HealthyGamerGG - Money and Debt Crush My Mental Health

Episode Date: July 28, 2022

Dr. K dives into feelings around money, workplace burnout, insecurities, and more! Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/healthygamergg/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You fix what you can, and if you're still unhappy there, and your workplace can't accommodate the rest or aren't willing to accommodate the rest or whatever, then you should consider finding a different job or whatever. Welcome. Thanks. What do you go by, friend? I go by Snow. Snow? Yeah. Cool.

So what are you working on, Snow? Yeah, so my prompt was, I want to work on moving on from the contemplative. to preparation stage of change. I've been trying to change for many years, and I think I have decent awareness into myself, but it's still not enough to make me want to take action. Okay. Wow, that was very well thought out. Thank you.

So can you tell, can you explain to us what the contemplative versus preparation stages are? Yeah, although like full disclosure, I have a slide up, so I'm going to. Just like read all of that. So the contemplative stage of change is where you're aware the problem exists, but you don't have commitment to action. And the preparation stage of change is when you're intent on taking action to address the problem.

Okay. Very well said. So you're aware that there's a problem, but you're not motivated to take action. Yeah, or there's like a strong resistance. Okay. Is there a strong resistance? Yeah, there is a strong resistance, and I'm even aware of the different factors of that resistance, but even that is not enough to make me want to change. Okay. Can we go into some details, no? Yeah, for sure. So I guess I actually want to say that the previous caller kind of helped

a bit more and is kind of related to my situation, but just with a different detail. So, yeah, just to go into a little bit more detail about my situation, it's that, so I'm really struggling in terms of changing with my belief towards money and how it ties to survival because it's weird because I don't even, I didn't, I didn't grow up. poor or anything. I grew up middle class. So I don't, it's weird because yeah, I don't feel like I have any strong negative early childhood stuff related to that. So I don't really know where that strong belief came from. But I have this like, I've been saving since I was a little kid. And so maybe it was like the ego syntonic stuff that really built up. Plus later negative stuff happened.

But basically, sorry, just my belief around money is that so currently I'm unemployed but I've been working full-time I was working full-time for about like four to five years and I was burnt out for my job and possibly the whole industry as well but I'm really having trouble because like I've tried several times so I even like tried part-time options just to see if it will work better with the burnout and stuff but I found that it still didn't work in terms of like pressure and stuff like that. And I'm trying to find like, yeah, trying to career change and stuff like that. But there's this part of me that like doesn't want to work honestly.

And there's also a part of me that like lacks direction. And that's the thing about myself. It's like I find it hard. Yeah, I find it very hard to know. Well, it's like, sorry, no. I do know some things that I want. I think the resistance to money, also spending money, is one big factor that holds me back. Okay. So when you say you want to move on to preparation, what's your goal?

So what do you want to be able to do that you're not able to do right now? I think my goal is either to be okay, because I have some savings, like, probably not enough to last me the rest of my life, but at least I can go for a few years, especially because I still live with my dad right now. So either one option is to be okay with, like kind of be okay with taking it slow because I also find that I'm quite impatient. Option two is like, I guess you can say the ideal or what I think I should be doing, which is like, you know, to find a better job that suits me more.

Okay. All right. So let me understand. So can I think for a second, Snow? Yeah. Thank you for calling in today, by the way. No, I'm so happy I got chosen somehow. Yeah.

I feel very grateful too. Yeah. It makes me sad that people, I mean, I'm glad people feel grateful, but it makes me sad that we don't have enough time to get to, you know, everyone who has questions. But anyway, that's not to distract. Okay. So the first thing that, yeah, let me just think for a second. Yeah. So the first thing that I want to point out is I think there are two separate things here. And I think part of the reason why it may be hard for you to move on from contemplative is because it's almost like either option is good, but they're in the opposite

direction. Yeah. Does that make sense? Because I'm sort of noticing that, okay, one thing, one way, so let's take a step back and talk about stages of change for a second. You, awesome PowerPoint, by the way, loved it. So oftentimes when we look at someone's motivation and their ability to change behavior, what we've sort of discovered scientifically is that there are a lot of cognitive stages that people go through before they can take action. And one of the biggest problems that people run into is that unless you understand where someone is in their stages of change, certain things may work and certain things may not work. So the simplest example, so the stages of change model really developed with addictions. And what we found is that people

who are alcoholics, for example, telling them to go to an AA meeting and get sober and stuff like that, which is like the preparation and action stage, didn't work if they were pre-contemplative, which means they didn't know that they had a problem. So giving someone's solutions, like talking to a 15-year-old kid who wants to be a CS-Go Pro and telling them that they have to stop failing classes and they need to pass their classes isn't going to work because pre-contemplative, they just don't think it's a problem. They're like, no, I'm going to be a pro. I don't need to study. So the first stage is pre-contemplative, which is when people don't have insight or awareness that a problem even exists. The second stage is contemplative, which is now I'm aware

that there's a problem, but I'm conflicted about it. So there's a part of me that wants to change, but there's a part of me that wants to stay the same. Then we move on to preparation, which is when someone is like, okay, I absolutely do want to change. Now we have to figure out how to change. What's the best way? My biggest issue with what you're saying, Snow, is that I think you're contemplative in two different issues that lead you in opposite directions. So one is the value of money. What is your relationship with money? The second is whether you should have a job, have a career change, and burnout. But it's almost like you're lumping those two together.

