Speaker 1: In some kind of spiritual movements or wellness movements. We
Speaker 1: tend to kind of exalt the person who has overcome
Speaker 1: the obstacle and forget that there's going to be more obstacles.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the one you feed Throughout time, great thinkers
Speaker 2: have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have, quotes
Speaker 2: like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think,
Speaker 2: ring true, and yet for many of us, our thoughts
Speaker 2: don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy,
Speaker 2: or fear. We see what we don't have instead of
Speaker 2: what we do. We think things that hold us back
Speaker 2: and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking.
Speaker 2: Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort
Speaker 2: to make a life worth living. This podcast is about
Speaker 2: how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction,
Speaker 2: how they feed their good wolf.
Speaker 3: We all know that good habits are ways that we
Speaker 3: bring what we value into the world, and we each
Speaker 3: have our own list of what matters to us. Maybe
Speaker 3: you want to feel more energetic, improve your relationships, have
Speaker 3: a tidy your home, cook more instead of eating out
Speaker 3: for nights a week, whatever habit you want to build.
Speaker 3: It's entirely possible to make it happen. But if you
Speaker 3: feel under equipped and overwhelmed to make real sustainable change,
Speaker 3: you are not alone. And that's why I've made my
Speaker 3: free masterclass open to everyone and available to watch anytime now.
Speaker 3: It's called Habits that Stick. How to be remarkably consistent
Speaker 3: no matter what goal you set. You can grab it
Speaker 3: at oneufeed dot net slash habits. Again. It's free and
Speaker 3: you can watch it whenever it works for you. Go
Speaker 3: to one you feed dot net slash habits.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is
Speaker 2: doctor Pooja Luschman, a board certified psychiatrist and author specializing
Speaker 2: in women's health and clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at
Speaker 2: George Washington University. She's a leading voice at the intersection
Speaker 2: of mental health and gender focused on helping women and
Speaker 2: other marginalized communities escape the tyranny of foe self care.
Speaker 2: She maintains an active private practice where she treats women
Speaker 2: struggling with burnout, perfectionism, disillusionment, as well as clinical conditions
Speaker 2: like depression and anxiety. Pooja is a frequent contributor to
Speaker 2: The New York Times and often goes viral on Instagram. Today,
Speaker 2: Eric and Poja discuss her book Real Self Care, A
Speaker 2: Transformative Program for Redefining Wellness. Crystals, cleanses and bubble bats
Speaker 2: not included.
Speaker 3: Hi Pooja, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4: Hi Eric, Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm really excited to have you on. We're going
Speaker 3: to be discussing your book, Real Self Care, A Transformative
Speaker 3: Program for Redefining Wellness, and in parentheses, crystals, cleanses and
Speaker 3: bubble baths not included. So we'll be talking about that,
Speaker 3: and I think there's so much great material in there.
Speaker 3: But before we get there, we'll start like we always
Speaker 3: do with the Parable and the Parable. There's a grandparent
Speaker 3: who's talking with their grandchild and they say, in life,
Speaker 3: there are two wolves inside of us that are always
Speaker 3: a battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things
Speaker 3: like kindness and bravery and love, and the other's a
Speaker 3: bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear.
Speaker 3: And the grandchild stops and think about it for a
Speaker 3: second and look up at their grandparent and they say, well,
Speaker 3: which one wins? And the grandparent says the one you feed.
Speaker 3: So I'd like to start off by asking you what
Speaker 3: that parable means to you in your life and in
Speaker 3: the work that you do.
Speaker 4: I love the parable.
Speaker 1: I think that it applies in so many different contexts,
Speaker 1: and as a psychiatrist, one of the ways that it
Speaker 1: speaks to me is that it calls our attention to
Speaker 1: our internal worlds, and it calls our attention to the
Speaker 1: agency that we have. There is so much, obviously that's
Speaker 1: out of our control, given the socio political contexts that
Speaker 1: we live in and global events that are kind of
Speaker 1: always taking place, and our internal worlds.
Speaker 4: We get to decide what.
Speaker 1: We give our attention to internally and externally. And the
Speaker 1: parable to me is really that's what it's about. That
Speaker 1: you can exert choice, you can exert agency, and in
Speaker 1: doing that, it's kind of radical, right and sort of
Speaker 1: even recognizing that it's powerful.
Speaker 3: I love the way you frame that up. And I'd
Speaker 3: love to start by heading into talking about real self care.
Speaker 3: What's the difference between real self care and what you
Speaker 3: call faux self care.
Speaker 1: I wanted to set up this framework in a way
Speaker 1: that called to attention the wellness industry for starters and
Speaker 1: That's why, you know one of the subtitles Crystals, Cleanses
Speaker 1: and bubble bats not included, because in my practice, I
Speaker 1: see patients come in all the time and they say,
Speaker 1: you know, doctor Luxman, I'm stressed out, I'm burnt out,
Speaker 1: I'm not sleeping well, I'm not eating well, and I
Speaker 1: feel like it's my fault because I have this meditation
Speaker 1: app on my phone that I know I'm supposed to
Speaker 1: be using, but by the end of the day, the
Speaker 1: last thing I want to do is meditate. And you know,
Speaker 1: I've said over and over you can't meditate your way
Speaker 1: out of a forty hour work week without childcare. Like,
Speaker 1: that's not how wellness works. And when we focus on
Speaker 1: things that are sort of commodified, when we focus on
Speaker 1: what you can buy, it really takes away from the
Speaker 1: true meaning of well being. So when I say faux
Speaker 1: self care, what I mean is it's the juice cleanse,
Speaker 1: it's the bubble bath.
Speaker 4: It is also the yoga or the meditation.
Speaker 1: And I know that there's folks that are listening that
Speaker 1: are like, hey, wait a second, Pooja, yoga really works,
Speaker 1: meditation really helps me. And I'm not saying that that
Speaker 1: they're bad. What I'm saying is that the actual real
Speaker 1: self care is the internal process that you take to
Speaker 1: get to the thing. So you can imagine one person
Speaker 1: is at a yoga class and they're on their mat,
Speaker 1: totally in their head, comparing themselves to the person next
Speaker 1: to them that's doing a headstand and they can't do
Speaker 1: a headstand, and maybe they're not wearing the right Lululemon leggings.
Speaker 1: And that's their yoga class versus somebody else who's gone
Speaker 1: through the principles of real self care, set boundaries, understood
Speaker 1: how to apply self compassion to that inner critic in
Speaker 1: their head, really understood their values and why yoga is
Speaker 1: so important, and what it means for them to be
Speaker 1: at yoga once or twice a week, and how that
Speaker 1: is actually an exertion of power. That person is actually
Speaker 1: fully present in the yoga class and able to really
Speaker 1: kind of take it in. But on the surface, both
Speaker 1: of those are I went to a yoga class, right,
Speaker 1: That's what I'm kind of trying to explain here, And
Speaker 1: I will say it is a little bit abstract. You know,
Speaker 1: the principles of real self care. There's four principles. Boundaries, compassion, values, power.
Speaker 1: They're all internal, right. Part of the framework too is
Speaker 1: that I can't actually tell you what your real self
Speaker 1: care is, like, what your tool is. You have to
Speaker 1: work through the principles yourself because it's different for everybody.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: For one person it might be yoga. For another person
Speaker 1: that week, it might be I'm going to actually go
Speaker 1: out to dinner with my close friend. For another person,
Speaker 1: it might be actually, what I'm really avoiding is doing
Speaker 1: my taxes, and I mean to sit down and do
Speaker 1: my taxes, right, So it's always changing as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, And I've heard you talk about this in
Speaker 3: a sense of, you know, real self care is a
Speaker 3: principle or a set of principles, not tools. Now, there
Speaker 3: are tools that we can use, and I think your
Speaker 3: yoga class example is a great one, you know, the
Speaker 3: obvious one being a hammer. Right, A hammer could drive
Speaker 3: in a nail. I could also smash ten windows with
Speaker 3: it if I wanted, right, Like, the tool is sort
Speaker 3: of only as effective as the way in which it's used,
Speaker 3: in the circumstances in which it's used, and why it
Speaker 3: is used. And I think that's what you're kind of
Speaker 3: aiming at, is this deeper internal sense of what really
Speaker 3: matters to me, and am I living my life that way?
