January 28, 2025 • 37 mins
John and Richard discussed stress, triggers, coping strategies, lessons learned and stress management techniques. The focus is on middle-aged, black man and managing and mitigating the stress that we encountered just living life.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, Welcome to raw and Refined the Gentleman's Hour, where
we're going to have conversations with middle aged black men
about what's going on. We welcome you to listen, comment, like,
and hopefully encourage others to join for future conversations as well.
(00:26):
We like to start off with the toast, and we
feel that the most appropriate toast at this in our
real meeting would be an old fashioned why in old fashion?
Because it is raw and refined.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Today, two of the three of me goes out. Here's
John and Rich. Greg will join us next time. So
today we're talking about ways to deal with and mitigate
stress in our lives. Welcome to the inaugural podcast. From
time to time we'll have all three other times as
will be two of us. We'll sometimes have guests on
with us as well. John will tell you about himself,
(01:14):
and I'm Rich I'll tell you about myself. You know,
we've known each other for the majority of our lives.
John's a doctor and I'm a university dean, and we're
here to talk about a lot of different things, you know,
in this podcast, but for today, we're talking about ways
to deal with and mitigate stress in our lives. Quick
overview of this episode. John's going to introduce himself in
(01:38):
a moment, and then we're going to talk a little
bit about personal stress triggers and some insights on dealing
with that. We'll talk about coping strategies, we'll kind of
talk about some lessons we've learned over our lifetimes for
dealing with stress, and then we'll close it out. So, John,
what do you want to share with the people about
you in the way of an introduction?
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Well, I appreciate it rich Man. It's so good that
we're doing something like this. I think the aspect of
just understanding how important it is for men to be
able to talk and just talk about what's going on.
It's so vitally important, which is you know, us three
we've always had that ability to do so, which I
(02:20):
think has helped us, you know, at least even get
to where we are right now with managing day to
day life events as well. It's something that I'm excited
about us getting done and being able to share with
the public. You know, I am an internal medicine physician,
do a lot of different things as relates to that,
also involved with health equity as well, so I'm sure
(02:43):
some of what we talked today will have some of
that influence in there as well.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Wonderful, wonderful. So let's jump on in our first topic
and hear personal stress triggers. John, what are some of
your personal stress triggers. I'll go second.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Okay, you know, it can always depend on the day.
If I think about it like that, if most of
my week is suspend that work, then it's a matter
of not having things feel like they're flowing as well
as we'd like for them too, and then feeling the
pressure of what that looks like. So, you know, being
(03:20):
a physician and working in a clinic, you're always kind
of on a time crunch. You're kind of trying to
figure out how to make sure you're giving people the
time that they need when they're seeing you, but also
making sure that you're being aware of the other people
that are waiting to see you as well. And then
you have your team members that are there that are
(03:42):
asking questions and looking for responses as it relates to
that as well. But most of that right now is
probably around more of the work stressors. As far as
just personal wellness, I'd say not feeling like I've got
enough time to just do some of the things that
I'd like to do well. So we'll talk a little
(04:03):
bit more probably about how we can kind of dwelve
into that a little bit more. But you know, for
right now, I'm thinking those are kind of my major stressors,
right Yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
I think that it's very similar. I think that's quite common.
You know, as working professionals that a big chunk of
our personal stressors are going to be work related. You know,
just naturally we spend so much of our waking time
at work or doing work related stuff. So for me, deadline,
what I do is as a dean, a big chunk
(04:35):
with my responsibility is curriculum related. Another chunk of it
is faculty performance and things like that. So I don't
have anything life or death going on in my space.
But every job, every company, every organization feels as though
everything that they need to get done it's somewhat life
or death. Right So you know, there's I guess, you know,
(04:55):
those work related stresses. It's a perfect example in twenty
twenty for we you know, we run in a crunch
of accreditation visits and so you know, the timelines are
getting compressed, all the requests for information things that nature
can kind of pile up. You know. That's the examples
of how that stress can happen. And then you know
there's always interpersonal relationship stuff, you know, right, even in
(05:19):
the best in relationships, things pop up that can add stress.
But I think the biggest thing for me probably is
work related stressors and maintaining and doing everything in those
buckets within those time frames and things like that. But
you know, one of the things that we have to
do is is we have to you know, figure out,
you know, the work life balance, right, that challenge how
(05:41):
do we effectively get what we need to do for
work done, but not let it consume our tied life.
You know, I can remember on many occasions I've been
with my employer, the parent company since fifteen sixteen years
something like that, and you know a lot of new
people come long over time, and I always would say
(06:01):
to them that, you know, it's important that you not
let this place consume you, because it will if you
allow it. It's very easy to let the job become
your whole life or a bigger chunk of your life
than it should. So the challenge in managing that balance
that you know, it's I'd say probably the best thing
is if you can pick an employer that if you
(06:23):
if you have to work for someone and you know,
aren't blessed to work for yourself. You know, finding an
employer who actually values work life balance is huge because
if the employer doesn't, then it's it's wholly up to you.
There's nothing that's being built into the structure to accommodate that.
If you you know, let's go ahead.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
No, I was just going to say, yeah, you brought
you brought up really too good points that I don't
want us to leave on yet. And one is the
work life balance aspect of things is. And then the
second interpersonal stressors as well. You know, given us and
the public may not be aware, but we're we're middle
aged men, you know, we're in our fifties, so we're
(07:03):
in a generation now that we're having to not only
try to take care of our families, ourselves, but also
our parents. So this is something that impacts a lot
of what we have going on as it relates to
stressors that there's no there's no great history or or
anything there that that can help guide us as to
(07:25):
what that looks like. You know, So we're trying to
navigate that, and that that puts a big wrinkle in
things as relates to how do we how do we
manage those stressors Because we love our families, you know,
we love our parents. We want to be able to
provide and help them.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Along the way.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
But they have issues going on trying to navigate this world.
They may have memory issues that are going on, they
may have illnesses that prevent them from being able to
be fully independent. And then for some they may still
have kids that are growing up and what that looks like,
you know, as well as just maintaining your own sanity
through it all as well. And then when the work
(08:00):
life balance comes up, you know, I know you may
see it as well, Rick, I see it when I
see folks that are coming in new to to the
practice of medicine or even new to what it means
to be in a clinic. Their conception of what work
life balance is is a lot different than I say,
probably with you and our conception of work life balance is.
(08:21):
I think they're more on life than the work, and
I appreciate that, but not understanding that you have to
have the work in order to provide for some of
the life that you that you want as well.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
Yeah, it's it's tough. I can remember when when we
were a lot younger, when I was still practicing law,
having a buddy who would making a lot of money
but was totally neglecting as health in pursuit of all
the scratch you could make. And I just remember saying,
to hell, you know, your family is really going to
enjoy all that money you make for them, you know,
(08:53):
after you're gone, after you're gone, you know, right, do
you want to have Do you want to have an
opportunity to enjoy any of this? Or is it just
you know, are you cool with you know, working yourself
into the ground, and if you are and cool, but
it just seems to me that you could figure out
a way to you know, be able to hang around
and enjoy some of this what you create.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
I agree, Man, it took me turning fifty to truly
understand that I've worked in order to be able to
enjoy life. But I want to be able to enjoy
life before something happens to where whatever I'm making is
going towards that.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
I tell my folks who are getting close to retirement
that hey, you know, let's try to do what we can,
you know, at least make sure that you can enjoy
what you've been doing all these years, you know what
I'm saying, trying to give it a perception that, hey,
it ain't all about just us working right now either.
So we get that work life balance, We understand aspects
(09:54):
of it, but hey, when you get to that point
when you can you can just sit back, relax and enjoy.
