June 2, 2021 • 19 mins
Welcome to the Security Chipmunks podcast where we talk about the development of cybersecurity skills. To stay up to date in today's world you need to be resilient, that’s why as Advanced Persistent Chipmunks we keep chipping away at it.
We had intended to publish this episode in May for Mental Health Awareness Month.
However this episode has been plagued by audio quality issues, so apologies in advance -NS
https://www.mentalhealthhackers.org/
https://www.strugglecare.com/
https://www.window-swap.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
UNKNOWN (00:00):
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (00:09):
Welcome to Security Chipmunks Podcast, where we talk
about the development ofcybersecurity skills.
To stay up to date in today'sworld, you need to be resilient.
That's why as advanced,persistent chipmunks, we keep
chipping away at it.
My name is Meg Sedna Johnson.
My co-host is Neil Smalley.
SPEAKER_01 (00:27):
Hi, Edna.
How's it going?
SPEAKER_00 (00:29):
Hi, Neil.
I'm doing great.
How are you?
SPEAKER_01 (00:32):
Not too bad.
Not too bad.
SPEAKER_00 (00:34):
So we're doing kind of a different episode today,
aren't we?
SPEAKER_01 (00:37):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (00:39):
Yes, it is.
It's the Mental Health AwarenessMonth.
SPEAKER_01 (00:42):
Gotcha.
So standard disclaimer applieshere.
We are not mental healthprofessionals.
If you need help, please seek aprofessional.
With that said, let's jump intoit.
SPEAKER_00 (00:53):
All right.
Yeah.
So with this pandemic, it's beenreally hard for people.
So I wanted to kind of talkabout ways that you can work
towards a better mental healthand having people better balance
in your life one thing oneconcept that really helps me is
(01:17):
it's a concept of spoons so thespoons are the amount of mental
energy that you have and thiskind of just gives language to
people who are dealing withdepression or other mental
health illnesses to be able toexpress like how much they have
(01:39):
to be able to get through theday so this spoon theory and for
people who have chronic illnessthey call themselves spoonies
this is just how much they'reable to contribute to their day
and depending on their level ofwellness they'll have more
(02:01):
spoons for a day than others soif you're having a great day
where you're feeling good thisalso works for chronic illness,
if you're having pain and so on.
So if somebody was dealing withpain, they have a low pain day,
they have more spoons to be ableto get stuff done.
But if they're having a highpain day, that pain takes away
(02:25):
their spoons.
So their spoons are being takenup by dealing with the pain.
So for somebody that's dealingwith depression, if you're
having a a really difficult,depressing day, you might not
have a lot of spoons.
So you might not be able to getthrough and it's more
(02:48):
challenging to get through thedaily activities like taking a
shower, brushing your hair,eating, making sure you're
drinking water and taking yourmedicine.
So it just depends of your levelof wellness.
SPEAKER_01 (03:03):
Interesting.
SPEAKER_00 (03:04):
Have you ever heard of it?
SPEAKER_01 (03:06):
Yeah, I have.
I also think another way tothink about it is for me it's
like i like video games rightand so a lot of them will have
something like a stamina meteror something like that and so
you can only run for so longbefore your stamina runs out or
maybe you're going through likemud or something and your
(03:27):
character's not gonna be able torun as fast because you're going
through mud so like an examplethat would be like okay maybe i
don't do so well in a crowd insocial situations maybe i can
sprint faster with a fullstamina meter but i'm going
through mud and my staminameters tapped out, I'm going to
be in a very slow pace.
So it really depends on how muchenergy have I burned through
(03:50):
already and what kind of terrainam I going through.
SPEAKER_00 (03:53):
Right.
Yeah, so that's a goodcomparison when you're dealing
with mental health issues.
Like you're stuck in the mud andyou're trying to get your brain
on track, but Sarah Serotoninand dopamine are low.
So one way that I deal withbringing up my serotonin or
(04:16):
dopamine throughout the day, Ihave a box of fidget toys at my
desk.
So I will pick something up andI'll start fidgeting with it as
I'm trying to work throughthings.
And that helps me fight off.
It both helps me focus and alsohelps me with bringing up the
(04:39):
dopamine and feeling betterthroughout the day.
SPEAKER_01 (04:42):
Do you have a favorite one?
