Episode 26 Preventing Burnout in Healthcare: Insights with Dr. Gary Simonds

Maria Mayes: [00:00:00] Well, welcome back Chakra and Chardonnay listeners. So I'm super excited and grateful to be back with you again, and really excited to share my guest today, which is Gary Simmons. Gary's so grateful to have you on the show today. 

Gary Simonds: I'm, I'm so honored to be here and, uh, looking very much forward to it.

Maria Mayes: Well, I'd love for you to just tell us a little bit about your background, the work you focus on right now, before we get into our wellbeing tips. 

Gary Simonds: Sounds great. Um, I, I am, uh, by trade a neurosurgeon, um, and have spent many a year, uh, deep in the bowels of the hospitals, uh, doing surgery and, uh, usually at, uh, big level one trauma centers.

So, uh, kind of a lot of thrills and chills. Um, but, uh, through the years, Uh, particularly the last decade or so, I became very interested in burnout, uh, particularly in physicians. [00:01:00] But then, you know, the deeper we got into it, the more we realized that, uh, uh, everybody in healthcare was, uh, having significant problems with burnout.

And, um, we, I, I happened to, um, run into a world expert in burnout in physicians, a clinical psychologist, uh, and he and I worked together, uh, a lot. On on the subject for, uh, several years and wrote three books, uh, nonfiction books on burnout and health care workers, and I continue to, uh, have a lot of interest in it.

I've actually retired from surgery, but I teach at medical school and and, uh, undergrads at Virginia Tech, um, and then do a lot still in writing and giving talks on burnout, uh, Particularly in healthcare workers, but it's certainly not, [00:02:00] uh, isolated. 

Maria Mayes: Wow. Yeah, I can see why the universe, uh, created this connection here, because I certainly, um, what I found within my work is actually healthcare and mental healthcare providers are those who seem to be resonating, vibrating towards me.

So I actually spent a lot of time in that arena and definitely see it. I think. It's such a, um, we're at this really place of opportunity and also I feel like obligation, um, to resource our, um, physicians, our nurses, everybody in healthcare with tools to prevent burnout. So I'd love to hear a little bit about, um, the things that you go into in the books and just some tips on that regarding that because I think it's, it's, it's just.

You know, I saw some data on it the other day on LinkedIn, and I can't remember the, the, the data points, but it was just. It, I mean, it was over 50 percent of physicians interviewed had [00:03:00] said, you know, just burnt out. And this was, uh, post pandemic, but 2020, 2021, 2022, and this current year, I mean, it's just, it doesn't seem to be getting any better.

So I think, um, yeah, I'm just so excited to learn from you, um, on what has worked with what you've seen in your work. 

Gary Simonds: Yeah, I'm delighted to share it, and I think you're very much on track with what we would like to see out there. And I, you know, just to be frank about it, we're, it may be selfish of us in healthcare to be kind of going, Oh, you know, we're burning out, somebody's got to do something.

I think it's, I think it's epidemic in our society. We are all kind of pushed the limits, uh, of multitasking and, you know, keeping our heads above water and, and, uh, always running from place to place. And then we have, you know, [00:04:00] everybody has some PTSD from the pandemic, I think. And, uh, so I don't want to make it sound like, uh, you know, if, if you're not in healthcare, it doesn't matter.

It's just, uh, I don't know. Sure as much, but I know the healthcare universe very well, right, right. As, as you point out, uh, you know, you can look at various assays and various ways to, to, uh, figure out how many people are and, and it. The numbers, they're all over the place, but as you say, a commonly landed upon number is 50%.

In some ways, I think it's, it's almost like a sliding scale depends how how tightly you want to apply definitions to it. Because in some ways, I think a lot more people are. And the flip side is if you tighten it up and you say how many people are. You know, are truly failing are, are coming apart at the seams.

It's [00:05:00] going to be considerably less, but it's, it's a miserable existence to be burned out. I mean, the, the principles of it is you, you have no emotional energy left. You're you're, you've lost your empathy. You have a feeling of nihilism that everything that you do is not, you know, is not making a difference.

And that's just not a happy state of being. What we found with our group. How this all got started was, you know, my own team, I was ahead of a neurosurgery team and it's a big group of surgeons and residents and PAs and nurse practitioners, nurses, administrators, anyway, I We were all just being nasty and kind of snapping at each other and getting in trouble in the hospital.

People making nurses cry and stuff like that. I was saying, what, what, what is going on? That's when I hit on the idea that, you know, perhaps this is functions of burnout. And, and what we find, I think is, [00:06:00] you know, good people, which most of them were very good people when they're depleted, when they're really depleted, um, idiosyncrasies start coming out, bad behaviors start coming out.

