Transcript
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Speaker: Hello and welcome to Rest and Recreation, the work-life balance podcast from Abbasida, where we don't tell you what to think, but we are hoping to make you think.
Speaker: I am your host, Michael Millward. Today, Dr. Stephanie Steele-Wren from Psychology Works is explaining how I can reclaim myself through rest, rituals, and nervous system healing.
Speaker: Dr. Stephanie is based in Arkansas in the United States of America, a place I have not visited. If I do get the opportunity to go, i will make all of my travel arrangements with the Ultimate Travel Club.
Speaker: because that is where I can access trade prices on flights, hotels, trains, holidays and all sorts of other travel related purchases. You can also access those trade prices on travel by joining the Ultimate Travel Club.
Speaker: And to make that easy, I have put a link with a built-in discount code in the description. Now that I have paid some bills, it is time to make an episode of Rest and Recreation that will be well worth listening to, liking, downloading and subscribing to.
Speaker: and I hope well worth sharing with friends, family and work colleagues as well. Hello, Dr. Stephanie. Hi there. Thank you for having me, Michael. I really appreciate it.
Speaker: I am really looking forward to finding out more about the work that you do. Before we do that, please could you give me little bit about your career to date and how you ended up running Psychology Works?
Speaker: start because it's been gosh like fit almost 20 years now. um I didn't major in psychology initially. Took Psych 101 just to fill my schedule and I, as cliche as it sounds, fell in love with psychology. Went on to do a master's in community mental health. I have worked a lot of hours in community mental health centers and had a lot of exposure to different mental health and how we look at it and view it. Then i went on to get a doctorate.
Speaker: During my doctorate, I focused on psychological assessment. So formal psychological testing and evaluation for things like autism, ADHD, and general diagnostics. A lot of times I see folks who have had so many different diagnoses thrown at them and they're just trying to figure out what is actually going on so that we're treating the right thing with the best treatment modalities rooted in research that we have. So it gives people clarity, more tailored treatment plan. it Actually through my studies, realized that I have ADHD myself and was formally diagnosed in my early 30s actually. So that has been the catalyst to opening my private practice and focusing on neurodivergence. Folks whose brains are quote unquote different from the norm or what we would consider normal. I don't like using that word to be honest with you because what's normal? what's normal No, so it's one of those quite emotional words and
Speaker: I take it as a compliment, you know, as as an adult, I'm like, yeah, so I think differently. I am different. That makes me distinguish to some extent. At least that's how I've conceptualized it for myself. But as a kid, i got teased and bullied a lot because I was different. And I was kind of weird, but now i embrace it. And I'm so glad to see this movement, not just for the neurodivergent community, but you know everyone to yeah reclaim themselves and be who they are and you know not be afraid to be who they are. i also am almost finished with a book that
Speaker: It likely will self-publish, but it's on masking, in which we associate with the autism community, but we all do it to a certain level. And the whole book is just about understanding yourself better, how it's rooted in our nervous system. It's not a social skill deficit, you know masking. But yeah, that has really fueled opening my practice and focusing on neurodivergence. And now I'm trying to change the systems. We have Walmart headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas. We have J.B. Hunt. We also have tyson have a lot of headquarters here and innovative companies who are really interested in changing the systems that are just not built for everybody. Innovative companies is one of those things where yeah you can't have innovation inside an organization, regardless of what type of organization it is, unless you have people who are creative, who are thinking outside the box, thinking
Speaker: about doing things differently and also have the confidence to do those things differently as well. Yes, and the spaces to do that and not being stigmatized for it or in the extreme cases fired for communicating differently or challenging the status quo. that's yes I went out on my own and became an entrepreneur because i I don't like being told what to do. That's just the truth. And i didn't i didn't like how things were being done in my field. So I wanted to do them differently. um
Speaker: My way and you know just something that fit me better as a person, not just a professional. So in some ways, you have reclaimed yourself.
Speaker: by the choices that you've made about the work that you do and how you will do that work. Absolutely, yes. And I actually work Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday with clients and patients and then i'm with my two-year-old daughter on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. i have really had to figure out what that looks like for me, especially becoming a parent. That is for sure.