SPEAKER_00 (04:46):
This flashlight thing, it has a magnet and so
when I pull off the end and thenit clicks back in.
It does sound very
SPEAKER_01 (05:00):
satisfying.
SPEAKER_00 (05:01):
Yes, it's got a very satisfying little click when it
finds its home.
It's not really meant as afidget toy but it has made its
way into my fidget toy box.
That's it.
SPEAKER_01 (05:16):
Yeah, I have a number of different ones.
There's things like beadedbracelets that are fun for me,
and then there's...
Silly Putty's good, but I reallylike what's...
beaded rubber erasers.
So, like, in the art aisle of,like, your office store, you can
find beaded rubber, and it's alittle less messy than Silly
(05:37):
Putty, I've found.
It's like, it doesn't stick it.
stick as much and you can playwith it like uh play-doh is not
necessarily as messy as play-dohor silly potty or something like
that that can be really fun
SPEAKER_00 (05:49):
nice yeah excellent those are excellent ideas so the
way i discovered the fidget toyswas there's an organization
called mental health hackers andat conferences they have a room
where you can kind of go andjust relax and So it's very
(06:09):
nice.
You go and play with fidgettoys.
They have fidget toys across allthe tables.
They have coloring books.
Depending on which conferenceyou go, they have kind of
different things.
But one of the things they haveis like a pool filled with
Orbeez.
Oh,
SPEAKER_01 (06:27):
wow.
SPEAKER_00 (06:28):
Yeah.
So like a kid's pool.
For people who don't
SPEAKER_01 (06:30):
know, that's like the kind of bead thing that
expands in water or
SPEAKER_00 (06:36):
something.
Yeah.
They're great for watering yourplants if you have orbeez they
because they absorb all thewater and then over time they
dehydrate so if you are badabout remembering to water your
plants put a bunch of wet orbeezon your plants and it will over
time water your plants so yeahso mental health hackers they're
(07:01):
bringing awareness of mentalhealth issues in an industry
where you deal with a lot ofstress and burnouts So I think
they make it more acceptable totalk about mental health issues
by bringing it to theconferences and like, hey, we
can talk about it.
It's okay.
(07:22):
So I think they're a greatorganization.
SPEAKER_01 (07:25):
I definitely think it can be intimidating to ask
for help.
It's not always easy to gethelp, especially with our
healthcare system.
But I think just even takingthat first step, if you have
family or friends you can talkto, being able to ask for help
when You need to not try to doeverything on your own as I know
a lot of people just, you know,like myself included, try to
(07:46):
just go along and do everythingon our own.
And I feel completely swampedand overwhelmed, but you don't
necessarily have to do that.
And you can get help, you know,friends, family, mental health
care professionals.
I mean, it's not all, it's notgoing to be all instant fit.
Nothing's like an instant fix oranything takes a lot of work.
SPEAKER_00 (08:08):
Yes.
SPEAKER_01 (08:08):
and you're not necessarily going to get the
right help from the first personyou come across.
It's kind of like looking for ajob or anything else.
You have to evaluate if it'sgoing to work for you because
not everybody is the same.
SPEAKER_00 (08:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
So what are some of the tipsthat you have for dealing with
if you have the blues or thesads
SPEAKER_01 (08:38):
So it can definitely be easy to overdo it on things.
Chocolate does help to someextent, but that's only part of
the picture.
SPEAKER_00 (08:49):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (08:50):
Seeing how professional health, some people
just need medication becausetheir bodies just don't make
enough of the right chemicals ornot.
That's not something I reallyhave experience with or want to
go into because I just don'thave that professional
knowledge, right?
But it's definitely...
If you think you need that,something you can talk to your
(09:11):
doctor about or something.
As far as tips go, again, itreally depends on the
individual, but there's a numberof different things you can do.
Some things that have helped meis, one, I deleted Facebook for
starters.
That eliminated so much stressright there.
SPEAKER_00 (09:32):
Yeah.
UNKNOWN (09:35):
Notification fatigue or alert fatigue.
I know there's some rules thatit just doesn't allow for it.
It's like you have to always beon.
SPEAKER_01 (09:43):
And then there's that bleed over into the rest of
your life from work.