And then that just amplifies the problem amongst each other. You know, somebody snaps at you. Now you're not feeling as good. Right. It's that, 

Maria Mayes: it's that attuning to whatever the energy is in the room. Right. And so it's 

Gary Simonds: contagious. 

So we, we worked on my team first and we worked intensely on them using all sorts of methods to try to start building resilience. And what made me a convert, because I'll tell you, neurosurgeons in general are cynical about almost everything. And, uh, but what made me a convert was, It took a few months to really get off the ground, but after several months of working on this, all of a sudden, the whole situation changed, people were happier.

They were, they were interacting much better. I was no longer getting complaints about the [00:07:00] team. Um, uh, in fact, the team started, you know, various members of the team started winning awards across the hospital and stuff. And it was really a, um, substantive, uh, change, uh, for the better. And so it just made me into a zealot, you know, I got to get this news out.

And as you say, I almost feel obligated to, to try to help, uh, pass the word and, and give various, uh, methodologies and strategies. So to kind of answer your other question, I think, and it goes back to again, uh, some of what I've heard you talk about and seen on your sites and stuff is, I think a really good way to look at burnout. is to kind of imagine that all of us have a bank of energy and I don't know what you call the energy you can call it psychic energy, emotional energy, whatever it is.

It's, it's the stuff that gets us to get up and [00:08:00] move and do something and, and tackle problems and to, uh, be productive. It's the stuff that, you know, makes. Life good. Um, and we all have it. And, but everything we do in the day, every interaction we have, every activity we get involved in, everything we see here, feel it either makes the deposit in that bank, or it makes.

So withdraw. And, uh, to me, it's a, it's a nice metaphor and analogy that it what burnout would be is a situation where you've overdrawn, where the withdraws have far beaten out the deposits. And now, even when you're depositing, even if you're doing the stuff that works, you're it's not enough. It's just not enough to get you.

over the edge and get you back into the swing of things, right? And it can kind of spiral and sink deeper and deeper. Or if you're lucky, you can, you can keep making [00:09:00] deposits until finally you, you kick back into a normal and much more happier existence and more energized way of life. Does that make sense?

Yeah, I 

Maria Mayes: was just thinking back in the black, right? On the balance sheet. Yeah, 

Gary Simonds: exactly. The bank's not calling and saying, you are grossly overdrawn. Yeah. 

Maria Mayes: No, and I think there's so much to that in regards to if we're coming in with depleted, burnt out, just candle has burnt at both ends for so many years to the point where Even in our best to show up, maybe we can still give the presentation, do the surgery, serve the client, finish the product, win the case, but there's an underlying energy, like what you're saying, that's there, that is not going to be one that is of its full potential to uplift and radiate and offer all, all that we have.

So even if we're able to accomplish the task at hand, we're doing so [00:10:00] without. Really fully bringing our vibrancy to it. And I think that comes through, that comes through from the patients, from the clients, from the, from the team. So it. I really, I really believe in in the whole concept of energy and bioenergetics and all these different amazing things that we just weren't taught, you know, I mean, at the end of the day, we know better now so we have got to do better and we've got to do better for our health care.

Gary Simonds: Yeah, I mean, I completely resonate with what you're saying and I think, uh, that the cool thing about it. Well, there's a dark side to it. I, let me hit the, I'll hit the dark side quick, but, um, and I, I, I saw it in one of your, one of your pieces. I can't remember. Uh, but, um, you talk about, you know, that we can actually change our brains.

Um, and, yeah. There's real, I'm out of the [00:11:00] neuroscience world. There is real neuroscience to this, that, that chronic stress, chronic, uh, depression, uh, you know, just being depleted actually changes the way our brain connects, our neurons connect with one another. It gets all the way down. To the synaptic and the genetic levels, uh, that if we can alter our brain's chemistry, our brain's anatomy, um, on the microscopic level, uh, by persistently being stressed or persistently being down and the flip side, and I guess that's, you know, where we really need to get to the flip side is you can push it the other way.

Um, you can start going in the other way by, by reinforcing the circuitry that is associated with, with reward and happiness and, and, uh, energy. And, um, so where we [00:12:00] went with this, where we went with, uh, our team and how we've been, uh, trying to approach it and, and push the message is kind of goes to. We, we were trying to study and this is not just us, it's the people in the business, but study if you say that 50 percent of people are burning out, what are the 50 percent doing?

Or if it's 70, 30, what are the 30 percent doing who aren't burning out and what you start to see is patterns of behavior and patterns of activity, um, that seem to help restore the energy more than, uh, allows the energy to be depleted. Um, and it's, there's a whole slews of things that can be done, but what we try to really latch onto were the simple things.

