October 6, 2025 • 47 mins
In this powerful episode of Growing Tall Poppies: Thrive After Trauma, host Dr Nat Green is joined by Alexandra Reid, a creative wellness coach who specializes in helping high-achieving women recover from burnout and reconnect with themselves and their inner calm.
Burnout can feel isolating, overwhelming, and relentless — especially for women in high-pressure, data-driven environments such as STEM. Alexandra shares her personal journey from high-achieving professional to burnout survivor, and how she has used creativity, reflective exercises, and nature-based practices to rebuild resilience, self-awareness, and inner confidence.
In this conversation, we explore:
- Why “doing more” isn’t always the solution — and how creative practices can quiet the overactive mind.
- The importance of nature, movement, and simple daily rituals in restoring energy and balance.
- How to recognize early signs of burnout before it spirals and strategies to prevent recurring cycles.
- The power of reflective art exercises, like the bridge drawing, to uncover subconscious blocks and clarify goals.
- Navigating systemic and gender-based challenges in male-dominated industries while maintaining self-preservation and boundaries.
- The journey from burnout to post-traumatic growth, building resilience, and fostering self-confidence.
Whether you’re a professional woman struggling to balance high expectations or someone interested in creative recovery, this episode is packed with practical tools, insights, and inspiration to reclaim your energy, joy, and purpose.
✨ Key Takeaways:
- Permission to Pause – Rest is not a luxury; it’s essential for recovery and creative growth.
- Creative Practice as a Tool for Reflection – Exercises like bridge drawings bring subconscious thoughts to the surface and foster self-awareness.
- Nature and Movement Restore Energy – Even short walks outside can significantly reduce stress and reconnect you to the present moment.
- Recognize and Break Patterns – Learn to notice early burnout signs, perfectionism, and unhealthy work cycles before they escalate.
- Resilience is Built, Not Born – Rebuilding inner resources and confidence requires patience, self-compassion, and reflection.
- Boundaries and Self-Preservation Matter – Speaking up and walking away when necessary are critical steps in protecting your wellbeing.
🔗 Resources and How to Connect with Lexi:
- LinkedIn: Connect here
- YouTube
- Mind Art Wellness Website: mindartwellness.com
- FREE 5-Day Creative Reset Challenge — daily prompts + demonstration videos. here
This episode will leave you inspired to slow down, re
If this episode resonates with you then I'd love for you to hit SUBSCRIBE so you can keep updated with each new episode as soon as it's released and we'd be most grateful if you would give us a RATING as well. You can also find me on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/drnatgreen/ or on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/DrNatalieGreen
Intro and Outro music: Inspired Ambient by Playsound.
Disclaimer: This podcast is intended for educational purposes only. It is not intended to be deemed or treated as psychological treatment or to replace the need for psychological treatment.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dr Nat Green (00:01):
Welcome to the Growing Tall Poppies Podcast.
I'm your host, Dr.
Nat Green, and I'm so excited tohave you join me as we discuss
what it means to navigate yourway through post-traumatic
growth and not just survive, butto thrive after trauma.
(00:23):
Through our podcast, we willexplore ways for you to create a
life filled with greaterpurpose, self-awareness, and a
deep inner peace.
Through integrating the manyyears of knowledge and
professional experience, as wellas the wisdom of those who have
experienced trauma firsthand.
(00:44):
We'll combine psychologyaccelerated approaches.
Coaching and personal experienceto assist you, to learn, to grow
and to thrive.
I hope to empower you to createdeeper awareness and
understanding and strongerconnections with yourself and
with others, whilst also pavingthe way for those who have
(01:08):
experienced trauma and adversityto reduce their suffering and
become the very best versions ofthemselves.
In order to thrive.
Thank you so much for joining meon today's episode.
Hi, and welcome back to GrowingTall Poppies.
I'm Dr.
(01:28):
Nat Green and I'm really excitedand grateful today to bring you
our next guest on the podcast.
It's my pleasure to welcome anamazing lady who has agreed to
come and chat with us todayabout both her personal and her
professional experience and toshare her wisdom and wealth of
knowledge with us.
So let me start by welcomingAlexandra.
(01:51):
We'll also chat with her andcall her Lexi through the show.
Alexandra Reid.
She's a creative wellness coachwho helps high achieving women
recover from burnout andreconnect with their inner calm.
After years working in scienceand medical technology, she
experienced the toll ofconstantly pushing through
(02:12):
stress and emotional overload,and now she supports women who
feel the same, especially thosewho are sensitive, driven, and
quietly exhausted.
And I know that there's a lot ofour listeners who are very much
in that boat right now, andAlexandra uses mindfulness,
(02:33):
neuroscience, and art therapyinspired practices and offers
gentle tools that help herclients process emotions,
release pressure, and feel likethemselves again.
So welcome, Lexi.
It's so great to have you here.
Alexandra Reid (02:49):
Well, thank you Nat.
Thank, I'm very happy to be onthe podcast.
Glad we got to connect.
I know we're a few oceans apart,so that's terrific.
You know, I'll start where youusually start at the beginning.
So I did the typical academicroute.
Um mm-hmm.
I always.
Love doing both biology and artwhen I was in high school.
(03:11):
But my parents, let's just saystrongly encouraged me to go the
science route'cause they feltthat was definitely, more likely
for job prospects.
Okay.
So I went into biology.
I fell in love with molecularbiology and I, followed a
master's.
I took on a PhD, I even did apostdoc.
And by the time I got throughthe academic.
(03:34):
Ladder, so to speak.
I realized that I was tired ofdoing what, my postdoc friends
that I called, they call itresearch'cause you redo it all
the time.
Dr Nat Green (03:45):
Yes.
I can so relate to that.
Alexandra Reid (03:48):
Exactly.
So, it was, much as I love.
Experimenting and discoveringnew things.
The, daily grind of, showing upin the lab and just doing a lot
of the grunt work over and overagain.
And I thought, okay I've donethis.
Let's see if I can do science ina different way.
And I got into working for anot-for-profit, which led me to
(04:11):
the federal government doinggrant reviews.
So I was on the side where I gotto read all kinds of cutting
edge research proposals from.
Everywhere, like biology,physics, chemistry, engineering,
and that was fantastic because Igot to go out and meet these,
young professors quite oftengetting started in their career.
(04:32):
And the grant that I helpedlooked after was actually, an
industry collaboration grant.
So they needed to have.
A company on board to partner onthe research.
So it was great.
I got to go out in the communitynetwork, meet lots of people.
And that's what actually led meinto, my most recent role,
working for a medical devicecompany.
I was out at a networking eventtalking, and they said, oh, we
(04:56):
could really use your expertisein our business development.
We do a lot of consulting.
for companies to build medicaldevices for them.
And so that was the most recentcompany.
It's based here in Victoria.
Called Starfish Medical, and Iworked there for a number of
years.
First in the businessdevelopment, like I mentioned,
and then I moved over to theQuality Affairs.
(05:16):
Quality assurance and regulatoryaffairs department, so QA RA
work.
Mm-hmm.
Which is very, very detailoriented because essentially we
are the last stop for themedical devices being, safe and
effective to be used on peoplethey, have to go to Health
Canada.
Mm-hmm.
FDA to be approved.
And it's, it's our job in thatdepartment to make sure not only
(05:39):
is all the paperwork in place,but that the, the device is
passed.
All the testing, and so I didthat for a number of years and
it was during the pandemic.
We landed a large governmentcontract to develop emergency
ventilators, and so obviouslyduring the pandemic there was a
lot of pressure for us to getthese ready and out the door as
(06:01):
fast as possible, so we ended upworking.
Especially our department.
We were a small department.
We were wearing a lot of hatsand working closely with the
engineers.
And we worked pretty much 24 7to get these ventilators
approved and in the hands ofCanadian government so they
could get in hands of Canadians.
Of course I'm working from homelike everyone else.
(06:22):
Mm.
Um, I'm always on call.
I ended up setting a desk in mybedroom'cause we were lacking
space and I had young kids.
Yeah.
And so pretty much I'd wake upin the morning, go to my desk.
And then check it throughout theevening and go to sleep and do
it all over again.
And it was just, it reallybegan, taking a toll.
(06:43):
It might disrupted my sleep.
The stress got to me as itwould, I think most people.
Oh, definitely I did.
Yeah.
And I didn't know how to turnoff.
That was the other big issue.
And, I've always done fine arton the side, but I found during
this time I couldn't even paint.
I, was blocked with this.
(07:03):
What I learned was calledburnout.
At the time I was just like, Ican't sleep.
I can't stop thinking aboutwork, but I'm not, I don't feel
like I'm being as effective as Icould be'cause I'm not sleeping,
round and round it goes.
And it was during that time andI thought I, really miss being
in the studio, but I can't facetackling on a big.
Painting, and mm-hmm.
(07:23):
And to be fair, the galleries Iused to show on had closed.
'cause again, it's COVID.
Yeah.
There were a lot of artists, atthe time suddenly stuck in their
studios.
There were no shows, there wereno galleries.
And being an artist didn't feellike a great relief either.
But I turned to looking into arttherapy'cause I thought, maybe
that's an avenue I can exploreand.
(07:46):
Honestly, that was great becauseit took the pressure off
completing a final finishedartwork.
Like I, I disassociated thecreativity from needing to
produce something that lookedgood.
Something I, up until that pointI'd been very focused if I spent
time in my studio, I needed tobe productive, I needed to make
(08:06):
something.
I could bring to the gallery, Icould sell and.
That sucked all the joy out too.
So now here I have work burningme out here.
I can't work in my studio.
But I started doing these littlesimple creative exercises.
They were almost like doodles.
There was the mindfulness aspectand the nice thing about them is
(08:29):
they were, quick and there wasno pressure to make it look
good.
I don't know if you've everplayed Pictionary, but sometimes
not well.
Exactly.
But that's what took.
Took the pressure off.
It didn't have to look good.
It was just more of a way togetting my thoughts out on the
paper.
Both a combination of picturesand words.
(08:50):
And.
It actually and then I I waslike, oh, I am feeling better
for doing this.
