Active Duty to Private Practice with Dr. Russell Kirk

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There are many roadblocks presented when developing a dental career. From financial struggles to battling introversion and depression, Dr. Russell Kirk shares his journey through all of it. He talks about his valuable experience in the military, how he learned humility, anger management, leadership, and how to prioritize the important things in life.

In this episode, Russell speaks in-depth about his military career and how valuable it was to his dentistry career and education. He also shares some struggles and issues along the way and how he overcame them and learned valuable lessons from each. Russell emphasizes the importance of a strong work ethic, self-responsibility, being open to criticism, and accepting help. Through developing these traits and practices he has become happier and more successful in his life and career.

Key Quotes:

“There’s a lot of, a lot of learning to do as soon as you get into practice.”
“The older I get, the smarter my parents and grandparents were.”
“Anything worth doing isn’t going to be easy. If you can outwork the other person, you can sometimes outwork talent.”
“The educational opportunities in the military are really robust.”
“Early in the game I liked to blame everyone else that things weren’t going right, and it was pretty frustrating, and now I realize that at the end of the day it’s all on your shoulders.”
“A lot of us have similar stories and there’s variations but the underlying theme is, it’s a tough profession and life is tough but there are other people out there and we’re trudging along and doing okay.”
“You get out here on an island by yourself and it’s easy to get discouraged and it’s easy to get frustrated then you go to a meeting or have a conversation like this and you come away with a little bit quicker step.”
“You have to stop being the victim and start being accountable for everything in your life.”