I want you to be well, healthy in a place
where you can enjoy all of that as well, and
not using all that you've earned to pay for the
medicines and doctor visits, you know, the legal fees and
whatever else that's looking like, well, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
It reminds me of this, you know meme I saying
on Facebook at some point along the way or one
of those platforms where it's this couple they're riding on
the river or something like over in Italy. They're senior
citizens and they're both just laid out, you know, knocked out.
They're trying to kick it, but they don't have any
guess left in the tank to do any of that,
(10:38):
you know. And so that's to your point. Talk a
little bit about financial stress or time management struggles and
how that can impact as a stress triggers. Oh your
financial stress or time management.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Yeah, so speaking on both of those, man time management,
financial matters sometimes intertwine as well. But you know, time
management comes down to how do we where we place
our effort given the time that we have. So, you know,
we have twenty four hours within a day, but you
have to rest, you have to eat, you have to
be able to relax your mind during that time. And
(11:14):
for those that say, oh, I'll rest when i'm dead,
well you may be dead a lot sooner than you
expect it to be and not really again going back
to being able to joy all that you had work
towards as well too, So you've got to learn understand
time management man like you know, someone like myself, yourself
as well involved with other activities you know, take up time.
(11:35):
Family takes up time, work takes up time, meetings take
up time. So it's again prioritizing what that looks like
and what's important for you and for you to be
able to get done what you want to try to accomplish.
When it comes to financial stressors, I think you know,
it's a matter of what we want, you know, I
mean there are aspects of what we need when it
(11:57):
comes to finances, and that's food and shelter, But then
comes down to what is it that we want type deal,
and that's to be able to travel. You know. For
some it's the clothes, for some it's the jewelry. For
some is the you know, being able to have a
certain persona with their life, their cars, their house, their.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Things of that nature.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
So some of that we put onto ourselves, which can
be okay, but now you have to understand how am
I going to navigate through those financial stressors so that
I can still maintain my health and wellness in order
to enjoy all of those you know that I'm trying
to achieve as well.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
I think one of the things that's helped me a
great deal is as actively using the calendar. You know,
just something that's just simple tech kind of thing, but
it makes a big difference. And so you know, I've
got obviously we got fifteen different calendars. I've got in
my current role, I run the programs for three different universities.
That's part of our system. So I've literally got three
(12:55):
calendars for work. It's all merged into outlook, you know.
So the view that I have appears just one calendar,
but it's three calendars and better than that. And then
I have my personal calendar, which is you know, which
also has layers because it's one with me, it's one
with my wife and I, and then there's a third
one that's all full family, that's my wife and my
(13:16):
mother and I, you know, so on my phone. Then
that means there's like six calendars all working together, but
you know, I can see it all and so it's
still it allows me to keep a good handle on
where I got going on every day every weekend two
months from now, four months from now, and I think
that that helps. I've gotten to a point in my
(13:37):
life where I'm comfortable saying no to people, no, you
can't have that time, that time is for me, or
no this time I'm doing this or that, or nope,
I'm just not doing anything at this time, you know.
So I've gotten to a point where I'm comfortable enough.
And then, you know, one of the most basic things
I've done, and I've done this for decades now, but
every day on my calendar, lunch is blocked out. I
(13:59):
block out time lunch, and it's and it's on the
public facing calendar. So anybody that tries to schedule something
on my calendar, any invite you're trying to send me,
you're gonna see that that time is blocked out. So
if you want to schedule something during that time, that's fine.
But I'm gonna be eating during that meeting, you know, right,
And that's important, bro. Yeah, so or if we're in
(14:21):
the same place, we're gonna be eating during that night,
or you're gonna be sitting there watching me eat. But
you know, it's just the taking control of my time
and making sure that I'm the one deciding as much
as possible about how my time is divvied up, you know,
I think is important.
Speaker 3 (14:37):
So let's talk I think real quick about what the
calendar is, bro. I'm with I'm like you on that.
I've got my work you know, Outlook calendar, and I've
got my personal calendar as well. What I would encourage
us to do, though, try to have our calendar as
a guide to what what is going on, preparedness, being
(15:00):
prepared for what it looks like in the future days.
But be careful about how overloaded that calendar can get
as well. You can look at that calendar and see
that you've got every slot already booked up, except like
you said, your lunch time in there. Well okay, well
that you also put in time for you in there.
(15:20):
You see what I'm saying, that you put in your
time for just a moment for yourself. Did you put
a time in there for say, okay, I got my lunch,
but what about my exercise? What about I'm giving a
call to my significant other to say, hey, how you
doing or whatever like that, because that whole day can
be blocked up with all these other excess activities. And
let's be real, at the end of the day, you
(15:41):
know somebody, yes, is important, but is it really as important.
It's just other things that are going on in our
lives as well.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, good point. And so yeah, when I talk about
the calendar being filled in, that includes everything, even like
for example, this today, this time is on the calendar.
And that's not so much just for me, that's also
for my wife, so she knows what I've got going on,
you know, that's some part of our shared calendar. But yeah,
so so she knows what I've got going on on
(16:10):
that day as well, so we can plan things together effectively.
And you know, like for me. I think some things
depends on the level of priority that you give them.
So like for me, the like you're talking about the
exercise that's built in for me, that's built in all
the time, and it's built into my workday as well.
So I'm literally hosting meetings, we're doing one on one
(16:32):
calls with some of my people while I'm on the
elliptical or you know, things like that, so we're making
sure that I've got the time to get in that exercise,
you know. But like you said, it's not just that
you're using the calendar. It's about the priorities that you
give two different things that you're putting on that calendar.
So it's you know, it's those are those those things
(16:53):
that you're doing that are going to enrich you? Are
they going on the calendar? Are those things that are
going to support your health and your wellness? Are they
going on their calendar too? So that everything that matters
and not just work, you know. Yeah, So it's gotta.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
Be I appreciate that this. So this is us getting
into some of you know, what we're talking about as
far as coping strategies there. And you know, my brother,
I'm I'm gonna put a word of caution in there
to you. I heard what you said about exercise and
having maybe a meeting or something all while you exercise.
And now I am one that I try to encourage folks, Hey,
(17:29):
do not blending the two. Okay, exercise is for you
once you start to bring in outside factors into the exercise,
and it's no longer giving you the true benefit that
you're trying to get from exercise. So you're trying to
get your heart rate and things of that going. Well,
you can do that walking around or whatever. You can
do that jumping up and down, whatever, but it's also
(17:51):
a mental aspect to exercise that you need from that
as well. And if you've got your mind going on
work related things while you are exercising, but I tell folks, no,
you're just still working, my friend, You're just still being
active while you're working. That's not the kind of exercise
I'm encouraging you to do because I need us to
have that mental space to where it is not associated
(18:12):
with these other things in order to relax and rest
your mind and body while doing so. So I love exercise,
but yet.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
I don't try and relax my mind. But I'm exercises though.
That's what I use the meditation for. Good, that's what Yeah, yeah,
that's what I use the meditation for. But I find
something that's not something that happens often. But if I've
got to, you know, if I've got a meeting, I
do one on one phone calls with some of my
program chairs and so that's just that's just to catch
(18:42):
up a touch base. What's going on. Is there anything
that you need? And say, for instance, one of mine,
it's at nine am and I'm at the gym and
it's eight forty five. I got the choice. I can
cut myne I can shut it down, or I can
keep going a little longer and then we can chat
while I'm finishing up on the elliptical. You know. So
it's something like that. But it happens on occasion, but
(19:03):
it's not when I say that it's on it's not
on my schedule to work out while I'm having meetings.
Or I might get a you know, because we're pretty
much an on call all the time kind of world.
You know, I might be working out and I might
get a text from one of my people it says,
hey you got a minute, you got you know, I
got a quick question. Sure, give me a call and
then we'll wrap that and then I'll go back. But yeah,
(19:25):
I get your point. But yeah, I use the calming
of the mind doesn't happen when I'm working out, because,
for one, I'm bumping my playlist. I have the cardio
playlist that I'm bumping that does not allow for calm.
