In this powerful throwback episode originally recorded in October 2024, Resilience Gone Wild host Jessica Morgenthal sits down one-on-one with Dr. Phil Richmond, a veterinarian and passionate mental health advocate. In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, this re-release sheds light on the often-overlooked mental health crisis within the veterinary profession—and the strength it takes to ask for help.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:03):
Welcome to Resilience Gone Wild.
I'm here with my amazing producer Kai, and
we are just just getting super excited about
the conversation that we just had with doctor
Phil Richmond,
and we can't wait for you to hear
it. That's putting it lightly. I think the
conversation you guys had was so incredible, so
insightful.
So many things, like, hit home with me,
(00:25):
and I know we'll hit home with so
many listeners out there. You know, doctor Phil's
journey through substance abuse, his suicidal ideation, the
work he does in in the in the
vet community on helping get,
tools as he put it to veterinarians because
it's not
this wonderful,
you know, sunshine and rainbows gig that I
think a lot of us think it is.
It it's very difficult. It's long hours, and
(00:47):
you're dealing with, you know, highly highly emotional,
moments. So it's it was just fascinating to
hear his story, his perspective, and and really
this idea of, like, how we can relate
to even canines. You know, we you the
episode prior was was all about gators. Right?
But his ideas about what he sees in
the in the clinic when it comes to
(01:07):
dogs and how they control their breathing. Was
that the coolest thing? Like, to be able
to watch the way their
hearts and their breathing connect Yeah. In real
time Right.
With a technology that's
giving that example
Right. That he can teach new veterinarians
to, like, manage their own stress through watching
how a dog manages theirs. And, again, and
(01:29):
it's this it's this great, beautiful metaphor that
we're all about, right, that the intense power
of thought
can truly control our bodies, and it's something
we can learn
from from nature and the animal kingdom. So,
you know, I think let's let's get to
the interview. Sound good? Awesome. Thanks. Alright. So
welcome, Phil Richmond.
Phil is an award winning
joyful veterinarian
(01:50):
who founded Flourishing
Phoenix Veterinary Consultants,
where he and the organization advocate for positive
culture and individual team and organizational
psychological
health, safety, and well-being
in veterinary workplaces.
He was awarded the
FVMA
Gold Star for service in 2019,
(02:11):
the FVMA
veterinarian
of the year in 2021,
and received the Uncharted Veterinary Communities
Founders Award
in 2023.
So welcome to the podcast, Phil. Welcome to
Resilience Gone Wild, and I'm so excited to
be here with you and reconnect.
Phil and I met while we were studying
(02:31):
positive psychology together
a few years ago, and he's one of
the most inspiring,
passionate,
purposeful,
and generous people I know. Thank you so
much for joining us and sharing your insights
and your wisdom and your love of people
and nature and its resilience.
So Phil, tell us about yourself.
(02:53):
Thank you, Jessica. And it's so exciting to
be here with you and, like, the journey
knowing,
you know, from the time that we met
and we connected and we were in class
together and then seeing the journey that you've
been on and and creating all this, it's
just it's wonderful. I do get the goosebumps
Oh, thank you. Already doing that. So,
but, yes. I mean, it's just you know,
(03:14):
it's it's always interesting. It's like, well, why
in the heck is a veterinarian,
you know, or why do any of us
do well-being?
And, you know, what really happened to me
and just, you know, quick as quick and
impactful and succinct as I can make this,
and I am gonna talk about suicide, suicidal
ideation, and, you know, alcohol and substance use
disorder,
(03:35):
is that that's really what my journey was.
It's about a year and a half into
practice.
You know, I had one tool in the
toolbox. I didn't have I didn't have skills
of resiliency.
You know, I had alcohol and substances to
try to change and throttle the way that
I felt and and address, you know, anxiety
and the and the,
you know, that hamster wheel thought process
(03:56):
that I had. You were numb instead of
solving. Right. Exactly. Yeah.
And so it got to a point about
a year and a half into practice where,
you know, the perfectionism,
the burnout, you know,
the workaholism,
you know, to work you know, being a
workaholic,
came to a point where I
got home from my, you know, from work.
I had my backpack on. I put my
(04:18):
backpack down. I sat down on my couch,
you know, and I'm a young veterinarian, and
I'm just like, I can't do this for
another twenty years.
And
I, you know, I had a plan for
ending my life. And, you know, I was
like, if a, b, or c happens, you
know, I'm I'm gonna,
you know, I had a plan. And thank
goodness what happened is that the people that
(04:40):
I worked with
recognized what was going on with me, got
me the help that I needed. And I
ended up going into a treatment center, which
as a young veterinarian, as a professional, is
scary,
potentially
shouldn't be, but, you know, shame and guilt
filled. Yeah.
And the journey ended up, and this is
why I love, you know, what you're doing
and talking about resiliency is one of the
(05:01):
most impactful things that I learned was I
got a toolbox, you know, of skills of
resiliency.
And that helped save my life, one,
and two, helped me really love veterinary medicine
again. And to go in and
find ways to be in this challenging environment
and see what part I was playing in
(05:21):
it, but then also what some of the
external,
you know, factors were and finding the balance
between those. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think
it's a very unknown,
sadly unknown fact that we all think our
veterinarians
are, like, these joyful, caring, like, easygoing,
just loving people who have this perfect life
of of getting to interact with their, you
(05:44):
know, with their purpose every minute of the
day. But
the mental health challenges for veterinarians are, you
know, the data shows it's staggeringly difficult. Yeah.
So,
you know, you're representing
that voice and making such an impact on
helping to break the stigma
and to bring the toolbox, you know, to
(06:05):
create opportunity
for people to get off that couch and
live again
is just is just such a gift to
everyone, so thank you. And thank you for
sharing your story. That was, you know, that
was vulnerable and I really we all appreciate
it.
Thank you. So to that end, you know,
we're talking about breathing and we're talking about
(06:25):
intentional breathing and
and what we can do to
to take care of our bodies
so that we can get through
the challenges that are gonna come every minute,
every day, you know,
to bumps in the road to all of
us and to how to manage,
you know, helping that through
(06:46):
through our bodies and how incredibly the animal
kingdom,
and I'm sure the plant kingdom
does these exercises as well, has these tools.
So, what comes up for you around that?
Yeah. So breathing, definitely one of the one
of the things that not just from you
know, what's what's always fascinating, let me say
this, is the the wisdom
(07:09):
of the ages
and then that gets backed up, you know,
as we have more tools and have we
have more knowledge, that gets backed up by
science and, you know, and evidence.
And
when we talked a little bit about it
before we before we started the, before we,
started going live, but
breathing,
such a fundamental way for us to throttle
(07:31):
down the stress response.
And so what's fascinating
is that when we hear about breathing, we
talk about, you know, the vagal nerve and
stimulating the parasympathetic
nervous system and all these, you know, these
bigger terms.
And
what is exciting is as a veterinarian
is the dogs,
you can you can see that reflected
(07:54):
on their EKG, on their electrocardiogram, the plop
plop plop plop plop.
You know, when when they're under anesthesia or
even if they're, you know, even if they're
not, but certainly when they're under anesthesia, we're
monitoring them for surgical procedures. When they take
a breath
and when they don't,
the speed of the heart changes. The speed
of the rhythm changes
(08:14):
because of
the
impact the breathing has on the sympathetic nervous
system and the parasympathetic nervous system. So
it's it's actually easier for me as a
veterinarian to be able to teach breathing at
well, maybe not easier, but I have a
tool in the toolbox
that every veterinary professional that monitors anesthesia,
(08:35):
that monitors canines, dogs under anesthesia,
I can go,
what's the what's that called? Respiratory sinus arrhythmia.
Why does it happen? Because they're, you know,
when they breathe in, sympathetic nervous system goes
out. When they breathe out, you know, the
vagals and
I'm like, we do the same thing.
What? And so we can tap into that.
Right. We do the same thing as the
(08:55):
whole thing. We do the same thing. Like
it's crazy.
Yeah. You know what I'm thinking? Like what's
coming to mind is just such a cool
picture of your teaching
breathing
and stress relief exercises around that
by having veteran, I don't know if you
did this or not, I'm just imagining like
having them breathe along
with the dog.
Like take the same calming breath as the
(09:16):
dog because you see how it slows your
heart, Like it's like so in your face
how effective it is. Like this isn't just
like hooey that's out there that some neurologist
or neuroscientist figured out. Like it's in front
of your face, it's right there, look at
it. Right.
And I mean, certainly, there's like the the
Oura ring and there's other, you know, there's
other ways to, you know, to monitor it.
