Saying no as the end of the year approaches

I was delighted to join Alex James on ABC Central West Radio this morning. We had a short and punchy discussion about Burnout Recovery strategies, and how to say no to requests without feeling guilty. I shared my own experience of this the other week when I cancelled an event I had advertised, and all the brain drama I noticed about doing this. 

Here is the transcript of the interview:

Alex James [00:00:00]:
Friday morning, 1st November. Can you believe that? Already into November. And I don't know about you, but I'm exhausted. I mean, the thought of planning Christmas, buying gifts, finding time to attend all the catch ups I'm invited to, and still work a full time job. It makes me, some days, wanna just lock on my doors and stay inside until it all kinda passes over. So if it feels all a bit overwhelming, how do you deal with that? How do you make sure you're not taking on too much? Especially in your job. Orange's doctor Jo Braid helps healthcare professionals avoid burnout. And she joins us this morning.

Alex James [00:00:32]:
Jo, thank you for being on the program again.

Jo Braid [00:00:33]:
Good morning, Alex. Thank you for inviting me again.

Alex James [00:00:36]:
I mean, this time of year, I guess, it is kind of it's busy. Right? And and I think that, that that must have some some kind of relationship with burnout in your in your personal and professional life.

Jo Braid [00:00:47]:
Absolutely. Yeah. The risk is definitely there. I guess, we've got a 7 week countdown or so towards

Alex James [00:00:52]:
Christmas now.

Jo Braid [00:00:54]:
I'm not counting the days.

Alex James [00:00:55]:
No. You've got kids for that. Right?

Jo Braid [00:00:56]:
They do

Alex James [00:00:57]:
that for you.

Jo Braid [00:00:57]:
Yeah. Exactly. But yeah. You know, we can either look at it at as this sort of finite amount of time and how am I gonna get everything done or look at what is important right now. What is the one thing that I can focus on right now? I've got a load of strategies that I might share with your listeners in the call today.

Alex James [00:01:16]:
Absolutely. And, look, I know that, last time we spoke, there were, there were 4 points. Right? Four points, and, I was wondering, could you run us through those again? Those are things that keep in mind. Right?

Jo Braid [00:01:25]:
Yeah. These are the foundations for burnout recovery that I share, with clients on my podcast, all of that. The 4 are mindset, movement, sleep, and support. And I can expand on those a bit as well. So your mindset, like, great place to start right now. What is your perspective as you look towards the end of the year? Just check-in with yourself. Okay? And then as I said before, one strategy to switch it around is what is important right now.

Alex James [00:01:52]:
It's coming back to the present.

Jo Braid [00:01:53]:
Our brains can't really multitask. Yeah. So, like, what is important right now? Do that one thing. Great. Done. Okay. There's lots of different ways we can look at our mindset, but just sort of, are you have you got a really strong inner critic rolling along with you, or is there more of an inner coach and sort of backing yourself and, like, believing in yourself that you can do the next thing? Movement, great for discharging cortisol. That's what's high when we're trending towards burnout.

Jo Braid [00:02:19]:
It's one of our sort of stress hormones. And when there's too much, we wanna get that out of our body. So movement, whatever you choose to do, whether it's a dance party in the ABC studio or moving or stretching or whatever, what are you choosing to do there? Sleep. So many things happen in our brain that just don't happen when we're awake. So the garbage system comes out, that doesn't happen when we're awake. Our memories are consolidated. Memory goes down a bit when we're trending towards burnout, short term memory in particular. Right.

Jo Braid [00:02:49]:
Really? Yeah. So really important. Try and get that 7 to 9 hours of sleep a night. That's about the best amount for most people. And then support, who can you reach out to? Who is in your tribe? Do you have a GP? I always ask that in all of my presentations. I do. It's so important for all of us to have somebody or a mentor or a coach maybe.

Alex James [00:03:09]:
Okay. Alright. So so those are 4, I guess, 4 key things to really, like, center yourself on. Right? When you feel yourself, I mean, it's it's a good thing to reflect on, I guess, as well. And I'll be honest with you, Dror, I feel a bit guilty saying no to people. It's something that I've always struggled with. I, you know, absolutely grew up as a in a yes family, as a yes man, continue to be a yes man, but then sometimes it's physically not possible. Right? Is there a way to kind of avoid that guilt or deal with that guilt when you need to say no?

