Will Power
Being a physical therapy entrepreneur can be unbelievably challenging at times. From patient care, to running the businesses, to balancing a family, it’s no wonder many entrepreneurs feel overwhelmed and burned out. Each Tuesday, join Will Humphreys, a retired private practice owner and medical entrepreneur, as he introduces game-changing leadership concepts and interviews other successful leaders in healthcare. If you want to start, scale, or sell your outpatient physical therapy business, this is for you. Together not only can we increase our income, impact and freedom, we can build the largest network of healthcare leaders in the world at the Will Power Podcast.
Will Power
Unearthing Your Purpose For Profits & Freedom - Solo
Unearthing Your Purpose: Unlocking Happiness and Success
Could your unique superpower be the key to happiness and success? In this episode, "Unearthing Your Purpose," we explore how reflecting on your strengths and talents—often highlighted by those around you—can help uncover a purpose that guides your life and makes a meaningful impact. By examining past experiences, especially moments of pain, we reveal hidden truths that shape your purpose and give deeper meaning to your existence.
Key Takeaways:
- Discover your superpower to uncover your purpose
- Reflect on strengths and past experiences for guidance
- Create a purpose statement that resonates deeply
- Transform company culture and attract the right people with purpose-driven leadership
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Thank you for tuning in to today's episode, rockstar. Today we're talking about your purpose. We're going to talk about how to define it, understand it, because what you'll see as you start to lean into this thing that you have is that you have a superpower. You have a gift, something that no one else has Truly We've done studies on this. They have the best coaches. Talk all about the unique personal capability that you have in serving others and making the world a better place.
Speaker 1:The biggest problem that we find is that most people don't believe it's possible or they simply don't spend enough time developing it or understanding it. There's that whole mindset that we should look at our weaknesses and improve those, but the best people don't work on developing their weaknesses. They spend time living in their strength. But to live in your strength, you have to know what it is first. So I ask you again what is your superpower? Here's an exercise I would like for you to do. I would like for you to spend some time with the people that know you best friends and family and, if you can be with them in person, but if not, send them an email and let them know that you're doing some self-work and that you would like to know what they believe are your greatest attributes and talents. This is a really powerful exercise that one of my coaches took me through and it helped me understand something about myself that I couldn't see through the trees right Like. We need other people and their perspective to help frame what it is that we do really well in life. And when we get that feedback, it creates this unbelievable connection that we could have with these people who know us and love us the most, connection that we could have with these people who know us and love us the most. And if you're wanting extra credit on this assignment, ask them, after they share that with you, to tell you what it is. That's the hardest thing about living or knowing you. You have to be brave to do this one, but this is where the real value is, because as people start to share with you maybe some of those challenges from a place of love and connection, and if you're really open to receiving it, I'm telling you the world is yours, but today we're focusing on those great strengths.
Speaker 1:You have your superpower, because inherently baked into that superpower that you have, that no one else has, is your purpose. What is a purpose? A purpose is a belief. It's a statement. What is a purpose? A purpose is a belief. It's a statement. It's like a North Star that helps drive the reason why we exist. That's going to vary person to person, but in the end we're all connected in the fact that all of our purposes are meant to help others. But there's a flavor of it that's completely unique to you, that only you have, that you might need some help in getting understanding from people around you, but that purpose is going to serve you in a way that is hard to describe, other than saying, after spending 10,000 hours and coaching people over the years, it is the lack of clarity on people's purpose and superpower that oftentimes makes them stuck.
Speaker 1:Whether people are struggling in a business because they don't know how to recruit or how they can connect that balance of home and work, it's because they're lost on their purpose. They're confused as to why they exist. When people are clear as to why they exist and they know their superpowers, they intentionally build their worlds around themselves to hyper-focus on the thing that they do, a God-given trait that no one else has, that you can develop to serve the world. So, as you're thinking about your purpose, we're going to translate this more into different environments where purposes matter Remember organizational structures is like gravity. What benefits one type of organization benefits all, and so this can be true for a company. A company should have a purpose statement, and we're going to spend some time on that. A family should have its own purpose statement, and a purpose statement helps guide the children and the parents in helping create that North Star. It's that line in the sand that they believe in, that helps them make decisions, but also gives them that peace and clarity as to why they exist. It forms connection, and so, as we start to understand this concept of purpose, I want you to sit back and just be in curiosity around it. It's not a destination, it's a journey that we learn from as we continue to grow, and it's a living statement. It's something that will evolve over time.