Now when I'm walking, I have a very different playlist
that's Alice Coltrane, and it's just a couple of songs
Love Supreme, a couple other ones. So it puts you
(19:47):
in that totally different mind state. Yeah, but I hear
what you're saying.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
That you put in it's about meditation time, so and
that's it's a matter of being able to find those balances.
So if you're still any those moments in then I
think that's still fine. You know, it's just a it's
just a matter of just knowing that. You know, I
have folks who are laboring and they're like, you know, hey,
I'm moving, I'm doing all kind of stuff at work
(20:13):
all day. I'm like, yeah, but you're not giving your
mind to break through any of that too. So that's
where that's important. So as long as you're getting that
aspect of it in, then I definitely feel like you're
helping them reduce those stressors. But also, brother, you know,
I'm gonna say, make sure that when you're doing things
outside of work, that you're finding time to do those
things that you enjoy. You know as well. Some people
(20:35):
think they got to go to the gym. Some people
think they got to join this class, they got to
do that in order to get their activity or whatever.
In I say, no, I mean, be an active doesn't
necessarily mean that you have to be in a place
to do that.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
You can do that in your home.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
You can go walking, you can go to the park,
you can dance, you know, swim, laught, cycle, whatever that's
looking like. Those are the activities that you want to
do because that's what to release that stress that you're under.
If you're stressed about oh I got to get to
this class or ooh I got to catch up with
what this this person doing in order to be able
to show that I'm doing they do not really reducing
(21:11):
any stress. You just added a whole other level right that.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, you've you've you've been creased your stress because now
you somehow turned it into a competition or something something artificial.
I think the most important thing you said right there
is to have the activity in a place where you're
having the fun with it too. So like one of
the things that we started doing recently, well not we've
been doing it for a little while, but we turned
(21:34):
it up a little bit recently. My wife and I
like the bowl We're not real we're not great bowlers,
but we enjoy it and it's a good exercise. And
so last fall, I want to say, we went out
and we got we bought bowling shoes just because you know,
it's like we wanted to go a little more often,
and you know, I hate using those rented shoes, so
we wouldn't have got some some. You know, they weren't
(21:55):
really expensive, but we want to want to you know,
pro shop at the bowling alley and got us some.
And then right around Christmas, I said, you know, I
have been doing some research and looking into it, and
so we went and we got bowling balls. When it
got our own balls and got them, you know, drilled
totally different experience having your own bowling ball because if
for one is fitted to your hands, so you know,
(22:15):
it just feels completely different Friday, we were going to
go to the jail, but instead we said, hey, let's
go bowling. And then we went and bowled for a
few hours, and then we went to the gym on Saturday,
just finding ways to be active and to do fun stuff.
At the same time, I had my watch on my
Apple Watch on it and had turned onto bowling, you know,
(22:35):
so it was track and I burned like three hundred
and fifty galleries while I was bowling, you know, so
you know, you know, yeah, you know, it would have
been great if I hadn't eaten a whole bunch of
chicken nuggets and fries right right there, you go, right, so,
you know, so I probably came out and that negatives
(23:00):
the calories consumed versus the calories burned. You know, we
had a good time, you know, and you know, in
terms of doing things like that, doing fun things, you know,
and and burning some calories while you're doing it, you know,
it's a great way to manage stress, to cope with
stress things of that. So you know, we've talked about exercise,
(23:23):
let's a little bit about let's talk a little bit
about sleep. You know, as a doctor, I know, you know,
you can really delve into you know, what happens when
you're not getting enough sleep, when people routinely short themselves.
You know, I think as a society, as a culture,
we've accepted this notion that people are supposed to work
really hard to be successful. You know, sleep is a
(23:45):
thing that often suffers. You know, there's you know, you
got finite blocks of time for work. You can't really
move that too much, right, if you've got to work
eight hours a day or ten hours a day, you've
got to do that. Then, you know, depending on where
you live. You know, there's another reality of a commute, right,
people are living, you know, if you're not working from home.
You know, my day was usually I was usually spending
(24:06):
before I became a remote worker, I was spending three
hours a day in the commute, you know, easily ninety
minutes in each direction. So if you're talking nine hours
for work, another three hours in the commute, that's twelve
hours right there. Right, So you got twelve hours left,
So then you know you're cutting If you're talking about
some quality time with your family, that's a couple hours, right.
(24:29):
There was time before you started that commute, at the
beginning of the day right, you got up, you don't
sprint out the door and you know five minutes after
you wake up, you know, on most days, so you know,
you're talking about at most eight hours, but for most people,
they're not getting eight hours of sleep, they're getting somewhere
four to six in there, right. Yeah, that's destrimental.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
Yeah, it definitely is in the long run. It definitely
affects our bodies, you know, and our spirit as well.
So some other things to do, you know, to try
to help get yourself ready for that kind of restfulness.
We'll say, you know, one of the things we do,
my wife and I, we travel and we dedicate time
just be able to spend together. My wife works out
(25:12):
of town throughout the week, but it's pretty much home
on the weekends unless we're traveling for some other event
or anything. So we just make sure that we make
that time, has time that we spend together. And you
need that relaxation component, especially after busy lifestyles, busy work
days and things of that nature. Your exercise and helps
your body to be able to relax actually as well.
(25:34):
But it's a matter of what we're doing throughout the
day too. So sometimes you know, late night activities or
late evening activities of exercise may not have to be
the cycling or the sprint or the up and down
you know, bodywork, whatever type deal, but it might be
the tight chi or yoga type activities that you can
do that helps the body still be active but yet
(25:56):
calms the body down as well. But really we should
be striving for at least about at least about six
to eight hours of sleep. But again, you know you
mentioned it, well, Rick, how does that day look? And
if you're left with only a certain amount of time
for you to try to get that rest, that doesn't
necessarily mean also that you're going to be restfully resting,
(26:17):
you know, during that time as well. So we talked
about it earlier about making sure our calendars are what
they are, but that's where we have to make sure
you're putting in the time for you, and that's part
of that time. It's like I need my downtime. I
need to turn off these devices that I have on
that Like you said, we're basically twenty four hours now
on this. Before somebody knew not the call you have
(26:38):
to ten o'clock. Well, now they send you a text
message or an email. And but you're here, the beep
or you see the light come on, you're like, ah, shoot,
what's that. Let me see what's going on. So now
you got the mind repped back up again. But it's
a matter of trying to find those moments where you're
going to say, look, we're shutting this down. TV's off.
I've already done some things to help relax my mind beforehand,
and then just trying to get to that sleep pattern.
(27:00):
Of course, there are things going on. You might have
that big project the next day. You might have those
that conversations you got to have with your professors and
everything the next day that you may not want to have,
but you know, you got to have with them about
some things that are going on. I might know that
I've got some patience coming in the next day that
I'm like, oh man, they are not where they're at,
or I know we're gonna have to talk about some
things that's just not going to be too comfortable with
(27:21):
with their health and things. So those things do play
into that as well. But for the most part, yeah,
we want to try to make sure that we're getting
in at least a good six to eight hours of
restless sleep and again try to find where you turning
off those devices at least at least about thirty minutes
to an hour before you're getting ready to kind of
wind things down as well.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Yeah, I'm gonna throw another technological suggestion in there. I
don't know if Android. I'm assuming Android has something similar
to it. With Apple products, they have this thing called
focus focus. You can set different focus settings, you know.
I use a focus for work. It's a work focused
on allows my phone will only ring for certain people.