Because if you tell somebody, Here, I've got a way to help you with this, but [00:13:00] it's a five step, hyper complicated, you're gonna have to do a lot of reading, you're gonna have to do a lot of studying, you're gonna have to, you know, you're gonna have to start running marathons. Yeah. People aren't gonna do 

Maria Mayes: it.

Yeah, life is hard enough already. We're not, we don't want to add more complexity, right? 

Gary Simonds: It's gotta be simple. Exactly. And so, um, you know, I know, uh, you work a lot on meditation and that is certainly way up there, you know, on the list of, of activities, and you see Tremendous benefits in various people.

But another rule that we give to it is that what works for Peter may not work for Paul. Each person is, you know, is going to have to find strategies that work for them. And so we, we always start out with the same thing. We always start out with the idea that, you know, there, there's some pillars that you have to have.

Uh, and one of them. Or a couple of them is what we call self compassion and self care and when we get to self compassion, what we [00:14:00] mean is, that you develop Emotional intelligence about yourself. We, we kind of know about emotional intelligence about other people. Read the room, see what So often we don't pay any attention to ourselves.

Maria Mayes: It is such an underestimated, I think, skill that is not trained, right? We're not taught this growing up. So I love that this is, this is my jam. Self compassion is my jam in terms of just having come from being a very, um, depleted, burned out, self critical human. That was doing, doing, doing, and evolving to now someone that's truly trying to stay in that space of being, and that's what allows me to be self compassionate.

I think, I mean, I just, sorry to interrupt, but I just can't say enough things about self compassion, because it's something that I find in every space that I go and teach, in every, um, every demographic I serve, we have this lack. of deep self compassion. So I love that you're [00:15:00] starting there.

So tell me more. 

Gary Simonds: And, you know, again, we're both, I think it's, you know, two people preaching to the choir. So 

Maria Mayes: we're drinking the same Kool Aid or the same wine, 

Gary Simonds: right? Yeah. We're not going to have a lot of controversy, I'm afraid, but But, uh, you know, it may be because there's some, uh, reality testing to this and it may be good, but yeah.

And so, and, and then you think about our society and that's why I say it's not just healthcare, it's everybody. They're going a mile a minute. You're always having to attend to 10, 15 things at once. It's very hard. To sometimes stop and just say, Where am I and all this? Well, how am I feeling? What is making me feel good?

What's making me feel bad? Where is my energy level? What am I? You know, am I taking this on with full force or am I just going through the motions? Um, am I sleepwalking through life and that sort of thing? So and so you have to kind of, you have to, you have to teach yourself about [00:16:00] yourself. Who am I? What?

You know, what, what brings me, uh, joy, what brings me fear, what brings me hardship or whatever in life, uh, you have to kind of then be able to take an account. Well, where am I? Where am I in my spectrums? Uh, you know, am I doing well? Am I, am I underwater? Um, And then the next step is the idea of self care.

And that is, it doesn't do any good just to recognize it. You then have to do something about it. If you're lagging, you have to be willing to do it. And we're in a, in, in healthcare, it's so easy to fall into the trap. But again, I think it's across society that what happens when we start doing self, self, uh, compassion and self care is, uh, we start feeling guilty.

Oh, I should be doing this. Oh, I should be doing that. It's really easy in healthcare. It's stress-laxing, right? Yeah. And we're so, you know, in healthcare, we're so trained to be focused on the patient, focus [00:17:00] on their needs. And, you know, the minute you start thinking about yourself, you go, they're just like, Oh my gosh, you, you know, what, what are you, a raging narcissist?

You're, you know, you're a sociopath. Um, But we know, for example, in health care, it's very hard to take good care of patients if, if you're not up to snuff, if you are sagging and, and, uh, low on energy. So right out of the block, those would be a couple of the biggest things. And that's, you know, in the self care, that's where the things like meditation come in.

You know, if you find that meditation is one of the things that makes deposits, you should be doing it. And it turns out that for a lot of people, it does. Now, I'm going to be frank with you. It's never worked with me. I, I don't know. I'm probably too hyperactive and I, you know, I'm not able to kind of calm down and sit down and.

and feel the air rush across my face or whatever. Uh, but, but I know a lot of people and we did, we started doing some experiments with the [00:18:00] team and they were just preliminary, but you could see changes and just, you know, just the calmness in, in approaching surgery. So we actually ran some things where we had people meditate just before going in to do an operation.

you know, tested how they felt afterwards. And anyway, you know, in preliminary studies, at least, it was very positive. So To me, meditation would be one of the strategies that help you do self care. Once your self compassion has told you, I need some work, you know, or I'm just trying to build up those stores of energy.

