And welcome back to the Wellness Paradox podcast . I'm so grateful that you can join us on this journey towards greater human flourishing . As always , I'm your host , michael Stack , an exercise physiologist by training and a health entrepreneur and a health educator by trade , and I'm fascinated by a phenomena I call the Wellness Paradox .
This paradox , as I view it , is the trust , interaction and communication gap that exists between fitness professionals and our medical community . This podcast is all about closing off that gap by disseminating the latest , most evidence-based and most engaging information in the health sciences , and to do that , in episode 106 , we're joined by Karen Dowell .
Karen Dowell is a psychologist and a coach by trade and training , and this conversation is going to be around a book that she published in 2022 called Building Psychological Fitness certainly a title that will resonate with our audience , and this is a book about how high performers achieve with ease .
And the conversation we're going to have has lessons for both the individual professionals that listen to this podcast , as well as the clients and the patients that we work with , and I think one of the things that's going to become very clear in this discussion is the importance of tending to and taking care of our psychological fitness in a very similar fashion to
what we take care of our physical fitness , and again , all of us that listen to this obviously greatly value physical fitness , and I believe we value psychological fitness as well , but sometimes we don't think of them from the same perspective , and so I hope that's what this conversation leaves you with .
Any information we'd like to share with you from today's episode can be found on the show notes page , that's by going to wellnessparadoxpodcom forward slash episode 106 . Please enjoy this conversation with Karen Dowell Today . We're delighted to be joined by Karen Dowell . Karen , thank you so much for joining us .
Thanks for having me .
Michael .
So I'm super excited for this conversation because , although we are a fitness and a wellness podcast , obviously a big component to that and we've talked about this many times on the podcast is the psychological aspect and more and more as the research comes out , we realize that really intrinsic ties between psychology and fitness , and so whenever we have a chance to
have one of these discussions , I'm always excited . And , karen , we're going to spend some time talking about your book today . But before we dive into this discussion on your book , why don't you just give us a little bit of an idea of your background to provide some context for the conversation around the book ?
Great . So I'm based out of Minneapolis , minnesota , and I'm a psychologist . So I've been a psychologist for 25 , 6 years and my focus has always been in the workplace , and so I say that I've always been involved in fostering mental health at work . I just haven't been able to call at that until the last few years . So I've done .
My background is that I've done a lot of leadership development and assessment and coaching and then in the last probably five years I've leaned much more into fostering mental health awareness at work and helping people with burnout . Work with a lot of high achievers .
And during COVID I just began having this energy around and tension around , feeling really sad about how people are struggling , and I was hearing during my coaching calls I even counted one morning how many times I heard the word struggle and it was like 27 times people talking about their , their struggle . They're overwhelmed .
There was such uncertainty and people were still just feeling really alone in their experience , and so that's where I got the energy to write . The book is just as one more channel and mechanism and way for information to be accessible and to try to present it in a way that that people could tolerate , which is why I came up with psychological fitness .
Because when we talk about mental health , you know there's still stigma and people get confused about what's mental illness , mental illness and mental health . And when I was researching for the title of my book and I was looking at options using the words mental health , there were plenty of people that said , oh , that doesn't apply to me .
So you know we're making progress on a whole person being . You know a whole person being like we all have mental health , just like we all have physical health . We're not healthy or not .
Yeah .
I'm mostly physically healthy but I do have some ailments and challenges , but I don't have a disease , I don't have pathology and you know same with mental health . So I just operate out of that whole person continuum model . And so that was kind of a long answer to your question , but that's just a bit about my background and kind of what informs me .
So I've been trying to just get the word out , make mental health more mainstream , and I hope that you know we can be talking about our mental fitness just like we talk about our physical fitness .
Indeed , and you know no more important time . We've all seen and read the statistics of , you know , the mental health crisis . You know that exists in this country there's not enough mental health providers for all the people that need to be seen , mental health professionals .
I mean , it's a real problem and you know it's interesting that you come at this from the organizational perspective , because you know burnout is a very real thing , particularly , you know , in the healthcare space . You know a lot of the people that listen to this podcast are involved in healthcare either directly or indirectly , and it's a it's a challenging time .
You know resources are constrained and people are having to do more , and so we often sometimes don't always think of taking care of ourselves first , but it's the putting , putting on your own oxygen mask and making sure that you take care of yourself so you can take care of other people is is important , and I think you know we're going to take this discussion
in kind of two directions . You know one is you know what should our listeners , who are professionals , you know what should they be doing to ensure that they can flourish and be mentally healthy , but also you know how can they apply these lessons to the people that they work with on a day by day basis .
