Going Under: Anesthesia Answered with Dr. Brian Schmutzler
Going Under: Anesthesia Answered is a podcast with renowned physician and anesthesiologist Dr. Brian Schmutzler. Together with Award-Winning Co-Host and television journalist, Vahid Sadrzadeh, the podcast aims to answer not only your most pressing anesthesia questions but to provide the most up-to-date medical data available.
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Going Under: Anesthesia Answered with Dr. Brian Schmutzler
Mentors, Faith, And My Why
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In this edition of Going Under: Anesthesia Answered with Dr. Brian Shmutzler, we trace the mentors who shaped Brian’s faith, scientific rigor, leadership, and fatherhood, and how that guidance forged a clearer 'why'.
From early belief to clinical judgment, and family models to business integrity, Dr. Brian and Vahid discuss why being bold and present matters.
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SPEAKER_00This is going under anesthesia answered with the good doc, Dr. Brian Schmutzler. I am Vahid Saderzade, and we are brought to you by the Butterfly Network. We are.
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SPEAKER_00Boca.
SPEAKER_02Boca.
SPEAKER_00Is it? Is it Boca? I don't know. Um yeah, they are. Is it right now?
Framing The Conversation: Mentors And Buckets
SPEAKER_02Yeah, where is the Butterfly Innovator Forum this year? Whoa. Nope, that's not it. We'll get back to you on that. Yes, we will. I'll look it up. I'll figure it out.
SPEAKER_00I'm excited about this podcast, and here's why. We're talking about mentors. Uh leadership, faith, the whole nine. But really, who has mentored you to this point in your life? Um, and I think it's important for you know, a big chunk of of your audience is students, yes, that's uh and and first city residents or you know um those studying specialties, but younger younger medical audiences.
SPEAKER_02It looks like it's on a cruise ship this year. Where? I don't know. I can't tell.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Okay, sorry about that. Um so so it's it's really important, I think, in terms of for this podcast, everybody has a different path. Yeah. Your path was different than student B over here. Yep. What was that path and why was that mentor, two mentors, three mentors so important to getting you to where you are now?
Early Faith And First Mentor
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so some of this comes from um I'm sort of moving into the phase of my life where I'm becoming a mentor, right? So I, you know, I used to be the young guy, and then you know, I was at an event, and I all of a sudden realized I was like the old guy, and everybody was younger than me. And so I think over the last probably six to ten months, twelve months, I've realized that I need to be a mentor to people. And so that got me thinking about who were my mentors growing up, right? So I just basically I just wrote down all the kind of mentors that I had from the time I was a young kid to now, basically. So um, yeah, and it's I think it's critically important for anybody, whether you're you know going into medicine or not, to have a mentor. Now, I also think it's pretty critically important that you have a mentor in your medical field as well. And I I'm just remembering now that I didn't really have one for anesthesia, but that's okay. I have I I mean I have you know medical, medical, yeah, yeah, yeah. So um, yeah. So I'll just go through these and we can kind of chat about them and then you know we'll go from there and see where the conversation leads. So um I guess for me, um, you know, my faith, uh Christianity, sorry. Christianity is incredibly important. And so how did I come to that faith? I know we talked about this on other episodes, but um, you know, I started attending a Bible study uh with one of my friends when I was 10, 11 years old. And so John, my Bible study leader, is the first person I think of as one of the mentors. So um he he was an interesting guy, or is I guess an interesting guy. He's obviously still alive. I still keep in contact with him. But he um so he had a job, full-time job, and a wife and kids and all kinds of stuff, but he poured a lot of time into us. You know, there were, I don't know, seven or eight of us in this in this Bible study, poured a lot of time into us on a couple of times a week and took us on trips and all kinds of stuff. Awesome guy. Um, but really I learned a lot about like who God was and you know why I should be a faithful person and learned about scripture and you know, all that sort of stuff. And I think he he was key in kind of helping me come to Christ personally. Um and I I don't know that I even really ever talked to him about this, but um, yeah, so so I mean I spent a lot of time in that group with him, with our friends, um, and and like I said, I still keep in contact with him to to this very day, but he was a mentor in the sense of helping me come to Christ, but also having like a you know a healthy family to look at, right? As opposed to, you know, my my parents weren't weren't probably the best example in terms of of um that sort of stuff, right? So we had, you know, a bunch of kids and like a healthy marriage and stuff. So that was that was cool. And I that's kind of the first person who comes to mind when I think about a a mentor. Um so yeah.
