Permission to Heal Episode #69 - A Conversation with Sabrina Runbeck about Retraining Your Brain

Sabrina Runbeck - the Queen of Performance and Productivity
Retrain Your Brain to Skyrocket Your Profitability and Productivity
International Peak Performance Speaker

Sabrina Runbeck, MPH, MHS, PA-C is a Cardiothoracic Surgery Physician Associate (PA) with more than 10 years of experience in psychology, public health, and neuroscience. After overcoming burnout and feeling stuck in a career that drained her, she became an International Peak Performance Keynote Speaker who empowers ambitious health practice owners to get back 10 hours of freedom per week and increase their team’s productivity. 

Her clients stop having endless to-do lists, constantly putting out fires, or are not able to move steadily forward. She is still practicing surgically and empowering other healthcare leaders to have a double win in both work and life.

Sabrina hosts the Powerful and Passionate Healthcare, Professionals Podcast and is an international bestselling author of the book, Asian Women Who BossUp: Secrets From Women Who Are Forging Their Own Path and Thriving. Women Who Boss Up .

Connect with Sabrina
Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Podcast, and Medium. 

 
Connect with Marci

·       Website, Patreon, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Facebook Group.

·       Permission to Heal on YouTube.

·       Permission to Land  (memoir) - Hardcover, Paperback, eBook, audiobook 

-      Permission to Land: Personal Transformation Through Writing

Permission to Heal Bookshop - Buy books from the episodes & support independent bookstores. 

Permission to Heal is a passion of mine.  I need your help to bring more inspirational episodes to the world; please consider becoming a patron through PATREON. You get perks & the contentment knowing you are helping get PTH out to the people who need it.  

Transcript

Hello everyone. And welcome to permission to heal. I am Marci Brockman, and I am thrilled that you were here in today's episode. I have a conversation with a lovely young woman named Sabrina Runbeck. Sabrina is a cardiothoracic surgery physician associate with more than 10 years of experience in psychology, public health and neuropsych. As well as cardiothoracic surgery, she actually will have her hands inside a patient's chest cavity after overcoming burnout from practicing medicine and feeling stuck in a career that she loved, but drained her. She became an international peak performance keynote speaker who empowers ambitious health practice owners to get back 10 hours of freedom per week and increase their team's productivity. 

[00:00:49] Our clients stop having endless. It's constantly putting out fires and an inability to move steadily forward. She is still practicing surgically and empowering other healthcare leaders to have a double win in both her work and life. And she has been given the nickname queen of performance and productivity. 

[00:01:11] Co-written a book a few years ago called "Asian women who boss up secrets from women who are forging their own path and thriving." And she has two or three other books in the pipeline coming very soon. She gave us a little bit of a little teaser about that. She is the host of the "powerful and passionate healthcare professionals podcast" that runs every week and that she talks to a healthcare professional. About burnout and productivity and performance management and so on. So she's just got a lot of really tangible things to say that are not just limited to medical professionals. I think that anybody who works really hard at what they do and takes a lot of meaning and so on. Tends to listen. We tend to work a little too hard. 

[00:02:07] I think that a big problem that we struggle with in 2022 is life work balance. I think when we were all home or the majority of the country was home during lockdown of the COVID-19 epidemic pandemic, we kind of reprioritized our things a little bit, realizing that we really do need more. Self-care time, more peaceful downtime with our families more. More non-work time to enjoy our human to human connections and the things that bring us peace and joy. And that's where Sabrina and her very no-nonsense wisdom come in. So join us and you can retrain your brain to skyrocket your productivity and your enjoyment of life. 

[00:02:55] Thanks so much.

[00:00:00] Marci Brockmann: Welcome Sabrina. So excited to have you here. Thanks  

[00:00:04] Sabrina Runbeck: Marcy for having me. I know you're having a busy day. Everyone else's was listening to us. It's like hectic life, but we're here because we want it to be a way to enjoy ourselves and that's all that matters. 

[00:00:16] Marci Brockmann: Absolutely. Absolutely. And although I think we slightly come at this from different directions. But although maybe not. We are both talking about mental health and wellness and peace, adding peace and calm and control into our lives so that we can live the best, most meaningful, joyful life that people can live. 

