#TherapistsConnect 'Taster' Episode - How We Care

Welcome to this episode of the Therapist Connect podcast.  For this series, we're doing things slightly differently. And we've got a variety of different types of podcast episodes, which we'll be releasing over the forthcoming weeks. In this series, we'll also be offering taster podcast episodes. For these episodes, we've searched far and wide for different podcasts. And we've got some sample episodes to put out on our platform and introduce our listeners to all the wonderful podcasts that are out there. If you're interested in appearing in one of our podcast episodes, then send us an email at info@therapist-connect.com and we will send you some details about how you can get your voice heard.

This week we share the initial episode of the 'How We Care' podcast.

Twitter - @howwecarepod

‘How We Care’ is a series of monthly collaborative conversations between helping professionals for people who care for a living. Hosts Elizabeth Turp and Paul Gaunt.

You can find more episodes here - How We Care Podcast (elizabethturp.co.uk) (or on the usual podcast platforms). 

#TherapistsConnect is a platform for connecting therapists.
Website: www.Therapists-Connect.com
Twitter: @Therapists_C
Instagram: @TherapistsConnect
Facebook: @TherConnect

Origins of #TherapistsConnect

Transcript

Peter Blundell: 0:00

Hello, and welcome to this episode of the Therapist Connect podcast. For this series we're doing things slightly differently. And we've got a variety of different types of podcast episodes, which we'll be releasing over the forthcoming weeks. In this series, we'll also be offering taster podcast episodes. For these episodes, we've searched far and wide for different podcasts. And we've got some sample episodes to put out on our platform and introduce our listeners to all the wonderful podcasts that are out there. If you're interested in appearing in one of our podcast episodes, then send us an email at info@therapist-connect.com and we will send you some details about how you can get your voice heard.

Opening: 0:41

Welcome to the Therapist Connect podcast, a podcast for therapists by therapists.

Elizabeth Turp: 1:08

Hello, and welcome. I'm Elizabeth Terp a counselor, trainer and writer,

Paul Gaunt: 1:13

and I'm Paul Gaunt careers advisor, trainer and lecturer. And this is How We Care;

Elizabeth Turp: 1:20

conversations about what it takes to help people for a living.

Paul Gaunt: 1:25

We are two experienced and committed helping professionals who are passionate about finding the best ways to take care of the people we help through our work. And to support helping professionals to take care of themselves.

Elizabeth Turp: 1:38

So if you're a counselor, careers advisor, coach, social worker, medical professional, learning and development or HR professional or any other skilled helper or aspire to be one, this podcast is for you. Let's reflect on How We Care. Hello and welcome to episode one. Being with emotions can help in conversations.

Paul Gaunt: 2:24

Elizabeth, as we are making this our very first podcast, it might be a good idea to just revisit how this came about.

Elizabeth Turp: 2:37

And yeah,

Paul Gaunt: 2:38

How we know each other.

Elizabeth Turp: 2:39

Yeah.

Paul Gaunt: 2:39

So I wondered if you'd start with going, it goes back quite away, doesn't it? It does. I haven't actually worked out how many years because it's a bit scary, isn't it, but I'm probably about 25 years since we first met. And we actually met when I was a student at university looking for some careers guidance. Because I had a very strong sense of what I wanted to do with my life. But I didn't know what profession that was. And I don't remember the exact details of what I came to you about. But I know the outcomes. So it was around. I was doing English and psychology. And we we had the option to do Counseling Psychology. And I did that, but I can't remember when I first came to see you whether it was before or after that doesn't really matter. But anyway, what I strongly remember, and it's the reason that we got back in touch many years later, really, is that you were really great at what you did. And that's what you know, you were very empathic, you know, just very helpful, you know, because when you're that age, and you don't really know what you want to do in your life, it can be quite difficult can't it, and complicated. And, you know, and and I can't feel like you really did help me set out on the right path. So that's how we originally met. And then a few years ago, since I've been in private practice, I had quite a lot of clients at one point in my counseling practice, who needed some careers guidance. So I think I think I got in touch with you didn't I and sort of said, can you recommend somebody who can help these people. And that's how we got back in touch. So I'll let you take over. Yeah. And then I was taking my first kind of tentative steps into doing private career consultations. And so you were able to not only refer some clients to me, but also helped me to get access to the shared space in a very good central location at a very reasonable price. I was able to start off there so you know, it's, it's kind of it's, it's hopefully a nice story in that we've been able to be mutually helpful to each other at different times.