SPEAKER_00Just the faith, I think the faith aspect is huge. If you're looking at buckets, right? Right, yeah. And you have many different buckets that contributed to who you are today. Yep. Um and I and I always kind of look at these buckets like if if the buckets aren't filled and not weighted towards each other, there it's gonna be unequal, right? I mean or sporadic, or you're gonna lean too far one way or the other. And so the faith bucket at a young age is a huge bucket to fill because a lot of people don't fill that bucket till later. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And it and it definitely you know formulated who I was and how I kind of proceeded into the world. So the the second and the second person that came to mind, and you'll love this name, Dr. Alan Schmetzer. Hey, yeah, so no relation, no Schmitzer Schmitzler. Yeah, yeah, it was a Schmitz. Schmetzer Schmutzler. Yeah. So um, so I I thought back in like high school that I wanted to be a psychiatrist. Yeah. So I've talked about that. But um, so what was what was cool about him, he got like I can't even remember, some somehow randomly, I got his number from somebody I knew from somewhere. Yeah, anyway. So I started started just chatting with him, and he would let me come into his office, talk to like listen to it while he talked to the patients, and then he'd explain to me afterwards, like this is the diagnostic criteria I used, and um, you know, the the uh medicines I used and why and all that sort of stuff. It was really cool to just see because I I didn't have physicians in my family. Um, you know, my my dad's brother was uh or it I think he's retired, was an optometrist, but that's about the closest I came to anything medical. Um so he let me spend a ton of time with him. I did a whole project when I was a senior. Um, you know, he had us over to his house. Like it he was super, super nice guy and just kind of let me do a lot of things that I probably wouldn't have had the opportunity to do otherwise. And so um, and then you know, my my favorite quote from from him was Um, it's nearly impossible to study the thing that you're trying to study the thing you're trying to study with that thing, meaning the mind, right? So, like, how do you study the mind using the mind? It's it's like a paradox, right? So that that's kind of what he he used to talk about, is like we don't understand what's going on, but how could we? How could we be evaluating or studying the mind when we're having to use the mind to study the mind? Interesting. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I'm trying to wrap my brain around that quote itself.
SPEAKER_02Well, and it's you know, 16, 17, 18 years old. I didn't understand what that meant, but the older I get, obviously, the more I kind of like that it blows my mind even more, right? Like I'm using the finite mind to try to study the mind. And then, you know, if you even take that back to faith, right? I'm I'm using my finite mind to try to understand an infinite God. And so how do you how do you wrap your head around that? It's it's basically impossible, right?
SPEAKER_00So you had so at a young age, you kind of had these big overarching mentors themes in your life. Yeah, definitely. Um I want to know when you kind of decided and when maybe when was that? When did you decide to go to medical school?
Psychiatry Shadowing And Thinking Scientifically
SPEAKER_02Um, I had always kind of said I wanted to be a doctor. Um I I mean I probably started preparing for it when I was in late middle school, early high school. Like I just knew I knew I wanted to I knew I wanted to study science and to help people, and so that I mean it's cliche, right? That's what everybody writes on their med school application. But yeah, I knew it, I knew it from from way before. Now, what I did start to do towards the end of high school and all through college was research as well. Realize that I really like the research aspect of things too, which is why I did a combined MD PhD degree. But at this point, your faith has already formed. I mean, your faith is never fully formed, right? I'm still forming my faith at this point. But yeah, I I mean I had I had at least a rudimentary, you know, teenage knowledge of what faith was. I mean, I had I had given my life to Jesus for sure, right? So um that that wasn't a question, but I certainly was not mature in my faith after four or five years, right?
