[00:00] Peter: ​​​​It's a good hedge to have all these income sources. Cause you don't know what's going to happen. I'm part of it's like, you know, the, the business of medicine could change, but also your interests just might change. Like, you know, we put so much time and energy and to be a doctor and at the beginning, that's all you want to do.

But maybe 10 years into it, you're like, you know what? I don't want to be a doctor anymore. I want to do this. Or I want to do a part-time or I spend more time. My family that's me too. I want to spend more time my family or these kinds of things and your interest start to change. How are you going to have that flexibility to be able to do that, especially if you're relying a hundred percent of medicine for your, for your income.

And so the only way to do that is to have it coming from different sources. And so that's something I encourage everyone to do.

[00:45] Pranay: Hi and welcome to the, from MD to entrepreneur podcast inside, look on how to become a physician entrepreneur.

Everyone. I'm so excited to be able to talk to my friend and mentor Dr. Peter Kim, he's an anesthesiologist and a serial entrepreneur who has started multiple eight figure businesses, including passive income MD curbside real estate and descent equity group. We will break down his formula for turning a simple idea into a successful business.

Hey, Peter, how's it going? Thanks for joining us. 

[01:20] Peter: Thanks for having me today. There's gonna be a lot of fun. 

[01:22] Pranay: Yeah. You know, you have to be my first interview guests. Super excited. 

[01:25] Peter: Thanks for having me. I'm honored. 

[01:28] Pranay: Yeah. Awesome. So I know a lot of people know Dr. Peter Kim with multiple businesses, but for the handful of people that don't know you, could you tell me a little bit about yourself?

[01:37] Peter: Uh, sure. I mean, anesthesiologist, I live on orange county, California, married to another physician who is an ophthalmologist. They have a couple of kids and actually I just moved to this area down from LA, like just about six months ago, besides the anesthesiologists, you know, over time, I've also focused on building different businesses.

Uh, as well as, uh, been a pretty avid real estate investor. And then the goal of all this stuff was to really just to create more control in my life, to be able to control my time better, to do things that I was passionate about. Uh, you know, I love being a doctor and I absolutely still love it, but it's not the only thing I wanted to do.

And, uh, um, you know, again, being a full-time physician, kind of a, it's tough on the schedule at times. And so I wanted to see if I could create a situation where I was able to do almost everything that I wanted to do. Uh, You know, live life on my own terms and be a good dad and husband at the same time.

So that's my life. 

[02:28] Pranay: It's interesting that you bring up control because many of us thought, and once we came into attending that we would have that control. We'd finally be able to take over our lives and really do what we wanted. So how has that kind of different than what you were expecting? 

[02:41] Peter: Yeah, it was the same.

I mean, it's, you know, when you had, that's kind of the dream that you're sold, like early on, I mean, obviously you want to be a doctor you want to help people. And I think that's still the primary motivation behind becoming a doctor and that's why people do it. But the secondary gain to that is that, you know, by, by, you know, uh, sacrificing all of your twenties and all that time is that you can live a good life afterwards with a ton of control.

You're gonna live the good life as an attending and. As a med student, anyways, when you see these attendings, you're like, oh, they got it made. You know, maybe they, you know, they live well. They seem to travel. They that sort of thing. And then once you get there, you actually find out life is a little bit different.

I think that most of us are finding out that life is a little bit different as a doctor today, especially today. Right. It's different from my father's generation. And my father happened to be a doctor. And you mean, you talked to him about medicine and how it was it's different today. You know, we're definitely more.

Of really like cogs in a wheel type, you know, cogs in a big machine, you know, type, um, situation today as physicians and doctors and in medicine. And it's not, doesn't seem to be getting any better. That happened to me when I became an attending, I found out that I was not in control of my time. I was not control of my income and really my schedule and that sort of thing.

And it really upset me because I saw what kind of impact it would have. Not only in my life, just at the current moment, but how it would look like in five or 10 years, if it kept going like this and it all started because, you know, I had a certain schedule, a certain expectation of becoming a partner.

