Unveiling the True Power Of Resilience; a Paradigm Shift - with Kylie Warry

Unveiling the True Power Of Resilience; a Paradigm Shift – with Kylie Warry

It might seem as though the word ‘resilience’ has become overused, especially since the events of 2020. Yet it is mission-critical if you as a health professional are to continue to bring the best of who you are to your work and to your life. In this episode, Jo is joined by Rehabilitation Counsellor and communications expert, Kylie Warry to discuss a new way of thinking about resilience and she shares a powerful tool that helps you to lean into your existing strengths.

You can connect with Kylie via her website or find out more about the Resilience Doughnut here.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

If you know you need more support, please visit my website at https://jomuirhead.com

Transcript

Jo:

So welcome to yet another episode of the Entrepreneurial Clinician Podcast, where we speak into all things that it’s going to take for us to future proof ourselves. So what you may not realise is that my whole discovery about what it means to be entrepreneurial led me down a path to help me understand how we as health professionals can future proof ourselves against being redundant about being exhausted, burnt out, and completely consumed by the work. So that’s how the two things actually work together. For anybody who’s kind of going, why does Jo have this Facebook group that doesn’t say the Entrepreneurial Clinician? That’s why <laugh>. And today I have the pleasure of interviewing one of my favourite colleagues, friends, spiritual advisors, partners in crime. What Kylie had to teach me about resilience got me through my cancer diagnosis and journey, and continues to help me navigate the challenges and difficult adversities that come along, even though I don’t have cancer anymore. So, thank you, Kylie.

Kylie:

You’re very welcome.

Jo:

So, Kylie, share with us who are you, what do you do? How do you turn up in the world?

Kylie:

Okay. I am a health professional. I’m a mum, I’m a friend, I’m a wife. I’m in my own business. I’ve worked with you now for oh six or seven years.

Jo:

It’s ok. It’s been a while.

Kylie:

Yeah, it feels like forever though. And I mean that in the most positive way.

Jo:

Yeah.

Kylie:

In the most positive way. I’m someone who I love empowering people to be their best. That’s what gets me outta bed in the morning. And I’ve, because I work in the area of health, I usually work in the area with people that have ill health across every area of the spectrum. It can be physical or mental or emotional or anything like that, or chronic illness. And I feel like I’ve been really blessed to be able to work with these people. And so for me, it’s about finding any way that I can make that work, work better. Anything that supports these people in a way, for example, I’m a results driven person. So if I can find a way to help someone get to their goal more quickly, obviously I’m going to grab onto that with everything I’ve got and, and use it. And the subject we’re talking about today is one of those things for me.

Jo:

Yeah, absolutely. One of the things I love is your passion for learning, it’s such a strong value for you. You can’t not learn. I’m like, heads too full. Stop it. I want my trashy TV and my crochet hook about now. Kylie’s like, oh, I’m lying in bed doing this new course. I don’t compare myself to you. It’s just like that value is so strong in you. And that the results of that for me have been wonderful. Cause I get to share in your learnings. So today I wanna talk about a concept that we have heard the word we have probably switched off when we’ve heard the word like I did. We hear the word and we go na na na. I don’t need to know. I already know it. Or you are going to go, oh, wow, I wonder what new information, new ways of thinking about it. I wonder if there’s something new here. So I invite you now listeners to get your curious ears on because we are gonna be talking about becoming resilient, being resilient, activating resilience to help us keep doing this work. And I assure you, the way Kylie talks about this is unlike anything you’ve ever heard before. Because I was one of those people that went resilient. Oh my God, here we go again. It’s another one of those words that corporate has bastardised, that positive psychology makes me feel like I am not doing well enough. And then Kylie went, no, let me share with you what it really is and how it really works. So there we go. No, no, no pressure Kylie. So can we start with your working definition of resilience? What is it?

Kylie:

Look for me, resilience. You know, there are some people that make it sound like it’s Bambi in the forest for the butterflies flapping about, you know, it’s not that, it’s not beautiful most of the time. For me, resilience is about facing the crap that life throws at you and getting back up again. It’s about changing your relationship with failure and seeing it in a brand new way. It’s about self-care and about forgiving yourself. So that’s how I would explain resilience.