And so I think from a culturalor systemic level needs to be
looked at and said, okay, maybepeople would do better jobs if
they weren't always stressedout.
Maybe we can do this better,have a better shift system or
(10:06):
something.
But yeah, it's definitely notalways easy.
Anyway, you can like cut down onthe amount of interruptions
because I know that we have likea limited amount of decisions or
processing to deal withdecisions every day and every
little interruption does nothelp with that.
At least that's my anecdotalexperience with it.
(10:28):
I reduced my notifications on myphone.
My phone like used to be thesource, like one of the greatest
sources of stress.
Nowadays, I pretty much onlyhave a notification on if it's
an alarm or if it's a phonecall.
So it doesn't mean I don't getother stuff.
I just don't have it audible.
(10:49):
So I set specific timesthroughout the day to check and
get back.
So usually it's like within atwo-hour time frame, like every
two hours or so that I am ableto check and that way I don't
miss something important if it'ssomething super important like
you know it's either going to bea phone call or it can wait
(11:10):
really i do a lot of video callsgetting into that zoom fatigue
SPEAKER_00 (11:16):
yeah
SPEAKER_01 (11:17):
so for that i typically do two hours of video
and then an hour off just tokeep my my sanity because if
you're on video all day it'sjust it's really hard you can
definitely get around that bydoing audio only or or even text
when possible.
And then really just trying toeliminate meetings that could be
(11:38):
an email.
Slack and Discord and chat apps,that's still not technically
asynchronous.
It's more of real time.
So there are other asynchronousparts that application
department and whatnot, evenjust as simple as like a shared
Google doc or a ticketing systemor any number of other options
(12:02):
that you can workcollaboratively with people, but
it doesn't have to benecessarily in real time,
especially with a distributedteam in different time zones or
different things, it can getpretty tricky.
But if done properly, it canreally eliminate lots of
unneeded meetings that conflictwith people's schedules and just
reduce stress all around.
So there's trying to reducemeetings and interruptions in
(12:25):
people's actual doing work isreally helpful.
SPEAKER_00 (12:30):
Yeah, absolutely.
Something that I discoveredrather recently is there's a
therapist on TikTok and she hada baby when the pandemic hit and
then she got postpartumdepression, but she was not able
to have her family there becausethey're all isolating because of
(12:54):
COVID.
So she had to kind of come upwith her own way of doing
things.
So she's got a website calledstrugglecare.com.
And in it, she describes how,you know, okay, you're not able
to cope to 100%.
So you don't have to keep aperfectly maintained house.
(13:17):
So she describes what the basicthings to function are.
So like, you need to make sureyou have clean plates and clean
clothes, but your house doesn'thave to be spotless.
You don't have to haveeverything.
Everything dusted.
So she's got some great ideasthere.
There are worksheets that she'screated and she's got some
(13:41):
resources on her website thatreally help with, you know, if
you're having a really deepdepression, what would work for
you?
Like if you're having a reallytough day, you can't shower.
Okay.
Can you brush your hair?
Can you, you know, get a wipeand, you know, Yeah.
(14:32):
So if that helps some people.
SPEAKER_01 (14:36):
I found that if I'm able to forgive myself for
procrastinating something or notgetting everything on my to-do
list done, I'm much more likelyto finish it up the next day
than if I had spent all nightguilt tripping about it and not
being able to sleep.
So definitely does help.
SPEAKER_00 (14:53):
One thing with regards to the pandemic that if
people are having depression,one thing that I recommend
checking on, This is very true.
(15:16):
So make sure you go and go toyour doctor and get checked out
as part of, you know,
SPEAKER_01 (15:22):
your overall wellness.
So when I was in the PacificNorthwest, I'm very familiar
with this to the point where,uh, I don't get out much.
So I actually have a happy lightand a happy light is a super
bright light.
You can turn on for probablylike half an hour, 45 minutes or
something like that.
And it helps trick your braininto thinking you're getting
(15:43):
some light.
And so it actually, uh, doeshelp improve my mood.
So if I'm having a really badtime of things, for example,
like in the winter or something,when it's really dark a lot or
overcast or whatnot, I can gowith that.
And then, of course, it'll alsohelp with sleep.
If your body doesn't know whenyour day-night cycle is, it can
(16:06):
have issues with that as well.