SPEAKER_00It's been what 30 years since that happened? Yeah, almost almost. So not talking now specifically, but talking then, yeah. How did you, as a young person, how did you um balance the faith aspect of your life with the science medical aspect of what they were teaching you?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, so I think intelligent design is the answer to that question, right? So so if you look, the more you learn about science, the more you learn about medicine, the more you learn about the human body, the more likely it is and the more obvious to me that it is that that a knowledgeable, intelligent creator created us. This there's no way, in my opinion, that this was all random. It just couldn't, it couldn't have been. We couldn't have been randomly put on Earth, we couldn't have been randomly put on the only planet that we would actually survive in. And then you can even go back, and if you want to argue with me, fine. That's I mean, you know, you're not gonna change my mind, but if you want to make that argument that, okay, well, you know, it's all it's all you know, random and big bang and whatever, okay, but then who created the molecules to create the big bang that you speak of, right? At some point you get back to there has to be a creator. Nothing you can't create nothing out of something out of nothing. So there had to be something to create something. So So you you have those two buckets.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You have the faith bucket and you have kind of the Yeah, medicine career bucket. Career bucket. Yeah. Tell me about the next bucket.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Uh so I would say And the mentor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I would say, um, you know, and I'm skipping ahead a little bit here because there's other kind of things in between, but um, the next thing that really came to my mind is um my my father-in-law, my my wife's dad, um, in terms of a man. Now, their their marriage in general, they've been married 50 years or something like that. They've got an amazing marriage. They started churches together, and I've I've in a lot of conversations I've been having lately, I've been saying this, so this may sound rehearsed, but it's just something I've been talking about a lot lately because of some conversations I've been in. Um, he he is a big time mentor to me and has been really since I met my wife. Um, you know, again, I I go back to I I didn't have biblical manhood really displayed for me when I was a kid. Um, and so my father-in-law, um, I mean, he is that. And on top of that, he's like a man's man, right? So he's the person who really got me into like hunting. Not that I hunt a lot now, but I did some hunting. I hunts hunted bear. He got me into like, you know, weapons, like having a gun, shooting a gun. I never shot a gun before I spent time with him. Um, but mostly like I thank him for the way that he raised my wife to expect like what he was, right? So, and and that that moves forward even me, right? And and that I want to be more like him because of the way that like she is, and and I'd like to raise my kids in the same way that my kids are obviously boys and not girls, so there's some differences there, but I'd like to raise my kids the same way that he raised her. So, um, and and you know, like we kind of were talking about some themes, and I haven't stuck to the to the ideas here, the themes or whatever, but um just yeah, just the the whole thing of him, just the way that he carries himself. Um, he's a very quiet guy, but like when he says something, it's meaningful. Um, and so yeah, so he's been a mentor for me in like uh like being a husband, being a father, like family life stuff. And and I've known him now for 22 years, like half my life.
SPEAKER_00So that leads me to my next question. I don't think you and I have ever talked about this before. What's that? So you're a very good father. I've seen I've I mean, I try. I try. Our kids listen, our kids have through the years, they've hung out together, and you know, my 12-year-old is like a bigger brother. Yeah, you know, like they have a great time together, they have a travel together, like that's no secret. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But where did you learn the patience? Oh, yeah. Where where did you learn those finite skills, right? Of like, you know, because I mean, in terms of your dad, yeah, right? I mean, it sounds like your father-in-law was a big part of a hundred percent, yeah. You kind of forming into this man, right? But and this father. Yeah. But taking the experiences of your own father, taking the experiences of your father-in-law, yeah, how have you molded those into you being a father?