Jo:

Wow. See, that is a whole new definition, right? People you weren’t expecting that. So we’ve all heard the definition of bouncing back or getting back up again. And for me, once I started to embody being a resilient human being, I went, it’s so much bigger than that. I don’t wanna bounce back. I wanna bounce better.

Kylie:

I love that.

Jo:

<Laugh>. Yeah. I don’t want it to feel like I’m fighting all the time. I don’t want it just like I’m losing my resilience. I’m losing my grip on resilience. Cause I’m a highly perfectionistic person. We know that about me.

Kylie:

Me too. Me too. <Laugh>.

Jo:

And I honestly thought I was failing at my recovery. Like, because I wasn’t resilient enough. And I would have all of these incredibly well-meaning people in my world who would say things like, you just need to be resilient. And I’m like, I had words to say that were usually four letters long and we don’t want the little e-sign on this <laugh> on this podcast episode today. So why is it important that we redefine resilience?

Kylie:

It’s because it’s important because the definition that most of us have doesn’t work. It doesn’t support us. And look, the only time we need to be resilient is when we’re facing something really hard. So why would we then kick ourselves, put another weight on our shoulders, hold ourselves underwater and wonder why we’re struggling. Do you know what I mean? Like, we’ve gotta make it easier. We’ve got to learn to use what’s already in our hands, what already makes us feel confident and competent to get through that difficulty. Because if we don’t do that, we may as well just keep struggling. And no one wants to do that. And the last thing I ever wanna do as a health professional is make my clients feel like that.

Jo:

Yeah. And today we often refer to that type of language as gaslighting our clients. And I didn’t have the knowledge of what gaslighting meant a couple of years ago. But that was genuinely what was going on for me. So it was like, where we internalised what somebody else is saying as I’m not good enough. I’m failing. You’re not pleased with me. Yeah. I’ve gotta do better. And when you’re going through a hard time, the last thing you need is more of that failure stuff. Cause you’re probably good at telling yourself how awful crap and horrible you are.

Kylie:

We all are very, very good at that. And one of the first things that I will say to someone who’s struggling with their self-talk is this whole idea of, what would you say to your best friend at this moment? Because we need to talk to ourselves in that way. And if we can start to even just do that, for example, that just changes things so quickly. Something that one of my favourite people, Brene Brown says is that every day we do our best but every day our best is different. And I love that because sometimes we have those days every now and again where it all just fits and it flows and we’re like soaring and we feel fantastic. And then the next day we wake up and we try and do the same thing and it just doesn’t work. And that’s when we think we’re failing. But, no, we’re doing our best and every day our best is different. We’ve really gotta give ourselves that space and forgiveness to just show up and do what we can.

Jo:

Yes, we do. And I love the way you get impassioned by this. Like, we just have to give ourselves the space to show up and do the best that we can on the day. That our best is different, because you and I work in an environment where we’re supposed to be able to predict and put a plan in place that makes everybody perform at their best at work every day.

Kylie:

Who was that person? Let’s find them and give them a talking to <laugh>

Jo:

Magical unicorn person that turns up to their work every single day and they upgrade their hours and they upgrade their duties and they upgrade in a linear process. And it all builds on each other because the day they don’t, it’s Kylie and Jo’s fault because we haven’t taught them how to be resilient.

Kylie:

Yeah, that’s right. <Laugh>, that’s so true. I don’t know about you, but I know for me, when I’m sitting in front of a client and they’re sharing their struggle with me and I’m able to tell them that that’s normal and that’s okay. And that I know that they’re doing their best. You literally, it’s not levitation, but you literally see the pressure off their shoulders and you literally see them just get comfortable and realise, oh, someone’s actually hearing me. And that’s powerful.

Jo:

Yeah. We do not give enough credit as health professionals to creating the opportunity for the people in front of us to feel seen and feel heard.

Kylie:

Yeah.

Jo:

Yeah. If we stopped rushing through our process to get to the outcome that we think we need to provide. People would be served so much better. Yeah. Anyway, I’m gonna step off my little soap box now.

Kylie:

<Laugh>.

Jo:

So Kylie, how have you used what you’ve learned about resilience? Because you have quite a specific model which we are gonna talk into, but how have you used your understanding of resilience in your work to help you keep doing what you do?