Speaker 3: I mean, to me, that's the foundation of any kind
Speaker 3: of good life. You know, it's not even just self care,
Speaker 3: it's just a good life is about knowing what matters
Speaker 3: to us and aligning ourselves with that, and the situations,
Speaker 3: the power structures that we find ourselves in often make
Speaker 3: that very difficult to do.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I completely agree with you, Eric, and I think
Speaker 1: that it all comes back down to values, and we
Speaker 1: can talk a little bit about what values means and
Speaker 1: kind of how to get there.
Speaker 4: But like you said, it, it's actually hard, it's actually.
Speaker 1: Radical, because so much of our external world and the
Speaker 1: way that we live our lives in this kind of
Speaker 1: very productivity oriented culture is actually pushing against that is
Speaker 1: push you against your own unique sort of preferences and
Speaker 1: quirks and things that actually bring you joy and are
Speaker 1: telling you, well, no, actually, you know you should just
Speaker 1: have an example in the book of a patient who
Speaker 1: was reading in her kitchen and was like, you know,
Speaker 1: everyone's telling me to like get beige, right, beige with
Speaker 1: everything because that the resale value. And then she's I
Speaker 1: hate beige. You know, you know that's kind of It
Speaker 1: seems like a silly example, but it's actually those are
Speaker 1: the types of decisions that can be really empowering.
Speaker 3: I think about these ideas a lot, like what does
Speaker 3: it actually mean to be well? And how do people
Speaker 3: become well? And how do they heal? You know, with
Speaker 3: my own addictionarycover and depression recovery. And you know, there's
Speaker 3: an idea that I talk about often. It's not my idea.
Speaker 3: It comes from the Buddhist concept of refuge, right, Refuge
Speaker 3: being a place that you go when things are difficult,
Speaker 3: and we talk about true and false refuges, right, and
Speaker 3: that is like, you know, a false refuge is maybe
Speaker 3: zoning out all the time to Netflix versus engaging in
Speaker 3: your life. A true refuge might be something like more
Speaker 3: like yoga or meditation or But you're talking about an
Speaker 3: even deeper level than that, right, Like, it's one thing
Speaker 3: to move to spend less of our time on the
Speaker 3: false refuges, the things that don't actually rejuvenate us, refresh us,
Speaker 3: make us feel better, and spend more on things that do.
Speaker 3: But you're talking about an even deeper level where we're
Speaker 3: making really difficult decisions about how and where we spend
Speaker 3: our time. And that can be really difficult to do.
Speaker 3: My experience is that's really difficult for people to do
Speaker 3: when they're already overwhelmed. So let's talk a little bit about,
Speaker 3: you know, the person who's like, I'm already drowning. How
Speaker 3: do I start to implement deeper principle based things which
Speaker 3: seem like they are going to take a lot more
Speaker 3: time and energy. How do you approach that with someone?
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I really appreciate you bringing that up, because
Speaker 1: it's true that so many folks really kind of feel
Speaker 1: like they're in that drowning place. And I will be
Speaker 1: totally honest. I have a little kid, a toddler, I
Speaker 1: have a demanding career, My partner has a demanding career.
Speaker 1: I sometimes feel like I'm drowning to you and all
Speaker 1: of it. So it's not right, it's and I also
Speaker 1: want to pull back and just also know that the
Speaker 1: whole framework of real self care is based on the
Speaker 1: idea of the concept of you demonic well being, which
Speaker 1: is probably not new to you or to your listeners,
Speaker 1: but just as a recap, you Demonic well being says
Speaker 1: that a well lived life is one in which your
Speaker 1: activities and your behaviors are aligned with what's most important
Speaker 1: to you, with your purpose. And there's tons of research
Speaker 1: out there that shows that folks who are able to
Speaker 1: identify and name their values and their purpose and feel
Speaker 1: that their life is for the most part aligned with
Speaker 1: those things, not one hundred percent, because no one's perfect,
Speaker 1: but right mostly in that direction, they have better mental
Speaker 1: health outcomes. They have better physical health outcome. And this
Speaker 1: is in contrast to hedonic well being. Hedonic well being
Speaker 1: you can kind of think of it as the pursuit
Speaker 1: of pleasure or the absence of suffering. That's kind of
Speaker 1: like the treat yourself sort of mentality, which I think
Speaker 1: that's what we're kind of referencing a little bit too,
Speaker 1: because when you're drowning, you just kind of feel like, well,
Speaker 1: you know what, I just need to get that, you know,
Speaker 1: six hundred calorie Starbucks latte that's actually a milkshake because
Speaker 1: I deserve it, right.
Speaker 4: I just need to escape. I need to watch six
Speaker 4: hours of Netflix.
Speaker 1: Right. So, the reason that the first principle of real
Speaker 1: self care is boundaries is because you can't even actually
Speaker 1: get to the values part until you start to make
Speaker 1: some space for yourself and you start to energetically really
Speaker 1: consider what it means to take up space and how
Speaker 1: to sort of take some stuff off of your plate.
Speaker 1: The boundaries piece is probably the hardest piece to this
Speaker 1: whole process, and that's the reason and that it's the
Speaker 1: first one, and it's also the reason that the four
Speaker 1: principles are sort of it's a circular process.
Speaker 4: It's not just like linear.
Speaker 1: It's like you're always kind of basically coming back to
Speaker 1: boundaries because if there was one mental health skill, to learn,
Speaker 1: boundaries is the one, and to get back to your
Speaker 1: question of like how to actually do it. So folks
Speaker 1: might be kind of rolling their eyes a little bit
Speaker 1: because I will acknowledge that, you know, basically every therapist
Speaker 1: on Instagram is talking about boundaries at this point, so
Speaker 1: it could be a little bit sort of cliche. But
Speaker 1: my take on boundaries is a little bit different. So
Speaker 1: I think of boundaries as the pause, not saying no,
Speaker 1: but it's the pause that is the boundary. And this
Speaker 1: was kind of an AHA moment for me Back in
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen when I just graduated residency from George Washington University.
Speaker 1: My mentor took me out for lunch and it was
Speaker 1: my first day on the faculty and I was like
Speaker 1: bright eyed and bushy tailed, and she was like, Pooja,
Speaker 1: I have one piece of advice for you. And I
Speaker 1: thought it was going to be some sort of like
Speaker 1: clinical pearl about how to dose ssrrise or like sail
Speaker 1: lize or something, and she was like, no, Puja, you
Speaker 1: don't need to answer your phone. You can let it
Speaker 1: go to voicemail, listen to what they want, decide, and
Speaker 1: then respond. And that's when I was like, Oh, it's
Speaker 1: the pause, and then you can choose yes, no, or negotiate,
Speaker 1: because the truth is there is always a cost to
Speaker 1: know yeah, and that costs might be financial, it might
Speaker 1: be emotional, interpersonal. But we can't pretend that no is
Speaker 1: accessible to everyone all the time.
Speaker 3: Right right, That pause is so important. I had a
Speaker 3: coaching client once where you know, we had to set
Speaker 3: up a new rule, and the rule was that anytime
Speaker 3: anybody asked them to do anything, they had to say,
Speaker 3: that's a really interesting opportunity. Let me get back to you.
Speaker 3: Even if inside they were screaming yes, yes, yes, yes,
Speaker 3: I want to do it, the answer was always for
Speaker 3: this person, thanks for the invitation to do that. Let
Speaker 3: me think about it. Because part of what happens, and
Speaker 3: I know I do this is I get asked to
Speaker 3: do something, and I evaluate that thing on its own
Speaker 3: individual merit. I'm like, oh, that does sound really cool,
Speaker 3: and I'll say yes, but does it sound cool when
Speaker 3: I consider it in the context of everything else that's
Speaker 3: going on in my life? I need a pause to
Speaker 3: be able to do that, you know, And this person
Speaker 3: we just found like that was the rule we had
Speaker 3: to set so that they could come back and go,
Speaker 3: all right, let me have a few minutes to actually
Speaker 3: think about this, when is it? What else is going
Speaker 3: on that week? That sort of thing. So I think
Speaker 3: that pause is so critical, and I love the idea
Speaker 3: that a boundary isn't always no, right, that a boundary
Speaker 3: could be yes, could be no, could be negotiate, But
Speaker 3: the critical thing is taking the time to contemplate the
Speaker 3: decision yes.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And you know it's funny, this isn't my therapy session.
