Overcoming Overwhelm to Achieve Your Goals with Dr. Samantha Brody

Dr. Cates: Hi there. I’m Dr Trevor Cates. Welcome to the spa doctor podcast. Today we’re talking about how to overcome overwhelm so you can achieve your New Year’s resolutions. My guest is Dr Samantha Brody. She is a licensed naturopathic physician and acupuncturist in Portland, Oregon. She also runs a virtual arm of her business, doing coaching and consulting with clients across the globe. Dr Samantha writes for a variety of publications and has been quoted in media outlets including the Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, Huffington posts and shape. She’s author of “Overcoming Overwhelm, Dismantle Your Stress from the Inside Out”. In this interview we discussed the difference between managing stress and overcoming overwhelm. How do you identify what you personally need to address, stress and overwhelm, and how to set yourself up for successfully achieving your New Year’s goals. So please enjoy this interview. Dr. Samantha, welcome to my podcast. It’s great to have you here.

Dr. Brody: Thank you so much. I’m so excited.

Dr. Cates: Yes. So this time of year we’ve just gotten through the holidays and all the chaos. Um, and now we’re first of the year and New Year’s resolution. So this is the time to feel the pressure, right? And so you know a lot about overwhelm. So that’s what we’re talking about today. So what, what, what does it mean to be overwhelmed? I mean, I think we all know what that is, but what’s your definition?

Dr. Brody: But yeah, so I think about overwhelm a little bit differently than we typically think about it. So overwhelmed. We often feel when we say we feel overwhelmed, we just kind of feel tight and stressed and like there’s not one more thing we can do, but I think about overwhelm as being the end state of an accumulation of just too much stress and that can be the stress that we typically think about as stress. You know, the normal, I’m stressed because I’ve got this deadline or I’m stressed because the holidays were difficult on my family, but it’s also the little stresses that accumulate to basically fill up our buckets is the way I think about it. We have a certain ability to handle stress. I represent that as a bucket and all the stresses increase, increase, increase, fill up that bucket and then spill over and that’s when we get overwhelmed and they can manifest as this typical feeling of overwhelmed, but it can also manifest physically with a health issue or emotionally or even spiritually. For some people it’s just the too much and then how it impacts us is when I consider the overwhelm.

Dr. Cates: Okay, so overcoming overwhelm is different than managing stress?

Dr. Brody: So different. So managing stress and managing stress is important. Don’t get me wrong. We have to learn how to be able to deal with our stress and I often will encourage people to come up with kind of outside the box ways to manage their stress. You know, not this, the typical mani/pedi or meditation, those things are off know of course always great, but getting out from under overwhelmed and really dealing with their stress is about dismantling and decreasing the overall load. Instead of just saying, okay, I’m going to manage the stress that I already have because ultimately we’re going to have more and more stress. That’s what life is about. I think we often say, oh, well around the corner I’ll be less stressed because this will be done or that will be done, but then life happens and more things pile on and whatever they are, and even just aging. As we age, we get more stressed just from being in our bodies on the planet and so you can only manage it reasonably for so long before it starts manifesting in either symptoms or emotional states that don’t feel good.

Dr. Cates: Right, so what are some of those things that people experience that? What are some of those symptoms that people experience then?

Dr. Brody: I think it can really vary from person to person, so whatever your weak spot is, where the overwhelm is going to manifest. Now of course we’re all prone to having it manifest as this kind of, as we talked about, the kind of typical feeling of feeling overwhelmed or quote unquote stressed, but for each of us we have a different spot where were disposed because of our genetics and our personal history and just the choices that we’ve made in the past. So one person might manifest, they’re overwhelm as headaches, and another person might manifest it with gut symptoms or fatigue or trouble sleeping, or pretty much just about any symptom from my belief perspective, from my perspective, any symptom will have some .. There’s some aspect of our symptoms that is impacted by the accumulation of stress that we have in our lives.

Dr. Cates: All right. And what about this? You mentioned a bucket theory and you’re for managing overwhelm. So let’s talk about that.