So that is also helpful there.
So definitely use it when youneed it.
Also, being in a box.
Even in the Pacific Northwest,if you don't never leave your
house, you don't get that green.
So having plants can be quitethe mood booster.
(16:28):
Even just one or two.
Absolutely.
Just like a cactus or asucculent that doesn't pretty
much ever need water orsomething.
They're just about my speed.
Especially if you're strugglingto do the basics, you don't want
to be having to take care ofplants.
The low-maintenance plants arereally quite handy.
me.
Absolutely.
(16:53):
There's some pretty realisticfake plants out there that can
definitely be a mood boost aswell.
SPEAKER_00 (16:59):
Absolutely.
I have a little aloe plant.
I love my little plant.
I have managed to keep it alive.
I think we've covered a lot ofthings.
Is there anything that we're
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
missing?
Yes.
I live and work in a room thatfaces the neighbors.
So I have film on my window andthen I have a blackout curtain.
So there's something calledwindow-swap.com and it lets me
bring up video clips of otherpeople's windows from around the
(17:31):
world.
So if I need to pick me up, Ican just pop that up in my
second monitor
SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
while I work.
Very nice.
All right.
Oh, and also pets.
Pets can help you feel better.
I really want a goldenretriever, but that's on hold.
I have two dogs already.
SPEAKER_01 (17:53):
There you go.
We have two cats and a fish.
Nice.
We like hanging out together.
SPEAKER_00 (18:00):
And the cats don't eat the
SPEAKER_01 (18:01):
fish?
No.
It's just another form ofentertainment.
That's like the big stainedglass doors.
The birds like to come and hangout with the plants out in front
of the windows.
The cats will sit and watch.
Every once in a while.
I do actually get out of my roomto go pet the cats.
(18:23):
It's definitely a nice break togo brew some tea and sit and pet
the cats for a bit.
At the end of the day, I thinkthat's one of the key things.
Making sure to take enoughbreaks and let your brain rest.
Your brain is still going to beworking on the problem.
(18:44):
Oftentimes, it'll be morehelpful than just staring at
your screen for another now arebanging your head against a
wall.
Put your brain work on in thebackground and you'll be
surprised at what I'll come up
SPEAKER_00 (18:57):
with.
Yeah.
Thanks for listening to theSecurity Chipmunks.
And remember, if it seemsoverwhelming, just keep chipping
away at it.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (00:09):
Welcome to Security Chipmunks Podcast, where we talk
about the development ofcybersecurity skills.
To stay up to date in today'sworld, you need to be resilient.
That's why as advanced,persistent chipmunks, we keep
chipping away at it.
My name is Meg Sedna Johnson.
My co-host is Neil Smalley.
SPEAKER_01 (00:27):
Hi, Edna.
How's it going?
SPEAKER_00 (00:29):
Hi, Neil.
I'm doing great.
How are you?
SPEAKER_01 (00:32):
Not too bad.
Not too bad.
SPEAKER_00 (00:34):
So we're doing kind of a different episode today,
aren't we?
SPEAKER_01 (00:37):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (00:39):
Yes, it is.
It's the Mental Health AwarenessMonth.
SPEAKER_01 (00:42):
Gotcha.
So standard disclaimer applieshere.
We are not mental healthprofessionals.
If you need help, please seek aprofessional.
With that said, let's jump intoit.
SPEAKER_00 (00:53):
All right.
Yeah.
So with this pandemic, it's beenreally hard for people.
So I wanted to kind of talkabout ways that you can work
towards a better mental healthand having people better balance
in your life one thing oneconcept that really helps me is
(01:17):
it's a concept of spoons so thespoons are the amount of mental
energy that you have and thiskind of just gives language to
people who are dealing withdepression or other mental
health illnesses to be able toexpress like how much they have
(01:39):
to be able to get through theday so this spoon theory and for
people who have chronic illnessthey call themselves spoonies
this is just how much they'reable to contribute to their day
and depending on their level ofwellness they'll have more
(02:01):
spoons for a day than others soif you're having a great day
where you're feeling good thisalso works for chronic illness,
if you're having pain and so on.
So if somebody was dealing withpain, they have a low pain day,
they have more spoons to be ableto get stuff done.