I'm, I just want to make as many deposits, uh, as I can. Um, another big one, and I'm not going to go through the list. We, we identify at least 70, but a few of the big ones, another big one is the maintenance of relationships that we care about. Um, it, it took a big hit, I think, [00:19:00] in COVID. Uh, it takes a big hit in middle age.

So we, we, if you graph, you know, people that you're close with and the amount of contacts you have with people that you're close with, when you hit middle age, it starts sagging now, men are much worse than women. 

Maria Mayes: And where are we defining middle age starting? 

Gary Simonds: Oh, I don't know how to get it. 

Maria Mayes: I'm calling it.

I'm stealing this from one of my guests, Hillary DeCesar. She said, it's the mid zone. I'm in the mid zone. So now that's my term. I'm not middle age. I'm 

Gary Simonds: mid zone. Yeah. And I think that's a fair way, fair way to look at it. I think it's, I think it's once you kind of hit stride, uh, in terms of, you know, economic security and all that sort of thing, you know, you're twenties, you're kind of.

You know, everything is a challenge and there's a fair amount of anxiety and that sort of thing. And, um, it's somewhere along the line, you kind of hit some sort of stride and you're kind of saying, [00:20:00] okay, this is what life is going to look like for a while. And, and you're going along, um, but. We start carving down our, our relationships, um, and, and men, like I said, men, especially you look at men once they hit the high forties to fifties and you, you can often, you know, count their close relationships outside of their spouse, maybe on one finger.

Yeah. Um, and you know, it's not that women don't do it either. And so. And particularly, you know, you're also often in the heat of your profession. You've reached that point in your profession where you're, you know, you're, you're a game changer, you're a mover and shaker, but that just means more responsibility and more work.

And so you're. Again, focus less on family and friends and that sort of thing. Also, if you look at, you know, so with burnout, there's, there's a fairly strong correlation with loss of relationships to burnout, [00:21:00] but it's also dementia. So if you want to look to later in your life, um, you know, one of the, the, you know, kind of protections against dementia is maintenance of relationships.

 pEople who have significantly reduced relationships are at much higher risk. So anyway, that's a, that's the one to keep, you know, in the back pocket. But two more that I think are very powerful. Um, and one is debriefing of stressors and that's, um, to, you know, if something's particularly bothering you to have someone or people, it's always nice if you have a group, but have someone or people who you trust, who you can relate things to, um, who can relate things to you that, so you can share it, a resilience group, if you will.

Um, You, you share, uh, you know, things that are particularly bothering you. Now [00:22:00] the danger there is you don't want it to, um, deteriorate into just complaining that you just sit and complain. Well, you know, I, I, let's say you're a, you, you have a bad, uh, interaction with a coworker. Well, he said this and I said this, and he said this, and do you believe it?

He sneered at me and then blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you, if you do that, all you're doing is reliving it. Which is not particularly good for you. Um, but if you were able to say, look, I had a bad interaction with a coworker today, and it really makes me feel like crap. I know I'm not going to sleep tonight because I'm going to be ruminating about it.

Um, you know, I, I wish I could, I wish I could handle these things better and you might get to what set it off, but you don't need all the other detail. What you really need is your response to it. And then. We, we, if you get into the psychobabble, you know, is your response adaptive or maladaptive? And they're not [00:23:00] pejorative terms.

Adaptive means, does it serve you? Does it restore energy? Maladaptive would be, is, does it not serve you? Does it take energy away? Yeah, is it expansive 

Maria Mayes: or contractive? 

Gary Simonds: Exactly. And so, um, so if you have a trusted group or trusted friend to, that you can discuss this with, you can discuss, well, you know, are there ways that I could respond differently?

Are there ways that I could respond that would be expansive or would be, uh, would be adaptive? And, you know, if you have a group, a lot of times examples will start popping up, Oh, yeah, you know, I've, I've had that happen. And here's what I did. And it may or may not work for you. But, uh, it, it really, if you can do it that way, it alleviates just putting it out on the table, alleviates a lot of the stress.

And then sometimes you learn different coping skills, uh, to do it. And, you know, it could be. Meditation could [00:24:00] be involved. You could say, you know, every time I go into surgery, I'm going to give you a surgeon's one, but you know, every time I go into surgery, that first 15 minutes, my stomach is turning. Well, have you ever tried, you know, doing a little meditation before you scrub in or something like that?