So let's , let's get into this on a high level before we start to apply it and talk about the framework that you put together in the book . Walk us through a little bit of about what we need to know in terms of building our psychological fitness , from your perspective .
Yes , great . And so essentially , my book is just a big research book , resource book , and I tried to include interventions that are all science backed and evidence based , and the model , basically , is just reminding us that we have agency over our well being and our mental health . And so use the word flourishing and I love that .
And the workplace happens to be the channel that I utilize . I mean , you know , you can try to tap the educational system or healthcare or the government , and the workplace is just the system in which I try to promote the message .
So I mean , at a high level , really , I my hope is to get many people , as many people as possible , out of that red zone of struggle and strain and suffering and move us into the zones of thriving and flourishing and to prevent people in the middle from sliding into the red zone .
And so the framework is basically this idea that we have agency I use these ACE pillars , ace , which is the need to take action and take steps that we have agency over how , like lovers , we can pull to enhance our well being and mental health , and and connecting with people and doing it with others is important , and the idea of empowerment and you have
empowerment again is just that we have some agency and we can be proactive whether it's looking at prevention or or the proactivity to generate additional mental health and and flourishing and I believe the workplace should be a source of well being and a source of flourishing , not something that damages our well being .
So the idea is we can train for physical fitness . We can also train for psychological fitness and we know that the components of any sort of personal change or self development are that change works . We can change with small steps over time , with follow up and accountability .
You mentioned the red zone and you know , I think people understand , you know mental illness , but I don't think sometimes people are aware of , maybe , when they're in that zone , of when they're you know they're , they're languishing or you know whatever , whatever word you want to use , what are some things that you know people who are listening can , can pay
attention to , to see if you know , maybe they need to be more aware of their psychological fitness deteriorating .
Yes , so there are all kinds of mental health continuum models . I have one that I put in my book , but they're that's not proprietary . There are many different ways to look at that illness wellness model .
But really taking inventory and having some time to reflect on number one , like the fundamental health practices , so , you know , we all know plenty of the things that we should be doing , that we don't do or shouldn't be doing , that we still do .
So looking at the foundation of we need to be getting sleep and hydrating , and getting exercise and drinking water and connecting with people . So all of that , but then also really understanding how to do a deeper dive , to check in with ourselves on how is my mood , how is the quality of my thinking .
It's very easy if we're triggered or experiencing fear , anxiety , to get into thinking traps . How do I understand how to regulate my emotions ? How do I foster emotional , emotional literacy so that I understand my feelings ? Because our emotions are signals , they're important , they're not necessarily facts .
So we want to look at them , but not but have a little bit of space between our relationship with our thoughts and feelings , so that we're having a right sized response to the situation . So I would just say , you know , checking in with ourselves , how am I feeling ? What are my , what are my , what's my attitude ?
What level of engagement am I having at work ? Where's my energy level ? What are energy boosters in my life ? What are energy drainers in my life ? Like ? These are all just different threads that we can appraise and assess , to check in with ourselves .
Check in with ourselves , I think , is so important , because we are all so busy and we're all so distracted and we check in with a lot of people in our life , but I feel as if many times the day goes by and we probably spend not as much time checking in with ourselves as was what we need to . So I think that that awareness piece is really important .
Yes , and if you think of , you know , the components of health , is if we think of our physical health , our emotional health , our cognitive health , our spiritual health , like these are all planes in which we can figure out what . Where is a gap ?
Is it an acute problem or where is there opportunity that I can generate or , you know , move further into the zone of health in any of those categories and vectors . And the pause , that taking time to reflect and pause .
It's a step that's very often overlooked and we're given such messages of hustle and be more productive and hurryness that it's really easy to forget , it's easy to do , but it's also easy to not do .
So , in terms of the model that you present in the book , let's first talk to the professionals that are listening to this podcast , that are trying to excel in their career . They're trying to make people healthier . How would you recommend that they apply that to the model that you present to their own careers ?
What can we pick out of the book as some really important lessons that people can consider and start implementing ?
Well , you know , when we think about the idea , like the paradigm of energy management , which is tends to be pretty relatable to people , fitness professionals tend to have that idea of tapping into energy , rest , recovery , replenish much more effectively than what we would think of as like our corporate athletes .
So I my , I mean and I often use that as an example you know trainers or people that are elite athletes or very in tune with their fitness habits . Those habits and practices can be applied emotionally and cognitively and how we manage our attention and all that . So I think there's a lot to be learned .