But if they're having a highpain day, that pain takes away
(02:25):
their spoons.
So their spoons are being takenup by dealing with the pain.
So for somebody that's dealingwith depression, if you're
having a a really difficult,depressing day, you might not
have a lot of spoons.
So you might not be able to getthrough and it's more
(02:48):
challenging to get through thedaily activities like taking a
shower, brushing your hair,eating, making sure you're
drinking water and taking yourmedicine.
So it just depends of your levelof wellness.
SPEAKER_01 (03:03):
Interesting.
SPEAKER_00 (03:04):
Have you ever heard of it?
SPEAKER_01 (03:06):
Yeah, I have.
I also think another way tothink about it is for me it's
like i like video games rightand so a lot of them will have
something like a stamina meteror something like that and so
you can only run for so longbefore your stamina runs out or
maybe you're going through likemud or something and your
(03:27):
character's not gonna be able torun as fast because you're going
through mud so like an examplethat would be like okay maybe i
don't do so well in a crowd insocial situations maybe i can
sprint faster with a fullstamina meter but i'm going
through mud and my staminameters tapped out, I'm going to
be in a very slow pace.
So it really depends on how muchenergy have I burned through
(03:50):
already and what kind of terrainam I going through.
SPEAKER_00 (03:53):
Right.
Yeah, so that's a goodcomparison when you're dealing
with mental health issues.
Like you're stuck in the mud andyou're trying to get your brain
on track, but Sarah Serotoninand dopamine are low.
So one way that I deal withbringing up my serotonin or
(04:16):
dopamine throughout the day, Ihave a box of fidget toys at my
desk.
So I will pick something up andI'll start fidgeting with it as
I'm trying to work throughthings.
And that helps me fight off.
It both helps me focus and alsohelps me with bringing up the
(04:39):
dopamine and feeling betterthroughout the day.
SPEAKER_01 (04:42):
Do you have a favorite one?
SPEAKER_00 (04:46):
This flashlight thing, it has a magnet and so
when I pull off the end and thenit clicks back in.
It does sound very
SPEAKER_01 (05:00):
satisfying.
SPEAKER_00 (05:01):
Yes, it's got a very satisfying little click when it
finds its home.
It's not really meant as afidget toy but it has made its
way into my fidget toy box.
That's it.
SPEAKER_01 (05:16):
Yeah, I have a number of different ones.
There's things like beadedbracelets that are fun for me,
and then there's...
Silly Putty's good, but I reallylike what's...
beaded rubber erasers.
So, like, in the art aisle of,like, your office store, you can
find beaded rubber, and it's alittle less messy than Silly
(05:37):
Putty, I've found.
It's like, it doesn't stick it.
stick as much and you can playwith it like uh play-doh is not
necessarily as messy as play-dohor silly potty or something like
that that can be really fun
SPEAKER_00 (05:49):
nice yeah excellent those are excellent ideas so the
way i discovered the fidget toyswas there's an organization
called mental health hackers andat conferences they have a room
where you can kind of go andjust relax and So it's very
(06:09):
nice.
You go and play with fidgettoys.
They have fidget toys across allthe tables.
They have coloring books.
Depending on which conferenceyou go, they have kind of
different things.
But one of the things they haveis like a pool filled with
Orbeez.
Oh,
SPEAKER_01 (06:27):
wow.
SPEAKER_00 (06:28):
Yeah.
So like a kid's pool.
For people who don't
SPEAKER_01 (06:30):
know, that's like the kind of bead thing that
expands in water or
SPEAKER_00 (06:36):
something.
Yeah.
They're great for watering yourplants if you have orbeez they
because they absorb all thewater and then over time they
dehydrate so if you are badabout remembering to water your
plants put a bunch of wet orbeezon your plants and it will over
time water your plants so yeahso mental health hackers they're
(07:01):
bringing awareness of mentalhealth issues in an industry
where you deal with a lot ofstress and burnouts So I think
they make it more acceptable totalk about mental health issues
by bringing it to theconferences and like, hey, we
can talk about it.
It's okay.
(07:22):
So I think they're a greatorganization.
SPEAKER_01 (07:25):
I definitely think it can be intimidating to ask
for help.
It's not always easy to gethelp, especially with our
healthcare system.