Speaker 1:So, as we get into this, just don't worry about going anywhere today in this podcast. Just stay with me. Be with me in this space of what is it that makes me special? So we can't start this process together, rockstar, until I tell you something, and I need you to really believe it you matter, like you, matter you as an individual. Your existence matters to so many. I've had the experience of having people that I love really question whether or not they matter and even consider taking their own lives, and what's amazing about that is the confusion that people have on the impact they make in the lives around them. So the fact that you're even listening to this is an indication that you're a person who cares about the impact you make. So just lean into this truth that you matter. What you do matters, what you struggle with matters. It's like it's really important, and if you can believe that, if you can really lean into that, then maybe, just maybe, you have something special to give the world that no one else has.
Speaker 1:So when we're looking for our purpose as an individual or a company or a family, where do we start looking? Well, it's a story. We want to always begin with our past, and not just our past, but our past. Pain usually is the best place to start in unearthing experiences that have defined our existence and give us the purpose of why we exist on this earth. So, for example, in my world, I look backwards and I see a couple of key moments of pain that helped define my purpose. The first that I think of was a mountain climbing accident I had as a teenager. I was climbing 50 feet in the air without ropes and fell Five stories of a building, broke both arms, both legs, 21 bones in my body. I had a series of surgeries. I had a whole number of just painful physical and emotional experiences that occurred around that.
Speaker 1:But I will never forget the day after my weeks in the hospital being in my living room that had been converted into a bedroom, seeing Connie Clemons walk in the door. Connie Clemons was my physical therapist, my first physical therapist. She came bounding in. I thought she was super old. She was in her mid-40s I'm older now than she was but she had this loud outfit on with colors, five foot, nothing, super energetic, the biggest ball of light in hope you've ever seen, and I hated her guts instantly. She came in and just loved me. But I had been so depressed, so down, so down on my pain that when she came in I just didn't want that kind of light around me. But she put a gait belt on me and stood me up for the first time and loved me. She cried when I walked and answered the door for the first time months later in my platform walker. This woman did something that showed me how we, as individuals, can be the light and hope in the lives of others when they're in the darkest nights of their lives. So much so that that's why I became a physical therapist. And so, as I've looked backwards in time for a while, my personal purpose was to be the light in the lives of others.
Speaker 1:Remember, we don't want to overcomplicate these phrases that we develop. It's the story of our past, usually our past pain, that gives those phrases meaning. It's our belief in those statements that matter most. And it doesn't have to sound cool. I would just ask you to create something like a short phrase, even if it doesn't fully define your purpose or your superpower, but something that you just feel emotionally connected with. So for me, for the longest time, it was to be the light in the lives of others. Over time, that evolved into being to uplifting others through service and humor, and now, currently, my purpose is to build and strengthen families, which I could go into, but ultimately, that phrase is what matters, because when I look at that phrase, it is my guiding star.
Speaker 1:That phrase later became my company purpose when I owned a physical therapy practice. I wanted my physical therapists and everyone in the team to know that every single person walking in that door was going through some sort of dark night in their lives. And so, from a branding perspective, we actually built on that. We created a sun logo, we made sure that we told the front desk that their job was to be the light and hope in the lives of others. Whether that's the guy bringing in the water or a patient in severe pain, it didn't matter, and you can only imagine what that did to our company culture. And it didn't matter and you can only imagine what that did to our company culture. But it started with my purpose, understanding why I existed. And then it evolved into the organizational structure at work. And then my journey took an interesting turn when I started recognizing the fact that purpose is like gravity, and so we started defining our family purpose. And our family purpose is to go, fight, win, go fight, win stands for something. There's a whole story behind that I'll share in a different podcast, but in my case, with my wife, that phrase means something to us that we can share the story as to why we created that language around our purpose, because in the end, it's the story around the purpose that draws people in.