Dr. Brody: I think about stress as you know we talked about a little earlier in the accumulation, so I think about it as a bucket. So we’re each born with a certain size bucket and some people are born with little tiny buckets and some people are born with big buckets and this manifests kind of how resilient we are, but there are some things that can change the size of your bucket. There aren’t very many. So you know, if you went and meditated an hour everyday for 20 years, your ability to handle stress would change. But for the most part, we have this kind of, here is how it, here’s what it looks like for you. This is your, this is what you’ve got, which is why sometimes what two people will go through similar stresses and one person just kind of rolls right off them and then the other person ends up in all kinds of hurt. So I think about it as a bucket and then different things fill up this bucket and there are some things that you can change and some things that you can’t change that fill that bucket up. Things that are, you know, your history, for instance, that’s a stress things you’ve been through in the past. You can’t change that. You can change how you interact with to interact with it, or you have say your genetics. You can’t change your genetics. You can make changes in your life, so you’re less likely to turn a gene on. For instance, as you know, the the field of epigenetics where our genetic dispositions intersect with our in the world around us and our choices in our lives. And so these different things fill up the bucket. We have environmental stresses, nutritional stresses, financial stress, no stress, some insufficiencies things. You’re not getting enough, fresh air, water, sunlight, and eventually the accumulation of these stresses will overflow the bucket and once that happens, then we manifest symptoms on the other side and so with this bucket theory, what I’m looking at is helping people identify what their specific stresses are that fill up the bucket and what they can change, what they can’t change, and then very specifically what they choose not to change because ultimately you can’t do it all. You can’t do all the things you want to do, let alone all the things that you are supposed to do or you should do or you need to do or you’ve committed to do. And so we need to be able to have a way to vet what things we actually are willing to kind of get out of our buckets to decrease the overall load. And sometimes there are big things that we don’t have control over and sometimes they’re small things that we have an immense amount of control over that. Looking at an accumulation of many small things, we can decrease our overall load and have it less likely to spill over. Does that makes sense?

Dr. Cates: Yeah, it does. So how do you help people identify or find what they need to address that, that stress or overwhelm?

Dr. Brody: Yeah, that’s a great question. In the book the, it’s a four step process. The book’s called Overcoming Overwhelm, as you mentioned. The, the process that I take readers through is to first identify what’s most important to them. I call that their true north. So what your values are, your core values are and how you want to feel and then what things it is that you want to accomplish or how you want to, uh, kind of experience your day to day. I’ll say I’ll say it more like that. And so we identified the true north and then we look at how we make change fast. And so some people make change best with little changes and other people may change best with more sweeping changes. It really varies from person to person and even issue over issue or day over day as well. And then once you have an idea about that, then we’d look at what is your accumulation of stress, and we in the book, we actually go through all of these areas and identify all the different stresses, which at first upfront it seems daunting because there are so many of them, but the magic is in being able to look at all of these things. So many of them we have control over and we can make changes to just a little bit at a time in order to be able to then make a plan, which is the last step of what things we’re going to address. So we look at the stresses, we look at what’s, what’s, what are the nonnegotiable things that we really need to change. So for, for me, for instance, if I don’t get eight hours of sleep at night, I’m a legitimate rack and I can’t make choices in my life that line up with what’s most important to me and how I want to feel when I’m not getting the sleep I need. And so that for me is a non negotiable. So the work, it’s hard work for me to deal with that because it’s something that I, it’s a challenge for me in my life in general. That’s one of my weak spots. But being able to say, all right, here’s what’s most important and in order for me to vet each individual choice, I need to look at is this something that I need to deal with? And then what are the precise steps I’m going to take to do that. So some of the changes that I, that I, you know, that people will pull out of this, are these bigger changes saying without this one thing, it’s gonna be very hard for me to get to these other things. However often by addressing the smaller things and wrapping our head around, okay, I can, you know, clean off my desk. I can choose to eat a vegetable with every meal. I can choose to eat protein. I can, you know, get rid of all of the pants that are too small in my close that makes me feel like crap every morning when I tried to squeeze into them, you know, these smaller things that cause us stress that we can get rid of and then lower the overall load. And so for each person it’s different, but we identify the stresses by getting clear about what’s most important, enumerating them and then assessing them one each one individually to say, is this something that’s going to have enough impact that it’s worth bothering to make the change and then how am I going to do it? Like what exactly is it that I’m going to need to do to get there?

Dr. Cates: Right. So let’s, let’s do an example. So this time of year people have new year’s resolutions and I feel like you could individualize this a bit for people. You’re going to help set people up for success because as we know, um, the success rate of New Year’s resolutions actually isn’t very good and not good at all.

Dr. Brody: No, it’s not.