Speaker: Yes. But this idea of reclaiming yourself, I think, is quite interesting because the vast majority of people aren't in the situation where they can reclaim themselves through the the work that they do or the way in which they work because they're not in a situation to do what they do independently or the opportunities aren't there. But you can reclaim yourself through other ways as well, through how you choose to spend your leisure time, how you choose to rest and the type of recreation activities that you take on as well. But
Speaker: One of the things that you've said is important about this is the nervous system. And for me, ah someone who hasn't got your education, he said, nervous system is a physical thing.
Speaker: that yeah If you hit me, my nerves will tell me that I'm now in pain. And that how does the nervous system relate to psychology? That's a big question.
Speaker: It's all connected. The mind, the body, it's all connected. But our nervous system, the way that I conceptualize it, it often functions at the subconscious level.
Speaker: So a lot of us, and myself included, I'll be honest there, our nervous system for different reasons, you know, whether it's from being different, like we were just talking about and being neurodivergent and the system's not being set up for you and just feeling drained, trying to fit in all the time, or someone just has a really stressful job or they have kids and older aging parents they have to take care of. So there's just so much going on for folks. And a lot of us,
Speaker: In this day and age, like our nervous system stays on and on mode all the time. So our bodies just never get that restoration that we really, really need. So I think it's so fundamentally ingrained in our nervous system. So if you are physically tired, then that has an impact on your nervous system. You've got stressed, you're exhausted, you're physically tired.
Speaker: That will also have an impact on your mental health as well. worse Of course, of course, it is all connected. And I'm glad to see a movement towards just realizing that. And even and in the United States, I've been really happy when I go see my primary care doctor, they screen you for things like depression. Just it seems so simple to do that, but it's only until recently that we've been checking in on not only the physical ailments someone might have, but the mental health piece.
Speaker: So having physicians mention that has been great. So we're moving in the right direction, I think. So we need to be aware, if we're going to sort of like reset our physical and mental health and make best use of our rest and recreation time, we've got to be aware of our nervous system and the impact that our physical health and psychological health are connected. So someone who's feeling tired, physically tired, is, so is if I understand you correctly,
Speaker: is more likely to suffer from a mental health issue as well. And the longer that that period of physical tiredness, exhaustion goes on, the more likely there is that there will be a mental health issue as well.
Speaker: percent I look at it as sort of a limit you know that's different for everybody, but there's some limit that we all reach, that our nervous systems reach.
Speaker: And strategies and things we've used in the past just don't work anymore. you know they're They're not helpful anymore. One of the things that you've suggested that we change, you've described them as emotional decompression activities.
Speaker: What is an emotional de decompression activity? So it's probably honestly some things that people already do, but... They don't realize that that's what they're doing. Yes, and a lot of it comes down to intention of what we're trying to do for ourselves and our nervous system. So so these are just suggestions um that I know have helped my patients over the years and myself, that you don't have to do what I'm saying exactly as I'm saying. So just suggestions, things that might help folks out.
Speaker: One thing about signaling to the nervous system it's time to take a break, I call it the small shift rule. So stepping outside, like actually outside your office for 30 seconds, getting fresh air, switching to a different chair a different spot in the room, dimming the lights. If you know you're someone with light sensitivity, things like that, taking a few deep breaths. So, you know they're small shifts, but they really interrupt that nervous system and tell it to go, okay,
Speaker: you can relax, even if it's just briefly. Things you know like that are just so helpful. And I like to come up with like what I refer to as like micro um techniques, things that are accessible really anywhere that you can use at any point. You just made my day.
Speaker: Well, I'm understanding really what you mean precisely because no in my working day, I'm dealing with all sorts of HR issues. And I go from one HR issue to the next hr issue and dealing with different clients what i do which i think i will now describe as an emotional decompression activity is i sometimes find myself playing a little game on the computer which is mahjong solitaire my brain goes into doing something completely different which is actually looking for the matching tile and i had not realized until you just described it there that what i'm doing is resetting my brain
Speaker: <unk> yeah that's a perfect example so that I can go from one activity to another activity. And I can also think back to times when I would have been working in an office with lots of people, big office.