Um, so that might be a, an example of how that works out. Now I can't give you the debriefing without the flip side. Um, and because it's important because it's probably more important than the debriefing. And that's the idea of collecting uplifts. Uh, what we, what we say, harvesting uplifts. I love 

Maria Mayes: that.

Harvesting uplifts. 

Gary Simonds: So again, I'm going to use a healthcare example, but I think it goes, you know, in any, anything you're involved in, but in our world, we're kind of trained to look for bad things. We, we want to head bad things off at the pass. So our brains are really locked into looking for bad things that happen.

What can we do about it? When can we [00:25:00] intervene? Uh, how can I put the fire out? And, and we don't notice. Any of the good stuff that's going on around us. Why? Because in some ways that's white noise, it, it, you know, Oh, okay, the person's doing fine. I don't have to worry about it. Right. But what that means is we just surround ourselves with negative stuff, negativity.

I, you know, I, I'm worried about this patient. Oh my gosh, that patient may, you know, may sink and that sort of thing. So And yet, if you think about a healthcare setting, how many amazing things are going on around you at any one time, you know, so a family member hugs you because you help their loved one, a patient you've been working on for weeks finally gets out of the hospital and goes home, you know, or just the magic of, of, you know, what we're using an MRI scan for goodness sakes is incredible.

Anyway, The idea is to [00:26:00] purposefully, and a lot of these activities, the mindfulness, a any of these activities is a pur. You gotta have a pur purposeness to it. Mm-Hmm. , you know, it, it's not gonna come natural. You gotta force yourself initially. Yeah. 

Maria Mayes: It have to be intentionality with it, right? 

Gary Simonds: I mean, just have to be.

Exactly. And, and, and that takes upfront energy. So you're gonna expend some of your bank account to do it. But the payback can be huge. And this one, the uplifting is well supported in this, you know, when, when it's been looked at, you know, in the psychological studies and that sort of thing. But it's the idea to say, I'm going to notice a few things and I'm going to write them down.

Or most people now might put them on the phone. I write everything down. Um, and. Write them down, take them home. And sometime that evening, even preferably just before you go to sleep, as a matter of fact, just go through them and it doesn't have to be [00:27:00] 50. It can be five, go through three to five each night for a little while.

And what happens again, you're retraining your brain and, and you're, you will start. Noticing these things without having to intentionally look for them after a while, they will just start popping up. And then there, there are little islands of positivity, little islands of charge that goes into your banks and, and becomes, you know, a habit after a while.

Maria Mayes: So I'm like a living proof of those examples that you shared. A lot of them are what I've incorporated into my life and what I teach. And so I'm, I'm loving each part of it. And, and I love, I really love the thought of a resilience group. Cause a lot of times we talk about, um, even with, if you know, the same things that may be things that you're still stirring about before you go to bed.

Right. So a lot of times I literally even just said this to my husband [00:28:00] last night. He's like, Oh shit. In the middle of the night. Right. I'm like, Write it down, get it out of your head, put it on paper, right, because if I do that each night, right, if I, if I put the concerns that are still maybe of the day that the shoulda, coulda, wouldas, right, or how am I gonna, right, the, the future casting, the, the past looking, um, and then follow that up with, What happened that was really cool today or what am I grateful about or God, my air conditioning works and it's August, you know, so I love that, but I think to power that up through a resilience group that can then offer you, you know, just like you would, and oftentimes on any work team, but, but doing it in a very intentional way, the way you described it, I think is such a beautiful, um, takeaway.

That, you know, folks who are listening, I mean, lots of takeaways today, but folks who are listening, like, if you don't have a, a team like that, if you don't have even one person like that. How can you get there? Who can you reach out [00:29:00] to to be that person? Because I think that's huge, that um, ability to share to be open, to be courageous enough to receive, right?

Recommendations of how things could, could maybe go differently. I think that's 

Gary Simonds: really cool. Yeah, I think there's probably multiple ways, uh, that you might be able to get there. I was lucky because I was the boss. So I told everybody they had to be there, but, uh, but it was interesting, you know, and what, what some people are going to run into is there is often a, you know, almost a reflexive response to, Oh, we're going to, we're going to deal with psychological health, you know, where we, Oh, really, I, you know, I.

It, it, it gives them the willies or they think it's too much psychobabble or, or whatever. And we, we ran into that for sure. Just rampant cynicism. Mm-Hmm. . But boy, I'll tell you to, you know, watch these, these surgeons and, and PAs and [00:30:00] residents, after a while, they were fully invested. I mean, they dove in.

Nobody missed a meeting. I had to order people to go to meetings originally. And then I, you know, after a while they made it so. I can see a number of ways, you know, uh, one way you can play the game with yourself, you can do any of these exercises yourself, but I really think it's great when you've got others.