Does that? I think because the way I see it, the career change relates to money. Because at the end of it, it's about, it's about like survival for me. Yeah. I understand, I understand how they're related. But you see how it's kind of like, so do you want to change your relationship with money? or do you want to give in to your relationship with money and find a new career? I think...

I think I want to... Does that... I think I want to change with my relationship with money more, a little bit more. Yeah, but do you see what I mean? Like, I understand how the two are related, but like... You're conflict... So you have two goals. One is to change careers and one is to change your relationship with money, right?

Well, for, like, changing careers, it's like a second. Or it's like, again, it's what I think I should do. Because, I mean, I feel like the reality is that you have to earn money to survive in this world. Unless you can like literally plant, you know, like grow every single thing you eat. But like still need to pay for electricity and stuff. So it's like actually like to be quite honest, I don't want to work. And I know that's a common sentiment. But.

So I don't know. know, I feel like the career change is a little bit secondary. But my relationship with money is so strong that it feels like it's, it may be the thing I want to change more, but it feels like it's going to be harder and longer to change that than to like, you know, just get a job again and have some income. Yes. So let me ask you something. If you change your relationship with money, what would happen to your job or job prospects

or future? Well, I would be more relaxed about it because I'm like, when I'm working, to be honest, I don't, I get money and you would think that I would feel happy getting money, but I don't feel happy. And I also don't feel happy. I feel very anxious when I spend money as well. So I do think, yeah, that kind of needs to change. Okay, I understand that.

So what I'm sort of, so why don't you tell us about your feelings about money? Can you articulate that a little bit? It's very complicated because I think maybe, or maybe it comes across this way, but like, I keep talking about it. So obviously it's very, like, important in some way to me, or it's like weighing heavily on my mind. Actually, I think of it as like, how should I say, like, I'm more towards the anti-work side of things. I don't really like capitalism. I prefer like socialism or, you know, the ideals of like communism could have been. Or maybe the ideals of socialism.

Like, I'm very idealist. So I don't, it's kind of like very ego dystonic, my feeling about money. Okay. It's like, I care so much about it. Damn, someone's been doing their homework. I care about it. I said, damn, someone's been doing their homework. Yeah.

Ego-distonic. ages of change. Yeah. So tell me, how do you feel about money? Conflicted? So what's the conflict? Like, part of me, part of me cares a lot about it.

Anxious part of me, I would say, the fear. And can you tell us what the fear and, can you tell us about survival and money and the fear? Yeah, it's like, I guess, especially now, because I've struggled with depression and anxiety and stuff. So it's like, wait, I just lost my train of thought.

Can you just like the question? Can you just tell me what you freak out about when it comes to money? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, sorry. Yeah, it's like I freak out about like going bankrupt and like being homeless and like buying in a painful way. Yeah. Okay, okay.

Good. I mean, not good, but thank you for explaining that. Because that's what I'd assumed. but I think we just need to make sure. So now let me ask you a question. If you changed your attitudes about money and you are no longer worried about things, you've got savings saved up for a couple of years, you started chilling, right? You started to live this life where you're not working and like you don't have to figure it out right now because you're no longer paranoid about becoming bankrupt and homeless and dying a pauper. You with me so far?

Yeah. How would you feel about yourself? yeah I would feel I should say I do feel because like I honestly I'm like going back and forth I'm living back and forth like between these two states so I feel

better I feel peaceful but there is still that I don't know there's still that anxiety like and sometimes that's the thing it's like for me it's like I feel like I've been made

I do acknowledge that I've made some progress, but my current situation is like strange in that I feel. So like today I'm actually in a very good mood or like pretty positive, like functioning normally, I would say. So I'm not in that depression where it's like, you know, six months depression, like straight depression kind of thing. I'm like, it's strange because it's not even, it's not even hypomania. I saw a psychiatrist and they said it doesn't qualify as hypomania, but it's like, I would say just a level under where it's like within a month, I'm like feeling positive. Like right now, I'm doing things like going outside, you know, like talking to my career counselor, trying to like have information interviews, like working on things.

then I think like just some small negative things build up over time and I think I have a problem I don't really know how to like release it properly or if I'm releasing it properly but maybe what's an example or something that builds up like a very a small example but recently happens like I just saw some spiders in my house and I was like I was I wasn't that angry about it, but I was angry about it. And then it's like a couple of those small things where it's like and I don't completely berate myself, but I feel a little bit bad at like, I don't know, I was just angry about it. So, yeah, I don't know, but just those kinds of like small things. Yeah. So Snow, I'm going to, I'm going to go out. Is it okay if I kind of go out on a limb and make a couple of

assumptions and try to do something that I don't do often, which is potentially give you advice. Yeah. So I'm noticing a lot of different things. The first is that it seems like the way that you process your emotions could be better, especially when it comes to the piling up of small things. Yeah. Okay. So if someone has difficulty processing small,

emotional insults, let's say, or attacks, what does that mean for their work situation? If I have difficulty processing the frustrations and challenges of work on a day-to-day basis, what's going to happen to me over time? You'll burn out. 100%. Okay. So once you burn out, then working is hard, right? Yeah.