Dr. Cates: So like a lot of people, like the big ones are, I want to lose weight in the first of the year. I’m going to, I’m going to get back in shape, I’m going to get to the gym, I’m going to lose weight. So let’s talk about. Let’s just use an example. So if someone wants to get back in the gym, they want to get back into working out regularly, what, how would you help them individualize this so they can set themselves up for success and overcome the overwhelm of this goal.

Dr. Brody: That’s a great question. So the first thing I would say is I really encourage people to not make resolutions, but instead of making resolutions and have a theme or an intention, right? So if the intention is to get back into shape because you want to feel better in your body, what is it? What’s the. Is it the going to the gym that’s going to get you feeling better in your body? Or is it the movement that’s going to get you fit? Like what exactly is it? Right? And so trying to be really clear about what your actual goal is underneath, like what’s driving it, right? Because the success is often about, you know, if you say, okay, I’m going to go to the gym and then you don’t go to the gym twice, well now you haven’t done it and you’re like, forget it. I didn’t get there, I blew my resolution. But if your intention to, your theme is to honor your body by moving it or to keep yourself in shape because it’s gonna help with your health when we aren’t able to, you know, when we don’t follow through with that resolution or with that thing we can say or what’s, how can I take this and use it to my benefit for, for making choices in the future that are really going to serve me. So there’s always a reason you’re not getting to the gym. So if it’s something like, you know, it’s never that you’re lazy, right? People are so lazy. I’m not getting to the gym. It’s never that people aren’t lazy. People have varied priorities. They have too much on their plate. They don’t have enough bandwidth to be able to make that change. They don’t feel good about their bodies, so they don’t want to show up at the gym in their, you know, in their workout clothes, whatever those things are.

Dr. Cates: Maybe they’re just tired …

Dr. Brody: YES, or they’re just tired. Right. So you can’t, you know, you, if you’re going to, you can’t get up at five in the morning to the gym. So I might back into it and say, all right, if you know that you’re the reason you’re not getting there because you’re tired, how do we get you to have more energy in the morning? Well, first of all, you have your natural pathic physician look at what’s getting in the way of you having the energy you want. Is it related to your nutrition as it related to your sleep quality as it related to your health condition like thyroid or anemia. So we, you know, we have to get that off the table but also look at all right. You know, most people when we’re looking at why we’re tired, you kind of get back into it. You said, well, I am on my phone, you know, doing this last text or messing around on facebook until 11 and of course you’re not going to get up at five and go to the gym because you’re tired and then you feel badly for not going and you give yourself a hard time and that doesn’t do us any favors at all. Now we just feel badly about ourselves on top of not being able to button their pants. So I mean I think it’s really about getting about getting underneath it, right? So what is, you know, how can you make, have an intention instead of this specific number goal for instance. And then what things do you need to put in place to be able to see it through? And if you don’t to be brutal, absolutely brutal about identifying why, like what’s why, what is getting in your way? And sometimes it’s, you know, it, it can be something like fatigue or a logistical thing. Sometimes it’s discomfort. Your subconscious has discomfort with being happy or fit or you know, because somehow you have a story in your subconscious that doesn’t line up with this conscious experience of feeling fit and sexy and healthy, whatever that is, or that you’re making the choice to lose weight because of the societal dictum that you should look a certain way instead of really feeling like, well, this is what I want. I would like to be 10 pounds lighter because that’s how I’m gonna feel better in my body. I’ll have more energy and be more flexible or whatever those things are, right? It’s about choice. What do you want for you, right? Is this your choice is something you want and if then you can’t move forward with it. Why?

Dr. Cates: Right. And then also like you mentioned, feeling comfortable, not feeling comfortable putting gym clothes on and going to the gym. Like you might wake up and be like, Oh God, I don’t want to. I don’t want to put those. I don’t want to be in the gym with all these other people looking at me. Yeah, I think it’s important to why. What is going to be in the way, what are the obstacles to being successful and achieving your goals and, and addressing them. Because I do, I often, I think that that’s why people fail a lot of times with new year’s resolutions because they don’t look at what might be in their way, what are the obstacles, what are the roadblocks, and addressing those beforehand. And then, and then the other big part, I feel like people beat themselves up and then they give up or you know, mess up. I’m putting air quotes because we all mess up.