(28:03):
I can identify the people that I want my phone
to ring for. If you're not in this group, if
you call, it doesn't ring. If you send a text message,
I don't get notifications. There's a driving focused right, it's
one if you're driving, you know, you'll get text messages
or you might get phone calls, you know, or whatever.
And then I have it. There's a sleep focus I
have set. So when the sleep focus I've got in
(28:23):
my phone set what time my regular sleep time is right,
what time I'm going to bed, my alarm, what time
it goes off in the morning. And so what happens
is a couple of things I've got, you know, lights
get dammed in my house at a certain time automatically.
They come on in the morning at a certain time automatically.
But the best thing is that focus. Only a select
few people will my phone ring for after ten o'clock.
(28:45):
After ten o'clock is you know, you grig, my wife,
my mom, you know, just a small handful of people.
My phone won't ring for anybody else. It just goes
the voicemail and it's silent. My watch at once, it
hits the sleep focus, the screen dims, my phone dims,
you know, all of the tech automatically. I have it
set to shut down about an hour before bedtime. So
(29:09):
that and again so you know, if an emergency comes
to yet, if somebody could call, if you called me
four five times in a row, it'll make you know.
I have that setting on there. But for most everything
else it automatically shuts it down. So again it's it's
just trying to take control of as much of that
time as possible, managing as much of my time myself,
(29:30):
you know, so other people aren't pulling it and tugging
at it, because you know, I'll listen to that message
in the morning and be like, hey, I'm sorry, Yeah,
you get that message you left at one o'clock in
the morning, you know, because you saw some funny something
on you know that was hilarious. Yeah, well it was
funny this morning. It was still it was still funny,
you know, but I didn't need to hear none of
(29:50):
that ship last night.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
So yeah, so folks got to be able to be
okay with that too, you know what I'm saying. So
folks got to realize that, look, just because you up
at two, three whatever in the morning, I mean, everybody
else is going to be up at the same time
and it's okay.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah as well. So yeah, so you've talked about family
and friends, spending quality time. You know, one thing we
didn't really talk a whole lot about yet is hobbies
or creative outlets. Is as ways to do stress relief.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
Yeah, I think you know real quick on that. You know,
it depends on and that goes back to a little
bit about what I was saying about, what are your
interest type deal and that's how you keep that interest going.
So for me, you know, I've always loved the martial
arts actually kung fu, tai chi or things that I've
done over the past twenty years, and I love it.
I realized that I have not given myself that space
(30:42):
to be as involved with it as I had been.
And that's on me, you know, it's not on anything else,
because I'm the one that's set that calendar, set those
timeframes and everything as well. But I recognize how I
miss it as well, and that's up to me to
now decide how am I going to find that space
to get it back.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
And it could Life happens when we drift, you know, life,
and we just we drift away from things and and
and and we can move into other places just because
of the normal you know, movements of life. When we
don't maintain that priority list. You know, like you said,
you it's it's slipped in priority, not intentionally, right, It
wasn't like at some point you said, you know what,
(31:20):
I'm tired of kicking shit. You know, you know, it
just kind of eased down the list as other things
creeped up right and kind of took a little more space.
And so you gotta kind of, you know, you gotta say,
I still love kicking shit, damn it, and and and
you know, squeeze it back in.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
That's exactly bring me some things, so those are good thing.
And then you know it depends on what it is
you love. I mean, I love to dance. Whenever I
can get out there to dance, I'm gonna be somewhere dancing.
And and that's because it just it's a relaxing space
for me, and I enjoyed. If you enjoy crochet, if
you enjoy playing cards, if you enjoy going for walks,
(31:59):
all those can be considered hobbies, you know, as well
as other ways to relieve stress and things too. So
actourage all of us to find that something, you know
what I mean. If it's reading, excellent, but we got
to find that something in order to try to help
just give us again a moment where your mind is
not always focused on one thing as well.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
Yeah, the pandemic introduced me, really introduced me to walk
in and when it's not cold, which so for half
the year because I'm in Chicago, and so for half
the year. You know, I try to walk every day.
My basic is on days that I work out, I
walk about a mile. On days that I don't work out,
I walk somewhere between three and five miles. There's a
(32:44):
nice park not far from my home. It's beautiful park,
and you know, I just walk in all the time,
and then I've walked it so much that in the
cold weather, when I walk in the gym, i walk
on the treadmill. But I've walked this park so much
that i have a really good mental image of the
entire park. And so one of the things that I do,
and this is I do to distress, is when I'm
(33:05):
walking on the treadmill, I try to keep I try
to walk and maintain a mental image of that park
as though i'm walking through it. The challenge is mentally
slowing your mind down, because you can walk through that
whole park in like five seconds in your mind, right,
you can just sit through it. Your mind moves at
that sweet But I'm trying to walk on the treadmill
and I'm trying to move through the park in my
mind at the same pace that i'm walking. So that
(33:29):
so that that that's a nice mental exercise. And so
I'm focused just on the image of that park as
I'm moving through. It takes me through it as if
i'm walking, and it takes me away from everything else.
So it's a really cool distressor. But that's like I said,
I've walked that park so many times over the last
several years that I've got the entire park, even where
(33:49):
some of the rabbits jump out and say, hey, but
it's a it's a it's a cool connection with with
mother nature for me, and it's a great way to
keep my stress down.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
That's excellent. That's your practice, say nindfulness, my friend. So
that's exactly what that is, no matter.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Where it takes you.
Speaker 3 (34:05):
If it takes you to that park, if it takes
you to that beach, if it takes you to that
grove or whatever, that is where you can find yourself
truly at peace with where you are, then that's practicing
mindfulness during those times. And that's important, man, especially when
things steel heavy. Take a few minutes. It doesn't have
to be fifteen, but take a few minutes just to
get you there, to help get you settled back down
(34:27):
so that you can be that dynamic performer that you
want to be through your work days and stuff as well.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
So, yes, well, I think we've touched on a lot
of things here. We've touched on some personal stress triggers,
we looked at some coping strategies. I think we've both
talked about some of the lessons we've learned along the way.
You know, I think one of the things I'd like
to stress as we get ready to wrap up is
(34:52):
that people don't have to make huge changes to get
on a better path towards managing and distress and things
like that. You know, baby steps actually do help. Making
small little changes, maybe just starting to use that calendar,
or being a little bit more selfish about some of
your time blocking off some time it's just for you,
(35:13):
or shutting down a little earlier each night. One little
change can make a difference, and it might get you
to a point where you'll start to notice, Okay, I
can really control this stuff. I can really manage more
of this stuff myself instead of just letting life happen
for me.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
It's setting those small goals. Sometimes when we reach for
those lofty goals, it's okay to have them, and we
need them, but we got to understand their steps to
get to that goal as well. And if you take
those steps and you're achieving those goals, and that helps
keep you motivated to get to the next level. And
that goes for just wellness and stress relief as well
as just losing weight or getting this exercise goal or
(35:50):
this work goal, all of them all of that. You're
absolutely right, brother, We got to just make sure you
take the small steps in order to get to those
areas well. And I hope that with our list listeners too, Rick,
you know, those that are listening, you know, truly understanding
and recognizing this is our first episode as well. But
we want folks to hopefully get some great takeaways from
(36:12):
this and if they have some input, have some suggestions,
want to share some things that they're doing as well
to help with stress management, please do that. And you
know this won't be our last conversation as relates to this.
It'll come up again something else that we're talking about.
So we would definitely like to utilize that information, and
we hope that you share share a podcast with others
(36:33):
as well.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Most definitely you think stress will come back again, you
will be talking about stre Come on, man, we just
solved We just solved it for the whole world right now,
So everybody listen to the podcast and everybody's good. Now
we'll move on to something else, because we never going
to have to deal with stress again.
Speaker 1 (36:49):
Right all right?