So that's what started me toself-study into the neuroscience
behind creativity, theneuroscience behind what is my
brain doing while I'm doing thisstuff?
Because I am a scientist atheart and I wanted to marry my
two interests together.
(09:11):
Anyway, long story short.
As you do.
I started looking into, Ithought at first of doing
creativity coaching, but Ireally like the idea of using
creativity for wellness, andthat's why I decided to call
myself a creative wellness coachrather than a creativity coach,
because my goal is to usecreativity to.
(09:33):
Much like you've got like aFitbit to count your steps.
A Fitbit is a wellness device.
It's, proactively trying to keepyou fit.
Versus like a pacemaker.
It's a medical device, it'skeeping your heart pumping.
So there's a difference betweena medical device to keep you
healthy.
It's treating you, it'sdiagnosing you and a wellness
device.
So I like to use creativity asessentially a wellness device.
(09:57):
So yeah.
And the women I work with arevery much.
Holding a mirror up to myselfwhere I was five years ago.
It's hard to believe five yearsago was the pandemic.
Dr Nat Green (10:08):
No, it's crazy, isn't it?
It just goes so fast and yet westill see so many consequences
of it in our everyday life,don't we?
Alexandra Reid (10:17):
It is and in some ways I'd say the stress has
almost boomeranged.
We we all dealt with the stressof the pandemic, and there's a
sense of solidarity.
We'll all get through ittogether.
And then certainly here in NorthAmerica, there's been a huge
push with the return to office.
Dr Nat Green (10:34):
Same here.
Alexandra Reid (10:34):
Yeah, exactly.
And suddenly, especially womenwe juggle a lot.
We look after the home, welooked after the kids, we can
look after elderly parents.
And now we got used to havingmaybe a hybrid system where we
could build in that flexibilityof juggling our jobs on our own
terms and still deal with all ofthese.
(10:55):
What they call it, the invisiblelabor, but it certainly doesn't
feel very invisible when you'redriving your kids around to
appointments or driving parentsaround to their appointments
and, then still trying to makedinner and clean the house.
So it's, I would say in someways the stress has ramped up
even more after COVID I, atleast, so I've seen with a lot
(11:16):
of the women I'm talking to now,it's kinda like we, we dealt
with that.
Then suddenly now there's evenmore stress now that we're back.
And yeah, so that's, so theseare the women that I'm working
with is often I do say the womenI work with are the niche I look
at is women in stem, so science,technology, engineering, and
math.
(11:36):
Which isn't to say that womenoutside those fields certainly
aren't expressing burnout.
I've worked in all the fields,I've worked in academia, I've
worked in government, I'veworked in corporate.
So I have a pretty good sense ofsome of the challenges they're
facing.
And these fields still tend tobe male dominated, so they're
absolutely.
(11:57):
So there's not just thechallenge of doing your job
well, but it's often doing itbetter than your male
counterpart because.
You're being judged on an unevenplaying field that way.
Oh,
Dr Nat Green (12:08):
how?
How many times do we hear that?
You've gotta do it twice as wellto prove yourself.
So there's that extra level thatyou've gotta push, So it's no
wonder at all when you were on24 7, that there was that huge
burnout experience because youare also trying to make sure you
had to do more to proveyourself, to keep up, to be even
(12:31):
recognized despite the factthat.
You are already doing a greatjob,
Alexandra Reid (12:37):
and I think a lot of times women, certainly
the women I speak to, there's abig issue with giving ourselves
permission to rest.
Dr Nat Green (12:45):
Yes, I hear that all the time.
It's a, common topic that wetalk about on the podcast
because you know of, I thinkwe're also intergenerational
stuff, that's what's happened.
You just keep doing it and it'spassed on and it's passed on.
We have really good teachers whoself-sacrifice and keep going,
(13:06):
and you don't have time to rest.
But the reality is we have torest.
Especially when we have burnout.
Alexandra Reid (13:16):
And we never give ourselves a chance to
recover.
We think, oh I I, took a nightoff and now I'm gonna work twice
as hard to make up for it.
So you think you're givingyourself a break, but you're
still pushing yourself as hard,if not harder afterwards.
It's often when they, often sayyou, you get really sick on
(13:36):
vacation.
Because suddenly, all the time.
Yeah, exactly.
Here you are finally taking thatwell deserved break and your
body goes, oh, it's about time.
And it just collapses uponitself.
Dr Nat Green (13:48):
Definitely.
So you talked about when youwere deep in that period and
then looking back, you thought,oh yeah, now I know it was
burnout.
So there was sleeplessness thatbeing on all the time.
What other symptoms did younotice with your burnout?
Definitely
Alexandra Reid (14:05):
like it affected my moods.
I would say I always joke aboutusing my mom voice, which I
realize is a really screechy,not pleasant voice to use.
I had a short fuse right with myfamily.
I just seem to be on edge allthe time.
(14:26):
Like I just, and again, I it wasvery hard and this is something
I'm learning for myself.
I'm doing a lot more meditationand mindfulness for myself.
Is.
I wasn't present in any of mymoments.
I was always thinking about thenext task that I should be
doing.
And they, a lot of neurosciencesshowed we can't truly multitask,
(14:47):
we just quickly switch betweentasks.
And studies have shown that welose up to almost, I believe,
40% of our productivity due tothis, what we think is being
productive, multitasking, butwe're not, and again, that adds
up after a while, that sense of,the other part of burnout, which
(15:07):
I didn't expect, is I knew I wasdoing something important.
But it started to not feel thatway.
Like it was almost like I wasbecoming numb.
And disengaged.
So it was, yeah almost became anobserver of.
Anybody could do this.
(15:28):
Why am I here?
Is it's, I lost a bit of thatsense of purpose, even though I
knew intellectually on paperwhat we were doing was truly
important, but it stoppedfeeling.
Meaningful to me.
And I think it was just my bodyagain, protecting itself and
shutting down emotions.
(15:48):
And certainly what I've readabout burnout, there is a very
strong disengagement aspect toit as well.
And almost disenchantment fromwhat you truly loved before and
then suddenly it, it's not.
What you love to do and, youdon't know why, because it was
something you loved to do beforethat.
Dr Nat Green (16:08):
Definitely.
And I know one of the thingsthat I talk about a lot on here
and in the work that I do withmy clients is really about those
three brains, the head, theheart, and the gut, and.
When we go through trauma orexperience significant burnout,
one of those at least, butusually two will disconnect.
(16:28):
So the head brain keeps goingand we overthink and we
overanalyze, and the heart brainthat feels, we disconnect that
from everything else and we goemotional numbing and we go down
that route and, that.
Gut stuff is the purpose and themeaning, so it makes sense why
(16:50):
when we are really in the midstof that, that they're no longer
integrated because it's a safetymechanism.
Yeah, and I really loved whatyou were saying as well about
how you got into the art and theart therapy because obviously
with all your neuroscience workthat was a beautiful way.
(17:14):
To incorporate the analyticalbrain, but also the creative
brain.
So that was amazing.
So tell us a bit more when youwent down the neuroscience path,
what that looked like for youand how you brought them all
together in the work you do now.
Alexandra Reid (17:30):
Yeah.
And it's still, I'm stilllearning there's still new
studies coming out all the time,but one of the biggest things is
when you're in, an anxiousstate, like that fight or flight
or flop state, they, yes.
It's, you can't be creative,right?
It's just like that part of yourbrain is shut off.
(17:51):
But even if you can.
Almost force a switch.
So maybe it's just, as I said,you just start doodling on a
piece of paper.
You just start one of the easyexercises I do is you draw to
your breathing, right?
You just actually, and thathelps you slow down it helps you
become present very and suddenlyyou're paying attention to your
(18:12):
breath, and your hand is doingsomething and that trips you
outta that anxious state.
And it puts you into more ofwhat they call the flow state,
which I'm sure you're familiarwith.
Yeah.
But it's almost like literallytwo parts of your brain.
And it's not as easy to say leftbrain, right brain, because they
are complimentary.
It's not exactly.
(18:34):
Yeah, it's not asstraightforward as switching
one, but it's definitely thepatterns of the brain that light
up are different at that point.
And you can definitely see thereis various different sectors
lighting up that way.
I can't remember all the namesoff the top of my head, but it's
if you see two images of doingone creative activity versus
(18:55):
another, and that could beanything creative.
It doesn't, I obviously I'mdrawn to the visual arts, but
it's true with music.
Music, yeah.
It's true.
Yeah, music is huge that way.
But even things as simple asgardening, just being out
cooking yeah.
Like it's, funny when you thinkof here, I think of cooking as a
(19:16):
chore for me, but there but if Itake out the, drudgery of making
the next meal and I just enjoycooking.
For cooking's sake, then it is acreative activity.
So it's again, what they alwaystalk about what fills your cup,
right?
So you, if you choose theactivities that fill your cup
(19:37):
That's what helps bring you backto yourself as well.
And starting small.
That's the other thing is thatlike I, I mentioned I felt
completely blocked to take on abig painting.
It was just like, oh, you knowthat beyond the blank canvas, it
was just the thought of.
The amount of work, like it justseemed like too much of a
(19:58):
mountain to climb, but.
I could go into the studio anddo a little bit of collage, I
could do a little bit of colorstudies, like just even playing
with color, like just literallymixing paints together was
soothing for me.
So I think you have to figureout what, what works for you.
But for me and certainly thewomen I've been working with,
(20:18):
just these little simpleexercises.
The nice thing with the arttherapy or art, I say art
therapy inspired exercises.
'cause we do a lot more forwardthinking rather than reflective
thinking as well with these.
Okay.
And that's what I find is thebig difference between therapy
and coaching is I find coachingvery forward.
(20:39):
Moving towards goals.
Yes.
Versus, yeah, therapy tends tobe more reflective, looking
backwards what got you to whereyou are today as opposed to what
you want to get to.
Yeah.
So with these exercises, theyare actually, they become
artifacts of what your mind wasdoing, what your emotional state
was at the moment you createdit.
(21:00):
We do another exercise whereit's basically you draw like a
gingerbread person very simple.