Elizabeth Turp: 5:10

Yeah,

Paul Gaunt: 5:10

I think, I think coming on from that is some of the conversations we've had where we've been exploring topics of mutual interest in concern in our kind of professional fields. And it's led us here really, hasn't it? So yeah, those conversations have led to this series of podcasts because we found that there is so much to discuss.

Elizabeth Turp: 5:38

Yeah. And this particular topic that we're going to be talking about today is the is the thing that kind of sets the whole thing off. So I don't know, do you want to sort of say a little bit about that, and how that came up for you as a professional?

Paul Gaunt: 5:51

Yeah. With with career guidance, I mean, there's very different perceptions of what it's about. And you know, there are different facets involved in delivering career guidance, which depend often unaware the person seeking the career guidance is at. But sometimes it's assumed, I think that you know, that it's relatively emotion free, that it's a very transactional, I'm interested in these jobs, can you give me a steer? Can you give me some information, and there's no real kind of deep emotion involved. And many times, that's probably true, that's probably the case. But from my experience, long experience now of being involved in career guidance, that there is often significant amount of engagement, emotional investment in career decisions, as they probably should be, because they are, you know, inextricably linked to how you how you live your life and what you want out of your life. So I was recently reading or rereading an article by a career practitioner called Dr. Oliver Jank, and he's based in the southwest of England. And he wrote an article called engaging with the emotional content of career guidance, which I use with the students I teach, I teach on the course at Coventry University for career practitioners. And he says, I'm reading this because he's expressing it probably better than I could, "People have a tendency to bring aspects of all areas of their lives into career guidance, interactions, including at times powerful emotions, and this requires great skill and sensitivity on the part of careers practitioners". And I'd agree wholeheartedly with that. And then he says, "For career guidance in whatever format to be effective, individuals need to feel that they can safely reveal their ideas, their curiosity, their confusion, and their fears about the future, in a non judgmental setting". Careers advisors are trained to facilitate such a safe space when working with clients. And then he refers to the psychologist Carl Rogers - Carl Rogers core conditions for therapeutic change, which he there's three of them, empathy, genuiness on the part of the practitioner, and unconditional positive regard. And generally, the idea of being able to get into the person's world getting to understand where they're coming from. And not to impose our own worldview on that.

Elizabeth Turp: 8:46

Yeah. And to be open to whatever it is they want to bring and need to bring.

Paul Gaunt: 8:51

Yeah. So and I'm guessing that this is something that's very relevant in the work that you do.

Elizabeth Turp: 9:02

Yeah, absolutely fundamental. And some approaches. Put that as the main thing. Um, you know, there's lots of debate, you know, do we need additional theories and additional skills? And, yeah, but a lot of practitioners, especially, quite interestingly, very experienced ones, find that over time, they come back to Rogers, called the person centered approach with those conditions that that and he considered that they were necessary and sufficient for therapeutic change, as a quote from Rogers, and you know, I, I'm one of these people that I actually find that that is true, that you may have done additional training and all different therapeutic models. But fundamentally, if you provide those conditions for a client, that's where the change happens. And so, what's coming to mind for me now is in therapy, obviously, that's absolutely fundamental. The quote that you just gave there Paul, it comes from every profession, who might be listening to this who they consider that they have helping conversations, if they can provide those conditions, even if it's a 10 minute appointment, you know, like doctors may only have 10 minutes for the person, if they're able to actually be open to what a person really needs to say, and respect that and be genuine about it. That's where the opportunity for help really occurs. And that, you know, even in a less kind of structured focus thing is careers, guidance or therapy, in meetings that a manager might have or something like that. It's quite useful, I think, to think about what the opposite of that is. And I think we'll maybe come on to that later in the podcast. But if you think if you if you're not doing those three things, you can be shutting things down. And getting in the way of any kind of process.

