Dr. Dung Trinh: A Man of Selfless Service, Unwavering Faith & Meaningful Legacy
“A lot of the missions and events that we do, we assume that we want to go back and change lives. But the life that changes most is the volunteer.”
If there’s one person that the entire Team Dklutr truly admires, it’s definitely this man.
Dr. Trinh is one of those people that will definitely make a mark in your life. A living legend and one of the most influential and inspiring people you’ll ever get the privilege to meet, Dr. Trinh - or Doc, as we affectionately call him - is surely one of a kind. He has the most to brag and boast about yet he is one of the humblest people you’ll ever get to meet. His work and research in the field of Alzheimer’s and brain health will continue to blaze the trail and help millions more.
Listen to Dr. Trinh’s awe-inspiring story of his journey post-Vietnam war and how he was able to achieve everything he has now while still being connected to his roots. It’s an amazing story that we can all learn from and be inspired by.
Meet Dr. Dung Trinh:
Dr. Trinh is a medical missionary and well-known expert training others on evidence-based healthy brain strategies, preventive health and wellness, inflammation, ketosis, and intermittent fasting. He has shared educational and medical knowledge on television, radio, professional associations, Kiwanis, Rotary Clubs, religious centers, local colleges, medical centers, senior centers, and at Alzheimer's Orange County.
Dr. Trinh serves in leadership positions in a number of healthcare organizations and sits on several advisory boards, board of directors and helped found several successful companies ranging from healthcare to e-commerce. His passion is to train leaders who are collaborators and lead by serving.
Connect with Dung Trinh:
Connect with Team Dklutr:
TDE Episode 19: Dr. Dung Trinh: A Man of Selfless Service, Unwavering Faith & Meaningful Legacy
Anne: Today is actually very special for Carl and myself. Carl, I'm just so glad because we have somebody on the show who I don't want to be too mushy. But this is somebody that personally On many levels I really admire and respect not even because of what he's accomplished and he's a very accomplished man, but on just different levels in the different aspects of his life, I admire him for His life's work.
I admire him for the father that he is. I admire him for the businessman that he is and also for His very generous heart in the way Into everyday life. So I'm just so glad to have our first guest for the declutter effect. None other than The one the only dr. Duncan welcome to the show
Dung Trinh: Wow, that's so nice, I'll pay you later for that.
Anne: Oh I didn't even practice that. But I feel that we're just very honored. Honor doesn't even cover it, but we're very grateful not just as a client, but you know, we consider you as a mentor from afar that has become not just a client, but a beloved. family member, if you even accept that, and then also a member of Team Dklutr.
Dung Trinh: Yay! I feel the same. Yeah, thank you so much. I feel the same. You guys are definitely family. Been, uh, collaborating for, over a year now, right?
Anne: No, it's been two years.
Dung Trinh: Two years. Wow. Wow, that's amazing. Yeah And having enjoyed the journey together and so it's been great.
Anne: Thank you. I'm glad we're very glad It's been a pleasant journey so far and long way to go
Dung Trinh: And congratulations on this new podcast of yours. It's amazing.
Anne: Thank you. And, fun fact, this podcast was born after we guested on your show. Right? It was a great idea because he was very electrified by that interview with you and Paul Roberts.
Dung Trinh: That's amazing.
Carl: I have a handful of questions that we would like to ask because you as a person are very interesting And if there is one true influencer, I think it's you.
Anne: Influencer in the best kind of sense. Yes, I agree.
Carl: Yes. So I just want the audience to know how vast your influence is and, from what I researched about you, you serve on several advisory boards. And you are a Board of Director and helped found several companies ranging from healthcare to e-commerce. Yeah, can you tell me more about that? Because it's quite a range of industries. I mean, there's so much going on for you
Dung Trinh: Yeah, it's pretty simple. I just don't take my ADD medications. So, so it's, so my brain goes different directions. I just don't take the meds. And so, yeah, but, uh, yeah, I've always been, uh, I suppose I've always been entrepreneurial minded and, it's just been a process where I, I look at life and I look at, problems to be solved and, and gaps in solutions yeah, and I think about those things quite a bit and if possible, I try to help, I guess, uh, fill, gaps in the issues in life.