And when I did become a partner, my schedule did not meet the expectation. And so, uh, I was really upset by it, but luckily I was able to talk to some people who had figured it out, how to kind of take that kind of situation and turn it around right. Where they were actually more in control of their. I followed what they did, which was pretty much invest in real estate and start business.

And it's created a different situation for me, you know, now it's 10 years later. 

[04:33] Pranay: Yeah. That's amazing. Um, let's, let's take a step backwards and, um, I know we've talked a little bit offline about all the different kinds of businesses or stuff that you've done growing up. So it, you know, your passive income MD is not the first thing that you started.

So could we talk a little bit about.

[04:50] Peter: Yeah, I think that I've always had some sort of, I wouldn't call it entrepreneurial kind of mindset or whatever, but I just had fun with starting businesses. Like even when I was young, I grew up in a family doctor, so I kind of had that whole thing or I'm going to be a doctor when I grow.

But it's funny. Like I lived up, I lived on like this really kind of remote golf course, like out in the middle of nowhere, uh, growing up. But what I used to do as a kid, instead of playing golf, which I regret today, I should've played a lot more golf. Instead of doing that, what I would do with a bunch of neighborhood kids, we would go find golf balls, lost in the woods and we'd sell them to all the golfers coming up, but we'd sell lemonade.

You know, we figured out, okay, if they coming out, we sell them a lemonade with summer ball. We sell them this. Then we kind of create more of a, it's always do it, that we just go buy candy with it. Right. But that was. Started that whole idea that Harry, there are ways to, I don't know, to create a good situation.

I honestly, we spend no money like really about where we're able to create value. And I didn't think about it that way, but looking back on it, that's kind of what. And so that kind of continued throughout, you know, my childhood, even growing up, I, at times where, you know, especially in college and especially in med school, when you are super poor, you don't have any money.

Are you going to debt? I found ways to make money, not just in a job type way, but in sort of like business. Type ways. Right? And so I, you know, would figure out here's a solution. Here's a problem that people are facing. And let's see if we can figure it out to create a solution. And the whole idea behind all this stuff was like a win for everybody.

Right? That's always been kind of the, my whole premise behind all the businesses is like, it's gotta be situation where the client or customer wins. Right. Hopefully society or some other good is there's a win there, but also I win too. So it's like, you know, there's selfish component, but everybody needs to win.

And I think that was the premise behind all that. And you know, the passive income idea is probably one of the more later businesses that I truly started, where I found that a lot of physicians, when it came to learning about real estate, when it came to learning about entrepreneurship and all these types of things, there just, weren't a lot of great resources for them.

And so the goal for me, when I started. The blog, it wasn't necessarily to sort of business. It was just kind of to inform people, but just like most things, I found that when you add value out there, people find a way to want more and there's ways to create income from it. And so just like when we started with the blog and the podcast and then the different courses and different conferences, none of it was super intentional.

I'll just be honest with you. Just basically. Asking people what they need, what they want and see if I could provide that in some sort of way. And of course it has to be worth my time as well. Right. But, um, and people are more than willing to really compensate me for my time, but because I was adding value to other people's lives.

Right. And so that's how a lot of these businesses started and it's just been a fun journey. 

[07:29] Pranay: Yeah, well, you know, in the starting, uh, I assume you make a, probably a pretty good salary as a sociologist, especially in OB anesthesiologist. So I know every hour that you're spending on your business outside of anesthesia and Orr is money literally out of your hands.

So, how did you kind of manage that and how did you kind of balance the fact of possibly losing some money on one side and planning for the future? Well, 

[07:54] Peter: I think part of it was, uh, you know, you try to find, first of all, I try to find breaks in my day where I didn't have to necessarily use any extra time.

Uh, you know, for an anesthesiologist, there are times in between cases, for example, like their downtime, where most of the times I would just sit there on ESPN or something like that. Right. And so I started substituting that time, especially like, man, even though. Like you're up late at night, you know, you have a case, you got a second case coming out.

