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Beth Frates, M.D., Founder of Wellness Synergy

By Cheval John

March 7th 2018

Today’s episode of What’s The Word? features Beth Frates, M.D., co-author and founder of The Wellness Synergy.

The Wellness Synergy provides people the tools and skills needed to optimize their health and wellness.

Dr. Frates decided to enter the medical field after a health scare with her father when she was eighteen years old.

In that time, she earned a degree in both biology and psychology from Harvard University and earned her medical degree from Stanford University.

Dr. Frates co-authored the book “Life After Stroke: The Guide to Recovering Your Health and Preventing Another Stroke” published by John Hopkins University Press.

In this episode, you will hear:

-the transition to founding the Wellness Synergy Center
-why moving around can help your brain
-how social media helped Dr. Frates to stand out in her profession

Snippet on Vallano Media TV

Full show on BlogTalkRadio

The episode was recorded on Facebook Live via Blue Jeans Network

Dr. Frates’ Website: www.wellness-synergy.com

Twitter: @BethFrates

You can also subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast, Stitcher and Google Play Music.

Quotes from Dr. Beth Frates On:

WORK-LIFE BALANCE

There’s pressure to perform and produce.

I think it was very heavy in the 80s where my dad was living in New York City and running his own company.

I believe there’s similar pressures but I do think it’s a little better.

People talk more about family, work-life balance than they did when my dad was experiencing his health setbacks.

So I think we have made some strides.

I think especially entrepreneurs and those who are responsible for the profits of the company still feels stress about the employees and making sure they can provide a good life for the employees and for the clients or customers or whatever their business is.

I think there’s still a lot of stress.

The idea though is if you don’t take care of ourselves, if we don’t have proper nutrition, exercise, sleep, then we won’t be at our best and we won’t perform at our best.

So the tide is changing slightly in we’re understanding you cannot pour from an empty cup.

If we want to do our best job at work, we really better take care of ourselves so that we are our best for everyone else instead of I’m not important, I just have to get the work done, get the work done, get the next client.

We need to realize we can do that better if we have the energy, if we have a clear mind, if we have a sense of purpose, if we feel good about social connections, if we feel good about our relationships with those around us and with those at work, we’ll be more productive and be able to really give our best authentic selves to those around us.

EXERCISING FOR THE BRAIN

Most who people think about exercise think about the heart which is right.

Exercise is really good for our heart and our cardiovascular system.

We can reduce blood pressure.

We can reduce cholesterol.

We can do a lot of good by exercising and we can even increase insulin sensitivity.

What we don’t tend to think about is what exercise does to the brain.

A lot of physicians don’t tend to know this.

We know know that after exercising, you get an increase in brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) which is also called “miracle grow” for the brain.

It helps neurons to make new connections and it also increases neurogenesis.

All very good.

Research shows that if you look at MRI’s, you can look at the hippocampus, a specific part of the brain that is intricately involved in consolidating memories.

So if you want to keep your memory for a long period of time, exercise should be on you list.

One-half of people who are 85 or older have memory problems.

So if you want to be in the half that does not have memory problems, I recommend exercising.

How much do we need, that’s the question.

There’s a lot of research still going on around that.

But, the recommendation is to accumulate 150 minutes of moderate intense physical activity in the week which is like a half hour, five days a week.

If you want to exercise more on the weekends, you could be doing half hour, both days on the weekends or you could be doing an hour both days on the weekend depending on your schedule.

You get all the benefits that exercise can give to all your organs including your brain.

The ten minutes come from the United States Health and Human Services Department which holds all the data something like 8,000 studies that were done on exercising.

They found that if you exercise ten minutes, yes, just ten minutes every day for a total of 70 minutes, your chances of getting sick or dying goes down dramatically.

If you are not exercising three days a week for 30 minutes for three months, you are considered at a sedentary level, which means sitting down.

If you are considered sedentary, you have an increased risk of a heart attack and a stroke.

SOCIAL MEDIA

I did not want to get involved with social media.

I did for a very long time use LinkedIn because that’s very professional.

You set up your account and you connect with people.

It seemed as if I didn’t have to have interaction.

You would connect or not connect and that would be it.

I wasn’t very involved with messaging or posting or anything.

So that worked for me really well.

Our department of physical medical rehabilitation at Harvard University which is based at Spaulding Rehab Hospital has a lot of great research and a great program.

In April of last year, the department said, “We’re all doing great things, but nobody knows what we are doing. We have to get up with the times. Yes, we’re physicians, but we need to promote our programs in order for them to survive and thrive.”

So they encouraged us to get on Twitter and post.

I have a colleague, Dr. Julie Silver, who basically set me up and taught me about Twitter.

I’ll never forget I did not know how to tweet.

I did not know how to retweet.

I did not understand if someone put an @bethfrates that meant they wanted you to retweet.

There’s a whole world of twitter that I did not know.