Dr. Brody: Right? And I always say like, you can’t fail it. Self care. You can’t. It’s a process of figuring out what you need for you. And honestly, I believe that it’s so much more harmful to give yourself, you know, to feel that shame, to feel badly and to give yourself a hard time. I think that’s more harmful and carrying an extra 10 pounds, honestly, most of the time. And so, you know, ultimately how can you reconcile those things. So we’re making choices that line up with what our values are and not, you know, you never look back and say, Oh, I’m so glad I spent 10 years shaming myself because I didn’t follow through with that or shaming myself for not fitting into my pants or, you know, whatever the reason is that we do that, which is so undermining in particular for women, I think.

Dr. Cates: Yeah. So I think that if you, if you go a day or two and you’re not getting to the gym, don’t, don’t beat yourself up, but at the same time you don’t want to keep giving yourself that excuse. Oh, I’m not gonna. You still got to get to the gym. If you set that goal, it first of all set goals that you’re really going to follow it. Right? And then right at that goal, how can you set yourself up for success? Right?

Dr. Brody: Right. Yeah. And the like, what are the pieces that you need to get? And you know what I mean? Is it, if it’s important to you to get to the gym, which it really. I mean, honestly, that’s what you happen to pick the thing that I think is important for everyone as far as our overall health strength training is one of the most important things that we can do for our bodies, especially as we age. But I, you know, I agree 100 percent, you know, don’t pick something that’s unreasonable and, and look at what’s most important. Like is it, you know, often we will end up prioritizing things that aren’t as important really. And so vetting on a regular basis, is it more important, you know, sometimes it is more important. For instance, to know your kid forgot his saxophone, you’re going to bring it to school, so going to the gym, but you might just say, all right, you’re going to have to deal with the consequences for getting your saxophone. I’m going to the gym. So being able to vet on a, you know, on within each moment what is most important right now based on what my values are.

Dr. Cates: Yeah, absolutely. And then one of the things that I know we’re talking about going to the gym is sometimes really can’t make it to the gym, but I could still do pushups at home or whatever. I’ve got a physio ball and you know, a little bit of hand weights, just some basic stuff so that somehow they don’t have time to drive all the way to the gym. I’m maybe I’d like maybe, I don’t know, I’m not feeling like I want to put those gym clothes on or whatever. Then we’ll do something at home to hold you over to, to help keep you kind of in that flow. Right?

Dr. Brody: Absolutely. And that’s part of setting yourself up for success. If I don’t get to the gym, what am I going to do? So you don’t end up just not going to the gym and not doing anything. You have a plan. If I don’t know, I’m going to go three times a week, there’s going to be an, you know, a time that I’m not gonna make it. If I don’t, I need, I’m going to choose to do something at home or I’m going to reschedule. That’s the other thing, putting it on your schedule, whatever goal it is and you’re trying to meet, putting it on your schedule and whether that’s a self care thing or whether it’s going to the gym or you know, then you can actually look at what’s, you know, what’s in that slot and what’s the most important thing. And sometimes it’s going to be more important to do something other than go to the gym whether you feel like it or not, but exactly having, you know, you can drop and do 10 pushups right now. I mean don’t.

Dr. Cates: Alright. So, um, so I think, uh, let’s, let’s give some other examples because I think one of the New Year’s resolutions that people often say is they want to lose weight for, as their news resolution. I encourage people to be a little bit more specific. Like I just gave the example of getting to the gym or you know, another example would be eating healthier. So because it’s going to get you to that goal and uh, but without putting that pressure on yourself.

Dr. Brody: Right. Well, I think that’s exactly what we’ve been talking about. So what, you know, what is it that you can, can you reframe it so it’s not specifically a number, but it’s about your health and about how you’re going to be putting things into place to make sure that they’re going to work for you. Right? I mean it’s, you know, the other thing is if you’re going to the gym, you might gain weight because you’re lifting weights and you might not actually lose weight and that’s better in some cases even. And so I think, I think just being careful about the, you know, what things you’re choosing and making sure that they actually line up with what is, you know, what your actual goal is, right? And for weight loss, you know, it’s such a common goal, right? But why do you want to lose weight? It’s to feel better if it’s to feel better, you want to make better food choices. So what do you need to put in place to be successful with that particular thing? Right. Do you need to plan ahead? Do you need to get help? If you have that luxury, do you need to, you know, choose to cut certain things out for a period of time? Do you want it, you know, whatever it is that is going to work for you, that you know, you need to identify and you know, what hasn’t worked in the past. That’s the other thing. I think we do the same things over and over that don’t work if every year, like I’m gonna lose 10 pounds this year, you know, if you’re not doing something differently, the same thing is going to happen.