You got some time in between just sitting there, like, what do you do at that time? Right. Also when I was driving, you know, you're listening to podcasts, but you're planning your business. And you're, you know, I had a long commute at times. And so it, you know, the first goal was to actually use time that, you know, some people call it no extra time or net time where you, you, that time is kind of wasted anyways.

And so might as well just. Build a business come up with ideas like walking your dog. You know, sometimes those are the best times to actually create ideas. Cause I'm just walking my dog. There's no other responsibility that I have. And so I just start thinking right. And stuff like that. And so even with working as a physician, it was, it was really about finding those cracks first.

But the funny thing is like, you know, you can be, you can come home from a hard day at work. But then if you have this like business idea that you're like fixated on and passionate about, like you find some extra energy and so you might spend an hour, two hours. My name is Dale pretty late, but it's something that it's funny how, you know, it's all, it's like a mental game.

I think even though you're tired, if you're excited by it, like you'll find the time to do it. And so what I used to even sometimes do was that I used to wait. Pretty early. I go to work pretty early as anesthesiologist, but I wake up like an hour earlier and I'd start working on stuff like before I go into work and things like that.

So, um, I, I don't think that, um, you know, there are people are busy. Everyone's busy. Like if you think of anybody starting a business, like nobody's just, there are a few people that have meant to just be sitting there and doing nothing, but they're usually doing something else. They either having another business or they're a professional and all these people find ways to.

And so I don't think that should, that idea should keep anybody, especially if they're busy physician or doctor from thinking about starting a business. Yeah. 

[09:57] Pranay: And I actually, uh, that's one thing that I always had an issue with. Um, and that's why I work nights, you know, it's quieter as a hospitalist to work nights and you have so much more time.

I actually tried to do a week of days and I got nothing done. I was always on the phone with case management or social workers or all this stuff, and it drove me crazy. Uh, but that's, that's just to me, that's because I wanted to do stuff and I know you've done a lot of nights. A lot of our phone calls are pretty the early morning when I'm getting off a shift or late at night, you have passive income MD.

You have a couple other businesses, um, curbside real estate. And I know it's a real estate company, but tell me about what kind of problem you saw and how you thought of kind of the solution. Because I want people, I want people to have an idea of here's a problem that I see. Cause a lot of times people will see a problem and then be like, I hope someone fixes it.

You can fix it. You're the person that has that power. Um, and if you have that problem, probably a lot of other people do. So, um, let's talk about curbside and maybe a scent as well. And what kind of problems? 

[10:56] Peter: Yeah. His company go curbside real estate, but again, it didn't start as a company. What happened was probably the same thing that happens to most people.

Most doctors, when they first come out out of. Residency and training and they get onto, real-world started making an attending salary. And then at first, one of the first things you want to do is buy a house. Right. They want to my house, that's what I wanted to do. And it's almost like a Rite of passage, almost a feeling of like you've made it and you're settled.

And so I try to buy my house and I didn't know where to start. I didn't know who to talk to. I didn't know what resources were out there and just wondering, cause my wife and I, we happened to walk into one of these like, you know, model type houses and we saw them and I was like, Hey, this looks nice. And she's like, yeah, it looks great.

Should we buy it, like, we didn't even know how to get started. And so we just talked to a sales person there and they're like, sure, fill out these forms and, um, you know, for financing. And so we're like, okay, I don't even know if we can afford this. I have no idea. So we started filling out that form and then we just got, we got declined, like immediately.

I was like, I don't get it. Like we're two doctors and, you know, we should be able to buy a pretty ma I mean, as a modest house, I didn't get it in. So there were some qualifications, a reason why they wouldn't give us a little. And so I was pretty discouraged by it because my wife and I had almost that point, we already started dreaming, imagining we were living in that place.

Right. This is going to not going to be our forever home, but it's like our first home, we were excited by the neighborhood and all that stuff. And so it's pretty down on it, like, okay, we're going to have to give this home up. And I happened to talk somebody in the Orr and they were like, Hey, well, you know, I had the same situation.

Have you heard of physician loans? And I've like, I've never heard of physician loans. And then they're like, well, it's like home loans that are specifically geared to. Geared to physicians or doctors who are coming out, who might make good high salaries, but they don't have a lot saved up for the down payment.