Paul Gaunt: 11:03

So thinking about those preconditions that Rogers talks about, so empathy, genuiness and unconditional positive regard. They sound really good. How, for instance, would you go about setting up a session with a client to enable those to happen?

Elizabeth Turp: 11:24

Oh, wow, what a question. Well, what came to mind as soon as you asked me that question was you don't it's embodied? It's something that you are. So but that isn't really helpful for trainees. So that's, that's coming from someone who's been doing it for a long time, I suppose. But yeah, you it's not something you put on, it's something that you are and that you offer. And it's kind of it's your, almost your default setting in interactions. Now, I'm not saying you go about in the world being like that with everybody. Because if you did that, that would not be good for anyone, for yourself. But yeah, certainly, that is the fundamental approach I take to every interaction I have with the client. So it's quite hard to to answer how you do that, I think because it's very complex. And I mean, I suppose you need to do it to different degrees in different interactions, different professional interactions, like for me, I have to be doing that majority of the time, if not all the time. Whereas for, you know, a teacher having an interaction with somebody who's got a problem or something, they may need to kind of amplify that for a short part of the time, and then go into a different role. So but it is, I mean, it's really difficult to answer because it's, it's very complex. And I think the unconditional positive regard part is something about how you as a professional actually relate to your that, well, there's lots of different terms isn't there, there's client, patient, you know student, supervisee, employee, whatever, whatever the relationship is, yeah. What? How do you, what do you actually feel, and this is going to get into quite interesting territory that can be a little bit controversial, even in therapy, that it's a human relationship. And there is some level of care. and dare I say, even the word love that might might have to be involved in order for you to fully embody those conditions. Does that make sense?

Paul Gaunt: 13:38

Yes, it makes complete sense. And one of the things I know I discuss with the students on our program is that unconditional positive regard is, is possibly easy to talk about as a concept. Yeah, yeah. When you've got someone in front of you, you may have a kind of reaction to to them in some way, which isn't positive. And we all you know, we all can't necessarily control our kind of instinctive reactions, but maybe what we can control is how we manage those and how, yeah, yeah, attend to them, understand them, and don't let them interfere with what your'e offering to that person.

Elizabeth Turp: 14:22

Where self awareness comes in, which is a real big skill that often isn't taught. I mean, it is taught in therapy, because it's a key skill. But I think in other professions, it's taught, probably, if you're teaching people, you're probably teaching that, aren't you, but other people may not have that self awareness, or awareness that you need self awareness. So I think it's not I mean, there are some therapeutic approaches that don't involve self awareness and don't really acknowledge that your own stuff can be quite easily brought up by another person. You know, there's a really simple example here, that somebody told me the other day, I think it was a friend, but it doesn't matter because it comes up a lot. So say you're having a professional interaction with a person. And they remind you of your grandmother, for example, now, that could go one way or the other, couldn't it, in fact I've actually experienced that, not with a client, so it's not a personal thing. But, um, you know, if you have an affectionate relationship with your grandmother, then that's one thing. But if you had a problematic relationship with your grandmother, and this person sat in front of you, and you are feeling some of it might not sound it's not rational. So this is an emotional response. And then you kind of engage with some of those difficult feelings that you may have about your own life, it's, it can be quite tricky not to let that get in the way of the core conditions that we're talking about. And so that's when a high level of self awareness is necessary. And also a high level of skill in being able to not only identify what's that feeling, whether you have to know what the feeling is, but you have to know what you're feeling, and then put it to one side. So this can be quite difficult stuff. And you know, and I think, there, there's something about an element of some of this being natural, but there's also an element of it being these are skills that you can develop, but it depends where you have the opportunity to develop them in your training, you know, and some people haven't. So it's difficult.

