Your worth as a human is based on what you do and how much you help others. if you heard a friend describe themselves like that, you'd be quick to tell them that that's nonsense. But we seem to find it very easy to believe it of ourselves. As healthcare professionals or people in high stress, high stakes jobs. Our roles and even our identities are wrapped up in this idea of being helpful.
And when we are in a team, sometimes that can look like taking on too much responsibility or rescuing other people for fear of what other people might think of us. This week Dr. Sarah Coope, former GP, team coach and specialist in conflict and mediation joins us again to look at ways we can use our natural curiosity about our own responses.
She's got a great tool to help you identify your default programming and work through how you automatically react when people make unfair demands of you, so that you can identify and then start to change this deeply inbuilt programming and deliver a no that's compassionate and ultimately protects your boundaries. If you're in a high stress, high stakes, still blank medicine, and you're feeling stressed or overwhelmed, burning out or getting out are not your only options.
I'm Dr. Rachel Morris, and welcome to You Are Not a Frog. Hello, so I'm Dr. Sarah Coope. I'm a former GP, I'm a conflict coach and also a trained mediator. And I'm working alongside you, Rachel, as the CEO of Shapes Toolkit, which is really exciting and really love helping people, beat burnout and also resolve conflict so that they can, yeah, work happier. It's wonderful to have you, Sarah.
I wanted to get you on the podcast in an official interview, uh, context because I wanna pick your brains about our hardwired programming, this unconscious programming that we have, which means that we find it very, very difficult to either shed responsibility to say no or not just default to doing everything for everybody all, all the time.
Because I've noticed that doctors, senior healthcare professionals, people in these high stress, high stakes jobs, we often see delegating or not paying perfect or not finishing stuff off, or not being able to help people. We often just cannot say no to that, and we see, um, being asked to do something as an impossible choice. So it's either I do it or I let other people down. Either I protect myself or I protect my team.
We see things in a very binary way, which means that, of course, we default to protecting our team and not letting people down just because of the way I think we've been groomed and programmed and hardwired. And, and quite a lot of the time anyway, these choices that we think are very binary, they aren't anyway, there's, there's many different options, but I thought it would be really good to explore some of this programming.
In the background that doctors and other people in these high stakes jobs have. Now, I'm gonna start by getting a bit personal. What, what, what programming have you noticed that, that you've had that's made it hard for you to sort of lose some of this default responsibility? So I think for me, myself, I certainly can recognize, and I think this is a contributing factor, ending up in Burner was a sense of, I think a lot of it's around shame.
A lot of it's around the fear of failure, the fear of what people think if I don't do that or if I say no. There's a sense of I should be able to do it all. So there's this sort of unrealistic expectation, um, that I really can identify with. I think there's often a lot of assumptions made. Both, both ways.
So I think for me, I had a lot of assumptions that people, what people would think, but also perhaps, um, you know, maybe because if, if, if I appear to be capable, other people will think that I'm able to do all of that and more. I think that those sort of programming can be really. What's the word, sort of formative in many ways. And it's often unconscious. It's, it is often underneath the surface.
It's not something that we're, we're sort of telling ourselves consciously, but those sorts of patterns, and they go quite deep as I know from doing a lot of exploratory work, but also through coaching and, and other, and therapy and other, other modalities. It takes a lot of unpicking to find those things at the bottom. Yeah, that definitely rings true for me and it rings true for lots of people I work with.
Would you say that that's a universal thing, though, wanting to appear competent, or do you think it's particularly for people that are working in professions and sort of knowledge based industries? Or is it just a human nature? I think that's a, it's a really big question, isn't it? Because I think it depends. I think it's very prevalent in doctors. I think it's very prevalent in female doctors as as well.
I think there's a lot of conditioning that goes on that that sort of drives for many of us. And maybe it's the generation, this generation, I dunno, but I think that drives the, the self expectation, perhaps the other expectation as well, um, and needing to prove, you know, sometimes it's that if there's any elements of like low self-esteem, for example. Or just a sense of measuring one's self-worth about what we do and what we achieve. So I'm not sure if it's universal.
I think there's various, probably some personality traits. I think there's gonna be various, obviously a lot of historical factors. I think it depends on the environment around oneself, you know, what the kind of messages are in the culture, what the messages are, um, perhaps in one-to-one relationships within the team as well. I think it also probably depends on what kind of support one has and what messages receiving there.
But a lot of it does come from that deeper programming that sort of sticks within probably from childhood patterning or you know, from medical school as well, the sorts of messages we received, received then. I mean, you can look at other tools around the Enneagram. So I'm an Enneagram three, which is the achiever, achiever type. And I think, you know, that obviously, obviously plays a part.
And I think also, you know, for medics, I think, you know, we often have been those people who have achieved and have succeeded in so many ways that that becomes the norm. And there's almost, um, it's hard to imagine failing. It was hard to imagine not, not actually doing so well in something and what would that look like? So I think there's, there's those, the fear of the unknown sometimes.