Maybe they are more of like a 10 99 situations. Maybe don't have a longer work type history. They met up a good amount of student loan debt, but it's set up for someone like that to be, I was just still get a home loan and cause it makes sense. Cause you're a doctor. You're a good bet. You're making good money.

And that sort of thing. Maybe my re regular standard conventional metrics like your, you know, you don't qualify. But they have special product for it. So I was like, oh, this one's awesome. And never heard about it. So I looked into it like, honestly, I'm somehow I became an expert in it because you just like research it and research it and research, it found a great lender to help me out, was able to buy a home.

Thankfully. And when I started doing this, I just, first thing I did was send an email out to all of my residency mates and I said, okay, If you haven't bought a home yet, you're gonna run into this situation. Like, just call me, let me know. There's these Cinco physician loans. And I suggest you look into that.

If that you've run into that trouble, all I do is sharing information. Some people call me on it. They started to asking me, I started teaching them and ended up buying their homes. Some of them ended up telling some of their friends about this whole situation. They want to talk to me. They're like, Hey, do you mind if my friend talks to you?

So all these people started calling me out of nowhere and I'm like, Physician loan kind of expert in some sort of way, you know? And so I was like, all right, well, this is something that people need, obviously not enough people know about it. And so what I'd started doing was just creating a resource for almost like a network of physician loans and also agents because people are moving to different areas and they didn't know anybody in those areas.

And so they're like, how do I find a good agent who can help me. And this sort of thing. And so I happened to know a few agents and so I just feel like, okay, well we can create a business or at least it wasn't like a business. It was like, let's create a resource for doctors and physicians so that if they're trying to buy their first home, we'll connect them to great resources, lenders and agents.

And that's all it started. And then I figured out there's a way to ultimately monetize it on the backside of it later on, but in a way that the physician pays nothing, that it doesn't cost anything to them. Right. And you know, if anything, you know, you get it on the other side. And so I was like, this is a win for everybody.

It's a win for me. It's a win for the doctor. It's a win for the lender or agent everybody wins. I was like, oh my gosh, there's a perfect situation. That's how curbside came about. And now we've been running that big. Uh, five, six years. And now we, you know, I'm proud to say we've helped hundreds of physicians all over, across, across the country.

Uh, I think we've done like 43 states at this point and the business continues to grow. And so it's been a really powerful, fun thing for me to be able to provide a great resource for doctors and physics. We go to buy their first homes. And so it's like really fun to be part of so many of these things.

And so I get pictures all the time, like, Hey, this is our first home. And, uh, it's just a great feeling. So that's, that's an example of a business. Um, where again, it just started out of a, a need. And you know, I don't know about you, but there's so many things that you learn about, you know, whether you want to buy like an example.

This is right now, I'm going to buy solar for example. And I've learned so much more than I ever wanted to know about like solar power and now. Right. But then what do you do with that knowledge? Like after you've learned it once you just like buy thing and that's it, you let it go. It's like, it feels like such a waste to have all that information and not share it with other people.

And so that's how I started by doing it, by sharing that information. If something comes up great, if not, then, you know, worst case scenario, I just helped a bunch of people. 

[16:02] Pranay: And, you know, uh, doctors are just so amazing gathering information and going through what's junk. What's good. And I find that such a big, uh, source of good information as other doctors.

Right. Um, I know a lot of times I get on the phone with people and they'll be like, oh, you're a doctor. Uh, especially when I talk about real estate, I'm like, yeah, you know, I'm not like a real estate guru or anything, but they just love talking to other doctors. We have, you know, a shared history. Uh, but also we, we understand that men were able to kind of cut through a lot of the junk.

[16:34] Peter: Where did this whole thing is the reason why, you know, I think a lot of people have a lot of great ideas and I, uh, you know, I still come up with ideas and, but I think there's probably people listening to this, you know, they've had an idea or two and, you know, maybe they didn't act on it. And later on, it showed up somewhere else and they're like, oh my gosh, I had that idea.