(09:36):
And then, you know, I know that there's,
I mean, all kinds of of,
monitors and, you know, our
oh, jeez. Now the the term escapes me,
but when when we're when we're basically trying
to have our our average heart rhythm down,
what's the
what is the term the Too resilience teachers
don't can't come up with this term. It's
yeah. And I can I it's I can
(09:58):
picture the person to call who that I
know that does all this stuff? But anyway,
it happened to be bradycardia?
Bradycardia is at the slower heart rate, but
it's it's not the great great point, Kai,
but it's not the one that I'm thinking
of, which is there's a whole study
of essentially our goal
is is to is to get oh, it's
(10:18):
it's that we don't have huge jumps in
our heart rhythm. Like, we don't wanna have
huge spikes where where we have tachycardia,
you know, we versus, you know, bradycardia. We
wanna try to have, you know, more of
a a consistent heart rate through the day.
And what that means is that if we
can do that, it means that generally speaking,
we're not we're not having as many stressful
(10:39):
events and that kind of thing. Yeah. And
and to that end, the stress, thank you
Kai, you've set him off on a threshold.
Yes, on a broad rock.
Producer role,
check.
I'll chime in maybe five minutes.
But to that end, it's really, it's interesting
because it's so important
and just as a as a related topic,
(11:00):
like to manage your body so you don't
go through these high low stress Right. Reactions
like to just, you know, I mean, I
think of it in terms of like a
diabetic who's trying not to have these big
swings in their sugars. It's the same thing
in your heartbeat and and the way you
Yeah. Your muscle of your heart seems healthy
by not having these huge swings, except when
you're intentionally doing it with, you know, certain
(11:20):
exercises or whatever to get the exercise. But
you wanna go go run with that because
you probably teach something in this realm.
Well and so what so also using you
know, in the spirit of using animals Yeah.
You know, as as guides is there's a
whole
a whole area. And so, I I guess,
transparency. So I I do speak for this
(11:42):
group, but, but it's good group. It's called
Fear Free.
And but, essentially, just even not necessarily fear
free, but just canine behavior. Like, when when
pets come into the clinic,
domestic pets come into the clinic,
they have certain things that they do and
body language and things that we can see
that we know that their sympathetic nervous system
(12:04):
is getting
stimulated, and they're getting more anxious and more
fearful. Panting
or whatever. Panting, tail down, you know, eye
you know, seeing body language kinda crouching down,
you know, versus the ones where they're engaged,
you know, just like us. Like, you know,
both of them were leaning in and we're
talking or getting excited and but, you know,
versus kind of, you know,
(12:25):
coming back and being more introverted and isolated
and and, you know, looking for, you know,
for protection.
And so
we
also do those things and it's but it's
like it can be a little bit different,
you know, on an individual basis. So can
we and this goes along with it. Can
we be mindful and aware of
what are the what are the
(12:46):
physical manifestations
of that in my body
when I feel those stress responses, so then
I know, oh, this is this is happening
now. I can have some awareness of it
in the moment. And okay, oh, now what
what tools do I have in the toolbox?
Oh.
Yeah. And it's so I'm so happy you
brought that up because it's so directly about
what
(13:06):
I'm trying to offer here which is that
we are
so in line with using the metaphor of
these animal examples.
So like if
you feel like your body's out of control
and there's something going on, you know, picture
the dog
going from a stressed place to
a a non stressed place and what would
(13:26):
take
for that dog to get there. You know,
I wanted to throw something out at you,
which is I heard recently that I thought
was really cool and I'm like, oh, when
do I get to throw this into an
interview?
Yeah. It's just in terms of the reactions
that our bodies have that we can relate
to animals or we need to confront shame
and turning
(13:46):
red, like blushing.
Something only humans do. Only humans do. Right?
Like, and that's something that you've brought up
in terms of stigma and that subtly a
couple of times already. Like,
what are your thoughts on managing the stress
around that?
Yes. So the I think the thing that
was most powerful and and we I know
(14:08):
we learned this, you know, in our our
original CAP
class,
that was just something that really Okay. Wait.
Wait. CAP is
certificate in applied Certificate in applied positive psychology.
Sorry. Yes.
From the flourishing center. Mhmm. Great. I love
that I mean, just just a great course.
I mean, I have and I have no
just I I just love love the course.
(14:29):
And had I not done that course, I
wouldn't have gotten to Meet Jessica either because
we met in the in the,
consultant course, I think, later. Yeah. Yep. And
by the way, just as an aside, Amelia
is the guest on the first podcast interview.
Oh. Yeah. So I I like that. Yes.
Life is good.
But, so, as we're getting instruction,
you know, from from Amelia in the, you
(14:50):
know, in the videos,
one of the things that has always stuck
with me, you know, as one of those
moments, was that there is an 88
overlap
in what I I picture I use my
senses to bring in and find an idea
of what's going on versus what I imagine
in my head. Mhmm.
You know, essentially meaning, there's no dip. My
(15:13):
brain can't tell the difference whether it's actually
happening
or I'm imagining and it's happening. And just
the intense power of my thought
to create
a situation that my body responds to as
though
I'm getting chased by a tiger. Change your
story, change your life. Right? So %. Whatever
(15:34):
story is in your head. I've said
thousands of different ways over the years, over
the millennia, you know. I mean, you know,
the stoic philosophers, you know, have talked about
that for years. I mean, Shakespeare, you know,
talks about it, you know. Nothing is either
good or bad, but thinking makes it so,
you know. And that, you know, and to
to that that degree is just the how
(15:55):
much
our thoughts play a role in resilience. And
so I would say for me specifically, for
me personally, you know, we teach what we
what what impacts us most. That was one
of the first things that I taught was
challenging my thinking. Mhmm. You know, was was
learning how to how to ask myself, like,
is that true? You know, is that is
(16:16):
this valid?
And that that that has been very helpful
for me, you know, and and the people
that I've had the opportunity to work with
over the years. Yeah. Yeah. One of the
most important resiliency tools there is out there.
Yeah. To recognize that the story is
much of it made up
because we are a storytelling
brain and we fill in the gaps
(16:37):
to create a story because that's how we
remember things and that's how we think. So
to challenge whether all the pieces of that
story, how many of them are actually true?
Right. And how many of them are
creating a problem for you?
Right. And then Jessica, here's the thing. So
I mentioned I mentioned, so so I'm in
long term recovery, you know, as well. And
(16:58):
so some of the wisdom I got was
from twelve step recovery. And so what we
do is we go through, you know, basically,
you go through your entire life and you
look at all the resentments that you have
against people.
And
there was one common denominator in all of
those horrible resentments,
that it was me. Like, I was the
you know? And so what was bananas is
(17:19):
when I really saw that I could have
misinterpreted
one thing, and to your point, filled in
the blanks with something else. Mhmm. And then
I took action on that.
I took action towards another person. That person
then took action towards me, and it spiraled
downward
Yeah. Because of one misinterpretation
One assumption. I made. One assumption. Yeah. Right.
(17:42):
Yeah. My father used to have some very
colorful ways of describing assuming things, which I
won't
share share here. We all have pieces of
that. Right. Right. And those are the stories,
right? Like that's
the part we remember. Yeah. Who knows if
Yeah. How much of that was fully the
reality?
But that's what the story is in our
head, and that's what matters right now to
(18:03):
challenge it. Yeah.
Yep. And it's still and I'll say it's
a work in progress. I mean, I still
do it. I mean, it's just, you know,
that's the thing is I have tools, you
know, that can help me combat it, but
I I can get down the, you know,
down that rabbit hole, you know, as much
as anybody.
But the good news is today, I don't
I don't tend to stay there, you know,
nearly as long, you know, and and to
(18:25):
the to the level that I did where,
you know, that that,
you know, my heart rate was up all
the time because I was just like, oh,
this person, this, this, this, and then, you
know, and I'd drive you know, be driving
somewhere, and by the time I got there,
it was World War three in my head.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you made some many
really important points, and one of them that's
coming through for me is just the
(18:46):
the really vital recognition that we don't become
resilient a second, we don't pick up tools
and just have them, that it's a lifelong
process of growth
and
improvement
so that we can manage our lives in
a happier way and a more balanced way
and gaining little bits of tools along the
(19:06):
way and building them up into this toolbox
is great, but,
people who've gotten to a point where they've
confronted
such a low point that they've gone to
a formal sort of recovery
gives them permission,
you and others permission to say, you know
what, I'm on a long term recovery, this
(19:27):
is what life is and I need to
keep working on it. But the rest of
the world who isn't by, you know, owning
that change is necessary
to live life better
and growth is necessary.
The lesson here that's so important is we
all need to do this. You know, you've
taken on a formal mechanism
(19:48):
and I'm offering, you know, as are you,
you know, formal ish ways
to join
join us and
grow with us
with building these tools and that it's a
lifelong practice.
And best case,
we teach others.