[00:00:37] Marci Brockmann: Right.  
 

[00:00:38] Sabrina Runbeck: Exactly.  
 

[00:00:39] Marci Brockmann: Exactly. So, I would like to know a little bit more about. About you like who is Sabrina Runbeck and where did you grow up and what was your life like and how did you decide upon the career path that you embarked on?  

[00:00:56] Sabrina Runbeck: Okay. Yeah. Thanks. Sorry. Taking a little history walk. I  

[00:01:00] Marci Brockmann: love that. I just love people's career journeys. To me. This is, you know, candy. I just love hearing how other people figured themselves.  

[00:01:10] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah. So I'm only child, only girl in the family of all boys, all my cousins. And so from an Asian family perspective, it's always like, you're a girl, right? You'll take care of things. Be smart, get a job. You should be set. Right. Like, why are you getting married? Where are you having kids? And then the thing that make me joyful is stay home long. So I am someone who's like, okay, if you. Right. My family also come from the high education treating education. Like this is the only thing that you can do for your life. And for me is that it's not difficult to get the education, but what do I want it to do? 

[00:01:50] Sabrina Runbeck: So I've gone through. Two bachelor's to master's the fun things and the serious stuff. Start a medicine, I thought. Hmm. All right. Want to do anything else, but surgery, because nothing really intrigued me so much, even though my background has seen neuroscience public health. There was a lot of research background, except I'm someone who wants to be in the front was my hands inside the patient. 

[00:02:18] Sabrina Runbeck: So I did that  

[00:02:19] Marci Brockmann: literally in the mix. That's so much pressure though. My God.  

[00:02:26] Sabrina Runbeck: So some people consider pressure for me is that I fix things, right? Like I'm the fixer. So when I got into it and I also have the mentality of what's Sabrina while I'm Sabrina gets, and Momentum of generating it's surprisingly, whether it's you call it a luck or you called it, you actually know what you want so much. You start taking out all the opportunity that's presented to you without questioning right.  

[00:02:55] Marci Brockmann: Manifesting it. Absolutely.  

[00:02:57] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. And I got myself into one of those. Best heart survey center, really in a world where people will fly to us internationally, have their own translators and therefore the high demanding, right. When you're like, wow, I'm in that influence, right? I'm in that, there's the history of cardiac surgery that the big gurus in this field, I become so entrapped into the environmental. Well, you have to show up and who are you to leave? Who are you to think about that? If you don't take that call, you're responsible. No one else should be working that way except you. And those type of mentality, I think is very institutionalized. Instead of thinking, we actually in medicine are not really good on how to collaborate to accelerate.. We make ourselves take on so much responsibility. So I was. At that time working 80 plus hours, physically in a hospital and taking night calls just about every night. 

[00:04:07] Sabrina Runbeck: And then it becomes, wow,  

[00:04:10] Marci Brockmann: you don't even have time to sleep.  

[00:04:12] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. I will go to the restaurant, but step out to take the calls. Right. You can do things, quote unquote but you're never able to do things. You always have to be the first one to leave it's step bar, and then you figure out, can I hear this? Like what is happening? Right, right. And  

[00:04:30] Marci Brockmann: I would imagine there's a high amount of burnout. I am with that level of exhaustion. How are you? Does patient care suffer?  

[00:04:42] Sabrina Runbeck: Exactly. And I believe that that is the case and that many of us are in that functioning burnout. We got things down, we were working at it. We don't think we can ever get to that point, except when you hit the wall. So I remember there's one morning. I'm just so tired. I typically never take sick days at all right. Unless I have like a scheduled. Primary care GYN, employment that you need to go. Right. But that morning I was just exhausted. I'm still completed scrubbing in and I am just staring at. And trying to get through the surgery because I had a fever of 1 0 1 degrees, but the next morning finally realized I can't even move.. I have a tough time to even just go to the bathroom. I need a call out sick. And that's the time when I got on the phone and the manager on the other side. What Sabrina you didn't thought to tell us this sooner? Like we did  

[00:05:46] Marci Brockmann: You just woke up sick, how could it possibly have been sooner? .  

