Nursing U's Podcast
Nursing U is a podcast co-hosted by Julie and Caleb. We embark on an educational journey to redefine nursing within the modern healthcare landscape.
Our mission is to foster an open and collaborative environment where learning knows no bounds, and every topic—no matter how taboo—is explored with depth and sincerity. We delve into the essence of nursing, examining the intimate and often complex relationships between nurses and their patients amidst suffering and death.
Through our discussions, we aim to highlight the psychological impacts of nursing and caregiving, not only on the caregivers themselves but also on the healthcare system at large.
Our goal is to spark conversations that pave the way for healing and innovation in healthcare, ensuring the well-being of future generations.
'Nursing U' serves as a platform for examining the state of modern civilization through the lens of nursing, tackling issues that range from violence, drugs, and sex to family, compassion and love. We will utilize philosophy, religion and science to provide context and deeper understanding to the topics we tackle.
By seamlessly weaving humor with seriousness, we create a unique tapestry of learning, drawing wisdom from the experiences of elders and the unique challenges faced in nursing today.
Join us at 'Nursing U,' where we cultivate a community eager to explore the transformative power of nursing, education, and conversation in shaping a more whole and healthier world."
Disclaimer:
The hosts of 'Nursing U', Julie Reif and Caleb Schraeder are registered nurses; however, the content provided in this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only. Nothing shared on this podcast should be considered medical advice nor should it be used to diagnose or treat any medical condition. Always seek the guidance of your doctor or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition or health concerns. The views expressed on this podcast are personal opinions and do not represent the views of our employers or our professional licensing bodies.
Nursing U's Podcast
Ep #019 - Embracing Imperfections: Discovering Meaning and Purpose in Nursing Care
What if our greatest strengths as caregivers stem from embracing our own imperfections?" Join us in a profound exploration of the emotional complexities that healthcare professionals face, with a spotlight on PTSD and the weighty responsibilities that caregiving entails. Caleb shares transformative insights from "The Enlightenment: Pursuit of Happiness," guiding us through the historical shift from metaphysical to material reasoning and its impact on understanding human experiences. By reflecting on how our cognitive and emotional minds interact, particularly within the healthcare realm, we strive to engage with our whole selves amidst suffering and joy.
The conversation deepens as we navigate the intersection of metaphysical inquiry and scientific understanding in medicine. We discuss how crises can serve as catalysts for discovering a more grounded sense of self and purpose and explore how religion and spirituality offer intellectual frameworks that support meaning beyond the constraints of our minds. By embracing higher structures of meaning, we consider how individuals can navigate life’s myriad challenges with a renewed sense of purpose and happiness.
Lastly, we tackle the allure of oversimplified psychological terms often seen on social media and the challenges of maintaining objectivity in healthcare settings. Personal nursing experiences highlight the emotional disconnect that can arise from strictly following protocols, especially during crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. Through mindfulness and intentionality, routine caregiving tasks transform into meaningful interactions, emphasizing the importance of self-care, spiritual practices, and structured routines. We redefine selfishness as necessary self-care, illustrating how true wealth is measured not just in material terms, but in love, joy, and satisfaction with life.
Resources mentioned on the Episode;
The Enlightenment: The Pursuit of Happiness, 1680-1790 by Ritchie Robertson
Hi, I'm Julie.
Speaker 2:And I'm Caleb. Welcome to Nursing U, the podcast where we redefine nursing in today's healthcare landscape. Join Julie and I as we step outside the box on an unconventional healing journey.
Speaker 1:Together, we're diving deep into the heart of nursing, exploring the intricate relationships between caregivers and patients with sincerity and depth.
Speaker 2:Our mission is to create an open and collaborative experience where learning is expansive and fun.
Speaker 1:From the psychological impacts of nursing to the larger implications on the healthcare system. We're sparking conversations that lead to healing and innovation.
Speaker 2:We have serious experience and we won't pull our punches. But we'll also weave in some humor along the way, because we all know laughter is often the best medicine.
Speaker 1:It is, and we won't shy away from any topic, taboo or not, from violence and drugs to family and love, we're tackling it all.
Speaker 2:Our nursing knowledge is our base, but we will be bringing insights from philosophy, religion, science and art to deepen our understanding of the human experience.