But also perhaps there can be a sense of overvaluing achievement, and therefore an undervaluing, not lack of achievement, but undervaluing just kind of good enough at times and what that feels like. I remember I was coaching someone once, um, um, a very senior consultant. And I was just practicing coaching at the time.
I just, I was, I was training, and I had this model, which was the performance di diamond where you rated yourself on, um, how much you were achieving on your achievement in your job, your enjoyment of your job, your purpose in your job, and your recognition. So those four dimensions, and he was putting, you know, rating himself out of 10. And, um, he was achieving, did like 8, 9, 10 out of 10. Um, his enjoyment.
It was about three or four, um, I can't remember what the others were, but then we sort of did an exercise, well, okay, you're at 10. What would you like to be at? And he put his achievement. He said, I only want to be achieving five. I was like, why is that? He said, well, because that will put my enjoyment up so much more. 'Cause that, that when we joined up the two points on the diagram, it was like they were linked.
The higher his achievement, he said it just pulled the enjoyment down and the higher the enjoyment, maybe the slightly less on the achievement. Now, all the theory about working happier seems to say the opposite. Actually. If you are enjoying yourself, you probably will be achieving more, but I guess it depends what we mean by achievements.
And I think for him it was, you know, all these very important roles, you know, producing lots of reports and articles and journals, plus doing a really busy shift work pattern and all, all those sorts of things. So I, I think we've mainly been conditioned to achieve in, in certain ways.
So the achievement being never failing, like you said, but also rising to the top of the Royal Colleges or, or, or, or joining committees or being, you know, a big name, a big cheese as we, as we get more important in our jobs, potentially. Which, at the end of the day, often I see people aren't enjoying themselves that, that much when they're, they're doing all that. It's just another, the walls, the ladders against another wall to climb once you sort of get to the top there.
But that is just sort of hard wired into us, that, that your, your position and status, I think a bit. Yeah, I agree. And I, we sometimes talk about the equation or the, the pathway, hard work leads to success, leads to happiness. And then we ask the question, does it? And I think we've often been conditioned to believe that that's true. So we work hard, we'll then be successful, then we'll be happy. And that's, we know that's not always true as the example you've just given.
But also I think, and I dunno if it is just me that I thought I didn't deserve to enjoy my job almost. There was a sense of, you know, I had to work hard and I almost couldn't expect to enjoy it because hard work was kind of meant to be hard. And I, and I think that it was a real revelation when I started my portfolio career actually doing bits of other pieces of work that I found I was really enjoying and it almost didn't feel like work.
And I think that's quite a, a fixed, or quite a common pattern as well from other people I've spoken with, that they almost didn't realize they could enjoy hard work, and therefore that type of hard work is very different, isn't it? That's probably less focused on achievement, more focused on on purpose, I think. Yeah, I think that is a hardwiring we have that, yeah, work has to be difficult. Work has to be hard, and work has to feel like a chore. And I know where that came from for me.
I mean, I was doing all these A levels. I didn't wanna do chemistry A level, inorganic chemistry A level. Oh my goodness. I remember just sitting there and it was like kryptonite for someone with ADHD I tell you, just list in a very cold room listening to the headmaster droning on about inorganic chemistry. No interest whatsoever. It, it was absolutely painful, but that's where I internalized if you want to achieve, you have to actually suffer along along the way.
Otherwise, it's not really properly achievement And suffering through the, you know, the junior doctor years where you've got absolutely no sleep or suffering through the, I just work really hard through all these exams. You know, I've got 20 exams in one week, but then we can party really hard until we have to suffer again. Not very healthy is it?
it's not, but I think, again, repeated exposure to those kind of patterns and internalization of that as a belief which then can be like, this is what, yeah, almost like what I deserve or this is what I have to tolerate at the cost of, or in order to, in order to gonna get where I think I want to get or other people are saying I should get. I think that's what probably stops us saying no, because we think that's, well, that's just, that's just what we have to do.
So it's those kind of words, isn't it? Like I just have to do this. And so we almost have to suffer a bit to be a good doctor, to be paid a good salary and all that sort of thing. But I've got a bit of a theory that that medics, because you know, everybody wants status in society. They do. And there's this brilliant book by Will Storr called The Status Game. I'd recommend it to anybody. He's a journalist that looks at these different types of status and how it's changed through the ages.
But you can get status in different ways. You can get status by being utterly beautiful, utterly gorgeous, you know, but physi, you know, the Greek, the Greek Godlike status, you know, the, the, the sports stars that we just think are amazing or whatever. Now, there are some medics like that, but not many of us medics are the sort of Greek Gods, Greek God physique.
So if we haven't got that available to us, then the next type of status you can have in society, money, finances, being really, really rich, right? So that just, I mean, a lot of us, I think would go, oh, that's a bit crass, isn't it? You know who, who cares about? But you know, you can see that, can't you? All the, the tech bros and the, you know, loving the millionaires and all this sort of stuff. So you can, you can see it all around you, but often medics, you know, these day and age.
