What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I say, “You can have it all?”

I get it. You’re probably thinking I’m delusional right about now. It’s impossible to balance work, kids, family, rest, and fun– right? What if I changed that well-known cliche to this: “You can have what you want!” Does that feel a little more realistic, as if I’m not trying to trick you into believing a lie? I hope so.

Over the last seven years career coaching dentists and hygienists, I’ve witnessed amazing transformations– enough to convince me that it’s true. You can indeed have what you want, a much more realistic possibility than having it all.

If it’s so possible, then why are so many of us feeling uninspired and bored with the lives we chose?

The answer is because we’re focusing more on pleasing others than what we really want. Our strong sense of duty and obligation is the double-edged sword that gets in the way of finding the personal and professional balance we all crave.

Our commitment to duty and obligation is important. It helps guide us to do “what’s right” ensuring that we live a safe, productive life. That’s all well and good, but because many of us in dentistry are over-achievers, our perfectionist tendencies get directed at everything we do– even our sense of duty and obligation.

But when you let duty and obligation rule, you lose touch with something just as important: choosing yourself. Instead of being driven by autonomy and personal fulfillment, you’re constantly pulled by external expectations. Rather than following your own desires, you sacrifice them for the relentless need to do what’s expected of you. You trade curiosity and fun for predictability and routine, which keeps us safe– but often at the expense of our happiness.

You can live a life true to yourself, not what others expect of you.

In her book, The Top 5 Regrets of the Dying, best-selling author and palliative care nurse, Bronnie Ware, reflects on the discussions with her patients in their final days. The number one regret of people on their deathbed was, “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”

If that’s not a wake-up call, I don’t know what is! If you’re thinking, “That’s great, but I don’t even know what I really want,” I hear you. I used to feel the same way. For years, I was so consumed with being a successful dentist, I didn’t know who I was outside of that. I didn’t know what I liked or what I wanted for myself.

How do you believe that you can have what you want in life if you don’t even know what you want?

This lack of self-awareness is a common trap. Many of us choose a career in dentistry because we think it will give us the perfect balance in life. We’ll experience the satisfaction of serving others and impacting lives, the nobility of our work will earn us the respect of our family, and we will have the freedom and flexibility to do all the fun activities that really excite us.

At first, it works! The respect and the praise feel great. You feel proud of yourself, and then you settle into that approval and validation. But over time, the external praise starts to replace your inner sense of self. That’s when you begin to tie your self-worth to your professional identity.

You get so caught up in the role of “dentist” that you forget to cultivate other parts of yourself. You stop investing in personal growth and exploring interests beyond the office. Eventually, you start to believe that dentistry is who you are. When work is good, you feel great. But when the stress of managing the team, the monotony of doing the same work every day, or the fear of getting sued starts to creep in; it’s easy to feel like you’ve lost yourself entirely.

The truth is, you’re more than your job title.

Dentistry is an amazing profession that can give you everything you ever wanted, but it’s also challenging. It comes with a lot of baggage that can knock your confidence and lead to anxiety or even depression. You are such a good achiever that you grit your way through, always hustling– even at the expense of your own well-being. But If you want to find true balance and fulfillment, it’s vital that you step back and reassess how much of your life you’re living for others versus how much you’re living for yourself.

It’s never too late to realign your career with your personal values. By exploring your interests outside of work, you can fit dentistry into your life instead of fitting your life into dentistry.

All change starts with a first step. Take stock of all the ways you’re living life on other people’s terms. If you imagine that you’re living life based on a set of rules that were handed down to you, ask yourself: What unwritten rules dictate how I live? Which of these rules support me and which hold me back? You’ll see that you’re often living on autopilot, following rules you don’t even believe in and didn’t even know you had. That awareness can allow you to consciously re-write the rules of your life in a way that will serve you.

It’s your life, so you get to choose. Once you give yourself that permission to explore what you want, you’ll find it so much easier to take action.

Now imagine yourself at the end of your life. How do you want to feel when you look back?

Do you want to look back with regret, wishing your story had been different? Or do you want to know that you lived your best life? You are the author of your own story, and you get to decide.

When you reconnect with who you are beyond your profession, you’ll rediscover life on your terms. You’ll see that giving yourself permission to say yes to yourself isn’t selfish at all—it’s necessary. In fact, prioritizing your own well-being will help you show up as your best self at work and at home. You’ll be better for others when you’re better for yourself, and this newfound balance will also rekindle your relationship with dentistry, making your work feel more fulfilling and enjoyable again.

Maybe then you will allow yourself to believe that you can have it all– with one caveat: as long as “all” means what you want. Because isn’t that what having it all really means anyway?