So this is where I'm going to say, like, I think it's going to be drastic for you to, I'm not saying it's not possible. But it sounds like you have a certain value for money and you have a certain idea of what you should be doing. What's your ethnicity, by the way, if you don't mind me asking? You don't have to answer if you don't feel comfortable with it, but I'm just curious. I'm East Asian. Okay. So the reason I asked, I suspected that. And the reason that I asked is because oftentimes people from East Asian cultures will have a particular security-oriented approach to money.

Did you grow up in a household like that? No, I think my grandparents, yes, but I didn't live with them that long, but maybe I absorbed it, like really absorbed it and don't realize that. It's possible, right? So, like, this is where we have to be careful about ethnic, racial, and cultural influences on an individual mind. Because just because you, there have been studies done, for example, on Asian Americans and mental health where we can, we can do literal research and discover that there are particular patterns that are like common to Asian Americans in their mental health, which are separate from the average American. And also, just because there are cultural patterns does not mean that those patterns translate 100% to an individual. Does that make sense?

Yeah. So the thing is, I don't know that you're ready to part with your security related to money. What do you think? Yeah, I think because I do feel that is quite a big resistance. Yeah. I know things logically, like, it's. it may be worth it or it's probably worth it to like you know pay for therapy sessions again but like and I have I've had it's the I guess the problem is also I've had experiences and all my therapy experiences so far have not really worked like with the CBT Act models and even like myself um things I try to learn on my own I think honestly like you're the most helpful so far but I'm still stuck Yeah. So that's, yeah. So I'm sorry to hear that therapy has not been as helpful as it could have been.

I'm happy to hear that you've been able to find some help somewhere. And also I think that maybe the way we're thinking about this is a little bit different. So I'm seeing a couple different problems. The first is that if you can't process, can't is a strong word, but if emotional, if you've made the observation, which I think is absolutely on the right path, that sometimes little, emotional things pile up and you don't process them properly, that will absolutely lead to burnout in the workplace. Now, the interesting thing is that if you were to manage that and not feel burnt out in the workplace, the interesting thing about that is I think that could settle a lot of things for you. I'm not saying that you should continue to work for the rest of your life, even,

or that you should be a part of the capitalist system or whatever. All I'm saying is that there's only one dumpster fire we can deal with at a time. And right now what I'm getting the sense of is that in your life, there's a confluence of problems that are all hitting you at the same time. So it's like now you're burnt out at work and you don't even want to work. So it's now a good time. So like one solution to being burnt out from work is stopping to care about money. Does that make sense? Because if I stop caring about money, then I don't need to work. And all the pressure is off and it's like, I'm fine. But that doesn't sound to me like, it sounds to be like mentally checking out a little bit.

And I don't think that's actually like a healthy way to deal with burnout. Does that make sense? Yeah. At the same time, I do think that you've recognized that there are some attitudes towards money. So I'm guessing that because you have this survivalistic kind of bend towards money, when you want something and you can afford it, when you buy it, you still. it'll feel guilty and can't enjoy it entirely. Yeah, like if I, because I bought some books and stuff and if I don't read it, I feel like I didn't use it.

So it's like, and I can give up so easily, like I'm buying things because of that. Yeah, absolutely, right? So, so independent of the burnout and work stuff, even if you're working hard, it sounds like you're not even able to enjoy the fruits of the capitalistic war machine. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So like that's a separate issue which absolutely needs to be solved. You need to change your relationship with money. Be a little bit more chill. I think part of the problem though is that these two things I think are absolutely connected, but I think they're artificially connected. Like the solution to burnout is not to stop caring about money. Does that make sense? Even though they are

connected, we can see how they're connected. So in my mind, I'm almost seeing two separate problems here, each of which needs to be solved. It's just an issue of which one you want to tackle. first. And I wonder if part of the reason that it's hard for you to get out of the contemplative phase is actually because you've got two separate problems that you're linking together. Yeah, like that makes sense. And I do agree, like, I guess I have a problem with priority as well. In terms of the two problems, like, is it what you were referring to before in terms of, like, basically the two paths I want to go on? Sort of, right? Because what you're doing is you're, I think both of these can be solved, but they can be solved independently, whereas what you're doing is linking the two. And I think the problem is that when you link the two, there's like two sets of values that you both hold that conflict pretty hard with each other.

Yes, exactly. Yeah. And so I think actually what you can do is resolve both of those values, but the problem is that the way that you set up the equation, it's like there's losses on both sides. Yeah, yeah. And I think, interestingly enough, sometimes that's normal for contemplative. Like if I want to give up alcohol, there are benefits to giving up alcohol and there are losses to giving up alcohol, right? That sort of makes sense. But in my mind, there's like two actually separate issues. Burnout and your relationship with money, I don't think the reason that you got burnt out was your relationship with money. Does that make sense?

Yeah, I can agree with that. So then the question becomes, if those, if the reason you burnt out doesn't have to do with your relationship with money, why are you trying to solve that by changing your relationship with money? I guess so like originally I said that was the, or just to me, I felt like it's more important to change my relationship with money. But I don't know, like from what you're saying, or not even what you're saying, just like from what I feel now, like, And I think you mentioned, yeah, like maybe if I solve the burnout and like get back to work, but also kind of change my mindset in some ways, then it will set me up a little bit better to deal with the money issues. I think so.

So let me give you a couple of reasons for that. The first is like, I don't know how to say this, but if I have, let's say, a complicated relationship with romantic partners, some of that stuff I have to deal with on my own, but I can't fix that problem by giving up romantic relationships. Does that make sense? Yeah. Like if I decide, okay, like I struggle in romantic relationships, so I'm going to be celibate. Being celibate may protect me from some of the stress of a relationship, but it doesn't solve the relationship issues.