Reconciling Faith And Science
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and so I don't I don't want to, you know, brag on my father too much. I can't mean he so you know, rest in peace, obviously. Um he he always made it clear that he cared about me and he came to my events, right? That was a big thing because his dad didn't do that for him. He was always at every game I ever had, at every you know, school play I ever did, all that sort of stuff. So for me, that that was a big part of it. And I never he he did verbalize like that he cared about me and he was proud of me and all that sort of stuff. So that's those things I definitely took from my dad. Um, a lot of other things I did not. Um, and so we won't get again. I'm not gonna defame him on the podcast, but um, but those things for sure. Um now patience. I think if you asked my kids and Alicia if I was patient with them, um, I think they would probably give me a score of like a six on on the six out of ten patients. Um, you know, uh if I would have had kids 10 years earlier, I'm probably more like a two. Like my patience has gotten, I think, better over time. Um, but I mean a lot of it for me is is reading biblically based books about fatherhood and then just praying about it, right? Because I I don't, I mean, I don't I've never had a 10-year-old before, so I don't know what to do with a 10-year-old, right? I just like I didn't know how to change a diaper or how to interact with a one-year-old or a two-year-old or a five-year-old. So um, I mean, for me, it's it's I'm a I'm a big like research person. So trying to find good parenting books and websites and stuff that are biblically based, I think is is a lot of where where things came from. But in in terms of yeah, in terms of like how how to treat a child and how to be like an example as a godly, you know, biblically based father, that's my father-in-law.
Family Mentorship And Biblical Manhood
SPEAKER_00So I've always wanted to know this. Yeah. And I actually just talked to our trainer about this last week. And um, and I've I've said this a couple times actually over the last couple of weeks. Uh-huh. Um, because I find myself just, you know, like telling people your bio. Yeah. Just like, hey, you know, here's Brian and Is that that's a little weird, but that's okay. People ask me about you. Um But but I I think the biggest thing that I see, and and and the question I have for you is this because the this was it goes back to the motor, right? Yeah. And I don't think you can have all of these buckets without this one word. What's that? And that's the why. Okay. What is your why? Like what what is when you strip everything out, and this is what I'm getting at. Yeah. You're up at 3 a.m. Yeah, most mornings, yeah. You're researching like nobody else has. Your motor is going all the time. You know, some people just don't have the ability to do that. Some people just don't have that focus, they don't have the whatever. But I call that the why, right? Yeah. You know, I finished a triathlon. There had to be a why to finish the Iron Man triathlon. You just don't go out and do an Ironman triathlon because of the training involved, because of the time involved. 100%. So what's my why? Yeah. I mean, you spent all of these thousands of hours training, and you know, I mean, what's your why?
SPEAKER_02So uh I think it's changed over time. I think my initial why was fear of failure. And I think a lot of men probably are motivated by fear of failure. Um, I think that has morphed over time as I become more mature, not only in my faith, but just more mature as a person, of um I need to leave a legacy and to honor God in what I do. So that's my why now, right? So I think, you know, I I probably I probably err on the side, and most men do, right? So you either err on the side of doing too much or being lazy and doing too little, right? I probably push it two-thirds of the way too far by doing too much, right? So would my body probably appreciate some more sleep? Yeah. Should I maybe work a little less and not worry as much about it? Yeah. But I think at this point, I'm trying to leave that legacy for my family, but also as a Christian man. And so I people should see me and think, like, yeah, that guy works hard all the time. What's his motivation? And then I can share this. My motivation is just that, what I just talked about. So um, I guess that's where my motor comes from. Um, I also, and this is probably pathologic more so more so than than endearing, but um, my brain just doesn't stop. So, like, from the second I wake up to the second I go to bed, my I'm I'm always thinking of like, what's the next thing? What's how do I improve something? How do I make this or that better? Um, you know, what what do I need to do to make sure that that legacy endures? Trust me, I get those texts at three o'clock in the morning, so I know. Well, less so now because you went away from the dumb Android and went back to Apple so that I can send a send later. So That's right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00That's wow. All right. Yeah. Hey, listen, I don't I don't mind either platform. Yeah. Um clearly. It's not about my platform choices. The rest of us do. The rest of us mind. What what about we're gonna get into the next bucket and the next uh mentor. But how do you see that playing out with the boys? You know, like because everybody's different, right? Yeah, yeah. You know, their why might be different, even though they might not have a why right now.