Speaker: This office was not tall, it was long. The HR department, because we had people coming in for enth interviews and things, we were at one end near the main entrance. Oh, wow.
Speaker: If you wanted to do like a ah decompression type activity, you come out of the HR ah department and just walk along this long corridor to the other end of the building and back again.
Speaker: That's great. Simple, right? Simple stuff. yeah Yeah. You're not talking about complex type activities. is It's just simply tricking your brain into sort almost thinking that it's now the start of the day again.
Speaker: Yeah, and you mentioned the shifting between tasks. A lot of the patients that I assess and treat, you know, who are neurodivergent or not, have trouble switching between tasks and and doing something like that. Yeah, it resets your nervous system, your brain. you know, everything really does come back to the brain. um and how it's wired. um And that's from our experiences and the nature versus, you know, nurture argument and all of that. um But yeah, simple things really help our nervous system and our brain, you know, shift the next thing and and just just get a moment of
Speaker: rest. mean That's what it is. Yeah. Rest doesn't have to be all day. like it can be very short, you know, it doesn't have to be a marathon. It could be sprinting rests, you know, the way that we look at it. um Different things work for different folks.
Speaker: It's about finding what works for you rather than doing what someone else does. i'm not I'm not a smoker, but I suspect that a lot of people who are smokers and are going to the smoking facility are doing exactly the same thing.
Speaker: It's not so much the physical symptom of their addiction to to to nicotine is, I have to go and have a cigarette. It's the resetting of their brain between activities.
Speaker: which prompts the need for the cigarette. Yeah, I 100% agree with that. Yeah. Yeah, I've never actually thought of it like that. But yeah, because you have a almost an excuse of sorts to go take a break and and yeah potentially get away from your co-workers and you know have some alone time while while you're smoking.
Speaker: Yeah, I never thought of it like that. Oh, I see. yeah you' You're learning and and you're thinking. This is brilliant. I'm always learning. I think my patients have taught me more about life than any academic course or class, really. That's the truth. well Part of that, I suspect, is because every patient is different. And when you're looking at something that's an academic text, you're probably looking at generalizations with the person in front of you.
Speaker: their situation, their ability to adapt to their situation is as unique as they are. One of the other things that you talk about is this idea of a self-connection ritual.
Speaker: What is a self-connection ritual? Yeah, again, different things work for different people. What I mean by that is anything, any activity, and I can give you know plenty of examples, but you know any activity that makes you feel like a person, like yourself again.
Speaker: That is what what needs to be happening in the in the best case scenario. So finding it can be a ritual, whatever term you want to call it, but something that just makes you feel like you.
Speaker: Again, something easily accessible. Maybe that's listening to your favorite i dont know favorite type of music, doing something repetitive and soothing. Maybe it's like a soft blanket um that you just you know touch because it feels really soothing and really good. Maybe it's sitting outside and getting some sun. All these things that can just make you feel alive really but the self connection part is the bit where you're connecting to you as an individual yes that requires you to know who you are as an individual does and that can i suspect be more difficult for people than it sounds
Speaker: a great point that you do have to figure out who you are before you know what works for you. and i And that's a lifelong journey, at least in my book. yeah We talk about what like Maslow's hierarchy of needs and there's that one that's self-actualization. near the top. Yes, yes, very much near the top. Yeah, that's that's really hard to reach and it's a work in progress. The easy part of that is to say, i am my job title.
Speaker: That's a slippery slope. Yeah. That is one of the things that everyone is interested in. You meet someone new at a party, a dinner party at a school gate or whatever, and it's like, what do you do? And so people are asking you about your job.
Speaker: And that becomes the definition of you. had conversation with someone recently who said, I'm not going to ask you what your job is, but I'm going to ask you what your hobbies are.
Speaker: That's amazing. but that's That's really amazing. And if I can ask you what your hobbies are, then I get a better picture of who you are. and it took a few minutes to work out, well, of all the things that i do, what would I say is my hobby?
