Hi, my name is Dr. Jo Braid and I am the burnout recovery doctor. I help health care professionals overcome burnout and get their energy back. So whether you’re a med student, allied health professional, or a doctor who is suffering from feeling overwhelmed and exhausted, you’re in the right place. In this podcast, you will get your energy back through strategies for burnout recovery. This show will give you the practical tips and mindset strategies to help you recover from burnout in healthcare are you ready? Let’s dive in. 

Welcome to the second episode of the burnout recovery podcast. Please share this podcast with a friend who might want help or ideas with dealing with overwhelm or burnout. In this podcast, I will be including tools that I often use when coaching clients out of burnout. 

Today, I am sharing ways to grow your emotional awareness and how to get more familiar and confident in naming a range of feelings you may experience. So what really is a feeling or an emotion I use these two words interchangeably to mean the same thing. A feeling is really a vibration in your body from a neurochemical cascade. So you might think about some feelings that are more familiar to you. What does happy feel like in your body? What does overwhelmed feel like? What does stress feel like? What does playfulness feel like? What does confidence feel like? I grew up in the United Kingdom until my early 20s, after I’d finished my medical school training, and first year as an intern. And in my much more recent years, I’ve definitely grown my emotional awareness away from having a stiff upper lip and all that. I’ve coached other clients also from the UK, and they sometimes have said, Oh, yes, we didn’t really get to express our emotions much more than Yeah, it’s going okay. As I started my medical training, I was exposed to sights, sounds and smells, which were completely different to what I’d experienced in life so far. And I actually learned to put up a barrier to avoid feeling some of the most uncomfortable feelings through what I was experiencing, both as a medical student and then further on, especially as a junior doctor with more responsibility and often being first to a scene. And I really find life has been more colourful and more exciting, since I have grown my awareness of the whole range of feelings that we experience in life. We experience both negative and positive feelings. In fact, that’s how life’s meant to be 5050 range of yeah, the perceived good feelings and perceived bad feelings. And I think sometimes in society, we’re encouraged to only feel the positive feelings and do things to move away from the negative feelings. And I don’t, I don’t agree with that. I don’t think that’s the way to go. I think it’s important to be really aware of what those negative feelings feel like and what you do from that place. 

A tool that I commonly use with my clients is to invite them to think about what are their three most common feelings? What on a daily basis, might you feel really commonly? And why do you think you feel those three feelings? After you’ve pondered that, then let’s have a little dream or thoughts or invitation to what you would like your top three feelings to be. They might be the same. There might be one or two that are the same, there might be some different ones. And why do you want those three feelings to be your top three feelings? And as I will be explaining more and more through the podcasts to come. Our feelings drive us to take actions or inactions, which then create our results. If you chose these three top feelings, what results would you create from these top three feelings? Would they be different to what you’re currently creating in your life? For clients I coach in burnout recovery, they often feel dread and overwhelm, especially early on when we’re coaching together and it can still come up during the weeks later on that we coach together. And what happens? What do they do from a feeling of dread and overwhelm? Well, things come up like procrastinating, avoiding the task that they perceive is challenging, having a difficult conversation, sending an email, writing a report, avoiding doing the task from that feeling of dread or feeling of overwhelm. The result is that the task is still outstanding, and it hasn’t been addressed when it comes when that feeling is there in your body. And, and that can change. So that’s my encouragement to you that, yes, we can definitely be aware of those feelings that we have. But we also have the power within us to change our thoughts, which create a different feeling in us. 

I wanted to share with you today, what are my three top feelings that I like to have on the daily I wouldn’t say I have them always. But if I’m choosing my top three feelings, this is what they are. Consistency, connection, and playfulness. I’ve got three young boys who are under 12. And play is really important for me to experience as a feeling to really engage and connect with them well, so I love playfulness, it translates into the music that I do, I also love a hit of tennis. And that’s pretty hilarious and generally playful. 

I share with clients often a big feelings wheel, which has got a lot of different feelings that anyone might experience. Life consists of 5050 good and bad feelings. It’s totally normal and that’s what the human brain does. Today, I encourage you to become aware of this, I invite you to experience all the feelings that you might be feeling and don’t run away from them. Because nothing bad can come from a feeling it’s just a vibration in your body. And generally, the time for a feeling to pass through your body is about 90 seconds, and then it moves on. Now that depends on the thought that you’re having about a certain situation. And if you keep having the same sort, the same feeling will appear to stay longer in your body. But when you have a feeling whether it’s a positive feeling or a negative feeling, I encourage you to pause and acknowledge it, understand where it sits in your body and imagine describing it to a five or a six year old what it feels like in your body has it got a colour, does it move, has it got a temperature and really know what that feeling feels like to you in your own body before you look to change anything. Because the more awareness we start with, the more familiarity we have with ourselves. And from there, we can look to keep things the same, or look to change something from there. 

It’s a short and sweet podcast this week. That’s what I got for you all. 

Thanks so much for listening. I’ll catch up with you again soon. Cheers. Thank you for tuning in to the burnout recovery podcast. If you liked what you heard, please hit subscribe and head on over to my website at drjobraid.com. There you can download my free guide with 10 tips to take if you’re nearing burnout. See you next time!