SPEAKER_02Um I so I think Robbie, uh, my my older son is a lot more like me in the sense that, or is more like me than my younger son. I can tell he loves to research, like he's a researcher. He is very cerebral. We were just talking about this today. And so I think he has the same motivations. Maybe I mean, so part of this got kind of um instilled in me by my dad of like you don't get B's, you don't fail, right? So some of this is like my expectations for you are A, B, and C, right? You you you are A B and C or you're you are smart, yeah. You are smart, you don't fail, right? So I I I probably instill that in him, and he takes it to heart, and it's like I don't want to disappoint dad, which is the exact same way I was. I think my younger, I think my younger son is much more motivated by relationship and affirmation. And so for him, it's less about like, oh, I don't want to, I don't want to disappoint dad, these are the things I have to do. It's more like, how will this particular thing affect my relationship with my dad? Right. And and so like if if cleaning out if take if if taking out the trash, right, if all that's gonna result in for him is me saying, I'm upset that you didn't do that and I'm gonna have to take it out myself, that doesn't really fundamentally change our relationship. If it's going to like really hurt my or especially with with Alicia, they're they're much more sensitive to Alicia's um kind of feelings than mine, which is good. That's the way it should be, right? They they should be very sensitive to their mom's needs. Um that that if she's really upset about something, if it really hurts her feelings, then he's very much. On that, right? So I think he responds much more to relational things than Robbie, which is more like a fear of failure, disappointment thing, right? So I think the two of them are very, very different, which I'm an only child, so I, you know, I wouldn't I I I wouldn't have known all this to begin with.
SPEAKER_00But let's move to the next bucket. This is all so interesting to me to kind of dive into it.
Fatherhood, Patience, And Growth
SPEAKER_02It's a little deeper than I thought it was gonna get. I I got a little choked up talking about my father-in-law, so that was a little interesting, but anyway. That's what we're here for, baby. That's that's come on, you know. So so now the work bucket. Um Yeah, because that's comes later, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. So so I I think um, I think so. Dr. Cynthia Hinchin was my was my um like investigator. She was basically my boss when I was doing research. And so she she's great. I mean, she she did an awesome job doing research. I don't think she actually does research anymore. She's a neurologist as well. So I think she went in full-time neurology practice, which is fine. But um, she gave me like a passion for research and a passion for like reading, you know, scientific literature, thinking about it. And then she really taught me how to think scientifically. Um critically, scientifically. What science, scientifically, like like how do I read a paper? Like an article, right? People talk about all the time. Like, I did my research, I read an article. Well, she taught me how to actually read an article and look for the things that are in there that maybe make the article not mean what they say it means in the conclusion, right? That's a lot of what happens in science is people they show you all their data and they show you all their results, and then their conclusion is a huge jump from what the results actually show. So she taught me all that kind of stuff. She also taught me the discipline of you need to get things done on a timeline because if you don't, you'll never go back to medical school, and then you'll be 75 by the time you finish medical school and go to residency and actually have a real job. So um, so she was great in that regard and and she was really patient with me. I mean, I I I think I was probably I was probably hard, I still probably am hard to uh manage uh because I don't do well well with authority, like with a boss basically telling me what to do. Um and so she gave me the right amount of um she gave me the right amount of freedom, but also the right amount of structure, which which is it which is amazing because she um she didn't really have kids of her own, from what I recall. And so having that like innate ability to know how to basically it wasn't like parenting, like I wasn't her kid, but uh you know how to sort of guide me in a parental way while I was in the lab was was outstanding. So I I owe a lot of my sort of ability to have um have like success in the workplace to the habit she instilled in me.
SPEAKER_00As you move to this next stage in your life, yeah, what is um what is I guess the biggest uh factor for you? Maybe factor is not the right word, but what is most important to you in mentorship and um you know what bucket or what group or what mentor are you looking at next as you're kind of yeah as you phases of life, right?