You know, you've learned from us and then
you share it and the next person is
(20:09):
stronger and healthier and more balanced. Like, it's
a beautiful world And that's it. Right. It's
this this beautiful,
you know, force multiplier or, you know, the
the ripple positive ripple effect Yeah. You know,
that's talked about in positive psychology. Mhmm. And,
yeah. That's and it's actually that I just
got off a meeting with the FEMA, and
that's where we've got this whole well I'm
not just it made me think. Again, the
(20:31):
ADHD is, like, oh, like, that's literally
one of the big aspects of the program
is empowering
groups of well-being champions, like, people that that
have a desire to help the profe to
give them tools to do that, and then
they go out, you know, and be able
to they do this work themselves, but then
they go out and Mhmm. And, you know,
and try to help others. And to your
(20:52):
point is that that's that's the goal. I
mean, that's the vision of, was it twenty
twenty twenty five, you know, is that
what 5051%
would be flourishing or something that Oh, that's
right. Would you remember those numbers? I haven't
seen them in a while. Do you wanna
I don't. Explain what you just said because
it's actually really powerful. Oh, I probably shouldn't
even said it because I I could pay
it, but but there was a there was
(21:14):
a goal that so there's there's certainly different
ways of measuring there's there's a couple different
ways to measure flourishing, but
and the problem is is I don't remember
what the initial one was, but it was
that people that are truly flourishing, say, in
the PERMA model, which is positive emotion, engagement,
relationships, meaning and purpose,
achievement and accomplishment, and health,
(21:36):
or vitality, perma perma h or perma v
depending on but
the
that only and I'm arbitrarily throwing a number
out here that I think it was, like,
20%, you know, of of population like that.
Flourishing. Something like that. Yeah. And that Marty
Seligman, doctor Martin Seligman, the
father of modern positive psychology
(21:56):
or founder of modern positive psychology was
said the goal was fifth I think 51
or 50% by twenty twenty fifty.
You know, is that can we get these
tools out into everyone's hands, you know, to
create create a level of flourishing.
So yeah. Yeah. I have to say, I
I don't know if you've, we haven't talked
(22:17):
about this. I don't know if you've seen
recent arm work
by Michael Steger
that he threw out twenty five years in
to, no, fifty years in to positive psychology
and that's why I think the
date was set. It was like,
no, '95, it was thirty years in. Anyway,
it doesn't matter.
Caillou cut this, right? So
(22:39):
anyway. Maybe, I'm having a good time. I'm
also trying to find the Perma 50, is
it Perma 51? Is that the No, Perma
and Perma V. It's P E R M
A, which is the basic model that Marty
Sullivan came up with and Amelia added the
V and the version is either vitality or
health, and they're both out there.
And there's now,
(22:59):
there's even PERMA plus four now, which is,
which adds, I think, growth mindset, financial
Oh, okay. And something, some other Exactly.
One step in the market. Permutations like, yeah,
but but the core of it is the
perma. You know, nobody
Yeah. So,
the recent
work that I've been reading about is
(23:20):
it aligns very well with what my whole
purpose is which is that in these years
of positive psychology where we've been focusing on
individual happiness,
the end result
has been
such a self focus
as opposed to community focus and ripple focus
and
(23:41):
world focus that we are so
obsessed
with
me, me, me.
Like we had this me generation for a
little while but now it's gotten way worse
than just the me generation
and that we need to shift the work
we're doing to really focus on how our
behavior
impacts others.
Because
as you said, it's all cyclical, like it's
coming back, like you and the person that
(24:01):
you cyclical, like it's coming back like
you and the person that you hurt or
harmed or whatever
the right terminology is.
It spiraled,
right? Like it wasn't just one direction.
It comes back and it comes around and
around and around and it flows to everybody
else who's
in that
world. So we need to like pay attention
(24:21):
to if we can, if we feel ourself
for example in a small example, you know
with this high stress reaction
that we've got the story in our head,
we've got fear, we've got anger, we've got,
you know, negative emotion,
our heartbeat
is racing
or, you know, like an animal species from
some fear or whatever is going on.
(24:43):
And if we stop
and we we actually stop for a moment
and say, Okay, how is this affecting me
and what can I do about it? And
how is this affecting all the people around
me?
And is this good? Or how can I
fix this?
Yeah. Thoughts And and I'm
I'm reminded of a and I Kyle
(25:05):
fact check it, but it's something to the
effect and it's what I is that the
antidote to fear is grounded hope. You know?
Yes. The antidote to fear is hope. It
was Maya Angelou.
I think. Yeah. I just read it the
other day. Maybe I got it quoted wrong.
But yeah.
And and that's I mean, and that that's
really it. Is that and it's not not
to say that we don't
(25:26):
we don't always look at the bright side,
but that we honor that
it can be there, you know, is that
we're we're not,
you know, it's not toxic right. It's not
toxic positivity.
And that and it's funny because in in
vet med well, just in vet med because
we're human beings like everyone else. But, you
(25:46):
know, is that that gets thrown around, that
toxic positivity. And it's like, not all
positivity is toxic positivity, you know, is that
it's not, you know, is honoring that if
you're always, you know, shooting something down as
being toxic positivity,
you know, potentially,
we might wanna turn the lens in on
ourselves and say, why why is it that,
(26:08):
you know, and and we can let me
say this. We can wrap it in, well,
I'm I'm
pragmatic, and it's like, yes. And, but, you
you know, we can be,
what is it, a
realistic optimist. That's what I Yeah. That's what
that's that's what I like to describe myself.
I forget where I heard that first. Yeah.
I like that.
Yeah. A realistic optimist, you know, is not
(26:30):
not always looking at the bright side or
always, but it's like I always give it
that, hey, what what if, you know, what
if this too happens?
You know? I think I I think I
found found, the quote, if I could throw
it at you guys. Oh, thank you. Yes.
Alright. Sling it.
What is a fear of living? It's being
preeminently afraid of dying. It is not doing
(26:53):
what you came here to do out of
timidity and spinelessness.
The antidote is to take full responsibility for
yourself,
for the time you take up in the
space you occupy.
If you don't know what you're here to
do, then just do some good.
I like that. So it's just beautiful. Was
that Maya Angelou?
Yes. That was Maya Angelou. Yes. Okay. It
(27:13):
wasn't Yeah. The quote I mean, it was
the same realm, but somebody actually did say
the antidote. All right, well I fact checked
the Maya Angelou version.
So what, okay.
So that's awesome. But and that's the language
that's out there that we need, right? Like
we need to read
that fear is real
(27:33):
and that we shouldn't deny,
we should try to understand where it's coming
from
and then look for opportunity,
for hope instead of fear and stress, right?
Like so don't walk away from it. And
if I may, which
is not my skill at all, is I
wanna bring this wrap this into, like, what
we're talking about, you know, going back to
animals and this and that, is that that
(27:55):
is the beautiful difference
physiologically
or what the tool that we have is
that
fear does play a role. Fear can keep
us alive. Fear, you know, just like it
does with animals and why they have the
fear response.
But knowing that optimism
again, that
that skill of realistic optimism, depending on the
(28:16):
model you look at for resiliency, that is
a skill of resiliency,
you know, is to be able to honor
that something good might, you know, be able
to happen as well.
And that's the and that is that is
something that I can't, you know, I can't
teach my, you know, my canine and feline
patients, but I can, you know, I can,
(28:37):
you know, positive you know, give them positive
reinforcement and that type of thing. But it's
just I think that's that's really
a powerful
tool is the, you know, is what what
is one of the ways that we can
combat fear, you know, is hope hope and
optimism.
Yeah. The word intentionality is coming up for
me, which is a very positive psychology sort
(28:58):
of term,
and resiliency
term, but that's what's coming out is that
we as humans
can learn from
the
ancient wisdom of the animal kingdom
and then do it intentionally,
Like not wait for to evolve and adapt
to change around us, but to like stop
(29:20):
and dig out a tool and be intentional
about changing the thoughts, changing the behavior, changing
the breathing,
changing, you know, every aspect that we have
control over as humans that Yeah.
That canines
don't know that they have that control of.
Well, and I guess I didn't give them,
I didn't give canines
(29:42):
nearly enough credit. I don't know that cats
would, you know, there's always the joke about
cats. But, you know, that I come in
I come in from a day
that's, you know, and
these dogs go bananas.
With love. They're happy as with love. Right?
Pure love and that and that, what's beautiful
too is that we've shown now over over
(30:02):
the years the level of of
emotions that dogs
can can exhibit. And really, I mean, number
of of mammals as well. Yeah. And and
I will also say as birds, like, I
didn't like like, I was like, I've never
we're never having birds. There's just never in
January of twenty twenty two, we had none.
And then I I mean, I'll say we
have, jeez, I don't know, 27 birds now,
(30:24):
I think. No. In here. So they're not
all I mean, we have a well, we
have an aviary too, but we have we
went from no birds to we have two
conures, two kayaks,
military macaw, and a cockatoo, and an umbrella
cockatoo.