But I think just even takingthat first step, if you have
family or friends you can talkto, being able to ask for help
when You need to not try to doeverything on your own as I know
a lot of people just, you know,like myself included, try to
(07:46):
just go along and do everythingon our own.
And I feel completely swampedand overwhelmed, but you don't
necessarily have to do that.
And you can get help, you know,friends, family, mental health
care professionals.
I mean, it's not all, it's notgoing to be all instant fit.
Nothing's like an instant fix oranything takes a lot of work.
SPEAKER_00 (08:08):
Yes.
SPEAKER_01 (08:08):
and you're not necessarily going to get the
right help from the first personyou come across.
It's kind of like looking for ajob or anything else.
You have to evaluate if it'sgoing to work for you because
not everybody is the same.
SPEAKER_00 (08:27):
Yeah, absolutely.
So what are some of the tipsthat you have for dealing with
if you have the blues or thesads
SPEAKER_01 (08:38):
So it can definitely be easy to overdo it on things.
Chocolate does help to someextent, but that's only part of
the picture.
SPEAKER_00 (08:49):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (08:50):
Seeing how professional health, some people
just need medication becausetheir bodies just don't make
enough of the right chemicals ornot.
That's not something I reallyhave experience with or want to
go into because I just don'thave that professional
knowledge, right?
But it's definitely...
If you think you need that,something you can talk to your
(09:11):
doctor about or something.
As far as tips go, again, itreally depends on the
individual, but there's a numberof different things you can do.
Some things that have helped meis, one, I deleted Facebook for
starters.
That eliminated so much stressright there.
SPEAKER_00 (09:32):
Yeah.
UNKNOWN (09:35):
Notification fatigue or alert fatigue.
I know there's some rules thatit just doesn't allow for it.
It's like you have to always beon.
SPEAKER_01 (09:43):
And then there's that bleed over into the rest of
your life from work.
And so I think from a culturalor systemic level needs to be
looked at and said, okay, maybepeople would do better jobs if
they weren't always stressedout.
Maybe we can do this better,have a better shift system or
(10:06):
something.
But yeah, it's definitely notalways easy.
Anyway, you can like cut down onthe amount of interruptions
because I know that we have likea limited amount of decisions or
processing to deal withdecisions every day and every
little interruption does nothelp with that.
At least that's my anecdotalexperience with it.
(10:28):
I reduced my notifications on myphone.
My phone like used to be thesource, like one of the greatest
sources of stress.
Nowadays, I pretty much onlyhave a notification on if it's
an alarm or if it's a phonecall.
So it doesn't mean I don't getother stuff.
I just don't have it audible.
(10:49):
So I set specific timesthroughout the day to check and
get back.
So usually it's like within atwo-hour time frame, like every
two hours or so that I am ableto check and that way I don't
miss something important if it'ssomething super important like
you know it's either going to bea phone call or it can wait
(11:10):
really i do a lot of video callsgetting into that zoom fatigue
SPEAKER_00 (11:16):
yeah
SPEAKER_01 (11:17):
so for that i typically do two hours of video
and then an hour off just tokeep my my sanity because if
you're on video all day it'sjust it's really hard you can
definitely get around that bydoing audio only or or even text
when possible.
And then really just trying toeliminate meetings that could be
(11:38):
an email.
Slack and Discord and chat apps,that's still not technically
asynchronous.
It's more of real time.
So there are other asynchronousparts that application
department and whatnot, evenjust as simple as like a shared
Google doc or a ticketing systemor any number of other options
(12:02):
that you can workcollaboratively with people, but
it doesn't have to benecessarily in real time,
especially with a distributedteam in different time zones or
different things, it can getpretty tricky.
But if done properly, it canreally eliminate lots of
unneeded meetings that conflictwith people's schedules and just
reduce stress all around.
So there's trying to reducemeetings and interruptions in
(12:25):
people's actual doing work isreally helpful.
SPEAKER_00 (12:30):
Yeah, absolutely.
Something that I discoveredrather recently is there's a
therapist on TikTok and she hada baby when the pandemic hit and
then she got postpartumdepression, but she was not able
to have her family there becausethey're all isolating because of
(12:54):
COVID.
So she had to kind of come upwith her own way of doing
things.
So she's got a website calledstrugglecare.com.