Yeah. So I don't know how to say this, but all of your fears of survival and the security that money brings, those are hard enough to tackle when you've got it. If you're not working for two years and your bank account is shrinking month to month to month, it's like an absolutely do-or-die situation. You're like throwing a Hail Mary. Because either you figure this out or you're completely wiped. Does that make sense?

Yeah. Like, I'm not in as, yeah. So dealing with an insecurity, ideally should not be done by putting yourself completely at the mercy of the insecurity. The way that you develop security is by actually being in a secure place and then tackling your insecurity. It's not like throwing yourself into the insecurity headlong.

Does that make sense? Yes. So what that means in terms of money is that if you, let's say you decide not to work again and you just chill for a couple years, you could do a lot of intense personal work and you could come out the other side a very transformed person.

It's absolutely possible. I think it's going to be a bumpy road, and you may not come out the other side in the way that you want. Does that make sense? Yeah. So almost what I would say here is you start actually with little stuff, like emotional processing on a day-to-day basis, and you really consider a career change. And then hopefully what you can find is some kind of work that you find fulfilling and does not burn you out. Now, if you need to take a break from work for six months or a year or whatever, like, I'd say go for it. And the reason that you save, and this is where even the money part of you that's paranoid, we tell the money part of you, hey, the reason that we've scrimped and saved over five years is so that if we needed to take a break, we absolutely could.

And in order for me to find a career that is fulfilling and for my long-term financial security, I need to take a break for six months to a year. So you almost want to appease that part a little bit. What do you think about that? So when I hear that, um, sorry, part of me feels comforted. So that's kind of why I'm crying.

But part of me, the anxiety part of me, like still kind of gives back, like throws back, um, I don't know, like retorts, yeah.

Good. So you noticed that, right? So that's why I think it's going to be really hard for you to overcome that while the daily pressures of being unemployed are pounding on you. Yeah. So I'm glad you feel comforted because that's what we need to do, right? We need to not kick the part of you because the money part of you is actually looking out for you. It loves you. It cares about you.

Yeah. And also we need to tell it that, hey, like sometimes snow needs a break. We've worked really hard for five years doing something that we didn't really enjoy, where we were suffering a lot on a day-to-day basis, and we're kind of running on empty, and we need a break for a little while. I know you're afraid. I know that you're paranoid that will become lazy, and it'll be a gap on our resume, and all of these other scary thoughts that it tells you, right?

Yeah. And then you can say like, yeah, but we're going to just, we need a little bit of space because the old way wasn't working. And we're going to come back. We're going to be recharged. We're going to really think about what kind of career that we have that is fulfilling for us and provides us with financial security. That's the end goal. Yeah. How does hearing that make you feel?

To be honest, like, that is kind of where I was at. but I think what would help me in this situation because what's really helped so far is you actually telling me that like dealing with the burnout is probably easier like first of all should not be conflated entirely with money and is probably easier than actually fixing my relationship with money so on that topic like for the emotional processing

because honestly I'm still very confused. I've watched a lot of videos and stuff, but could you give me some specific details about what methods I should use? I don't know, I feel like I am using some methods, but it's not working as effectively for me. What methods are you using? So I journal a lot.

I guess my question here is like, is talking more effective, like actually verbalizing versus even whispering or like journaling or like typing? What do you think, Snow? I feel like it's a personal thing, but for me, I think like talking, maybe I have to do some more introspection or like analysis, but I feel like talking helps me more. but it's actually like so hard for me sometimes especially when I'm depressed like I just don't want to talk at all sometimes okay has this been helpful today it has been helpful um but i'm aware or like i remember when like i felt like this with some therapy sessions before and like i kind of just fall into the same pit again so that's why i'm trying to ask for like specific

steps for emotional processing. I don't know, because I honestly feel like I don't understand if there is a best way or like, yeah, I should figure out myself or like... Do you think we processed some emotions today? I feel like... I feel like the answer should be yes. But I also might be alexathymic or like just partially, and it's hard for me to I don't know what it feels like to process your emotions.

Yeah. So let's understand what happened today. Okay. So I'm also getting maybe a little bit of insight into why therapy has quote unquote not been very effective for you. So I said a couple things and then you broke down crying, right? Yeah. And then what happened? What did you do immediately after that?

I apologize. I don't remember that, but maybe you did. Oh. I don't think you did anything wrong. So then, like, we, like, taught, we were talking about all this kind of stuff. And then, like, you're suddenly, you sort of did a 180 on me. And you were like, do you have any concrete skills for emotional processing? And actually, what was helpful was when you told me to do ABCD, like, when you told me, like, okay, I need to work on emotional processing and burnout first.

So I think what's going. on is that sometimes when you get close to emotionally processing, you actually look for some kind of regimen or solution to do it instead of actually doing the work. Does that make sense? So like right on the cusp of emotional processing, your logical mind actually takes over. So you step away from your emotional mind and you're like, okay, give me a logical plan to emotionally process. And the moment that that actually happens, you move away from emotional processing. Yeah. Okay. Is that sinking in or no?