And I never I just didn't have in
fact, I think when we were in class
together, I don't know that I had them
then.
No. It was before 2022. That's amazing. But
(30:47):
but the level so even with the avians,
like, the level of
emotion, like, the level of connection
that they can I just didn't know that
that was I and I'm a I'm a
veterinarian? And I'm, like, embarrassed to say, like,
I spent, you know, forty something years of
my life
discounting
birds.
And we all do. To know the level
(31:09):
of connection that you could have. Yeah. I
mean, I read a lot of behaviorists
whose job it is, like, they've taken on
their role of exposing
the sentience
and emotion and the capacity
of a broad swath, not just primates and
not just mammals, of the animal kingdom that's
able to, and even the plant world, like
(31:32):
that reacts to energy,
right? Yes. And not just sun, but like
different types of energy.
So,
you know, I spend
a chunk of my time in the marine
life world and I've learned about
the the emotional connection and the individual personalities
of fish.
You know? Yeah.
(31:52):
Water based reptiles, turtles, like all of it,
like we have underestimated
and fought,
I could go into all kinds of
other directions on this given my other interests
in philosophy
and social justice and all that, but we
have shut off,
intentionally,
(32:12):
we've shut off
buying into
the equality
of
emotion and
sentience of
nonhumans.
And we're breaking that so that you went
through vet school probably when that wasn't bought
into.
And Yeah. And we've learned that in the
(32:33):
last, like, you know, just couple of decades.
There's been so much information about,
why it matters that we're all in this
world together
and that we all have emotion and nervous
systems on all the same organs, you know.
We
are heading towards the end of this conversation,
and I wanna offer you, Phil, like,
(32:53):
tell us what you want us to know.
What do the listeners need to hear?
So I think, you know, as far as
one thing, is to your point in the
beginning is as far as veterinarians
and, you know, what we may if we're
not in the profession, what we may see
you know, I think there's two
two schools of thought that's important to just
(33:13):
be aware of. Is one is there's the
the James Harriet,
you know, version of of veterinary medicine,
which is
quite honestly still a very big powerful driver,
you know, values and that type of thing
for us.
And then
combining that with
the realism
of today's level of veterinary medicine, which is
(33:34):
that there are things that we have the
ability to do in veterinary medicine that are
on par with human medicine. But people's value
systems are very, you know, are very different.
And some people,
which I'm not I'm not saying it's right
or wrong, but some people would say, well,
I would just never spend that, you know,
type of, you know, money on an animal
where some people are it doesn't you know,
(33:55):
I will I will go in those It's
family. You know. It's family. Right. And all
of and it's challenging as veterinarians because all
of those are valid, but we we have
to navigate that,
in a way. And that realizing that we
do go through a lot and that no
there isn't a I I will say this
as a as a bold state. There isn't
(34:16):
a veterinarian
in in The US or on this planet
that got into this because we wanted to
make a ton of financial resources. Like, that's
not we didn't go to sleep twice for
up to twelve years. Right. I mean, we
did it we all did it because we
wanted to help animals and, you know, in
in one way or another. And so
just saying that, like, the I I have
(34:37):
a well, we probably won't be able to
see it, but I have a sign from,
you know, it's,
in my office, it says, be curious, not
judgmental,
you know, from Walt Whitman, but also made
popular from the wonderful TV show Ted Lasso.
I love it. It's just, you know, is
is learn being being open that that person
that's, you know, in in the exam room
with you
wants wants to help you and your your
(35:00):
pet. And, you know, as much as your
you love your pet, they they really wanna
help them. And so, you know, just cognitive
empathy, like, being able to put and and
this goes for this is the same thing
that I teach on the other side to,
you know, to our our veterinary professionals is,
you know, understanding,
you know, what what our pet owners are
going through too.
And and then just being, you know, how
(35:21):
can we be of service to them? We're
we're, you know, unfortunately, we have one of
the highest,
risks of suicide in any any profession.
And so, yeah, just
as we would with anybody else, just a
little bit of grace,
you know, a little bit of empathy and,
you know, in that as we move forward.
And it really gets thank you for offering
(35:42):
that, and,
I've had such positive experiences with the veterinarians
I have,
I've worked with over the years with my
own
pup and with this turtle hospital that I
spend a lot of my time in, and
the
respect
and consideration
(36:03):
for
this ripple of energy
is just all we're asking for, right? Like
if you just, it's so hard when you're
dealing with
a sick family member or
the choice and the difficult choice to spend
the money or not spend the money or
do the,
those are decisions that are really hard,
(36:25):
do I do the work, but to just
bring it into a sense of community that
the people in the room are on your
side
and
you all move together in this decision,
that we all wanna help each other and
to recognize that we're all in things in
the world together and these aren't
(36:46):
you're not alone. It's like when you were
sitting on the couch and you felt alone
and then you weren't alone
because you were with your community who was
helping you. Like, it's always the case.
There's always other people in the game and
just accept them and bring them into your
circle and,
in positive energy and it changes everything. Yeah.
(37:07):
Yeah. Awesome. So tell us a couple of
things you're working on that you wanna share
that whoever's listening can if whether they're vets
or they're not vets. I don't know if
they're so yes. Yes. So, I mean, a
few things. So one, I'm very excited. So
we were releasing,
in in just a month or so,
we were talking about PERMA, the PERMA tool
for veterinary workplaces.
(37:29):
So it's a it's a comprehensive assessment,
on individual team and organizational level, well-being, psychological
health and safety,
psychological safety and positive leadership in, in veterinary
workplaces, and then giving,
giving leaders and individuals the tools, you know,
to improve those things in in veterinary workplaces.
So super, super excited about that. Actually partnering
(37:51):
with,
Michelle McQuade, Marnie Suptra, and the Well-being Lab
and the Good Foundry to to put that
out. Really excited. Well, she's really open because
they're in Australia, so you've got, like, a
global reach.
Like, this isn't just America. This is yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. And then we just I was
really grateful. I was a co author,
very recently on a,
(38:12):
a big project from a group called Veterinary
Visionaries. So it has all the you know,
most of the schools and most of, most
of the veterinary organizations in The US,
are all part of this, but we put
out, as one of one of three co
authors and,
four co authors on a paper,
for,
psychological health and safety guidelines for for veterinary
(38:33):
hospitals. So, you know, things that can do
that. And then the FVMA, Florida Veterinary Medical
Association, we have our well-being program.
We partnered with Blue Buffalo, which is amazing.
And then there we've got veterinary informed mental
health professionals
to help for the mental health aspect.
Actually, you'll appreciate this as the red kind
of red cape, green cape Mhmm. Thought exercise.
(38:55):
So we're we're
hoping to give another option to address mental
health issues in the profession,
and then we're training a a cadre of,
really involved,
well-being,
veterinarians and veterinary professionals that have an interest
in well-being,
giving them those tools to then go out
and create that positive ripple effect That's fantastic.
With their impact projects,
(39:17):
as well as a a number of other
things kind of ancillary to that that we're
doing, but those are kind of the two
big,
big things. And, you know, we've just there's
a big group of people working on this,
and it's just beautiful to see the energy.
So thank you. You.
Thank you for sharing that and I'm so
excited for all of your, these amazing paths
that you're generously
putting forth for
(39:38):
making the world better,
and it reminds me of, you know, how
important it is
to take all of this learning and start
it earlier.
So, you know, you've moved down to the
vet school level where you're bringing
this into
who you are that you become as a
vet, not
just that you have to learn how to
(39:59):
do it after you're already suffering. But, like,
you know, to start out by saying these
are some of the challenges and
Right. This is how this is fill your
toolbox now because you're gonna need it. And
then even I would think to bring it
down to, you know,
preschool, children's level, where you're, you know, you're
having these relationships at that level with both
animals and animal professionals.
(40:19):
Thank you, Phil. You have made my day
and my week and my life better, and,
thank you for making so many people's lives
better.
Aw. It's you're you're a really special person,
and I'm just so privileged to have you
in my life. So and now you're in
all these other people's lives, so thank you
for coming. And it's just and it's beautiful
thinking of how we came together and being
(40:40):
be being able to come back together after
this time and seeing how you've impacted the
world and and getting to meet Kai. And
so thank you so much. So and more
to come. You know what? Yeah. We'd love
to have you back. Yeah. So next time
Yeah. We'll we'll go even deeper on some
of these cool things.
Awesome. Sounds good. Awesome. See you soon.
(41:06):
This has been a production of BLI Studios
produced by me, Kai. Follow along with our
other BLI produced shows at balancinglife'sissues.com/podcast-BLI.