Speaker 1: I have my own therapist too, but I'm totally going
Speaker 1: through that right now with writing a book and all
Speaker 1: of the influx of demands that have common opportunities in
Speaker 1: this new kind of phase of my career where I
Speaker 1: really love seeing patients. I love working with people one
Speaker 1: on one. I also love writing, and now, all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, my weeks, I don't have time to write anymore,
Speaker 1: and so I'm going through my own round of real
Speaker 1: self care where I'm like, hey, wait, what happened here?
Speaker 1: How do I get back to the things I actually
Speaker 1: really enjoy? I do enjoy these conversations too, for sure,
Speaker 1: but it's like, you have to really be selective and understand,
Speaker 1: like you said, the context. And I share that story
Speaker 1: and my own personal experience because I think it's important
Speaker 1: for folks to understand that this is always a work
Speaker 1: in progress. And with every new season of your life,
Speaker 1: whether it's a new whether it's a promotion you get,
Speaker 1: whether it's you know, a new baby, whether it's going
Speaker 1: through divorce or illness, you're going to have to relearn
Speaker 1: the skill set because it's again, it's a new context.
Speaker 1: You don't know yet what all of the data points are.
Speaker 1: So it doesn't mean that you've failed. It doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that you don't know how to set boundaries. It just
Speaker 1: means that you're just developing the same muscle in a
Speaker 1: new context.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, so I would love to maybe for a moment,
Speaker 3: go back to a little bit on the faux self
Speaker 3: care side. I wonder if you could share with me
Speaker 3: what you mean when you use the phrase the tyranny
Speaker 3: of self care.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that came to me actually in the context of
Speaker 1: my experience as a healthcare worker, as a physician. So
Speaker 1: as many folks know, whatever side of healthcare you're on,
Speaker 1: whether it's the clinician provider side or the patient side,
Speaker 1: healthcare in America is broken, and especially mental health services.
Speaker 1: It's so hard to find affordable, accessible care. And so
Speaker 1: what I was seeing, I mean, even starting in like
Speaker 1: the twenty tens, was everybody was burnt out. I was
Speaker 1: burnt out as a resident. But the answer that the
Speaker 1: hospital systems and kind of the higher ups we're giving
Speaker 1: is like, well, you know, learn how to meditate, you know,
Speaker 1: resilience training, you know, here's your yoga class.
Speaker 4: But it was like they.
Speaker 1: Weren't doing anything to actually fix the structural issues. So
Speaker 1: making sure that there's like adequate paid leave, making sure
Speaker 1: that people can have you know, a certain number of
Speaker 1: sick days, all of those kind of systemic supports were
Speaker 1: not there, and instead they were putting the onus on
Speaker 1: the individual to meditate or to do yoga, or to
Speaker 1: lose weight or whatever the.
Speaker 4: Thing might be.
Speaker 1: And so that's what I mean when I'm pointing to
Speaker 1: the tyranny, like it's sort of it's another way that
Speaker 1: greedy capitalism. I just came to learn that term. Greedy capitalism,
Speaker 1: you know, exonerates the system and puts the onus of
Speaker 1: responsibility on the individual. And then you feel bad because
Speaker 1: you know, like I was saying earlier, with like the
Speaker 1: meditation app where you go through your whole day and
Speaker 1: you're working like triple shifts, but then you feel like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: if only I took the time to meditate, I'd be
Speaker 1: able to fix all these problems. And that's not to
Speaker 1: say that meditation or any of these individual choices. It's
Speaker 1: not that we don't have agency. We certainly do. But
Speaker 1: I think, you know, I come from a framework of
Speaker 1: the dialectic it's both end, right, we need both the
Speaker 1: systemic change and we need to be able to exert
Speaker 1: our own agency, and you can't have one without the other.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So talk to me a little bit about that
Speaker 3: idea of the both and of individual change and systemic change,
Speaker 3: because this, I think is a really concept. I find
Speaker 3: really interesting to think about and often difficult to put
Speaker 3: into practice right because on one hand, we recognize that
Speaker 3: the individual solutions are not sufficient, and yet we can't
Speaker 3: snap our fingers and have the world be different than
Speaker 3: it is right now, and so we are then often
Speaker 3: back to individual solutions. And even in this role, I
Speaker 3: think about how many of my conversations should be about
Speaker 3: the individual ways of dealing with life circumstances versus the
Speaker 3: systemic and I'll be honest, I lean towards the individual
Speaker 3: because it's where I feel like I have the most
Speaker 3: to offer. And yet there is the systemic side. And
Speaker 3: what I have seen happen in a lot of what
Speaker 3: I would consider the wellness movement the self care movement,
Speaker 3: is this idea of it becomes very individualized, and it
Speaker 3: can become very self absorbed, and where all my energy
Speaker 3: is going into I'm going to get better, And then
Speaker 3: that's often talked about like, well, once I'm better, then
Speaker 3: I can contribute to the world, and I think that's
Speaker 3: a false choice because that often doesn't come. I mean,
Speaker 3: my first introduction to wellness and healing and all that
Speaker 3: in any real way was a twelve step program, and
Speaker 3: right from day one, we were encouraged to be helping
Speaker 3: other people right working on the collective whole, and ourselves
Speaker 3: were joined together. And I'm just curious how you think
Speaker 3: about that, you know, the individual versus the collective or
Speaker 3: the systemic change. And I think the way you do
Speaker 3: think about it is different than a lot of ways
Speaker 3: I've heard it articulated. So I'd love to get your
Speaker 3: thoughts on that. There's a long question.
Speaker 4: I love long questions.
Speaker 1: I appreciate you saying that you lean more towards the
Speaker 1: individual side, because I hold that bias too. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm a psychiatrist. I work with people one on one
Speaker 1: and that's where I feel like I can be the
Speaker 1: most helpful as well.
Speaker 4: And part of what.
Speaker 1: Like my own real self care process, like part of
Speaker 1: what rejuvenates me is using my voice to advocate for
Speaker 1: the structural changes and for my patients, and you know,
Speaker 1: kind of hopefully moving the conversation to a different place.
Speaker 4: So I did.
Speaker 1: I actually had a conversation a few months ago for
Speaker 1: the Ezra Kline Show with Tressy Mcmillancottam, who's a sociologist
Speaker 1: and amazing powerhouse. She's a sociologist, so she comes from
Speaker 1: the complete other side.
Speaker 4: And I was a little.
Speaker 1: Nervous because I was like, oh gosh, I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: to really prove to her, you know, because the reality
Speaker 1: is the examples that I give in the book of
Speaker 1: Let's say, a woman who a patient, who is you know,
Speaker 1: going through the boundaries, the compassion, the values, and works
Speaker 1: up the strength to have a hard conversation with her
Speaker 1: partner about the fact that after having you know, two kids,
Speaker 1: for the third she really wants him to ask for
Speaker 1: having a paternity leave, right, and that leads to him
Speaker 1: asking and his company saying yes, and that change goes
Speaker 1: on to impact everybody else.
Speaker 4: That's rare, right, Like a lot of employees would say no.
Speaker 1: And that's true that this isn't every situation or every circumstance.
Speaker 1: But my take on this is that if wellness and
Speaker 1: self care stays commercial, if it stays commodified, then we
Speaker 1: don't even have a chance of getting to collective change.
Speaker 1: Whereas if we start conversing about self care as an
Speaker 1: internal process, as a personal process, then at least we
Speaker 1: have a chance of getting to that collective change.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: I think of this as the dialectic that we discuss
Speaker 1: which isn't my concept that comes from dialectical behavior therapy
Speaker 1: Marshall Lenihan's work of you know, being able to hold
Speaker 1: to opposing truths at the same time, and I think
Speaker 1: that change is always so much slower than we want
Speaker 1: it to be. One of the things that gives me
Speaker 1: hope and that helps me stay in the fight, really,
Speaker 1: because I think that's what it is right, staying in
Speaker 1: the fight and continuing to have these conversations and reflect
Speaker 1: and think about your choices. Is I'm actually the first
Speaker 1: generation of women on my mom's maternal side to go
Speaker 1: to graduate school, to get a doctorate, to work professionally
Speaker 1: outside the home. That's just one generation and those types
Speaker 1: of changes like that's that's a big deal. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: a big deal, and yes it's it takes a long time.