Um, you can always start with a, a trusted friend. You can start with a, with a partner, with a life partner for sure. Um, but. Also, you know, as you, I think the more we kind of open ourselves up and watch the people around us, um, we may notice that there are, there are colleagues, for example, in the workplace, um, who, you know, who seem to be, uh, sagging under the load and there's nothing wrong.

In fact, it's, it's good for both of us to, uh, to address it. And, you know, say, what's up? Is there anything I, you know, [00:31:00] I can do? Is there anything you want to talk about? Yeah. And just opening the door sometimes, uh, people will, we'll see that as, you know, a lifeline and we'll, we'll take hold of it. It's a it's a thing of we can go through our world with blinders on and and we did. I mean, this is another example, but we at one point we quizzed my team. about just facts about people they worked with every day. So like the scrub nurse that you work with every day or your, your clinic nurse that you work with every day or medical assistant and simple things.

Are they married? Do they have children? And, and almost to a person, zero, zero knowledge of the life outside of here, here, doc, here's what you need. You know, here's the patient, whatever. And, and so what we were saying [00:32:00] is there we are in a workplace filled with people, filled with people we work very closely with, and we're not truly engaging, we don't, we don't, we don't know them.

It's not that we don't care, it's just, we just march through our world, and what that does is sets up, it also sets up a tremendous Sense of loneliness. You can be amongst all these people and feel horribly alone, 

Maria Mayes: which is like the, the equation for burnout, right? I think loneliness, there's some studies, uh, another guest I had on, uh, Amy Lynn Durham shared some statistic about.

The amount of burnout that was actually specifically loneliness kind of masked as burnout. So I think it's definitely has to be a huge attributing factor, right? 

Gary Simonds: Oh, you know, absolutely. And again, I think that's all of us in this society. It becomes very easy not to engage, not to truly have a person to person interaction.

Maria Mayes: Well, when we're, we're on this hamster wheel [00:33:00] of productivity, it's really hard to step off of it for a second. To say, hey, how are you? How are the kids? Right? You might say that in the surface, you're yelling it while you're on the hamster wheel, right? But you're not eye to eye engaging and being fully present.

Gary Simonds: And yeah, exactly. They may tell you and you don't, it just goes right through. So, uh, you know, again, to get back to your question by, by just engaging and listening and being open, you're going to start picking up, you know, other people's situations and lot. And after a while, you're going to be able to identify people who you may be able to sync with and talk with.

Um, and, and there's, you know, if you offer a modicum of kindness and interest to people around you, it will come back. They will, they will then feel like you're the person that, you know, They can relate to and they're going to notice when you're down, you know, and, [00:34:00] and so I think these things, you know, truly can have a ripple on a pond effect.

Uh, but again, it's upfront energy. You got to remind yourself, don't just go through the day. Don't sleepwalk. Don't, you know, actually. Ask how the weekend went, you know, and remember that their husband had a recent heart attack and you know, how's your husband doing? That sort of thing. Sure. Sure. 

Maria Mayes: I love that.

So I've got another question for you before we move this conversation into one about wine, which I'm anxious to get to. And I'm just curious in any of the self care, uh, the modality specifically, cause I have some experience with this, Did you, did you leverage any breathwork techniques?

Was that ever part of the, the process in terms of the self care options? Okay. 

Gary Simonds: Absolutely. Uh, I mean, we, we brought in all, all types, uh, all, all different because we really wanted to You know, maybe not the most, [00:35:00] uh, the most ethical thing on earth, but we kind of experimented with my team, you know, and tried all sorts of different things.

Uh, and, and what we did, though, is, you know, we, we spent much of that time, really sampling for them. What do you think is helping? What, what do you find is best for you? And again, that's where we discovered that, you know, again, what, what works for Peter doesn't necessarily work for Paul. Yeah. Yeah.

And I, and I do think we have to be careful, you know, in the business of trying to To get this across to believe that there is a panacea that, you know, if you all do this, you're all going to do better. 

Maria Mayes: Well, it's really interesting. One of the, the clients that I have, it's, um, a hospital here locally.

And I'm working with the residents, so mostly from the hospital, but also some traveling. Right. And so once a month I'm going in and. Each month there's a different, so the first month was breathwork. Next week I'll be [00:36:00] teaching, um, just a very introductory meditation.

Then we're going to go on, we're going to go through about five different types of modalities just to kind of drop off some things. It was really interesting to see. You know, first thing I asked is, does anybody have a breathwork practice?