As I was figuring out twitter, I found it to be remarkably fun.

It was enjoyable.

It was not drudgery because I like learning about other people.

I like learning what other people are doing.

It’s fascinating.

It’s great to see what other people are doing and posting.

I am involved with many different physician groups and I’m also involved with other patient groups.

I feel like I’ve gotten a lot out of Twitter.

In fact, I have actually made friends from twitter that I would have never have met.

Some are not even in this country (United States).

Certainly not in my state or in my department.

I gained friends and some colleagues I might be presenting with.

I have gotten opportunities like this and other podcasts to do because of twitter.

I’m finishing a book proposal hopefully this year and I have been told that you need to have a following of some kind.

They have asked me, “How many people follow you on twitter?”

It helps if you have some followers because then the publicist thinks, “Okay, she could potentially sell this book. There are people who are listening to her.”

So that might help me.

Forward Thinking Companies Look “Backwards”

By Cheval John

We are told to not dwell on the past.

That is very sound advice because we might be missing out on the possibilities of improving ourselves and our business.

It is the same thing with old social media advice regarding certain tactics to grow our audience.

These tactics which worked in the past will not work right now because social media changes all the time.

Sometimes, it might be good to look at the past because you can appreciate the journey to being where you are right now in your business and life.

Have you notice why users of WordPress see their blog posts archived from most recent to the oldest?

Or your podcast archive from the newest to the very first episode?

You might also see on Twitter and Facebook the posts going “backwards” too.

Mel Robbins‘ message on the Video Advice YouTube channel, gives a deeper explanation indirectly on why it is important to look backwards in order to move forward.

Hope you enjoy.

Cynthia Bazin’s Transition To Founding “The Smart Chic”

By Cheval John

Live video has changed the way how we interact on social media.

Before, we would chat with many people via social media platforms like Facebook (Instagram), Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, YouTube to keep up with what is happening in the world.

With Twitter, it made communication much easier in “real time” because of the instantaneous response.

When live streaming arrived in 2015, interaction on social media went to the next level with no signs of slowing down.

According to Cisco, 82% of all internet traffic will be drived by video by 2021.

Which means if you are not using video for your business, it will become much harder to reach your ideal audience in the future.

Another reason why you should be using live video is to meet people you would not have met before even with social.

I was very fortunate to have met Cynthia Bazin two years ago via live streaming.

She was among the early adopters of Periscope and also made some guest appearances on shows which was hosted on the now defuncted video platform called blab.

Cynthia have the drive of helping business owners to be laser focused and her company “The Smart Chic” is centered on her values.

I had the opportunity to interview Cynthia on this week’s episode of What’s The Word?

The show was recorded on Facebook Live via Blue Jeans Network

In this episode, you will hear:

How she transitioned from a private investigator to running her company

Why she did not dive immediately into entrepreneurship

How to run a business on the side while you working in a toxic company

How she overcame doubts to become successful with her company

How live streaming help take her business to the next level

The importance of having a mentor

Why video should be part of the business’ marketing strategy

Snippet of the interview on Vallano Media TV

Full episode on BlogTalkRadio

Cynthia Bazin’s Business Website: www.smartchic.me

Facebook: The Smart Chic

Twitter: @thesmartchic

Did you enjoy this post and who would you want to make a guest appearance on the show?

Creating A Winning Culture In Your Company

By Cheval John

November 19th, 2016

The #HTownTakeOver reignited after the University of Houston (UH) football team defeated then No.5 Louisville 36-10 in front of a record 42,822 fans at TDECU Stadium on Thursday night.

The football matchup was broadcast in front of a national television audience on ESPN and a national radio audience on ESPN Radio.

This Tweet by KPRC 2 sports reporter, Lainie Fritz, who captured the storming of the field after UH’s victory.

And ESPN had one of the best live streaming thursday night viewership this season due to this matchup

The campus has been a scene of a winning culture since Houston’s coach Tom Herman took over the team in December of 2014.

Since Herman’s arrival, UH has a record of 22-3 with an American Athletic Conference championship and a Peach Bowl win over Florida State University.

What is more impressive is that UH’s success has taken over the city of Houston

In a city that has plenty of professional sports teams, UH has found a way to get their football team into the spotlight.

UH has had success under previous football coaches like Kevin Sumlin and their softball team have been extremely successful since they began in 2001.

However, the recent success of UH’s football team seems to be in another level.

One could argue that UH’s recent rise to prominence started when they achieved the Tier One Status in 2011 by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education under the leadership of Chancellor Renu Khator.

With the Tier One status, UH were able to bring in world class professors and recruit future college students who were elite in their respective high schools from around the world.

From there, they were able to secure the funds to build the 40,000 seat TDECU stadium over the same grounds of the demolished Robertson Stadium in time for the 2014 football season.

That first year in the new stadium, Houston finished with an 8-5 record.