Speaker 1: But I think that probably most listeners can look back
Speaker 1: at their family tree, their family history and see in
Speaker 1: one or two generations how much has changed and how
Speaker 1: much is different. Collectively.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think being able to hold the opposites there
Speaker 3: is really important in this area because it's both at
Speaker 3: the same time. The little things that we do, like
Speaker 3: you being the first person in your family to do X, Y,
Speaker 3: and Z is like a really big deal and progress
Speaker 3: is being made. I mean, I can't help but look
Speaker 3: around at certain aspects of society and be like, wow,
Speaker 3: the progress is tremendous and there's a long way to go.
Speaker 3: Like I often think about, like gay rights, right. Gay
Speaker 3: rights from when I was an eighteen year old to
Speaker 3: where they are today is a night and day proposition difference.
Speaker 3: It is an order of magnitude difference. And at the
Speaker 3: exact same time, there is some gay child being bullied
Speaker 3: somewhere in some small town in Missouri. Right, both those
Speaker 3: things are true. We've made a ton of progress and
Speaker 3: we've got a long way to go. But I feel
Speaker 3: like it's so important to grasp both of those things because,
Speaker 3: at least for me, if I don't acknowledge and see
Speaker 3: the progress, it doesn't give me much hope to continue
Speaker 3: to try and do things differently. But if all I
Speaker 3: do is get into a Pollyanna everything has gotten better phase,
Speaker 3: then I'm not continuing to advocate for changes that need
Speaker 3: to occur.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I completely agree, And I was just thinking back
Speaker 1: to a experience that I had at Esslin. I mean,
Speaker 1: I write about this in the book. Actually I went
Speaker 1: to Essln. It was in I think it was like
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen, and I was burnt out as a psychiatrist.
Speaker 1: I went like, very seriously, like I was going to
Speaker 1: get these deep questions answered. It was like this mindful
Speaker 1: movement weak. And it was a lot of money. You know,
Speaker 1: it's expensive. Esslin is not cheap. And I remember when
Speaker 1: I was there, there was this couple they were in
Speaker 1: their sixties I think, and we were eating lunch together
Speaker 1: and they're like, oh, yeah, we come here once a
Speaker 1: year for our vacation. We're here on vacation. And I
Speaker 1: was so insulted. I was like, this is in a vacation.
Speaker 1: You know, this is serious work. And you know this
Speaker 1: was after Trump had been elected. As I reflected more
Speaker 1: on this, I think they were more right than I
Speaker 1: was in terms of thinking about it actually as a vacation,
Speaker 1: as a refuge, as a way to get away. It
Speaker 1: was probably more accurate than the pressure that I was
Speaker 1: putting on myself for that week of time.
Speaker 4: And one of the things that stuck.
Speaker 1: Out to me while I was there is that nobody
Speaker 1: was actually talking about Trump there. It was totally this
Speaker 1: internal spiritual woo woo place, a lot of wealthy white folks, right,
Speaker 1: And the absence of any of that discussion about social
Speaker 1: determinants of health, about identity and race and privilege, it
Speaker 1: was glaring. So I think even actually just bringing it
Speaker 1: into the room, just bringing it into the room and
Speaker 1: like having it be part of the conversation in the
Speaker 1: wellness space, that in itself is powerful. Like we all
Speaker 1: know that change takes a long time and it's hard,
Speaker 1: and I don't think anyone's expecting, you know, their meditation
Speaker 1: teacher to be able to solve, you know, the mortgage crisis, right,
Speaker 1: No one has that expectation, right, But at least to
Speaker 1: be aware and to bring that into your framework of
Speaker 1: how you're teaching and how you're presenting information, I think
Speaker 1: goes a really long way.
Speaker 3: I had a conversation recently with padreg Otama or Tuma,
Speaker 3: I never know how to say his name. He's a poet.
Speaker 3: He runs a podcast with the On Being Network called
Speaker 3: on Poetry, and he had a section and we got
Speaker 3: into this conversation and I'd never thought of it this way,
Speaker 3: but I think it ties a little bit into what
Speaker 3: you're saying, which is he talks about in any sort
Speaker 3: of church movement or an AA movement or anything. There's
Speaker 3: a lot put on the testimony, meaning somebody saying like
Speaker 3: I was this broken person, or and I did this,
Speaker 3: or I was having a lot of problems with depression
Speaker 3: and then I took ketamine and suddenly I'm better. Or
Speaker 3: I meditate and it makes me feel X, Y or z,
Speaker 3: and those are useful things. But what happens for the
Speaker 3: people who are sitting there who that's not happening for
Speaker 3: for the person who is the meditation teacher is going
Speaker 3: on and on about how much meditation has changed their life,
Speaker 3: or one of their students is talking about and somebody
Speaker 3: else is sitting there, going, well, I meditate twenty minutes
Speaker 3: every day and my life is still a mess. Like
Speaker 3: what about that? So like what does that do to people?
Speaker 3: And I think it ties to what you were just saying.
Speaker 3: If we're not talking about the social determinants of wellness,
Speaker 3: if we're not taking into consideration the context of which
Speaker 3: people's lives are, these ideas can actually become and I
Speaker 3: think this is what talking about with the tyranny of
Speaker 3: self care. These ideas can become ways that we feel
Speaker 3: worse about ourselves or cause us to disengage from potentially
Speaker 3: helpful modalities at all because we feel like we're not
Speaker 3: being understood by them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's such a great point, and it's interesting. As
Speaker 1: you were talking, I was also thinking. My mind went
Speaker 1: to the person giving the testimony and what happens to
Speaker 1: that person when understandably something traumatic happens in their life, right,
Speaker 1: and they stop meditating, or maybe they are still meditating,
Speaker 1: but it doesn't work like it used to, and then
Speaker 1: where do you go from there? And I think for
Speaker 1: me that's why with real self care, it was so
Speaker 1: important to frame it as it's not an outcome, it's
Speaker 1: not a destination. Yes, it's a continuous process. And I
Speaker 1: think you could probably say that the same about you know,
Speaker 1: whether you call it activism or organizing or whatever term
Speaker 1: you use for moving our society to a more progressive place.
Speaker 1: That it's I think just because of the nature of
Speaker 1: how deeply inequitable our society is and then the roots
Speaker 1: on which we were built. I don't think it's a destination.
Speaker 1: I think it's like we just always have to keep
Speaker 1: going and it's kind of an in some sense, it's
Speaker 1: a little aspirational. So to me, progress is actually staying
Speaker 1: in it, right, like staying in the game, and like
Speaker 1: continuing to come back to that work even when you
Speaker 1: have moments of burning out, even when you have times
Speaker 1: where you're like, you know what, Yes, I did just
Speaker 1: order something on Amazon, even though I know I should
Speaker 1: be supporting the small businesses down the street, and right,
Speaker 1: like not beating yourself up too much, just being like, Okay,
Speaker 1: well next week, you know, I try again. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: I think how we have to think about success. And
Speaker 1: in my mind, I think there's a connection there with
Speaker 1: the testimony and the ways in which, in some kind
Speaker 1: of spiritual movements or wellness movements, we tend to kind
Speaker 1: of exalt the person who has overcome the obstacle, yes,
Speaker 1: and forget that there's going to be more obstacles.
Speaker 3: Yeah, my life is a testament to that, right. I mean, like,
Speaker 3: you know, I got sober at twenty four from heroin addiction.
Speaker 3: You know, stayed sober eight years, then start drinking again,
Speaker 3: so it was like what now, like all that's out
Speaker 3: the window, and then you know, get sober again and
Speaker 3: depression and you probably run into this a little bit too.
Speaker 3: I think one of the other elements that gets into
Speaker 3: this if you're the sort of person who helps others
Speaker 3: to any degree, you suddenly are worried about when you're
Speaker 3: not doing great, Like is everything I teach people bs.
Speaker 4: Yep, yep, right, yeah.