Speaker 1:So, whether you're a nurse, a healthcare professional or just someone curious about the world of caregiving, this podcast is for you.
Speaker 2:One last thing, a quick disclaimer before we dive in. While we're both registered nurses, nothing we discuss here should be taken as medical advice. Always consult with your doctor or a qualified healthcare provider for any medical concerns you may have. The views expressed here are our own and don't necessarily reflect those of our employers or licensing bodies.
Speaker 1:So let's get started on this journey together. Welcome to Nursing U, where every conversation leads to a healthier world.
Speaker 2:Hey, all right, very good, it worked. Look at our smiles. We're like little kids. Oh, that's so funny.
Speaker 1:It works so great. It's kind of like when you're in the room getting ready for an open heart or the balloon pump's coming in and you're like I know how to do that. Okay, they come get you and you go in.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you blow everything in and it works, yeah, like high-fiving, and everything's great. Yeah, yeah, that's the feeling. Well, we're here for another week. This is good. The last episode that aired just right before we started was the one with christina, and it was it's a pretty deep episode. I just had to listen to it several times because there's so much, it's just heavy. It's heavy but it's so real and it was so great that we got to talk to her on the other side of all of her history yeah yeah, it was she, she did an amazing job yeah, she did, yeah, it was good.
Speaker 1:So this week we're just going to, sorry, didn't mean to interrupt Go ahead.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I apologize, my audio was so terrible in that, in that video, at least at the beginning, I'm only about a quarter of the way through listening to it just in my car.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know again, it is what it is.
Speaker 2:We don't know, you know, learning as we go.
Speaker 1:That is right, and sometimes it's just not going to be perfect, and because we're not perfect and we're practicing non-perfectness and loving ourselves despite of all the non-perfectness, right, that's right. So I think today we're going to talk about meaning. It doesn't seem like we can really steer away too much from, at least right now, talking about how serious you know PTSD and just the heaviness that the nursing profession brings to the people who are doing the caring, and so I should say healthcare workers. And so Caleb and I were discussing and he's done a lot of writing and a lot of reading, show your book, he does a lot of reading.
Speaker 2:The Enlightenment.
Speaker 2:Pursuit of Happiness, pursuit of happiness, I mean pursuit of happiness. Yeah, it's. That's an interesting title because the Enlightenment was, you know, on the other side of the medieval period and is the result of many wars that were often religious in nature and specifically it really kicked off around. Well, this book says 1680. But this book says 1680, really, the last war that kind of propelled the Enlightenment forward was the Thirty Years' War. It was 30 years long, it lasted 30 years. It started in 1618 and ended in 1648.
Speaker 2:On the other side of it, essentially everyone said we need to look to the material world for the answers of our existential questions instead of looking to spirituality and metaphysical answers, which is what had been, you know, the predominant system of answering all of our existential questions. Um, there was always some Theo theistic uh view of, uh, why we're experiencing what we're experiencing, and, um, so the enlightenment really kind of the transitional period between that war and the actual enlightenment was kind of entering into the age of reason, where we were reasoning our material world, and so it's just a fascinating time and one that I look back to and think about a lot, which is why I'm reading the book, and if anybody else out there is listening and you've read this book. It's, boy, good for you. And please reach out, because it's not so easy to find people that are interested in investing. You know, investing that much time into a book or or a subject. There's just not so many of us.
Speaker 1:I mean, that is dedication in it. To win it for sure. The book down below for those who can't, who aren't watching the video, just so, if you, if you're curious.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And so really, in all that we talked about how there's so many facets to our minds and how we deal with life and just being here with our thinking minds, our emotional minds, our feeling bodies and all of that and how it kind of plays into where you end up when you're kind of in the depths of your despair and what that kind of looks like and the things around you can push you farther down.
Speaker 1:You know dealing with things that we have to deal with in caring for patients suffering death and dying, and you know even the happy moments of you know all of that that we have to deal with with our person and our whole selves dealing with that person and our whole selves dealing with that person and their whole selves there. If you have no meaning to it, I just think it affects you. It can affect you in a negative way without you knowing that. That's what's happening. I think a lot of it is. We don't realize what's actually going on behind closed doors of our mind, our brain and our soul, actually going on behind closed doors of our mind, our brain and our soul when we are working so hard to be good and to do a good job and to save the people until you just aren't functioning, and then you're questioning everything you know.