Yes.
And you do a body scan.
You draw the emotions or thetenseness you're feeling in the
body or where it feels light,you know where's where do you
feel grounded?
Where, does peacefulness live inyour body?
How do you, color code that youknow what color feels peaceful?
(21:23):
What shapes feel peaceful?
And you can do that on a dailybasis.
You could almost take youremotional temperature with a
body scan and.
That's a great thing to reflectback on a week later saying, oh
that was full of green, horriblespiky shapes and now you know,
like what, whatever is yourpersonal code for the stress or
(21:47):
the anxiety.
But it also realizes yourealize, oh, I've been keeping
it all in my shoulders and myneck and.
Maybe I should do somestretching.
Like it's another way ofbringing self-awareness to parts
that you may not be thinkingabout.
Yeah.
So yeah, we do all kinds
Dr Nat Green (22:02):
of little activities like that.
It's amazing.
I, I love a good body scan.
I use a body scan all the time,but I really like that idea of
that combination of thegingerbread man and doing that
to cross over and reallyreconnect with yourself and
what's going on.
And visually be able to put itoutside yourself as well.
(22:24):
So I really like that.
Excellent.
And it's very
Alexandra Reid (22:27):
simple, right?
Like it's, I love it and I oftentell my clients you don't need
an art studio.
Like I, I quite often what I'mdemonstrating on my videos, I'll
use my kids' arts schoolsupplies, like the Crayola
markers and crayons, right?
It's just whatever you have tohand something that I also tell
my clients, if you wanna go tothe art store and spoil yourself
(22:48):
I wouldn't discourage thateither be.
It's what you have to hand aswell is just fine.
It's just the act of creatingthat is, is the healing part.
Dr Nat Green (23:02):
Yeah.
So what do you think the turningpoint was for you to recognize
that burnout?
Start being able to go and drawagain and, engage in that and
shift from that merely survivingthrough to thriving.
Alexandra Reid (23:22):
It definitely took time.
I will, say that and it tookthose small steps of giving
myself permission to.
Take time out to do that and notfeel guilty or selfish that I
was taking the time for myselfand not quote, wasting time in
the studio.
'cause I wasn't producingsomething for, a gallery.
(23:46):
But it was, I had to make aconcerted effort of actually,
no, I'm gonna take this time andtalk to my family and say, look,
can you make dinner tonight?
Can you pick up can you drivethe kids and.
I had to work with my family tobuild that in.
So it, it is definitely that actof taking the first step.
(24:11):
But I realized I needed to do itright.
'cause it was not gonna besustainable.
I was gonna have to step awayfrom something and I didn't
wanna step away from the familyand I,
Dr Nat Green (24:20):
no, I
Alexandra Reid (24:21):
couldn't really afford to step away from work.
So I'm like, okay, I have tofigure out where this balance
is.
And.
And I'm, still learning thatbalance.
But it's.
It is just deciding at somepoint where this isn't
sustainable.
And honestly like the days whereyou just feel like you're not
(24:41):
gonna get outta bed, you'relike, okay, I gotta do something
right.
Like this.
This is not good for anybody.
So I don't know if there was ahard.
Turning point.
Except for the fact that I wasjust feeling less and less
myself and, my friend said thatto me too.
I guess maybe that was the otherthing is that I had friends
saying you're usually a lot moreupbeat than this, right?
Dr Nat Green (25:03):
Yeah, but getting that feedback as well from
others rather than just what youwere thinking.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So it sounds like there was somespecific things like permission,
giving yourself permission,speaking up.
Communicating what your needswere and also putting some
boundaries in place foryourself.
Alexandra Reid (25:26):
Boundaries is a big one that comes up again,
both for myself and a lot of myclients.
Definitely.
It's that feeling that I need,everyone relies on me.
I can't let them down, right?
And.
I think a lot of the women Iwork with are very professional,
very high performing gotstraight A's in school and went
(25:46):
on to get promoted and suddenlythey're at this position where
they're they, don't have thesupport beneath them.
They've climbed up so high, sofast that.
They haven't built those,external supports for
themselves.
And and realizing that they'renecessary one another activity
(26:09):
we do is, it's called thepersonal solar system.
And basically you draw yourselfin the center as the sun.
Dr Nat Green (26:17):
Yeah.
Alexandra Reid (26:18):
And you start mapping out who's in your orbit
who, is closest to you, who's inyour inner circle, and then you
start looking beyond and who'sfurther out and who would you
like to bring closer and who,who have you let drift.
Realizing that you let themdrift.
And then there's also the flipside of who would you like to
let drift a little further out?
(26:39):
Do you wanna
Dr Nat Green (26:40):
let go off to go into the solar system on their
own in the galaxy?
Yes,
Alexandra Reid (26:45):
exactly.
But again, it's that sense ofunderstanding.
Who's in your support networkand again, just paying attention
to who you could reach out to orwho you'd like to reach out to
more.
Dr Nat Green (26:57):
And I think one of the things as well that you've
hinted at there then as well, isthat the energy drainers, that
it's okay to put thoseboundaries in when we know that
the people we hang around impactour own energy.
And we impact their energy.
(27:17):
So when you are hanging aroundpeople who are also burnt out
negative, then it drags us downand we drag others down when
we're in that state.
So I think they're reallyimportant things to look at
Who's in your solar system andyour support network and
community.
What else do you think isimportant when you're looking at
(27:39):
recovering from burnout, likethe women that you work with?
Alexandra Reid (27:44):
Getting outside, honestly, that's much as I
promote being creative, I thinkalso I am I, learned about
forest bathing, which is aJapanese term.
I, have a beautiful forest pathbehind my house, and I try to
walk out there daily with my dogand, it's funny, like for a
(28:06):
while I could not do sittingmeditation.
I could not sit still.
I was so much in my head it wasnot helpful.
So I thought, oh, I
Dr Nat Green (28:14):
hear you.
I still can't sit still, butthat might be my A DHD
Alexandra Reid (28:19):
and getting outside with just and being in
I'm very fortunate where I live.
I can walk to the ocean, I can.
Walk in the forest.
So I, admit I'm very fortunatewhere I live, but I think even
just going to a park and justsitting on a bench surrounded by
trees and grass and just takinga few slow, deep breaths for
(28:41):
yourself.
That makes a huge difference.
Just getting we quote thesunshine, the vitamin D I know
it's tricky as we're starting tohead into shorter days here
where I'm, we've
Dr Nat Green (28:51):
got the opposite.
We've just, you've got theopposite.
Yeah.
You're lucky.
We've just Yeah.
Solstice and we're moving intothe nice, warm, warmer, longer
days.
Sorry.
Yeah, just rub in.
You've come out of it, you'vejust enjoyed it.
Alexandra Reid (29:05):
Oh, we are.
And honestly, we're having abeautiful fall right now.
Just that perfect blue crispnessand so I do know the rain will
be coming.
That's something that we get alot of here is rain.
Dr Nat Green (29:18):
Yeah.
Be prepared for the rain.
Yeah.
And we'll prepare for the warmthand the heat, right?
Alexandra Reid (29:25):
Yeah.
But yeah, that's something Iencourage.
The women I work with too istrying to do, two things is call
a friend and go for a walk.
So even if you're just doing,and I've actually started trying
to do that with calling myparents is I try to schedule a
call so I can go out and walkthe dog and be outside and have
(29:47):
that family connection.
Yeah.
And I find it's actually.
You get so into the conversationthat sometimes you realize, oh,
I've walked on autopilot.
So it, it's funny.
Or other times where yourealize, oh, this isn't a great
conversation, but at least I canlook at the trees and enjoy
being outside
Dr Nat Green (30:06):
and be present, like you said, and be present.
It's really important becausewhen you're deep in that burnout
or, trauma recovery.
You don't really enjoy thatpresent moment.
So that's such a powerful thing,isn't it, to really soak in
what's around you, andparticularly that grounding in
nature like you've just said.
I love that.
(30:28):
So if you were to look back at,when you were going through the
adversity and the stuff that hadgone on and your burnout, what
do you think some of the.
Key maybe qualities or personalattributes that you saw in
(30:50):
yourself and in your clients.
What are they for moving fromthat trauma into post-traumatic
growth or burnout into burnout,recovery?
Alexandra Reid (31:02):
It's, building self-confidence.
I think a lot of it comes downto, learning to build those
internal resources, theresiliency, they, often talk
about resiliency, about theability to bounce back, but I
think it's more than that.
I, do think it's that, it's likebuilding that, I often think of
(31:23):
it as like a coal.
Burning inside and you wanna fanthe coal and keep it going,
right?
Because that's the energy that'sgonna keep you going through the
day.
And I think a lot of people whodeal with trauma and burnout,
quite literally, that ember goesout.
Yes.
And exactly.
It takes, it does take some careand some nurturing, self
(31:46):
nurturing to get it back.
And I, think for a lot ofpeople, they don't.
I would advise'em not to rush itbecause there's that feeling of,
oh, I'm better now.
And then you tackle oneverything that put you in that
position in the first place.
Yeah.
So I think there's that abilityto realize once you've burned
(32:09):
out start trying to eitherchange what put you in that
position.
Or start noticing some of thewarning signs that you may have
overlooked or ignored blatantly.
That's the other thing is thatwhole feeling of, oh, I'll just
push through this.
And realize when you startcatching those old patterns that
(32:29):
landed you in that position andthat, we're not perfect.
It's an evolving thing, but Ithink it's building that
self-confidence, building thatself-awareness, and again,
giving yourself that permissionto take a break and not be
perfect, right?
That, that's, there's, I haven'teven touched on perfectionism,
but it's always there in
Dr Nat Green (32:51):
us high achievers that go down that path.
That's always there, isn't it?
Alexandra Reid (32:55):
Exactly.
So it that's the elephant in theroom that you know it like, I
have to be perfect.
I have to do this perfectly.
Or I can't let anyone else do it'cause they're not gonna do it
as perfectly as me.
So there's, yeah.
Dr Nat Green (33:07):
And I would imagine that in that stem space
that's even more evident.