No, I understand what you're saying because I definitely, like, the word that comes to mind is optimization. Yes. You can't. Good. To keep going. But like, but then the problem is like, have I? I don't know. Because my question is that I'm like, I don't, again, it's like, I don't know what I should be feeling if I've totally.

like followed it through completely emotionally processed. Like is it the cathartic feeling after crying? Is that like 100% or? Yeah. So I think so I think if you get the opportunity to work with a therapist, I think you should. And I think what you should do with that therapist. So this is tricky. But sometimes I've had patients like this.

Some patients need to be given solutions on the surface and then need the emotional processing to happen without. them realizing it. So this is the kind of thing where I think the more you get closer to emotionally processing, the more your mind is going to be like actually feels uncomfortable. And then what happens when we feel uncomfortable with emotions is our logical mind is like, let's optimize. Because optimizing is safe territory for you, right? You know how to optimize, no. You made a PowerPoint about contemplating. No, no, I didn't make it. I found it online. Whatever. Right. So you had this PowerPoint ready. You did your homework. So like optimization, being, a good person in terms of doing your work and like if I give you an ABC D EFG and I say

Snow do these things you will do it until you are burnt out and you can't do it anymore right but what you want is like push all the way to the back yeah and then you end up burning yourself out because you're so good at pushing yourself what you want to the back oh I want this I don't I want this particular shirt let's say, or I want this bicycle. And then what you want, in comes your money complex. And your money complex is like, no, no, no, snow. We can't afford that.

We need this money for a rainy day. So no bike for snow. And then here comes a rainy day where we're burnt out. We can't work. Look, we saved all this money for a rainy day. And your money complex is like, no, no, no. We can't actually spend the money for a rainy day on a rainy day. We have to keep that in case there's a rainy day.

Right? So it's like, yeah, maybe I was saving it for a rainy day, but I don't even want to spend it on the rainy day. Right, exactly, right? So it's like, it's just, it's weird because you've saved it specifically for this purpose. Now, in terms of like what to do for you, you know, I do think that this is where there's like some concrete stuff about processing emotions. So like journaling at the end of the day, I think is useful. There's a particular meditation exercise that we sometimes teach people, which I can share with you, today, which is before you go to bed.

It's kind of, I guess is our meditation for the day. But basically go back. So when we start our day, usually we feel pretty fresh. And then as the day goes on, there are all kinds of emotions that come up that aren't like worked through properly. And so we get scared from the spiders and we have all these thoughts. And then we get distracted, right? Before we resolve the problem of the spiders, we get pulled into.

something else. So that leftover emotion gets kind of like banked. At the end of the day, we've wound ourselves up. And sometimes people have difficulty falling asleep because they're worrying about all this different stuff. That's all banked up emotion that's been waiting to get out. So there's a simple practice that you can do, which is what I call the meditative rewind practice. I think it's in Dr. Kay's guide if you've had access to that, but I can teach it to you now. And it's basically you go back, you start at the end of your day. So if you're laying in bed, and you go back, you go backwards in time and go through basically each event of the day. And as you go through each event of the day, you acknowledge especially the emotional impact of that.

So, for example, I was brushing my teeth, but my partner didn't put the cap on the toothbrush. So the first amount of, I mean, on the toothpaste, so the first amount of toothpaste that came out was all crusty and like dried out. And I couldn't even brush my teeth with it. And it was really annoying because they do that all the time. Oh my God. And wow, I really got frustrated with them. Sort of acknowledge the emotion. And then kind of go to the previous thing.

So before that, I had to do the laundry. before that, you know, I had a great piece of cake for dessert and that was really enjoyable before that. And you basically want to go through all of your day and just acknowledge the emotions that you felt until you end up with waking up. Sometimes the practice takes five minutes, 15 minutes, 30 minutes. For some people, it can take even a little bit longer. And that can be sort of like, it sort of like sort of starts you off with, okay, the day started, I was pretty fresh and now I've like worked through like acknowledge for yourself that you've worked through a lot of what's happened today and now it's time to go to bed.

So. So yeah, I want to say I have heard of this before. I did watch it on the guide. But when you say acknowledge, like, do you mean like, do you mean kind of like what you just did saying it, saying it in my mind? and like in a calm manner but not getting hooked by the feelings? Yes, exactly. So you'll feel some of the feelings come up, right?

And you want to just notice, wow, that really upset me. And it was just incredibly frustrating. But then it is very good question. So then you don't want to get caught up in it. So remember, the purpose of the meditative rewind practices to be like somewhat sequential. So then like if, for example, with the toothpaste example, if I, if I'm not careful, then what my mind will do was be like, I can't believe, like I've told them so many times and they never listen and they do this and they do this. And last time during my birthday, they forgot this. And then your mind is off all kinds of places and then it just ramps itself up.

Yeah. So you don't want to like engage too much, which you want to kind of acknowledge, okay, wow, like how did I really feel in that moment? Okay, so actually like labeling it. Yes. Okay. Yes. Right? So one of the, so some of the stuff may go back to EQ, emotional quotient.