Speaker 2 (36:55):
Oh man? That is good. Well, thank you all so
much for spending time with us today. God bless you all,
and good night, good night,
Hello, Welcome to raw and Refined the Gentleman's Hour, where
we're going to have conversations with middle aged black men
about what's going on. We welcome you to listen, comment, like,
and hopefully encourage others to join for future conversations as well.
(00:26):
We like to start off with the toast, and we
feel that the most appropriate toast at this in our
real meeting would be an old fashioned why in old fashion?
Because it is raw and refined.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Today, two of the three of me goes out. Here's
John and Rich. Greg will join us next time. So
today we're talking about ways to deal with and mitigate
stress in our lives. Welcome to the inaugural podcast. From
time to time we'll have all three other times as
will be two of us. We'll sometimes have guests on
with us as well. John will tell you about himself,
(01:14):
and I'm Rich I'll tell you about myself. You know,
we've known each other for the majority of our lives.
John's a doctor and I'm a university dean, and we're
here to talk about a lot of different things, you know,
in this podcast, but for today, we're talking about ways
to deal with and mitigate stress in our lives. Quick
overview of this episode. John's going to introduce himself in
(01:38):
a moment, and then we're going to talk a little
bit about personal stress triggers and some insights on dealing
with that. We'll talk about coping strategies, we'll kind of
talk about some lessons we've learned over our lifetimes for
dealing with stress, and then we'll close it out. So, John,
what do you want to share with the people about
you in the way of an introduction?
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Well, I appreciate it rich Man. It's so good that
we're doing something like this. I think the aspect of
just understanding how important it is for men to be
able to talk and just talk about what's going on.
It's so vitally important, which is you know, us three
we've always had that ability to do so, which I
(02:20):
think has helped us, you know, at least even get
to where we are right now with managing day to
day life events as well. It's something that I'm excited
about us getting done and being able to share with
the public. You know, I am an internal medicine physician,
do a lot of different things as relates to that,
also involved with health equity as well, so I'm sure
(02:43):
some of what we talked today will have some of
that influence in there as well.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Wonderful, wonderful. So let's jump on in our first topic
and hear personal stress triggers. John, what are some of
your personal stress triggers. I'll go second.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Okay, you know, it can always depend on the day.
If I think about it like that, if most of
my week is suspend that work, then it's a matter
of not having things feel like they're flowing as well
as we'd like for them too, and then feeling the
pressure of what that looks like. So, you know, being
(03:20):
a physician and working in a clinic, you're always kind
of on a time crunch. You're kind of trying to
figure out how to make sure you're giving people the
time that they need when they're seeing you, but also
making sure that you're being aware of the other people
that are waiting to see you as well. And then
you have your team members that are there that are
(03:42):
asking questions and looking for responses as it relates to
that as well. But most of that right now is
probably around more of the work stressors. As far as
just personal wellness, I'd say not feeling like I've got
enough time to just do some of the things that
I'd like to do well. So we'll talk a little
(04:03):
bit more probably about how we can kind of dwelve
into that a little bit more. But you know, for
right now, I'm thinking those are kind of my major stressors,
right Yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
I think that it's very similar. I think that's quite common.
You know, as working professionals that a big chunk of
our personal stressors are going to be work related. You know,
just naturally we spend so much of our waking time
at work or doing work related stuff. So for me, deadline,
what I do is as a dean, a big chunk
(04:35):
with my responsibility is curriculum related. Another chunk of it
is faculty performance and things like that. So I don't
have anything life or death going on in my space.
But every job, every company, every organization feels as though
everything that they need to get done it's somewhat life
or death. Right So you know, there's I guess, you know,
(04:55):
those work related stresses. It's a perfect example in twenty
twenty for we you know, we run in a crunch
of accreditation visits and so you know, the timelines are
getting compressed, all the requests for information things that nature
can kind of pile up. You know. That's the examples
of how that stress can happen. And then you know
there's always interpersonal relationship stuff, you know, right, even in
(05:19):
the best in relationships, things pop up that can add stress.
But I think the biggest thing for me probably is
work related stressors and maintaining and doing everything in those
buckets within those time frames and things like that. But
you know, one of the things that we have to
do is is we have to you know, figure out,
you know, the work life balance, right, that challenge how
(05:41):
do we effectively get what we need to do for
work done, but not let it consume our tied life.
You know, I can remember on many occasions I've been
with my employer, the parent company since fifteen sixteen years
something like that, and you know a lot of new
people come long over time, and I always would say
(06:01):
to them that, you know, it's important that you not
let this place consume you, because it will if you
allow it. It's very easy to let the job become
your whole life or a bigger chunk of your life
than it should. So the challenge in managing that balance
that you know, it's I'd say probably the best thing
is if you can pick an employer that if you
(06:23):
if you have to work for someone and you know,
aren't blessed to work for yourself. You know, finding an
employer who actually values work life balance is huge because
if the employer doesn't, then it's it's wholly up to you.
There's nothing that's being built into the structure to accommodate that.
If you you know, let's go ahead.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
No, I was just going to say, yeah, you brought
you brought up really too good points that I don't
want us to leave on yet. And one is the
work life balance aspect of things is. And then the
second interpersonal stressors as well. You know, given us and
the public may not be aware, but we're we're middle
aged men, you know, we're in our fifties, so we're
(07:03):
in a generation now that we're having to not only
try to take care of our families, ourselves, but also
our parents. So this is something that impacts a lot
of what we have going on as it relates to
stressors that there's no there's no great history or or
anything there that that can help guide us as to
(07:25):
what that looks like. You know, So we're trying to
navigate that, and that that puts a big wrinkle in
things as relates to how do we how do we
manage those stressors Because we love our families, you know,
we love our parents. We want to be able to
provide and help them.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Along the way.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
But they have issues going on trying to navigate this world.
They may have memory issues that are going on, they
may have illnesses that prevent them from being able to
be fully independent. And then for some they may still
have kids that are growing up and what that looks like,
you know, as well as just maintaining your own sanity
through it all as well. And then when the work
(08:00):
life balance comes up, you know, I know you may
see it as well, Rick, I see it when I
see folks that are coming in new to to the
practice of medicine or even new to what it means
to be in a clinic. Their conception of what work
life balance is is a lot different than I say,
probably with you and our conception of work life balance is.
(08:21):
I think they're more on life than the work, and
I appreciate that, but not understanding that you have to
have the work in order to provide for some of
the life that you that you want as well.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
Yeah, it's it's tough. I can remember when when we
were a lot younger, when I was still practicing law,
having a buddy who would making a lot of money
but was totally neglecting as health in pursuit of all
the scratch you could make. And I just remember saying,
to hell, you know, your family is really going to
enjoy all that money you make for them, you know,
(08:53):
after you're gone, after you're gone, you know, right, do
you want to have Do you want to have an
opportunity to enjoy any of this? Or is it just
you know, are you cool with you know, working yourself
into the ground, and if you are and cool, but
it just seems to me that you could figure out
a way to you know, be able to hang around
and enjoy some of this what you create.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
I agree, Man, it took me turning fifty to truly
understand that I've worked in order to be able to
enjoy life. But I want to be able to enjoy
life before something happens to where whatever I'm making is
going towards that.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
I tell my folks who are getting close to retirement
that hey, you know, let's try to do what we can,
you know, at least make sure that you can enjoy
what you've been doing all these years, you know what
I'm saying, trying to give it a perception that, hey,
it ain't all about just us working right now either.
So we get that work life balance, We understand aspects
(09:54):
of it, but hey, when you get to that point
when you can you can just sit back, relax and enjoy.
I want you to be well, healthy in a place
where you can enjoy all of that as well, and
not using all that you've earned to pay for the
medicines and doctor visits, you know, the legal fees and
whatever else that's looking like, well, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
It reminds me of this, you know meme I saying
on Facebook at some point along the way or one
of those platforms where it's this couple they're riding on
the river or something like over in Italy. They're senior
citizens and they're both just laid out, you know, knocked out.