Dr. Cates: So eating healthier and, and the new year, um, is something I hear people say a lot and I, you mentioned a few good things. Anything else that helps set people up for success with that? And addressing they’re overwhelmed because I, uh, I think for some people the idea of going from the holidays and probably over knowing a little bit, going straight into the new year and then I’m going to restrict that feels overwhelming, right?

Dr. Brody: For sure. I mean, I think one of the things that I really work because it’s the new year, we’re talking about it in this context, but ultimately I think when we’re able to create a life that it’s more in alignment with what our values are and how we want to feel. First of all, you don’t go so off the rails at the, you know, around the holidays because you know, you might choose to have a cookie, but instead of you don’t have to have six. You might choose, you know, you can say, all right, I know that I love peppermint bark or whatever that’s called from trader Joe’s. Well, you could also get a mint dark chocolate bar that has a quarter of the sugar. So going into it, you’re not that far off the rails. It becomes much easier then, you know, because for me, with my patients and my clients and the people I work, you know, my readers and everyone I work with, it’s really encouraged people to not, you know, it’s not about right now, it’s not about this second, it’s about in general in your life. It’s about the longitude of it, it’s about interacting with your life and the way that really works for you. Big Picture and you know with the food stuff, it’s overwhelming to. I mean the amount of. We spend less time in our culture cooking than any other industrialized nation. It is like the percentage of our time that we spend planning for and preparing food. It’s, it’s crazy. I mean it’s, it’s people feel like, oh, I don’t have time to cook. Well the amount of time, even the people who were spending a lot of time, it’s still half the time that they do in many other cultures and we are so accustomed to this quick fix thing. I mean, part of it is a mindset shift. I think about all right, if this is something that’s important to me, how am I going to make time for it? And you either make time for it or you don’t. And if you make time for it, I mean something else has to give. So being really clear ahead of time about what else is going to give so you don’t feel overwhelmed trying to eat healthily because you can’t, you know, you can’t eat healthfully out of a box for the long haul, you know, you just can’t. It takes, it takes effort and time. There’s no question about that, but it doesn’t have to be all consuming either. There’s you know you can prep food and freeze it. You can have, you know, I often do a project with my patients and clients were having to do what’s called the menu project and my particularly crafty patients I have them actually literally do it as a craft project, like a menu that you would get at a restaurant. So they opened it up and there’s breakfast options, lunch options, dinner options. Then on the back there snacks that they planned out to make sure line up with what their goals are. As far as you know, for some people they’re looking at calories. For some people they’re looking at macros for some people that are looking at avoiding certain foods. So you take that kind of decision making overwhelmed part off of the, off of your plate and you have right here matches. It doesn’t mean you can’t go outside of that, but if you know that you’re not going to have to come up with a new breakfast, you just look at your list. Is that right? What do I have in the house? It’s to meet my needs. Then that, you know, it takes the part of the, the, the part that’s overwhelming where you have to make the decision in the moment because there’s no decision. Fatigue is real.

Dr. Cates: you know, what I think is overwhelming is the idea of driving somewhere to go out and especially if you have to wait in line or wait for somebody to serve you. I mean we’re talking about what saves you time. I’m making a home cooked meal. To me, the way that I cook, I think it’s actually faster than having to drive to. I don’t go to fast food restaurants, how much time, but I see people in line like sitting in line for my, you know, some of the fast food restaurants, McDonald’s or whatever, there’s a big line and they’re having to sit there for awhile and you know, wait, it’s not fast anymore. Like what can we whip up in the kitchen and not have to get in the car? Like what do we have