And one of the key skills of emotional quotient is being able to identify your internal emotional state. Mm-hmm. So that's a very concrete kind of thing that you can do. It's a good meditation practice. Okay. Okay. The other thing to just think a little bit about is, you know, if you want to take a break for a little while, negotiate with the money complex, and see what amount of time

it can actually give you off. If it's three months, six months, whatever. Maybe it's still 20, 23. And then give yourself that time. And then what I would really start doing is thinking about, you know, what kind of work would you find more fulfilling? And then hopefully also, it's not just the work, because I think this is what a lot of the anti-work people kind of miss is that there are absolutely crappy jobs out there, but you have an influence in terms of how happy you are at a job. Right? This is where like the biggest problem with the anti-work movement is that they assume that jobs are completely static. And part of the reason for that, I don't really blame them for that, because what happens is because of the nature of social media and stuff like that, the most

extreme scenarios rise to the surface. So what everyone is reading about are the places. that are terrible to work. There are some places that are terrible to work, some places that are amazing to work. And the truth is most places are kind of

in the middle where like most bosses actually want their employees to be like happy. Like most bosses are not, you know, capitalistic overlords. This has been my experience.

Maybe I've been lucky. But, you know, they want the job done, but it's like a lot of bosses. Like I've had multiple bosses. Many of them care about me as people, is like as a person, I'll still reach out to them.

I have good relationships with them. Like those kinds of bosses exist. So to think a little bit about, okay, what kind of career do you want to be in? What sort of work do you find like engaging? And then also, whenever you do decide to go back to work or when you try to look for jobs or whatever, then start to really consider don't put up with crap just because your money complex tells you we need this job in order to survive. right, that's where you've got to start changing the way that you behave at work. And that's where like, so for example, one of the things we found in career coaching is that what a lot of people benefit from is working out with a coach, first of all, what they feel at work that they're unhappy with, and then practicing how to talk to people about it.

So that when you go and talk to your boss, you don't come across as a whiny entitled employee. you don't lead with your emotions, right? You're not like, there's an eruption of frustration. What it is is like going to your boss and like sort of having a nice like pre-prepared thing that's like, hey, this is something I found really frustrating at work. This person in particular seems to like purposely, I know it sounds kind of paranoid, seems to be purposely like trying to make my life difficult. And at first I thought, am I just being paranoid?

But I've actually talked to these three coworkers who say that this person, does the same thing to them. Yeah. At this point, I'm just trying to do my job. I want to do a good job. And these other three people are too. But as long as this person is like sabotaging us, not only does it make it frustrating, I spend basically 60 to 90 minutes like trying to fix this person's problems.

And when you frame things to a boss like that, oftentimes the boss will like be on your side. It's just about communicating things in a good way. So I think there's a lot about work that you can handle yourself. And what we also know about research from burnout is that burnout is a combination of individual things plus work things. It's not created entirely by work and it's not created entirely by an individual. So the problem is that employers think that burnout is an employee problem. Employees think that burnout is an employer problem. y'all should fix this because I'm burning out or mental health is your responsibility as an employee so

here's a subscription to a meditation app and hands off we're not going to change anything about the way that we work so the problem is that both sides are trying to punt burnout to the other one whereas in all of the interventions that I've done on burnout that have been successful it involves a shared responsibility just to give you one quick example of that so one place was you know called me in to teach meditation. And I was like, cool, I'm happy to teach meditation. When are we going to do it? And they're like, okay, well, their shift ends at 6 p.m. so you can teach meditation from 6 to 6.30. And then I said, uh-uh. If you want me to teach meditation, it has to be a part of their workday. And they need to be excused of 30 minutes of work in order to learn meditation.

You can't make wellness an additional burden on your employees. And then they were like, oh, okay, fine. And it worked out great. Surprisingly, teaching 30 minutes of meditation did not impact productivity negatively at all. People just got their work done in the same amount of time. They just spent less time on like browsing on Reddit, sitting on the toilet, not working. Right. Anyway, this is kind of a tangent, but this just goes back to this idea that burnout, I think, is going to be somewhat individually influenced. And if you can manage your emotions at work and be super careful about suppressing what you dislike at work because money and security.

Okay, so I think, I feel like I still don't understand the suppression or emotional processing part, but if I can, if I can try to summarize and you can say if it's correct or not, then it's, I don't know, are you laughing because I'm trying to rationalize this again or? No, I'm laughing. I'm sorry, that was, sometimes I wear my expressions on my face. I was actually appreciating how conscientious you are about learning. And I'm glad that you asked if it made you a little uncomfortable, because I think it's awesome.

You're a fantastic student. Oh, God, I think I lost my train of thought, but it was something about rationalizing. You were going to try to summarize emotional processing and suppressing emotions. Okay, let me think, sorry. So, yeah, so I guess my takeaway is that, I may have thought I was emotionally processing when, you know, like, was kind of either living the emotion or even, I may have been able to notice it, which sounds like that's the right path. Suppressing it may have come in when I started to rationalize too early. So I guess like it's just like I understand the stuff about doing it at the end of the day

Especially if I haven't had time throughout the day, but it's like if I had time in the day like So I let myself be angry about the spiders like fully first because I don't want to get too angry Like if I don't let myself get too angry is that suppressing it? Um So So, okay. So letting yourself, I don't know what you mean by too angry, because that implies, it sounds like that's suppressing.

