Now that the metaphysical has all but been drummed out of the curriculum of most chiropractic colleges, students have to leave campus to learn anything that elevates them above mere spine therapists. Reducing chiropractic to biomechanics and the briefest treatment for low back pain is a lot like the allopaths who see the body as a collection of parts, rather an integrated whole. This alarming trend is increasingly visible at seminar programs in which the newest chiropractors hound me for scripts.
“Is that written down anywhere?” They ask after a spontaneously created riff about the importance of keeping appointments or the likelihood of a relapse if care is discontinued as soon as the symptoms subside.
“No, actually I just made it up.”
Thinking that the words I said had some incredible power, and that if they were to say them it would sway patients, is just about as mechanistic as it gets. Assuming that verbal communication can be considered separately from the nonverbal is naïve and unrealistic.
After a stint or two with a couple of consulting firms, most chiropractors learn that simply regurgitating processed, preformed, molded, shaped and predigested scripts don’t work. The scripted words simply “vibrate” at a different frequency (usually higher) than the doctor’s body from which it’s coming from—a distinction patients are able to discern effortlessly, raising suspicion and tagged as not trustworthy. Turns out that what your body is saying is more important than what your mouth is saying! And saying someone else’s words rarely produces the necessary body language unless you’re among the ranks of a Tom Hanks, Russell Crowe and the like.
Thank goodness! If you think influencing the lives of the people who entrust their health with you is as simple as memorizing and pronouncing the right words, you either have a profound lack of respect for patients, are trying to compensate for the growing realization that you’re actually powerless over patients, or both.
If you need a script, you don’t know who you are.
Consider the last time you answered your cell/mobile phone. Did you need a script to successfully handle the call? Or how about your conversation at the family dinner table last night. Did you need to consult a manual to parrot someone else’s words? Of course not. You had a “voice,” a point of view and a complete command of the English language because you knew who you were. Tragically, it appears that the newest chiropractors don’t need a collection of scripts as much as they need a clear identity.
Once you know who you are, what you want and have clear and honorable intentions, the words come effortlessly. And what they may lack in eloquence (that’s just practice) will be more than compensated for by their rock solid sincerity, congruence and resonance.
Instead of looking for new words or an artful turn of phrase, a better strategy is to get to know yourself and what you stand for. Clarify your intent. Visualize the outcome you want from a lifetime of patient service. All of which is difficult to do if you think you’re merely a “bad back” doctor hamstrung by the inability to prescribe drugs, who relies on a dangerous intervention that’s likely to cause a stroke and should produce results in fewer than six visits.