[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hi, I'm Dr. Jesse henson, and I'm inviting you to join me on lead with heart.
We explore how the mind, body, relationships, and culture contribute to transformative leadership.
This is Lead with Heart on NOW Media Television.
Welcome to Lead with Heart, where we.
[00:00:32] Speaker B: Explore what it truly means to lead with purpose, compassion, and humanity. I'm your host, Dr. Jesse Hansen. Today we're honored to be joined by Dr. Yasser Sanball, an interventional cardiologist and the owner of Yasser Sonbol, M.D.P.A. for more than a decade, Dr. Sanbol has served the residents of Fort Bend county through his private cardiology practice, offering not just clinical excellence, but but also care rooted in treating patients like family.
Dr. Sonbol's work centers on the human heart, both physically and emotionally, and his journey into medicine began with a deep sense of service and responsibility.
Dr. Sonbol, it's a pleasure to have you here. And so, as we begin, I want to first just acknowledge and thank you so much for showing up today. I had the honor of coming on your show not too long ago, and I was immediately touched by.
[00:01:26] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:01:26] Speaker B: The amount of heart. I admit I didn't know an incredible amount of about you and just came onto your show, and I was touched by the amount of heart you showed and vulnerability. So I want to thank you for being here. And I also want to say. Yeah, absolutely.
And also to just say thank you to being open to sharing about your journey. And that's a little bit of a shift that we're bringing forward in Lead with Heart is continuing to deepen that sense of how vulnerability is actually a superpower. So many times we think that being vulnerable is synonymous with being weak. But here today, I wanted to dive deeper into better understanding who you are, how you became the amazing doctor and healer that you are now. So I'm just wondering if you could kind of start off with anything you feel relevant of that formed your path. In particular, how you started to know.
[00:02:18] Speaker A: You wanted to become a doctor, what.
[00:02:20] Speaker B: Kind of experiences brought you to this place as much as you're open to sharing.
[00:02:25] Speaker C: Sure. So, you know, I really, you know, people ask me that question all the time about, you know, how did I know I wanted to be a doctor? And truth be told, I really can't answer that question because, you know, I think it's a bunch of things. One is, you know, growing up, my mom always said to me, you know, hopefully one day you're going to be a doctor. You know, and so that kind of just got deep rooted in my head.
[00:02:50] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:51] Speaker C: And, you know, and so for me, it was one of those things where I just kind of grew up thinking to myself, I'm going to be a doctor, or at least try to be.
I was never really good at engineering type stuff, so physics was always my week.
Math wasn't definitely my strongest suit.
I was much better at science than I was at, you know, other things. And so I think it was just kind of one of those things where I felt like, all right, if I had to pick a career path, this would make sense in picking a career path.
I have family members who are physicians, like uncles and so forth. You know, obviously watching them growing up was really a lot of fun. And I kind of enjoyed, you know, watching how what they did and, you know, followed them along at times just to kind of gain experience, etc.
And so that's, I think, what really formed the path for me. I just decided I wanted to do something in healthcare, and if I was going to do something in healthcare, I wanted it to be somewhere where I felt like I could be in a leadership role to a certain extent. You know, I feel like all my life I've been somewhat of a leader, never really a follower.
I've been able to kind of set my own path. And so I felt like if I was going to do something in healthcare, I wanted it to be something in which, you know, I was a leader in healthcare and had that ability.
And so that's where I think it just kind of ended up that I got into med school and this is where I am today.
Okay.
[00:04:26] Speaker B: Beautiful. Beautiful. Well, no, and I appreciate, I know you mentioned there that, you know, somewhere along the line, your mom was the one that mentioned or planted that seed for you. And, you know, as a. As a psychologist and having done a lot of my own personal work, I'm very well aware that those early life experiences impact us so much. And so to me, and I also believe there is. There's light and shadow in all things that they interplay with each other. So the light is obvious here in terms of who you've become, who you are continually becoming.
I wonder.
Yeah. Did you ever have a chance to think about or ever at every point, even once she said that, was there ever an idea of something else or. Do you know what I mean? Maybe the shadow of that is that got put on you before you had a choice of your own. Not to say you wouldn't have made that choice. Just curious.
[00:05:16] Speaker C: That's a great question. You know, I. I've actually never.
I mean, maybe, maybe now, 20 years later or whatever, I would say, you know, I would go back and do this differently or do something else or, you know, could I have been an administrator and, you know, or a master's in business or enjoyed finance? Like, for example, one of my hobbies is the stock market. Maybe if I would have done finance, I would have been happier and enjoyed that more. I don't know. But, you know, never really did I feel this inclination to do something else along the lines. So it was just kind of a one, one track mind. And this is where I'm going and this is what I'm planning on doing. And I mean, even, even the first time I applied for med school, I didn't get in and I was actually planning on reapplying and somehow I luckily got taken off a waiting list and got into Indiana University, and that's when I started my career there back in 97.
And so, you know, even at that time when I didn't was planning on reapplying, I never really thought about doing something else. I just continued down this line. And I think, you know, sometimes when you, when you go down a certain direction. Right. I mean, you're. You spend all this time preparing and studying and, you know, taking all the prerequisites and doing MCATs and. And you're like, well, I did all this work.