So because you're using the word too, which is the point is there's not like an appropriate amount of emotion, right? There's just, you feel what you feel. It's just what do you do with what you feel? So do you let it control your behaviors? Do you let it control your thoughts? or do you acknowledge it, kind of notice it, and then like the interesting thing about emotion that is acknowledged and noticed is that it tends to take control of you less. The problem is that when we suppress emotion, it actually takes control of us more,

because when we suppress it, we lose awareness of it. And that's how you get people who are like, think they're super logical, but are actually like behaving quite emotionally. Does that make sense? I just have one question is that, so in the past, I have tried to notice my emotions. And I guess the thing is because it didn't like in the way it worked because, yes, like, if I feel myself getting angry and I notice that, it does calm it down because otherwise I'm feeding into it by like, you know, by my thoughts. but in some ways it felt like when I noticed it

when it calmed down it felt like that was suppressing it because it was going down I think that's wrong right well so I mean so that's where I think you should figure it out but so maybe the reason it felt like it was suppressing it is because

you are probably pretty good at suppressing your emotions and so your primary coping mechanism for negative emotion is suppression. And so the end result is the same. The emotion goes down. The question is, is it coming back later?

In the case of suppression, it's going to come back. In the case of processing, it shouldn't. Or it'll come back weaker. I guess it's really hard to tell, though, because, yeah, it's hard for me to tell. Yeah. Yeah. So hopefully we'll have some kind of, we may do a stream or something soon. I've been writing up a curriculum on emotional processing.

And originally this was slated to be for group coaching, but we may stream a portion of it or something. I don't know exactly what I'm doing with it. But I've noticed that there's actually a need in the community that no one ever teaches us how to process emotions. Yeah, that would be super helpful to get information on. Yeah, so I just have to figure out how to break it down into steps. but I think for you, Snow, a couple of, like, key things to remember is, first of all, you know,

I'd start with just being a little bit careful about trying to solve burnout by adjusting your relationship with money. I think these are both issues that you're probably going to have to deal with in terms of figuring out how to work in a healthy, fulfilling way. I mean, you don't necessarily have to if you, you know, if you really decide that's not for you, that's totally fine. But I don't think that burning out after four or five years of working, is a good reason to leave the workforce. I mean, I think it's a good reason to leave the workforce then. But I would not go completely off of working

because I think that there's a lot of value to doing stuff that you find enriches the world. And that's where I do believe that a lot of jobs out there like do create value for people. And it's about sort of figuring out how you manage emotions to prevent your burnout. And then hopefully once that sort of gets sorted out, then over time once you've got, you know, once you're not dipping into your savings,

then you can start to develop a really healthy relationship with money. Do I don't know, I'm not asking for like a full thing, but like you just have any, like, quick, or is it possible to have any quick tips on developing good relationship with money, like just a direction? I think a lot of it is somewhat similar to stuff that we've covered before in the sense that I think, first of all, acknowledging that that part of your mind is looking out for you. It's not a bad guy that needs to be conquered. So it's almost like trying to reassure it without giving into it. That's really the goal, right? is to notice that, okay, like, you really are looking out for me, but we have four years of savings or two years of savings.

I can actually afford a bicycle. Right? Like, if I go from two years to 1.98 years of savings, that's okay. And, like, I deserve to be a little bit happy. And one of the things that money is absolutely there for security. Yeah. And money is also there to, like, help people feel happy. And that's where I would even think a little bit about being, like, concrete with it.

So, like, how much money would I have to save in order to feel secure? And sort of just really thinking through things like that. Okay, yeah, because I've thought about those things before. Like, it's so hard. Like, I cannot put a number to it or it will be a really, like, a high number. But maybe I, it sounds like I'm doing the right thing in terms of like acknowledging that, like, I do recognize that it's actually trying to protect me. So it sounds like I should keep doing that. It sounds like that is the right thing to do.

Yeah. So I also get the sense that, you know, you've, I mean, you've come a long way from it sounds like where you were. Because even, even today, you're sort of, I think like you mentioned, you're contemplative, right? So you've moved out of pre-contemplative into contemplative. So you acknowledge the advantages and the disadvantages of your relationship with money. And that's actually huge. So I think if you just kind of keep at it for a while and also like some of that work is easier to do. You know, you can't, it's easier to learn detachment from food when your stomach is full.

It's harder to learn it when your stomach is empty. Yeah, exactly. Good. So it sounds like that's, yeah, so good luck to you, Snow. Any last questions before we wrap up for the day? No, I guess there was that meditation. I was just curious about like mantras. Like, would you recommend any for me or just go with like the own chanting?

Let me think about that for a second. Are you, do you participate in any kind of religious tradition, Snow? Not actively by identify with Buddhism. Okay. Okay. So I think I do have a general recommendation. It's just not something that I can teach you. So I feel like if you can get access to someone who can teach you a Lakshmi-oriented mantra, I do think that would help you. Would you spell that out for me? Yeah. L-A-K-S-H-M-I. L-A-K-H-S-H-M-I.

Okay. So if you're in the Buddhist tradition, a lot of the traditionally Hindu gods will have Buddhist counterparts or versions. So there may be some kind of bodhisattva that is in the same direction as Lakshmi. The problem is that most of my spiritual training is not from that tradition. So I can't teach that to you. But I feel like that's probably what you need. would it be harmful if I did it or it's I understand that you can't teach it to me but like if I found like I'm trying to say would it be harmful if I did that specific one and not like a Buddhist

counterpart no no it wouldn't be it wouldn't be harmful it's just if you if you're leaning towards a like so for example like if you go to a buddhist temple and there's a buddhist monk there you can go and ask that buddhys monk do you know a lachshmi month or know anything that's similar to a Lakshmi mantra. Okay. Does that, that's what I mean. It won't be harmful. But I would definitely recommend learning from an actual person who understands this stuff if you can.