There's a lot of us we could learn from fitness professionals . You know how to apply some of their habits and practices into other areas of our lives . So , being aware of where are we exerting , where are we over exerting and what do we need to do in that space to replenish and refuel . So I would encourage people to think about that .
You know how , about my , my emotional energy , my cognitive energy , attention management is a huge challenge for people . Right now . We have so many signals and inputs and distractions and interruptions digitally that I think people are feeling really depleted and particularly scattered and distractible , and part of that is it isn't our fault .
Yeah like technology is bigger than us . So what we can do is look at what are the external conditions we're creating for ourselves and then managing my internal conditions so that I'm able to focus and self regulate . I guess I would ask what do you think your listeners , what do you think their greatest challenges in this space ?
Well , so you hit on one of them . You know I was actually thinking about it as you were saying . That is that you know partly . You know fitness professionals have had to put themselves on social media quite a bit as a way to differentiate themselves , you know , in the marketplace .
That's one of the great things about you know social media and , look , it has many ills as well , but one of the great things is it's kind of democratized advertising to a certain extent in our , in our industry .
So they're , they're on these things , you know all of the time , and so that co exists with the fact that most of the people that listen to this podcast , you know they're working with patients or clients , you know one on one during the day and you know they might go from you know eight to five , or in some cases you know eight to eight , with a break in
the middle of the day , and they need to have , or at least try to have , as much energy for the 8am person as the 7pm person . So I think that those are some of the challenges .
So I guess you know I would turn that back around to you and I would say in terms of you know , how do you , how do you recommend to professionals that need to be on social media that that they manage that constant stream of of inundation from social media ? And you know how do you , how do you manage your energy ?
You know , during the day , you know as you're trying to , you know , have as much energy for the first person as the last person , because that's a real challenge . I'd like to take a quick break from today's episode to tell you a little bit more about one of our strategic partners as a podcast .
As many of you know , the Wellness Paradox is all about closing off the trust , interaction and communication gap between fitness professionals and the medical community , and no organization does that better than the Medical Fitness Association . They are the professional member association for the medical fitness industry .
This is the industry that integrates directly with healthcare in many facilities throughout the entire country . The MFA is your go-to source for all things medical fitness . They provide newsletters , webinars . They even have standards and guidelines for medical fitness facilities .
They do events around the entire country and , most importantly , they are one of the more engaging networks in the entire fitness industry . I personally have benefited from the network that I've developed through the Medical Fitness Association and I highly recommend that all of you that are interested in solving the Wellness Paradox engage with the MFA .
To find out more about the Medical Fitness Association , you can go to their website , medicalfitnessorg . That's medicalfitnessorg . Now back to today's episode .
Right . So that's really the challenge of any kind of knowledge worker as well , or entrepreneur or solopreneur , and I think it's even harder for entrepreneurs and solopreneurs that aren't having some ecosystem and structure offered for them . I think that makes it even more challenging . So what I would say is thinking about pace .
It's really for any high achievers and I'm guessing that most of your audience is just that , because that's who shows up to podcast to try and learn and grow and develop and get better being reasonable about the expectations we set for ourselves is really important , because high achievers also sometimes can have excessively high expectations that aren't necessarily reasonable
and then that generates unnecessary distress . So a lot of mental health really is also about managing our level of stress . Healthy tension , healthy stress is great . It helps us get stronger , it helps us build confidence and grow and develop .
Unnecessary distress is not so even just looking at how we're spending our day and our lives and trying to separate what is the unnecessary distress that's showing up and pacing and taking breaks , taking small breaks .
I'm sure you've seen in it's kind of everywhere now the brain studies that are coming out of the impact of not taking breaks and it really it's damaging to the brain and it leads to constricted , restricted thinking . And even just taking small breaks throughout the day can make a big difference .
So it's just remembering to do cognitive rest , just like we need physical rest If we don't sleep we'll literally die so our brains need breaks too . So I would say a challenge for all of us is managing our expectations , making sure they're reasonable pacing .
So if I'm exerting and going in fifth gear , whether it's in my workout or at work or in my business or with my family , that's okay . I just need to account for that and then make sure that I'm building in proper , right sized amount of rest and recovery in second gear .
And that pacing I think is really hard , like learning to operate in the third and fourth gear for high achievers , I think is challenging .
Yeah , that's almost what I was going to ask you , because the thing that comes up in my mind is the concept of boundaries .
We all need boundaries to make sure we do stay safe in all the endeavors that we under take , and I think the fitness professionals listening to this know that we don't have somebody who's never squatted before , put 315 pounds on the bar and try to squat it . We start them with their body weight and then go to a dumbbell .