We're not the most rich people, are we? Because, you know, salaries aren't, haven't kept up with et cetera, et cetera. So then you've got another type of status, which has been altruistic, you know, and we saw that with, with Mr. Tom, you know, the, the walking, you know, in his garden in COVID, and people that do really good things for people. Yeah, and Mother Theresa, you know, people that have done lots of things for charity.
We, we think these people are absolutely wonderful and, and that's good. And you can see why. It's beneficial to a society to elevate people who are very altruistic and stuff. But I think that doctors have then started to look on their status as being the good ones, being the people that always help. And then, you know, it doesn't matter about how much money you've got or how good looking you are, 'cause actually you are the professional, the one who's always there and helping.
So what does that mean for your status when you say no? Or you say I'm not doing that anymore, you give the responsibility back. So it's not just that, that threat of rejection 'cause you might upset someone by saying, no, you are actually giving away some of your power and some of your status. as you were saying, that I was thinking yes.
So therefore, the achievement for, for people who, maybe it's not about achieving a status which is relating to looks or finance, but more around altruism or doing good, if that's the driving force. Then actually, it's really hard to not do that, isn't it? Because that's where one gets one's worth or even identity. And I think another thing that that's important to think about is, you know what? What makes up your identity? Who, who are you?
And sometimes when I'm doing a workshop, I'll go around the room and just say to people, just introduce yourself and then we'll get halfway around the room and I'll just say, just stop and just think, what has everybody said at the beginning of their introduction? And they've all said, I am. I am a GP, I am a emergency medicine consultant. It's the I am. And I'm not saying that that's wrong.
I guess I just highlight that to people because is your job and which is what you're talking about, the status, which has a lot of implications to it, is that really who you are? Who are, you know, who else are you? And as some of this, some of this can be really helpful to recognize that actually it's, our status doesn't come, I say all from one part of our lives or all from one role, which I think helps to make it maybe a little more comfortable when we do need to set limits, around that.
it's an interesting one, this, you know, I, yeah. I am a doctor. 'cause when people ask me what do you do these days? Often? My first response is, well, I used to be a doctor. Bizarrely. I mean, but I would still, you know, I'm still, I'm still a doctor. I'm working in a different field, but I feel the need to say, well, I used to be a GP, partly 'cause people don't really understand what I do. If I say, well, I do a podcast and we do training, people like, oh really?
What on earth that, you know, what that does that entail? But yeah, there is something about, I just sort of want to put a bit of credibility in there, perhaps, you know, I am worth something in society, sort of, you know. And this thing about having to be worth it, having to contribute and contribution is a, a very noble thing and it's very worthy.
And I've just read a, a book about Adlerian psychology that talks about actually that the, the highest thing that somebody can do is contribute just by sort of being who they are. But we really feel it. I think as, as doctors and medics, this thing about having to contribute so much so that we contribute when it's not even necessary, we over contribute, and we will always just take on the task. I, I don't know whether it's a particularly doctory thing that.
When someone asks you to do a task in a surgery, for example, I had plenty of of other healthcare professionals saying to me, no, I can't, I can't do that. No, it's not my role. No, I won't do that. I'm not comfortable. But I never had a doctor saying, no, I can't do that, or I won't do that. And why do you think that was? Well, I think there is. This training that we have, that if no one else can do that task, then we can do it.
And partly it's the different role roles in that doctors by and large are prescribers. They can do lots of different, different things. They can do procedures as long been taught properly and stuff, whereas in, in other, in other roles, you have to get certified to do things. I remember when I was a junior doctor, the. The nurses on CCU just decided that their phlebotomy certificates had run out, so they just bleeped me and I had to come do the whole blood round.
'Cause it, it was literally anything in the hospital defaulted to the, the lowest junior doctor. And that conditioning runs really deep and it just became your responsibility and anyone could bleep you at any time to do anything. And there was, I didn't ever feel like I could say no or it wasn't my job or my responsibility.
I would just have to say, even if I didn't have time, I'd say, well, I'll, I'll put it on my list and then I'll come round and do it, and I'd get an awful lot of criticism for not doing it, you know, if you were agency that you were busy somewhere else with another patient.
And so there's a lot sort of shame, internalized that I couldn't get round to do anything that I'd been asked to do, even though I, it wasn't really my job and I couldn't possibly have the time to do it, but I took that on as my fault. And that fits, doesn't it? With what I said earlier around, often it's other people's expectations that you should do it all. It's all your job to do.
And so that example of being a junior doctor and both the expectation but also the internal and the conditioning was, I, well, I just have to do it, I think that's what then makes it much harder further on down the line, because it's always been that. Our job to do everything. The book stops with us. And in some ways, yes, it, it does, but I think what we, we see a lot of, and we've experienced ourselves as well, but what, you know, that's not sustainable and, and the cost of that.