Got an idea for the show? Email me,
Kai, at balancing life's issues dot com. And
don't forget to stay in touch with your
host, Jessica, at jessica@winwinwinmindset.com.
(41:26):
Anything else to add, Miles?
Welcome to Resilience Gone Wild.
I'm here with my amazing producer Kai, and
we are just just getting super excited about
the conversation that we just had with doctor
Phil Richmond,
and we can't wait for you to hear
it. That's putting it lightly. I think the
conversation you guys had was so incredible, so
insightful.
So many things, like, hit home with me,
(00:25):
and I know we'll hit home with so
many listeners out there. You know, doctor Phil's
journey through substance abuse, his suicidal ideation, the
work he does in in the in the
vet community on helping get,
tools as he put it to veterinarians because
it's not
this wonderful,
you know, sunshine and rainbows gig that I
think a lot of us think it is.
It it's very difficult. It's long hours, and
(00:47):
you're dealing with, you know, highly highly emotional,
moments. So it's it was just fascinating to
hear his story, his perspective, and and really
this idea of, like, how we can relate
to even canines. You know, we you the
episode prior was was all about gators. Right?
But his ideas about what he sees in
the in the clinic when it comes to
(01:07):
dogs and how they control their breathing. Was
that the coolest thing? Like, to be able
to watch the way their
hearts and their breathing connect Yeah. In real
time Right.
With a technology that's
giving that example
Right. That he can teach new veterinarians
to, like, manage their own stress through watching
how a dog manages theirs. And, again, and
(01:29):
it's this it's this great, beautiful metaphor that
we're all about, right, that the intense power
of thought
can truly control our bodies, and it's something
we can learn
from from nature and the animal kingdom. So,
you know, I think let's let's get to
the interview. Sound good? Awesome. Thanks. Alright. So
welcome, Phil Richmond.
Phil is an award winning
joyful veterinarian
(01:50):
who founded Flourishing
Phoenix Veterinary Consultants,
where he and the organization advocate for positive
culture and individual team and organizational
psychological
health, safety, and well-being
in veterinary workplaces.
He was awarded the
FVMA
Gold Star for service in 2019,
(02:11):
the FVMA
veterinarian
of the year in 2021,
and received the Uncharted Veterinary Communities
Founders Award
in 2023.
So welcome to the podcast, Phil. Welcome to
Resilience Gone Wild, and I'm so excited to
be here with you and reconnect.
Phil and I met while we were studying
(02:31):
positive psychology together
a few years ago, and he's one of
the most inspiring,
passionate,
purposeful,
and generous people I know. Thank you so
much for joining us and sharing your insights
and your wisdom and your love of people
and nature and its resilience.
So Phil, tell us about yourself.
(02:53):
Thank you, Jessica. And it's so exciting to
be here with you and, like, the journey
knowing,
you know, from the time that we met
and we connected and we were in class
together and then seeing the journey that you've
been on and and creating all this, it's
just it's wonderful. I do get the goosebumps
Oh, thank you. Already doing that. So,
but, yes. I mean, it's just you know,
(03:14):
it's it's always interesting. It's like, well, why
in the heck is a veterinarian,
you know, or why do any of us
do well-being?
And, you know, what really happened to me
and just, you know, quick as quick and
impactful and succinct as I can make this,
and I am gonna talk about suicide, suicidal
ideation, and, you know, alcohol and substance use
disorder,
(03:35):
is that that's really what my journey was.
It's about a year and a half into
practice.
You know, I had one tool in the
toolbox. I didn't have I didn't have skills
of resiliency.
You know, I had alcohol and substances to
try to change and throttle the way that
I felt and and address, you know, anxiety
and the and the,
you know, that hamster wheel thought process
(03:56):
that I had. You were numb instead of
solving. Right. Exactly. Yeah.
And so it got to a point about
a year and a half into practice where,
you know, the perfectionism,
the burnout, you know,
the workaholism,
you know, to work you know, being a
workaholic,
came to a point where I
got home from my, you know, from work.
I had my backpack on. I put my
(04:18):
backpack down. I sat down on my couch,
you know, and I'm a young veterinarian, and
I'm just like, I can't do this for
another twenty years.
And
I, you know, I had a plan for
ending my life. And, you know, I was
like, if a, b, or c happens, you
know, I'm I'm gonna,
you know, I had a plan. And thank
goodness what happened is that the people that
(04:40):
I worked with
recognized what was going on with me, got
me the help that I needed. And I
ended up going into a treatment center, which
as a young veterinarian, as a professional, is
scary,
potentially
shouldn't be, but, you know, shame and guilt
filled. Yeah.
And the journey ended up, and this is
why I love, you know, what you're doing
and talking about resiliency is one of the
(05:01):
most impactful things that I learned was I
got a toolbox, you know, of skills of
resiliency.
And that helped save my life, one,
and two, helped me really love veterinary medicine
again. And to go in and
find ways to be in this challenging environment
and see what part I was playing in
(05:21):
it, but then also what some of the
external,
you know, factors were and finding the balance
between those. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think
it's a very unknown,
sadly unknown fact that we all think our
veterinarians
are, like, these joyful, caring, like, easygoing,
just loving people who have this perfect life
of of getting to interact with their, you
(05:44):
know, with their purpose every minute of the
day. But
the mental health challenges for veterinarians are, you
know, the data shows it's staggeringly difficult. Yeah.
So,
you know, you're representing
that voice and making such an impact on
helping to break the stigma
and to bring the toolbox, you know, to
(06:05):
create opportunity
for people to get off that couch and
live again
is just is just such a gift to
everyone, so thank you. And thank you for
sharing your story. That was, you know, that
was vulnerable and I really we all appreciate
it.
Thank you. So to that end, you know,
we're talking about breathing and we're talking about
(06:25):
intentional breathing and
and what we can do to
to take care of our bodies
so that we can get through
the challenges that are gonna come every minute,
every day, you know,
to bumps in the road to all of
us and to how to manage,
you know, helping that through
(06:46):
through our bodies and how incredibly the animal
kingdom,
and I'm sure the plant kingdom
does these exercises as well, has these tools.
So, what comes up for you around that?
Yeah. So breathing, definitely one of the one
of the things that not just from you
know, what's what's always fascinating, let me say
this, is the the wisdom
(07:09):
of the ages
and then that gets backed up, you know,
as we have more tools and have we
have more knowledge, that gets backed up by
science and, you know, and evidence.
And
when we talked a little bit about it
before we before we started the, before we,
started going live, but
breathing,
such a fundamental way for us to throttle
(07:31):
down the stress response.
And so what's fascinating
is that when we hear about breathing, we
talk about, you know, the vagal nerve and
stimulating the parasympathetic
nervous system and all these, you know, these
bigger terms.
And
what is exciting is as a veterinarian
is the dogs,
you can you can see that reflected
(07:54):
on their EKG, on their electrocardiogram, the plop
plop plop plop plop.
You know, when when they're under anesthesia or
even if they're, you know, even if they're
not, but certainly when they're under anesthesia, we're
monitoring them for surgical procedures. When they take
a breath
and when they don't,
the speed of the heart changes. The speed
of the rhythm changes
(08:14):
because of
the
impact the breathing has on the sympathetic nervous
system and the parasympathetic nervous system. So
it's it's actually easier for me as a
veterinarian to be able to teach breathing at
well, maybe not easier, but I have a
tool in the toolbox
that every veterinary professional that monitors anesthesia,
(08:35):
that monitors canines, dogs under anesthesia,
I can go,
what's the what's that called? Respiratory sinus arrhythmia.
Why does it happen? Because they're, you know,
when they breathe in, sympathetic nervous system goes
out. When they breathe out, you know, the
vagals and
I'm like, we do the same thing.
What? And so we can tap into that.
Right. We do the same thing as the
(08:55):
whole thing. We do the same thing. Like
it's crazy.
Yeah. You know what I'm thinking? Like what's
coming to mind is just such a cool
picture of your teaching
breathing
and stress relief exercises around that
by having veteran, I don't know if you
did this or not, I'm just imagining like
having them breathe along
with the dog.
Like take the same calming breath as the
(09:16):
dog because you see how it slows your
heart, Like it's like so in your face
how effective it is. Like this isn't just
like hooey that's out there that some neurologist
or neuroscientist figured out. Like it's in front
of your face, it's right there, look at
it. Right.
And I mean, certainly, there's like the the
Oura ring and there's other, you know, there's
other ways to, you know, to monitor it.
(09:36):
And then, you know, I know that there's,
I mean, all kinds of of,
monitors and, you know, our
oh, jeez. Now the the term escapes me,
but when when we're when we're basically trying
to have our our average heart rhythm down,
what's the
what is the term the Too resilience teachers
don't can't come up with this term. It's
yeah. And I can I it's I can
(09:58):
picture the person to call who that I
know that does all this stuff? But anyway,
it happened to be bradycardia?