But I think the challenge and I'll say this as an entrepreneur myself who's owned several businesses , I've always and I think the people that listen will also find this hard is that how do you strike the balance between trying to achieve achieve at a high level , but also not overshoot the mark ?
I feel like that's a very , very fine line and one I know I've always personally struggled with , and I'm sure you hear this a lot . So I guess the more succinct question is how do you still push and excel and succeed , but not overdo it to the point of your detriment ?
I think that's the million dollar question right there . It is , isn't it Like just enough . You want to do just enough so that it's not damaging . We all probably have a slightly different threshold there and different levels of stamina and what we're willing to tolerate and values and understanding of what is important to us .
So , I think , any self-awareness of understanding all those things and knowing we get to decide . We get to decide what's the most important thing and we get to make choices , and those choices can be hard . So boundary setting is super important . It might be . I'm saying no to this incoming request . It could be an emotional boundary , but that's challenging .
Setting boundaries with people in particular is hard because we don't want to disappoint . We don't want to disappoint , we don't want to hurt people's feelings yet and if I'm not managing my own mental and physical health , nobody's going to do it for me .
Yeah , yeah , absolutely . You mentioned values and I want to stay on that for a second . I sometimes think that people don't take a step back and actually really codify , kind of what their values are , and I've always found that's been a very helpful thing for me . I feel like almost act as a compass for me to orientate myself through life .
So , with the people that you work with , how do you have them look at values ? What role does values play ? Do you use values exercises ? Talk about that for a second . So I feel like that's something that's so foundational but it's often overlooked .
Absolutely .
I think it's really important to call out , especially because there's so much noise out there and so much static about what we should be doing and what success should look like and what effectiveness should be , that really social media can be a super positive platform until it's not , and so you know that's up to each of us in terms of what relationship we want
to have with it . But the values exercises I almost always use in coaching , because that should guide everything what is the most important thing to my client , what is the most important thing to you ? Because what I think doesn't matter .
Right , right .
And so how to do that . I mean it's a verb . I think it's just like a continual reflection that we get to come back to , because different seasons of life our values can change . Some will change , some will adapt , some won't .
But really , in short , it's looking at a whole bunch of lists , a big , long list of values , and then honing it down to pick your top three to five .
Getting to 10 to 15 is pretty easy , doesn't take too long , but really honing that down to three to five is challenging and it just it does require some stillness and calm and to internally go inside ourselves and figure out what truly is the most important thing to us .
And then , with that information yes , we use that as a compass to make life decisions or as a mental model and to challenge ourselves to see if we are in alignment with that .
Sometimes we can end up with a value on the list that we think we should have but we're not necessarily living in alignment with , and then we can understand like , is that actually a value , or is that a value I was conditioned to feel like I think I should have ?
And then how we line our lives up if we are living in reasonable alignment with our values that can help us lean into thriving and flourishing .
Yeah , yeah . So such , I think , an important exercise , and it's something that when I have coached clients on health behavior change , it's a tool that I have used there . How do you orientate your health behavior changes to your values ?
If you value family well , being healthier allows you to spend more active time with your family , so I think it's a very interesting tool .
Karen , I know there's pretty much everything in your book that can apply to the fitness professional listening can also apply to the clients and the patients that they work with , but I'm wondering if there's anything in particular that you would say to our audience in terms of the lessons that your book teaches that you know maybe within their scope of practice , they
could carry over to their work with their clients , because in a lot of cases and the fitness professionals that are listening to this will shake their heads at this Sometimes we turn into like de facto , you know psychologists for our clients , even though it is grossly outside of our scope . We're with them three hours a week .
You know four hours a week we talk to them . So is there any particular things that you want to point out from the book , or even from your experience , that you think fitness professionals could , could take away for the work they do with their clients and patients .
Yes , you know , what's coming up for me is just the power of the role that you can play in someone's life , like it isn't just about fitness , it isn't just about getting stronger or getting in shape , like that idea of being present with people and creating that safe place of trust that they're able to share with you and talk with you . Like this is it .
Yeah this is what we need . This is what we need is the power of connection and social fabric , and people want to be heard . They need to be heard and you know , even though you're the fitness experts , you can't do it for them , but you're on the journey with them and that's . I think that's just really powerful .
And I speak a lot about this idea of accompaniment , which is a little more of like a horizontal way of looking at it , rather than , you know , you're the expert and they're the patient , or I'm the expert and they're the client .
But looking at leaning into this idea that we are all in this together and whether it's their fitness path or a recovery path , or the path of mental health or healing from mental illness or healing from a physical injury , like that , that space that you hold for people is so impactful .