And in it, she describes how,you know, okay, you're not able
to cope to 100%.
So you don't have to keep aperfectly maintained house.
(13:17):
So she describes what the basicthings to function are.
So like, you need to make sureyou have clean plates and clean
clothes, but your house doesn'thave to be spotless.
You don't have to haveeverything.
Everything dusted.
So she's got some great ideasthere.
There are worksheets that she'screated and she's got some
(13:41):
resources on her website thatreally help with, you know, if
you're having a really deepdepression, what would work for
you?
Like if you're having a reallytough day, you can't shower.
Okay.
Can you brush your hair?
Can you, you know, get a wipeand, you know, Yeah.
(14:32):
So if that helps some people.
SPEAKER_01 (14:36):
I found that if I'm able to forgive myself for
procrastinating something or notgetting everything on my to-do
list done, I'm much more likelyto finish it up the next day
than if I had spent all nightguilt tripping about it and not
being able to sleep.
So definitely does help.
SPEAKER_00 (14:53):
One thing with regards to the pandemic that if
people are having depression,one thing that I recommend
checking on, This is very true.
(15:16):
So make sure you go and go toyour doctor and get checked out
as part of, you know,
SPEAKER_01 (15:22):
your overall wellness.
So when I was in the PacificNorthwest, I'm very familiar
with this to the point where,uh, I don't get out much.
So I actually have a happy lightand a happy light is a super
bright light.
You can turn on for probablylike half an hour, 45 minutes or
something like that.
And it helps trick your braininto thinking you're getting
(15:43):
some light.
And so it actually, uh, doeshelp improve my mood.
So if I'm having a really badtime of things, for example,
like in the winter or something,when it's really dark a lot or
overcast or whatnot, I can gowith that.
And then, of course, it'll alsohelp with sleep.
If your body doesn't know whenyour day-night cycle is, it can
(16:06):
have issues with that as well.
So that is also helpful there.
So definitely use it when youneed it.
Also, being in a box.
Even in the Pacific Northwest,if you don't never leave your
house, you don't get that green.
So having plants can be quitethe mood booster.
(16:28):
Even just one or two.
Absolutely.
Just like a cactus or asucculent that doesn't pretty
much ever need water orsomething.
They're just about my speed.
Especially if you're strugglingto do the basics, you don't want
to be having to take care ofplants.
The low-maintenance plants arereally quite handy.
me.
Absolutely.
(16:53):
There's some pretty realisticfake plants out there that can
definitely be a mood boost aswell.
SPEAKER_00 (16:59):
Absolutely.
I have a little aloe plant.
I love my little plant.
I have managed to keep it alive.
I think we've covered a lot ofthings.
Is there anything that we're
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
missing?
Yes.
I live and work in a room thatfaces the neighbors.
So I have film on my window andthen I have a blackout curtain.
So there's something calledwindow-swap.com and it lets me
bring up video clips of otherpeople's windows from around the
(17:31):
world.
So if I need to pick me up, Ican just pop that up in my
second monitor
SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
while I work.
Very nice.
All right.
Oh, and also pets.
Pets can help you feel better.
I really want a goldenretriever, but that's on hold.
I have two dogs already.
SPEAKER_01 (17:53):
There you go.
We have two cats and a fish.
Nice.
We like hanging out together.
SPEAKER_00 (18:00):
And the cats don't eat the
SPEAKER_01 (18:01):
fish?
No.
It's just another form ofentertainment.
That's like the big stainedglass doors.
The birds like to come and hangout with the plants out in front
of the windows.
The cats will sit and watch.
Every once in a while.
I do actually get out of my roomto go pet the cats.
(18:23):
It's definitely a nice break togo brew some tea and sit and pet
the cats for a bit.
At the end of the day, I thinkthat's one of the key things.
Making sure to take enoughbreaks and let your brain rest.
Your brain is still going to beworking on the problem.
(18:44):
Oftentimes, it'll be morehelpful than just staring at
your screen for another now arebanging your head against a
wall.
Put your brain work on in thebackground and you'll be
surprised at what I'll come up
SPEAKER_00 (18:57):
with.
Yeah.
Thanks for listening to theSecurity Chipmunks.
And remember, if it seemsoverwhelming, just keep chipping
away at it.
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