They're trying to kick it, but they don't have any
guess left in the tank to do any of that,
(10:38):
you know. And so that's to your point. Talk a
little bit about financial stress or time management struggles and
how that can impact as a stress triggers. Oh your
financial stress or time management.
Speaker 3 (10:51):
Yeah, so speaking on both of those, man time management,
financial matters sometimes intertwine as well. But you know, time
management comes down to how do we where we place
our effort given the time that we have. So, you know,
we have twenty four hours within a day, but you
have to rest, you have to eat, you have to
be able to relax your mind during that time. And
(11:14):
for those that say, oh, I'll rest when i'm dead,
well you may be dead a lot sooner than you
expect it to be and not really again going back
to being able to joy all that you had work
towards as well too, So you've got to learn understand
time management man like you know, someone like myself, yourself
as well involved with other activities you know, take up time.
(11:35):
Family takes up time, work takes up time, meetings take
up time. So it's again prioritizing what that looks like
and what's important for you and for you to be
able to get done what you want to try to accomplish.
When it comes to financial stressors, I think you know,
it's a matter of what we want, you know, I
mean there are aspects of what we need when it
(11:57):
comes to finances, and that's food and shelter, But then
comes down to what is it that we want type deal,
and that's to be able to travel. You know. For
some it's the clothes, for some it's the jewelry. For
some is the you know, being able to have a
certain persona with their life, their cars, their house, their.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Things of that nature.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
So some of that we put onto ourselves, which can
be okay, but now you have to understand how am
I going to navigate through those financial stressors so that
I can still maintain my health and wellness in order
to enjoy all of those you know that I'm trying
to achieve as well.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
I think one of the things that's helped me a
great deal is as actively using the calendar. You know,
just something that's just simple tech kind of thing, but
it makes a big difference. And so you know, I've
got obviously we got fifteen different calendars. I've got in
my current role, I run the programs for three different universities.
That's part of our system. So I've literally got three
(12:55):
calendars for work. It's all merged into outlook, you know.
So the view that I have appears just one calendar,
but it's three calendars and better than that. And then
I have my personal calendar, which is you know, which
also has layers because it's one with me, it's one
with my wife and I, and then there's a third
one that's all full family, that's my wife and my
(13:16):
mother and I, you know, so on my phone. Then
that means there's like six calendars all working together, but
you know, I can see it all and so it's
still it allows me to keep a good handle on
where I got going on every day every weekend two
months from now, four months from now, and I think
that that helps. I've gotten to a point in my
(13:37):
life where I'm comfortable saying no to people, no, you
can't have that time, that time is for me, or
no this time I'm doing this or that, or nope,
I'm just not doing anything at this time, you know.
So I've gotten to a point where I'm comfortable enough.
And then, you know, one of the most basic things
I've done, and I've done this for decades now, but
every day on my calendar, lunch is blocked out. I
(13:59):
block out time lunch, and it's and it's on the
public facing calendar. So anybody that tries to schedule something
on my calendar, any invite you're trying to send me,
you're gonna see that that time is blocked out. So
if you want to schedule something during that time, that's fine.
But I'm gonna be eating during that meeting, you know, right,
And that's important, bro. Yeah, so or if we're in
(14:21):
the same place, we're gonna be eating during that night,
or you're gonna be sitting there watching me eat. But
you know, it's just the taking control of my time
and making sure that I'm the one deciding as much
as possible about how my time is divvied up, you know,
I think is important.
Speaker 3 (14:37):
So let's talk I think real quick about what the
calendar is, bro. I'm with I'm like you on that.
I've got my work you know, Outlook calendar, and I've
got my personal calendar as well. What I would encourage
us to do, though, try to have our calendar as
a guide to what what is going on, preparedness, being
(15:00):
prepared for what it looks like in the future days.
But be careful about how overloaded that calendar can get
as well. You can look at that calendar and see
that you've got every slot already booked up, except like
you said, your lunch time in there. Well okay, well
that you also put in time for you in there.
(15:20):
You see what I'm saying, that you put in your
time for just a moment for yourself. Did you put
a time in there for say, okay, I got my lunch,
but what about my exercise? What about I'm giving a
call to my significant other to say, hey, how you
doing or whatever like that, because that whole day can
be blocked up with all these other excess activities. And
let's be real, at the end of the day, you
(15:41):
know somebody, yes, is important, but is it really as important.
It's just other things that are going on in our
lives as well.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, good point. And so yeah, when I talk about
the calendar being filled in, that includes everything, even like
for example, this today, this time is on the calendar.
And that's not so much just for me, that's also
for my wife, so she knows what I've got going on,
you know, that's some part of our shared calendar. But yeah,
so so she knows what I've got going on on
(16:10):
that day as well, so we can plan things together effectively.
And you know, like for me. I think some things
depends on the level of priority that you give them.
So like for me, the like you're talking about the
exercise that's built in for me, that's built in all
the time, and it's built into my workday as well.
So I'm literally hosting meetings, we're doing one on one
(16:32):
calls with some of my people while I'm on the
elliptical or you know, things like that, so we're making
sure that I've got the time to get in that exercise,
you know. But like you said, it's not just that
you're using the calendar. It's about the priorities that you
give two different things that you're putting on that calendar.
So it's you know, it's those are those those things
(16:53):
that you're doing that are going to enrich you? Are
they going on the calendar? Are those things that are
going to support your health and your wellness? Are they
going on their calendar too? So that everything that matters
and not just work, you know. Yeah, So it's gotta.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
Be I appreciate that this. So this is us getting
into some of you know, what we're talking about as
far as coping strategies there. And you know, my brother,
I'm I'm gonna put a word of caution in there
to you. I heard what you said about exercise and
having maybe a meeting or something all while you exercise.
And now I am one that I try to encourage folks, Hey,
(17:29):
do not blending the two. Okay, exercise is for you
once you start to bring in outside factors into the exercise,
and it's no longer giving you the true benefit that
you're trying to get from exercise. So you're trying to
get your heart rate and things of that going. Well,
you can do that walking around or whatever. You can
do that jumping up and down, whatever, but it's also
(17:51):
a mental aspect to exercise that you need from that
as well. And if you've got your mind going on
work related things while you are exercising, but I tell folks, no,
you're just still working, my friend, You're just still being
active while you're working. That's not the kind of exercise
I'm encouraging you to do because I need us to
have that mental space to where it is not associated
(18:12):
with these other things in order to relax and rest
your mind and body while doing so. So I love exercise,
but yet.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
I don't try and relax my mind. But I'm exercises though.
That's what I use the meditation for. Good, that's what Yeah, yeah,
that's what I use the meditation for. But I find
something that's not something that happens often. But if I've
got to, you know, if I've got a meeting, I
do one on one phone calls with some of my
program chairs and so that's just that's just to catch
(18:42):
up a touch base. What's going on. Is there anything
that you need? And say, for instance, one of mine,
it's at nine am and I'm at the gym and
it's eight forty five. I got the choice. I can
cut myne I can shut it down, or I can
keep going a little longer and then we can chat
while I'm finishing up on the elliptical. You know. So
it's something like that. But it happens on occasion, but
(19:03):
it's not when I say that it's on it's not
on my schedule to work out while I'm having meetings.
Or I might get a you know, because we're pretty
much an on call all the time kind of world.
You know, I might be working out and I might
get a text from one of my people it says,
hey you got a minute, you got you know, I
got a quick question. Sure, give me a call and
then we'll wrap that and then I'll go back. But yeah,
(19:25):
I get your point. But yeah, I use the calming
of the mind doesn't happen when I'm working out, because,
for one, I'm bumping my playlist. I have the cardio
playlist that I'm bumping that does not allow for calm.