Does anybody, you know, do any breathing practices and not one in there? Which kind of blew my mind because it was probably about 30 people. Um, and then asked about, does anybody have a meditation practice? Again, you know, Pins, right? Nothing, right? And then as I started going further, what about, let's say, maybe a movement practice, a yoga practice, you know, a hand here, hand there, physical fitness practice, and a few more hands there.

 What was really interesting is, is the cynicism and the resistance that you could kind of see energetically from some, right? But then as we started doing the experiences, I think there was one in particular that finally at the last Exercise that we did the laptop was actually to the side or as before it was still.

Yeah. Yeah. So, but I think it's so [00:37:00] powerful. One of the things that I was looking to, um, connect with them on is how empowered are you? If you enter now into a room where you're going to be dealing with crisis, right?

You're not in a children's hospital, whether you're a parent or a, or a child without being in some sort of crisis. Right. And so all of the emotions, all of the, the energy that they're bringing in here, you have to come in. With a certain type of energy and you can empower yourself and choose do I bring in one?

That's calm by taking a few breaths before I step in deeper than normal slower than normal Do I come in in a chaotic environment rushing from room to room to room because everybody's gonna attune to you and I think I saw some light bulbs go on there and, and, and I'm just really hopeful that this is something that we can plug into, you know, everywhere from the conference room to the cocktail table is what kind of my focus is and, um, the [00:38:00] patient care room to every place in between, because we have this ability to one empower ourselves and then to empower those that are with us by being responsible for the energy that we're bringing into the room.

 For me, the breath has been the, fastest way to get fully present. That's accessible, you don't have to have a tool here, a tool there, you know, it's just, it's always with you, you just quickly can, can leverage it to go in, but there's other, there's certainly other options, too, to explore, but I just, um, I'm really excited to hear about this work that you're doing because you can, I mean, 

this is, like I said, I feel like not only do we have an opportunity, we have an obligation 

Gary Simonds: to yeah, and I mean, it's I kudos to you for doing this because they need it. Absolutely need it. I 100 percent agree about, you know, what do you bring into a room if you, you know, you slump your way in and and you already show that you don't want to be there or you're cynical.

[00:39:00] It's a whole lot different from Coming in energized, uh, interested, excited, but, uh, also, you know, to your point, and I, I, I gotta, I have to admit, I, I should have incorporated, incorporated this in, uh, and I haven't, but your point is very well taken. So I, I give these, I give talks on, you know, giving bad news.

And I tell people I'm a world expert in giving bad news, not because I'm bright or anything like that, but because I have a lot of practice. Um, one of them is not to just plunge into the room, come out of one patient's room and go into the next, uh, you know, if it's particularly bad stuff, go find a empty room or a closet or something and think for a minute, get your nerves, calm your nerves.

Think for a minute, what sort of message you want to get across, let yourself become calm so that you could, and I should just mention the breathing. I, [00:40:00] I never have. Well, maybe it's 

Maria Mayes: pushups on the bathroom counter. I mean, it's whatever we need to do. I say that because I used to do that in between meetings, right?

Intense meetings. So whatever we can do to reset our nervous system to you. Whatever works for us. Like you said, 

Gary Simonds: there's even, uh, you know, there's scenarios in medicine, certainly in surgery, but, you know, anywhere in the health care sphere where suddenly something goes wrong and there's a, uh, there's an old saying.

It's out of a, it's out of a book. But, uh, you know, when, when one of these crises is. Occurs. One of the first things you should do is take your own pulse. Uh, and the idea, the idea is exactly what you're talking about. You know, take a deep breath. Don't go, you know, don't allow the crisis of the situation to panic you.

You've got to be the voice of reason and the voice, you know, in the epitome of calm because it Somebody's got to conduct this, this [00:41:00] orchestra. Yes. So, uh, yeah, no, I think your points are very well taken and it's interesting. There has been progress. First of all, I think this generation, the generation you're working with, um, They are much more attuned to self care.

They may have forgotten it. Pre meds go through a grinder and I'm sure they, it's been beaten out of them. But as a generation, they are more attuned to self care. So I think You may have a more receptive audience than you think, uh, given a, given enough opportunity to hit them a few times, one time, it's 

Maria Mayes: hard to have.

We need a little consistency for sure. 

Gary Simonds: Right. And it's hard to have epiphanies, you know, with one session, it just, it's not going to affect most, but. One of the, the, the governing board, the governing organization that accredits residencies, the teaching of residents has mandated, uh, uh, resilience [00:42:00] training.

Now, they don't give it any specifics. They don't give amount of time. You just have to demonstrate that you do it. So there are going to be certain systems that take it very seriously. And we'll look to people like you to, Hey, how do we do this? Can you help us? Give us some things that we can do. And then there's some people are going to say, you know, every six months we'll bring in a bunch of puppies.