[00:05:49] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. And also, well, they know my team knows I was sick already the day before. And we do have these contingency of people helping us swapping ourselves out. Right. But somehow it becomes inconvenient. Well, why do we have emergency backup plans if we don't even intend to use that? So that's when I start realizing, wow. There are better way to live and not just work you work, shouldn't be your whole identity of who you are. And my own research back in the day before into medicine was self efficacy, self care, and stress management. How did we all learn so much in life and throw that out of the window when we place ourselves into it, environmental, which is trying to fit us so hard to be long, instead of saying. Those are the people who are robbing your precious time. Energy and sanity and we stop giving ourselves boundary. You start letting people push things around and it's no longer that let's just fix the environment. Let's move on. If we move on that same story place over and over again. That's what I see with friends that I have conversation with. Clients who has switched from one hospital to the next clinic. And next it's the same story. If we don't optimize how we master our, decision-making, how we change our attitude, how we identify the things that are not helping us move forward. And then we can never really get out of that difficult situation.  

[00:07:37] Marci Brockmann: It's systemic dysfunction. Absolutely. And, and as I'm listening to you speak, I'm thinking that I have lawyer friends who are like that. I've got people who are like in upper level corporate management who were like that too. They, their, their, their job is their identity. You know, I've heard, I've heard people in law enforcement say the same. You know that, that you might work 12 hour shifts, you might have to stay and, and, you know, handle a client or a call or whatever after time. And I think from my perspective, just hearing this kind of from you from the first time, it, I think speaks to a larger sickness. If you will forgive the pun there of our corporate system, you know, like I think it's inherited from our Puritan forebears from the start of the country, and this whole capitalist mentality that we have to like be worked to death. If we were going to say that this is what our job is, you know, like I, I think that, that the power. The powers that be, feel like that they can take over our very lives. And I, I think that that needs to change.  

[00:09:01] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. And that definitely is a movement that we need to create and that's why I start pivoting because people know. I even when I was younger high school college, I'm always the lead in getting people socializing. I was the RA then I was the head of all the RAs. I was like always making movements. How do we fill some kind of gap? And they even same thing at work. And the Admins like, well, seems like you have a plan. Let's talk about it then. Yes. We talk about it with talk about it for two years before something makes a change. Right. And then even each hospital system, I rotate out for whether it's just a travel job or a full-time job, whatever, not now I'll have something similar. Right. They're all have the right tapes. So I realized, plus from my own story, from interacting with other people and from even servants and studies showing patient satisfaction actually decreases when you're providers are employees.. So that means we need to direct our attention, these providers or in private practice. And that number is declining due to long hours. They're having high turnover in their own staff and. Insurance billing system is so convoluted and then feel like they're not making enough, but I believe we can fix all that. 

[00:10:28] Sabrina Runbeck: We can really change the way that we practice medicine and get rid of these baggages and feeling like we have to be busy. We have to see more patient. We have to just like, get to that next point before we can feel fulfilled as a, someone who simply is here to serve and everyone is serving some different way. And that starts with how can we master ourselves? 

[00:10:54] Sabrina Runbeck: How can we get rid of the distractions, the disinterest and dismayed things in life.  

[00:11:04] Marci Brockmann: So, how do you do that? Where do we start from? I mean, that seems like a huge problem,  

[00:11:09] Sabrina Runbeck: right? And I believe two things we needed to provide the personal efficiency system and. Create the external systems, the matches, what we want. 

[00:11:22] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. It's creating that individuality understanding what works best for you instead of keep adapting into other people's system. So then, I work with people for two months, period, and then we go through the six core progression. Now, number one, a lot of people wouldn't know we have to start with the end in mind. 

[00:11:42] Sabrina Runbeck: Right, right. A lot of times when people say, and then burn out, they say they got distracted. It's because they lost their aim. They start just going to build some kind of thing that worked and then they keep going without any reassessment. So where am I heading? Oh, Hey. Seems to work. Okay. I'm just sustaining it because you're in survival mode instead of growth mode. 

[00:12:06] Sabrina Runbeck: So where is that? Go because that end go ties into the culture. You want to create if you don't even understand the culture that we can talk about, the very last piece is creating that influence that A-Team the only right people in your team, just because someone has the skill is a good person. They might not need to be in your team because they're not a good person for what your personal. 