You know, I knew it wasn't going to be easy.
You know, I knew it was a possibility I wouldn't get in. But do I really want to give up on this just because I failed at the first time doing it? And I, I think that was probably my mindset more or less is, you know, I expected it not to be easy. I expected the road to be difficult. And so for me, it was, you know, I'm not going to give up just because, you know, maybe after a second try, I might have reconsidered my career options.
[00:07:09] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:07:10] Speaker C: And thought of something different. But I think I was going to give it one more shot before I gave up.
[00:07:14] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:07:15] Speaker B: Well, I'm so glad you did. I'm so glad you did. And you know, like I said, I think it's. It's beautiful that that path was set before you. And I also love that. Here you are 20 years later, you said, and I feel like you're also establishing yourself and that you can start to ask those questions and maybe, obviously not a full career change, but somehow. Oh, yeah. Like, for example, though I chose this path long ago and the academic pursuits required to become a psychologist, it seems silly to undo all that. But I have often said to people, secretly, I long to be a carpenter. I. I love woodwork. And, you know, I dream about at some point, even if it's just a few hours a week, you know, So I. Yeah, I like that you're bringing this up to me to think about as well, and. Go ahead. Yeah.
[00:07:58] Speaker C: You know, I think, Jesse, it goes back to when you were on my show and we were talking about, you know, the connection between body, mind and spirit. Right. And, you know, here I am, I'm 50 now, and, you know, I'm. I always ask myself, how did I end up here? And I truly believe, just as part of my spirituality, we're all destined to be where we're supposed to be. You know, this. This is where I'm supposed to be, and I'm supposed to be in this position, and I'm supposed to be here doing this part because this is where God believes I'm going to do my part in the world, you know, and so I could go back and say, well, I could have done this or I could have done that or whatever else, but maybe. Maybe my contribution to the world wasn't there. You know, maybe my contribution to the world is where I'm at today.
And so that's kind of how I see it now and how I look at it as part of my, you know, spiritual growth and my growth over the years and, you know, how I've changed is to say to myself, you know, you. You are where you're supposed to be, and this is where I'm supposed to be right now.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:01] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:09:02] Speaker B: Beautiful. I wonder, you know, you mentioned you not passed the test the first time, went back to do it again.
I've had the blessing of working with many medical doctors through their own processes, and I know that residency in particular is somewhat of a, you know, a big challenge. And I just wonder, you know, if you're open to sharing anything you remember from the point of kind of knowing you were going to become a doctor all the way till you're fully becoming a doctor, even a little bit into that. What were some of the challenges you faced? Or did you have those moments where just especially in residency, where being worked so hard, how did you get. Get through that?
[00:09:35] Speaker C: You know, I mean, every one of those steps was its own challenge, right? And so when you get to medical school, you know, I remember the first day, the opening ceremony, and, you know, they. We sat in this hall and they looked at us and, you know, we were a class of over 200 people, and the guy looked at us. And he said, I want you each to look to your left and to your right, because one of you is not going to be here at the end of these four years.
You know, everybody that gets there is, you know, obviously highly educated and has done well throughout their life academically. Right. Most people are straight A students, or at least close to it, et cetera. And he would look at us and say, just remember that the majority of you are barely going to pass medical school, right? So you can imagine you'd go from being an honor roll student, getting straight A's, or for the most part, you know, my GPA was close to a 4. 0.
And you wake up and every test you take, you're like, thank God I at least passed, right? I didn't fail.
You know, And. And you spend the next four years under that, and you start to say to yourself, man, should I really be here? Right? And.
And, you know, part of. Part of the challenge is, you know, most people don't talk about their grades, right? So you're. You're assuming you're the only one there, even though on the very first day, you were told that the majority of people in that class are going to be in the same boat you are. Yeah. But you don't want to believe that because you believe everybody's doing better than you, right? So you got to reset your goals and your mindset and. And all that to be able to adjust to that.
And then you get to residency, right? You go through medical school, you do these clinical rotations for two years.
You know, you're very protected, you're very shielded.
You know, you're not really responsible for patients per se. You know, you show up, you write notes, you follow people around that are teaching you, you know, all this kind of stuff, and you're just kind of going through the motions of things and you're learning certain things.
And I'll never forget this because I will never forget my first day of internship and my first day of being on call as an intern.
And nothing prepared you for your very first day being on call as an intern throughout your entire career path, because all of a sudden, you shift from being the student to the doctor.
You've now become the doctor.
You are officially an md. You have a license. You don't have a. Well, we're not licensed technically, but you're an md. You're giving orders. People are taking your orders, and you're responsible for people's lives.
[00:12:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:18] Speaker C: And so, you know, I remember that night vividly. I mean, I was at the University of Minnesota. My very first day of internship on call, I was covering cardiology, bone marrow transplant, ICU and hematology, oncology wards.
[00:12:36] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:12:37] Speaker C: Sickest patients at the hospital. You were covering them for the very first night on call and my pager must have went off every three seconds. Wow.
[00:12:48] Speaker B: Dr.
[00:12:48] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:12:49] Speaker B: I'm going to jump in. I'm sorry we have to take a quick break, but I want to. When we come back, we're going to go deeper into the elements of faith and pressure. All that pressure, keeping faith. I want to talk to you more about that. We'll be right back here on Lead with Heart on NOW Media tv. Thanks for tuning in.