Alexandra Reid (33:14):
Oh, it is.
It's that's where all the t'sand all the i's it's, that,
yeah.
Yeah, everything that's verydata driven, it's very
scrutinized and it's highpressure and high turnaround.
And yeah, it's just again, thatsense of I need to always be on
(33:36):
or I'll miss something.
And yeah, that definitely it,the job in itself creates that
sense of pressure.
But I do wonder sometimes if themen feel it as strongly as the
women.
'cause again, I talk to mostlyburned out women, so I would be
curious to know about that.
Dr Nat Green (33:54):
Yeah.
And do you think, because that'sthe world that you've worked in
for so long, do you think thatthere were men in that space who
also were burned out but justdidn't acknowledge it?
Alexandra Reid (34:07):
I'm sure because there's there's certainly a lot
of cultural conditioning.
We'll leave it at that, butYeah, for sure.
God forbid men show theiremotions.
Like that would be admittingweakness.
Absolutely.
Dr Nat Green (34:23):
Yeah.
There's so many layers aren'tthere, really to that?
Oh, yeah.
Years and years of things beingingrained and yeah.
So many systemic issues as well.
Alexandra Reid (34:36):
Yeah, so I, wouldn't be surprised, but
again, they wouldn't necessarilybe the ones that would show up
to tell me about it.
Dr Nat Green (34:45):
No, So being female in that very male
oriented industry, how was itfor you when you recognized
this?
Did you let them know what washappening?
Or did you hide it?
Alexandra Reid (35:03):
It's interesting, a couple of jobs
ago, I actually had a, malemanager and he was saying some
not quite appropriate remarks.
And this, was before the Me Toomovement.
Yeah.
And I remember discussing it, sohe was my.
Direct manager and I actuallytalked about it to our director
(35:27):
who happened to be a woman.
And this was really interestingas she said, oh, are you sure
he's not just boys being boys.
And I was like, I.
How could you say that?
Like it was just, I was justtotally I, came to you
vulnerable, I expressed myconcerns and you've dismissed it
and it, really set me backbecause here I was coming to a
(35:49):
woman in authority Yeah.
Who I trusted and have it bedismissed.
And sure enough, down the road,he was actually let go from his
position long after I'd moved onfor those very same.
Issues, but somebody else waswilling to listen to it.
So yeah, it's it, that was alesson that was a very negative
(36:12):
lesson to learn.
But it was something that I'msure I wasn't the only one to
experience something like that.
Dr Nat Green (36:20):
Yeah.
And as you were saying thatthank you so much for sharing
it.
It brought up this experiencefor me, very similar that I was
working well.
Consulting in an organization,but treated very much like an
employee and part of the family.
And it was great in many ways,but I was experiencing some
(36:42):
really inappropriate emails fromone of the guys and really with
that bullying tone and it wasn'tvery pleasant at all.
And I went to the manager,similar things.
She was female and I was told, Ithink you're being a bit
fragile.
(37:03):
I was like, gobsmacked.
I'm like, what?
And I had evidence and all ofthis and I just, oh, and I had
very similar negativeexperience.
In the end, I made a choice towalk away'cause that was what I
needed to do for my health andsanity.
'cause I was exhausted burnoutand, experiencing vicarious
trauma myself.
(37:23):
But again, isn't that so liketotally different industries?
Yeah.
But still happens.
And I'm not talking that longago, nor am I Exactly.
We're not talking 20 years agowhen this stuff wasn't talked
about.
And it's challenging, but Iguess it's as, you said, you.
(37:48):
Did something about it foryourself.
You spoke up and then you madeyour own decision.
I did the same.
I spoke up, couldn't do it, so Iwalked away.
And sometimes that's aboutputting those boundaries in
place, self preservation, andgiving ourselves permission,
comes
Alexandra Reid (38:05):
back to permission.
Yes, exactly.
Dr Nat Green (38:07):
The things that you have really beautifully
articulated are so important.
Yeah.
So what other things.
Do you work with the, ladiesthat you work with that you feel
are important in their recoveryjourney?
Do you have any other littlegentle exercises or tools you'd
(38:28):
love to share?
'cause you've already sharedsome amazing ones.
Alexandra Reid (38:34):
And there's another when we talk about
drawing as a coaching forwardthinking tool there's another
exercise, which was interesting.
'cause what we do is Idemonstrate on a video for them
what to do.
There's a list of questions andthen I meet with them afterwards
and we discuss it.
(38:55):
It's interesting.
A lot of them have said it's thediscussion afterwards where they
come back and look at they havea lot of thoughts and feelings
come up while they're doing theexercise.
Yeah.
But it's the reflectingafterwards of seeing what
subconsciously they put intotheir pictures.
So the exercise was it was abridge drawing exercise.
And basically you have things onone side of the shore you'd like
(39:20):
to walk away from, that you'd toleave behind that you're
struggling with.
Yeah.
On the other side of the shore,whatever that may look like, is
the things you want to movetowards, the things you're
aspiring to that bring you joy,that light you up, that bring
you peace and calm, and you drawa bridge between the two areas,
and it can be any type ofbridge.
(39:42):
And there can be any type ofobstacles and.
So I've met with a number ofwomen and seen everything from
the Golden Gate Bridge to Yeah.
Rickety rope bridges to stonebridges with trolls like,
Dr Nat Green (39:57):
yeah.
It's
Alexandra Reid (39:58):
really interesting to see what people
come up with would be.
And, but I had one woman say tome, she looked at her bridge and
she'd drawn a rickety plankbridge.
And each of these planks wereobstacles and they were spaced
far apart.
She was worried she was gonnafall between them and she'd
drawn these big waves of waterunderneath.
(40:19):
And it looked very dangerousunderneath.
And she's I just realized I drewall these waves and I can't
swim.
Why am I, it was just, and itwas totally unprompted.
It was just really, I laughed'cause she laughed and she's
like, why did I draw this formyself?
And it's just those littlemoments where you get.
(40:43):
Into the, art of creating andsuddenly thoughts and, feelings
just end up on the page.
And it's not till you take thatsober second look of go,
Dr Nat Green (40:52):
oh,
Alexandra Reid (40:53):
what does this mean?
And a lot of it's up tointerpretation, but I just, we
both cracked up after that'causeit was quite pretty funny.
But it's so powerful, isn't it?
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah.
It, really was for both of us.
And that was just talkingthrough her drawing, right?
And what did this mean to youand what did that mean to you
and Yeah, so it was just that,again, self-awareness.
(41:15):
Building that self-awarenessbecause.
If you're not aware of yourissues, it's really hard to
figure out how you wanna changethem or fix them.
Absolutely.
Dr Nat Green (41:24):
Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
And it sounds like it's abeautiful way to bring that
unconscious and subconsciousstuff to the surface, which we
often, eh, we might really knowwhat's going on, but we've
pushed it down so much and itcan bring it up to the surface
and, make us face it.
Definitely as painful as it canbe,
Alexandra Reid (41:45):
but yeah.
Yeah.
A lot of that is, it's, yeah, soI, really like.
Discussing the work afterwardsbecause there's, learnings that
come out of that.
There's, basically three stagesof learnings.
There's kind of the thinkingabout what I wanna draw.
There's the act of drawing, andthen there's the reflecting upon
the drawing afterwards and whatdoes it mean.
(42:06):
So there's a lot of takeawaysand the nice thing is, then you
can go back to it months later.
You'll know exactly how you feltat that moment.
You were drawing it, which isquite neat.
It's like a I was, I joke, it'sa Kodiak moment, right?
Yes.
It's a snapshot of what you werefeeling at that moment.
Dr Nat Green (42:27):
Yeah.
Beautiful.
I love that so much.
Lexi, as we move to wrappingthis conversation up, where can
our listeners find out moreabout you and find you online?
I'm
Alexandra Reid (42:40):
quite active on LinkedIn because again, my
audience is professional womenand it's, I really enjoy posting
on LinkedIn and connecting.
In fact, I've found somewonderful women.
We've just connected throughLinkedIn and world's away.
It's exactly industries away.
So that's, I'm quite activethere.
And also on my, websitemindartwellness.com.
(43:06):
There's a free challenge.
It's like a five day emailchallenge where if you sign up,
you get basically a dailycreative prompt and a little
video of me demonstrating it.
So it's called the, five dayReset challenge creative Reset
Challenge.
So yeah that's, a great.
Taster of what the coachingfeels like.
(43:28):
And then I have a newsletter aswell, and I send out a weekly
newsletter with again, links tocreative exercises that I write
about and blogs and so on.
So there, there's a lot ofresources on my website.
So I definitely would encouragepeople to look for me there.
Dr Nat Green (43:44):
Fantastic.
And I'll put that in our shownotes for sure.
So the five day Creative Resetchallenge on your.
Mind art wellness.com website.
So I would highly encourage, Iknow I'll be checking it out and
yeah, and signing up for thenewsletter as well so I can stay
connected to you and I know thatour listeners will definitely be
(44:06):
very interested in that.
Alexandra Reid (44:08):
Yeah, and I hope they connect with me on LinkedIn
and all of those same links arethere as well in my profile.
And you can read more about meand, see what I've been up to as
well.
Dr Nat Green (44:17):
Excellent.
I'll put all that in the shownotes for our listeners to check
out.
And I always like to wrap up theconversation with a question.
What do you think your youngestself would think of where you
are and what you've achievednow?
Alexandra Reid (44:36):
Oh she's gonna wonder why I didn't go into fine
art, because she was convincedshe was gonna be an artist when
she was younger.
But I'd like her to see the factthat art and science can live
together and produce it's one ofthose they joke about hybrid
vigor, when take two differentthings, and you combine them and
(45:00):
the result is more than the sumof the parts.
And so I'd like her to goyou're, an artist in a different
way now.
And have her be happy with that.
Dr Nat Green (45:11):
I love that so much.
And really you've come fullcircle.
The fine arts is what you wantedand you went into, as you said
to please your parents and pickthat path.
But you've come full circle andyou've beautifully combined
both.
I love that.
That's amazing.
Thank you so much for coming ontoday and sharing your story and
(45:32):
your beautiful, resources andyour wisdom.