[00:12:34] Sabrina Runbeck: Correct. Particular team. Yeah.  

[00:12:36] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. So we have to start with, what, how do you define success? What are the characteristics you want to embody on your team on the team body? How do you define the most important things on what do you want it to achieve? Right. Then we kind of reverse engineer instead of constantly like, oh, this sounds good. That sounds good. And then you never get anywhere. So that tie into the second piece is we want to be a finisher, not just a starter. Right. And to finish, you have to know how to gain momentum and knowing that there are checkpoints that we have to make many people talk about smart goals. Yes. It's important, but what's missing in. Five tasks is that excitement piece. If we don't know how to bring back that excitement into what we're trying to achieve, people still don't have that emotion tied to keep going. ' 

[00:13:26] Sabrina Runbeck: Then third, we tap into the performance science, part of the positive intelligence thing of this three core muscles that we're building the sabotaging, the self-mastery and the Sage, which is the empowerment side. Right? So the more we understanding what type of patterns that this a sabotaging tendencies that we have stopping us, and we make a name out of it. Right. I call my itty bitty shitty committee by my lowest shitty, how many is always singing? 

[00:13:57] Sabrina Runbeck: And I was like, oh yeah, you got to stop. Right. I am not listening to you. The faster we can catch up. The better it is because now we can say, if we catch ourselves, now we can. Neuromodulation to get to the next phase, but if we don't catch ourselves, then guess what? Hours and days later, then you're like, oh, that's what happened. I couldn't even see at the moment  

[00:14:23] Marci Brockmann: I do that a lot with my internal monologue. I'm going to name that bitch. Oh my God. That's brilliant!  

[00:14:29] Sabrina Runbeck: Great. I, like, I re all my client make them name something. You don't have to name all your saboteurs so you can just. Big one, right? We call them the judge. Like the judge will judge every single little thing that you've done and then your environment and your people. 

[00:14:46] Sabrina Runbeck: So instead of having that negativity that our survival brain is training us to do, we're going to pivot into Noah. Everything is a lesson learned is a gift and opportunity even if I can't find any gift in that situation. Okay. That didn't serve me. So move on. Right, right. It's not to say we buried it, but we reflect you really do not do anything for me. 

[00:15:14] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. I it's going to cost me more heartache. So I understand what I don't want. Therefore, you actually understand what you want.  

[00:15:22] Marci Brockmann: Yeah. I give that advice to a lot of people who have a lots of choices to make, you know, even if you can narrow down. What you don't want, you're you're figuring out, or at least getting yourself closer toward what you do want, which is in itself making the decision. 

[00:15:41] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. And then I think it is easier for people to understand what they don't want. That lists every single thing that they want. And some of the one of the leadership group I ran for our healthcare leaders is that they brought up the problem of what if people just don't even know what their core value is then like, that's fine. 

[00:16:02] Marci Brockmann: How do you figure that out? Right.  

[00:16:03] Sabrina Runbeck: So then we can ask the right question to get there. So as. First, Who are the Core people that play into your life? What are the characteristics that you admire them to be? Right? What are the common themes in that? And then you can say, oh, okay. That's where I'm getting like sample from. 

[00:16:25] Sabrina Runbeck: Where are you already absorbing information? It's a TV news media. How are they reflecting? I'm building up a persona, right? So then we start understanding where the influences are coming from. And now how are we identifying what works for us, where we truly want to be? And that can at least be the start of the guidance. Then the deeper dive with. Talking to the people, right? Those that you actually trust their opinion. How do they see you? Right. What are some of the characteristic they will use to describe you? And what are the common patterns you can gather from that conversation? That's a very raw conversation. 

[00:17:07] Marci Brockmann: That's a very vulnerable question to ask.  

[00:17:10] Sabrina Runbeck: Yes. So you can start easy by. Hey, I am in the place that I wanted to learn more about myself. And I know you are someone I trust in my life, and I would love to have an open conversation on how you see me so I can get to a better place. And I believe people actually do love to help each other out. Especially those people who are important. Yeah, exactly. And so then we gone through where you need it to be, how do you be a finisher? How do you master your psychology? So you can build up what I call mental immunity. And then is what is your natural energy help you, right? Yes. Some people we can we stop there for one second? 