[00:13:05] Speaker A: We'll be right back with more insights, stories and practices to help you lead from your whole self.
This is Lead with Heart on Now Media Television.
Hi, I'm Dr. Jesse Hanson and I'm inviting you to join me on Lead With Heart, a weekly show on NOW Media Television focused on awakening a new kind of leadership, one rooted in embodiment, awareness and human connection.
Every episode of Lead With Heart goes beyond corporate models and surface metrics.
We explore how the mind, body, relationships and culture contribute to transformative leadership. If you're a leader, healer, entrepreneur or innovator who brings a story of personal evolution, team impact or leadership beyond the status quo, I'd love to feature you as a contributor.
Lead with Heart airs on NOW Media Television Networks, the first bilingual media network in the US and it's also available on Roku TV, Apple TV, iHeartRadio, Sirius XM and all major podcast platforms.
And we're back. I'm Dr. Jesse Hanson and you're watching Lead with Heart on Now Media Television. Let's continue embracing leadership with presence and purpose.
Welcome back to Lead with Heart.
[00:14:32] Speaker B: Want more of what you're watching? Stay connected to Lead With Heart and every NOW Media TV favorite live on demand anytime you like. Download the free Now Media TV app on Roku or iOS and unlock non stop bilingual programming in English and Spanish. If you're on the move, you can also catch the podcast versions right from our own website at www. Now Media tv. From business and news to lifestyle, culture and beyond, NOW Media TV is streaming around the clock. Ready when you are.
[00:15:05] Speaker C: All right.
[00:15:05] Speaker A: Welcome back to Lead with Heart.
[00:15:07] Speaker B: I am here with Dr. Yassir Sanbo, an amazing doctor, and I'm going to give you the title of healer because I feel like you bring so much heart into what you do and how you practice. And we're going to continue to extract that through the next Few segments we left off with you describing some of the pressures and what I would reflect back to you. The balance of pressure and of course there's that wish and drive to do well and not be one of those people that won't be here tomorrow or at the end of the program.
But also I wanted to play into and talk more about faith. You've mentioned that. I know in our last conversation you brought up spirituality and to kind of take us from, you know, who you are now in specific, curious to hear how, you know, what levels of faith were with you as you were pressuring through all those and that transition into becoming a doctor from, from the intern role. Yeah. Just anything you'd share with our, our viewers around who you are now and the role of faith and spirituality in that?
[00:16:08] Speaker C: Sure. So, so I, I'll be completely honest, you know, I, I was not very in touch with my faith back in those days. You know, I, I kind of lost my way and you know, I was in college, you know, pretty faithful and followed, you know, my religion and did a lot of things.
I think I was surrounded by a different group of people back then that helped me kind of stay in that, in that realm. And then I kind of lost my way in medical school and lost my way in residency for a while and it wasn't until, you know, and then I kind of regained it, you know, somewhere in the middle of my life that were in my mid-30s somewhere. And then I lost it again until about, maybe about four or five years ago. Okay. And I, I think it's really that that whole journey has made me just, you know, grow and be a better person than what I am. And I think it's helped me be a better physician, a better father, a better husband, just a better all around person, you know, and I, I'm not ashamed of it, you know, I, I, I'm sad that I went through that, but it also, you know, I believe that sometimes you got to hit rock bottom before you can go back up. Right. And I think during that journey I managed to hit rock bottom, you know, emotionally, personally, spiritually, all of it, you know, and I think I had to get to that point to be where I am today.
And you know, I had to go through a lot of struggles, a lot of different struggles. Whether it was, you know, I mean, I think people think doctors are just these people that don't have any problems or spoon fed.
We are human beings just like everybody else, you know, and we go through ups and downs and we go through trials and tribulations in life, and. And it's tough, you know, but, you know, I think grounding myself at some point helped me weather the storms that I go through now. And so, you know, now when I have a. Something going on or a problem or whatever else, I'm able to handle it a lot differently than I would have done it even five years ago. Right? Because I say to myself, you know what? God's got me. I'm good.
Whatever's gonna happen is gonna happen. I just got to focus what I. What I can control. Yeah.
I keep my faith. I say, I still got food on the table, my kids are still fed, there's a roof over my head, you know, and it's going to find its path one way or the other. You know, whatever's meant it's going to be.
And so I think that's where, for example, when people stand up for me when I walk into a room, right, My patients, I tell them, sit down.
I'm not the president. You don't need to stand up for me. I'm just a regular human being like the rest of you who has a family, who has kids, who, you know, has to go to choir concerts and band concerts and soccer games and whatever else, you know, I mean, still got to pay my electric bill like everybody else.
[00:19:14] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:19:14] Speaker C: The way it goes, you know, I.
[00:19:16] Speaker B: Think that that humility is. Is beautiful.
[00:19:19] Speaker C: And.
[00:19:19] Speaker B: And I. I resonate with that as well. And as a mental health professional, just always try to stay very humble and human and. And I think that's what I connected with you initially. And what. What called me to invite you on to Lead with Heart is that I do think you're an awesome example for. For myself and for, I'm sure, lots of viewers out here who.