And we, I suppose the question we, we are really looking at is what makes it so, so difficult to say no in those, you know, in at work.
And I think it's often because of all, of, all of the experience, whether it's in childhood and the attachment style, whether it is, like I said, GCSEs and A levels you particularly want to do, but you know, you, you, you are on that, that conveyor belt as I've often felt, of this is the path you should take or you've chosen, but you should take it and just keep going. And then it does become like, this is who I am and that belief of I need to, this is what I need to do in order to have.
You know that that's whatever it is, I, and then I'll be happy. And I've talked a bit about that. Like what is it we have, we think we have to, we have to do in order to, in order to have, and then we'll be. Whereas I really think focus on, you know, who do I need to be first? And when I focus on that, which is a lot, bit of it is around internal state, who do I need to be in order to then do out of that sense of being, then I'll probably have. What it is I, I really want.
But that's a huge upside down shift, isn't it? Um, but I think that makes, that example you've just given there really brings home those expectations. And then what, what choice did you have in that moment? Well, I mean, it's interesting. I had the choice that I could have just said, no, don't do it. But then my brain was telling me, if you don't do it, those patients are all at risk, because they wouldn't have had their blood test taken.
You know, nowadays I would've said, well no, I'm not doing it. You need to find something else, you need to find somebody else to do that. Let's report it to the phlebotomy service, blah, blah, blah. But I think, but back then. Back then, yeah, however many years ago. Because we're constantly asking, and I heard someone talk about these three questions we're asking ourselves. Number one is, am I safe? So my amygdala's saying am I safe? Are people accepting me?
Are, are people thinking well of me? Is there gonna be any bad consequences? And we always extrapolate the bad consequences. So, you know, if I don't do that blood rind on CCU, then they might die of hyperkalemia essentially, and then I won't be safe 'cause I'll be reported and et cetera. Um, the next question people wanna ask is though, am I accepted? Do people around here accept me?
And saying no to someone, or, you know, not taking on that default responsibility might mean that they don't accept me. And I would love to be able to say to all our listeners, oh, don't worry, people will accept you if you say no. But I, I can't. 'cause there are some really real consequences of, of saying no, people might not accept you. They might criticize you. They might not as well, but they might. They might do.
But it's like you said, and we can say as much as we want oh, it doesn't matter what other people think about you, it's what you think about yourself. But in, in reality that that is really, really hard. And the other thing we want to answer is, am I okay? And I think that's a big one. And by, okay. I think we mean am I good? Well, I mean, am I good? Am I a good person? Do I have integrity? Am I helping other people? Because when I was brought up, it was all about am I good or not?
There was a lot of talk about sin and all that sort of stuff. So have I been sinful? Have I been bad? And you know, I'm absolutely terrified of that. It's hardwired into me, you know, have I been good or not? And obviously that is such a subjective interpretation, but I think a lot of doctors, we want to be good. and I think the way I've shifted that a bit has been do I respect myself? And I suppose. It's similar, isn't it? But the, have I been good? It's almost where's the judgment measure?
Like who's, who sort of yardstick are we comparing that to? Whereas the question, and I was talking about this when I was, um, doing a talk on difficult, having boundaries of difficult people, was actually we have to hold the, our own sort of yardstick against it for ourselves. Do I respect myself in this moment? So, and this is the hard thing, isn't it? Even if other people is a sense of rejection from them because of, of your decision or your no or whatever it is at the end of the day.
So like, can I live, can I live with that decision that I've made? And that's gonna be different for different people. And of course, you could spend a long time in picking like, what makes you say yes? What makes you say no? I like that. Can I, can I live with that decision? Actually, someone else also recently said to me, actually, let's ditch the good and bad. I said, okay, well what about helpful? She said, no, let's ditch helpful and unhelpful.
Let's just do does that behavior work or doesn't it work? The behavior that works? The behavior that doesn't work. So saying, no, well actually that does, that behavior does work for me. It might not work for you, but it, it works for me and it's really, really important. So there are things that you said we need to identify and understand ourselves. You've got the self-awareness, but then you have to unlearn the pattern.
So how do you go about starting to unlearn these patterns, and this programming? I mean, it does all start with that awareness, doesn't it? It all starts with recognizing them. So I think for me, it was through having some coaching about 20 years ago before I did the coaching training myself and, and just, I spent a lot of time journaling and, and writing things. I had to bring some of these patterns into the light.
So I would, I would do a lot of reflection, which is there's medics and I'm sure the other professionals, that's what we, we do. I would think about things that had happened and just try and reflect on it and think, okay, what was I. You know, what was I thinking at that moment? What was the underlying thought process? What was the, when you think of it almost like a, a software kind of program, it was really helpful for me to, to break it down. What wrong was the steps in that?
And it's not, people say, oh, that's so much naval gazing. It. It's not. It's, it's about understanding oneself and this is all part of, say, compassionate leadership and other things that if we raise our awareness and can recognize these patterns, then we have a choice. And when we have that choice, it's so, so freeing. It's the Viktor Frankl kind of quote, isn't it? The, the between stimulus and, and response. There's a space. Uh, and in that space is our power to choose.