Speaker 2:And then, like you're working and and striving to succeed at, at saving a life, when in the back of your mind, you're like should I be like me, Ma's not well, me like what? What is the line of, uh, heroic effort? Um, why am I doing this? Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this?
Speaker 1:Right, I think we ask a lot of questions of searching for meaning. What does this mean? Why am I doing this? Why are we saving grandma? Why aren't we doing this for this? Why did this person survive in, this person die? You know, I mean, there's a lot of things that we you know. Why do I have to be the one to float? Why do I have to be the one to give up my patient to float and go take more patients? Why do I have to take the first admin always? Why do I? You know, there's a lot of you know wise. Why does the hospital system do this? Why are the insurance companies doing that? There are, there are a lot of why's and it's not really.
Speaker 1:I don't think that you need to know the answers to all of that, but it it has to mean something. Or it's like swirl, like a toilet bowl. It's like it's like a toilet bowl in your mind. It just swirling, nonstop, flushing and there's nothing to grab onto. There's not, you're just swirl. That's how I felt swirling around with no anchor, with no. I didn't even know I really should grasp out, like I should reach out, like I just thought this is what it is like and I'm a nurse and I have to work, and I have to go, I have to get money and and I do like being a nurse and I'm good at it, and so this is what it is and.
Speaker 1:I just have to figure out, I guess, how to handle it and that I mean that's.
Speaker 2:I mean that's kind of why I mean that's. You know, as I, you know, look back on the journey, you know I can I think I said I talked about it a little bit in the pod with Riz, where you know, I think I talked about it in the context of conspiracy theories that we are meaning making beings. We're constantly looking for what things mean and the symbolism. Like you know, there was a case where this man was dying and his wife was standing at the foot of the bed and she was just like this, so angry. She was just so angry and no affection and no love, and I was like, oh my god, this marriage, like lucky him, he's getting out yeah so one example of of creating meaning, of creating meaning.
Speaker 2:Maybe I've talked about this before, but in the woodworking I was creating a practice or a method of imparting meaning into what I was creating, which was making it meaningful which is why I also couldn't sell it.
Speaker 2:But that's a side. Sell it, but that's a. That's a side, completely side note to the, to the broader context of, uh, the fact that we are beings that are constantly making meaning, um, and and I think that because of the experiences of watching people suffer and die, you know over and over and over, and having, you know, not a really firm grasp on what I believe about God or my role in the world, or you know, the age old question of why are we even here? You know the infirmity of the people that I'm taking care of, their existence is just evaporating right in front of my eyes all the time, and so being subjected to that and not having a really good, grounded worldview, not understanding the history of the enlightenment, you know that's, it's this, this, all of these thoughts have led me back to the enlightenment. You know that's, it's this, this, all of these thoughts have led me back to the enlightenment period, at medieval period, to understand how we got to where we are, how did how, how is it that you know we created this system of evidence-based practice? You know, like no one really questions evidence-based practice, but there are some serious, serious flaws in it. One just right off the cuff is finance.
Speaker 2:Brandy talked about that. Whoever's funding the study to create the evidence necessarily has bias. And then on top of that you have the individual who has an idea and they want to prove the idea. So they have a bias of you know, their. You know maybe that's an ego based bias that I want my idea to be the one that succeeds and thrives, or you know prevails, to be the one that succeeds and thrives, or you know prevails. So there are absolutely inherent biases that impact the quality of the evidence-based data. So how do we get there? And you know, you kind of, when you start looking back at, at at how the scientific method became what it is today, you know, I absolutely think that it was. It was starting before the actual, like official time frame of the Enlightenment period.
Speaker 2:Enlightenment period, the roots of it were. I mean, I think I see the roots of the Enlightenment period going all the way back to I believe it was 1450s. 1458 was maybe something like that was when the typesetting was invented. You know, once we, when you look back at history and you look at when typesetting came into our world, it radically transformed how we communicated, radically transformed everything, and without that, the Enlightenment period, because the sharing of ideas was impossible. So because everyone was writing on a parchment scroll you know, we were writing on dead animals and on copper plates, and I mean it's crazy, the efficiency, like the inefficiency, of those means of communication were, were so limiting and the typesetting, and then once the printing press was invented, it was off to the races and data was just being, you know, knowledge was being shared across the board, and so that really is kind of the root of of the enlightenment period and and scientific inquiry, because without that it was very difficult to to share knowledge.