Speaker: What is a hobby? Well, a hobby is probably something you don't really need to do in order to survive. It's not cooking. you need it to survive. You do, but it's something which isn't... you do but it's not fit yes yeah something which isn't part of survival, it is part of thrival. You're thriving when you have a hobby and you you're doing it for you.
Speaker: So the question is like not what do you do, meaning what job do you do, but what do you do for you is a way to connect with you as an individual. And I'm thinking that there'll be lots of parents who are thinking, when it was the last time that I did something just simply for my God, that's good. go to work.
Speaker: Yeah. I go to work. I do things for my boss, for the customers, for the suppliers. I go home and I become the taxi of mom and dad. And when they get older, I become the bank of mom and dad.
Speaker: So when is it that I do something for me? One of my friends decided, he said, he reached a particular age with a zero in it. and he said, I'm going to do something simply for me.
Speaker: I said, oh, what is it? He says, I'm going to get a hair transplant. If it makes him feel better, then it's just great. It was something for him. And something that said that I am worth i am caring about me.
Speaker: I want something for me. And just you. Yeah. That identity piece. So many folks get caught up in tying their identity to their job titles or their profession and their careers. And yeah granted, mine is it crosses over the line into my personal life because a lot of what I do... is based off of my own lived experiences but at the same time that would have been such a shift just in like social norms if someone asked me that like okay what do you do for yourself what are your hobbies and that is a question when i'm doing my own clinical interviews with patients that almost i would say 99 of the time and i'm not inflating that people don't know what to say they go man i haven't thought about that in a while i have you know what i don't know like i
Speaker: I really don't do anything other than work or take care of my kids. So you're you're just really bringing up such a universal, no matter what country or even I think a lot of cultures you know that you're in, that's such a universal principle of that's just part of society. It's okay to have a hobby when you're a child, teenager, but adults don't have hobbies.
Speaker: But they should because that's what what can give structure to leisure time. And it can also provide the reason for you to strive for advancement, promotion at work, to earn more money so that you can do more of the hobby that you have.
Speaker: Yeah, and not giving weight more to your job than anything else. I've been like that before and I even have days still that sometimes are like that, but i I try to just remind myself like, I built this from the ground up my first baby, you know, my practice, my business, but it's not everything about me and being a mom.
Speaker: It's only been two years. That's been such an identity shift. I saw something the other day that called it, I think, matrescence, what your brain goes through as a woman becoming a mom and just the physical changes and just how that all It takes about five or so years I've seen in the research for a new mom to figure out her new identity and how she's changed. But something I remember talking to my own therapist, we're encouraged to do that as psychologists. um But I remember talking about that before I even had my daughter. i was like, I don't want to lose myself. I know I'm going to change. That's inevitable. But I don't want to lose who I am and what I enjoy for myself. And to feel okay saying that and not guilty as a mom is hard. Well, that's ah a symptom of 21st century life, really, I suppose, least I think. And I'm not going to sit here as as an as the male of the species and not sort of highlight the situation that when a man becomes a father, his life is completely upturned. Oh,
Speaker: The men may not have the physical piece, but there's, yes, very much an identity shift that we haven't quite come to understand. Yeah. yeah You go from being the breadwinner for you to being the breadwinner where every decision that you now make, whether that's can I afford to buy that new T-shirt or would I rather buy a T-shirt for my child. Really, really good point. mean You put yourself second.
Speaker: right You are now second. And you have two children, then you are third. you have a job title and then the most important job title that you have is father, husband, and then the job that you do and that complete shift in in mindset can mean that you can spend a very long time before you can actually reconnect with yourself as an individual and actually work out, okay, what what works, what are my rituals. And if you one of your rituals is that you are going to spend time with your children,
Speaker: And I have people on my team here at Abasida who will go and pick their children up from school and they'll be parked outside the school having conversation with me on their mobile phone. And then I'll hear this noise in the background and then this little voice going, Daddy.
