A Young Dentist Takes the Challenge and Succeeds

Last February a young dentist travelled around the world to spend a week with me and Susan so that he could begin his own challenge of excellence. The first time he had seen my work online, he could not believe that this level of excellence existed. I assured him that on the world stage, there were many dentists who were equal OR BETTER clinical dentists than me. We have maintained our mentor/student relationship over the last year and he sends me the cases that he has treated for my critique or the cases that he wants to treat and asks what I would do if this was my patient. Several days ago, my wonderful student sends me his before and after photos of a direct posterior restoration that PERFECTLY mimics a natural tooth and I immediately emailed him a note of congratulations. This morning, he sends me the following:

"Hi DR.Gerald, its all because of you. What ever i do and get the results(only the good and the perfect!!!) I just offer it to you, I don't like to keep anything in my head(just be neutral!!!), because if i keep thinking about the result, i know i will never improve, still so much is there to see and learn!!!!. Without your mentoring my brain wouldn't have realized that these things exists and results also can be given in this fashion, thanks for your encouragement, take care, Ashok."

It is a tribute to young Dr. Ashok that he has accepted the challenge of excellence, worked hard this past year to move in the direction of excellence and has SUCCEEDED in producing wonderful clinical dentistry.

The task of working with young dentists to make them better at what they do has always been assigned to older (ok old) dentists who have risen to the top of our wonderful profession. I have accepted this task because I am working on my legacy so that in 10 or 15 years dentists will tell their patients about me and how I helped them when they were younger.

There can be no better legacy.