Dr. Brody: And sometimes I think that’s about planning and you know, having the things there that you know, you need that will meet your needs because if all you have in your kitchen is, you know, sugar cereal and pop tarts, you know, you can’t make a good decision because you know, you can’t, you need to plan ahead. And you know, again, that’s when I was working with someone who can help you figure out what’s gonna work for you. But sometimes it’s just common sense. Right. You know, if you, it takes, you know, I actually had a patient recently who was a. I was looking at her food journal. I have most of my patients and clients track their food and she, I was looking at her breakfast and she was having two eggs and a piece of toast for breakfast. And you know, first of all I said that’s not enough food, but I said, could you put two fried eggs? And I said, can you have, could you have vegetables with your breakfast also because you’re trying to increase the amount of vegetables you’re having and for lunch you said it’s too difficult because you’re at work. Couldn’t you just make scrambled eggs? Should I don’t have time to do that? I don’t have time to make scrambled eggs in the morning to put to make vegetables in the morning to have with my eggs. And so I actually, the next morning I was like, what are you even doing? I set a timer on my phone. I set a timer as if they return timers now I’d set a timer on my phone and I literally, I made two fried eggs and then I made a scramble with vegetables that I had premade. And then I made a scramble with fresh vegetables all the fastest. Was the scramble with the premade vegetables, but throwing vegetables and saw tagging them and then adding two eggs and scrambling. It took less time than the Friday that she was making.

Dr. Cates: Yeah, it doesn’t, doesn’t have to take a long time. I think another thing too that people say as I’m eating healthy, but everybody else in my house is not. And um, I know that’s a big one that comes up is I’m trying to make these changes, but the rest of my family’s not on board. Um, which, you know, it’s not always an easy one. I do think though that if you can encourage your whole family to eat healthy, they’re gonna benefit from it too. So I don’t know if you have any

Dr. Brody: chips. You know, what I did, this is, what I usually will do is encourage my patients to just say tough like that we’re going to be eating and if you’re, you know what I mean, let me tell you, your kids are getting, if you don’t your kids, I mean occasionally there are kids who are legitimately pick lean, just piggy enough and able to stop eating. But when you get, you know, people will eat what you’re serving eventually. Now, of course there are some relationship dynamics that don’t allow for that, but you know, the two things you can do are, you know, you can make a separate meal for yourself and if you prep it ahead, it’s usually fine. But also to start saying, all right, this is what we’re eating, I’m choosing health for our family. Um, and you can eat whatever you want out of the house. You know, my, my 12 year old, you know, he say, Oh yeah, at school some kid brought in like thousand dollars of candy. I’m like, what’d you eat? These like, well, you know, I ate this and I eat this. And then I gave the rest away and that’s kind of how he was. He’s just kind of geared to do that. He would, he would no sooner eat 12 pieces of candy than, you know, take a bite of the desk because he would feel terrible because he’s used to eating healthy food and eating in a way that really supports his body because that’s what I feed my family. Does it annoy them sometimes? Sure. Um, but that’s, you know, it’s important enough to me that that’s a place that I’m willing to put my foot down, although every family is going to be different, right. Um, where you’re willing to draw your hard and fast line.

Dr. Cates: I think with kids that earlier. So I have three kids and I think the earlier you get them started with being involved the better because if you can get them involved, they, they, uh, they appreciate it more if they just, the food just shows up on the table and this, you know, they, they can be pickier about it, but if they’re involved in it, I’ve had that they appreciate it more. So I love this idea of the menu creating the menu, what you mentioned about that. I could see that some kids, my kids would maybe not for a particular interest because they’re teenagers, but, but when they’re younger, I could see how they would love to create something creative and if they’re involved in that process then they feel appreciated and they understand and they go along with it better.

Dr. Brody: And my kid’s not crafty at all. I mean, he’s, he’s, uh, he’s Sporty, right, because like, I’m not into crafts, I mean the sports, but so he wouldn’t be into making, uh, uh, you know, doing a menu project, but we say, you know, come up with, let’s sit down and come up with 10 lunch ideas and then he writes down because, you know, there’s nothing that’ll, you know, chaff me more than my kid coming home, not with his lunch, stolen his lunchbox that drives me out of my mind. So I’ll say, okay, well what is it that you want to eat and how can we make, you know, what’s a healthy version of that to make sure that you’re getting a healthy good lunch so your brain is working the way it needs to be. And then he, you know, he’ll, we’ll post it up on the fridge and then he’s actually picking from his own list of what he wants to pay for lunch.

Dr. Cates: Okay. Well, I think we gave a couple of common scenarios for New Year’s resolutions. Anything else you want to say about those?

Dr. Brody: I really think that we covered most of what I like to talk about, about the resolution part. Yeah. Themes.

