your how-to guide for getting your
hey sharon thanks for coming on we’re
having a very lively uh talk beforehand
there may have been a lot of laughing
and screwing around and not knowing
where this may go but i’m going to keep
down the road we can go off course but i
think this is very timely right now uh
you’re you’re an author you’re a
practice practicing psychiatrist or
psychologist psychologist psychologist
you don’t prescribe drugs um
and that’s what i like i like people who
i’m not a big fan of just pure academics
because they talk from theory and not
necessarily experience so i like the the
hybrid of i always say time in the salt
mines but in the seat you got to have
both to be able to teach people and to
be able to work with people so with that
how did you get into what you do today
well i mean it’s a long story from the
beginning so i’m just gonna give you the
you got time there’s no constraints here
yeah well i’ve always been somebody who
is interested in how the mind works i
think that’s why i ended up going into
psychology i really wanted to understand
figure out how i can help them
and as i was doing this work and i’ve
basically practicing for the last 20
over the course of the last maybe six
years or so i decided that i i really
just got turned on to coaching and i
thought about you know if i’m going to
start this other business
who are the people that i like working
with the most because as a psychologist
i would basically see anybody who walked
right you didn’t have a specialty then
as a psychologist with your practice at
that time just just that i worked with
they would come to me through like
insurance companies and things like that
so i never really knew who was going to
come in they would just be funneled in
and the majority of people had very
similar issues so we would do a lot of
the same work so it would be depression
then we got more into like trauma work
but as i and and of course they came
from all different disciplines so i had
people who were you know executives and
then others that were physicians and
others that were students and i’m
and as i was trying to intentionally
around my coaching i really wanted
i was going to be excited to work with
and to be more selective in my audience
and what i realize is i’m i really love
the people who are those go-getters the
show up and they’re motivated and
they’re engaged because the alternative
from you know my clinical experience is
just show up every week and for them
that was enough it’s like i’m checking
but they don’t remember what you talked
about the week before and there’s no
continuity in between sessions they’re
not really doing anything with the
and i was like that doesn’t work for me
right i’m really about saying
transformation and so i was looking for
going to do something with it that get
excited that they’re like okay i tried
this in my life this is what happened
and i always take that kind of
scientific approach to try something out
come back that’s data let’s see if it
worked great if it didn’t work why it
didn’t work what we can try next and
that’s how you kind of build the life
that you want to build right we do that
in business but i like to apply that to
i was like well what are those
professions where people are
really working hard and they’re
struggling and what are the things that
i can help them with given my
years of experience in the field how can
i kind of package that for them and so i
landed on burnout i was like oh what is
this burnout thing i mean we’ve all
heard the term but i was like i don’t
even know what that means let me look it
up and started to kind of read on it
and the more i read the more i was like
come in and they’re describing their
situation they don’t use that word
but that’s exactly what they’re
describing and i thought well how
fascinating that people are actually in
the midst of burnout and they don’t even
right and so then i decided like part of
my mission has to be educating people um
so that they can start to
the solution that is required right so
as a psychologist or even like anybody
in medicine or psychiatry like they know
there’s a diagnosis for the problem not
like any sort of stigma on the person
but so that we can have a tailored
foot is broken we’re going to have a
very different treatment than if you
have a sore throat and it’s the same
thing in psychology right so if you’re
depressed it’s going to be different
well and that’s the thing too is you’re
right the word burnout is thrown
out all the time you know and you said
you found me through my episode where
come unraveled during covet a bit of i
was just frustrated with people
not taking advantage of the free time as
someone who had heard i’m sure you’ve
heard it the excuse especially starting
in health is the biggest complaint i
just don’t have time you don’t
understand my life you know the typical
excuse after excuse after excuse were
straight back to the smartphone
and it just aggravated me that people
have been complaining that they work too
hard don’t have enough free time they’re
burned out then they get all this free
they don’t do anything they literally
double down on their bad behavior and it
threw me for a loop a little bit i just
got frustrated not understanding
that my audience isn’t the typical
like you said i have highly motivated
people looking to do better
and that’s what i kind of strive for too
i want the people who are going to
change who are interested in being
better people getting out there and
making things happen not being a victim
not complaining about the system yeah
hey i complain about the system enough
but i’ve worked in it and i tried bust
my butt to try and fix it i want people
who are fixers i always say you’re
either part of the problem or you’re
part of the solution so is that kind of
how you were weaving your way to find
your coaching kind of a person the
person who you wanted to come in
what they’re doing outside the coaching
but it was what they were doing inside
the coaching so sometimes people get
you know when you’re experiencing
it affects you in all different ways and
then it’s hard for people to
they’re not showing up as their true
selves right because they’re under kind
of the pressure of their their mind
their showing up in stress mode and that
just takes you away from how you
normally would be in the world so for
you’re somebody who cares very much
about relationships and you’re also very
knowledge based so you’re you’re a
thinker you’re somebody who um
likes to analyze situations but when
you’re under stress you’re probably
going into action mode and like what
you change how you show up and that’s
happens when people are burned out is
they’re not themselves they’re exhausted
cynical they are experiencing and
depending how far down the rabbit hole
they’ve gone i mean their body starts to
are finding that they’ve developed all
kinds of health conditions all these
things are starting to affect you in
your confidence in your performance at
work and they start to become this
right the more you see that your
performance has declined if you are
with getting things done achievement
right that’s what these high achievers
are all about it’s like i have to
perform and a lot of them their
self-worth is really tied into that then
and then they get into the depression
mode and the anxiety mode and imposter
syndrome is showing up so it becomes
like i said the self-perpetuating cycle
experience these symptoms the more
i i’m hoping that makes sense no
as you were saying all this
it was playing uh a part of my life in
my head and i’ve talked about it but not
in depth there’s a lot of pieces that i
i tell people there’s certain things i’m
just not comfortable about talking about
um because i i i go through life
evolving i call it some prior to
government service during government
service i’m in my post-government
service i’m in phase three of my
and phase two was incredibly
instrumental in in shaping what is now
gary i lost gary during the government a
and as you said that at the end of my
i was incredibly uh i mean i was
stressed out the worst i’d ever been i
was holding on by a thread
i was sick all the time uh my health was
terrible my sleep was terrible and i
thought by doubling down and working
harder i could fix the problem and it
made me less efficient made me worse
made me incredibly not even anywhere fun
to be around i was a horrible
munching i mean i was terrible i was
i was bitter and i would snap real quick
so it’s funny as you say those things i
was going through this progression and
i didn’t even recognize it until the
very end to where i was almost too far
gone i caught it i think it was not just
it was a couple people around me who
came to me and said hey man
this is what you need to do