Speaker: Yep. Yep. And I know that that conversation that I'm having, regardless of what stage it is at, is now over. It's done. Yeah. No, you can try. But yeah, no, your your brain is to your child. Now, the most important person in that car is that child and colleague my teammates attention is rightly focused 100% on discovering what their child has been doing all day and that's one of his rituals yeah that's one of these rituals just reminded me of something that I talk a lot about with patients and I've had to figure this out for myself and especially during COVID with a lot of working from home. But, you know, most people go straight from, you were just saying this, from work demands to home demands and personal life demands. And there's like no buffer in between. So having some sort of like
Speaker: transitional ritual also helps that nervous system that we were just talking about reset. Okay, so I was in work mode, but now I am, you know, in my personal life or mom or dad mode and having some sort of ritual in between there so that it doesn't feel so chaotic going from work to personal life or hot Yes, included walking as part of your commute to and from work. i think that always worked for me. Yeah, or just this person you talked about, your colleague was just in the car, but you know, sitting in the car before you go into go go home. I do that a lot, especially if listening to a really good song, but I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna give myself two minutes to just decompress, you know, that emotional decompression before I go in the house and know that there's going to be a bunch of demands from my very opinionated two-year-old. So yeah. They all are. She is. They all are.
Speaker: ah But yeah, they they all are in their own way. Yeah, but that just, we were talking about, yeah, shifting and having these rituals, but yeah, just allowing our brain to go from one thing to the next and not just expecting it to just, you know, switch at the snap of a finger. Yes. I think that idea of shifting from one mindset to another at the snap of a finger is one of those things that places a big demand on us to be always on to be always 100% aware and ready to go is one of those things that like you say impacts the stress that when we're always compressed we're always stressed we're always not as post when you've made me think about is okay so if we're stressed from work stress from home stress from commuting stress from there's stress everywhere in life we have to
Speaker: be honest with ourselves to acknowledge that, to be able to, in some ways, identify what are the the triggers of our stress, do what we can to remove them, manage them, and then if we can't, then live with them. But we are aware of those triggers that cause us to be stressed or compressed.
Speaker: But when I think about it, I've worked with so many people who didn't have a way they didn't understand how they could decompress quickly effectively efficiently so that they could move on to the next part of their day you know and had a friend who told me that their nine-year-old had said why are you so unhappy daddy and he was kind of like it's nothing to do with you it's just work
Speaker: And at that point, he'd said that he'd realized that he'd taken work home with him, which is one of the things that when he became a dad, he said he didn't want one to ever do. But he got work, he got family.
Speaker: Family was fantastic, but he'd taken and work into the family. And having listened to you now, what I'm thinking is what he lacked was a decompression tool that he could activate quickly,
Speaker: easily anywhere at any time to like just go through a ritual that would remove reduce the stress that he was under Yeah, yeah, even a minute or two before you walk in that door and you know see your family. Yeah can make such a big difference. Yeah, and that yeah bringing work home is is just yes So hard to not do that and none of these things you're not going to do them perfectly then then that's fine But yeah having something you can fall back on i think the the yeah the important part
Speaker: is the awareness that we all need to have a ritual a decompressing ritual that works for us and i think that's great yeah always say you know we're going on rest and recreation as with every other i've seen the podcast is make people think and you've certainly made me think today dr stephanie certainly made me think thank you very much well yeah this has been a great conversation uh you know these are things that people don't really necessarily talk about out in the open and honestly. So yes I love that we're having these conversations and putting them out there because I'm sure someone listening is going, oh my gosh, yeah, that's, yes, that's exactly it. Okay. And maybe they'll try something out after work today and it'll make a difference. And that's all i I hope from, you know, sharing my viewpoints and having these conversations. That's all I hope for. Thank you. I'm sure they will. Thank you.
Speaker: I am Michael Millward, the managing director of Abucida and in this episode of Rest and Recreation I have been having a conversation with Dr. Stephanie Steele Wren from Psychology Works.
Speaker: You can find out more about both of us by using the links in the description. Before you undertake any new activity it is a good idea to make sure that you are fit enough to undertake that activity.
Speaker: so consult your GP or, as we say here at Abusida, take the annual health test, which is available from York Test. The annual health assessment from York Test provides and an assessment of 39 different health markers, including cholesterol levels, the risk of diabetes, vitamin levels, organ functions. The list is comprehensive and extensive.
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Speaker: Until the next episode of Rest and Recreation, thank you for listening and goodbye.
