I knew I wanted to be a dentist back in high school. Nobody handed it to me. I worked two or three jobs at a time to pay my way through a private college and then dental school.

I chose Georgetown for its strong clinical program. I’ll admit there was a second reason: Washington, DC is only an hour from Annapolis and the Chesapeake Bay. Even back then, I was building my life around two things, dentistry and sailing.

People sometimes ask how a dentist ends up sailing solo around the world. To me, the two aren’t so different. Both take steady hands, careful preparation and the patience to solve one problem at a time. I’ve spent my career building those skills chairside. Now I get to take them into the Southern Ocean.

Dentistry asked for a sacrifice early on. I had been riding motorcycles since I was 14, but I gave them up to protect my hands. It turned out to be a good trade, because I sold the bike and bought my first sailboat with the money.

Over the years, I earned both a Fellowship and a Mastership with the Academy of General Dentistry, and I’m a founding partner of a practice in Washington, DC. Today I’m also Chief Dental Officer at Candid, the lead sponsor of my Global Solo Challenge campaign. I’m grateful to have them on board.

You don’t have to give up your profession to chase something extraordinary. You just have to plan for it, sometimes for fifty years.