SPEAKER_02That's interesting. I mean, so for me, I think um I think presence is one, like the ability to talk to that person is important in mentorship for me right now. Um I think integrity and accountability, right? And going both ways, right? So so I think those those mentors I've talked about so far, and even even the next mentor I talk about, who's kind he, you know, he owns the company, the the national anesthesia management company that I work for, um, those are kind of more people who I'm accountable to them, but they are not really accountable to me. I think I'm moving into the phase of my life where I want mutual accountability, and so I think what the last person we'll talk about, and then you know, even going forward in other mentors that I look for uh is the is the you know, and it's not unilateral, it's bi-directional accountability and and integrity. And so, yeah, that's maybe what I'm looking for now in a mentor, and how how I want to be as a mentor. Who is that last well? So, so let's go the next one first. I've got two more. So I've got again in in and and he he does a great job with accountability for sure, so don't get me wrong, but um, he's not really so so Kurt Zumwald, he's the CEO of CCI Anesthesia. Um, he's not, I mean, I guess he is in a sort of you know theoretical sense accountable to me because he runs the company, but um, but yeah, but he he so he's he's been a mentor to me for a long time, um, since I've been with the company, you know, six, seven years, eight years, whatever it is now. Um, and so he he's been a mentor to me in a couple of ways. Uh he's shown me how to do business in the right way, um, that you don't have to oversell or get on that line of not telling the truth. You just be honest and you do the right things for the right reasons, even though sometimes that may hurt you in a business perspective. Um, and so that he definitely taught me that. He also taught me forgiveness. He and I had a uh falling out a couple of years into our relationship on some business terms. Um, and um, you know, he was right. I'll I'll admit it, he was right for the most part in that situation. Um, and so we sort of went our separate ways for about a couple of weeks, and then he called me and said, Hey, listen, I'm gonna give you another chance. And so I respect him for that forever, right? Um, and and now, you know, he's obviously he's one of my mentors. I'm executive leadership within the company, right? It worked out the way that that we all hoped it would. Um, but yeah, I think that mentorship is huge um in the accountability, in the showing me how to run business and showing me um, you know, uh forgiveness, I guess. Yeah. And who's the final one? Yeah, so the last one is is my pastor, Lucas Miles, um Influence Church, nine o'clock and eleven o'clock, Sunday mornings, Granger, Indiana. Shameless plug. Um shame in about it. So he he sat on this podcast probably about a year ago, wasn't it? Maybe a little less than a year. I'm hoping we can get him on again. I'm hoping we get him on again too. Yeah, he's he's busy doing a lot of other things, but um, he sat on here, and what I said, what I said to him a year ago, I said it privately and publicly on the podcast, is that I am secure in my faith, but not bold in my faith, right? And what he said to me is give me a year and I'll change that. And I think we kind of laughed and whatever. And um, I would say, I I mean, you know, you're an outsider perspective. Would you say that's true? 100%. Okay.
SPEAKER_00Well, I'm not really an outsider perspective. Well, not an outsider, but I'm just yeah, but I'm not you're not in my head. No, I'm not you. I'm not you.
Research Mentor And Scientific Rigor
SPEAKER_02So from your perspective, have I become more bold in my faith? Absolutely. So, so to to me, he's a mentor in that way. I mean, he's an awesome pastor. He, you know, the the sermons he gives are awesome. He's a friend, right? So I I I text him and I see him outside of church, you know, not just as that's my pastor, um, but he also he he does the hard things he has to do, no matter what the consequences. And and it's it's always Jesus-based, but it's also like he'll call somebody out if he has to call him out, even though it may mean something, right? He he put up a big sign in front of the church that that probably made a lot of people mad, but he did it because it was the right thing to do. And so I think in terms of how to be bold in my faith, aside from all the other things, I think he's an awesome guy, he's a good friend, right? So don't don't get it, Lucas. If you're listening, don't get me wrong. This is not the only reason I see you as a mentor, but I think a big reason I see you as a mentor is because you've helped move me into boldness in my faith, like it not just at church, not just at home, but you know, everywhere everywhere I go. So that's awesome. That's the last one.
SPEAKER_00That's awesome. Yeah. I think there's so much I just think there's so much we can learn, yeah, right, um, from each other by just sitting and listening.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I think that's the benefit of doing a podcast, right?
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You and I went into this whole thing a couple years ago. Yep. And um, I I'm always gun ho for a podcast, but always for the right reasons.
SPEAKER_01Right, right.