Kylie:

Well, the whole premise of the model that I work with is that we first have to be resilient before we can teach someone else to be resilient. It’s not one of those models where you step back and you’re separate from it and you must do these things. And when you do these things, you will feel this. You’ve got to teach it from a place of authenticity, from understanding. Because when you come from that place, it changes everything with how you communicate to the person that you’re supporting. And they know that you get it and they know that it’s, that it’s real. And that’s actually a beautiful bonus for us as health professionals as well, because we all know that the work that we do is hard. It is draining. We have probably, sometimes it’s 70% lost to 30% win. You know what I mean? It’s not always that positive outcome, yay, they got back to work or they got a great outcome from their diagnosis. I’m dealing with people that have got kids that have got terminal illnesses. I’m dealing with people that have terminal diagnoses themselves that they’re not going to get better. So being able to show up and, and know how that affects me, and then me turn up at my best and use the resources that I have to cope as well as I can and then share that with someone is the whole premise behind the model. And that’s what I do.

Jo:

Yeah. It is exactly what you do. And we’ve now had the opportunity for us to deliver it. Well, you delivered it. I facilitated an entire coaching program and watching the 12 health professionals who are engaged in that coaching program get it and understand, oh my gosh, I’ve gotta do this first before I can make any change. And hearing the comments that they made about that, it was like both of us had butterflies in our tummy because it was just so exciting.

Kylie:

And I get that every time. And it’s been over 10 years now that I’ve been doing this and I get it every single time.

Jo:

Well, thank you for bringing that up because my next question is what made you pursue this? What was it that made you go, I need to learn about this thing called resilience?

Kylie:

Well, I’ve gotta be honest and say I did not know what was come gonna come from it, as you said, very nicely in the introduction. I am an avid learner. I am such an avid learner. I have a spreadsheet with all of the things I’ve purchased on it so that I don’t lose track of what I’ve bought and can get through it at some point in time. And that’s never gonna change. I’ve accepted that about myself. And what I’ve done now is give myself permission to get through it when I can. It’s not something I have to do all the time. So that’s wonderful. But I was working in a very frustrating system here in Australia. I know you sometimes have people that listen from all over the world. So in Australia we’ve got a very frustrating worker’s compensation system, but I know you are familiar with it. I was burned out. I was crispy, it was pretty bad. So I heard one of my colleagues told me about this course that they were gonna go to. And I went along and it was two or two or three days long and I just started learning about this concept. And it was one of the most giving courses that I’ve ever done. I left feeling filled, feeling fulfilled, and feeling so excited and optimistic about the potential. So basically I went and did this course and then you had to go through this process of accreditation so you could then deliver the course and use it yourself. So I went through that and basically that’s been probably, ooh, 13 years ago now, my goodness gracious. And I speak to groups about this. I speak to corporates, I speak to teams, I speak to schools, I speak to parents, and I speak to individuals as a group about this concept. And I also use it in my daily work because I’m just so passionate about the difference that it can make and the fact that having something you can use that is simple and actually enjoyable to use. Because when you’re struggling, you don’t want someone else to tell you another thing that you have to try that then you’ll feel like you’re gonna fail at.

Jo:

Yes. You’re so right. Don’t tell me to get on the floor when I can’t get up again.

Kylie:

Exactly. So we teach people to use the things that are already working for them. So it’s easy. It’s not hard.

Jo:

Give me an example of some of the things. Cause you know, we’ve got smart people listening to this podcast, right? And they’re all going, there’s gotta be a tool, there’s gotta be an assessment I can do that tells me what the things are. But that’s not what you mean when you talk about strengths, is it?

Kylie:

Well, look, the model that we use is called the Resilience Doughnut. And it’s a very simple model that was developed by a lady called Lyn Warrley. And what she did was she researched resilient populations of people and found out what are the common things that contribute to someone being resilient? And what she found was there are two types of things. There are external things in our life that contribute to ourselves being resilient. And there are internal parts of us that contribute to being resilient. The internal part is like our mindset, how we talk to ourselves. So it’s that whole, I can cope with this problem when it shows up or I can’t. The external factors, there’s seven factors outside of the donut. So it’s this lovely round, colourful model that we use and it just steps you through what are these different areas in your life and are they contributing to you feeling strong at the moment? Do they make you feel satisfied, confident, competent? How do they show up for you? And once we identify those things, we then look at how do you practise those parts of your life? What do you do at that moment? So for, one of the parts for me is learning. That’s actually one of my strengths, funnily enough. And so for me to know that that’s actually something that’s good for me to do, that I’m not being naughty by procrastinating on some other project and learning something new, I’m using my strengths. And one of the other parts that strengthens me as funny as well, that you say that is sharing that with people that I care about. Hello. That’s what you and I do all the time. So that’s something that when I do that I do, I feel this sense of confidence and competency and it gives that then strengthens me to face whatever it is that’s showing up in my world that isn’t working.