It's been very powerful and Iknow that our listeners are
gonna love listening to thisepisode.
Oh, thank you.
I'm glad we finally got toconnect.
after life stopped getting inour way.
Exactly.
Thank you so much, Lexi.
Bye for now.
(45:53):
Bye Thank you for joining me inthis episode of Growing Tall
Poppies.
It is my deepest hope thattoday's episode may have
inspired and empowered you tostep fully into your
post-traumatic growth, so thatyou can have absolute clarity
(46:15):
around who you are, what mattersthe most to you, and to assist
you to release your negativeemotions.
And regulate your nervous systemso you can fully thrive.
New episodes are published everyTuesday, and I hope you'll
continue to join us as weexplore both the strategies and
(46:36):
the personal qualities requiredto fully live a life of
post-traumatic growth and tothrive.
So if it feels aligned to youand really resonates, then I
invite you to hit subscribe andit would mean the world to us.
If you could share this episodewith others who you feel may
benefit too, you may also findme on Instagram at Growing Tall
(47:01):
Poppies and Facebook, Dr.
Natalie Green.
Remember, every moment is anopportunity to look for the
lessons and to learn andincrease your ability to live
the life you desire and deserve.
So for now, stay connected.
Stay inspired.
(47:22):
Stand tall like the tall poppyyou are, and keep shining your
light brightly in the world.
Bye for.
Welcome to the Growing Tall Poppies Podcast.
I'm your host, Dr.
Nat Green, and I'm so excited tohave you join me as we discuss
what it means to navigate yourway through post-traumatic
growth and not just survive, butto thrive after trauma.
(00:23):
Through our podcast, we willexplore ways for you to create a
life filled with greaterpurpose, self-awareness, and a
deep inner peace.
Through integrating the manyyears of knowledge and
professional experience, as wellas the wisdom of those who have
experienced trauma firsthand.
(00:44):
We'll combine psychologyaccelerated approaches.
Coaching and personal experienceto assist you, to learn, to grow
and to thrive.
I hope to empower you to createdeeper awareness and
understanding and strongerconnections with yourself and
with others, whilst also pavingthe way for those who have
(01:08):
experienced trauma and adversityto reduce their suffering and
become the very best versions ofthemselves.
In order to thrive.
Thank you so much for joining meon today's episode.
Hi, and welcome back to GrowingTall Poppies.
I'm Dr.
(01:28):
Nat Green and I'm really excitedand grateful today to bring you
our next guest on the podcast.
It's my pleasure to welcome anamazing lady who has agreed to
come and chat with us todayabout both her personal and her
professional experience and toshare her wisdom and wealth of
knowledge with us.
So let me start by welcomingAlexandra.
(01:51):
We'll also chat with her andcall her Lexi through the show.
Alexandra Reid.
She's a creative wellness coachwho helps high achieving women
recover from burnout andreconnect with their inner calm.
After years working in scienceand medical technology, she
experienced the toll ofconstantly pushing through
(02:12):
stress and emotional overload,and now she supports women who
feel the same, especially thosewho are sensitive, driven, and
quietly exhausted.
And I know that there's a lot ofour listeners who are very much
in that boat right now, andAlexandra uses mindfulness,
(02:33):
neuroscience, and art therapyinspired practices and offers
gentle tools that help herclients process emotions,
release pressure, and feel likethemselves again.
So welcome, Lexi.
It's so great to have you here.
Alexandra Reid (02:49):
Well, thank you Nat.
Thank, I'm very happy to be onthe podcast.
Glad we got to connect.
I know we're a few oceans apart,so that's terrific.
You know, I'll start where youusually start at the beginning.
So I did the typical academicroute.
Um mm-hmm.
I always.
Love doing both biology and artwhen I was in high school.
(03:11):
But my parents, let's just saystrongly encouraged me to go the
science route'cause they feltthat was definitely, more likely
for job prospects.
Okay.
So I went into biology.
I fell in love with molecularbiology and I, followed a
master's.
I took on a PhD, I even did apostdoc.
And by the time I got throughthe academic.
(03:34):
Ladder, so to speak.
I realized that I was tired ofdoing what, my postdoc friends
that I called, they call itresearch'cause you redo it all
the time.
Dr Nat Green (03:45):
Yes.
I can so relate to that.
Alexandra Reid (03:48):
Exactly.
So, it was, much as I love.
Experimenting and discoveringnew things.
The, daily grind of, showing upin the lab and just doing a lot
of the grunt work over and overagain.
And I thought, okay I've donethis.
Let's see if I can do science ina different way.
And I got into working for anot-for-profit, which led me to
(04:11):
the federal government doinggrant reviews.
So I was on the side where I gotto read all kinds of cutting
edge research proposals from.
Everywhere, like biology,physics, chemistry, engineering,
and that was fantastic because Igot to go out and meet these,
young professors quite oftengetting started in their career.
(04:32):
And the grant that I helpedlooked after was actually, an
industry collaboration grant.
So they needed to have.
A company on board to partner onthe research.
So it was great.
I got to go out in the communitynetwork, meet lots of people.
And that's what actually led meinto, my most recent role,
working for a medical devicecompany.
I was out at a networking eventtalking, and they said, oh, we
(04:56):
could really use your expertisein our business development.
We do a lot of consulting.
for companies to build medicaldevices for them.
And so that was the most recentcompany.
It's based here in Victoria.
Called Starfish Medical, and Iworked there for a number of
years.
First in the businessdevelopment, like I mentioned,
and then I moved over to theQuality Affairs.
(05:16):
Quality assurance and regulatoryaffairs department, so QA RA
work.
Mm-hmm.
Which is very, very detailoriented because essentially we
are the last stop for themedical devices being, safe and
effective to be used on peoplethey, have to go to Health
Canada.
Mm-hmm.
FDA to be approved.
And it's, it's our job in thatdepartment to make sure not only
(05:39):
is all the paperwork in place,but that the, the device is
passed.
All the testing, and so I didthat for a number of years and
it was during the pandemic.
We landed a large governmentcontract to develop emergency
ventilators, and so obviouslyduring the pandemic there was a
lot of pressure for us to getthese ready and out the door as
(06:01):
fast as possible, so we ended upworking.
Especially our department.
We were a small department.
We were wearing a lot of hatsand working closely with the
engineers.
And we worked pretty much 24 7to get these ventilators
approved and in the hands ofCanadian government so they
could get in hands of Canadians.
Of course I'm working from homelike everyone else.
(06:22):
Mm.
Um, I'm always on call.
I ended up setting a desk in mybedroom'cause we were lacking
space and I had young kids.
Yeah.
And so pretty much I'd wake upin the morning, go to my desk.
And then check it throughout theevening and go to sleep and do
it all over again.
And it was just, it reallybegan, taking a toll.
(06:43):
It might disrupted my sleep.
The stress got to me as itwould, I think most people.
Oh, definitely I did.
Yeah.
And I didn't know how to turnoff.
That was the other big issue.
And, I've always done fine arton the side, but I found during
this time I couldn't even paint.
I, was blocked with this.
(07:03):
What I learned was calledburnout.
At the time I was just like, Ican't sleep.
I can't stop thinking aboutwork, but I'm not, I don't feel
like I'm being as effective as Icould be'cause I'm not sleeping,
round and round it goes.
And it was during that time andI thought I, really miss being
in the studio, but I can't facetackling on a big.
Painting, and mm-hmm.
(07:23):
And to be fair, the galleries Iused to show on had closed.
'cause again, it's COVID.
Yeah.
There were a lot of artists, atthe time suddenly stuck in their
studios.
There were no shows, there wereno galleries.
And being an artist didn't feellike a great relief either.
But I turned to looking into arttherapy'cause I thought, maybe
that's an avenue I can exploreand.
(07:46):
Honestly, that was great becauseit took the pressure off
completing a final finishedartwork.
Like I, I disassociated thecreativity from needing to
produce something that lookedgood.
Something I, up until that pointI'd been very focused if I spent
time in my studio, I needed tobe productive, I needed to make
(08:06):
something.
I could bring to the gallery, Icould sell and.
That sucked all the joy out too.
So now here I have work burningme out here.
I can't work in my studio.
But I started doing these littlesimple creative exercises.
They were almost like doodles.
There was the mindfulness aspectand the nice thing about them is
(08:29):
they were, quick and there wasno pressure to make it look
good.
I don't know if you've everplayed Pictionary, but sometimes
not well.
Exactly.
But that's what took.
Took the pressure off.
It didn't have to look good.
It was just more of a way togetting my thoughts out on the
paper.
Both a combination of picturesand words.
(08:50):
And.
It actually and then I I waslike, oh, I am feeling better
for doing this.
So that's what started me toself-study into the neuroscience
behind creativity, theneuroscience behind what is my
brain doing while I'm doing thisstuff?
Because I am a scientist atheart and I wanted to marry my
two interests together.
(09:11):
Anyway, long story short.
As you do.
I started looking into, Ithought at first of doing
creativity coaching, but Ireally like the idea of using
creativity for wellness, andthat's why I decided to call
myself a creative wellness coachrather than a creativity coach,
because my goal is to usecreativity to.
(09:33):
Much like you've got like aFitbit to count your steps.
A Fitbit is a wellness device.
It's, proactively trying to keepyou fit.
Versus like a pacemaker.
It's a medical device, it'skeeping your heart pumping.
So there's a difference betweena medical device to keep you
healthy.
It's treating you, it'sdiagnosing you and a wellness
device.
So I like to use creativity asessentially a wellness device.
(09:57):
So yeah.
And the women I work with arevery much.
Holding a mirror up to myselfwhere I was five years ago.
It's hard to believe five yearsago was the pandemic.
Dr Nat Green (10:08):
No, it's crazy, isn't it?
It just goes so fast and yet westill see so many consequences
of it in our everyday life,don't we?
Alexandra Reid (10:17):
It is and in some ways I'd say the stress has
almost boomeranged.
We we all dealt with the stressof the pandemic, and there's a
sense of solidarity.
We'll all get through ittogether.