So that power of accompaniment is just this idea that we're alongside one another , we're in it together . I'm not going to be able to fix it all for you . I don't have a magic bullet , nor do you . There isn't one equation or algorithm that is going to equal fitness for everybody .
So you know , whether it's fitness or mental health , like , we're all unique and we all need different ingredients to kind of put together our own physical , mental health , flourishing recipe .
But whatever , whether it's fitness or mental health or psychology or teaching somebody how to box , I mean whatever the craft is that idea of being present and connected with people . I just think it has compound impact .
Yeah , well said , well said .
Yeah , and I just I hope that you know your listeners can lean into finding that the purpose in that .
Yeah .
Just really powerful Like you could . You're changing lives , even if , regardless of where people are in their fitness journey , it's , I think it really like can be , that can be life changing .
Yeah , this idea of connection , accompaniment , I think , is so important , and I thought of this a lot lately in the context of AI , and you know the fact that you know probably AI , if it can't already do it in short order , will be able to write the perfect exercise program for you , right , like it can write the program , but it's not AI , is not going to
be there to accompany you . You're not going to connect with AI , and so I think that's even a more important commodity , you know , than it was . You know that ability to connect and accompany somebody . And it was , you know , 15 , you know , 20 years ago , where people didn't have access to the knowledge .
Now you know the knowledge exists , like if you want a great workout , you can find it somewhere , but that personal connection , you know that that is at the heart of , I think , what you know . Anyone in the allied health space , you know that therapeutic alliance is just so important .
Absolutely Well , and we know now it's connection is the greatest predictor of longevity . Yes , yes so that applies to everyone , everywhere , in all businesses , organizations , functions , professions , everything , and it's actionable . Like you can change your life today . So , yeah , I AI is great , but I do the humanity . I will not replace the humanity .
Yeah , ease of it .
Amen to that . If you were to take all the things that you talked about in your book and you know just your experiences in general in what you've done in your career and you can kind of , you know , maybe give the audience one take home lesson from our conversation , and maybe it's something you've already said , but you know , what would that ?
What would that be for you ? You know , if you want people to remember , you know , if you remember nothing else from our talk , remember this , what is it ?
Well , the one thing would be you are not alone in the struggle , because we all have those moments that it seems like everyone else is killing . It seems like it's easy for everyone else and and we all have our struggle it's like human pain and suffering . None of us are immune to it . So that's the one thing I would say .
And from a practical standpoint , in the realm of the promotion of flourishing or thriving in whatever area of well being is thinking of like the progress principle , small things matter . Doing a one minute meditation over time is way better than zero .
Yeah , and I'm sure you know your listeners deal with that in the fitness realm is we make it too big and then we don't do the thing . Whether I'm going to wait till I can , you know , run five miles ? Well , just walk around the block .
I mean that , that progress principle , when it's fostering our mental health or physical health , it really does make a difference . So incremental , small steps can add up .
Absolutely Sustainable .
Yeah .
So , karen , where can people go if they want to find out about all the great work you're doing ? Where's a great place to find your book ? We'll link up to all this on the show notes page , but I just want to make sure the audience hears it , just in case they don't make their way to the show notes page .
Yes , great , thank you . So my website is Dr Karen dollcom and I'm on LinkedIn . I'm on Instagram and Facebook , mostly LinkedIn , so in my books are Amazon or anywhere that sells books .
Awesome , and you know we will link up to all of that on the show notes page , karen .
This has been a great conversation and before I let you go , we're going to end the podcast with the question I always end the podcast on and I always enjoy asking this question to people who are kind of in the broader , you know , allied health space , have it be physicians or psychologists , which is , you know , the paradox .
As I view it , is this trust , interaction and communication gap that has evolved between fitness professionals in our medical community . From your perspective , if you give the fitness professionals one piece of advice to close off that gap , what would that piece of advice be ?
Oh wow , I'm going to have to ask you that question when we get offline . My advice is because my lens is as a psychologist . My advice is remain curious . All of us coming to the world of health or illness or pathology , or clinicians or you know whatever , just remain curious about how all the practitioners are coming to the table .
Yeah , I think remain curious is a great answer to many questions and a good maximum for life . Karen doll , thank you so much for joining us on the Wallace paradox .
I'm so grateful , thank you .
Well , I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Karen as much as I did . If you found it insightful and informative , please share with your friends and colleagues . Those shares make a huge difference for us .
Any information we like to share with you from today's episode can be found on the show notes page , that's by going to wellness paradox podcom forward slash episode 106 . Please be on the lookout for our next episode when it drops in two weeks , and don't forget to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform . Until we try to get next , please be well .