Paul Gaunt: 16:30

Yeah. So in terms of setting up those core conditions, then I think what you're saying, I've got it right, is it it's as much if not more about presence than any particular technique or

Elizabeth Turp: 16:43

Exactly. Exactly about presence? Yeah.

Paul Gaunt: 16:47

And it's, it's brought to mind something I observed. So as part of my role as a lecturer at Coventry, I observe observe and feedback, is a lot of trainees do. And it's brought to mind a particular a particularly good one I saw recently, where the person had a client who was not in a great place, they lost a job. And they were angry about it and trying to make sense of it. And what, what our student did, I think, which was really interesting to me, and I commented on positively was, what I felt was, it goes back to what that quote I read from Oliver Jenkin earlier, created a really good, safe space for that person to just almost let all of that anger be expressed. And what was fascinating to me, and I, again, I fed this back was how little our students said or did during during that, yes, conversation. So it was a presencing it was just sat there and almost kind of soaked up and, and, and gave sufficient indication that she was a) really interested and b) wanting to help, but not by diving in and saying you should do this, you should do that, you should feel this, or you should feel that. But just, letting that all come out. And the other interesting thing that happened was that I kind of visibly saw the anger being expressed. And then almost kind of draining

Elizabeth Turp: 18:49

Exactly. Yeah. away. Like it had been bottled up for ages. Yeah, but a lot of emotion has been and that's kind of the root of a lot of mental health problems is that we live in a culture where we, we haven't been taught how to express emotion, or we've been told that our emotions aren't valid, or all kinds of other things so we hold on to those emotions. And when we have an encounter, where a person is able to sit with us, while we experience those emotions, that's a really good description of what goes on, because it's not about the professional doing anything with that feeling. It's that they are able to be with it. And and it's something that comes to mind as well, where sometimes people can think of therapy as like a container. So a person will come into the therapy session, obviously, well, not now cause we're in a pandemic so we're working on video calling, but ordinarily, they'll come into a room and they'll do the work. They'll express the emotion and do it and then they'll leave the room again. So depending on what we're working with, sometimes you actually sort of talk about that as part of the preparation for doing difficult work and you'll say okay, we'll we're going to work on this And if you wants to think of it as leaving the emotion in the room, and putting it away again, and going back out into the world that can really help. So what you've described, there is a sort of micro example of that, where there was a really strong emotion that that person needed to express before they could move forward with getting their help with their career's side. And that's perfect, because that that person allowed that they were okay with it, they didn't run away from it or trying to shut it down. They they were with it. And in doing that, it's it's that action because it's it's, it's, it's an absence of action, rather than an action, isn't it, really, but it's allowing, and it kind of, it makes it okay for that person to express that feeling. Because it's that human interaction, that a lot of us don't have that much over in our day to day lives.

Paul Gaunt: 20:58

Yes, and I that that's interesting that you make that point that that we don't have that kind of interaction often and something we say to our students is sometimes you have to realize that the conversation you're having with that person, be they at school University, be they an adult, you're talking to them about things, or asking them about things that they may not always get the chance to talk about, or may never have talked about before. Yeah, and certainly not talked about in the way that they are given space to be them. So you know, I think a lot of people get a lot of advice and opinions, yeah, given to them, especially when we're young, which are often incredibly loving and well meaning but almost like, you know, our brains can be so crowded with thoughts and feelings that that we've got from what other people have said that we don't necessarily get the opportunity to explore what we think and how we feel, and I think where skilled help helping conversations come in, that space is created, isn't it, that it's a place for you, I'm not giving you the benefit of my accumulated wisdom and telling you what you should do? I'm actually giving you a space to say, what's going on for you at the moment and how to help,