Jo Braid [00:03:38]:
Yeah. Yeah. Sure. I'll share with you a little story about, an event I actually ended up saying no to. Okay. I'd scheduled out this event for New South Wales Small Business Month. I've done a virtual one. That was great.

Jo Braid [00:03:50]:
I was gonna do the in person one here in Orange, had a venue lined up, and I pulled the pin last week.

Alex James [00:03:56]:
And Really?

Jo Braid [00:03:57]:
Yeah. And my brain had all this drama around, you can't do that. You're committed. You're reliable. You've got to show up for people. I actually had no registrations, but, you know, that's because I hadn't really been marketing it much because I wasn't really sure about doing it or not. Yeah. And, so I, you know, I actually got a bit of, like, coaching around it to sort of go, it's okay.

Jo Braid [00:04:19]:
You know, you're another human in this busy, world that we all live in. And if the resources aren't there at the moment, give yourself that permission to say no. And rather than feeling guilty, I was like, hey, look, I may be not gonna show up as my best that evening. My needs matter too, and I'm just gonna let it go.

Alex James [00:04:39]:
I know that you started this, you know, this is quite a personal thing for you about helping healthcare professionals in particular, but but people avoid burnout. Mhmm. But was it still it sounds like it was still kind of a bit hard, I guess, to say no.

Jo Braid [00:04:51]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. Like, that people pleasing angle, is very common in people who, get burnout. I would say I'm still always on that journey of burnout proofing my life, and I'm just a bit more aware of some of the symptoms I didn't notice before, but there's still threads of people pleasing that comes through with me, you know, still from time to 2. Time for sure.

Alex James [00:05:12]:
Well, you're really walking the walk. Thanks. You know? Like, I mean well, but it it's true though because I guess, you know, that for people who may who maybe don't who don't, like, who, you know, who don't know this, they just hear hear us on the radio, they go, okay, well, you're just saying this kinda

Jo Braid [00:05:25]:
thing. But, I

Alex James [00:05:25]:
mean, that must have been an important thing for you as well. I mean, maybe in reflection going, well, no. I mean, this is what I tell people to do, so I need to live that. Right?

Jo Braid [00:05:32]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Alex James [00:05:33]:
Wow. Okay.

Jo Braid [00:05:33]:
Exactly right, Alex. Like, I could have canceled it and not really talked about the backstory around it, but I did share a bit on, socials and in my newsletter as well, and now I've just shared it on the radio station as well. So there we go.

Alex James [00:05:45]:
Wow. Okay. Yeah. I guess that vulnerability is a really interesting way to connect to people. And do you think that maybe that does does that help people maybe in either recovery or or or beforehand?

Jo Braid [00:05:55]:
Yeah. Yeah. You know, burnout, it's people who are very type a who try and fix everything themselves and, like, if I just work harder, I'm gonna get out of this. And I put a trick or treat post out last night about how, yeah, burnout might encourage you to work harder, but the rewards ain't gonna be treats. They're gonna be tricks. It's gonna be sleepless nights and more caffeine needed and all of that.

Alex James [00:06:16]:
Don't point at my coffee when you said

Jo Braid [00:06:18]:
that. I'm gonna go and get one in minutes. Yeah. No. So yeah. It it it is important to try and break through and and see that vulnerability and that authentic human behind maybe the mask that they're putting on, most of the time.

Alex James [00:06:32]:
And if people wanted to to connect with you, Jo, or I'll find out a little bit more about you, what where can they go? What how can they do that? Yeah.

Jo Braid [00:06:38]:
So I'm on LinkedIn, Instagram, and I've also got my podcast, The Burnout Recovery Podcast.

Alex James [00:06:46]:
Wonderful. Jo, great to have you in studio again. Thanks for joining us.

Jo Braid [00:06:49]:
Thanks again, Alex. See you. See you soon.

Alex James [00:06:51]:
That's Orange's Doctor Jo Braid there who, is the burnout doctor, helps, health care professionals in particular, but all professionals, with burnout recovery and also avoiding burnout.