Speaker 1:So create a purpose statement for yourself first, something that you believe was created as a result of probably a past negative experience, something you care about passionately, something that is a line in the sand for you, and start writing it down. Put it somewhere on a mirror, anywhere you can, to help you remember. I have my personal statements written out on a Google Doc and I review that once a month. I have a few things on there as well, but ultimately, in a personal world, we just don't want to forget our purpose because once that happens, we start losing our way. From a company's perspective, if we don't have it clearly defined and here's how you know if you have a clearly defined rock star perspective, if we don't have it clearly defined and here's how you know if you have a clearly defined rock star, if your company has a company purpose and no one can remember it offhand, you've got some work to do and that's okay. Like there's so much confusion around, like mission statements versus purpose statements, don't worry about mission statements and if you've created one great, keep it.
Speaker 1:Just remember short, powerful phrases connected to a story as to why you started the business or started a family or became a leader in a business. Those phrases need to be short, memorable and tied to an experience that can be felt in a story. So that's what I want you to work on is developing that. Now, why does that matter from a company perspective? Very simply put most, every single person I've coached who gets stuck is because they're not clear on this thing.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about recruiting, for example. If you're a business owner and you're trying to develop a team and you're trying to recruit people to join you, people want to know why it matters to them. Why should they join your company? That's the number one question we have to answer when we're trying to recruit a dream team. Why would someone even want to join your team, much less dedicate their life to building your vision? Well, we have to be clear for what we stand for, because usually what we see in job ads are statements like come join our fast-growing, fun-paced environment. Yeah, like what is that? But what if someone knew who they stood for and said our company's purpose is to be the light and hope in the lives of others.
Speaker 1:We are looking for individuals who truly want to meet people in the darkest nights of their lives and not just help them physically, but emotionally and in every way we can. The language and the emotional impact is completely uncomparable. We are able to derive the language necessary in all of our messaging, not just to like recruiting, but generating new clients. No matter what our business is, no matter what we're trying to create by generating the language that you can feel, because it's based in a story of truth that we've earned, people will be attracted to it who are meant to be good fits. And what's cool about that from a recruiting or new client perspective, is that the more clear we are in our company purpose, the more it will detract people who aren't good fits. You know someone who's looking to better themselves and not really dedicate their life to a team isn't going to be attracted to that statement. They'll be turned off by it because they know that there's going to be a strong stance that they're going to be resisting against.
Speaker 1:So the idea of company purpose is so vital for us and I want you to think about it anatomically for those of you who are healthcare providers. When we think about our human bodies, the purpose is just like the heart. When we think about our human bodies, the purpose is just like the heart, emotionally and physiologically. Emotionally, we correlate the heart with everything we feel in life, right? No, that's just like the company purpose. But think about it anatomically. Our hearts exist to keep us alive. It beats, but it doesn't always beat the same. So when we're going through a physical challenge we're hiking up a mountain, lifting weights, going for a run what does our heart do? It beats faster, giving that oxygen that our body so desperately needs in those moments where they're being taxed. The same happens in a company. Companies that are growing are like a physical body that's being challenged. There's going to be additional stress involved on the people, on the leadership team, and what we need more than ever in those moments is more oxygen.
Speaker 1:In this case, our company purpose needs to be reiterated more frequently. It needs to be created in our company in a way where it's actually being lived, where people can recite it off the top of their heads. So how do they do that? Well, the first thing I always recommend to companies and families is to create that company purpose and first explain it to the team and have them buy into it, have them give their thoughts as to why it's important or not. But after the initial meeting, it's important to bring it up frequently. In every company I own.
Speaker 1:We have a different purpose and that purpose gets discussed in our weekly meeting every single week, and it doesn't take a long time. We're talking like a two-minute, sometimes off-the-cuff, discussion that another person leads out on every time as to why their company exists. So in my virtual rockstar company, where we hire virtual assistants for team members, that is correlated to my personal purpose, which is to build and strengthen families, and so someone will share hey, I believe in our company purpose because we're hiring people overseas to help their families and better the lives of the people that they're working with. But every week we just talk about it just for a couple of minutes to keep it top of mind. But every week we just talk about it just for a couple of minutes to keep it top of mind.
Speaker 1:Because if we bring up metrics and statistics as the main focus of all of our meetings very quickly, especially in healthcare companies, it starts to feel like a statistics push and that feels, especially to healthcare providers, like it's a money grab. That's a common misconception, because healthcare providers in general do not have a healthy way of thinking about money. To begin with, they don't understand its functional role unless you're an owner or a leader. So it's so important to always bring up purpose as the one side of the coin, and then we talk about metrics and money on the other side of the coin. They are two sides of the same coin. Purpose is the why we exist, money and metrics are the what, how we measure our execution on our purpose. And so that explanation, that realization every week helps keep things top of mind and keeps them connected, keeps them retained in the company so that they want to continue to work with you and with the team, because they start working for something that's bigger than them. Now, that's just the beginning.