And then certainly here in NorthAmerica, there's been a huge
push with the return to office.
Dr Nat Green (10:34):
Same here.
Alexandra Reid (10:34):
Yeah, exactly.
And suddenly, especially womenwe juggle a lot.
We look after the home, welooked after the kids, we can
look after elderly parents.
And now we got used to havingmaybe a hybrid system where we
could build in that flexibilityof juggling our jobs on our own
terms and still deal with all ofthese.
(10:55):
What they call it, the invisiblelabor, but it certainly doesn't
feel very invisible when you'redriving your kids around to
appointments or driving parentsaround to their appointments
and, then still trying to makedinner and clean the house.
So it's, I would say in someways the stress has ramped up
even more after COVID I, atleast, so I've seen with a lot
(11:16):
of the women I'm talking to now,it's kinda like we, we dealt
with that.
Then suddenly now there's evenmore stress now that we're back.
And yeah, so that's, so theseare the women that I'm working
with is often I do say the womenI work with are the niche I look
at is women in stem, so science,technology, engineering, and
math.
(11:36):
Which isn't to say that womenoutside those fields certainly
aren't expressing burnout.
I've worked in all the fields,I've worked in academia, I've
worked in government, I'veworked in corporate.
So I have a pretty good sense ofsome of the challenges they're
facing.
And these fields still tend tobe male dominated, so they're
absolutely.
(11:57):
So there's not just thechallenge of doing your job
well, but it's often doing itbetter than your male
counterpart because.
You're being judged on an unevenplaying field that way.
Oh,
Dr Nat Green (12:08):
how?
How many times do we hear that?
You've gotta do it twice as wellto prove yourself.
So there's that extra level thatyou've gotta push, So it's no
wonder at all when you were on24 7, that there was that huge
burnout experience because youare also trying to make sure you
had to do more to proveyourself, to keep up, to be even
(12:31):
recognized despite the factthat.
You are already doing a greatjob,
Alexandra Reid (12:37):
and I think a lot of times women, certainly
the women I speak to, there's abig issue with giving ourselves
permission to rest.
Dr Nat Green (12:45):
Yes, I hear that all the time.
It's a, common topic that wetalk about on the podcast
because you know of, I thinkwe're also intergenerational
stuff, that's what's happened.
You just keep doing it and it'spassed on and it's passed on.
We have really good teachers whoself-sacrifice and keep going,
(13:06):
and you don't have time to rest.
But the reality is we have torest.
Especially when we have burnout.
Alexandra Reid (13:16):
And we never give ourselves a chance to
recover.
We think, oh I I, took a nightoff and now I'm gonna work twice
as hard to make up for it.
So you think you're givingyourself a break, but you're
still pushing yourself as hard,if not harder afterwards.
It's often when they, often sayyou, you get really sick on
(13:36):
vacation.
Because suddenly, all the time.
Yeah, exactly.
Here you are finally taking thatwell deserved break and your
body goes, oh, it's about time.
And it just collapses uponitself.
Dr Nat Green (13:48):
Definitely.
So you talked about when youwere deep in that period and
then looking back, you thought,oh yeah, now I know it was
burnout.
So there was sleeplessness thatbeing on all the time.
What other symptoms did younotice with your burnout?
Definitely
Alexandra Reid (14:05):
like it affected my moods.
I would say I always joke aboutusing my mom voice, which I
realize is a really screechy,not pleasant voice to use.
I had a short fuse right with myfamily.
I just seem to be on edge allthe time.
(14:26):
Like I just, and again, I it wasvery hard and this is something
I'm learning for myself.
I'm doing a lot more meditationand mindfulness for myself.
Is.
I wasn't present in any of mymoments.
I was always thinking about thenext task that I should be
doing.
And they, a lot of neurosciencesshowed we can't truly multitask,
(14:47):
we just quickly switch betweentasks.
And studies have shown that welose up to almost, I believe,
40% of our productivity due tothis, what we think is being
productive, multitasking, butwe're not, and again, that adds
up after a while, that sense of,the other part of burnout, which
(15:07):
I didn't expect, is I knew I wasdoing something important.
But it started to not feel thatway.
Like it was almost like I wasbecoming numb.
And disengaged.
So it was, yeah almost became anobserver of.
Anybody could do this.
(15:28):
Why am I here?
Is it's, I lost a bit of thatsense of purpose, even though I
knew intellectually on paperwhat we were doing was truly
important, but it stoppedfeeling.
Meaningful to me.
And I think it was just my bodyagain, protecting itself and
shutting down emotions.
(15:48):
And certainly what I've readabout burnout, there is a very
strong disengagement aspect toit as well.
And almost disenchantment fromwhat you truly loved before and
then suddenly it, it's not.
What you love to do and, youdon't know why, because it was
something you loved to do beforethat.
Dr Nat Green (16:08):
Definitely.
And I know one of the thingsthat I talk about a lot on here
and in the work that I do withmy clients is really about those
three brains, the head, theheart, and the gut, and.
When we go through trauma orexperience significant burnout,
one of those at least, butusually two will disconnect.
(16:28):
So the head brain keeps goingand we overthink and we
overanalyze, and the heart brainthat feels, we disconnect that
from everything else and we goemotional numbing and we go down
that route and, that.
Gut stuff is the purpose and themeaning, so it makes sense why
(16:50):
when we are really in the midstof that, that they're no longer
integrated because it's a safetymechanism.
Yeah, and I really loved whatyou were saying as well about
how you got into the art and theart therapy because obviously
with all your neuroscience workthat was a beautiful way.
(17:14):
To incorporate the analyticalbrain, but also the creative
brain.
So that was amazing.
So tell us a bit more when youwent down the neuroscience path,
what that looked like for youand how you brought them all
together in the work you do now.
Alexandra Reid (17:30):
Yeah.
And it's still, I'm stilllearning there's still new
studies coming out all the time,but one of the biggest things is
when you're in, an anxiousstate, like that fight or flight
or flop state, they, yes.
It's, you can't be creative,right?
It's just like that part of yourbrain is shut off.
(17:51):
But even if you can.
Almost force a switch.
So maybe it's just, as I said,you just start doodling on a
piece of paper.
You just start one of the easyexercises I do is you draw to
your breathing, right?
You just actually, and thathelps you slow down it helps you
become present very and suddenlyyou're paying attention to your
(18:12):
breath, and your hand is doingsomething and that trips you
outta that anxious state.
And it puts you into more ofwhat they call the flow state,
which I'm sure you're familiarwith.
Yeah.
But it's almost like literallytwo parts of your brain.
And it's not as easy to say leftbrain, right brain, because they
are complimentary.
It's not exactly.
(18:34):
Yeah, it's not asstraightforward as switching
one, but it's definitely thepatterns of the brain that light
up are different at that point.
And you can definitely see thereis various different sectors
lighting up that way.
I can't remember all the namesoff the top of my head, but it's
if you see two images of doingone creative activity versus
(18:55):
another, and that could beanything creative.
It doesn't, I obviously I'mdrawn to the visual arts, but
it's true with music.
Music, yeah.
It's true.
Yeah, music is huge that way.
But even things as simple asgardening, just being out
cooking yeah.
Like it's, funny when you thinkof here, I think of cooking as a
(19:16):
chore for me, but there but if Itake out the, drudgery of making
the next meal and I just enjoycooking.
For cooking's sake, then it is acreative activity.
So it's again, what they alwaystalk about what fills your cup,
right?
So you, if you choose theactivities that fill your cup
(19:37):
That's what helps bring you backto yourself as well.
And starting small.
That's the other thing is thatlike I, I mentioned I felt
completely blocked to take on abig painting.
It was just like, oh, you knowthat beyond the blank canvas, it
was just the thought of.
The amount of work, like it justseemed like too much of a
(19:58):
mountain to climb, but.
I could go into the studio anddo a little bit of collage, I
could do a little bit of colorstudies, like just even playing
with color, like just literallymixing paints together was
soothing for me.
So I think you have to figureout what, what works for you.
But for me and certainly thewomen I've been working with,
(20:18):
just these little simpleexercises.
The nice thing with the arttherapy or art, I say art
therapy inspired exercises.
'cause we do a lot more forwardthinking rather than reflective
thinking as well with these.
Okay.
And that's what I find is thebig difference between therapy
and coaching is I find coachingvery forward.
(20:39):
Moving towards goals.
Yes.
Versus, yeah, therapy tends tobe more reflective, looking
backwards what got you to whereyou are today as opposed to what
you want to get to.
Yeah.
So with these exercises, theyare actually, they become
artifacts of what your mind wasdoing, what your emotional state
was at the moment you createdit.
(21:00):
We do another exercise whereit's basically you draw like a
gingerbread person very simple.
Yes.
And you do a body scan.
You draw the emotions or thetenseness you're feeling in the
body or where it feels light,you know where's where do you
feel grounded?
Where, does peacefulness live inyour body?
How do you, color code that youknow what color feels peaceful?
(21:23):
What shapes feel peaceful?
And you can do that on a dailybasis.
You could almost take youremotional temperature with a
body scan and.
That's a great thing to reflectback on a week later saying, oh
that was full of green, horriblespiky shapes and now you know,
like what, whatever is yourpersonal code for the stress or
(21:47):
the anxiety.
But it also realizes yourealize, oh, I've been keeping
it all in my shoulders and myneck and.
Maybe I should do somestretching.
Like it's another way ofbringing self-awareness to parts
that you may not be thinkingabout.
Yeah.
So yeah, we do all kinds
Dr Nat Green (22:02):
of little activities like that.
It's amazing.
I, I love a good body scan.
I use a body scan all the time,but I really like that idea of
that combination of thegingerbread man and doing that
to cross over and reallyreconnect with yourself and
what's going on.
And visually be able to put itoutside yourself as well.
(22:24):
So I really like that.
Excellent.
And it's very
Alexandra Reid (22:27):
simple, right?
Like it's, I love it and I oftentell my clients you don't need
an art studio.
Like I, I quite often what I'mdemonstrating on my videos, I'll
use my kids' arts schoolsupplies, like the Crayola
markers and crayons, right?