Speaker 3: You know, I've evolved with that over the years where
Speaker 3: I'm like, well, no, of course it's not, you know,
Speaker 3: because I'm just a human and I have difficult times,
Speaker 3: and I cope with those difficult times way better than
Speaker 3: I used to. Doesn't mean I cope with them perfectly,
Speaker 3: you know, doesn't mean that I don't make mistakes, doesn't
Speaker 3: mean that I don't do all that stuff, but do
Speaker 3: it a little bit better than I used to. But
Speaker 3: you know, ten years ago when we started this show,
Speaker 3: I can't remember the exact phrase, but I wrote out
Speaker 3: a little introduction for the show, and listeners can probably
Speaker 3: tell you exactly what it is because it plays at
Speaker 3: the beginning of every episode. I just don't listen to it,
Speaker 3: But it was something along the lines of living a
Speaker 3: good life takes consistent, creative and constant effort, meaning like
Speaker 3: this never ends. You know. It's not like you're going
Speaker 3: to just listen to just the right conversation on a
Speaker 3: podcast or go to just the right weekend you know
Speaker 3: retreat or week long retreat, and then it's over, you know,
Speaker 3: and you're suddenly well for good, Like that's not how
Speaker 3: life works.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm just nodding my head because I just agree
Speaker 1: so fferently. And I hate that we live in a
Speaker 1: culture that like exalts or you know, kind of puts
Speaker 1: on the pedestal that it's better for it to just
Speaker 1: be neatly tied into a bow, you know, kind of
Speaker 1: because I think it's so much more interesting too. You know,
Speaker 1: I would say people, I do therapy with my patients
Speaker 1: as well as prescribe medications, and that's relatively unusual for
Speaker 1: a psychiatrist, but I say it's because like there'd be
Speaker 1: so much more fun for me, like writing prescriptions like
Speaker 1: that's fine, that's like, you know, that's but the therapy
Speaker 1: piece is like getting to be with somebody on their journey,
Speaker 1: like that is That's just such an honor. And I
Speaker 1: gained so much from that too, in terms of just
Speaker 1: the privilege of being there.
Speaker 4: And what did I want to say?
Speaker 1: You know, I share in the book and the introduction
Speaker 1: my own kind of tumultuous history, which about a decade
Speaker 1: ago more than a decade ago. At this time, I
Speaker 1: left medicine, blew up my marriage, moved into a wellness
Speaker 1: commune that was focused on sexuality and spirituality and meditation,
Speaker 1: and I was with that group for two years and
Speaker 1: then ultimately left and had to kind of rebuild my
Speaker 1: life and come back to medicine. And part of what
Speaker 1: led me there was the false belief that there's just
Speaker 1: like one answer and that there's just like this one
Speaker 1: thing that will fix everything, and also the belief that
Speaker 1: it's outside of you if somebody else knows, whether it's
Speaker 1: you know, the meditation teacher, the podcast hosts the psychiatrist
Speaker 1: right like, it really isn't unfortunately, like the reality is
Speaker 1: for real well being, it's something that you have to
Speaker 1: work at every single day for the rest of your life,
Speaker 1: and ultimately it does have to come from you. And
Speaker 1: that's you know, and maybe that's depressing, but I think
Speaker 1: that's hopeful actually because that gives you back the agency.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was going to say it. On one glance,
Speaker 3: it can feel overwhelming, particularly if you're in a very
Speaker 3: difficult spot and you're like, it's always going to feel
Speaker 3: like this. No that I don't think that's what we're saying.
Speaker 3: I think we're saying that there's no destination, you know,
Speaker 3: I think it's absolutely true. And I think part of
Speaker 3: the problem too, is the way that wellness has become
Speaker 3: commoditized and commercial. And I'm part of that, right, Like
Speaker 3: I have a podcast and we get advertising in order
Speaker 3: to run the podcast. I teach courses, right, and I
Speaker 3: have to market those courses right. And I'm always really
Speaker 3: struggling with like the sort of marketing that will actually
Speaker 3: entice somebody into doing the course versus going over the
Speaker 3: top or you know, I've often said, like you could
Speaker 3: boil my entire philosophy down to like I'll teach you
Speaker 3: how to not make things worse. I'm like, that just
Speaker 3: doesn't sell. Like nobody's gonna buy that. It's a tremendously
Speaker 3: useful skill actually if you have it, you know. But
Speaker 3: I wrestle with this in my own way. And I mean,
Speaker 3: you know, anybody who writes a book, right, you've got
Speaker 3: you're getting blurbs on the book that are just over
Speaker 3: the top, right, They're just like, you know, we want
Speaker 3: those blurbs because that's what's going to sell the book.
Speaker 3: And I just find it it's a complicated relationship to
Speaker 3: have to be both critiquing that space and be in it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it feels like you've been in my brain for
Speaker 1: the past year, so as I launched a self help book.
Speaker 1: And but you know, what I would say is that
Speaker 1: the way that I handle this is to be transparent,
Speaker 1: you know, and to acknowledge like that I do wrestle
Speaker 1: with it, and that I do not to pretend that
Speaker 1: it's not there those contradictions, but to really.
Speaker 4: Bring it into the room.
Speaker 1: And I think that humanizes the quote unquote experts. I
Speaker 1: think that it also gives people who are looking for
Speaker 1: a structure right, because we can't give answers, but we
Speaker 1: can provide a structure, right.
Speaker 4: People that are looking for a structure, it.
Speaker 1: Helps them to be as they're choosing sort of what
Speaker 1: they put in their ears, right, who's on their feed
Speaker 1: when they're scrolling, you know. As a physician, I think
Speaker 1: that I've come to the where I've landed is that
Speaker 1: when when doctors are not in these spaces, then the
Speaker 1: void gets filled with a lot of junk. And so
Speaker 1: it is actually important for folks who are coming with
Speaker 1: integrity and do have training and background and knowledge too.
Speaker 1: I guess do the messy work of figuring out how
Speaker 1: to be there as opposed to kind of staying up
Speaker 1: on this high horse and kind of being like, well,
Speaker 1: that's beneath me, you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's get into the principles a little bit more
Speaker 3: and maybe we can give some tools for people to use. Again,
Speaker 3: real self care is not about a tool but some
Speaker 3: practices and different things. And so I'd love to just
Speaker 3: have you sort of reiterate the four principles of self
Speaker 3: care again. Let's go into those a little more deep.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there's four boundaries, compassion, values, and power. You
Speaker 1: could kind of distill it down to, because I know
Speaker 1: everyone likes, you know, just a list, do less things,
Speaker 1: be nice to yourself, spend your time on what really matters.
Speaker 1: That's the hardest one, and either give back or ask
Speaker 1: for help. And you know, we talked a little bit
Speaker 1: about boundaries and how my conceptual boundaries is the pause, right,
Speaker 1: And you can think of that on the micro level,
Speaker 1: you know, when an email comes in from your boss or.
Speaker 4: Your kid's school asks for you.
Speaker 1: To join a committee, or you can also think of
Speaker 1: it on the macro level of like, you know, what
Speaker 1: do I want my career to be where do I
Speaker 1: want to live, do I want to have children or not?
Speaker 1: Like those are big, big life decisions that you can
Speaker 1: take a pause or you should take a pause. You
Speaker 1: shouldn't just kind of continue on the path of what
Speaker 1: you think you're supposed to have your life look like
Speaker 1: and then end up doing what I did, which I
Speaker 1: would not advise, blowing it up. And you know, right,
Speaker 1: so's there's kind of two levels to that. Compassion is
Speaker 1: the next principle because obviously, as soon as you start
Speaker 1: setting limits with people in your life, everyone's going to
Speaker 1: be mad at you and have feelings, and then you're
Speaker 1: going to feel guilty. And so because in my clinical practice,
Speaker 1: I work with women, mostly mothers, pregnant and postpartum folks,
Speaker 1: you know, the number one complaint I get is sort
Speaker 1: of like, okay, doctor Leuchman, I'm saying, no, I'm setting boundaries,
Speaker 1: but like I feel so guilty. I feel so guilty,
Speaker 1: you know. And the way that I work with this
Speaker 1: comes from acceptance and Commitment therapy ACT. It takes a
Speaker 1: lot from Buddhist philosophy, which is like, you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: you feel guilty, Like yes, we can't change our feelings.
Speaker 1: That's not how feelings work. It doesn't work to try
Speaker 1: and run away from the guilt or to turn the
Speaker 1: guilt off. And so I think of guilt as actually
Speaker 1: a manifestation of all of these external social constructs and
Speaker 1: contradictory expectations that are put in particular on women, but
Speaker 1: not only women, because I know men experience this in
Speaker 1: different ways too. But when you're told that you have
Speaker 1: to be in two places at once in order to
Speaker 1: be a good mom, like that doesn't make sense. You
Speaker 1: can't do that, there's no right choice, and so our
Speaker 1: brain takes that conflict and makes us the bad guy,
Speaker 1: and that's guilt. So one helpful kind of metaphor that
Speaker 1: I use is to think of guilt as if it's
Speaker 1: a broken check engine light on your car dashboard. So
Speaker 1: you know, like if you've taken your car to get
Speaker 1: serviced and the oil change and everything, everything's good, but
Speaker 1: then there's like a light on the dash that keeps
Speaker 1: going off. It doesn't actually give you any meaningful information
Speaker 1: it's broken, but it's just going off. That's what guilt is.