And they always feel that regret, like I should have done that, you know? And that's like one feeling that I just don't want to live. Like, I don't want to live with that feeling. And I've learned that, you know, what's happened to me. Right. A couple of times where, like I thought of that, I should've just done something like people tend to regret, right.

People tend to regret, like, just not having thoughts, something, not having tried something and failed. They always regret, like the other side was just like, I just, I didn't try. And so I didn't want that. And I've been. That I've tried a lot of things and failed, done poorly. Uh, a lot of failures in my life.

I'd say, you know, like investments that didn't go well, or, you know, even these small businesses, like I've tried so many different ideas and you can imagine how many different LLCs I filed for in my life. Uh, but you know, things that didn't happen, but you know, out of that, like some good stuff does happen.

And, you know, fortunately like over time it's allowed me to just try new and cool things.

[17:42] Pranay: And up until pretty recently, you've been working full time. Right? So while you were doing all these businesses, so you had a pretty good safety net, right? You didn't just say, Hey, I'm going to start a business. I'm an entrepreneur. I'm quitting. 

[17:54] Peter: I think that that's one of the, um, unique benefits. I'd say advantages that doctors have when they're trying to start businesses. I mean, yeah, we're a little bit short on time and that might be that sort of thing. But number one, we are have steady. So our families, no matter a lot of these businesses, unless we're investing huge sums of money into it, which, you know, may happen.

But a lot of us are able to create businesses without, you know, putting our whole nest egg into it. Uh, we're able to have a steady job and nothing to fall back on. Like I always thought we what's the worst case scenario. You started a business. It didn't go well. Yes, it ate up some time. There's probably some stress involved, maybe a little bit.

But you just ended up where you're at. Right. And if you're happy with that, that's okay. It was a lot of people they're starting these businesses because they want more, they want something different and without trying something nothing's right. And it's going to change. So, um, Dr. Lucky, we have always something to fall back on.

If, you know, if needed, we have a skillset that is in demand, right. We may not be as in control as we want it to be in the past, but it's in demand. We can find. And so we have that to be able to feed our families and that sort of thing. I think that a lot of entrepreneurs out there, like when you talk to a lot of other people, they like it's boom or bust, you know, and you hear all these great stories of all these amazing people and these entrepreneurs that have made billions and all that stuff.

But how many stories do you, I mean, there are stories right. Of the people that flamed out and just didn't have anything and this sort of thing, but we don't have to be like that. We can still, we have something to fall back on it. So that's a unique thing we have. And that's why I tell, but encourage all that.

If you have that idea, why not try, you know, a little bit of time, but you're going to regret not having tried. I think. 

[19:29] Pranay: And that freedom that you've achieved now has you've gotten it over time. Right. You know, I know a lot of times people will say, uh, you know, it's going to be hard to replace my salary or, you know, I want to get half my salary by next year.

And a lot of times people have kind of these goals that are, are great. You know, it's nice to kind of shoot for the moon. But in reality, it's a little bit different. So could you talk a little bit about how the, the returns of your businesses kind of change your life over here?

[19:58] Peter:  I had a lot more meager goals. I mean, I had big goals too. Like, you know, the big ones, right. I want to make a lot of money over. I mean, you know, this kind of thing, you know, uh, changed my lifestyle completely. But at the beginning, actually I started with some smaller goals. You know, I was working a lot of nights and weekends, and I said, if I can replace the income of a one night.

I think that would change my life. I mean, that's one night at home and I'd feel much better to change the next day. I'd be able to exercise and do whatever. Like you feel a lot better. I get to spend it with my wife and my family that one night it makes a big difference or that one weekend that you don't have to work.

That's life changing, especially for us as doctors. I mean, it's huge, right. Or not having to, for some people not having to feel that pressure picking up extra. And that sort of thing. And so there's a number on that, all that hasn't got a specific number and everyone knows what that number is because they're going for it, right.