And a lot of it, a lot of those gap fillings end up to be corporations and things of that sort. But it's, uh, yeah, that's always been kind of the mindset with that. but it's not all in my mind, the work related, it's just doing things that I have a passion for and, doing things that I see purpose, a lot of it's just purpose and passion and following those things.
Anne: It's funny that you said that though because those were the exact words that we talked about in one of our episodes And we're gonna link that in the show notes, but magic happens when fashion meets purpose and that is actually very evident and you, Dr. Trinh, and just that little joke that you said earlier, that's one of the things that I also love about Dr. Trinh is he doesn't really take himself too seriously. But honestly, he's, what you said, very influential, like in the field of Alzheimer's, charity work, like non profit, he's all over the, all over the place in the best sense. You're everywhere, it's what I mean.
Carl: There's this one interesting aspect of your life that I want to personally ask. It's because you are a minority coming in in the U.S. at a very young age. And, are you familiar with Dr. Trinh's background?
Anne: He did tell me his story in one of our meetings a year or so ago, yeah.
Carl: And reflecting on your first hand experience after being rescued by a U. S. helicopter a day before the fall of Saigon during the U. S. Vietnam War, That must be a traumatic experience for you as a young kid
Dung Trinh: Yeah, it's definitely an experience that one doesn't forget. I was five years old and it was a long time ago. The war ended on April 30th. 1975, and I was five years old at the time and a day before, on April 29th, I remember being on the tarmac of the airport in Vietnam, it wasn't inside the airport where I was on the runway.
And I remember being with a lot of other Vietnamese, uh, refugees, very, um, loud, confusing, noisy, people were yelling and screening. I was with my siblings. I was the oldest, at five. I had a sister who's three years old, another sister who's two years old and a brother who was. Old and our mom was with us, and we could hear shooting and bombing and all that.
And because it was a day before the end and it was a gray day, kind of like this today. Kind of drizzly. Mm-hmm. , we knew that, Yeah, something was happening because there's a lot of shooting and all that. Although I was only five. It was uh, yeah, just a crazy experience growing up. but we saw these big black Helicopters, they're called chinook helicopters.
They have like two different rotors and they would land, several hundred feet in front of us, the back, the helicopter would go down, people would run in, and the helicopter would take off. The helicopter was really loud because, I don't know if you've been close to the helicopter, it's super loud, we had no hearing protection.
Uh, it's very windy, from the rotors, uh, overhead, super windy. And these helicopters would land people would run in then they would take off another one would land and eventually there was a big black helicopter that landed probably about Maybe 200 feet away from us super windy super loud the back would go down and we were told that as it was our time to run, uh, so I, grabbed my sister's hand.
She was three years old and then mom had my other two siblings in both hands, my two year old sister and my three month old brother. And we ran toward the back of this helicopter, and the ramp was down, and I was one of the first that got in. But I saw like a serviceman on the right side with his helicopter helmet.
He had a pistol and then there were two rows of seats and I ran in and sat on the left side and sat down buckled up and it was really the first time where I felt some kind of even as a five year old kid. I felt some kind of hope it was weird because I kind of knew that, you know, we were leaving everything behind.
And my only memory of as a five year old kid was I remember growing up with grandma, my grandma raised me because my parents moved around a lot during work. But remember a lot about the war, sleeping underneath our beds rather than on top of our beds because at night Uh, you look outside the window there's flashes of light And you knew that there was a battle going on And so we're always afraid like the roof would fall down like some mortar would hit the roof and the house would collapse So yeah, we spent a lot of nights underneath our beds.