The students can, you know, pet the puppies. And then we've checked the box and that there is that type of cynicism out there as well. And then that can get translated to the trainees, right? Sure. Sure. So, you know, but it is a more receptive group, and I would, I would encourage you to keep hitting them with it.

Maria Mayes: Will do. Challenge accepted. So, 

Gary Simonds: it's great work, by the way, that it's needed. 

Maria Mayes: Yeah, my, my heart is in it. So, um, having been a patient, having been a mom, I mean, my, my son had, um, [00:43:00] Two surgeries in the last year and both time before we went in, I said, can you guys just do me a favor?

Everybody take a few deep breaths before you start. That was all I asked and they did and and to see my son stop, I think it was the anesthesiologist one time said, can I just take a few breaths first? So, um, which, you know, they'll never practice with me, but me in modeling it as a parent, it's, they've absorbed it through osmosis because they won't do it with me.

But of course, I love it. So I really appreciate all the wisdom and insights. I mean, gosh, so much good information before we talk. Why in a second, where can people find you, your work? And is there anything you're currently working on that? You'd like people to see more 

Gary Simonds: of store. Uh, and thanks for the opportunity.

I, I do have a website. It's just my name. Uh, Gary R. Simon's Simmons is actually how you pronounce it, but it's spelled like Simon. So it's Gary R. Simons. com. Um, and my books are on there. Uh, actually what, what's [00:44:00] going on right now is I wrote a novel and that's out. Right. Just came out of a month or two ago.

Okay. It also centers around this, this notion, um, believe it or not, it's about a brain surgeon who's, uh, a workaholic and over, you know, overextended, burned out, and he begins to see ghosts. He believes he's seeing ghosts. So, uh, I like it. 

Maria Mayes: Well, beautiful. And then are you on social platforms as 

Gary Simonds: well? Oh, yeah, I you know, especially I there's a facebook author page and okay and instagram I also make little right now i'm One of the things I'm tackling, I was telling you that the pre-meds are put through a ringer.

Mm-Hmm. . So I decided to make these mini videos and they're very unprofessional. It's just me holding a phone and talking for a few minutes about Uhhuh, , the whole process of [00:45:00] getting into healthcare graduate schools. Oh, okay. Um, and those are out there on, on uh, uh, Instagram 

Maria Mayes: Well, we'll include, I'll include all the, the goodness, all the ways to get ahold of you in the show notes. And again, thanks for all that insight. Now, I'd love to know, Gary, what type of wine you like to mindfully enjoy, if any. 

Gary Simonds: Um, you know, everything has the story, uh, but, uh, I, I am a, a fairly bad insomniac anyway, and that part of that's just through training.

I mean, for decades I was up every third or fourth night Mm-Hmm. rushing into a, a trauma center. But, um, but I found through the years that my favorite wines, uh, keep me up stuff that's been aged in oak and, you know, with high, with tannins. So I used to, I mean, it would be a Shiraz. would definitely be way up there at Cab Sav.

 I'm pretty reduced [00:46:00] to, uh, white wines and I love the New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs. Uh, that tends to be what I do. Um, I, I very much, we use it, uh, in the evening for, We don't go high dose or anything, but just to have something in your hand and be able to relate and, uh, calm down. And I have some friends who've converted to, uh, to non alcoholic wine, and we've been trying some and it's not working.

Maria Mayes: There are, they're actually getting quite a bit better. So I've, I explored those as well. And I remember the first time I had a non alcoholic wine, I was, I was, uh, I think I was pregnant and my, uh, my sister in law gave me some. And I remember just It was horrible. Like I had to spit it out almost like thank you, but no, I'll just stick with my water for the next nine months and then maybe come back to it.

But the ones I've been exploring of late have really have really come a long way. So, and there's a lot of lower alcohol wines now as [00:47:00] well. So you're 

Gary Simonds: going to have to give me a list because so far we're failing miserably. 

Maria Mayes: Yeah, I'll certainly share that. Well, awesome. I love that you like the, the zing of the sauv blanc and that you're keeping it low dose and that just, just for being here and sharing all this.

I really am appreciative for the work that you're doing and um, how it, how it can just. Help empower everyone in healthcare, not only the physician and the nurse and everybody in between in the process, but also on the receiving end, the patient. So I love it. Thank you. 

Gary Simonds: Well, ultimately that's what we're trying to focus on, right?

I mean, we can give better care, uh, and I guarantee you we can get better care for not burned out. 

Maria Mayes: Yeah. A hundred percent. Thank you so much, Gary. 

Gary Simonds: Thank you