Speaker 1:Other things you can do, one of my favorite things we ever did as a company, and I will tell you when we had the right people, these ideas I can't tell you how much of them came from me or somebody else, because it was almost this mind meld that I got to experience for a few years of just amazing alignment. But we had this cool charity that we sponsored called Feed my Starving Children here in Arizona, and what we decided to do, since our company purpose was to be the light and hope in the lives of others, we created in each clinic we had four locations, there was a wall dedicated to light and hope, recognition and what people would do. It started really simply with sticky notes. If someone on the team or a patient or the guy bringing in the water saw someone living that value or that purpose of being the light and hope in the lives of others, they would write it down. So you'd see things like my coworker, john, went and got me lunch when I was doing my notes. He was my light and hope today and they would stick it on the wall lunch when I was doing my notes. He was my light and hope today and I would stick it on the wall. Now you can imagine over time how people would get recognized and it was put on the wall.
Speaker 1:Things started evolving. The sticky notes went from being those square neon colored ones to being custom designed ones or just even thematic ones that, like over Thanksgiving, it was like turkeys and those types of things, and then, on the wall, some of the clinics went ahead and started making shapes with their sticky notes. I remember this one clinic in Maricopa, the city. We had this massive T-Rex dinosaur made out of sticky notes that took over this huge wall and patients got into it. Patients would write things down. Oh my gosh, my husband brought me to my therapy session. Stick it on the wall. It was so energizing. It was almost like this culture of just constantly recognizing and being grateful for things that were happening around us. And what we did is, at the end of the year, we tallied up all the sticky notes, and every sticky note was a dollar that our company would donate to Feed my Starving Children. And then we'd go down to this packing center that they had and we would pack meals on a Saturday morning for half the day and we'd do this official check, handover to the members of that organization and we took pictures of it and we celebrated it and we lived it.
Speaker 1:And so there's so many endless ways to develop your company purpose. And here's the best part, it's not work. This is why you became whatever it is that you've become in life that you love, whether it's professional, whether it's personal right, whether it's a parent. When we are living in our purpose and we're developing it, it's the coolest thing because it's always fun. It's just fun, because it's not work. That's the heart set of what we do. So allowing ourselves to develop. That gives us an advantage over everybody else who are trying to grind through this life. When we can find the joy through our purpose and stating it, living it, inspiring others to do it, we have an advantage that no one else could ever even dream of, because we're clear as to why we exist and, like I said, for everyone, in the end it's for other people.
Speaker 1:It's hard to feel bad about my life when I'm busy serving in the lives of others and I feel like I'm making a difference, because if I can see the difference in the lives of others, then maybe, just maybe, I matter. Maybe, just maybe my company is more than just a jail cell for my job. Maybe it's an opportunity to make a difference. So, rockstars, I hope that you'll take this podcast episode into your heart. You'll spend some time creating that company purpose. No matter where you're listening to this, whether it's on YouTube or a podcast channel, throw it in the notes.
Speaker 1:What you think your purpose is, what your company purpose is, what your family purpose is, put it in there. I will look at every single one and I will comment on it, because in the end, whether we're starting a new business or we're halfway through life or at the end of our life and we're trying to make sense of everything, it always comes back to our purpose. Our past pain has given us the soil from which we can unearth our purpose and that is where we determine our path. So it goes pain, purpose path. Thank you so much, rockstars, for being with me, especially to the end of this episode. I really appreciate you and, whatever your purpose is, I hope that we continue to align our common purposes to make this place the best it can be.
Speaker 1:Thanks for tuning in. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to today's episode. As a thank you, I have a gift In today's show notes. There's a link for you to join the Stress-Free PT newsletter. This is a comedy newsletter for anyone who works in healthcare and of course we're going to have comedy bits. We're going to have inspirational stories, leadership bits. It's going to be a weekly newsletter just to lighten your week, to help you do what you love with more passion. So click that link below and join that newsletter and we'll see you in our next episode.