Speaker 1: You don't have to set your moral compass according to
Speaker 1: the guilts, like you can just sort of let it
Speaker 1: be in the background.
Speaker 3: So let me ask you a question about that, because
Speaker 3: this ties to another concept that comes up that you
Speaker 3: talk about later on under values, and it's this idea
Speaker 3: of the shoulds, right, I should do this, I should
Speaker 3: do that right, which is associated with there's a guilt
Speaker 3: element of that right. And there are certainly ways in
Speaker 3: which we are absorbing these shoulds from the outside world
Speaker 3: and they're making us feel guilty. But I found in
Speaker 3: my life that guilt is often also the way in
Speaker 3: which I recognize when I'm not living according to my values.
Speaker 3: So how do you tell the difference between the guilt
Speaker 3: that is sort of being put upon you that you
Speaker 3: just need to sort of ignore, like the broken engine light,
Speaker 3: like just kind of okay, it's there, I'm gonna let
Speaker 3: it be. There are the feelings there. I'm just but
Speaker 3: I'm still going to proceed in this direction versus a
Speaker 3: sign that I'm not living according to what I value.
Speaker 3: And this is where the should gets really interesting because
Speaker 3: we've got you know, it's become a big thing like
Speaker 3: don't should on yourself, don't should on yourself. But a
Speaker 3: lot of times for me, my values end up almost
Speaker 3: being a should. Let me say that a different way.
Speaker 3: It's very difficult for me to tweeze out what is
Speaker 3: a externally given should that I don't want to live
Speaker 3: into anymore, and what is an actual internal should that
Speaker 3: I actually know and believe, and tweezing that apart sometimes
Speaker 3: feels nearly possible because we are conditioned at every level
Speaker 3: all the way through our being. I'm just kind of
Speaker 3: curious how you think about those different things, because to me,
Speaker 3: it's more complex than just saying I'm going to ignore
Speaker 3: the shoulds and ignore the guilt, because there are times
Speaker 3: that those things are actually to me ways of being
Speaker 3: an indicator that I'm off track.
Speaker 4: This is a great question.
Speaker 1: There is a difference in how the guilt presents itself
Speaker 1: when it's coming from the culture and the expectations of
Speaker 1: an external environment versus when it's more based on an
Speaker 1: internal kind of conflict, And of course there can be
Speaker 1: overlap right right at times. I think that from what
Speaker 1: I've seen is that when it's externally based, there's more
Speaker 1: of an urgency, like that feeling, or like the voice,
Speaker 1: or however your internal dialogue or narrative works like it
Speaker 1: just it comes really quickly and then there's like a
Speaker 1: panic to it, and it usually has sort of like
Speaker 1: the same quality over a variety of different situations. So
Speaker 1: whether we're talking about like things in your personal life
Speaker 1: with your partner, or whether we're talking about something that's
Speaker 1: going on in your work life with your boss, like,
Speaker 1: there might be a similar tone to the narrative, or
Speaker 1: there's like just a generally a more urgent sort of
Speaker 1: feel and a consistent voice, whereas the more internally based
Speaker 1: feedback maybe we could call it, I think, is like softer.
Speaker 1: It doesn't have as much of like a panicked urgency.
Speaker 1: Like it's more like you're reflecting and you're thinking, and
Speaker 1: you're kind of like hmm, oh okay, let me you know,
Speaker 1: let me go there, let me let myself sort of
Speaker 1: like go there and explore that, whereas the external voice
Speaker 1: is like it's not about like go there and explore that.
Speaker 4: It's like it's shouting at you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 1: And they might be mixed too, like right, there can
Speaker 1: be times where they're mixed, and then that's where.
Speaker 4: It's helpful to have a therapist or a coach.
Speaker 1: Or you know, somebody that can be an external, supportive, validating,
Speaker 1: non judgmental person to be able to tease things apart.
Speaker 3: With I'm trying to feel into that experience. And I
Speaker 3: think you're actually right to some degree that the guilt
Speaker 3: that comes from disappointing someone else does feel more panicky.
Speaker 3: Like I've said before on the show, in my life,
Speaker 3: I have noticed like a particular voice that will show
Speaker 3: up for years. It was I need a drink, I
Speaker 3: need a drink, I need a drink, even after I
Speaker 3: was sober, and then it transformed from that into what
Speaker 3: does not sound better, which is I wish I was dead.
Speaker 3: I wish I was dead. I wish I was dead.
Speaker 3: But what I realized when I started to really look
Speaker 3: at that, I noticed where it most often came up,
Speaker 3: And it most often came up when I was in
Speaker 3: a situation where I was going to have to disappoint someone,
Speaker 3: primarily when I was in a situation where there was
Speaker 3: no way not to disappoint someone, you know, like the
Speaker 3: decision I'm going to make is either going to make
Speaker 3: my wife happy and my son unhappy, and that caused
Speaker 3: in me a sense of despair that isn't the same
Speaker 3: as when I am feeling internally off track. The phrase
Speaker 3: I wish I was dead, right, is so over the
Speaker 3: top urgent feeling in comparison, And that's where it came
Speaker 3: up in me. You know, it comes up in those circumstances.
Speaker 3: And you know, I love what you said about a
Speaker 3: mother who can't be in two places at once. Ginny
Speaker 3: and I had a similar experience recently. I talked about
Speaker 3: this at great length on another episode, and I don't
Speaker 3: know where they come out in relation to each other,
Speaker 3: but an insight I had. But my mom was in
Speaker 3: Columbus and was having some health challenges. Her mom was
Speaker 3: in Georgia and was battling dementia. And we went back
Speaker 3: and forth between the two, and I realized, you know,
Speaker 3: I was carrying this weight that like, when I'm in Georgia,
Speaker 3: my mom's not happy, and when I'm in Ohio, her
Speaker 3: mom's not happy. And I was carrying that emotional weight
Speaker 3: until I realized one day, like, oh wait, it is
Speaker 3: literally impossible to make them both happy, Like it can't
Speaker 3: be done right. All of a sudden, there was a
Speaker 3: freedom there for me in that, and so I think
Speaker 3: that was a way of resolving that conundrum. But I
Speaker 3: think what you just said really makes a lot of
Speaker 3: sense to me about the tone and the urgency of
Speaker 3: quote unquote that guilt.
Speaker 1: Thank you, And you know what you just said too
Speaker 1: about like it's literally impossible for me to act in
Speaker 1: a way that will have both of them feel happy
Speaker 1: at the same time. And you said that gave you freedom,
Speaker 1: and I think or a sense of freedom, and like,
Speaker 1: one of the ways that I think about that, I
Speaker 1: think it's a similar thing is that it's not yours,
Speaker 1: That it's not your feeling. The weight of it that
Speaker 1: you were carrying around was not yours to carry. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And so maybe that's one of the ways where when
Speaker 1: I'm talking about like internal versus external, that's a way
Speaker 1: that it's maybe a little bit of a semantic thing too.
Speaker 1: But I think you know, what we're describing here is
Speaker 1: the whole point of real self care. And my hope
Speaker 1: for real self care is that it invites these deeper
Speaker 1: conversations in ourselves and with others where we can reflect
Speaker 1: on how we manage our time, how we think about
Speaker 1: the expectations that are put on us and that we
Speaker 1: have of ourselves, and kind of tease apart all these
Speaker 1: different threads because the answer is again, like they're different
Speaker 1: for everyone, and they're not easy to come to in
Speaker 1: that you do have to wrestle with it. You do
Speaker 1: have to kind of work with it. It's not the
Speaker 1: same as just kind of saying, Okay, well, you know,
Speaker 1: here's the exercise plan, here's the right you know, here's
Speaker 1: the ten step like skincare routine.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think the other thing about this idea
Speaker 3: of boundaries is that we get the idea that sort
Speaker 3: of once we set them or establish them, they're sort
Speaker 3: of in place, right, And life is a lot more
Speaker 3: dynamic than that, Right, Like, I may set a boundary
Speaker 3: which is I'm going to take very good care of
Speaker 3: my physical health and the way I'm going to do
Speaker 3: it as X, Y and Z, and that is my
Speaker 3: boundary and it's my value. And then there can be
Speaker 3: a circumstance in which another value of mine, say my
Speaker 3: dog's well being, there's a crisis, and that then all
Speaker 3: of a sudden needs to supplant the boundary that I
Speaker 3: just set around around this thing. Right, Like, it's not
Speaker 3: so easy as like you just line your values up
Speaker 3: one through five and then you just kind of have
Speaker 3: your marching orders. Because life doesn't work that way, you know,
Speaker 3: life is always throwing different circumstances at us. You know,
Speaker 3: there's this idea in habit creation. You know, our cultures
Speaker 3: become so obsessed with the idea of habits. I mean,
Speaker 3: I talk a lot about behavior change, and I think
Speaker 3: they're important, But the key thing in there is that
Speaker 3: habits only form in a stable context, and most of
Speaker 3: us don't have stable contexts as our lives. If you're
Speaker 3: a parent, you do not have a stable context, right.