Elizabeth Turp: 22:29

Because what we're both trying to achieve with our clients, is we're trying to help them find their own answer. So when when you describe what goes on, often in our relationship with family, friends, and you know, anyone who's got kind of any relationship to us has their own agenda, because they're, they care about you, and they're emotionally involved with you and all of that, as you say, often that is well meaning that, oh, why don't you just do this, or, you know, whatever the experience of that, if it's a difficult emotional stuff is have been shut down. And that can actually be quite damaging. I mean, depending on how long it goes on for and what we're talking about. So in a way, what we're trying to do is that it's really fascinating, and I'm sure some people listening to this, won't understand this, necessarily that especially maybe with your profession, because careers advisor, you think some people would think that you someone's come to see you and they come in, because they want you to tell them what to do. But it's the opposite of that if you if you do that, you're going to miss a lot of the time what their actual true self needs and your job. And this, I know this is how you work because I've experienced it, is that you help them to get in touch with what they actually want, not what the family wants for them, or what their partner thinks they should be doing or what society thinks they should be doing. But what they absolutely deeply want for themselves. And they often people often don't know that because as you say, they're so cluttered in their minds with all these other values and expectations and things like that. And it's our job to provide the space for exploration, isn't it?

Paul Gaunt: 24:11

Yeah, and sometimes providing that space you get people get light bulb moments don't they, people get moments where they say, oh, wow, I've, I see clearly what I need to do now or I or I really know how I feel about that. And that and that's them doing that, isn't it that's them doing it and us facilitating it, it's not us kind of directly making it happen necessarily.

Elizabeth Turp: 24:38

But you don't need to because that's the power of the core conditions, isn't it and I think that's where a lot of therapy goes wrong and a lot of you know a lot of other interactions in all different kinds of professions go wrong. But if you as a professional feel pressured to act and to fix and to sort and to take control in some way way. And that can come from all kinds of different places. It can be internal, but it can also be what you're told you are as a professional, or it can come from arrogance, or it can come from time pressure. But if we take that stuff, so I've got to, somebody just said something to me, and I need to do something with it. And I need to move them on quickly, or I need to I mean, literally, that's what GP's can experience, because I think they're a good example. They've got 10 minutes. Now, I've seen a lot of doctors in my time, and we'll come on to that. But there are doctors and I, my GP's, fantastic, who can provide the core conditions in two minutes. So it is possible. You know, it's possible, there are people who have that ability to make you feel like they've got all the time in the world to hear you. And to help you to go get where you need to get. And I think GP's is a really good example, because they're trained to go right, here's a problem, here's a solution do a prescription. Gone. That's it. Yes, that's their throw. That's the medical model, isn't it? I mean, obviously, that's my simplification. But, you know, that's, that also doesn't work. Because there's so much nuance in a medical interaction, so much emotion, often so much fear, so many questions, you know, all of that. But all of these types of issues are relevant to all these different interactions. And I think we're talking very positively here, because I think we're both so passionate about the approach that we use, and the effect that it gets. But I think we should also touch on what happens if you do the opposite of this, because it can actually be quite damaging, it can, it can kind of reinforce hopelessness, and you know, it can contribute to depression, and things like that, if people, I'm talking about when people come for help, and they've got a lot of complex issues, and kind of, you know, this, they're feeling very emotionally raw at that particular point. And if they're not received, with the openness that we're talking about, and the support, that can kind of catapult them backwards. And I've seen, I've seen it so many times where I've had clients come to me who we've seen other therapy professionals who've kind of said the wrong thing to them, or you know, and also in my specialist field, I see a lot. And I've also experienced it as a patient, where if you've got a particular medical problem, and you go and see a doctor who is unable to hear what you're really saying to them, and is kind of got their own agenda. So they might have already decided what the appointment is a about, or they might have decided what your symptoms mean. And they're not able to listen to what you're bringing that day, which might be, you know, a lot of fear, or it might be other symptoms, or it might not be all kinds of things, then that experience can be so damaging. And to the extent that when you have an interaction with a medical professional, who can provide those core conditions. I've had experiences like that, where I've seen doctors who can do nothing for me, and they say so. But because they have listened to me, they've had a human interaction with me. They've given me care. I felt I felt that that's benefited me, even though they're actually literally said to me, I'm really sorry, there's nothing I can do for you. So I don't know if that makes sense. But it's