[00:17:55] Marci Brockmann: What do you mean by mental immunity? Can you unpack that a little.  

[00:17:59] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah. So mental immunity means just like a physical immunity. We have a defense system for bacteria for the disease. Sure. Mental immunity means instead of wanting to prevent everything happened. We have the ability to say, if something happened, I, if we get attacked by a difficult situation, we know how to quickly pivot, all of that. So that's when I mentioned earlier on our three muscle groups. So if I identify I'm being triggered because my victim. Mo. I'm just like, oh gosh, 

[00:18:38] Marci Brockmann: It's triggering an old wound. .  

[00:18:39] Sabrina Runbeck: But my immunity kicks in. It's like, oh, those just my victim talking. Right. And therefore I stopped myself from complaining and then immediately reset myself into a more neutral and peaceful state. And then I can tap into the next place. Oh, what is that that I need to activate is that I need to start planning strategizing, or do I need it to be more curious about the situation? Why do I even feel like if they come in that place or do I need to give myself more empathy or that other person or situation more empathetic to discover what. Right. So then we start getting ourselves out of that mode and then have this defense system, the immunity to say, no matter what happens, I don't have to always feel like I'm at guard because I know how to solve every single problem. Right.  

[00:19:32] Marci Brockmann: So, do you have any strategies that you use yourself to get you from listening to the, the victim judge in your head to being grounded enough to, to take a step back and look at it from a, from a more balanced perspective, what do you do to, to reset your emotionality?  

[00:19:54] Sabrina Runbeck: The method that I learned is about, you want it to build like a 100 positive moments in your life. So those things can be a breathing exercise can be highlighting. One of your five senses can be simply knowing your proprioception, right? The person to that, like pass of how we are. We start noticing, oh, there's a tension. breathe through at letter release and it can be also simple thing like I'm putting on lipstick. Hmm. This moist is a moist guns across my lip. It actually feel good. It, they need that protection. And then also when I'm grabbing a drink, while I'm on the hot day, the ice is touching my lip. The is touching my mouth or I'm grabbing that glass. 

[00:20:43] Sabrina Runbeck: It has the water. It's condensation and I'm feeling cooling down. So these moments, right, there are positivity that we can add into our brain that we start noticing and become more appreciative. So you're noticing sensory experiences  

[00:21:03] Marci Brockmann: that pull you down into the present moment that make you feel your body again, and stop swirling around in your head.. 

[00:21:09] Marci Brockmann: Right. And  
 

[00:21:09] Sabrina Runbeck: then when we do get into a situation and then we can carve our self out. So at that moment, some definitely hard. Right. I, if someone really ticks me off now, I'm like, all right, like you really have to make yourself stop or I  

[00:21:30] Marci Brockmann: deep here, or we're going to fly off the handle. Yeah. Or  

[00:21:34] Sabrina Runbeck: I put on a timer, like you can be mad for the next five minutes and gather over it. And then after that, All right. So I care. Why do I, I was mad or do, do I care just to solve and move along? Right. Like, so at that moment, what I want and they, if I know what I want, can I just do something about it? so to be, to be that honest with yourself is definitely hard and it's definitely something that trained and then be like, okay, Take practice. And then you also have people in your corner who supports you, who can talk through that. And then the mentors that you that I continue to get training was from both the leadership or personal or business side.  

[00:22:17] Marci Brockmann: So how did you, how did you get from cardiothoracic surgery to this? Yeah, it was like a bit of a, an unique leap. If you'll allow me to make that judgment, I'm interested.  

[00:22:35] Sabrina Runbeck: I see it as a healthcare practice system, how we practice medicine, really, it's very much business oriented for many people. And then I think it's because if you think about either you come out of school, you want security, so security means a big large organization. 

[00:22:52] Marci Brockmann: And then you to pay you off your middle school, medical school loans,  

[00:22:55] Sabrina Runbeck: right? Oh yeah. Right. Like it doesn't matter if you gone from medicine, PA and P all these schooling has so many. Such a high price tag, and that's also bottleneck issue of you're seeing at the American medical association predict 122,000 physicians shortage in the next 10 years. Well, we can fill that huge gap by the newer. Graduates coming out. Right. Because we only have so many programs, so many residency, I even the PA programs and NP programs are limited to sill the scalp. So if everyone leaves who the heck and then be left to help us and to help our family,  

[00:23:38] Marci Brockmann: that's smarter and more efficiently and more effectively or so that we can reduce the amount of attrition and turnover and encourage more people to become. Medical professionals.  