SPEAKER_00Um, not everybody should have a podcast.
SPEAKER_02I think it's taught me how I mean you're natural at this because you're in media. It's taught me how to speak in this format and even in front of people, right? So I'm I mean, I'm appreciative for that. But I mean, and and the reason, so you know, how the sausage is made. The reason we started this podcast is because my social media is very much like kind of lighthearted, yeah, fun. Sure. And you know, I'm self-deprecating anesthesiologist, and I felt like I didn't have a platform to share big ideas, right? And so that's why we started the podcast.
SPEAKER_00So go ahead. And I'm glad no, and I'm glad we did. Yeah. Because I think I think, in terms of for the people out there who follow you, that's where I was going with this. Is it's invaluable to sit and listen. Yeah. How many times during a day do we just sit and listen? Not enough. Not enough. Yeah. You know, can we separate from our phone and separate from the external unless you're listening to the podcast on your phone, in which case don't separate from your phone.
SPEAKER_02100%.
SPEAKER_00You know what I'm saying? Yeah. But how many times do we get a chance to breathe, right? And just kind of separate from those external pressures and just listen. And I think if you take 35 minutes to listen to this podcast, you will learn those things because I think that's where we, you know, that's the intention is to learn from the experiences. Of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right? We're not just saying controversial. That's not one of those podcasts where we just say controversial things just for fun. Saying controversial things and stir up audience reactions, right? I mean, that's just not the point. We'd have more followers if we did that. But that's not, but that's not the point, right? And that's not who we are, I don't think. And so I think I I appreciate you opening up about those things because I think, you know, just sitting here listening to you talk about those things opens my eyes to a few ideas, right? And and a few of those, um, you know, how how can you take faith in medicine and how can you take mentorship and yeah, and all of those things and kind of formulate it into one thing. And you you're not even you're not done.
SPEAKER_02No, you're only 40 years old, right? I mean 44 pretty soon. But I mean, I yeah, I think I I think, you know, for me it's just uh an introspective thing of like I'm and it all started because I I realized at a couple of events that I went to that I am now I'm now the mentor. And so that's that's exciting, yeah, but at the same time it's very daunting. Like, how how do I how can I be as good a mentor to other people as these people were to me?
SPEAKER_00So one one more thing I'm gonna say.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh and and I want to speak about this just really quickly. There is a uh very dear friend of mine who you know, and um uh a good friend of mine, but a mentor, lifelong mentor of his that he's known for many, many years, who uh is diagnosed with cancer. He has really it's not a great outlook cancer diagnosis, and probably doesn't have much longer. Um and I said to him a couple months ago, I said to my friend a couple months ago, I said uh you need to ask this person as much as you can in the short amount of time you have, because you never know how much time you have left. Yep. And you're never gonna forget that, you're never gonna forget those conversations, and you would be remiss if you did not have those conversations. So that I think that's another reason to talk about some of these things, yeah. Because if you're never talking about them, yeah, you know you don't learn from them. You don't learn from them. And and so, you know, if you're out there listening, talk to those mentors. Of course, yeah, reach out to those people. Yep. Um because we only 20, 30 years later. Seriously. I mean, do it because you you never know when you're gonna get another chance to speak to those people and and get that knowledge. It's true. It's a hundred percent I'll say this. If they're talking to you in a mentorship role and they're giving you the time and the knowledge, guess what? They probably feel the same about you that you do about them. 100%.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I would I would agree that that makes a lot of sense. Um yeah, all right. So that was a very uh that was that was not where I was expecting that episode to go.
SPEAKER_00Um, but I'm glad we did it. 100% glad we did it. All right, that's Dr. Brian Schmutzler. And if you could ask him a question, ask him a question. If you've always wanted to ask him, reach out to him.
SPEAKER_02Yep, he reach out on socials, reach out uh yeah, here at uh at the podcast. So yeah, we're happy to answer him.
SPEAKER_00We are brought to you by the Butterfly Network. This is going under Anesthesia Answered with Dr. Brian Schmutzer. I'm Vahid Sadrzhade, and we'll see you in the next one. In the next one.