Dr. Cates: Um, is there anything else you think that, you know, of course we’ve been talking about in New Year’s new year’s resolutions and goals going into the new year and I think it is a great time to start fresh and start again and just set yourself up for success for that. But as we go through, um, the year, what are some of the other things that tend to create overwhelm for people that you notice?

Dr. Brody: I think it’s really different from person to person. And again, one of the things for me that I really think about is this accumulation of stresses and so really making you go goes through a whole process in my book to do this, but you don’t need a book to do it is to look at well where, what things are causing stress on my system and my life, you know, look around, right?

Dr. Brody: What is it that really feels overwhelming to me is that this particular pile of things that I haven’t gotten to, you know, something that I often will have people do is make what’s called a hit list with their to do list where they will go through their to do list and pick out like literally rewrite everything on the to do list or you know, cut and paste a that you can do in less than 10 minutes. And then literally put on your schedule every week, a couple of blocks of time where you’re working on your hit list. And then those things that are tolerations that you put up with day over day and week over week. I mean the, you know, the getting your check book, who has a checkbook now getting your checkbook balanced, your theoretical checkbook balanced. Or you know, the pile of things that you know, you know, I have a, I went to a, I went away on vacation a number of months ago and I came back and unloaded them and to step into this box. And I have a box in my office and I looked at that today and said, I’ve been looking at that box for two months and I’ve had a lot of things going on in the last few months that have been very challenging for me as far as our schedules go and logistics. But the, um, you know, it’s every time I look at that box it causes me stress. So I need to put on my schedule, empty the box. And it’s such a small thing, but it’s more than just the stress of the box. It’s the stress of day over day, looking at that thing. So I think being conscious about what’s getting in your way, what’s getting in your way of living the life that you really want to live and feeling good and not overwhelmed and energetic and then sequentially saying, all right, what things of those things, what can I really deal with? And I really encourage people to do that quarterly. To really go through a process every quarter of, all right, look around what’s in my way, what is getting in my way? And it can be, you can be getting in your own way. You know, what’s in my way of really making choices that line up with my values and having me feel good on a day to day basis. What are the, what are the little things were the bigger things, the discussions that we’re not having. The people that were being upset with a friend that had a uh, you know, I asked that I needed a favor, have a friend and I asked him and he was very dismissive of it. He just kind of minimizing of my experience and it really upset me and I, this thing weighed on me for two weeks and I was like, why don’t I just text him and tell him that bum me out? And I did that. And he was like, oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. And it was over, you know. So these things that when we let we choose to let them weigh on us and either you deal with it, or you let it go. Because the things we carry with us, whether they’re, you know, whether it’s an emotional thing with a friend or whether it’s a pile on your desk, I keep looking over there at the file on my desk, you know, know whatever the thing is addressing it and being willing to say, this is getting in my way of where I really want to be. And those can be habit things to like this year I have this constant conversation you, you, I would suspect you likely have this in your house too, around screens with the teenagers. Right. And their phones and the tech time. And you know, my kid, every time I start talking to him, he’s like, well, you’re on your phone all the time. It’s first of all, like I’m an adult. I get to make my own choices. But the truth is, I mean, those things are built to get your attention and, and I do want to change that. And you know, I have not, you know, I keep saying, right, I’m going to. He’s like, you keep saying you’re going to make a change and then you don’t. And, you know, it’s important for me to take that in, I mean, not, not as, not that he’s not to support his, you know, being defensive and turning it back on me because that’s a whole other conversation, but of saying, all right, this is something that I do want to change and I have not, you know, back to the resolution thing, I guess, you know, revisiting it. Okay, this is something I wanted to do. I didn’t. What else can I do? What’s keeping me from getting there? What feelings am I trying not to feel like, you know, by getting on my phone instead of not getting on my phone. Right. It’s like any dopamine thing where you’re, you’re trying, you’re making a choice because your brain doesn’t want to be in the moment.

Dr. Cates: No, and it’s a great point because we do these things for a reason. We can’t spend too much time on our phones for a reason. We, we grabbed for the, uh, some unhealthy comfort food items, uh, uh, we watched too much tv or all of these things are, they’re almost, you know, they can be addictive if we, if we’re not careful and we’re doing that to sort of escape and because of those dopamine, the neurotransmitter, a feel good kind of feelings we get. So there’s some physiologic reason this happens. And so when we know that it’s, sometimes it keeps us from a beating up on ourselves about it.