Paul Gaunt: 28:37

It makes complete sense. And it's brought to mind, somebody, I have student error I was trying to help me quite a long time ago. And and I was saying, or maybe you could do this. And he said no, no that I couldn't really do that at the moment because of such and such. And I said Oh, right. Okay, well, what about this? And I was just suggesting various courses of action and the lines of inquiry to any and he said to me, Well, you don't have to solve this for me. He said, it's enough for me to know that you care. And yeah, I know where you are if I need to speak to you. So it is what you're saying, it's about going back to this thing about presence, isn't it? Yeah. And there will be times when whether it's a career issue or a life issue around family relationships or anything like that, when we just don't have the power to do anything. Especially right now, or even or even say the right words that are kind of in you know, in inverted commas make it better. Yeah, but what going back to what you say, people sense that you're there for them, yeah, your presence is helpful. And as you say, they've had an opportunity to be listened to and be heard.

Elizabeth Turp: 30:08

Yeah. And that that is, cause that can happen in my line of work, I think it might be happening a little bit more at the moment than it would ordinarily. So if you're working with with somebody who has got very little agency over their own life right now, for financial reasons, and work stress reasons, and all kinds of, you know, external reasons, that I might not feel like I'm doing anything to help them. But if I check out with them, cause part of the process of therapies, you review the relationship regularly, you know, to make sure that they're getting what they want, then their their view on it might be quite different. And there their experience might be that you are giving me something, because you're listening, and you're allowing me to talk about what I need to talk about, you know, and so yeah, it's that it's, again, it's the opposite of shutting down of something. So I'm wondering, do you think it's useful to touch a little bit on what factors might lead a professional to not be able to sit with emotion? I guess we sort of touched on that a little bit before, didn't we? So if a person kind of if you have a strong reaction to a person, because they remind you of something, or you don't like them or something, do you think there's other other reasons why people might find it difficult to listen to difficult emotion?

Paul Gaunt: 31:31

I think Yeah. And I think probably we'll be exploring kind of deep listening in another session, but it does come down to the quality of parts of it, I think comes down to the quality of attention you're able to give. And I think going back to your doctor analogy, I'd agree with you about I've experienced both ends of the spectrum with doctors. And it's amazing when you think somebody can in a very short space of time. Yeah, create that safe space for you. It's warm. Yeah. But I think with the best will in the world, doctors are a great example of professionals who can be so overloaded at times that the quality of their attention to patients is bound to suffer. And so tired nurse, distraction, lack of concentration, so they may have the best of intentions, but also, in some ways, the worst of pressures. Yeah, yeah. Get get patients seen and to get through the day. Yeah. And so I think that's a factor even even, you know, we can all be, I guess, susceptible to that kind of pressure in different ways. Which is why kind of self care and self awareness is kind of important. But also, sometimes, it's, I think, going back to something you said it may be in some professional settings that people don't get that kind of training and preparation to deal with emotion. Or there's an assumption, and I think that happens in in some cases in my profession, that it's not your job to deal with it. You know, if someone's got motional issues you refer them on and, and there are times when obviously, you will, you'll say, yeah, it's not within my capacity to deal with this, I refer to another kind of helper.

Elizabeth Turp: 33:39

Yeah, yeah. if that all makes sense? Yeah. And I think often the, when, cause I work a lot with people who have come for therapy via their employer. So that literally is happened so a person who is having some difficulties, whether it's personal or professional difficulties, they'll come for some therapy, and the amount of times I hear the way managers kind of often aren't able to be or can't because of their pressures. But what happens a lot is that managers are in a very difficult position between, like hire up managers and their staff. And their kind of focus is so pressured on goals and outcomes and you know, profit, that they they can shut things down to the extent that it actually makes the problem a lot lot worse. So I've seen that so many times, but if they were able to sit with and acknowledge what their staff member is saying to them, just a few minutes, it could really transform their quality of the relationship and the ability to help them to move forward. But if they are not able to do that, and again, it's no there's no blame in this because obviously there's a lot of pressure to show like doctors that Yeah, but if if they all they can do is shut it down because just haven't got their headspace. They're not able, that can compound the problem, because again, it's a human interaction, even though you know, in some of the professions they're talking about, you go, and you know, you're vulnerable and you're going for a particular type of help, you have expectations about what the help might be, like, you'd hope that a doctor or a nurse would be quite caring with you. And obviously, they're not always you would hope that a therapist, they're not always, you know, but you, your manager, you wouldn't necessarily think your manager is going to be like that. But on a deep human level, if somebody has responsibility for us, there's always some kind of, kind of unconscious relationship that we have to them, because they have that authority over us. And there's always something about this person, even if we're not aware of it. This person should be looking after me because they have power over me. And if they don't do that, that can feel very damaging. And it happens on, like an organizational level where the staff members feel like infantilized by the way they're treated. Yeah,