Who both know you and are getting to know you, that it's such a great thing. One of the things I talk about all the time, Dr. Yasser, is bihemispheric brain activity and a quick, nerdy sense of it from neuroscience. That is a simplified way. But to say optimal health comes from bi. Hemispheric brain activity. You know, as you mentioned, the high pressure, time of residency equaling a bottom, all of that pressure and stress, it becomes harder and harder to cope with it, and we end up sort of trapped in our left brain, not only from all the studies and the pressures of that, but the, you know, the continual pressure. And so then the right brain or the more human and even animalistic parts of us get suppressed. And that. That never ends well for. For any of us. And so I just want to acknowledge that for our viewers as the continual collective learning of the goal being to create bi hemispheric brain activity, to learn not only what that means intellectually, but how to do it. And I think what you just shared there, you know, is a great example of how leading with heart shows up in the simplest things, of how Dr. Yasser walks into the room, you know, he comes in and very humbly like, hey, no, we're here. We're humans together. We're going to get through this. So I really appreciate what you bring in that level I also was extracting from when you were speaking, Dr. Yasser, that, you know, whether it goes through a primary religion or whatever other derivative of faith.
To me, one of the byproducts of when a person has faith is you said, you know, God's got my back. Something like that is being able to realize, wow, faith helps even when there are hard times, even when there are bottoms. It helps us have that place in us that says somehow it's going to be okay.
So I like that knowledge piece that you're bringing in terms of recognizing and it sounds like, yeah, obviously in all the pressures of that maybe lost connection to your faith, but not lost your faith fully because you wouldn't have made it through if you hadn't have had something guiding you, that good heart of yours. And so I'm curious. Yeah. If you just can give us a. Give our viewers a little more sense of. Another reason I invite you is I feel like the way that you are left brain and have all the medical knowledge that you have, but also you're very open, you're very human, you're very ready to admit your own imperfections, which I think is a sign of strength and respect.
So I'm just curious if our viewers, anything else you have around, how you've seen that overlap of you coming out of those harder times, how that impacted you, you as a doctor, you know, even as a father, but sort of the overlay of, of the personal and professional life as, as you live that out all those years.
[00:22:17] Speaker C: Well, I mean, I, I think really.
So I, I think when you, when you are not like we talked about before, I mean, you, when you are not connected body, mind and spirit, I think it affects you no matter whether you want to admit to it or not. Right. And so, you know, I think my medical knowledge is great and, you know, it makes me a good physician and it makes me able to listen to people and try to help them whatever way I can. And, you know, I'm blessed as a. As a proceduralist. I'm thankful and I'm blessed that I'm good at doing that and I'm good with my hands, and it makes me a good procedural person.
I think my spirituality really humbles me in the sense of.
Makes me human, right. Makes me a better father, and it makes me a better husband because it gives me the grounding to be able to implement that in my life and how I handle my children or how I handle things with my wife or how I handle things just with other people, right? Because I. I have a foundation that tells me I'm not better than anybody because I'm a doctor. I'm not better than anybody other than by my good values or not in the sense of. And better. But what. What I'm better in the eyes of God is, is in our religion is by my moral values, what I leave behind for my children and what my faith is and how I practice my religion. And so I think for me, those are the things that really, you know, make me who I am now.
And so I truly believe that those are the things I need to focus on. So, like, for example, in Islam, there's a big thing about waking up in the middle of the night and praying, right? And being able to pray.
And I no longer. I no longer really spend my time complaining to other people. When I'm really under a lot of stress, I find myself on my own, waking up at like 3 in the morning or 4 in the morning.
And when I do that, I ask myself, what do I do right now?
And so I get up and I just start praying and I just pray until I cry sometimes, you know, and somehow I miraculously feel better after that, you know, So I think it just goes back to, you know, I mean, I get it. Some people don't believe in God, some people don't believe in whatever. Some people don't have spirituality. But there's got to be something that has to ground you between that, between the earth and what's out there, you know, And I think that's where my spirituality comes in. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:25:06] Speaker B: Wow. Beautifully said. And thank you again for your humanness, Dr. Yasser. And I love that. And yeah, we're going to come to another break. When we come back, this next segment is called the Lotus, and it's about exactly what you said. How does. In your case, but also for all of us, how do we move through things like this? And so please stay tuned as we'll come back soon. Before we take this break, though, I'd love for you to just take a moment to let our viewers know how do they keep in touch with you and gain more from all that you walk with?
[00:25:35] Speaker C: Sure.
I'm
[email protected] I'm on social media, including Facebook and Instagram.
I don't have TikTok, so I don't know how to use that.
But yeah, I mean, you can call our office at 281-912-366 anytime. Happy to talk to anybody, anytime.
[00:25:57] Speaker B: Beautiful. Well, thank you so much. And after this, we'll be right back.
[00:26:01] Speaker A: With more Lead With Heart.
[00:26:02] Speaker B: Thanks for joining us.
[00:26:04] Speaker A: We'll be right back with more insights, stories and practices to help you lead from your whole self.
This is Lead with Heart on Now Media Television.
