I was listening to Everything Now by Arcade Fire and it prompted me to put down a few words about the struggles and the difficulties we find ourselves in, trying to be all things to all men.
Last week at the practice was an extraordinary week for lots and lots of reasons and too many to name here but lets focus on Thursday and Friday for the moment.
On Thursday Andy (Legg) provided an FP1 immediate full upper arch implant reconstruction which I know is a technical term and some dentists will understand this but it’s an area and a direction of travel for us in the practice (for Andy) which will break new ground and elevate him further into the realms of the expert in the immediate full arch reconstruction arena.
On Friday we had a new clinician start at the practice, my long-term friend and colleague Alex Jones.
Alex provided our remedial treatment case where he removed 12? Dental implants? From a patient who saw me 8 years ago looking for upper and lower fixed restorations who then went to Montenegro to have ‘experimental’ implants placed and returned to us to have them all taken out and then to have further implants placed and be reconstructed on the same day.
The before and after pictures of that case are quite extraordinary but then Andy and Alex have lots of before and after pictures of cases that are quite extraordinary.
And so, from my seat upstairs in the office on those days I watch and think ‘that should be me’!
And that’s fine, I’m 50 next year and I could dedicate the next 10 years of my life to become an Andy Legg or an Alex Jones, improving my knowledge of restorative dentistry and my practical skills in that area. Massively refine in my understanding of upper and lower fixed implant occlusion and reconstruction and everything that goes with this from the planning stages to the dealing with the complication stages and the psychological trauma of being the surgeon and the managing of the team through procedures which are 6, 8, 10 hours long.
And that’s fine, let's go in that direction.
But wait.
Ideally at the practice we would increase our capacity in clear aligners and straightforward orthodontics so, why don’t I just spend the next 10 years doing that because there’s no doubt that I could go on plenty of courses, speak to plenty of colleagues and at least adopt some basic skill in that area to allow me to help the practice set-up.
But, hang on though, perhaps I should just sit in on more of Jason Smithson’s composite courses and be better at that and then I can help with the composite restorations in the practice and much more of the aesthetic work that we do.
Hang on a minute, what about ceramic restorative restoration as an excellent area to be in and I could work with other clinicians in the practice and Orthodontics and composite technology and implant dentistry and apply that for the next 10 years too.
Oh sh*t, I’m running out of time.
No sh*t, I ran out of time a long time ago.
I meet many people now in my business who want to be experts in all of the above areas and in fact, sadly, quite a few who claim to be.
I suppose it’s possible for an extraordinary and exceptional individual to be really, really good at all of these areas but if they were, how on earth would they be able to run an organisation?
If they were able to do all of those things, how would they be able to maintain their health and even if they did all of those things would they be able to sustain any form of significant relationship with another person?
And imagine if they had children!
Society dictates that we should claim and strive to be the best in all areas of our life but that is of course a fallacy of complete impossibility.
Understanding that everything and everything now is impossible must be the first step we all take to contentment and happiness (P.S. the answer to the riddle, as always, is collaboration).
Blog Post Number - 2828
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