It's just whatever you have tohand something that I also tell
my clients, if you wanna go tothe art store and spoil yourself
(22:48):
I wouldn't discourage thateither be.
It's what you have to hand aswell is just fine.
It's just the act of creatingthat is, is the healing part.
Dr Nat Green (23:02):
Yeah.
So what do you think the turningpoint was for you to recognize
that burnout?
Start being able to go and drawagain and, engage in that and
shift from that merely survivingthrough to thriving.
Alexandra Reid (23:22):
It definitely took time.
I will, say that and it tookthose small steps of giving
myself permission to.
Take time out to do that and notfeel guilty or selfish that I
was taking the time for myselfand not quote, wasting time in
the studio.
'cause I wasn't producingsomething for, a gallery.
(23:46):
But it was, I had to make aconcerted effort of actually,
no, I'm gonna take this time andtalk to my family and say, look,
can you make dinner tonight?
Can you pick up can you drivethe kids and.
I had to work with my family tobuild that in.
So it, it is definitely that actof taking the first step.
(24:11):
But I realized I needed to do itright.
'cause it was not gonna besustainable.
I was gonna have to step awayfrom something and I didn't
wanna step away from the familyand I,
Dr Nat Green (24:20):
no, I
Alexandra Reid (24:21):
couldn't really afford to step away from work.
So I'm like, okay, I have tofigure out where this balance
is.
And.
And I'm, still learning thatbalance.
But it's.
It is just deciding at somepoint where this isn't
sustainable.
And honestly like the days whereyou just feel like you're not
(24:41):
gonna get outta bed, you'relike, okay, I gotta do something
right.
Like this.
This is not good for anybody.
So I don't know if there was ahard.
Turning point.
Except for the fact that I wasjust feeling less and less
myself and, my friend said thatto me too.
I guess maybe that was the otherthing is that I had friends
saying you're usually a lot moreupbeat than this, right?
Dr Nat Green (25:03):
Yeah, but getting that feedback as well from
others rather than just what youwere thinking.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So it sounds like there was somespecific things like permission,
giving yourself permission,speaking up.
Communicating what your needswere and also putting some
boundaries in place foryourself.
Alexandra Reid (25:26):
Boundaries is a big one that comes up again,
both for myself and a lot of myclients.
Definitely.
It's that feeling that I need,everyone relies on me.
I can't let them down, right?
And.
I think a lot of the women Iwork with are very professional,
very high performing gotstraight A's in school and went
(25:46):
on to get promoted and suddenlythey're at this position where
they're they, don't have thesupport beneath them.
They've climbed up so high, sofast that.
They haven't built those,external supports for
themselves.
And and realizing that they'renecessary one another activity
(26:09):
we do is, it's called thepersonal solar system.
And basically you draw yourselfin the center as the sun.
Dr Nat Green (26:17):
Yeah.
Alexandra Reid (26:18):
And you start mapping out who's in your orbit
who, is closest to you, who's inyour inner circle, and then you
start looking beyond and who'sfurther out and who would you
like to bring closer and who,who have you let drift.
Realizing that you let themdrift.
And then there's also the flipside of who would you like to
let drift a little further out?
(26:39):
Do you wanna
Dr Nat Green (26:40):
let go off to go into the solar system on their
own in the galaxy?
Yes,
Alexandra Reid (26:45):
exactly.
But again, it's that sense ofunderstanding.
Who's in your support networkand again, just paying attention
to who you could reach out to orwho you'd like to reach out to
more.
Dr Nat Green (26:57):
And I think one of the things as well that you've
hinted at there then as well, isthat the energy drainers, that
it's okay to put thoseboundaries in when we know that
the people we hang around impactour own energy.
And we impact their energy.
(27:17):
So when you are hanging aroundpeople who are also burnt out
negative, then it drags us downand we drag others down when
we're in that state.
So I think they're reallyimportant things to look at
Who's in your solar system andyour support network and
community.
What else do you think isimportant when you're looking at
(27:39):
recovering from burnout, likethe women that you work with?
Alexandra Reid (27:44):
Getting outside, honestly, that's much as I
promote being creative, I thinkalso I am I, learned about
forest bathing, which is aJapanese term.
I, have a beautiful forest pathbehind my house, and I try to
walk out there daily with my dogand, it's funny, like for a
(28:06):
while I could not do sittingmeditation.
I could not sit still.
I was so much in my head it wasnot helpful.
So I thought, oh, I
Dr Nat Green (28:14):
hear you.
I still can't sit still, butthat might be my A DHD
Alexandra Reid (28:19):
and getting outside with just and being in
I'm very fortunate where I live.
I can walk to the ocean, I can.
Walk in the forest.
So I, admit I'm very fortunatewhere I live, but I think even
just going to a park and justsitting on a bench surrounded by
trees and grass and just takinga few slow, deep breaths for
(28:41):
yourself.
That makes a huge difference.
Just getting we quote thesunshine, the vitamin D I know
it's tricky as we're starting tohead into shorter days here
where I'm, we've
Dr Nat Green (28:51):
got the opposite.
We've just, you've got theopposite.
Yeah.
You're lucky.
We've just Yeah.
Solstice and we're moving intothe nice, warm, warmer, longer
days.
Sorry.
Yeah, just rub in.
You've come out of it, you'vejust enjoyed it.
Alexandra Reid (29:05):
Oh, we are.
And honestly, we're having abeautiful fall right now.
Just that perfect blue crispnessand so I do know the rain will
be coming.
That's something that we get alot of here is rain.
Dr Nat Green (29:18):
Yeah.
Be prepared for the rain.
Yeah.
And we'll prepare for the warmthand the heat, right?
Alexandra Reid (29:25):
Yeah.
But yeah, that's something Iencourage.
The women I work with too istrying to do, two things is call
a friend and go for a walk.
So even if you're just doing,and I've actually started trying
to do that with calling myparents is I try to schedule a
call so I can go out and walkthe dog and be outside and have
(29:47):
that family connection.
Yeah.
And I find it's actually.
You get so into the conversationthat sometimes you realize, oh,
I've walked on autopilot.
So it, it's funny.
Or other times where yourealize, oh, this isn't a great
conversation, but at least I canlook at the trees and enjoy
being outside
Dr Nat Green (30:06):
and be present, like you said, and be present.
It's really important becausewhen you're deep in that burnout
or, trauma recovery.
You don't really enjoy thatpresent moment.
So that's such a powerful thing,isn't it, to really soak in
what's around you, andparticularly that grounding in
nature like you've just said.
I love that.
(30:28):
So if you were to look back at,when you were going through the
adversity and the stuff that hadgone on and your burnout, what
do you think some of the.
Key maybe qualities or personalattributes that you saw in
(30:50):
yourself and in your clients.
What are they for moving fromthat trauma into post-traumatic
growth or burnout into burnout,recovery?
Alexandra Reid (31:02):
It's, building self-confidence.
I think a lot of it comes downto, learning to build those
internal resources, theresiliency, they, often talk
about resiliency, about theability to bounce back, but I
think it's more than that.
I, do think it's that, it's likebuilding that, I often think of
(31:23):
it as like a coal.
Burning inside and you wanna fanthe coal and keep it going,
right?
Because that's the energy that'sgonna keep you going through the
day.
And I think a lot of people whodeal with trauma and burnout,
quite literally, that ember goesout.
Yes.
And exactly.
It takes, it does take some careand some nurturing, self
(31:46):
nurturing to get it back.
And I, think for a lot ofpeople, they don't.
I would advise'em not to rush itbecause there's that feeling of,
oh, I'm better now.
And then you tackle oneverything that put you in that
position in the first place.
Yeah.
So I think there's that abilityto realize once you've burned
(32:09):
out start trying to eitherchange what put you in that
position.
Or start noticing some of thewarning signs that you may have
overlooked or ignored blatantly.
That's the other thing is thatwhole feeling of, oh, I'll just
push through this.
And realize when you startcatching those old patterns that
(32:29):
landed you in that position andthat, we're not perfect.
It's an evolving thing, but Ithink it's building that
self-confidence, building thatself-awareness, and again,
giving yourself that permissionto take a break and not be
perfect, right?
That, that's, there's, I haven'teven touched on perfectionism,
but it's always there in
Dr Nat Green (32:51):
us high achievers that go down that path.
That's always there, isn't it?
Alexandra Reid (32:55):
Exactly.
So it that's the elephant in theroom that you know it like, I
have to be perfect.
I have to do this perfectly.
Or I can't let anyone else do it'cause they're not gonna do it
as perfectly as me.
So there's, yeah.
Dr Nat Green (33:07):
And I would imagine that in that stem space
that's even more evident.
Alexandra Reid (33:14):
Oh, it is.
It's that's where all the t'sand all the i's it's, that,
yeah.
Yeah, everything that's verydata driven, it's very
scrutinized and it's highpressure and high turnaround.
And yeah, it's just again, thatsense of I need to always be on
(33:36):
or I'll miss something.
And yeah, that definitely it,the job in itself creates that
sense of pressure.
But I do wonder sometimes if themen feel it as strongly as the
women.
'cause again, I talk to mostlyburned out women, so I would be
curious to know about that.
Dr Nat Green (33:54):
Yeah.
And do you think, because that'sthe world that you've worked in
for so long, do you think thatthere were men in that space who
also were burned out but justdidn't acknowledge it?
Alexandra Reid (34:07):
I'm sure because there's there's certainly a lot
of cultural conditioning.
We'll leave it at that, butYeah, for sure.
God forbid men show theiremotions.
Like that would be admittingweakness.
Absolutely.
Dr Nat Green (34:23):
Yeah.
There's so many layers aren'tthere, really to that?
Oh, yeah.
Years and years of things beingingrained and yeah.
So many systemic issues as well.
Alexandra Reid (34:36):
Yeah, so I, wouldn't be surprised, but
again, they wouldn't necessarilybe the ones that would show up
to tell me about it.
Dr Nat Green (34:45):
No, So being female in that very male
oriented industry, how was itfor you when you recognized
this?
Did you let them know what washappening?