Hi, I'm Dr. Jesse Hanson and I'm inviting you to join me on Lead With Heart, a weekly show on NOW Media Television focused on awakening a new kind of leadership, one rooted in embodiment, awareness and human connection.
Every episode of Lead with Heart goes beyond corporate models and surface metrics.
We explore how the mind, body, relationships and culture contribute to transformative leadership. If you're a leader, healer, entrepreneur or innovator who brings a story of personal evolution, team impact or leadership beyond the status quo, I'd love to feature you as a contributor.
Lead with Heart airs on NOW Media Television Networks, the first bilingual media network in the US and it's also available on Roku TV, Apple TV, iHeartRadio, SiriusXM, and all major podcast platforms.
And we're back. I'm Dr. Jesse Hanson and you're watching Lead with Heart on Now Media Television. Let's continue embracing lead leadership with presence and purpose.
Welcome back to Lead with Heart.
[00:27:32] Speaker B: I'm your host, Dr. Jesse Hansen. And in this segment, we're going to talk about the lotus.
For those of you that don't know, lotuses grow out of less than ideal things. You know, they grow out of fertilize, they grow out of crap. And one of the most magical things about the lotus is that it is one of the most beautiful, powerful flowers in ancient wisdom. It is also connected to the crown chakra, or our higher self, our connection to the divine. And so that's why this is called the lotus. And we want to look at a deeper dive into the hard things, the places. As Dr. Sanbol today has already began to open up with us, we want to take a deeper look. This segment with you around what rock bottom looked like and felt like.
It's no Secret. You know, I've had the honor of holding space for a lot of medical doctors as well as. Like any of us, it's pressure is hard to deal with, and the pressures that you guys go through in your training is some of the most rigorous, if not the most rigorous. So I also want to acknowledge, you know, it takes courage to be vulnerable. So thank you for having courage and sharing from your heart. What do you remember about those days and what were some of those challenges that really came up for you in the emotional realms and personal realms, you know, relationships.
How hard did it. Did it hit?
[00:28:53] Speaker C: Well, I mean, I think it was tough. You know, I mean, I think I went through a lot. Right. For me, at least, you know, I mean, I had some. Some, you know, somewhere along the line, I got divorced and, you know, I had to deal with, you know, being a father to two children, you know, saying 50% time, that was stressful and trying to maintain my career as much as I could.
You know, I. Being in private practice, it's. It's a challenge, obviously, just from running a business, you know. You know, they don't. They don't teach us those things in medical school. You know, I was never taught how to run a medical practice or understand even the nuances of billing and collections and. And all these things, you know, you run into, you know, I, like every other physician sometimes, you know, you run into malpractice issues that you got to deal with.
I think a lot of that was really, really stressful. And I think back then I chose to embrace other things to help me cope with it rather than, you know, I was never a drug user, but I enjoyed drinking, and I think I used that to help me cope with those things. And at some point I finally realized that that wasn't really helping. You know, it always worse rather than better. Right.
It took me to get to a point where, you know, I reached rock bottom, I think, when. When I realized that my. My kids have had become a little bit afraid of me because of my demeanor and because I was getting angrier and. And all this kind of stuff. And at that point, I woke up one morning and was like, I really can't live like this anymore. Like, this doesn't suit me. This isn't who I was. And I found different outlets to try to deal with whatever problems I was having.
And once I kind of realized that and change that behavior, I think it put me in a much better headspace mentally because I finally shifted the focus from thinking I can control everything and control the Outcome of everything.
Look, I don't really have as much control as I think I do. I can control what I eat, I control how fast I drive my car, I control my schedule and make time to go exercise or being there for my kids or doing whatever else. But no matter how hard I work, no matter what I do, I can't control how much money I actually make or I can't control my health or I can't control any of these things. Right. I just kind of leave it up to, you know, the plan and what's the plan. And the plan was, you know, things are going to be okay. You know, I hadn't been let down yet.
There was no reason for me to think that it was going to happen now.
So I just had to kind of trust that process.
Yeah.
[00:31:51] Speaker B: Wow. You gave me multiple moments of truth tingles, or God bumps, as they're called. It's just so much, so much lotus activity in there.
Thank you for taking ownership of the escape mechanisms or the coping mechanism of alcohol.
We all know you're not alone in that, of course, not even amongst doctors, but all of us. And it's just such a common way that I have a big background in addiction and interventions and intervention TV show. And that's one of my things that I like to promote is rather than worrying so much about am I addicted or not, is it recognize we all have addictions. Our, our brain is super programmed for repeated patterns. You know, there's levels of addiction and it's more of around why is it happening? And so I love to hear in your story that you went right to that you recognize, hey, this is not who I really am. What's going on here? And then the other powerful share you gave there was around your children, allowing your children to be mirrors for you, allowing them to help you see where you were out of alignment and how much the pressures were hitting.
And so yeah, you know, thank you. I can relate to that a lot as well as a father and hopefully other viewers can realize our children can be powerful mirrors like that.
So. Wow. Just first of all, thank you so much for putting that out there. And second of all, can you go a little deeper into.
You know, you mentioned prayer earlier and the power of just crying and releasing that way and ironically feeling better and less grumpy, less complaining the next day.