Like, you can Google a Lakshmi mantra. But I don't, I've noticed a difference between people who Google mantras enchant them and people who are taught mantras by a specific person. Got it. Okay. Cool. Thank you so much. You're very welcome. Take care of Snow. Good luck. Bye. All right. So a lot of stuff to cover there. I think it's, I think Snow was a great example of how a lot of stuff that's happening in the world right now can intersect. Right. So if I want to develop a healthy relationship with money, that's sort of like a personal quest in here. But then that can, you know, developing a healthy relationship with money can really intersect with work-related burnout and sort of like capitalistic, socialistic, whatever, like work environment kind of stuff.

And the interesting thing is that, you know, as we go through personal conflicts and we have personal challenges at work, sometimes what happens is we externalize those to broad-scale things. And I think that it can be healthy up to a point. Like it's important to understand trends that are going on in the world. At the same time, we've got to be a little bit careful because when you sort of say, I am unhappy with my job and the reason that I'm unhappy with my job is a capitalistic society, that may be true, but it leaves you with very little actionable stuff. So in medicine, we've got this really interesting principle, oftentimes patients don't understand, which is don't order a test unless it's going to alter your

management. So we never order tests or imaging or anything like that just to know. We only order stuff if it's actually going to change what we do. So if I have a 90-year-old woman who may have uterine cancer, but they're not going to be on chemotherapy and they're not going to go to surgery, there's actually no point in ordering the test because it's not going to change what we do. Right? So that's common thinking. Obviously, if there's a lot of, The patient really wants the test and wants to know for other reasons, and that's a different story. But generally speaking, we want to focus on things that are alterable. The tricky thing with a lot of this like anti-work sentiment is that there may be alterations,

like maybe you need to change who you vote for and go vote and stuff like that. That I think is all fantastic. But we also have to be careful because sometimes there are things that you can do to affect how burnt out you are at work. And we're not suggesting that, and this is where employers get tricky, because what they'll say is that 100% of the burden is on you. If you're burnt out, it's your fault. In my experience, and actually the literature supports this, if you look at Moslock's original research on burnout, it's sort of an intersectional problem. Right. So it's the connection between a person and a work environment that creates burnout.

So that's where there's some stuff that you can alter. and some stuff that you can. And that's where, like, you fix what you can. And if you're still unhappy there and your workplace can't accommodate the rest or aren't willing to accommodate the rest or whatever, then you should consider finding a different job or whatever. But I think what we've really discovered is that there's a lot that you can do in terms of how you communicate to your boss, altering your schedule,

changing, you know, setting healthy boundaries. Like, if your boss texts you at 10 p.m., don't answer. And they're like, hey, I texted you at 10 p.m. you didn't answer on Monday morning. You say, yeah, I'm sorry. I was confused. Am I supposed to be working at 10 p.m. on a Sunday night? You can ask them. Is that an expectation? And that's where, you know, like if they say, yeah, like, obviously, like you need to be available on your phone 24-7. You can say, okay, I understand that. So currently, my contract has this amount of work over this period of time listed. So availability 24-7, how does that affect like compensation? Just ask, right?

They're like, oh, like, it doesn't. If you don't like it, you can leave. And if your boss responds to you in a way like that, you can say, okay, thanks for clarifying. I appreciate it. And then you can start applying for other jobs. And then, you know, a week later, you're like, by the way, I'm leaving. When are you leaving? I'm leaving tomorrow. How can you do that to me? Surprised Pikachu face. Oh, well, you said if it didn't work for me, I should leave. So it's not working for me. So I'm going to go.

Surprise Pikachu face. Right? And then they're like, no, but like, and that's where you could say, look, I'm confused. You know, you're not going to be angry. So you're just like, I'm confused. We talked about what my, I was hired to do one job. You asked me to do something else.

I asked about compensation. You said it wasn't available. You said that if I didn't like it, I should leave. So I'm leaving. and that's it's not people are being passive. It's not passive aggressive. It's just setting a limit and sticking to it. You don't want to, you're not punishing them.

It's just, okay, these are the terms of work and that doesn't work for me. So that's, that happens sometimes. Anyway, we're getting off track. But the key thing here is that sometimes, you know, personal stuff like my relationship with money can kind of connect with work-related stuff. And that's where I do think that snow was a really good example of demonstrating how, if you do a lot of emotional suppression, it's going to lead to burnout. And that's where sometimes if I feel a certain way, it's not necessarily that the job needs to change it, right?

Some of that is just emotions that I need to process. That, like, you know, like, it's a frustrating job. Like, even if you work in medicine, which is sort of a good place to work generally, it's bad in some ways, but good in other ways. There's still just a lot about the job that can be incredibly frustrating. And that's what happens with jobs, is like no job is, like, no job is bad. perfect. And so managing that kind of stuff and like even communicating to your boss, like in a healthy and productive way about what your needs are, what your limits are, what you're trying,

you're trying to understand the rules of the game. And stuff like that, that's all stuff that's really, really important to do. So I think sometimes when we really look at career-oriented stuff, we don't realize that there's like a personal component to it. And that's actually why we develop the career coaching program, but, you know, is because we sort of realized, okay, like, wait a minute, this isn't just about negotiation tactics. Because everyone's like, okay, here's a book about negotiating where it's like, hold on, you need to understand how you feel a little bit first. Because a lot of times what gets people into trouble is like untempered feelings at work, right?