Work-life Wellness: Empowering Working Women to Thrive
Yesterday, I participated in a wellness webinar for women neonatologists. After a brief presentation about maintenance of wellness for working women, and a review of the “wellness wheel,” we broke into discussion groups to answer and discuss some practical questions. I think that our answers might be helpful to some of you hard working women.
Here is the brief overview:
We began with a refresher on maintaining wellness - how it requires positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, accomplishments, and health.
Our wellbeing journey starts with self-awareness, for both mind and body. How do we check in with ourselves? Do we drink, eat, sleep, and move our body well? Do we read, write (journal), and create (hobbies)? Do we appreciate nature and beauty? Do we practice acts of kindness and gratitude?
To process our emotions, we need to connect to ourselves and determine which state we are in:
1) a resting state,
2) a happy, creative, energetic, focused, and productive (or flow) state,
3) a high-alert state, or
4) a fight or flight state.
Our goal is always to move towards state number 2.
We reviewed the importance of triggers, to learn what they are for each of us, and how to observe them and choose our response. Do we pause to take a deep breath, look outside, drink water, feel our feet on the ground, and then stay in the moment?
Our goal is to open the space between the stimulus, or trigger, and our response.
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” Viktor E. Frankl
We want to slow down to notice and use our five senses to go back to state 2 above. Journaling helps us to connect to our emotions; so does using our body to move. Working on our character strengths is mandatory. (See www.viacharacter.org) Gratitude and affirmations are always helpful. We must learn to reflect with self-compassion. Our minds should work for us, not the other way around.
Creating a support network and system is mandatory, our connection to others. In order to maintain wellness, our self-care habits and routines are necessary. To thrive we must surround ourselves with inspiration, balance our work with rest, relaxation, and hobbies.
We reviewed the Wellness Wheel, illustrating the domains of wellness.
Here are our discussion points:
Our goal is to determine how these domains exist for each of us. Ask yourself “how well am I doing in each of these spaces?” Define what wellness means to you in each category, then identify your indicators or clues of low wellness in those categories. Finally, we must determine how to hardwire self-care practices that make self-care as easy as possible. From Atomic Habits, we must make our cues for self-care obvious, make the cues attractive, and make our practices satisfying.
In our discussion group of women docs with over twenty years of experience, we asked ourselves about the clues that indicated one or more of our domains needed attention. Strikingly, each of us admitted that when we were stressed, we tended to get grouchy, irritable, and impatient, and this was not just when the NICU was busy but when we were stressed in general. Each of us noted that our children often reflected our stress level back to us. For example, when we arrived home, our children would ask how many hours of sleep we got at work the night before.
When we talked about the ways we nourish our mind and body, each of us admitted that exercise, specifically running, was a primary way to maintain fitness as well as a stable mood. Running helped each of us to clarify our thinking and solve problems. As a group, we often scheduled our exercise. We exercised or ran preferably outside in nature, for the natural stress relief that being outdoors brings.
We discussed how we balanced our positive interventions with our busy schedules, and again, each of us admitted that we had trouble turning work off. Some of us had learned to set a specific time of day, say six or seven pm, to call “stop” and go home. Others scheduled exercise in the morning before an afternoon filled with meetings or paperwork. We described the benefit of having a partner to reach out to for a reality check, to remind us that it was okay to do certain things to take care of ourselves. Our partners had all learned to say, “I’ll watch the kids while you go do that.”
We asked ourselves how we kept our personal and professional lives separate. Specifically, how do we use boundaries and priorities to protect our time? We all agreed that we outsource mercilessly. We get someone else to do certain things, like household chores, whenever we can afford to pay someone else. And, we all recognized the importance of having our partners participate fully and do their fair share at home.
A final lesson for other working women. Each of us older, experienced neonatologists admitted that it took us a long time to learn to say no and to get comfortable with saying no. We had to learn to have honest and courageous conversations with those we work with, or work for. We had to learn how to be up front about what we can and cannot take on. We decided this was preferable to taking on more, begrudgingly going through it, and being tired, stressed, or resentful about it. We all agreed to be very specific about ending our day.
And finally, we each recommended to younger colleagues “learn to say no.” Post a note to yourself wherever you need to remember this: “I’m sorry, I just cannot do that right now.”
Please let me know if our discussion points resonated with you.
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