And I, that's what I wanted. And I think this is what a lot of coaching and probably a lot of CBT and other therapies like that will do is let's, let's expand that space. And it might be that we need support to do that. But expand that space and really look okay, what's actually going on? And then the unlearning for me. Because a lot of those are unconscious, automatic.
You've done it so often over time that you don't even realize you, it is happening and it takes, it does take some unpicking and go through the layers. I think a tool that I found really helpful for some of the unlearning was a tool called Ladder of Consequence. And I didn't invent this, but I cannot remember where I read it. So, um, I can't give credit apart from saying it's not mine.
But a lot of consequence, and I've used this a lot in coaching, so I'll draw a horizontal line and just put a letter X next to it. Now, X isn't about treasure, X is for situation X. It is the triggering kind of moment. And I try and reflect and go, okay, what was, what was the trigger? I know I reacted in a way that I don't, I want to change. You know, maybe, maybe it was with my kids, you know, or maybe it was with a patient or a colleague.
So I'd write down what was the situation X, and just write a headline on that horizontal line. And then I'd go and write a line underneath this these, so another horizontal line underneath. And I'd ask myself, and then what happened? And so I'd think, okay, so when situation hap, X happened, you know, the very beginning, the very first step of that might have been, you know, a child, you know, one of my children refusing to do something. But I'd ask them, that might be it. Then what happened?
And it might have been that in my head I had a thought, oh, you know, I haven't got time for this. And then I'd ask for another horizontal line underneath. And then what happened? So it might have been, I had a, you know, a bit of an irritable, um, I, I spoke irritably to my child. And then what happened? The child got upset, and then what happened? And I just kind of take it down to really pull out the pattern of what, you know, the consequences were of that.
And again, it was really, it's hard sometimes to do that, but it de, it definitely, it's very factual. And sometimes we don't clearly know what our thought was. So it's either a thought or a action that you had in that moment. It could be speech, you could have done something, you could have said something. So it's very clear that anyone observing it would see some of those on the outside. Some of it's internal only, you know.
So taking it right down, lots of horizontal lines until you get to kind of the output. And the output would usually be ending up, you know, I might have felt, I might have got angry and then probably after I got angry I'd feel really guilty and then I'd be upset. And there's a bit of a downward spiral, isn't there? A downward ladder.
And so what then I would do, and I'd do this in coaching with people when sometimes in the conflict coaching or I've coached a lot of people in sort of, who've been sent to coaching for anger management or other things, it's, which is a whole nother story about, you know, whether we could do that. But okay, let's take the same situation X. Draw a horizontal line above that. So now we're going the other direction. What would be the first new sort of pattern step?
If you're thinking about writing a new software program, what would be the first kind of command in that program? And it's just often asking oneself what would the very first thought be? And often we don't know. So we'd have to say for someone else who responds differently in that very same moment, what do you think they tell themselves? And usually you can think of something.
So say you're faced with a child who's refusing to do what you've asked someone who's able to respond calmly in that might think to themselves, okay, I wonder what's going on for them right now. And so you'd write down what you wanted to try as your new pattern and keep going. So if I told, if I thought to myself, I wonder what's going on for for them right now, then the next horizontal line might be a curious question.
Or it might be an empathic statement like, oh, you seem hungry right now, or, you know. So, and then what happens is you kind of go to the next level until, you know, you cly, you can't predict what the other person's, um, reactions, but you are sort of just going through what your pattern would look like in that and where that then takes you. And so all of that sort of, that's the lower ladder bit is the unlearning and then the top ladder is the relearning.
And I think, I think our lives are just constant unlearning and relearning from patterns. And what then I would encourage people to do, and I certainly did myself, was keep relearning that, that top pattern until that became the automatic. So it's like the override. And I really like the computer sort of for the software analogy, because we don't see that behind the scenes do we? We're so reliant on technology. We don't see that. We just see the output. And yet there's all of this going on.
And the more aware we can be of, and the more choiceful we are about our, both our internal dialogue and then our behaviors, we've got so many options, there's so much we can do. And there'd be moments when I just realized, oh, I just did that without even thinking, you know, lots of moments where I didn't, but I still could learn and go, oh, where did I, where did I, where did that just not sort of go the way that I want, that I, I wished it had, and I don't.
I, I found that such a powerful tool. And visually really, really helpful for me to sort of see it set out. And also I think it's something that anybody can do initially. There's deeper work to be done, so behind that pattern, I often say these patterns that we see, the, the below the line kind of patterns Are a bit like a tire on a bicycle wheel. They're sort of the bit that touches the surface or the bit that, you know, that other people experience.
But beneath the tire and the bike wheel, you've got all the spokes that come down to the sensor. And all the spokes are a bit like, um, beliefs that we have as we talked earlier. And often at the core of that I think are some of the attachment kind of, um, experiences. So often what deeper coaching or other work would do would be look at these kind of patterns because we have lots of them, and identify, okay, where's the common denominator here?
