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Anesthesia Education Personal Finances Preparing for Grad School/Residency Wellness

#12 – Ten Things Every Anesthesia Provider Should Know

The following ten ideas have the power to change your attitude towards and even the trajectory of your professional career and life.  There’s three core domains to developing as an anesthesia provider:  your knowledge base, skill set and attitude.  Each are unique and require different kinds of effort or deliberate practice to grow & improve.  This guide is predominately about tweaking & improving the attitude you approach your career with.  If you’re gonna show up in your life, why not show up with a level of stoke that pulls you through the doldrums & pushes you towards where you want to be?  These ten ideas may help you do just that.

1.  What you do matters because you hold the lives of your patients in your hands.

2.  You’re only as good as the decisions you make today (sort of).

3.  You provide a service and you are replaceable. 

4.  You have an incredible capacity to develop your skills, knowledge, attitude and even intelligence.  

5.  We work in systems that are designed by people, and people work in relationships.  

6.  No one cares about your money, career, scope of practice, time off, goals, wellbeing and success more than you do.

7.  Embracing delayed gratification and understanding the power of compounding interest are critical to creating a brighter financial future for yourself.

8.  You have more power, influence and capacity than you think, and so does everyone else.  

9.  Location – Compensation – Autonomy.  You can pick 2.  

10.  Joy is more valuable than your income or job.

Resources

Duckworth, A. (2016). Grit: The power of passion and perseverance (Vol. 124). New York, NY: Scribner. Retrieved from http://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Grit/Angela-Duckworth/9781501111105.

Dweck, C. S. (2008). Mindset: The new psychology of success. Random House Digital, Inc..  Retreived from https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/44330/mindset-by-carol-s-dweck-phd/9780345472328/.

Ericsson, A., & Pool, R. (2016). Peak: Secrets from the new science of expertise. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.  Retrieved from https://www.hmhbooks.com/shop/books/Peak/9780544947221.

Jebb, A. T., Tay, L., Diener, E., & Oishi, S. (2018). Happiness, income satiation and turning points around the world. Nature Human Behaviour, 2(1), 33-38.

Oliver, M. (2020). Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver. Penguin Books.

The Notorious B.I.G. (1997). Mo money mo problems [Song]. On Life after death. Bad Boy Records; Arista.

By Jon Lowrance

Jon Lowrance, MSN, CRNA is the producer of Anesthesia Guidebook, the go-to guide for anesthesia providers.