Whether, you know, a couple thousand dollars, whatever it is. Right. So what if that income could come from somewhere else, but you didn't have to work in medicine. And so that was my first goal. And that's what I started with when I started investing in real estate. That was my first goal. I started with, you know, I wanted X amount by a certain period of time.

Right. And then, you know, just started stacking on top of it. And then slowly you, you know, you think it's linear, but honestly, like as you get started, these things become exponential. I absolutely believe it because you become smarter at this. You become, you find more opportunities, you take bigger steps and better opportunities come your way.

And so it did start with one night, then it's two, right. And three then all my nights. And the next thing you know, all my income. Right. And that's how the, the, almost the trajectory. And it's pretty when I'm looking back on it, it's pretty crazy, but that's how it started. And so I think for physicians or doctors, sometimes when you look at the, it is good to set those big goals.

And I always tell people, come up with your large goal, right? You're X amount in how many years. And for me, if I really want to think about it, I wanted $20,000 a month in 20 years. That was my first kind of like passive income goal, $20,000 in 20 years. And then I started breaking that down. I said, look, if, if it sounds unattainable, especially from coming from zero.

Yeah, like $20,000 a month. But if I was able to kind of ch you know, break it down into chunks, that means like, you know, that means in 10,000, in 10 years, that means I would want $10,000 a month to kind of case to keep on pace five years, $5,000 a month. And then one year I'm just means I have to make $1,000 a month in passive income in one year.

And I'd be on pace to make $20,000 in 20 years. Could I do that? You know, that's $12,000 a year in passive. And I think there are definitely very clear ways for people to accomplish that, especially through real estate, to be able to create $12,000 of income a year. And so I just kind of started there. I started with a small building block and then stuff started stacking on top of each other.

And that's ultimately what led me to where I am today. And so it was nice cause I you're right. I, I was working full-time for a while. Then I had the flexibility and freedom to work, however much I wanted. And for a while I still continued to work quite a bit just because I enjoy. Then things inevitably, I'm so glad I was prepared for it thinks she's your work again?

You know, things change at work again, of course I COVID hit, I was already down for a little bit and in terms of timing, but COVID head and all these things changed with our practice and that sort of thing. And ultimately, uh, I walked into a situation where I was like, look, this is ultimately not worth it.

And I left and I left that position. I ended up picking up another per diem position somewhere else. And you know, now work a very limited shift schedule. But I still keep in it, but again, it's that freedom that comes from having this other income on the side. That was totally life, life changing. 

[23:28] Pranay: And, you know, one thing that I've realized now that I'm credentialed at multiple places, you don't have a ton of lateral movement, flexibility, meaning that you can't just say, okay, I'm going to go work at this other hospital.

Right. You have to spend a three month credentialing process. So even though you have a good job, uh, my dad told me to go into medicine cause you know, people are always going to get sick. Uh, and it's secure. Um, you don't have as much of that security as you want. And like you said, you know, multiple times things have changed for you and you were able to kind of take a step back because you were financially secure.

You knew you could bring food home. 

[24:05] Peter: Good hedge. I mean, it's good hedge to have all these income sources because you don't know what's going to happen. I'm part of, it's like, you know, the, the business of medicine could change, but also your interests just might change. Like, you know, we put so much time and energy and to be doctrine at the beginning, that's all you want to do.

But maybe 10 years into it, you're like, you know what? I don't want to be a doctor anymore. I want to do this. Or I want to do a part part-time or I spend more time in my family. That's me too. I want to spend more time in my family or these kinds of things. And your interests start to change. How are you going to have that flexibility to be able to do that, especially if you're relying a hundred percent of medicine for your, for your income.

And so the only way to do that is to have it coming from different sources. And so that's something I encourage everyone to do. Are these things. 

[24:46] Pranay: Definitely you, don't one thing a lot of budding entrepreneurs are worried about are what are, what are they, what are their colleagues gonna think? You know, what are they thinking to think if I do real estate or something else, but for you, it's even more interesting because you were as passive income MD initially, and not necessarily under Dr.