However, the season was considered disastrous due to the inaugural home opening loss to UTSA resulting in the firing of Tony Levine.

UH administration understood that if they wanted to take their football program to the next level in their new stadium, they had to bring in leadership who would bring in a culture of winning.

That was why they hired coach Herman to lead their football program because he played a role in helping Ohio State win a national championship under the new College Football Playoff format as an offensive coordinator for coach Urban Meyer.

Coach Herman instilled a winning culture at UH and the entire university community was onboard with the #htowntakeover movement.

The average home attendance at TDECU stadium have increase from 33,980 in 2015 to 38,953 this year.

UH administrators are trying to keep their coach from leaving the football team as major collegiate football teams are trying to hire him away from their school.

University of Texas seems to be the front runner to poach coach Herman away according to this ESPN report that the Longhorn’s most powerful boosters are trying to get Charlie Strong fired

Though UH have already increased coach Herman’s salary to $3 million a year, it seems like the money will not be enough.

The UH fans can hope that coach Herman will stay due to the stability of the UH administration who only want the best for their faculty and staff.

The above story showcases that as a business owner, you must:

1. Create a winning culture in your company

2. Allow your employees to shine in their respective roles

3. Avoid a power struggle (like the University of Texas boosters) that could tear your company apart

When you create a culture that allows your employees to shine in their roles, you will end up winning in the long term because they will go out of their way to promote you.

In the same manner as UH, customers will see your company as a place where people can grow their skills and positive recognition from outside sources will find you.

Have you created a winning culture like UH? You can leave your comments below.

The Flexibility Of Being A Small Business

By Cheval John

Photo Courtesy of  Dream Designs

Photo Courtesy of Dream Designs


Everyone is celebrating national small business week.

It is in honor of all of the small businesses which plays a huge part in the United States economy.

According to the U.S. Small Business Administration’s 2014 report, they were 28,443,856 small businesses currently in operation in the U.S.

The majority of the small businesses are non-employers (22,735,915).

Though these non-employer businesses would like to have employees, they probably enjoy being solopreneurs.

Another thing that you can factor in with these solopreneurs is the fact that their non-employer businesses could be side businesses because they are taking the small steps towards full-time entrepreneurship while they are at their current full time work.

One of the best things that small businesses have over the larger corporations is the flexibility to pivot when the market changes.

They do not have to worry too much about letting go of their workers if the economy is in a recession.

Though this is great news, you might still have the “I do not have enough money blues” to compete with the larger corporations.

That is not the mindset to have because you can still compete against the larger businesses even if you do not have the “large budget.”

Despite having “limited” resources, you have the ability to be very creative on how you market your product or services with the biggest game changer of all: SOCIAL MEDIA.

Social media is a place where anyone can interact with a person even if they are thousands of miles away.

With platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc., you can be very creative in how your share your message.

My suspicion is that you are like many of the small businesses who understand that must engage with your audience on a daily basis to earn their trust and eventually a new customer.

You also realize that gaining the trust of the customer is a long term goal and that it will take time to earn their loyalty.

If a corporation want to get their message out in the world, they buy advertisements, sponsor television events like college football, basketball, etc. to get in front of the large audience that are tuning in to watch the events.

That is why the smartest companies, intuition says the majority of small businesses, are participating in group chats on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn to build their audience.

They are also blogging to showcase their expertise.

Like Stephanie Shirley, owner of Bennis Public Relations Inc.

She shares about the ups-and-downs of running a business through her company’s blog

Mrs. Shirley was very creative in building a loyal following of nearly 1,000 fans because she has been very transparent with her readers.

Because of her transparency, she has taken her business to the next level.

Another way that small businesses can market their product or services is through a podcast.

You might be thinking “Why not just a blog?”

Though blogging is very, very important, the blogosphere is over populated.

According to statista.com, there were 173 million blogs in the world in October of 2011.

That number has really increased tremendously since that report came out.

It is also possible that they are more blogs out there that are not currently active at the moment.

So the number of blogs could possibly be close to 400 million.

However, they are about 300,000 podcasts.

And with the amount of people who uses smartphones which is over a billion, that is a huge opportunity for small business owners to reach a global audience.

And iTunes reported in 2013 that they had over 1 billion subscriptions of podcast from their website.

Another thing to consider about podcasting is that Apple created the Carplay system in 2014 that allows anyone to connect their iPhone to their car’s dashboard.

The Carplay system is set to be in 50% of cars hopefully by the end of this year.

So with less competition and huge access to potential listeners, small businesses can start a podcast and build a loyal audience in addition to having a blog.

They also do not have to worry about being their true selves when they are sharing their message out to the world unlike the corporations.

So if you are a small business and are looking to take your business to the next level, consider starting a podcast and also a blog because it will allow you to grow your audience the right way and you will not have to worry too much about using a marketing budget to share your message.

That is something that larger companies will probably not be able to do because they will have to get approved from a hierarchy of executives before they can share their message.