What do you remember from some of those rock bottom waves through your younger years? Yeah. How did you. Was it prayer then? Was there other methods? Was it simply the mirror from your children help us understand how you turned that crap into fertilizer for growth.
[00:33:41] Speaker C: Well, I think it's a combination, right? I mean, so, you know, the prayer part is separate. So that prayer part I do on my own.
It's in the middle of the night sometimes.
Nobody's there. It's just me and God. And I just stand there and I just pray and pray and pray until, you know, something clicks or I find myself in tears. Right.
Or I'll go to Friday prayers. You know, as Muslims, we have prayers on Fridays, and that's where, you know, our congregation is. And, you know, I could be having a bad day and something happens, and I walk into the sermon and I listen, and all of a sudden, there's a message in there that resonates with me. Right. It's. It's like I needed to hear this today, to move forward.
And that could be an overwhelming feeling when that happens, because it's almost like I don't want to say God is talking to me, but it makes you feel like God is there because this is what I was feeling. And I needed to hear this message. Yeah. Now, whether you want to believe it's true or not, that's entirely up to you, but I needed to hear this message in order to get past this point and not let this overwhelm me.
And sometimes that can be really powerful. Right. In that setting. I mean, I'm 50 years old. I can't tell you. I've been praying for a long time.
And I used to pray for a long time, but it wasn't until at this point in my life where prayer can really have a big impact on me. And I can cry during prayer, and I never did that before. And I think there's a reason for that, because I'm probably. Probably more in tune with myself praying now than I was back in my 20s or back in my 30s. You know, I just kind of did it out of habit. But now it's almost like not really habit, something I really want to do. You know, I. I don't want to miss my prayers. I don't want to miss standing in front of God and. And I believe, you know, that who's going to help me? Who's looking out for me? It's not my kids. It's not my wife. It's not my friends. It's faith. It's God. You know, he's got his plan for me, and I just got to trust it.
[00:35:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:56] Speaker C: That's a big part of what we believe in. And so, you know, my kids was one thing. It made me Realize, you know, I got to change my behavior.
But I, I don't think that would have helped had I not found my way back to God, you know, believe that. And so, you know, not only did I set my health into perspective, meaning I, I lost 80 pounds, got a trainer, got fit, whatever, but I think it's the combination of the three together. Not only I feel healthier, I'm spiritually stronger, which has made me mentally stronger. Yeah, those things come together.
[00:36:33] Speaker B: Beautiful.
[00:36:33] Speaker C: Beautiful.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: Yeah. The prayer as your most sacred individual personal practice. And then I also heard the theme of, you know, using connection and community and mosque or the religious structure to help you reconnect back to what you already knew deep inside. And, yeah, that's so well said. And I think that's such a great message for our viewers to hear around.
And for whatever it's worth, it resonates not just with my own personal growth journey, but also I've sat with thousands of people now across my career and something magical really does start to happen when people have faith and it comes from that place of what you said is someone, a presence. Whether you call it God, Allah, Yahweh, Shazam, however we want to frame it is the matter of that connection.
And you mentioned earlier, Dr. Yasser, about, you know, a part of your awakening or great shift that has helped you become the amazing man you are today had to do also with that realization of letting go of control. And to me, the opposite of control is surrender.
And faith is the bridge that we walk to get to surrender.
So I just also want to commend you on that in terms of having the courage to, you know, find a way to surrender deeper even when you had all the pressures and everything like that. I wonder just. Yeah, it does that. And the last quick thing I'll ask and get your comments is you said it resonated when you heard them. Them share a message. Resonance is actually a neurological, neuroscientific, neuro psychological word that is about cellular resonance, meaning you felt something in your body that you knew was true and it inspired you to. Course. Correct. So I just, Yeah, I just wonder if you have any, any closing thoughts on that before we take our next break. The power of resonance, the power of surrender, what that means to you.
[00:38:29] Speaker C: I mean, I think the power of resonance and the power of surrender are very powerful in the sense of the moment you realize there's only so much you're really in control of and you just trust that there's a plan and you just have to do your part. My part is to get up and go to work, take care of myself, take care of my children, take care of my family, you know, do my part and just let everything fall in place.
And I think that is very powerful. And once you can achieve that level, I think it gives a lot of peace of mind moving forward personally. Yeah.
[00:39:07] Speaker B: And it just, you know, I'm just still getting to know you that I get that sense of it that you, you know, you've practiced this long enough and you've been through enough of the hard knocks and it's something that now has created a consistent way of being in your life. And so just want to get, you know, see you in that and respect you in that. And we're going to take a break now, Dr. Yasser. When we come back, we're going to really go deeper into extracting the wisdom. And this is something that I believe in deeply, is that from any one personal journey that anyone's willing to be vulnerable and share, there's so much wisdom that can be extracted that is applicable and accessible to all of us. So stay tuned. We're going to go deeper into that when we come back here on Lead With Heart NOW Media tv.
[00:39:48] Speaker A: We'll be right back with more insights, stories and practices to help you lead from your whole self. This is Lead with Heart on Now Media Television.
Hi, I'm Dr. Jesse Hanson and I'm inviting you to join me on Lead with Heart, a weekly show on NOW Media Television focused on awakening a new kind of leadership, one rooted in embodied awareness and human connection.