Now when I'm walking, I have a very different playlist
that's Alice Coltrane, and it's just a couple of songs
Love Supreme, a couple other ones. So it puts you
(19:47):
in that totally different mind state. Yeah, but I hear
what you're saying.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
That you put in it's about meditation time, so and
that's it's a matter of being able to find those balances.
So if you're still any those moments in then I
think that's still fine. You know, it's just a it's
just a matter of just knowing that. You know, I
have folks who are laboring and they're like, you know, hey,
I'm moving, I'm doing all kind of stuff at work
(20:13):
all day. I'm like, yeah, but you're not giving your
mind to break through any of that too. So that's
where that's important. So as long as you're getting that
aspect of it in, then I definitely feel like you're
helping them reduce those stressors. But also, brother, you know,
I'm gonna say, make sure that when you're doing things
outside of work, that you're finding time to do those
things that you enjoy. You know as well. Some people
(20:35):
think they got to go to the gym. Some people
think they got to join this class, they got to
do that in order to get their activity or whatever.
In I say, no, I mean, be an active doesn't
necessarily mean that you have to be in a place
to do that.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
You can do that in your home.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
You can go walking, you can go to the park,
you can dance, you know, swim, laught, cycle, whatever that's
looking like. Those are the activities that you want to
do because that's what to release that stress that you're under.
If you're stressed about oh I got to get to
this class or ooh I got to catch up with
what this this person doing in order to be able
to show that I'm doing they do not really reducing
(21:11):
any stress. You just added a whole other level right that.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, you've you've you've been creased your stress because now
you somehow turned it into a competition or something something artificial.
I think the most important thing you said right there
is to have the activity in a place where you're
having the fun with it too. So like one of
the things that we started doing recently, well not we've
been doing it for a little while, but we turned
(21:34):
it up a little bit recently. My wife and I
like the bowl We're not real we're not great bowlers,
but we enjoy it and it's a good exercise. And
so last fall, I want to say, we went out
and we got we bought bowling shoes just because you know,
it's like we wanted to go a little more often,
and you know, I hate using those rented shoes, so
we wouldn't have got some some. You know, they weren't
(21:55):
really expensive, but we want to want to you know,
pro shop at the bowling alley and got us some.
And then right around Christmas, I said, you know, I
have been doing some research and looking into it, and
so we went and we got bowling balls. When it
got our own balls and got them, you know, drilled
totally different experience having your own bowling ball because if
for one is fitted to your hands, so you know,
(22:15):
it just feels completely different Friday, we were going to
go to the jail, but instead we said, hey, let's
go bowling. And then we went and bowled for a
few hours, and then we went to the gym on Saturday,
just finding ways to be active and to do fun stuff.
At the same time, I had my watch on my
Apple Watch on it and had turned onto bowling, you know,
(22:35):
so it was track and I burned like three hundred
and fifty galleries while I was bowling, you know, so
you know, you know, yeah, you know, it would have
been great if I hadn't eaten a whole bunch of
chicken nuggets and fries right right there, you go, right, so,
you know, so I probably came out and that negatives
(23:00):
the calories consumed versus the calories burned. You know, we
had a good time, you know, and you know, in
terms of doing things like that, doing fun things, you know,
and and burning some calories while you're doing it, you know,
it's a great way to manage stress, to cope with
stress things of that. So you know, we've talked about exercise,
(23:23):
let's a little bit about let's talk a little bit
about sleep. You know, as a doctor, I know, you know,
you can really delve into you know, what happens when
you're not getting enough sleep, when people routinely short themselves.
You know, I think as a society, as a culture,
we've accepted this notion that people are supposed to work
really hard to be successful. You know, sleep is a
(23:45):
thing that often suffers. You know, there's you know, you
got finite blocks of time for work. You can't really
move that too much, right, if you've got to work
eight hours a day or ten hours a day, you've
got to do that. Then, you know, depending on where
you live. You know, there's another reality of a commute, right,
people are living, you know, if you're not working from home.
You know, my day was usually I was usually spending
(24:06):
before I became a remote worker, I was spending three
hours a day in the commute, you know, easily ninety
minutes in each direction. So if you're talking nine hours
for work, another three hours in the commute, that's twelve
hours right there. Right, So you got twelve hours left,
So then you know you're cutting If you're talking about
some quality time with your family, that's a couple hours, right.
(24:29):
There was time before you started that commute, at the
beginning of the day right, you got up, you don't
sprint out the door and you know five minutes after
you wake up, you know, on most days, so you know,
you're talking about at most eight hours, but for most people,
they're not getting eight hours of sleep, they're getting somewhere
four to six in there, right. Yeah, that's destrimental.
Speaker 3 (24:52):
Yeah, it definitely is in the long run. It definitely
affects our bodies, you know, and our spirit as well.
So some other things to do, you know, to try
to help get yourself ready for that kind of restfulness.
We'll say, you know, one of the things we do,
my wife and I, we travel and we dedicate time
just be able to spend together. My wife works out
(25:12):
of town throughout the week, but it's pretty much home
on the weekends unless we're traveling for some other event
or anything. So we just make sure that we make
that time, has time that we spend together. And you
need that relaxation component, especially after busy lifestyles, busy work
days and things of that nature. Your exercise and helps
your body to be able to relax actually as well.
(25:34):
But it's a matter of what we're doing throughout the
day too. So sometimes you know, late night activities or
late evening activities of exercise may not have to be
the cycling or the sprint or the up and down
you know, bodywork, whatever type deal, but it might be
the tight chi or yoga type activities that you can
do that helps the body still be active but yet
(25:56):
calms the body down as well. But really we should
be striving for at least about at least about six
to eight hours of sleep. But again, you know you
mentioned it, well, Rick, how does that day look? And
if you're left with only a certain amount of time
for you to try to get that rest, that doesn't
necessarily mean also that you're going to be restfully resting,
(26:17):
you know, during that time as well. So we talked
about it earlier about making sure our calendars are what
they are, but that's where we have to make sure
you're putting in the time for you, and that's part
of that time. It's like I need my downtime. I
need to turn off these devices that I have on
that Like you said, we're basically twenty four hours now
on this. Before somebody knew not the call you have
(26:38):
to ten o'clock. Well, now they send you a text
message or an email. And but you're here, the beep
or you see the light come on, you're like, ah, shoot,
what's that. Let me see what's going on. So now
you got the mind repped back up again. But it's
a matter of trying to find those moments where you're
going to say, look, we're shutting this down. TV's off.
I've already done some things to help relax my mind beforehand,
and then just trying to get to that sleep pattern.
(27:00):
Of course, there are things going on. You might have
that big project the next day. You might have those
that conversations you got to have with your professors and
everything the next day that you may not want to have,
but you know, you got to have with them about
some things that are going on. I might know that
I've got some patience coming in the next day that
I'm like, oh man, they are not where they're at,
or I know we're gonna have to talk about some
things that's just not going to be too comfortable with
(27:21):
with their health and things. So those things do play
into that as well. But for the most part, yeah,
we want to try to make sure that we're getting
in at least a good six to eight hours of
restless sleep and again try to find where you turning
off those devices at least at least about thirty minutes
to an hour before you're getting ready to kind of
wind things down as well.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Yeah, I'm gonna throw another technological suggestion in there. I
don't know if Android. I'm assuming Android has something similar
to it. With Apple products, they have this thing called
focus focus. You can set different focus settings, you know.
I use a focus for work. It's a work focused
on allows my phone will only ring for certain people.
(28:03):
I can identify the people that I want my phone
to ring for. If you're not in this group, if
you call, it doesn't ring. If you send a text message,
I don't get notifications. There's a driving focused right, it's
one if you're driving, you know, you'll get text messages
or you might get phone calls, you know, or whatever.