Speaker 3: If you have a career on top of it, you
Speaker 3: probably your career doesn't give you a stable context either,
Speaker 3: because some weeks you can leave every day at five,
Speaker 3: and other weeks you know, you've got some big thing
Speaker 3: and you're like, oh, there's an emergency. I got to
Speaker 3: be here till nine, you know. And so with the
Speaker 3: context always shifting, our boundaries also have to be shifting.
Speaker 3: And that's why I love the idea that you have
Speaker 3: of the pause.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, right, the.
Speaker 3: Pause of Okay, Given all all the circumstances that are
Speaker 3: at play, right now, what's the right wise response for me? Yeah,
Speaker 3: to allocate my time, because that's often what we're talking
Speaker 3: about here, right, We're talking about a time allocation, you know,
Speaker 3: where I spend my time.
Speaker 1: Yes, and the flexibility right when you kind of think
Speaker 1: of it as like just a rigid thing, that's actually
Speaker 1: not helpful, Like we need to be able to cultivate
Speaker 1: that flexibility. And I think this is probably a nice
Speaker 1: place to talk about values too, because I think that values,
Speaker 1: you know, it's the crux of all of this. And
Speaker 1: the reason that values isn't the first principle is that
Speaker 1: because you actually do need to get some understanding of
Speaker 1: the boundaries and the compassion before you come to values.
Speaker 1: I think one of the things that I've noticed with
Speaker 1: my patients is that when I ask them about their values,
Speaker 1: like when I say, like, well, what really matters to you?
Speaker 1: What do you really care about? What's most important? I
Speaker 1: get one of two responses. Either I get like a
Speaker 1: very stock answer like you know, well my kids, you know,
Speaker 1: or or my parents, which is that's that's not helpful,
Speaker 1: because we all value our children, we all value our families.
Speaker 4: Right. And the other piece of that too is a value.
Speaker 1: It needs to be like an adverb or an adjective
Speaker 1: like it's supposed to be a quality because you can
Speaker 1: embody the value as you're moving towards the goal right,
Speaker 1: it's not static again, pointing to that flexibility. The other
Speaker 1: interesting response I get is actually anger because people are like, well,
Speaker 1: I don't have time to think about that, Like I'm
Speaker 1: worrying about like what's for dinner tonight and who's going
Speaker 1: to pick up Johnny from soccer practice?
Speaker 4: And like who has time?
Speaker 1: Right? Which is true, And it's worthwhile to make time
Speaker 1: because this is the type of inner work that is
Speaker 1: an investment. Yea, it reaps the rewards. So one of
Speaker 1: the exercises that I have in real self care for
Speaker 1: values and I really love it a lot, and it
Speaker 1: comes from acceptance and commitment therapies. And it's silly, but
Speaker 1: it's silly for a reason, because I think you do
Speaker 1: have to sort of like shake things up for people
Speaker 1: to not be so worried about the shoulds with values.
Speaker 1: So imagine you have two hundred dollars to throw a
Speaker 1: dinner party. What is that dinner party going to look like?
Speaker 1: And you kind of just let your mind go with it,
Speaker 1: you know, is it going to be are we gonna
Speaker 1: be outside in the park, Is my friend who plays
Speaker 1: in a band going to come play?
Speaker 4: Is it going to be a pot luck?
Speaker 1: And like everybody brings their favorite dish from the last
Speaker 1: state or country that they visited, or maybe your mind
Speaker 1: goes through like you know, sitting down at a table
Speaker 1: and the color scheme for the place mats. And it's
Speaker 1: so easy, in that little activity or exercise to understand
Speaker 1: that every single person is going to have a completely
Speaker 1: different dinner party. There's no best or right dinner party.
Speaker 1: It really is like, it's your preference, it's what you
Speaker 1: care about. And then from there then you pull out
Speaker 1: the adjectives and the adverbs, and you know, for one person,
Speaker 1: it might be like I want to look around and
Speaker 1: see everybody in like really deep conversation, and maybe the
Speaker 1: value is like connection or like intimacy or something like that.
Speaker 1: But maybe for somebody else it's like I want to
Speaker 1: see everybody dancing, and maybe it's like physicality or like embodiment, right,
Speaker 1: And you play with that because, like what you were saying,
Speaker 1: in different seasons of your life, the values are always changing.
Speaker 1: You have to be flexible with it. But I share
Speaker 1: that because I think it's a nice introductory way for
Speaker 1: folks that are wanting to, you know, take some of
Speaker 1: this work and try and implement it in their lives
Speaker 1: right away. You can do that, and then you can
Speaker 1: play around with it and see like, Okay, how do
Speaker 1: I incorporate that value into my week? How do I
Speaker 1: take whatever values came out from there? And how do
Speaker 1: I actually put that into my yoga class, or how
Speaker 1: do I put it into I'm training for a marathon,
Speaker 1: how do I put that into my training? You can
Speaker 1: take that and put it anywhere in your life.
Speaker 3: I love that. I love that exercise. I mean, I've
Speaker 3: interviewed both Stephen Hayes and Russ Harris and ask them like,
Speaker 3: what do you think is the best tool for creating
Speaker 3: values and all that? But I've never heard that one.
Speaker 3: And I love that idea because it does show how
Speaker 3: different it is. And you know, I think values work
Speaker 3: for me is often overwhelming because you know, there's a
Speaker 3: big list of values and I'm like, well, yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean I all found good. I agree with all those things, right,
Speaker 3: And so I think that values work is difficult for
Speaker 3: people because you know, you do have to really contemplate
Speaker 3: fairly deeply, and it causes you to recognize that you
Speaker 3: can't value everything in the same way that contemplating your
Speaker 3: time how you spend your time deeply causes you to
Speaker 3: confront a very similar fact, which is I can't do
Speaker 3: all the things I want to do, so I have
Speaker 3: to decide. And you know, anytime we make a decision
Speaker 3: about choosing one thing, we're not choosing other things, and
Speaker 3: that could be deeply uncomfortable. And then the other thing
Speaker 3: of values I think is so interesting is that sometimes
Speaker 3: living according to your values is actually a drag, you know,
Speaker 3: Like we talk about it as if you know, living
Speaker 3: according to your values and it's all going to be wonderful.
Speaker 3: Sometimes that kind of sucks, right, Like Ginny and I
Speaker 3: both had a value of taking care of our mother, right,
Speaker 3: and that caused us to live through a season of
Speaker 3: life that we did a lot of things we didn't
Speaker 3: particularly want to do if I was just choosing what
Speaker 3: makes me happy, but were about what we valued, you know.
Speaker 3: And so but I'm a huge proponent of values and
Speaker 3: reflecting more deeply, because again, you can't. And I think
Speaker 3: this is where I think your framework of these four
Speaker 3: are sort of interdependent or circular, right, Like, maybe I
Speaker 3: start with boundaries to clear out a little bit of space, right,
Speaker 3: but after I do my values work, I may come
Speaker 3: back and change those boundaries because I'm like, oh wait
Speaker 3: a second, Now I totally see what I value in
Speaker 3: a different way than I did before. It often seems
Speaker 3: like boundaries work is, at least in the beginning, a
Speaker 3: little messy, and then can get refined over time.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, And you know, I was just thinking as
Speaker 1: you were talking, and you're sharing the example of with
Speaker 1: you and Genny and your aging parents, Like the crux
Speaker 1: of why you're able to feel the way you do
Speaker 1: about it now is because you could make meaning, yes,
Speaker 1: of the time and energy that you spent, because you
Speaker 1: named your values and you were very clear and reflecting
Speaker 1: on that meaning. And I think this is important because
Speaker 1: I think that many folks are living lives aligned to
Speaker 1: their values, they just haven't taken the step to name
Speaker 1: it and understand the meaning. Yes, it is an extra step,
Speaker 1: it takes time, but once you do it, it gives you
Speaker 1: a better understanding of why you're doing what. Yeah, gosh,
Speaker 1: it really it sucks that I have to drive my
Speaker 1: kid thirty minutes to soccer practice, you know, every other day.