Bradycardia is at the slower heart rate, but
it's it's not the great great point, Kai,
but it's not the one that I'm thinking
of, which is there's a whole study
of essentially our goal
is is to is to get oh, it's
(10:18):
it's that we don't have huge jumps in
our heart rhythm. Like, we don't wanna have
huge spikes where where we have tachycardia,
you know, we versus, you know, bradycardia. We
wanna try to have, you know, more of
a a consistent heart rate through the day.
And what that means is that if we
can do that, it means that generally speaking,
we're not we're not having as many stressful
(10:39):
events and that kind of thing. Yeah. And
and to that end, the stress, thank you
Kai, you've set him off on a threshold.
Yes, on a broad rock.
Producer role,
check.
I'll chime in maybe five minutes.
But to that end, it's really, it's interesting
because it's so important
and just as a as a related topic,
(11:00):
like to manage your body so you don't
go through these high low stress Right. Reactions
like to just, you know, I mean, I
think of it in terms of like a
diabetic who's trying not to have these big
swings in their sugars. It's the same thing
in your heartbeat and and the way you
Yeah. Your muscle of your heart seems healthy
by not having these huge swings, except when
you're intentionally doing it with, you know, certain
(11:20):
exercises or whatever to get the exercise. But
you wanna go go run with that because
you probably teach something in this realm.
Well and so what so also using you
know, in the spirit of using animals Yeah.
You know, as as guides is there's a
whole
a whole area. And so, I I guess,
transparency. So I I do speak for this
(11:42):
group, but, but it's good group. It's called
Fear Free.
And but, essentially, just even not necessarily fear
free, but just canine behavior. Like, when when
pets come into the clinic,
domestic pets come into the clinic,
they have certain things that they do and
body language and things that we can see
that we know that their sympathetic nervous system
(12:04):
is getting
stimulated, and they're getting more anxious and more
fearful. Panting
or whatever. Panting, tail down, you know, eye
you know, seeing body language kinda crouching down,
you know, versus the ones where they're engaged,
you know, just like us. Like, you know,
both of them were leaning in and we're
talking or getting excited and but, you know,
versus kind of, you know,
(12:25):
coming back and being more introverted and isolated
and and, you know, looking for, you know,
for protection.
And so
we
also do those things and it's but it's
like it can be a little bit different,
you know, on an individual basis. So can
we and this goes along with it. Can
we be mindful and aware of
what are the what are the
(12:46):
physical manifestations
of that in my body
when I feel those stress responses, so then
I know, oh, this is this is happening
now. I can have some awareness of it
in the moment. And okay, oh, now what
what tools do I have in the toolbox?
Oh.
Yeah. And it's so I'm so happy you
brought that up because it's so directly about
what
(13:06):
I'm trying to offer here which is that
we are
so in line with using the metaphor of
these animal examples.
So like if
you feel like your body's out of control
and there's something going on, you know, picture
the dog
going from a stressed place to
a a non stressed place and what would
(13:26):
take
for that dog to get there. You know,
I wanted to throw something out at you,
which is I heard recently that I thought
was really cool and I'm like, oh, when
do I get to throw this into an
interview?
Yeah. It's just in terms of the reactions
that our bodies have that we can relate
to animals or we need to confront shame
and turning
(13:46):
red, like blushing.
Something only humans do. Only humans do. Right?
Like, and that's something that you've brought up
in terms of stigma and that subtly a
couple of times already. Like,
what are your thoughts on managing the stress
around that?
Yes. So the I think the thing that
was most powerful and and we I know
(14:08):
we learned this, you know, in our our
original CAP
class,
that was just something that really Okay. Wait.
Wait. CAP is
certificate in applied Certificate in applied positive psychology.
Sorry. Yes.
From the flourishing center. Mhmm. Great. I love
that I mean, just just a great course.
I mean, I have and I have no
just I I just love love the course.
(14:29):
And had I not done that course, I
wouldn't have gotten to Meet Jessica either because
we met in the in the,
consultant course, I think, later. Yeah. Yep. And
by the way, just as an aside, Amelia
is the guest on the first podcast interview.
Oh. Yeah. So I I like that. Yes.
Life is good.
But, so, as we're getting instruction,
you know, from from Amelia in the, you
(14:50):
know, in the videos,
one of the things that has always stuck
with me, you know, as one of those
moments, was that there is an 88
overlap
in what I I picture I use my
senses to bring in and find an idea
of what's going on versus what I imagine
in my head. Mhmm.
You know, essentially meaning, there's no dip. My
(15:13):
brain can't tell the difference whether it's actually
happening
or I'm imagining and it's happening. And just
the intense power of my thought
to create
a situation that my body responds to as
though
I'm getting chased by a tiger. Change your
story, change your life. Right? So %. Whatever
(15:34):
story is in your head. I've said
thousands of different ways over the years, over
the millennia, you know. I mean, you know,
the stoic philosophers, you know, have talked about
that for years. I mean, Shakespeare, you know,
talks about it, you know. Nothing is either
good or bad, but thinking makes it so,
you know. And that, you know, and to
to that that degree is just the how
(15:55):
much
our thoughts play a role in resilience. And
so I would say for me specifically, for
me personally, you know, we teach what we
what what impacts us most. That was one
of the first things that I taught was
challenging my thinking. Mhmm. You know, was was
learning how to how to ask myself, like,
is that true? You know, is that is
(16:16):
this valid?
And that that that has been very helpful
for me, you know, and and the people
that I've had the opportunity to work with
over the years. Yeah. Yeah. One of the
most important resiliency tools there is out there.
Yeah. To recognize that the story is
much of it made up
because we are a storytelling
brain and we fill in the gaps
(16:37):
to create a story because that's how we
remember things and that's how we think. So
to challenge whether all the pieces of that
story, how many of them are actually true?
Right. And how many of them are
creating a problem for you?
Right. And then Jessica, here's the thing. So
I mentioned I mentioned, so so I'm in
long term recovery, you know, as well. And
(16:58):
so some of the wisdom I got was
from twelve step recovery. And so what we
do is we go through, you know, basically,
you go through your entire life and you
look at all the resentments that you have
against people.
And
there was one common denominator in all of
those horrible resentments,
that it was me. Like, I was the
you know? And so what was bananas is
(17:19):
when I really saw that I could have
misinterpreted
one thing, and to your point, filled in
the blanks with something else. Mhmm. And then
I took action on that.
I took action towards another person. That person
then took action towards me, and it spiraled
downward
Yeah. Because of one misinterpretation
One assumption. I made. One assumption. Yeah. Right.
(17:42):
Yeah. My father used to have some very
colorful ways of describing assuming things, which I
won't
share share here. We all have pieces of
that. Right. Right. And those are the stories,
right? Like that's
the part we remember. Yeah. Who knows if
Yeah. How much of that was fully the
reality?
But that's what the story is in our
head, and that's what matters right now to
(18:03):
challenge it. Yeah.
Yep. And it's still and I'll say it's
a work in progress. I mean, I still
do it. I mean, it's just, you know,
that's the thing is I have tools, you
know, that can help me combat it, but
I I can get down the, you know,
down that rabbit hole, you know, as much
as anybody.
But the good news is today, I don't
I don't tend to stay there, you know,
nearly as long, you know, and and to
(18:25):
the to the level that I did where,
you know, that that,
you know, my heart rate was up all
the time because I was just like, oh,
this person, this, this, this, and then, you
know, and I'd drive you know, be driving
somewhere, and by the time I got there,
it was World War three in my head.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you made some many
really important points, and one of them that's
coming through for me is just the
(18:46):
the really vital recognition that we don't become
resilient a second, we don't pick up tools
and just have them, that it's a lifelong
process of growth
and
improvement
so that we can manage our lives in
a happier way and a more balanced way
and gaining little bits of tools along the
(19:06):
way and building them up into this toolbox
is great, but,
people who've gotten to a point where they've
confronted
such a low point that they've gone to
a formal sort of recovery
gives them permission,
you and others permission to say, you know
what, I'm on a long term recovery, this
(19:27):
is what life is and I need to
keep working on it. But the rest of
the world who isn't by, you know, owning
that change is necessary
to live life better
and growth is necessary.
The lesson here that's so important is we
all need to do this. You know, you've
taken on a formal mechanism
(19:48):
and I'm offering, you know, as are you,
you know, formal ish ways
to join
join us and
grow with us
with building these tools and that it's a
lifelong practice.
And best case,
we teach others.