[00:23:51] Sabrina Runbeck: Exactly. I it's now just focusing on, oh, you're burned out. Let's fix that. Actually the root, what we want. Okay. We want it to be known. We want to be seen, we want it to be somebody right. You way into medicine for most people is you have that bigger mission of how you want to serve. 

[00:24:09] Sabrina Runbeck: Maybe you had a personal story. Maybe you seen people who I, this miracle thing that you saw. So you wanted to be that person to see many people through how, however, the structure that we are in now. People barely have 10 minutes with their patients, and yet they are on the phone waiting at least half hour to even make appointment. 

[00:24:32] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. So these lack of system, lack of structure and the weight that we feel like just push, push, push out, hustled out. It's not going to sustain any of us. So that's why I say. Well, there are ways we can do it. If we can be more honest with ourselves, unless get the training from both the internal self-mastery and knowing what type of environment you can create for private practice side, because you know, every single step that you make. 

[00:25:04] Sabrina Runbeck: Can be dramatic, can be a really great thing for the team. Now you creative for the patients that you have. I, it's not about working more to be productive. It's actually about working less with very targeted way. And for anybody who read the book, The Big Leap, right? When you're sat high functioning, people actually tap out easily. Right? The. Issue from feeling you can't be that good all the time. Well, if you constantly have that mentality, of course, even not going to reach to a higher place, you're not going to live in your genius side of who you are. You're going to just wiggle around the competency. Excellent side. And sometimes people even dip down to the non competency because they feel like, oh, I can figure everything out. I'm just going to do it. And then. Hours of time and physical energy. I still not getting to where they need to go.  

[00:26:01] Marci Brockmann: It makes sense. It makes sense. I see, I see lots of parallels with that with even the education department. You know, I've been a teacher for 27 years and I, I see a lot. The same, you know, this is the way we've always done it and it's not working so well, but nobody's willing to do anything to change it. And I feel like there's so many of us that just sorta keep butting our heads up against the same brick wall, trying to figure out how to work smarter instead of working harder.  

[00:26:32] Sabrina Runbeck: Right. And that the sentence is so common, right? Well, this is how we always do. Great. If you feel like that's been serving you, I is getting you to the best place, then keep doing it. But if this only serving you in the short run, because he always get this much a result, instead of you're potentially can double that triple that,  

[00:26:57] Marci Brockmann: or you're just afraid of change. I mean, there's plenty of people who are just afraid of change or they're afraid to rock the boat because. You know, it might change, could the culture of the workplace, it might change the number of jobs that people have or, you know, change it in unpredictable ways that they don't know how to combat or fix or whatever. So in doing the research on you I read somewhere, I don't remember exactly that people call you the queen of performance and productivity. How'd you get that name?  

[00:27:34] Sabrina Runbeck: I was to in a high level individual personal training was Darren Hardy's program sorry. Brendon Burchard's program. And so I, someone who. Dive very deep into performance science for the past five years. And one of my coach was like, well, Sabrina, if all my clients can do what you do, that I will be so happy. And you are truly the queen of productivity because you just, whatever happens, you already done it. And I think is that it's not about. When you are chaotic, you actually got more things done is that you become so focused on what is the right thing. And therefore you make way for that one thing. And just like, if you think about. When people are really wanting to compete for athletic training or competition on some sort, right then, you know, there's a bunch of thing you can do. 

[00:28:33] Sabrina Runbeck: But the only thing that's right thing to do is that one thing that you can practice over and over again. And, and I actually realized a lot of things in life are not necessary and it's not really going to serve you in some way. So. That's why I pivot it into solely focused on how to gain 10 back, how to be that the best efficient person for the people that you need to serve. And therefore we can provide more value and actually get to a really want to go and not just talk about it.  