Jo:

Yeah. I love it. And thank you for such concrete examples. Cause when, when you took me through this, so I was fairly newly diagnosed with bilateral breast cancer. And it’s a horrible experience. And unfortunately Kylie knows enough about it being a horrible experience to walk with me through that. And I did the donut model assessment with her and we worked out what my strengths were. And for me it was like a breath of fresh air. It was like, oh, shoot, I don’t have to learn anything new.

Kylie:

Yeah. Yeah.

Jo:

Actually, I can use what I actually enjoy doing. So for me, one of my strengths is skill, which turns up a work. Now you and I are already sold on the fact that work contributes to our health. Cause you know, otherwise we wouldn’t do the work that we do. But for me it was like, well, I wanna keep working throughout this as much as I can. And do the things that I can, but I’ve gotta be mindful and aware of the parts of the work that are going to detract from me. Everybody else wanted to tell me to not work. And I’m like, no, I know this is important. I know if I stop working, I’m gonna go into such a big depression that it’s just gonna make things so much worse.

But then the other way it turned up for me was using my skills with craft. So I was just making all of those blankets for all these people that are sleeping rough. So that was powerful for me. But I didn’t have to go and learn anything new. It was just like, that’s what I get to do today. So the other really important part of this model is like, there’s seven. How many of them does the research say that we need to have for it to work?

Kylie:

Look, it can work with one, but it’s most powerful with three. And the thing is as well, for all of us lovely perfectionists out there, it’s very simple scoring when you’re going through the whole process. It’s a very simple scale between zero and 10. Anyone has used the visual analog scale. We are very aware of the zero to 10 scale, but it’s asking, is it working for me? And if so, how much is it working for me? So you don’t have to have an area of the model that’s at a nine or a 10 for it to be a strength. If everything’s at a two or a three and you’ve got a four or a five, great! Let’s work there. So it’s so easy to access those strengths. And what we find is that when we identify those strengths for people, and it sounds silly, but it’s almost like we give them permission to actually go, if that’s working for you, you do that. And when they do, it actually has a bit of an overflow effect. So sometimes it can overflow into other areas and other areas can be strengthened. But we don’t ever look at the areas that aren’t working because we already are experts in that every single person is an expert in what is not working. We need to shift away from that. And that can be really hard cause we are so stuck on what isn’t working. Like we’re so problem focused, we need to be solution focused.

Jo:

And that’s incredible. Cause as health professionals we are problem focused. We all like to think that we’re solution focused. We’ll tell our clients and we’ll write it our marketing that we’re solution focused. But what we do really well is identify the problems.

Kylie:

Absolutely. And something that I’ve had a really big realisation around very recently is that when we are dealing with someone who is immersed in the problem, and we then reiterate the problem to them when they’re coming to us distressed and they’re not coping. All we do when we reiterate the problem back to them is make them feel unheard. Make them feel like there’s no hope. Make them feel like there’s nowhere to go if we can just stop and listen to where they’re at. And then ask them questions about what is working for them. Where do they feel a sense of relief? Where do they feel a sense of peace or strength or confidence? And let’s work with that. It’s so empowering for the person there. It shifts things so completely. And then we’re not the one solving the person’s problem. They began solving it for themselves.

Jo:

Yeah. And that was the wake up call for me when we started working together on this when I was working clinically with clients and was applying this model to them. I’d be like, oh, the heaviness has gone outta my work. I’m actually putting the responsibility and the accountability back onto you. This is your life dear client. I’m a tool and a resource for you. Let me help you explore this for you rather than me feeling like I’m carrying the weight of having to fix everything for you. But that wouldn’t have occurred if I had not understood this model for myself.