What's the underlying conclusion you might have drawn when you were younger from your experience that meant you then try to keep yourself safe by not doing certain things or doing certain things? And if you can identify that and then ask, okay, as an adult now, what do what? What works better for me? I like that question. What would work better for me instead of this? And again, that's some of the unlearning and relearning. There's layers of it. I say like an onion.
I also think we need to remember other people's programming and I am guilty of making the assumptions that just 'cause I think one thing, I think everyone is gonna gonna think like that. And everything that obviously people say to me goes through the filters of my background, from my past of everything that's happened to me. It's funny, I was driving the other day. I saw a man walking along the road with a dog with a high vis vest on. And on this luminous yellow vest it said Reactive dog.
I was like, wow, that is brilliant. Imagine if we walked along with like our internal monologue or, or our like reactive personality or, um, things that people have told us or the, the filter that we run everything past it. It made me laugh 'cause I think I did a podcast on our amygdalas being a bit like a Rottweiler and having to put your dog on a lead. You've got this reactive dog inside you, but what will it react to?
And I think, uh, we've talked about, um, the fact that, you know, I have, I have a DHD and I always think I've grown up with people thinking I'm tactless or too much or whatever, and I have this sort of filter that I'm too much, or I, I've been tactless.
So imagine if I had a high vis vest that says, you know, reactive dog Tactless You know, and that's, so everything that people ask me, I'm really worried that I'm gonna be tactless, or that's the filter I run things through of other people's disapproval. It's, you know. I think someone's disapproving of me. Therefore, my first reaction is probably defensiveness defensive dog.
But what we're talking about is sort of almost changing that hives vest that we are wearing to, to going, well, we, I don't need to be a reactive dog right now. I could, I could change that first thought and that then might change everything else. Does that make It makes sense. It's about labels. I mean, I, I have a reactive dog, so I'm just thinking how great that would be.
'Cause I end up saying to other people that's, I'm fa as I'm coming towards them saying, oh, he's quite reactive and I'll give you a wide birth. But I think, you know, I think for ourselves, yeah, often we are literally going around with, you know, with labels on our backs of what other people have spoken over us or what we've told ourselves we are.
And I think then, because again, this is part of the focus on the wheel because we believe that to be true 'cause we've never really questioned it and unlearned it, we'd actually end up doing though I'm not saying you're not ous, Rachel, 'cause you've done a lot of work and you unlearned that. But I think, you know, I certainly went around with labels that weren't really true for me, but I thought that's what people thought, so actually then I behaved in that way.
It's the self-fulfilling prophecy, isn't it? And often we're so careful with our children not to label them 'cause we don't want them to go around thinking I'm lazy or I'm whatever, because we, I certainly thought that will just make that, they'll live up to that. So, you know, there's something, you know, so I've certainly saying to my teenagers, yeah, I, you know, I really trust you on this. Whereas inside, sometimes I'm not sure I really did.
No. But I wanted to kind of convey that to them so that they would go away thinking, okay, she trusts me, therefore they're trying, my theory was they would live up to that. And I think we have within our zone of power, the ability to relabel ourselves. And this is about the self-respect, bit about what works for us. You know, what is it we, and this comes back to identity. Who are you, isn't it? Who are you really? Like what and who do you need to be? Who, who do you want to be?
What almost is the jacket that you kind of wear that in a way is very validating and it gives you freedom and I think that's, there's so much in that. I was thinking wouldn't it be great if we could see other people's as well? You know, I can think of colleagues I've worked with, which who were absolutely lovely, but they were quite blunt and they would bark at you if you sort of caught them off guard.
But if you knew them well it would be fine 'cause you, you knew they were like that and so you'd make allowances. But other people get really offended and upset. But, you know, they sort of needed a, a, caution, very blunt, but actually very lovely type thing so that other people weren't gonna get offended. And I was just imagining a saw being sat there with a high-vis jacket saying over responsible doctor on it.
You know, so that when people ask you stuff that's not your role that you shouldn't have to take on, you can just look at that and go, okay, that's not the one I want to be wearing. Let's put the other one on of, of wise and, you know, safe and cautious and respectful of myself. And how would that ladder going upwards look, rather than the ladder going downwards of the over responsibility guilty doctor?
And when you think about, you know, the, the person you said you tends to react in a blunt way, that could be your situation X, where someone reacts in a blunt way to you and then you have a choice. But how would you. Interpret that. So you can take yourself down a defensive ladder by telling yourself, oh, they're always so, so, sort of like short with me. They obviously don't like me that much would be another thought. And then react to them with sort of, um, a bit of a cutting remark.
Or we can, I think the first step is actually the same probably for most patterns. It's I wonder what's going on for the other person. I mean, we've talked about this a lot in conflict resolution, haven't we? And other topics that we've discussed and I think.