You know, you've learned from us and then
you share it and the next person is
(20:09):
stronger and healthier and more balanced. Like, it's
a beautiful world And that's it. Right. It's
this this beautiful,
you know, force multiplier or, you know, the
the ripple positive ripple effect Yeah. You know,
that's talked about in positive psychology. Mhmm. And,
yeah. That's and it's actually that I just
got off a meeting with the FEMA, and
that's where we've got this whole well I'm
not just it made me think. Again, the
(20:31):
ADHD is, like, oh, like, that's literally
one of the big aspects of the program
is empowering
groups of well-being champions, like, people that that
have a desire to help the profe to
give them tools to do that, and then
they go out, you know, and be able
to they do this work themselves, but then
they go out and Mhmm. And, you know,
and try to help others. And to your
(20:52):
point is that that's that's the goal. I
mean, that's the vision of, was it twenty
twenty twenty five, you know, is that
what 5051%
would be flourishing or something that Oh, that's
right. Would you remember those numbers? I haven't
seen them in a while. Do you wanna
I don't. Explain what you just said because
it's actually really powerful. Oh, I probably shouldn't
even said it because I I could pay
it, but but there was a there was
(21:14):
a goal that so there's there's certainly different
ways of measuring there's there's a couple different
ways to measure flourishing, but
and the problem is is I don't remember
what the initial one was, but it was
that people that are truly flourishing, say, in
the PERMA model, which is positive emotion, engagement,
relationships, meaning and purpose,
achievement and accomplishment, and health,
(21:36):
or vitality, perma perma h or perma v
depending on but
the
that only and I'm arbitrarily throwing a number
out here that I think it was, like,
20%, you know, of of population like that.
Flourishing. Something like that. Yeah. And that Marty
Seligman, doctor Martin Seligman, the
father of modern positive psychology
(21:56):
or founder of modern positive psychology was
said the goal was fifth I think 51
or 50% by twenty twenty fifty.
You know, is that can we get these
tools out into everyone's hands, you know, to
create create a level of flourishing.
So yeah. Yeah. I have to say, I
I don't know if you've, we haven't talked
(22:17):
about this. I don't know if you've seen
recent arm work
by Michael Steger
that he threw out twenty five years in
to, no, fifty years in to positive psychology
and that's why I think the
date was set. It was like,
no, '95, it was thirty years in. Anyway,
it doesn't matter.
Caillou cut this, right? So
(22:39):
anyway. Maybe, I'm having a good time. I'm
also trying to find the Perma 50, is
it Perma 51? Is that the No, Perma
and Perma V. It's P E R M
A, which is the basic model that Marty
Sullivan came up with and Amelia added the
V and the version is either vitality or
health, and they're both out there.
And there's now,
(22:59):
there's even PERMA plus four now, which is,
which adds, I think, growth mindset, financial
Oh, okay. And something, some other Exactly.
One step in the market. Permutations like, yeah,
but but the core of it is the
perma. You know, nobody
Yeah. So,
the recent
work that I've been reading about is
(23:20):
it aligns very well with what my whole
purpose is which is that in these years
of positive psychology where we've been focusing on
individual happiness,
the end result
has been
such a self focus
as opposed to community focus and ripple focus
and
(23:41):
world focus that we are so
obsessed
with
me, me, me.
Like we had this me generation for a
little while but now it's gotten way worse
than just the me generation
and that we need to shift the work
we're doing to really focus on how our
behavior
impacts others.
Because
as you said, it's all cyclical, like it's
coming back, like you and the person that
(24:01):
you cyclical, like it's coming back like
you and the person that you hurt or
harmed or whatever
the right terminology is.
It spiraled,
right? Like it wasn't just one direction.
It comes back and it comes around and
around and around and it flows to everybody
else who's
in that
world. So we need to like pay attention
(24:21):
to if we can, if we feel ourself
for example in a small example, you know
with this high stress reaction
that we've got the story in our head,
we've got fear, we've got anger, we've got,
you know, negative emotion,
our heartbeat
is racing
or, you know, like an animal species from
some fear or whatever is going on.
(24:43):
And if we stop
and we we actually stop for a moment
and say, Okay, how is this affecting me
and what can I do about it? And
how is this affecting all the people around
me?
And is this good? Or how can I
fix this?
Yeah. Thoughts And and I'm
I'm reminded of a and I Kyle
(25:05):
fact check it, but it's something to the
effect and it's what I is that the
antidote to fear is grounded hope. You know?
Yes. The antidote to fear is hope. It
was Maya Angelou.
I think. Yeah. I just read it the
other day. Maybe I got it quoted wrong.
But yeah.
And and that's I mean, and that that's
really it. Is that and it's not not
to say that we don't
(25:26):
we don't always look at the bright side,
but that we honor that
it can be there, you know, is that
we're we're not,
you know, it's not toxic right. It's not
toxic positivity.
And that and it's funny because in in
vet med well, just in vet med because
we're human beings like everyone else. But, you
(25:46):
know, is that that gets thrown around, that
toxic positivity. And it's like, not all
positivity is toxic positivity, you know, is that
it's not, you know, is honoring that if
you're always, you know, shooting something down as
being toxic positivity,
you know, potentially,
we might wanna turn the lens in on
ourselves and say, why why is it that,
(26:08):
you know, and and we can let me
say this. We can wrap it in, well,
I'm I'm
pragmatic, and it's like, yes. And, but, you
you know, we can be,
what is it, a
realistic optimist. That's what I Yeah. That's what
that's that's what I like to describe myself.
I forget where I heard that first. Yeah.
I like that.
Yeah. A realistic optimist, you know, is not
(26:30):
not always looking at the bright side or
always, but it's like I always give it
that, hey, what what if, you know, what
if this too happens?
You know? I think I I think I
found found, the quote, if I could throw
it at you guys. Oh, thank you. Yes.
Alright. Sling it.
What is a fear of living? It's being
preeminently afraid of dying. It is not doing
(26:53):
what you came here to do out of
timidity and spinelessness.
The antidote is to take full responsibility for
yourself,
for the time you take up in the
space you occupy.
If you don't know what you're here to
do, then just do some good.
I like that. So it's just beautiful. Was
that Maya Angelou?
Yes. That was Maya Angelou. Yes. Okay. It
(27:13):
wasn't Yeah. The quote I mean, it was
the same realm, but somebody actually did say
the antidote. All right, well I fact checked
the Maya Angelou version.
So what, okay.
So that's awesome. But and that's the language
that's out there that we need, right? Like
we need to read
that fear is real
(27:33):
and that we shouldn't deny,
we should try to understand where it's coming
from
and then look for opportunity,
for hope instead of fear and stress, right?
Like so don't walk away from it. And
if I may, which
is not my skill at all, is I
wanna bring this wrap this into, like, what
we're talking about, you know, going back to
animals and this and that, is that that
(27:55):
is the beautiful difference
physiologically
or what the tool that we have is
that
fear does play a role. Fear can keep
us alive. Fear, you know, just like it
does with animals and why they have the
fear response.
But knowing that optimism
again, that
that skill of realistic optimism, depending on the
(28:16):
model you look at for resiliency, that is
a skill of resiliency,
you know, is to be able to honor
that something good might, you know, be able
to happen as well.
And that's the and that is that is
something that I can't, you know, I can't
teach my, you know, my canine and feline
patients, but I can, you know, I can,
(28:37):
you know, positive you know, give them positive
reinforcement and that type of thing. But it's
just I think that's that's really
a powerful
tool is the, you know, is what what
is one of the ways that we can
combat fear, you know, is hope hope and
optimism.
Yeah. The word intentionality is coming up for
me, which is a very positive psychology sort
(28:58):
of term,
and resiliency
term, but that's what's coming out is that
we as humans
can learn from
the
ancient wisdom of the animal kingdom
and then do it intentionally,
Like not wait for to evolve and adapt
to change around us, but to like stop
(29:20):
and dig out a tool and be intentional
about changing the thoughts, changing the behavior, changing
the breathing,
changing, you know, every aspect that we have
control over as humans that Yeah.
That canines
don't know that they have that control of.
Well, and I guess I didn't give them,
I didn't give canines
(29:42):
nearly enough credit. I don't know that cats
would, you know, there's always the joke about
cats. But, you know, that I come in
I come in from a day
that's, you know, and
these dogs go bananas.
With love. They're happy as with love. Right?
Pure love and that and that, what's beautiful
too is that we've shown now over over
(30:02):
the years the level of of
emotions that dogs
can can exhibit. And really, I mean, number
of of mammals as well. Yeah. And and
I will also say as birds, like, I
didn't like like, I was like, I've never
we're never having birds. There's just never in
January of twenty twenty two, we had none.
And then I I mean, I'll say we
have, jeez, I don't know, 27 birds now,
(30:24):
I think. No. In here. So they're not
all I mean, we have a well, we
have an aviary too, but we have we
went from no birds to we have two
conures, two kayaks,
military macaw, and a cockatoo, and an umbrella
cockatoo.