Kylie:

Yeah. Exactly. And I think that’s one of the reasons why I wanna empower clinicians and health professionals all over the world to know about this model. Because if we can release that weight from our own shoulders, because, you know, the reality is we’ve never been responsible for our clients. Like, correct. Where did that come from? But we all feel that way at times and some of us more often than others, and it’s often the most passionate people that sometimes get caught up in that whole dynamic. You feel like it’s your responsibility to make that change happen. But we’ve never had that responsibility and we’ve never had that ability either. So to actually get to the place where you can share with a person, empower them to make the decisions that are right for them in their own life. It’s the best way to work. And that gives us longevity.

Jo:

Yeah. That gives us longevity. It’s, it’s future proofing. So we as smart health professionals who are wanting to make sure that we’re doing quality work and keeping up to date and meeting our compliance requirements around CPD and CEUs. There’s so many choices for education. Like I could go and learn. So I could go and become ICF accredited coach if I wanted to. I could go and do motivational interviewing and become like a consultant in that. There’s so many things I could learn. Now you are a learner. What is it that made you go, this is the thing that forms the foundation for everything else that I do.

Kylie:

It’s because it empowers and frees up the client to do what’s right for them. So when you are in that position yourself, when you are feeling confident and competent yourself, then you are in a better position to be managing anything else that you decide to take on. If you are not in that place and you decide to take on something else, it’s just not going to work as well. It’s like letting your broken leg heal before you start walking. It’s a foundation principle from my perspective.

Jo:

So can you give me an example now in your business life? So how you have used your concept and model of resilience to help you keep turning up and doing the work that you do.

Kylie:

So how have I used it myself?

Jo:

Yeah, as in for you, not for your clients,

Kylie:

For me, well I learned this model in 2010. That was when I started using it. And then I went through my own experience with breast cancer in 2013. So for me, I was a doer. I was the person who believed that my value is in showing up and getting things done. And so when I was stripped completely there after all of my treatment and laying in bed feeling so sick that I couldn’t move, I didn’t have any value. That was where I was. I couldn’t do anything. My husband would come home from work in the afternoon and say, what did you do today? And I couldn’t even say I’d washed the dishes cause I couldn’t do anything. And for me, I was in this really bad place of, if I’m not doing and performing, then who am I? I’m no one. And I was reminded to go back to the model and to look at what are my strengths? And I learned that learning is one of my skills. And that sharing with people that I care about is one of my skills. And that community is something that’s really important to me. So what I started doing was writing a blog. And so I could sit in bed no matter how nauseous I was and I could put pen to paper and write a few points down. And that was how I started getting myself back to a place where I actually feel like I’m doing something that’s helpful and useful. Cause for me sharing my experience about going through breast cancer was something that made it, I had to make it meaningful. I think you’ve said a similar thing, Jo. I had to make something good from it. So if I could share my experiences to help someone else, then I was gonna do it. And it wasn’t just about me. I was really also passionate about helping the partners of people that go through breast cancer as well, because I saw how much my husband was struggling and how much he just felt so inept he couldn’t do anything to help me. And I felt inept because I couldn’t help him either. I couldn’t even help myself at some point. So sharing around that was really important for me too. So that’s a really personal and powerful example of how I use the model.

Jo:

Wow. Thank you so much for sharing all of that. And your blog was deliciously delightful for me when I was going through my own experience and so on a day-to-day basis now. How do you now use the model in your, just your day-to-day stuff?

Kylie:

Yeah. Look again to me it’s second nature. So I use it from the perspective of, I’m very clear on what my skills are and what my strengths are. And one of the things that I wanna make really clear is, it’s not like you do it once and then that you are there because your strengths change as you change. So for example, if one of your strengths is the partner factor and then you go through some relationship difficulties, another area might show up as a strength and that one might go down for a little while. So it’s very flexible. It changes with you. So you revisit it all the time and go, what’s working for me right now? What do I feel is giving me that sense of confidence and competence? And I do that very automatically now. So I use that as a bit of a basis and a decision tool for looking at things and going, what’s my next step here? What do I do? Do I take that piece of work on? Is that using my strengths or if it isn’t, are my strengths gonna be enough to help me do that? Ah, but because it’s not always about just focusing on your strengths. It’s about are my strengths enough like an oxygen tank for me right now to do something that I know is not an area of strength, but it’s important to me. Cause sometimes those opportunities do come up.