Peter. So tell me a little bit about what was going through your head when you started under a pseudonym. And then when you decided on coming out as Peter Dr. Porter, 

[25:14] Peter: I think things have even changed in the last five years, actually, even in medicine, there's nothing, the old guard that, you know, believes that as a doctor that's should be your one life.

And then nothing else should matter. You know, they're the doctors that sit there all night, like, you know, that love doing cases late into the night that are willing to give up. Unfortunately some of them are willing to give up kind of relationships and families and, and that's our thing, but you know, a duty as a physician.

And honestly, I think we probably need some people like that in the world to continue to advance medicine and things like that, but that just wasn't me. But I was worried being in a group that if I started sharing about stuff about real estate is sharing about. Creating other income sources started talking about having flexibility and freedom and wanting to do all these different things that somehow my group would look down upon me.

I didn't know what that would look like in terms of like some sort of consequence, but I just didn't like that idea. And so, and there weren't that many people talking about that kind of stuff online. And so I did it start under a pseudonym. I started writing blogs on. Just the website, any passive income MD.

I didn't put my name face. He wouldn't see me on there at all. And it's funny because I was doing that for a while and it was great. But then people started like reaching out to me and saying like, oh man, I have this situation. Like, can you help? Or I'd love to find out more. I'd love to Baba. Can we get a group of people together who think this way, it was just amazing.

The amount of like, uh, the, the feedback out there. Right. And, and how it resonated with so many people. And then I started realizing at a certain point. Wow. I can't get out there and meet people and connect with people unless I'm out there personally, myself too. And so after about a year of running the blog, that way I kind of stepped out out of the shadows and started letting people know, this is me.

This is who I am. This is why I've done it. And guess what nothing happened? Like all the fear that I had of people at work or other things, the consequences or the hospital, whatever, like nothing. And in fact, anything over time, I got people like on my side for people like exactly. Now five years later, there's so many people talking about it.

I feel there's so many, it is accepted not only accepted, it's encouraged. And I think a lot of doctors are saying that, yes, as doctors, we need to take back control of our lives, number one, and we need to explore other things and it's very much more celebrate. Then it was back then he, my dad told me when I started telling him about doing all these other things, he was like, just, just be a doctor.

You're going to live a good life. Don't, don't focus on these other things. And now today, when he like talks to me, he's like, oh, I'm so glad you started doing these other things. And I'm like, yeah, you told me not to, you know, but that's how he's come from a different generation. I got a lot of hate online too, on like, on comments, like what else?

My articles were on Doximity or whatever. I get comments. I started reading those comics. People are like, you know, we wasted people with, you know, ways to taxpayer money, education wasted, uh, educational spot, you know, seat for you at a medical school. So it could have gone to somebody else more dedicated, you know, all these types of things.

And I think a lot of other people feel get that too, when they, you know, they want to cut back and work part time, you wanna spend more time with their families. And a lot of people worry that what kind of, you know, what they're gonna hear from their colleagues and society and things like that. But I think it's a lot more accepted today and that's really great cause, um, I, I think.

It's better to keep good, happy people in medicine in some capacity than to lose them completely. For sure. And I think there should be ways for people to contribute. However, they. In that way. And so I think we're coming to a better place when it comes to that stuff. 

[28:51] Pranay: Yeah. It seems that the burnout epidemic is it's a zero or one thing where people are, you're either fully working full time or they quit, you know, and there's such a happy medium before people get burnt out.

I've actually talked to a bunch of medical students that are doing real estate and all this other stuff. You know, um, if they can have something that they can do that, you know, while they're still studying and all that stuff, but something that they can practice for another 20, 30 years, you know, that's the type of thing.

[29:18] Peter: Yeah. I mean, it was funny. I was in conversation, dinner conversation with some people and, and they were saying, okay, you know, there were people that are all professionals and they're like talking about certain, going to college now. You know, certain degrees, it doesn't get you where you want with just high student loan debt.

And so they needed to also, they're like, you can do that as a hobby, right? Let's say you're in the arts or something. Do the arts as a hobby, but you know, pursue something that's actually going to make you money, like medicine or law or engineering or something like that. And I was like, well, actually, if I want my kid to go into like something like being a doctor, I want them to have other things to fall back on.