[00:29:09] Marci Brockmann: True and, and, and have more time for yourself to actually. Relax and find peace and be with your family and bring joy and love and all of that connection to your own life on, on a personal note, because we've, we've been productive and we are efficient in handling the work side. So that now as a private citizen, quote, unquote, we, we have more, more time for ourselves.  

[00:29:34] Sabrina Runbeck: Exactly. Yeah. Usually I do ask people if I gave a day back for you, what are you going to do about it? Right. Are you going to go back to putting more time in your business or putting time for yourself, for your family and make people. Plan to out that perfect day. And what does that even look like? Right. So that also tap into what I mentioned earlier, that emotional picture we can visualize that we can really see what could happen, the how good would that feel to you? What would that mean to you to have those additional hours, additional things that you can have in your life? 

[00:30:13] Sabrina Runbeck: And therefore people have a more self-motivated. Action. Connection to do, instead of just like, well, this sounds good.  

[00:30:23] Marci Brockmann: Right? Right. And then they'll actually get stuff done because they'll, they'll have planned it out. They'll have figured out why it's important to them. And along the way of doing that figured out how they're going to actually make it. 

[00:30:40] Marci Brockmann: So will you tell us about your podcast? I know we were talking about it briefly before we started the interview and I cut you off. Cause I didn't want you to have to say it twice. So you have a podcast. Oh, let me turn the page here. That is currently powerful and passionate healthcare professionals. 

[00:30:56] Marci Brockmann: And you said something about a pivot, but after a hundred episodes, it's going to become something else I'm interested in the before and after.  

[00:31:02] Sabrina Runbeck: Yes. So the really the first hundred episodes we have been looking at, how do we become a powerhouse in our career as a healthcare leader and the passionate person in life. 

[00:31:15] Sabrina Runbeck: And I believe you have 10 key component of life. So we have experts sharing their stories and background their strategies in all these. Areas and I love it. It was a very interesting and now because my mission has always been serving the private practice. So we're pivoting to call Provider's Edge. So what is that edge that you can have? 

[00:31:44] Sabrina Runbeck: As a practice owner for the people around you, for the patient that you have really truly for yourself. And that means we're going to focusing on inviting practice owner to share the good, bad, ugly, and all the triumphs that they experienced through their journey in health care, entrepreneur ship and knowing, yes, fine. We're all going to have. Roller coasters and we're not sharing the medical discussion or treating, but simply how do we support each other? How do we solve problems when we have different issues? And what is the biggest thing that we learned? Plus we'll also interview other industry experts on what are the main, crucial thing that we need to do to stand out. Whether it's different strategies from a business operation, from digital technology, From a team building customer service, how do we become the tough of revolutionize, how we practice medicine and do it with ease, do it with joy and do a with that we truly believe in this can happen. And then people don't need to just bounce around left and right. To find. If well, your career paths and they, if this practice is actually serving you to align with your passion versus becoming a poison, 

[00:33:10] Marci Brockmann: it's a lofty goal. But I hope that that people. That you're successful, not only with the podcast, but that the individual practices are successful. I know from a patient standpoint, I see a lot of turmoil in practices as these management agencies come in and try to make things more efficient, which sometimes seems more efficient and sometimes just seems like more layers of bureaucracy. And yeah, and the insurance companies need to be put in their place because they're just ridiculous. Just ridiculous.  

[00:33:43] Marci Brockmann: You recently, co-wrote a book. Correct Asian Women Who Boss Up: Secrets from Women Who Were Forging Their Own Path and Thriving, written by, profiles of, of what 18 powerful Asian women will you tell us about what, what you wrote and how you got this operation? 

[00:34:03] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah, that's actually my very first book. I have two more coming out the pipeline is exciting that I always saw myself as a speaker, never as a writer and the, when the opportunity presented to me, because one of my friend Her name is Lucy Liu. So she always had to bury the name of being called Lucy Liu as as compared to the famous actress. 

[00:34:25] Sabrina Runbeck: So when she approached me was the idea is like, yes, a woman can be professionally know in many different industries and it doesn't has to be. Hey, you are a professional mom or you are the concierge type and, we can be CEOs and also running a successful in many different area. Asian women also have the thought that we can only pick the assessable careers, the medicine, the law, the engineering. The structured of a career, but we also know every single person has a different journey. Now I've been around, grow up. It was the silver spoon. All of us are have some kind of a zigzag and I'm a immigrant family. I, and I, gone through yes two multiple shifts where I want to be and realizing. I'm actually really good at speaking. I'm actually really good at connecting with people I'm actually really good at just, analyzing and seeing problems that people don't even see. And I come. Figure out the right ways. That makes sense for them. And instead of trying to fit them in a box from all this other things, people just trying to make them do. 