Jo:

Wow. That is incredibly powerful. We need to practise this. Right? This is something that you continue to reinforce. The best way to practise resilience is to be practising resilience when you don’t need it.

Kylie:

Yes, yes, yes. <Laugh> It’s a bit like you don’t practise anger management when we’re about to blow our fuse. We practise it while we are calm so we can use it when we are about to blow our fuse. So it’s like anything, this is a habit. This is a way of being. You learn some tools around our mindset that helps us to catch, what am I saying about this situation? A am I saying I can do this or, or am I wavering and saying I can’t. And if I can’t, then what, what is it about that that’s stopping me? What am I fearful of? What am I worried about? How do I reframe this? How do I use my strengths to help me get to a place where I can where I can? Because that’s the crux of this whole thing. It’s about understanding what’s going on for you. Is it using your strengths and what is your mindset around this place? Because if you are not in a healthy mindset, it’s not gonna work. It’s just not gonna work.

Jo:

No, not at all. Wow. Kylie, what an empowering conversation. So what is the number one thing about resilience or having a lifestyle of resilience? Cause it’s not a destination, it’s not a skillset that we pull out just before we’re about to fall in a heap. What is the number one thing you think health professionals, clinicians need to know right now to help them become a resilient being?

Kylie:

I think they need to practise the sorts of things that we spoke about earlier on, which is to practice self-compassion first. I mean that’s such a big thing because we are very hard on ourselves as health professionals. I think we need to get really real about looking after ourselves. And, you know, I can stand here and I can talk about this for days without even taking a breath. But I’m not gonna be so cocky to say that’s the only thing we ever use. It’s a wonderful thing we use and it works particularly well when we’re struggling. But it’s obviously something we need to have the skills off before we’re struggling. But I think if you are a health professional who has ever felt like life is too heavy, work is too heavy, the burden of clients and results is there. If you feel like you fail too much, then this is something that can just lighten that load for you and give you a new way to show up for yourself first and then to give you something that you can be using with your clients to empower them. Because I dunno about you, but supporting someone to get to their goal and having them doing the work, not you, is a much better outcome than what I was doing beforehand. We cannot push water uphill. It just doesn’t work that way.

Jo:

No. And there are so many health professionals looking for the hack or the thing that actually takes them out of, I can’t do the heaviness of this work anymore. I know that this is such a resourceful way of me being able to turn up in my zone of genius and help the clients who often don’t get help without it sacrificing me to the work.

Kylie:

Absolutely. And it’s just being able to know what’s my responsibility here and what’s theirs. And you’ve gotta get out of their circle because a lot of the time we’re in their circle with them trying to get things done that isn’t our responsibility, it’s not our zone. We’ve gotta get into our own circle.

Jo:

Mm. There’s a whole heap of stuff we can talk about there too.

Kylie:

That’s a whole other conversation.

Jo:

But what’s exciting for me, Kylie, is that you are a speaker at the Future Proofing Health Professional Symposium that’s happening in September. I am dancing for those of you who can’t see me right now, that is a rare occurrence. And Kylie will be speaking more about the model and how it works and how it turns up and how you can use it. She won’t be training you in the model cause it’s a symposium, it’s not a training. I just wanna be clear. But if you’ve heard Kylie talk today about this and it’s piqued your interest, you can come connect with her. There’ll be ways you can connect with her and her training in the show notes. Or you can join the symposium and hear 20 other people along with Kylie talk about things that we need to know and do and be prepared for so that we can keep doing this work without sacrificing ourselves to this work.

Kylie:

Amen.

Jo:

So my most important question right now, if we were gonna go to a cafe together, like we’re about to do in about three hours, <laugh>, what coffee are you gonna order?

Kylie:

Oh gosh, I’m so boring. I’m an almond decaf cappuccino on a cold day, on a hot day. I’m an almond decaf iced latte

Jo:

<Laugh>. And if you are not an Australian and you have no clue what she means, it’s okay. Jump into the Facebook group and we will help you understand <laugh>, because your Starbucks orders American people are very confusing. We were starting to realise that our preciousness around our coffee can be just as confusing.

Thank you so much, Kylie. I appreciate you. Thank you for being in my world. This is the Entrepreneurial Clinician Podcast. Until next episode, go be your awesome self.