Or did you hide it?
Alexandra Reid (35:03):
It's interesting, a couple of jobs
ago, I actually had a, malemanager and he was saying some
not quite appropriate remarks.
And this, was before the Me Toomovement.
Yeah.
And I remember discussing it, sohe was my.
Direct manager and I actuallytalked about it to our director
(35:27):
who happened to be a woman.
And this was really interestingas she said, oh, are you sure
he's not just boys being boys.
And I was like, I.
How could you say that?
Like it was just, I was justtotally I, came to you
vulnerable, I expressed myconcerns and you've dismissed it
and it, really set me backbecause here I was coming to a
(35:49):
woman in authority Yeah.
Who I trusted and have it bedismissed.
And sure enough, down the road,he was actually let go from his
position long after I'd moved onfor those very same.
Issues, but somebody else waswilling to listen to it.
So yeah, it's it, that was alesson that was a very negative
(36:12):
lesson to learn.
But it was something that I'msure I wasn't the only one to
experience something like that.
Dr Nat Green (36:20):
Yeah.
And as you were saying thatthank you so much for sharing
it.
It brought up this experiencefor me, very similar that I was
working well.
Consulting in an organization,but treated very much like an
employee and part of the family.
And it was great in many ways,but I was experiencing some
(36:42):
really inappropriate emails fromone of the guys and really with
that bullying tone and it wasn'tvery pleasant at all.
And I went to the manager,similar things.
She was female and I was told, Ithink you're being a bit
fragile.
(37:03):
I was like, gobsmacked.
I'm like, what?
And I had evidence and all ofthis and I just, oh, and I had
very similar negativeexperience.
In the end, I made a choice towalk away'cause that was what I
needed to do for my health andsanity.
'cause I was exhausted burnoutand, experiencing vicarious
trauma myself.
(37:23):
But again, isn't that so liketotally different industries?
Yeah.
But still happens.
And I'm not talking that longago, nor am I Exactly.
We're not talking 20 years agowhen this stuff wasn't talked
about.
And it's challenging, but Iguess it's as, you said, you.
(37:48):
Did something about it foryourself.
You spoke up and then you madeyour own decision.
I did the same.
I spoke up, couldn't do it, so Iwalked away.
And sometimes that's aboutputting those boundaries in
place, self preservation, andgiving ourselves permission,
comes
Alexandra Reid (38:05):
back to permission.
Yes, exactly.
Dr Nat Green (38:07):
The things that you have really beautifully
articulated are so important.
Yeah.
So what other things.
Do you work with the, ladiesthat you work with that you feel
are important in their recoveryjourney?
Do you have any other littlegentle exercises or tools you'd
(38:28):
love to share?
'cause you've already sharedsome amazing ones.
Alexandra Reid (38:34):
And there's another when we talk about
drawing as a coaching forwardthinking tool there's another
exercise, which was interesting.
'cause what we do is Idemonstrate on a video for them
what to do.
There's a list of questions andthen I meet with them afterwards
and we discuss it.
(38:55):
It's interesting.
A lot of them have said it's thediscussion afterwards where they
come back and look at they havea lot of thoughts and feelings
come up while they're doing theexercise.
Yeah.
But it's the reflectingafterwards of seeing what
subconsciously they put intotheir pictures.
So the exercise was it was abridge drawing exercise.
And basically you have things onone side of the shore you'd like
(39:20):
to walk away from, that you'd toleave behind that you're
struggling with.
Yeah.
On the other side of the shore,whatever that may look like, is
the things you want to movetowards, the things you're
aspiring to that bring you joy,that light you up, that bring
you peace and calm, and you drawa bridge between the two areas,
and it can be any type ofbridge.
(39:42):
And there can be any type ofobstacles and.
So I've met with a number ofwomen and seen everything from
the Golden Gate Bridge to Yeah.
Rickety rope bridges to stonebridges with trolls like,
Dr Nat Green (39:57):
yeah.
It's
Alexandra Reid (39:58):
really interesting to see what people
come up with would be.
And, but I had one woman say tome, she looked at her bridge and
she'd drawn a rickety plankbridge.
And each of these planks wereobstacles and they were spaced
far apart.
She was worried she was gonnafall between them and she'd
drawn these big waves of waterunderneath.
(40:19):
And it looked very dangerousunderneath.
And she's I just realized I drewall these waves and I can't
swim.
Why am I, it was just, and itwas totally unprompted.
It was just really, I laughed'cause she laughed and she's
like, why did I draw this formyself?
And it's just those littlemoments where you get.
(40:43):
Into the, art of creating andsuddenly thoughts and, feelings
just end up on the page.
And it's not till you take thatsober second look of go,
Dr Nat Green (40:52):
oh,
Alexandra Reid (40:53):
what does this mean?
And a lot of it's up tointerpretation, but I just, we
both cracked up after that'causeit was quite pretty funny.
But it's so powerful, isn't it?
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah.
It, really was for both of us.
And that was just talkingthrough her drawing, right?
And what did this mean to youand what did that mean to you
and Yeah, so it was just that,again, self-awareness.
(41:15):
Building that self-awarenessbecause.
If you're not aware of yourissues, it's really hard to
figure out how you wanna changethem or fix them.
Absolutely.
Dr Nat Green (41:24):
Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
And it sounds like it's abeautiful way to bring that
unconscious and subconsciousstuff to the surface, which we
often, eh, we might really knowwhat's going on, but we've
pushed it down so much and itcan bring it up to the surface
and, make us face it.
Definitely as painful as it canbe,
Alexandra Reid (41:45):
but yeah.
Yeah.
A lot of that is, it's, yeah, soI, really like.
Discussing the work afterwardsbecause there's, learnings that
come out of that.
There's, basically three stagesof learnings.
There's kind of the thinkingabout what I wanna draw.
There's the act of drawing, andthen there's the reflecting upon
the drawing afterwards and whatdoes it mean.
(42:06):
So there's a lot of takeawaysand the nice thing is, then you
can go back to it months later.
You'll know exactly how you feltat that moment.
You were drawing it, which isquite neat.
It's like a I was, I joke, it'sa Kodiak moment, right?
Yes.
It's a snapshot of what you werefeeling at that moment.
Dr Nat Green (42:27):
Yeah.
Beautiful.
I love that so much.
Lexi, as we move to wrappingthis conversation up, where can
our listeners find out moreabout you and find you online?
I'm
Alexandra Reid (42:40):
quite active on LinkedIn because again, my
audience is professional womenand it's, I really enjoy posting
on LinkedIn and connecting.
In fact, I've found somewonderful women.
We've just connected throughLinkedIn and world's away.
It's exactly industries away.
So that's, I'm quite activethere.
And also on my, websitemindartwellness.com.
(43:06):
There's a free challenge.
It's like a five day emailchallenge where if you sign up,
you get basically a dailycreative prompt and a little
video of me demonstrating it.
So it's called the, five dayReset challenge creative Reset
Challenge.
So yeah that's, a great.
Taster of what the coachingfeels like.
(43:28):
And then I have a newsletter aswell, and I send out a weekly
newsletter with again, links tocreative exercises that I write
about and blogs and so on.
So there, there's a lot ofresources on my website.
So I definitely would encouragepeople to look for me there.
Dr Nat Green (43:44):
Fantastic.
And I'll put that in our shownotes for sure.
So the five day Creative Resetchallenge on your.
Mind art wellness.com website.
So I would highly encourage, Iknow I'll be checking it out and
yeah, and signing up for thenewsletter as well so I can stay
connected to you and I know thatour listeners will definitely be
(44:06):
very interested in that.
Alexandra Reid (44:08):
Yeah, and I hope they connect with me on LinkedIn
and all of those same links arethere as well in my profile.
And you can read more about meand, see what I've been up to as
well.
Dr Nat Green (44:17):
Excellent.
I'll put all that in the shownotes for our listeners to check
out.
And I always like to wrap up theconversation with a question.
What do you think your youngestself would think of where you
are and what you've achievednow?
Alexandra Reid (44:36):
Oh she's gonna wonder why I didn't go into fine
art, because she was convincedshe was gonna be an artist when
she was younger.
But I'd like her to see the factthat art and science can live
together and produce it's one ofthose they joke about hybrid
vigor, when take two differentthings, and you combine them and
(45:00):
the result is more than the sumof the parts.
And so I'd like her to goyou're, an artist in a different
way now.
And have her be happy with that.
Dr Nat Green (45:11):
I love that so much.
And really you've come fullcircle.
The fine arts is what you wantedand you went into, as you said
to please your parents and pickthat path.
But you've come full circle andyou've beautifully combined
both.
I love that.
That's amazing.
Thank you so much for coming ontoday and sharing your story and
(45:32):
your beautiful, resources andyour wisdom.
It's been very powerful and Iknow that our listeners are
gonna love listening to thisepisode.
Oh, thank you.
I'm glad we finally got toconnect.
after life stopped getting inour way.
Exactly.
Thank you so much, Lexi.
Bye for now.
(45:53):
Bye Thank you for joining me inthis episode of Growing Tall
Poppies.
It is my deepest hope thattoday's episode may have
inspired and empowered you tostep fully into your
post-traumatic growth, so thatyou can have absolute clarity
(46:15):
around who you are, what mattersthe most to you, and to assist
you to release your negativeemotions.
And regulate your nervous systemso you can fully thrive.
New episodes are published everyTuesday, and I hope you'll
continue to join us as weexplore both the strategies and
(46:36):
the personal qualities requiredto fully live a life of
post-traumatic growth and tothrive.
So if it feels aligned to youand really resonates, then I
invite you to hit subscribe andit would mean the world to us.
If you could share this episodewith others who you feel may
benefit too, you may also findme on Instagram at Growing Tall
(47:01):
Poppies and Facebook, Dr.
Natalie Green.
Remember, every moment is anopportunity to look for the
lessons and to learn andincrease your ability to live
the life you desire and deserve.
So for now, stay connected.
Stay inspired.
(47:22):
Stand tall like the tall poppyyou are, and keep shining your
light brightly in the world.
Bye for.
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