[00:35:46] Sabrina Runbeck: And the other stories in this book have a podcast award, winning hosts movie makers, chefs, people who talking about money, mindset and people .Who talk about. Couples and being together, and even you want to get divorced, you can still have a peaceful divorce. And there are just so many amazing stories in this book that we gathered together. 

[00:36:14] Sabrina Runbeck: I'm just trusting that you don't have to be a writer to publish you have the support and we can guide it in different ways. And that's how we made it into an international bestseller.  

[00:36:27] Marci Brockmann: That's awesome. That's very cool. So before we wrap up let's do the seven quick questions. You ready for a little speed round? 

[00:36:35] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah. Okay.  

[00:36:37] Marci Brockmann: What six words would you use to describe yourself?  

[00:36:41] Sabrina Runbeck: I would say ambitious, charismatic, focused, colorful, activate, and. Someone who's always wanting to be a connector and that I think I'm just so much an extrovert that I need to feel that energy one what's people.  

[00:37:11] Marci Brockmann: Absolutely. I love that. What is your favorite way to spend a day?  

[00:37:17] Sabrina Runbeck: Oh, I like both. Going let's say biking, hiking, going to do something outside and then come back, soaking in the tub. Watch a movie drank wine and it goes, sleep  

[00:37:30] Marci Brockmann: sounds great. Let's do that. That's what I want to do on the extra day. Awesome. What's your favorite childhood memory?  

[00:37:40] Sabrina Runbeck: I love the zoo. I don't know why, but I just remember, I would prepare me. I be like, mom, let's go to the zoo. I'll literally prepare bag of me and go feed the bears, like zookeepers like that. But now it's like, oh, I want a feed that let us, like, I don't know why, but. But somehow I didn't go into veterinarian school. I want to deal with humans instead.  

[00:38:08] Marci Brockmann: Okay. What's your favorite meal?  

[00:38:12] Sabrina Runbeck: I mean, like type of food or just like three meals a day, I would say type of food. I like French, the small bites, multiple courses, and they look good. 

[00:38:24] Marci Brockmann: Okay. No one's ever answered that before. That's very cool. I liked that. Number five, what one piece of advice would you like to give your younger self  

[00:38:35] Sabrina Runbeck: oh, stick truth to what you, who you are, and then figure out radiate clarity, what you want and then just keep going.  

[00:38:44] Marci Brockmann: That's brilliant state. Let's do that again. 

[00:38:48] Marci Brockmann: Stay true to who you are and stay clear about what you want. You want. I like that. I like that. What is one thing you would most like to change about the world? 

[00:39:00] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah, the medical assistant needed to change. So once that, by the time.  

[00:39:05] Marci Brockmann: One step at a time and totally changing tactics. what TV shows are you bingeing right now that you like?  

[00:39:12] Sabrina Runbeck: I just finished Bridget tin. The second season is definitely better than the first one.  

[00:39:17] Marci Brockmann: It was good. It was less pornographic for sure. More drama. Yeah. I'm still in the middle of the second season. The first one. I'm a little frustrated though, which cause I just, I want, I want. Anthony to get involved with the older Sharma sister. And I'm still in the middle of the season. I was like five episodes left and it's just excruciating, but it's fabulous. Excruciating.  

[00:39:44] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah. I mean, like I call her the poverty consciousness. She's always feel like she cannot have, yeah.  

[00:39:51] Marci Brockmann: Yeah, definitely. Well, thank you so much Sabrina. This was really wonderful to have you here. All of the places that people can connect with you, your podcast books, your website, everything will all be listed in the show notes. And, and I just love this conversation. Thank you so much for being here.  

[00:40:08] Sabrina Runbeck: Yeah, I appreciate you. I appreciate everyone listening in.  

[00:40:12] Marci Brockmann: Thanks so much.