Speaker 4: But then you think, like.
Speaker 1: Actually, this soccer team is something that I know he
Speaker 1: loves and is giving him just such an amazing experience
Speaker 1: of like middle school or whatever. Right, and then when
Speaker 1: you name that, it reminds you of the why.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I could not agree more with what you just said,
Speaker 3: which is that I do think a lot of people
Speaker 3: I don't know if I'll say most people doesn't even matter,
Speaker 3: are living according to their values and they're not connecting
Speaker 3: the dots. So I use the exact same example you
Speaker 3: just did, which is, you know, taking my son to
Speaker 3: soccer practice. Right, I would get into this. I have
Speaker 3: to take in a soccer practice. I have to take
Speaker 3: in me soccer practice, and then realizing like, no, actually
Speaker 3: I do not, so why am I doing it? Okay,
Speaker 3: Now I'm connecting to why this thing matters? You know,
Speaker 3: in my Spiritual Habits program, I talk about generosity, and
Speaker 3: I'm like, one way to take this lesson is you
Speaker 3: need to do more. But the other way to take
Speaker 3: it is you could look at the ways in your
Speaker 3: life that you actually already are a generous person and
Speaker 3: connect to those you know, connect to the meaning that
Speaker 3: being a good parent is right. We just get on
Speaker 3: autopilot and it just becomes something we keep thinking I
Speaker 3: have to do. I'm trapped by. But when we reflect
Speaker 3: on what really matters. We're suddenly like, oh, these things
Speaker 3: are what really matters. It's just they're not always as
Speaker 3: fun as I might like them to be. But you know,
Speaker 3: making meaning does require that connection that you're talking about.
Speaker 3: Makes me think of another part in the book that
Speaker 3: you talk about, and I want to see if I
Speaker 3: could find it here. You're talking about being too goal focused,
Speaker 3: and you say, when you're too goal focused, you spend
Speaker 3: too much time in the problem solving part of your
Speaker 3: brain and you miss out on the good feelings that
Speaker 3: come when you achieve your goals. And you said, I
Speaker 3: think of gratitude not as counting your blessings, but as
Speaker 3: a form of digestion. Right, talk a little bit about
Speaker 3: digesting good experiences, because I think it applies to what
Speaker 3: we're talking about here too, which is digesting the meaning
Speaker 3: that our lives actually hold.
Speaker 4: Yes.
Speaker 1: So this comes from again sort of the Buddhist framework
Speaker 1: of the hungry ghost, those beings inside of us that
Speaker 1: have those thin necks but big, big bellies, and so
Speaker 1: you're just taking in all these experiences, but they're getting stuck.
Speaker 1: You're not actually digesting the nutrients. So that is one
Speaker 1: of the way that I connect to gratitude, because I
Speaker 1: find like the gratitude lists and things like that to
Speaker 1: be a little bit tyrannical, like another thing I beat
Speaker 1: myself up over because I haven't done it right at
Speaker 1: the end of the day. So instead thinking of it
Speaker 1: as looking at what you have and actually being present
Speaker 1: for it and allowing yourself to fully have it. You know,
Speaker 1: I was listening to an episode that you did with
Speaker 1: Greg McCune, I think it was a while ago, and
Speaker 1: he talked about, you know, the way to have more
Speaker 1: is not to try and get more, but to actually
Speaker 1: have the things that are already in your life. And
Speaker 1: I think that's a similar ethos right where you actually
Speaker 1: engage and are present and enjoy what is already there.
Speaker 1: The reason that I like digestion, I guess is because
Speaker 1: it's calls to mind actually taking in the nutrients. And
Speaker 1: you know, it's funny because I think I'm living that
Speaker 1: right now with you know, having my first book out
Speaker 1: and all of the things that have come with it
Speaker 1: that are so great, but also like having to really
Speaker 1: do some internal work to be present and to allow
Speaker 1: myself to have it and to give myself that, especially
Speaker 1: if you're somebody who's you know, admittedly an overachiever and
Speaker 1: a type a person. It's like so easy to just
Speaker 1: run to the next thing. That's not real self care, right,
Speaker 1: you have to stay.
Speaker 4: In what you have.
Speaker 1: I was also thinking that this is a great segue
Speaker 1: into power, the last principle. We're talking about meaning and
Speaker 1: actually like naming these connections. And as I was researching
Speaker 1: for the book and looking at the origins of self care,
Speaker 1: one of the things that came out is there's actually
Speaker 1: two parallel origins. There's people in medical community, actually psychiatrists
Speaker 1: started using self care as a term to refer to
Speaker 1: like exercise and diet and things like picking out your
Speaker 1: clothes that folks who are unlocked psych units could do
Speaker 1: as like places they actually had choices while being you know,
Speaker 1: in voluntarily committed. But then the other side there was
Speaker 1: Audrey Lord and Belle Hooks, the black queer activists and
Speaker 1: thinkers who were talking about self care as self preservation,
Speaker 1: especially for marginalized groups. And so with power as the
Speaker 1: last principle, what I'm trying to do is like bring
Speaker 1: this back to the boundaries, the compassion, the actually aligning
Speaker 1: and acting according to your values. Is that's a way
Speaker 1: that we take our energy back. That's a way that
Speaker 1: we actually live some form of resistance against a society
Speaker 1: that's sort of constantly trying to extract, extract, extract anyway.
Speaker 1: And so I was actually in Saint Paul at McCallister
Speaker 1: University on my book tour, talking to a group of
Speaker 1: higher education professionals, and there was a woman there, a professor.
Speaker 1: She's gay, and she taught queer literature at McAllister. And
Speaker 1: she said, Pooja, you know, I've read your book and
Speaker 1: I really resonate with things you're talking about.
Speaker 4: But how do I deal with the rage?
Speaker 1: Like, how do I deal with the fact that there's
Speaker 1: so much that is unfair and there's so much that's
Speaker 1: out of my control. And I have students who are
Speaker 1: gay who come into my office crying and who at times,
Speaker 1: are you know, suicidal. Like that's the level that I'm
Speaker 1: dealing with, and I feel like I'm not doing enough.
Speaker 1: And so we chatted and we talked a little bit more,
Speaker 1: and she remembered that she writes young adult queer sci
Speaker 1: fi novels for fun on the side. She had forgotten
Speaker 1: about this. Right, she takes all of her rage and
Speaker 1: she puts it into these books and she self publishes
Speaker 1: them and you know, they're on Amazon. And that's what
Speaker 1: she does with the rage. She puts it back into
Speaker 1: the community and creates something that is meaningful for young people.
Speaker 1: And just by naming that and making that connection, she
Speaker 1: felt a level of kind of freedom, like a little
Speaker 1: weight was lifted, like, oh, oh, I am doing something
Speaker 1: that this is my way, Like maybe I'm not holding
Speaker 1: a picket sign, maybe I'm not running for political office,
Speaker 1: but I'm doing this.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, that is a great, great example. And we
Speaker 3: are at the end of time. We're actually even over
Speaker 3: the end of time, which is fine because I've loved
Speaker 3: this conversation. You and I are going to talk briefly
Speaker 3: in the post show conversation. I would love to talk
Speaker 3: about the real self care thermometer. How do I know
Speaker 3: how I'm doing here? And we're going to talk about
Speaker 3: that in the post show conversation Listeners. If you'd like
Speaker 3: access to the post show conversation to ad free episodes
Speaker 3: and the pleasure of supporting a show that really does
Speaker 3: need your support, you can go to one ufeed dot
Speaker 3: net slash join Whoja. Thank you so much for coming on.
Speaker 3: This has been a great conversation. I feel like I
Speaker 3: just sort of abruptly ended it, but I've been trying
Speaker 3: to find a way to end it for like twenty minutes,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, I gotta hear that. I gotta hear that.
Speaker 3: So this has been really enjoyable.
Speaker 1: It's been such a pleasure. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: having me Eric.
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