Every episode of Lead with Heart goes beyond corporate models and surface metrics. We explore how the mind, body, relationships and culture contribute to transformative leadership. If you're a leader, healer, entrepreneur or innovator who brings a story of personal evolution, team impact or leadership beyond the status quo, I'd love to feature you as a contributor.
Lead With Heart airs on NOW Media Television Networks, the first bilingual media network in the US and it's also available on Roku TV, Apple TV, iHeartRadio, SiriusXM and all major podcast platforms.
And we're back. I'm Dr. Jesse Hansen and you're watching Lead with Heart on Now Media Television. Let's continue embracing leadership with presence and purpose.
Welcome back to Lead with Heart.
[00:41:16] Speaker B: Don't miss a second of this show or any of NOW Media TV favorites streaming live and on demand whenever and wherever you want. Grab the free Now Media TV app on Roku or iOS and enjoy instant access to our lineup of bilingual programs in both English and Spanish. Prefer podcasts. Listen to Lead With Heart anytime on the Now Media TV website at www.nowmedia.tv.
we're covering business, breaking news, lifestyle, culture and more. Now Media TV is available 24 7. So the stories you care about are always within reach.
All right.
[00:41:57] Speaker A: Welcome back to lead with heart.
[00:41:59] Speaker B: I am your host, Dr. Jesse, and I am grateful to be here with Dr. Yasser Sonbal. Today. We've been diving deeply through a lot of his personal journey and getting to better understand how he has become the man he has become.
In the last segment, one of the richest flower petals of the lotus that we are looking at and that Dr. Yasser brought forward is this battle that I feel like all of us go through, which is between control and surrender.
And as the the neuropsychologist here, I'll just remind our viewers that when we are focused so much on control, which so much of the academic training, I can acknowledge that, too, in my doctoral training, so much of it's based on controlling outcomes, getting the grades, getting everything to happen as we want it. And, well as that can happen, the simplest things of life as leaving the house and thinking we're going to get where we're meant to be on time because there will be no traffic or whatever, whatever it may be, we all battle with this notion of control versus surrendering.
And so I wanted our viewers to know before we dive right back into Dr. Sambo's story, is that the left brain is the part of our brain that majority is there trying to control, trying to figure out, analyze, and make an outcome happen.
The right brain is the part of us that is more like a being that is simply having an experience. And the left brain is trying to make something of that. It's not trying, it's doing it.
So I want to highlight that brain intelligence as we move deeper into understanding the wisdom that comes through your personal story.
You mentioned resonance and surrender being such core themes for you, Dr. Yasser. I wonder if you could just go deeper on that and share with us more today. What do you feel like is some of the wisdom you walk with that you wouldn't have had if you hadn't have gone through those rough bottoms, rock bottoms, that you described earlier.
[00:43:58] Speaker C: Sure. I mean, I think you at some point you sit back and look at your own life experience. Right. And so you say to yourself, all right, what have I gone through and how did it all play out? Right. And so some of the things I've gone through, which excuse me for I don't want to share everything online, but are on media, on television. But, you know, some of the things I've gone through, I could look back and say to myself, holy crap, this could have ended a lot worse, or this was going to be a much worse outcome for me moving forward.
And some of the times I look back and I say, you know what? I feel like the guy from Shawshank Redemption. I walked through 500 yards worth of crap and came out clean on the other end, okay? And so when I do that and when I sit back and I reflect on those moments, those are the moments where I say to myself, I had an aha moment. You know why? Because I thought I was in control of that situation. I thought, you know, whether I had a good lawyer or I had this or I had that going for me, but the reality is, my path was meant to take that destination, okay? And I had to go through some of those things order to wake up and in order to be a better person.
And God wasn't trying to punish me. He was trying to bring me closer to him, right? And so for me, now, whenever I have a problem, right, I surrender it. I just say to myself, all right, what do I need to do? For example, like, let's say I have a legal problem, and I say, all right, what do I need to do? Well, I need to put my ducks in a row, get an attorney, and just follow what my attorney tells me. I have a rule, right? I hire an attorney. I don't argue with him. You know, this is their job. This is what they do. So what I want to do is make sure that I am, you know, following their instructions, and I just have to surrender that. This person that I hired, this path that I took to get down to meet that person is exactly where I need to be, and it's exactly where God wants me, right? So I surrender that notion and I say, it's all gonna be okay. Whatever the outcome may be, I may not win, right? I may not be what I want it to be, but in the end, that outcome is gonna be what's best for me. And that I believe, you know, I mean, and I finally realized that in the struggles, for example, with my divorce, right, when I got divorced, I wanted my kids all the time. I wanted all this stuff. There was all that I had to pay a lot of money, etc. But you know what? I look back 10 years later, 10 years later, and I say, this worked out perfectly. Sure. Paid a little bit extra money, yes. But I got to be a father. My kids are bonded with me. I get to see them all the time, you know, so it's okay, whatever. However frustrating that experience was, however tiring it was, in the end I ended up on top and I ended up where I needed to be. Right. So. So now with everything, I just know that whatever happens, I may not see it at the time. Yeah, frustrated at the time.
But down the road the truth is going to reveal itself and I'm going to know why it happened.