And I never I just didn't have in
fact, I think when we were in class
together, I don't know that I had them
then.
No. It was before 2022. That's amazing. But
(30:47):
but the level so even with the avians,
like, the level of
emotion, like, the level of connection
that they can I just didn't know that
that was I and I'm a I'm a
veterinarian? And I'm, like, embarrassed to say, like,
I spent, you know, forty something years of
my life
discounting
birds.
And we all do. To know the level
(31:09):
of connection that you could have. Yeah. I
mean, I read a lot of behaviorists
whose job it is, like, they've taken on
their role of exposing
the sentience
and emotion and the capacity
of a broad swath, not just primates and
not just mammals, of the animal kingdom that's
able to, and even the plant world, like
(31:32):
that reacts to energy,
right? Yes. And not just sun, but like
different types of energy.
So,
you know, I spend
a chunk of my time in the marine
life world and I've learned about
the the emotional connection and the individual personalities
of fish.
You know? Yeah.
(31:52):
Water based reptiles, turtles, like all of it,
like we have underestimated
and fought,
I could go into all kinds of
other directions on this given my other interests
in philosophy
and social justice and all that, but we
have shut off,
intentionally,
(32:12):
we've shut off
buying into
the equality
of
emotion and
sentience of
nonhumans.
And we're breaking that so that you went
through vet school probably when that wasn't bought
into.
And Yeah. And we've learned that in the
(32:33):
last, like, you know, just couple of decades.
There's been so much information about,
why it matters that we're all in this
world together
and that we all have emotion and nervous
systems on all the same organs, you know.
We
are heading towards the end of this conversation,
and I wanna offer you, Phil, like,
(32:53):
tell us what you want us to know.
What do the listeners need to hear?
So I think, you know, as far as
one thing, is to your point in the
beginning is as far as veterinarians
and, you know, what we may if we're
not in the profession, what we may see
you know, I think there's two
two schools of thought that's important to just
(33:13):
be aware of. Is one is there's the
the James Harriet,
you know, version of of veterinary medicine,
which is
quite honestly still a very big powerful driver,
you know, values and that type of thing
for us.
And then
combining that with
the realism
of today's level of veterinary medicine, which is
(33:34):
that there are things that we have the
ability to do in veterinary medicine that are
on par with human medicine. But people's value
systems are very, you know, are very different.
And some people,
which I'm not I'm not saying it's right
or wrong, but some people would say, well,
I would just never spend that, you know,
type of, you know, money on an animal
where some people are it doesn't you know,
(33:55):
I will I will go in those It's
family. You know. It's family. Right. And all
of and it's challenging as veterinarians because all
of those are valid, but we we have
to navigate that,
in a way. And that realizing that we
do go through a lot and that no
there isn't a I I will say this
as a as a bold state. There isn't
(34:16):
a veterinarian
in in The US or on this planet
that got into this because we wanted to
make a ton of financial resources. Like, that's
not we didn't go to sleep twice for
up to twelve years. Right. I mean, we
did it we all did it because we
wanted to help animals and, you know, in
in one way or another. And so
just saying that, like, the I I have
(34:37):
a well, we probably won't be able to
see it, but I have a sign from,
you know, it's,
in my office, it says, be curious, not
judgmental,
you know, from Walt Whitman, but also made
popular from the wonderful TV show Ted Lasso.
I love it. It's just, you know, is
is learn being being open that that person
that's, you know, in in the exam room
with you
wants wants to help you and your your
(35:00):
pet. And, you know, as much as your
you love your pet, they they really wanna
help them. And so, you know, just cognitive
empathy, like, being able to put and and
this goes for this is the same thing
that I teach on the other side to,
you know, to our our veterinary professionals is,
you know, understanding,
you know, what what our pet owners are
going through too.
And and then just being, you know, how
(35:21):
can we be of service to them? We're
we're, you know, unfortunately, we have one of
the highest,
risks of suicide in any any profession.
And so, yeah, just
as we would with anybody else, just a
little bit of grace,
you know, a little bit of empathy and,
you know, in that as we move forward.
And it really gets thank you for offering
(35:42):
that, and,
I've had such positive experiences with the veterinarians
I have,
I've worked with over the years with my
own
pup and with this turtle hospital that I
spend a lot of my time in, and
the
respect
and consideration
(36:03):
for
this ripple of energy
is just all we're asking for, right? Like
if you just, it's so hard when you're
dealing with
a sick family member or
the choice and the difficult choice to spend
the money or not spend the money or
do the,
those are decisions that are really hard,
(36:25):
do I do the work, but to just
bring it into a sense of community that
the people in the room are on your
side
and
you all move together in this decision,
that we all wanna help each other and
to recognize that we're all in things in
the world together and these aren't
(36:46):
you're not alone. It's like when you were
sitting on the couch and you felt alone
and then you weren't alone
because you were with your community who was
helping you. Like, it's always the case.
There's always other people in the game and
just accept them and bring them into your
circle and,
in positive energy and it changes everything. Yeah.
(37:07):
Yeah. Awesome. So tell us a couple of
things you're working on that you wanna share
that whoever's listening can if whether they're vets
or they're not vets. I don't know if
they're so yes. Yes. So, I mean, a
few things. So one, I'm very excited. So
we were releasing,
in in just a month or so,
we were talking about PERMA, the PERMA tool
for veterinary workplaces.
(37:29):
So it's a it's a comprehensive assessment,
on individual team and organizational level, well-being, psychological
health and safety,
psychological safety and positive leadership in, in veterinary
workplaces, and then giving,
giving leaders and individuals the tools, you know,
to improve those things in in veterinary workplaces.
So super, super excited about that. Actually partnering
(37:51):
with,
Michelle McQuade, Marnie Suptra, and the Well-being Lab
and the Good Foundry to to put that
out. Really excited. Well, she's really open because
they're in Australia, so you've got, like, a
global reach.
Like, this isn't just America. This is yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. And then we just I was
really grateful. I was a co author,
very recently on a,
(38:12):
a big project from a group called Veterinary
Visionaries. So it has all the you know,
most of the schools and most of, most
of the veterinary organizations in The US,
are all part of this, but we put
out, as one of one of three co
authors and,
four co authors on a paper,
for,
psychological health and safety guidelines for for veterinary
(38:33):
hospitals. So, you know, things that can do
that. And then the FVMA, Florida Veterinary Medical
Association, we have our well-being program.
We partnered with Blue Buffalo, which is amazing.
And then there we've got veterinary informed mental
health professionals
to help for the mental health aspect.
Actually, you'll appreciate this as the red kind
of red cape, green cape Mhmm. Thought exercise.
(38:55):
So we're we're
hoping to give another option to address mental
health issues in the profession,
and then we're training a a cadre of,
really involved,
well-being,
veterinarians and veterinary professionals that have an interest
in well-being,
giving them those tools to then go out
and create that positive ripple effect That's fantastic.
With their impact projects,
(39:17):
as well as a a number of other
things kind of ancillary to that that we're
doing, but those are kind of the two
big,
big things. And, you know, we've just there's
a big group of people working on this,
and it's just beautiful to see the energy.
So thank you. You.
Thank you for sharing that and I'm so
excited for all of your, these amazing paths
that you're generously
putting forth for
(39:38):
making the world better,
and it reminds me of, you know, how
important it is
to take all of this learning and start
it earlier.
So, you know, you've moved down to the
vet school level where you're bringing
this into
who you are that you become as a
vet, not
just that you have to learn how to
(39:59):
do it after you're already suffering. But, like,
you know, to start out by saying these
are some of the challenges and
Right. This is how this is fill your
toolbox now because you're gonna need it. And
then even I would think to bring it
down to, you know,
preschool, children's level, where you're, you know, you're
having these relationships at that level with both
animals and animal professionals.
(40:19):
Thank you, Phil. You have made my day
and my week and my life better, and,
thank you for making so many people's lives
better.
Aw. It's you're you're a really special person,
and I'm just so privileged to have you
in my life. So and now you're in
all these other people's lives, so thank you
for coming. And it's just and it's beautiful
thinking of how we came together and being
(40:40):
be being able to come back together after
this time and seeing how you've impacted the
world and and getting to meet Kai. And
so thank you so much. So and more
to come. You know what? Yeah. We'd love
to have you back. Yeah. So next time
Yeah. We'll we'll go even deeper on some
of these cool things.
Awesome. Sounds good. Awesome. See you soon.
(41:06):
This has been a production of BLI Studios
produced by me, Kai. Follow along with our
other BLI produced shows at balancinglife'sissues.com/podcast-BLI.
Got an idea for the show? Email me,
Kai, at balancing life's issues dot com. And
don't forget to stay in touch with your
host, Jessica, at jessica@winwinwinmindset.com.
(41:26):
Anything else to add, Miles?
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