Paul Gaunt: 36:12

I yeah, I completely agree with that. And I think there's sometimes an attitude of, well, we, you know, we've given you a job we pay you your wages Yeah, we give you holidays. But there's, you know, I think sometimes, you know, I know, my experience, as a manager, I kind of felt a duty of care to the individuals I was managing. And that didn't mean, I have to be involved in every aspect of their life or anything. But just I would want to have a sense of how things were going for them and how they were feeling about things, but you had that care, you had that care. Not that there's any obligation for them to share anything of that, but just hopefully to know they could if they needed to?

Elizabeth Turp: 36:57

Yeah, yeah.

Paul Gaunt: 36:59

So I was just to change the angle slightly, I know, we'll be looking at self care in one of our future episodes for helping professionals but I just wanted to kind of touch on that briefly. In terms of mayby if you, if you don't mind reflecting on the the impact on you, of dealing with a lot of emotion in your professional in your day to day, so you can imagine you can have a day when you've been there for people. Yeah. And they've been expressing a lot of emotion. And I know you're a highly empathic person. So it's not like what Teflon is, it's not like you just kind of walk out the door and think none of that is Yeah, I can completely drop that. What would you say?

Elizabeth Turp: 38:00

So, how do I deal with it? How do I kind of look after myself? Yeah, yes, we're

Paul Gaunt: 38:06

Talking about deep emotions of the people we help, but our emotions are, you know, however much we try not to get involved. Oh, maybe maybe should be involved as well.

Elizabeth Turp: 38:17

Yeah, well, I think I think the starting point, needs to be a structure of self care that's there all the time. And I think that we will expand on this greatly in another session. But if you if you have a job like mine, where there's a huge amount of emotional stuff coming at you all the time, and that's your job, it's, it's vital that you have certain baselines in place already, of well, being enough, rest enough, you know, good food. A really important thing that I do, which can be developed in other professional things is boundaries, and a kind of a sort of attitude to your work and your own ability, which this is a very kind of subtle balance here. So you have to have enough confidence to know that you've done everything you can, in order to be able to let it go. So for me, because my sessions are, you know, they're all the same length usually, and, you know, a session ends and you write your notes, and then you have some kind of ritual, as a therapist from moving from one appointment to the next appointment. Now I have good chunks of time between so that's something that some people choose to do, some don't, but you do notes, you put your notes away, you physically put them away, and then you know, go, go downstairs, get a cup of tea, move around a bit, do something and shift to the next because the next appointment is a completely different person, and that's their time, that's their session. So the boundaries are really important, but for me, physical movement is actually something that I use a lot in order to kind of shift what I might be left with. So when I finished work, and I've seen a few clients for the day, I usually go, I usually Well, not at the moment, because I'm working at home. So I'll walk around near where I live. But usually I walk home from where I work, which is quite a decent amount of walk. And that helped, that helps me to kind of, sort of rebalance myself back into my myself, my own physical self, I suppose, and let go leave, leave, leave emotion, where it is. If, obviously, there's times where you know, you might be working something extremely difficult, or there's a build up, then you would use things like supervision in a different way, you would kind of bring in extra staff, depending on what you need. But as I say, you haven't got a baseline? Well, if you I mean, again, it depends if you work for yourself, or if you work for an organization. But you know, trying to have a kind of healthy level of work isn't always possible. But if it is possible, it's key to being, you know, keeping yourself in balance, because you're right, this stuff takes it's toll, and people burn out. I mean, the reality is a lot of therapists, and it's they talk about it quite a lot on the private Facebook forum and things like that, people burn out, because they doing work, they're doing too much work. And they're not taking enough account of the fact that they're using themselves as a human in that interaction, and that it does take its toll on you, you know, and I think another thing I tend to do is, if I've had a particularly challenging day, it kind of depends how I feel what I would do afterwards. So I have like, if I'm feeling energized, I might feel like, oh right, well I can, you know, read a book, or, or do some painting or something like that, if I'm feeling really depleted, I might choose to just sort of sit and watch something really restful on TV, or just basically being very intune with what you need yourself to kind of come back to balance. But it's it's kind of it's, in my profession, it's at least talked about, but I think in a lot of other professions. It's almost like taboo in this culture to talk about looking after your own self, isn't it?