And then I have it. There's a sleep focus I
have set. So when the sleep focus I've got in
(28:23):
my phone set what time my regular sleep time is right,
what time I'm going to bed, my alarm, what time
it goes off in the morning. And so what happens
is a couple of things I've got, you know, lights
get dammed in my house at a certain time automatically.
They come on in the morning at a certain time automatically.
But the best thing is that focus. Only a select
few people will my phone ring for after ten o'clock.
(28:45):
After ten o'clock is you know, you grig, my wife,
my mom, you know, just a small handful of people.
My phone won't ring for anybody else. It just goes
the voicemail and it's silent. My watch at once, it
hits the sleep focus, the screen dims, my phone dims,
you know, all of the tech automatically. I have it
set to shut down about an hour before bedtime. So
(29:09):
that and again so you know, if an emergency comes
to yet, if somebody could call, if you called me
four five times in a row, it'll make you know.
I have that setting on there. But for most everything
else it automatically shuts it down. So again it's it's
just trying to take control of as much of that
time as possible, managing as much of my time myself,
(29:30):
you know, so other people aren't pulling it and tugging
at it, because you know, I'll listen to that message
in the morning and be like, hey, I'm sorry, Yeah,
you get that message you left at one o'clock in
the morning, you know, because you saw some funny something
on you know that was hilarious. Yeah, well it was
funny this morning. It was still it was still funny,
you know, but I didn't need to hear none of
(29:50):
that ship last night.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
So yeah, so folks got to be able to be
okay with that too, you know what I'm saying. So
folks got to realize that, look, just because you up
at two, three whatever in the morning, I mean, everybody
else is going to be up at the same time
and it's okay.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah as well. So yeah, so you've talked about family
and friends, spending quality time. You know, one thing we
didn't really talk a whole lot about yet is hobbies
or creative outlets. Is as ways to do stress relief.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
Yeah, I think you know real quick on that. You know,
it depends on and that goes back to a little
bit about what I was saying about, what are your
interest type deal and that's how you keep that interest going.
So for me, you know, I've always loved the martial
arts actually kung fu, tai chi or things that I've
done over the past twenty years, and I love it.
I realized that I have not given myself that space
(30:42):
to be as involved with it as I had been.
And that's on me, you know, it's not on anything else,
because I'm the one that's set that calendar, set those
timeframes and everything as well. But I recognize how I
miss it as well, and that's up to me to
now decide how am I going to find that space
to get it back.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
And it could Life happens when we drift, you know, life,
and we just we drift away from things and and
and and we can move into other places just because
of the normal you know, movements of life. When we
don't maintain that priority list. You know, like you said,
you it's it's slipped in priority, not intentionally, right, It
wasn't like at some point you said, you know what,
(31:20):
I'm tired of kicking shit. You know, you know, it
just kind of eased down the list as other things
creeped up right and kind of took a little more space.
And so you gotta kind of, you know, you gotta say,
I still love kicking shit, damn it, and and and
you know, squeeze it back in.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
That's exactly bring me some things, so those are good thing.
And then you know it depends on what it is
you love. I mean, I love to dance. Whenever I
can get out there to dance, I'm gonna be somewhere dancing.
And and that's because it just it's a relaxing space
for me, and I enjoyed. If you enjoy crochet, if
you enjoy playing cards, if you enjoy going for walks,
(31:59):
all those can be considered hobbies, you know, as well
as other ways to relieve stress and things too. So
actourage all of us to find that something, you know
what I mean. If it's reading, excellent, but we got
to find that something in order to try to help
just give us again a moment where your mind is
not always focused on one thing as well.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
Yeah, the pandemic introduced me, really introduced me to walk
in and when it's not cold, which so for half
the year because I'm in Chicago, and so for half
the year. You know, I try to walk every day.
My basic is on days that I work out, I
walk about a mile. On days that I don't work out,
I walk somewhere between three and five miles. There's a
(32:44):
nice park not far from my home. It's beautiful park,
and you know, I just walk in all the time,
and then I've walked it so much that in the
cold weather, when I walk in the gym, i walk
on the treadmill. But I've walked this park so much
that i have a really good mental image of the
entire park. And so one of the things that I do,
and this is I do to distress, is when I'm
(33:05):
walking on the treadmill, I try to keep I try
to walk and maintain a mental image of that park
as though i'm walking through it. The challenge is mentally
slowing your mind down, because you can walk through that
whole park in like five seconds in your mind, right,
you can just sit through it. Your mind moves at
that sweet But I'm trying to walk on the treadmill
and I'm trying to move through the park in my
mind at the same pace that i'm walking. So that
(33:29):
so that that that's a nice mental exercise. And so
I'm focused just on the image of that park as
I'm moving through. It takes me through it as if
i'm walking, and it takes me away from everything else.
So it's a really cool distressor. But that's like I said,
I've walked that park so many times over the last
several years that I've got the entire park, even where
(33:49):
some of the rabbits jump out and say, hey, but
it's a it's a it's a cool connection with with
mother nature for me, and it's a great way to
keep my stress down.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
That's excellent. That's your practice, say nindfulness, my friend. So
that's exactly what that is, no matter.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Where it takes you.
Speaker 3 (34:05):
If it takes you to that park, if it takes
you to that beach, if it takes you to that
grove or whatever, that is where you can find yourself
truly at peace with where you are, then that's practicing
mindfulness during those times. And that's important, man, especially when
things steel heavy. Take a few minutes. It doesn't have
to be fifteen, but take a few minutes just to
get you there, to help get you settled back down
(34:27):
so that you can be that dynamic performer that you
want to be through your work days and stuff as well.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
So, yes, well, I think we've touched on a lot
of things here. We've touched on some personal stress triggers,
we looked at some coping strategies. I think we've both
talked about some of the lessons we've learned along the way.
You know, I think one of the things I'd like
to stress as we get ready to wrap up is
(34:52):
that people don't have to make huge changes to get
on a better path towards managing and distress and things
like that. You know, baby steps actually do help. Making
small little changes, maybe just starting to use that calendar,
or being a little bit more selfish about some of
your time blocking off some time it's just for you,
(35:13):
or shutting down a little earlier each night. One little
change can make a difference, and it might get you
to a point where you'll start to notice, Okay, I
can really control this stuff. I can really manage more
of this stuff myself instead of just letting life happen
for me.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
It's setting those small goals. Sometimes when we reach for
those lofty goals, it's okay to have them, and we
need them, but we got to understand their steps to
get to that goal as well. And if you take
those steps and you're achieving those goals, and that helps
keep you motivated to get to the next level. And
that goes for just wellness and stress relief as well
as just losing weight or getting this exercise goal or
(35:50):
this work goal, all of them all of that. You're
absolutely right, brother, We got to just make sure you
take the small steps in order to get to those
areas well. And I hope that with our list listeners too, Rick,
you know, those that are listening, you know, truly understanding
and recognizing this is our first episode as well. But
we want folks to hopefully get some great takeaways from
(36:12):
this and if they have some input, have some suggestions,
want to share some things that they're doing as well
to help with stress management, please do that. And you
know this won't be our last conversation as relates to this.
It'll come up again something else that we're talking about.
So we would definitely like to utilize that information, and
we hope that you share share a podcast with others
(36:33):
as well.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Most definitely you think stress will come back again, you
will be talking about stre Come on, man, we just
solved We just solved it for the whole world right now,
So everybody listen to the podcast and everybody's good. Now
we'll move on to something else, because we never going
to have to deal with stress again.
Speaker 1 (36:49):
Right all right?
Speaker 2 (36:55):
Oh man? That is good. Well, thank you all so
much for spending time with us today. God bless you all,
and good night, good night,
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