And I, I want them to have like real estate income. I want them to just have entrepreneurial skills. So that in medicine, if it isn't exactly what they expect it to be or cracked up to be, or they don't have the control and they have other things to fall back on. 

[30:04] Pranay: Yeah. It's funny that they want us to be well-rounded up until we get into medical school.And then after that, you have to only focus on medicine and nothing else today. Yeah. And you know, it's funny because after I became an entrepreneur, someone has skills that I was able to take back as she made me a better doctor.

[30:23] Peter: Yeah. I mean, I totally believe that, you know, it's all of it's, you know, a lot of the same skills, you know, dealing with people, dealing with problems and solutions and calm under pressure and, and being resourceful actually is probably a big part of it.

And so that's why I think doctors definitely are uniquely positioned to be successful when it comes to. Entrepreneurship and that, and so the ones that you see dive into it, they seem to do quite well. They have the, again, the parachute behind them of just being a doctor, you know, they can fall back on that if they need to, but then they also sometimes have some capital, they have connections, they have networks and they're able to do some really cool things inside a business.

Awesome. 

[30:58] Pranay: Well, Peter, let's talk about some, uh, rapid answer question. You know, money's usually tight when you start entrepreneurship. But fortunately, a lot of doctors have a little bit of money that they can set aside. But what I found is a lot of people will waste some money or spend a lot of money where it's not that useful just because they have some.

So is there anything that you wish you didn't spend money on when you first started entrepreneurship or felt that you wait. 

[31:24] Peter: Yeah, that's a good question. I think that whenever I've started certain businesses or had websites or courses, like I've always thought that it needs to be like super professional quality and everything needs to be perfect.

So I remember spending a lot of money on videographers. I remember spending a lot of money on like shoot locations and to do my videos. And the funny thing was like, I did scrap all of that, like in none of it. And what really mattered and people held onto was actually the content. What ended up happening was that there was a situation, you know, about this, where we're like, Hey, I'm going to, we're going to start our first course, but it has to be perfect.

And we hired a videographer. We had all this kind of stuff. And at the end of the day, like, it just did not end up looking good. And we just went with a PowerPoint and people absolutely loved it. And we spent so much time and energy on the wrong thing. I think the things that you should be spending time and energy on is not looking great, doing these kinds of things, but like, how do you best serve people?

Ultimately people will meet you where you're at. And, um, you know, ultimately all they care is about like, you know, you really caring and providing just great value at the end of the day. Not all of the, I think anyways, all of the kind of flash and that sort of thing. And so we spent, I spent so much money on that kind of stuff when it wasn't the.

[32:35] Pranay: Amazing. And last question, uh, peer, if there was a one thing you think about, about entrepreneurship that surprised you, what would it be? 

[32:44] Peter: I guess one thing that surprised me was that it never ends. It's not a bad way, but once you kind of have, uh, the bug and once you kind of start realizing that you can help solve problems and, you know, through entrepreneurship or these kinds of things, and you can help a ton of people, it's addictive.

So what ends up happening is that every situation or problem or thing that you see, you're thinking, how can I do this to serve more people? How can I do this to create a business around it? And so you can't stop thinking about it. And so I thought it was one of these things where you start a business and you make, you know, you make some money and then you're like, Don, and you're like, yeah, I'm going to retire.

Or are you going to do these type of things? But you see it all the time with all these like billionaires or millionaires that sell off their businesses, what do they go? What do they do right away? They just start another business. And I think that's kind of the way entrepreneurship. That it's not about doing things just so you can retire and sail off.

I'm sure some people do that, but for most people it's almost like a lifestyle and it's a way of kind of seeing the world. And that's been a really cool thing is that's why when you meet other entrepreneurs and you start talking about it, it doesn't matter what they're doing or what they've done. It's exciting because you see how they've kind of taken that mindset and applied it to another sort of problems.

And it's just exciting. So you'll always have something in common with whole. 

[33:59] Pranay: That's amazing. Thank you so much for your time, Peter. You're amazing.

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