Dr. Brody: Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

Dr. Cates: So when people. So when you notice making these changes that we’ve been talking about and with your patients, what are the positive things that you notice with this shift?

Dr. Brody: Oh my goodness. You know, I think, I think it’s different for everyone. I mean, I think ultimately it’s about when, when we make choices that are lined up with our values on a regular basis, we live in a really different space. And your whole overall experience day to day is different because I mean, you can, when, when you’re seeing, you know, you can see it when you look at people. Right? And then, so there’s this, there’s this piece of just, you know, when you see someone who’s clearly in alignment with what’s important to them. They seem, you know, they’re, they, they are clearly healthier, you know. And again, it’s not necessarily healthier physically, although often that is the case as well, but healthier in general in the way they’re interacting with their lives. And I also think that we know by making these choices, when the overall load goes down, people have the bandwidth to then take this next step to do things that we, you know, we long ago gave up on the things we always wanted to learn and the communities we always wanted to get involved with and the trips we always wanted to take. You know, we take those off the table because we’re so overwhelmed. And then you end up, you know, later in life saying, well, I never did all those things because I was so busy spinning my top and giving myself a hard time and judging myself and shaming myself when ultimately right life is, you know, I don’t want to be trite and say look, life is so short, you know, but truly, you know, no one ever looks back and says, Oh, I’m so glad I was so stressed. If, you know, spent my life being so stressed out and you know, that said there are some circumstances where they are, they are stressful. You know, people are born into circumstances where they don’t have access to education or don’t have access to healthy food or don’t have access to self awareness because they have had no exposure to that. They are born into situations where there are, you know, they don’t have the privilege to be able to, you know, whatever the thing is that because of your circumstance, and I don’t want to minimize that, right? Because it’s not like everyone has access to, you know, oh, I need more time. So I’m just gonna have someone come clean my house, um, but ultimately I do think that when we are able to act on the things that we do have control over and take responsibility and say, is this what I want my life to look like given my current, my starting line, given my circumstances right now? And then how can I make choices that will support me to have the best situation at possibly can given my circumstance.

Dr. Cates: Right, right. All right, well fantastic. And I think that your book walks people through this, so it makes it really simple, right? You’re the, your book that’s just come out.

Dr. Brody: Yeah, that’s the goal. So the “Overcoming Overwhelm: Dismantle Your Stress from the Inside Out”. We’re looking at really, instead of managing stress, of course we always want to manage it as well, but instead of just managing stress that we look at really undoing it and figuring out where in our lives we have control and how we can make more bandwidth in our lives to be able to do the things that we really want to do and feel how we want to feel.

Dr. Cates: Yeah, absolutely. Love it. Okay. Well, tell everybody where they can find your book where they can.

Dr. Brody: Thank you. So my, uh, there’s a page on my website, DrSamantha.com/overcomingoverwhelm and there are links on that page to your all of the different book sellers. You can buy an Amazon, there are, you can buy on indie books or you can go to your local bookstore and the website is DrSamantha.Com. You can find out more about me and my practice and my consulting business there as well, but ultimately I would love to see people be able to take advantage of the exercises in the book and those are all available also. There’s a link in the book that you can get them printed out as well.

Dr. Cates: Perfect. All right, well Dr Smith, thanks so much for coming on today. Really appreciate information.

Dr. Brody: Thank you for having me.

Dr. Cates: Good luck everybody with your, your New Year’s resolution goals. I hope you enjoyed this interview today with Dr Samantha Brody and I’m really curious, how are your New Year’s resolutions going? How are your goals this year? Whether this is just brand new right out of the gate, January and you’re watching this interview right as it goes live or you’re catching this as it’s gone later on in the year. Maybe you had new year’s resolutions, but I’m curious how did, how have they been going? Share with us and let us know how your New Year’s resolutions are going and if this interview is going to be able to help you stay on track, send us a message. You can email us, you can post a message on social media. You can post your comments in the section below on Youtube or on The Spa Dr. Website. Let us know how it’s going and you can find out more about Dr Samantha Brody in the show notes at theSPADr.com on the podcast page below her interview and if you haven’t done so already, I encourage you to get your customized skin report theskinquiz.com. Find out what messages your skin is trying to tell you about your health and what you can do about it. Also, I invite you to join me on social media. If you haven’t already, facebook, twitter, instagram, youtube, pinterest, and join the conversation there and I’ll see you next time on The Spa Dr. podcast.