Where I found I was able to keep myself regulated in stressful situations was to put my attention on the other person first, rather than on my anxious state, which would be all no. You know, they, they, they dislike or there, there are some sort of threat and if I could hold myself in that way and ask, I wonder what's going on for them, doesn't excuse their behavior, but it just enabled me to step out of my, I think out of my head in that moment.
So I think for many people, and I guess it's an invitation, is that first sort of next step going upwards is just that question. I wonder, I wonder what's going on for them. I was thinking if you did that, Sarah, with being asked to do something that you don't have capacity to do and often people's first default thought is, oh, I have to do it. That's just default. I have to, 'cause I've been asked to.
And then the next thought is, I don't really want to, but feeling really guilty and then probably getting defensive, but feeling trapped. So what would your, what would the other programming be? What would be the, I wonder programming there instead? A question I sometimes ask is, what makes you ask that?
I dunno if that's the right question, but I'm just thinking of at home sometimes if, uh, you know, if, if sometimes it has to do something, I'm, I'm just thinking that sometimes I kind go just give me the context. 'cause I think once we often understand the context behind it, behind the demand, it's sometimes it's easier than to, well, it gives us a slight bit of thinking space, but it also helps us to understand where that person's coming from.
And even then, when we need to say no to it, we can empathize with the reason behind the request. So it's a very similar take. I think it's like, I wonder what's behind the request? I wonder what's really going on. And I think that way, again, it doesn't, rather than if I say straight away to myself, oh, I'm gonna have to do this, I tend to then be annoyed with that person for having asked me and, and I'm probably going to either get super, you know, overexplain or whatever.
Whereas if I've thought, I wonder, yeah, I wonder where this is coming from. I dunno if that would always work because it might, people might be, well that's really obvious where it's coming from, but sometimes. Well, I don't, I think we assume though, it's like right, there's an emergency patient. Will you see them? Oh, I have to. Rather than, oh, I wonder why it's an emergency. or why I'm, why, why I'm being Why I'm being asked, I'm, I'm wonder why, I wonder where the request from.
I wonder what makes it emergency. I wonder if there's any other way of doing, of, of meeting this need. I wonder is a great question. Or I wonder what it is that the person asking me really needs. Like, mom, will you take me into town? I wonder do they want to spend time with me? Do they just need a lift? Do they not have any money for the train fair? You know, it's that, is that. It's that request rather than the default. I have to because I've been asked.
Or an assumption made that it's coming from a negative place, which. I think it's just experimenting with this. There's a, there's a spaciousness that's created by being curious. Um, and it doesn't mean, you know, there's times when you could, you, you just have, there's a sense of there isn't time to ask that question.
But even if, say if it was an emergency, someone's collapsed in front and you are, you are asked to do it, you're probably not gonna say, oh, wonder, you know, why is it mean that's being asked you just dealing with, but you might, you might wonder afterwards. And just think, you know, was the, it's a bit like there's a reflection on, on a significant event, isn't it? Was there anything else that could have been done differently, for example?
You know, I certainly know when I was, um, was working as a GP and I wouldn't say I wasn't the duty doctor, but I would be getting calls from reception, asking me to see patients. And I'm thinking, I wonder why I'm being asked when it's somebody else. And it was because that other person was being really, let's say let's, uh, let's say less than helpful to the reception staff. And so they didn't dare ask that person were coming to the path of least resistance.
And so that then required a conversation. So I think there's something there. Even the question, I wonder why I'm having such a negative reaction to being asked. Because there's one thing I'm learning and that is to trust my emotions. Like not trust that they're off, they're right or anything, but trust that they're flagging up, that there's something wrong. There's, you know, when I'm feeling uncomfortable about something, I shouldn't just go, oh, I'm being ridiculous. I'm like, oh my right.
I wonder why I am feeling uncomfortable about this situation. So even just, I wonder about then just assuming, oh, well that means that I've got to do, you know, or that means that this, actually, oh, I wonder, I wonder why I'm feeling like that. What boundaries being crossed, what doesn't feel quite right about this? What, you know, I'm not always blaming myself, not always going to that. oh gosh. I ought to do it. I must do it. I should. I ought, but, oh, I, I wonder.
I wonder, I think it's such a great question because it takes away, the judgment, opens up possibilities. It helps with that sort of recognition of patterns. There's so much, and I think. And a lot of it is just notice what you notice, say with your feelings, isn't it? Just notice what you notice and then ask yourself, what's that, what's that telling me? So I often ask a what question rather than a why. So if I ask myself know, why am I feeling like that?
There's a always, for me, I'm a bit sensitive to the why question. I feel, you know, there's like judgment for myself. So it's like, what is that telling me? And I think just going back to when people make requests of us or feels like demands, I've been talking about this quite a bit, um, in, in other conversations to say we can't, it's out of our control whether people ask us to do stuff that's completely outta control.