And then there are certain days where we would Or at nighttime where we would hear like the enemy patrolling outside the gorillas We call the vietcong so we would go and we would you know, huddle into a in a bedroom and hide hope they don't come in And I remember being interrogated by the the vietcong one time uh where Yeah, as a five, four, five year old kid, because my uncle was a high ranking, military commander, he was a colonel in the South Vietnamese Navy SEALs.
And so every time he would come and visit us, and then he would leave Viet Kong would come and ask us questions like, where's he going? What are his plans? They're trying to get information, right? About the war and, even being, you know, interrogated by that time. So, that's kind of my memory of Vietnam, a lot of it was the war.
And I guess, so when I sat down in that helicopter, I finally felt like. Peaceful because we were leaving And the helicopter took off and it flew over the ocean and it landed on an aircraft carrier, which is now an hour and a half away from me. The aircraft carriers decommissioned the SS midway.
And, uh, it was a journey. It was a journey. and I guess that journey can either make you traumatic in a negative way or maybe traumatic in a positive way, right? yeah, it was like, maybe a second chance for life. Although I was only a five year old kid. It's not like I had a first chance,
But I think that journey and that upbringing kind of gave us a certain outlook and personality to persevere and to try to, you know, to succeed in life. And, and that's kind of our upbringing. It's also a journey that led me to God because, you know, I grew up Buddhist.
Nothing wrong necessarily with that, but my family's Buddhist, my mother's a Buddhist nun, my grandma's a Buddhist nun, my uncle's a Buddhist monk, but it's a journey that also led me to faith, I suppose. And, in a personal way, you know, creator and God. And, so it's kind of helped direct a lot of my life and my decisions, with life.
Carl: I love how you told it in amazing details. It is as if we were there.
Anne: Yes. While you were telling the story. You do see, you know, war stories. and sometimes it feels like just a historical footnote, but to hear it from somebody firsthand and yeah, so firsthand and for him to come out, you know, with this amazing life that he has now, It kind of bookends that story beautifully.
I mean not a lot of people that came out of that or had this You know faith, but right faith like in what happened to them? But yes, just thank you for sharing that for taking us Yeah. Trip down memory lane, but very, you know, not necessarily, but you know, it's like, how
Carl: He described that when he is in the helicopter, there is a feeling of peace and hope.
Anne: And being safe.
Carl: But it's amazing that a five year old can. Yes, articulate. thank you. So, yeah, can you confidently say that because of those experiences that you have in the past, Helps you where you are right now.
Dung Trinh: I believe so. Yeah, I mean, we're all products of our history, right? We're all products of our experiences, whether we're an optimist, a pessimist, whether we like certain colors or fear certain things. a lot of it stems from experiences in life and those experiences in life, you know, create. A I guess of certain mindset Of how we make our decisions and live life and so sometimes I guess for me I was lucky in that these experiences, have not made me, you know depressed suicidal or on the negative side, yeah, it's uh helped on other ways but really the best aspect of this is that it led me to god Let me to having that personal faith, that personal relationship in a creator who loves me, who, uh, allowed me to be rescued as a child.
And, and because of that, there's purpose, right? This purpose is like, why am I here? Right. Why are we all here? we're all here and we're all still alive today because there's a purpose for me today in whatever today's agenda is that, and same for you, right? What is your plan for me today, Lord?
And you know, what do you have in store? Who do you want me to meet? what, uh, either good events or adversities that you want to pave in my way. and if the events are not good, what do you want me to learn from it? and so, yeah, I think my faith leads everything. And, in the end, right, it's really our loved ones, our friends, our family, and our deathbed, it's not, accumulation of things, or materialism that burns after you're dead.
Right. I think that drives the purpose of the passion. there's three P's purpose, passion, And the third P as an entrepreneur is profits, but the profits has to come last because it drives the, and it funds the purpose and the passion.
Anne: And just everything you said from the years that I've known you, I know that's going to happen.
Carl: I have a better understanding what drives you, uh, because from what I have seen your leading teams of physicians, dentists, you have nurses, leading nurses with you and high school students to third world countries, including Vietnam, Peru, Haiti, and Mexico, and you're providing free medical care.
