bad.
So that's what I mean by myemotions didn't have memories in
a way, like that was.
It's all kind of trippy.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
I feel like there's a lot of to behavior, that it's
like we all have free will.
You know, and I think mostpeople would agree that we have
free will, but I think there'sso much physiologically
happening that really kind ofdistracts from that free will.
But I will tell you, as somebodywho was a very heavy drinker
for a very long time is aroundman, maybe four or five years
ago I got to a point where Irealized I was just getting
(17:21):
really blackout a lot and when Islowed it down I was like I got
to do something.
I didn't completely abstain, Idid for a little bit.
It took so many years to buildup and once I got out of that, I
felt so good that when it camedown to time to go out drinking
with friends, instead of having16, 20 drinks, I'd have like
(17:43):
four at max because I didn'twant to feel that the next day.
And it's almost like I had togo through that to realize that.
But that's what I'm almosthearing you saying is that these
things that you know are goingto make you feel bad, you don't
want to do them anymore and youstart taking your health and
more priority, which I think issuch a cool thing.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Absolutely.
I mean, being a dentist andbeing an entrepreneur is so hard
and I really feel for thedentists that are out there that
don't have the space to processthese things.
Our neural pathways, we'readdicted to our past self, you
know, and you need, almost likea violent act to have change, to
have emotional memory in a way.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Well, talk about how you were kind of frustrated with
your practice life.
Can you explain to like howmuch was just making the
organizational changes at theoffice versus how much was
making changes in your healththat led you to this outlook and
where you're at today?
Speaker 2 (18:33):
I go back to the original core.
There's a quote that I live byand it's the one that is
response able is responsible.
It's something that my mentorhas shared with me, and so, as I
walk through the practice, Inoticed that I have the luxury
of really working on myself andhaving a lot of self-awareness
(18:54):
and knowing how I come off andknowing how the practice moves,
based on me being the bottleneck.
And as I start to develop thatsense of feeling good, I start
to really pay attention to howothers feel good, like what were
my last three interactions withevery single team member.
(19:15):
And then, as I was reflected,I'm like, especially at the
beginning, a lot of them werejust like criticism.
A lot of them was like thisneeds to be better.
You know, some sort ofmanagement conversation to
optimize something.
And as I was seeking feelinggood, or wanting to feel good
about my day-to-day, and as Iwas going through that journey,
(19:36):
I was thinking about my teammembers how can I make them feel
good day to day?
We started working on positivesevery single day and you start
to realize, like in our morninghuddles, where it's like you're
supposed to share a positive,some people will share negatives
, and it's like, huh, that's aninteresting observation, and so
focusing on that allowed me toask more questions, to help
(19:56):
people own their problems more.
Create an environment where theywant to do the work, versus
they're doing it because I toldthem to do it, because if I tell
them to do it, they're onlygoing to do the things that I
tell them to do, versus solveproblems that I didn't even say.
So, creating a true businessand becoming a true leader that
goes on the journey with my teamand allows them to have their
(20:20):
wins and I celebrate their winsand they can feel pride and get
connected to pride.
So for me, it was very muchlike the feelings side of things
, and once I focused on that, Ididn't have to do as much.
The practice naturally gotbetter.
You know, people solved theirown problems without coming to
(20:41):
me, and so I started to enjoythe whole thing more.
Speaker 1 (20:44):
It's intentionality.
I mean, it's like you'regetting very intentional about
creating the experience that youwant and I think we could all
learn a little bit from that.
But is there anything that youlook back like early in your
career, like from right when yougraduated, when you first
entered into practice ownership,that you kind of look back at
now and you're just like I justcan't believe I did that.
Speaker 2 (21:03):
I guess just the idea of like grinding it out I think
I was just so hardcore in like,if you want to be successful,
by your own definition you haveto sacrifice and you have to
suffer.
You're not supposed to enjoy.
And I think, as entrepreneurs,when you sacrifice, if you
(21:23):
really think about what you'resacrificing, you realize that
that sacrifice is truly notworth it.
And for me it was health.
For me it was that fulfillment.
But now that I'm a little bitolder now and I have just a
little bit more gray hairs, Ijust see that if you extrapolate
your life out into the future,to the 60, 70, 80, 90, 100,
(21:45):
whatever right Health starts tobecome the most important
investment.
And that sacrifice especiallyseeing patients and other
entrepreneurs sacrifice theirhealth it's like wow, that guy
didn't sleep for like threemonths and something's wrong.
You know like when are we goingto address these things?
And so, being hyper connectedto that and then looking back at
(22:09):
those days that I made thesacrifice, I just think there's
a better way.
Try to follow the fulfillmentpathway.
You can go through the processeven faster and enjoy the
process.
I think you could waste a lotof time going down the wrong
path, your own journey, whateverthat means.
(22:31):
So climb the right mountain,follow your heart, follow,
follow what feels good.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
That's great advice man Don't ignore it.
I love it.
So if people want to learn moreabout, like, how can I get
tested, how do I find out if mygut biome is all good, like talk
about that, where the listenerscan reach out to you there and
find out, get some help in thatregard.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, you can find us at guthormonecliniccom and send
us a message through thatplatform, my us a message
through that platform.
My email is dinhpeterdds atgmailcom.
You can email me.
I have a YouTube channel.
I have the Instagram channeltoo, if you want to look me up.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Awesome, That'll all be in the show notes listeners.
So, dude Peter, thanks so muchfor coming on.
Man, I think you've got so muchwisdom and it's been beneficial
for me to hear your story.
I mean, honestly, I can relateto so much of what you're saying
and I've never went down thisfunctional medicine hole before,
or at least not with myself andI'm interested to see what I
find.
But I think you've got just awealth of wisdom and I think
(23:31):
you've talked to a lot ofdentists today that are thinking
well, man, maybe I need to dosome things a little bit
differently now.
So thank you so much for comingon the podcast, man.
Appreciate it, You're welcome.
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