[00:47:24] Speaker B: Yeah, well said. Well said. I like how you also pulled in the element of surrender that's relational, the lawyer example. And I think same with our family members, our loved one, even when we're frustrated, even when we're going through something deep to continue to have that faith and trust, that it's all part of a greater learning. I also want to highlight too, as I was listening to you, I was thinking about how you and any of us in our rock bottoms, in our hard times, we're usually trapped in much more sympathetic nervous system activity, fight or flight, feeling that pressure. That's what your kids were attuning to when they were feeling, you know, dissonance with you, was that they were just, they still loved you. Of course, they could just feel, wow, Daddy's in, in fight or flight too often. And so that's also just a fascinating piece to realize that the, the notion of control, the notion of wanting to be in control, thinking we can control the outcomes, does spike our sympathetic nervous system, which you know as well as I do as doctors that that's actually not that healthy to be in that position all the time or too often.
Whereas the moment that you decide and you have to, each of us has to make a choice to say, okay, in this moment I'm making a choice to surrender. I'm going to maybe soft jaw breathe out of my mouth.
And this is where faith comes in to say to give it to God to be able to recognize. And in that moment we shift from that sympathetic into the parasympathetic, into being able to, you know, just surrender. And so I, I appreciate, I think that's a powerful wisdom that you're bringing out. I also want to remind our, our viewers as we wrap up this final segment around what is the wisdom we can all walk with in this is to me, that was so powerful when you were able to be humble and admit, you know, you were able to have a wake up call from your children. And it wasn't, you know, they weren't what healed you or got you there, but it was that wake up call. And I Think that's powerful, whether it's our children, maybe for others it might be our, it could be a loved one of any type. But they can be such powerful mirrors to us. I appreciate that you brought that out.
And then just also to me, the last little nugget of wisdom I see in all this is the way that you have stayed with yourself through all of this. Even when you've hit rock bottom, you still had something in you that kept you coming back to center and coming back to faith, coming back to, to God.
And I just think that's, that's a beautiful teaching for all of us. And, and I know as, as a, a trauma reprocessing specialist that, you know, each person has their own unique journey in, in this lifetime of awakening. And the more that we clear out and work with and, and when you go and pray and cry, technically that is a form of trauma reprocessing. We're letting the trapped up energy come out.
So I just, I just commend you on that. And I just really see it's such an honor to sit with you as, as both a medical doctor, but also just as a human. And where have you wear your heart on your sleeve?
So I, I just wonder, I want to ask one more time if, if you can just let the viewers know how they stay in touch with you. They want to keep in touch.
[00:50:30] Speaker C: Sure.
You can find us online at Sugarland Cardiology Specialist. I'm on social media as well. Yasser Sambal md.
I think I'm on Instagram.
So yeah, you can call my office at 281-912-3866. Happy to talk to you.
Those are it.
[00:50:50] Speaker B: Beautiful. Beautiful. Well, thank you again so much for being here. And I wonder, just one last short window here to share with us just any collective wisdom you've gained from this conversation. Something that you're walking away with.
Simple or deep, doesn't matter. Just kind of curious how this has been for you.
[00:51:09] Speaker C: This has been amazing actually. And, and I think that the one thing that you keep bringing up, the word vulnerable, and I think that's a very important thing for people to realize. Being vulnerable doesn't make you weak, and being vulnerable doesn't make you a bad person. And as a matter of fact, if you, if anybody knows, you cannot love people without being vulnerable. Right? You cannot be human without being vulnerable.
And that's the reality. If you spend your life protecting yourself away from vulnerability.
It never works out that way. Right. Because everybody needs somebody at some point. You know, the notion is, I Don't need anybody. I can do this all on my own is unrealistic, right? Yeah. And so you need not only family, friends, a support system, a spiritual system. It all comes together somehow. Right. And I think on this journey, what I've really learned is nothing is coincidence.
People you meet is not coincidence. Life experiences are not coincidence.
Everything is coming into your life for a reason, to teach you something, to make you better, to strengthen you to whatever it may be.
And so I think vulnerability is important, you know, and it makes us human.
[00:52:17] Speaker B: Well said. I couldn't agree more. Hence, you know, leading with Heart is watching how vulnerability can actually become a superpower rather than a misperception that it's a weakness.
[00:52:27] Speaker C: Right.
[00:52:27] Speaker B: So I thank you so much, Dr. Yasser. You, you've been an incredible guest today. Thank you for, for showing up with such heart, so honored that you've just said yes to the path as a doctor and so grateful that you have said yes to the path of, you know, spiritual growth and self understanding. One of the core tenets I'm working with in this show is to know thyself and you will lead with heart naturally. It's a natural byproduct. It's just going to be happening. So I want to thank you, Dr. Yasser. I want to thank all of our viewers. Please stay tuned to NOW Media TV for this show and many other great shows. We'll be coming back here with more great guests that are coming through a similar experience.
I felt like wanting to deepen the levels of getting to know the people behind the great businesses or healthcare practices that they run. And my wish for all of you viewers there is to just take a moment this week to listen to your own heart. Try to notice it physically, notice it emotionally, and choose one small act of care.
Thanks so much for tuning in to Lead with Heart. I'm your host, Dr. Jesse Hansen, and we'll see you next time.