Dung Trinh: Yes. Yes. I'm a medical missionary and it's just a way to give back from the blessings, what we've learned, and for me it's, and going back, because, I was one somebody who needed help, right? as a kid. The funny thing is we always go to orphanages around the world, whether it's in Haiti, Peru, Vietnam, or even Mexico on a yearly basis, we always drop by orphanages. We love the kids.
There's always arts and crafts and events that we would do, uh, with them. And it's always struck me like, huh, I'm always going back to orphanages and there must be something subconscious about it. the fact that I like children and, you know, I like having fun with the kids and they paint my toenails and things of that sort, you know, we do a lot of health stuff with them. You know, the subconscious thing is that my, father actually grew up in an orphanage. Oh, wow. Yeah. somewhat connected,
Anne: Very .
Dung Trinh: Always connected. Yeah. My dad grew up in an orphanage and, when he was a young child. Right. He has. His father or my grandfather died at an early age in his 30s. And his mother, who is my grandmother, was not able to afford to take care of five kids, right?
She has five children and so four boys and one girl. And so all the four boys went to live in the orphanages and grew up there. and I'm like, wow, this is probably the connection, right? I love my dad. I respect him a lot. And I knew that, he was rescued at an orphanage and I grew up there. And as a result of that, we're always back, it's like, you know, your activities are always connected to your past, right?
And most of it is subconscious. You don't think about it, but yeah, it's, uh, being a medical missionary is really something that, I think, the core of what I love to do, uh, with the medicine toolkit that I have. and I love to take our students back. Usually half of our teams are students, their high school students or college students, that we take back to all the countries and it's not because they have medical skills or anything of that sort, but, I think. Most of us who travel as medical missionaries, we hope to go back to somehow, you know, help another child, help somebody who's blind or who's a widow or who's a patient with leprosy, right? A lot of those events we do, we assume that we want to go back and change lives. But I think the life that changes the most is the volunteer.
And, that's one of the reasons why I love to take students because, our students come back from these trips and they're like, wow, you know, I'm only 16, I'm only 17, I'm 18, but I realized I can make a difference in another life. and as a result of that, they come back with me to other countries.
And so a lot of my students have been with me to like three, four different countries before they're, you know, age 20 and many of them are now, you know, their doctors, their nurses, because of their experiences with us. They've continued on to medical careers and different things of that sort, with the right perspective and with the right heart.
And so that's probably my biggest satisfaction is seeing my own students from Tungout, right? We call them youth ambassadors, right? Tungout youth ambassadors. Our own students' lives get changed and see, uh, how these trips affect them in that way. And, it's really neat. Really need to see that
Anne: Isn't there like, a saying that goes that the greatest miracle is that the person was changing. What's this? How did that go? We'll look it up, but it's something like that. Like that's the greatest miracle
Carl: But it's inspiring in the sense that it's very natural for you to help other people, for a fact that we need to decentralize our intent to self preserve and we need to. It's like forcing yourself or you have to be intentional when it comes to Giving back to other people but with you doc based on your stories. I think it's very natural for you to help And to think of others first before yourself and it's the reason why I think your influence will reach a lot of people Now,
Anne: Before that I'm gonna say something a bit controversial. I hope I don't get…
Carl: We can edit this.
Anne: It's very refreshing to have been around people. Sadly, our generation nowadays, people are more individually intuitive. to be as giving and as selfless as you're. So I do hope that you'd be able to influence and inspire more people to be just like you because there's only one Dr. Trinh, but we need more Dr. Trinhs in the world.
Carl: I think those people who are close to him will have that kind of passion.
Anne: Especially the youth ambassadors.
Carl: And it's because Dr. Trinh is very contagious? It's so far-reaching that it is felt here in the Philippines.
Anne: Contagious in the best sense.
Dung Trinh: Pandemic contagious. Pandemic contagious.