Paul Gaunt: 42:15

Yeah, it is a phrase that comes to mind. And I don't know where I've heard it or where I've read it. But the phrase is proper selfishness, which is about to the expense of others, necessarily, but just Yeah, not not forgetting to look after yourself, because you're busy trying to help everyone else.

Elizabeth Turp: 42:34

And also like radical self care. Radical self care is something I quite like, because there's an intersection here with the chronic health community, because I have health problems. So there's another kind of element of that where, you know, this is, people with chronic illness, it's essential, it's not a choice. It's like, if I want to function, there's certain things I have to do as well. And so that's kind of another that helps to shift that kind of mindset and cultural thing around looking after yourself being selfish, because this is really important analogy that I like, if I'm working with a carer or somebody who's really struggling with their own well being, I always just say to them, but you're using yourself and your own energy to help other people. If you get ill, you can't help other people anymore. Yeah. So that's not selfish to look after yourself. Because you're also benefiting, not just the people you work with but obviously, your family and friends as well, if you can kind of stay well, for them. It's staying well for yourself but they're also going to benefit if it's never selfish in the you know, I've reclaimed the word selfish as a positive. But yeah, the word selfish in our culture is negative, isn't it? And so, yeah, but actually, for any one of us doing the jobs that we're talking about here, you have to look after yourself, because otherwise, you know, it's not sustainable, basically.

Paul Gaunt: 43:58

Absolutely, this has been really interesting. And I know I've, I've learned a few things, you know, in the course of this conversation, and it's been a great opportunity to reflect Yeah, so. So I'm looking forward to the next one already.

Elizabeth Turp: 44:14

Great I am. So I had like a little brief exercise that people could maybe try if they wanted to relate it to this topic, is that brilliant. So yes, it's very simple. It's just think of the last time a client, student or employee, whatever of yours was with you, and they were emotional. So just sit there for a couple of minutes, reflect on that. Think about how you felt when that happened. And then think about how how you felt influenced what you did next. So just just simple, just a little so it says a way of starting to kind of get in touch with how, how we as humans feel when another person is visibly distressed with us. I mean, if you can't think of a recent professional example, you could always think of a friend or family member, I guess and, and lots of different things can come up from that. And some of them are urges. Some sometimes there might be an urge to run away. That can be a thing that sometimes people experience and have a lillte reflection on that. So next month's episode. I think we agreed is going to be on the topic of the problem with positive thinking. Yes, toxic positivity. Yes. And its dangers. Yes, yes. So please join us then for more reflection on how we care.

Paul Gaunt: 45:44

Thank you for listening. We hoped you enjoyed this episode. How We Care is brought to you by Elizabeth Turp and Paul Gaunt via simplecast. Case studies are generalized and do not relate to individual clients. Please subscribe for more episodes, rate us and follow us on Twitter details and show notes for information on upcoming episodes. Many thanks to Ed Tidy for the music and technical assistance. See you next time.

Opening: 46:39

Thank you for listening to the Therapist Connect podcast. Go to www.therapist-connect.com For more discussions and debates