'cause sometimes I would find myself feeling annoyed that I was being asked. And then I started to realize I have no control over whether I'm asked to do something. What I have control over is whether I say yes or not. And even if I feel like I, I, I don't have a choice about whether I say yes or not. I still have control over how I think about the thing that I'm gonna do. So that really helped, again, gave me freedom. I can think about that thing.
I can think about that person in a different way. It's not toxic positivity, it's about just recognizing I have control over how I'm seeing that and reframing, and then that impacts my emotions in a different way. And that's been really helpful to let go of that because yeah, let go of that frustration with, oh, why am I being asked to do even more? 'Cause they don't know other people. Dunno what you've got on your plate.
No, but I think that the less ability we have to say no, the more annoyed we get with other people for asking us things that we can't say no to. So how dare they ask me because I can't say no. Well, that's really unfair On the other person, they're just, they're just asking and I. Much prefer someone who can say no to me because it means I feel freer with them.
If I'm having to second guess that person, and I know they'll always say yes because they feel obliged, then actually I ask them a lot less and the relationship really suffers. So bizarrely, we think the relationship's gonna suffer if we say no to that person. I think the relationship suffers more in the long term if we don't feel free to say a wholehearted yes or no, because then we can't be real or honest with that person. And, and also that is very patronizing, isn't it, to the other person.
If imagine if I thought that you would never say no to me, you didn't have the ability to say no, then I would, I would just that, that's me controlling you. That's me saying, Sarah can't cope with me asking her for anything because she can't say no. And that's very parent child rather than adults who Adults isn't it? And that's the whole thing about boundaries, isn't it? That actually boundaries improve relationships. I mean, people don't always like a no, of course.
However, there's usually, and I've talked about this as well, in a, in a, in with reasonable people, people either they don't like your, no, they will, they will respect you for that. And I think that's where we know when it's, when you're dealing with someone who's, who's not reasonable, that's when you get the sort of toxic response.
But yeah, I mean, in, in our working relationship, we've very much given each other that sort of overt permission, haven't we, to do that because then we know where we are and we trust that the other person's adult enough to be honest with, with that. And I think that's so, so key Yeah, it's important for relationship. In our Permission to Thrive membership, we have a, a phrase, which I think came from Derek Sivers originally.
He's a really good, sort of thought leader, philosopher, but it's, it's either a hell yes or a no. So if we could, our default could be no, rather than yes, and we only really say yes to something if it feels like a hell yeah, then that, that seems to be quite a, a good way of managing, well see some of the really big things we're asked to do. Yeah. I, I read something about having a slow yes. So faster no and a slow Yes.
When, particularly if you're in a position of leadership, just because you will have a lot more requests. Um, so just have, yeah, just having that kind of, that balance. And it's not, yeah. I mean, of course you've gotta wave up, but sometimes it's better to do a, a fast no, and then you can always, you can always go back and say, I've been thinking about it. Actually, that is something I would be able to do. It's easier to do it that way than a fast yes. And the need to take that back, so.
Right. On that note, Sarah, what top three tips would you have for someone who is really struggling with this programming that they've, you know, obviously been hardwired into them since, since they've been a, a child, which is really causing them just to take on too much and not be able to say no to things? I think I would start with just noticing what you notice. So almost that self observation, gentle reflection, just having a couple of questions just to ask yourself.
And then even if you can just do that first step that takes you down the ladder and what's the first step that might move you up the way, it's just one shift, isn't it? And you will end up in a very different direction. And I think those are the three things, yeah. So just notice what you notice. See what you feel like you need to lean into.
What would be one situation that you would love to be different, and then just, just to start thinking about what that first step down, so you've got the warning sign and what might be the first step up? Brilliant. That's so helpful, Sarah. I love that ladder of consequence. Really, really helpful. And, uh, Sarah is a regular guest on our Monthly hot topics podcast, which is there in our FrogXtra and FrogXtra Gold membership.
So if you wanna hear, um, lots more from Sarah on a monthly basis, uh, in conversation with me about the things that have been coming up for us every month, then do think about joining. Sarah, if people wanna find out more about your work, um, about, um, the Shapes Toolkit training, where can they go? Yeah, so on our websites, that's wildmonday.co.uk and have a look at the training that we offer.
And also you can find me on LinkedIn, so Dr. Sarah Coope on LinkedIn and it's lots, lots of resources that you can also download from our website. Yeah, and, and we run stuff on conflict. We run stuff on, you know, how to even have those conflict conversations, um, how to say no and deal with pushback, all those sorts of things. So just, um, drop an email, get in touch, book a call with Sarah to discuss how uh, she can come and help your team.
So Sarah, thank you so much for being on the podcast. We'll speak to you soon. Thank you. Thanks for listening. Don't forget, you can get extra bonus episodes and audio courses along with unlimited access to our library of videos and CPD workbooks by joining FrogXtra and FrogXtra Gold, our memberships to help busy professionals like you beat burnout and work happier. Find out more at youarenotafrog.com/members.