Speaker 2:Um, so but I, I, I attribute, I, I, I, I look at that timeframe as because there's this separation of, you know, separation from looking at the metaphysical answers, looking at some theistic creationist story as the answer for our, our, our questions, and turning to studying and analyzing the natural phenomenon that exists all around us, and and so we created this system that um leans so heavily on the objective you have to. If you can't prove it, it doesn't exist, and that's just kind of bullshit, I mean very, very predominant in medical, in the medical field.
Speaker 2:I think it's fully realized in that. A thousand percent, yeah, and I think that's part of the problem, which is why I'm studying it. The purpose of the study is to understand how I got where I got, so that maybe I can figure out how to communicate that to others in a way that will maybe fortify their, their minds. I wish that I had, you know, we've talked about it. If I hadn't, if I hadn't gone through, I wouldn't be what I'm doing, what I'm doing today, I wouldn't be who I am today, and and uh, but we all found something.
Speaker 1:Like you, you either come to a point where you hear something or you see something. Something triggers it something triggers the start of it for you, and you may even go down the hill farther when you first start out on your healing journey, and so we're. We don't want to prevent anyone from going through what they need to go through, but we could be the trigger that asks, gets them to ask a question.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:Them to say what does this all mean? And and then you know you're combing over your whole life. It's not just your job, but it's why did you choose the job? Why, why, why, why? So you start to answer all the why? Questions and once you can find meaning and get some answers for yourself, it's almost like you've come out of that whirlpool and you have some grounding to stand on, to start to put things into perspective for yourself and understand what your purpose is and where you want to be and what makes you happy. All in finding, finding meaning and and and starting to question that. And so you know we're not everybody has to go through their own. I don't even know, and so you know we're not. Everybody has to go through their own.
Speaker 2:I don't even know. I mean, everybody probably calls it Dark Night of the.
Speaker 1:Soul. Dark Night of the Soul. Yeah, that's for sure. I mean, everybody kind of knows that. You know, whatever you want to call it, it's kind of a pit. And then you're like holy shit, I got to get out of here like this isn't fun, I'm not happy, nothing makes me smile. This is stupid. Why am I doing? I hate my scrubs.
Speaker 1:I don't I hate everybody I work with. You know all of it like it's. So can get so so disgusting in your mind of just like it's just disgusting and you have to start figuring that out Like why? So why is?
Speaker 2:it.
Speaker 1:What do you need? Where are you going to get that? You know it's very, it's a. It's like a liminal space, like a not really here, not really there, and I hope that this podcast hits some people in that space.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's so. That's one of the like. So one of the things that that I recognized a long time ago was that religion serves that purpose. There's an intellectual utility to submitting yourself to a higher structure of meaning. There's an intellectual utility that I don't have to concern myself with worrying about what this means or what that means. I can accept that God is real and God exists and I have an obligation to for lack of better words be a good person, be a functioning member of society. You know that was. That was ultimately the. You know, at the very bottom, that was. You know, the. The conclusion that I came to my obligation to God is to be fully functioning, contributing member of society. Not great at it, yet I'm doing my best, yeah, I'm trying. I wouldn't be sitting here doing this today if I hadn't put in a tremendous amount of effort to climb up out of where I came from.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So the intellectual utility that religion has served is, in my opinion, undeniably valuable, whatever that is for you.
Speaker 1:Right. I think that's important. You know, whatever, whatever, whatever spirituality that you believe in it, that a definition that kind of crosses all boards is something higher than yourself, something outside of yourself or a higher version of yourself, however you want to do it, because when you're only thinking it's you and you have all the control to figure it out, it that's going to be almost impossible to to get out of. But when you're able to utilize that tool of but I don't have to, I don't have to do that. I have someone supporting me, something supporting me myself, supporting me higher outside of your own mind, it, it gives a little relief, it serves as as a relief until you can really decide what you believe and what is going to be most beneficial for your life. Yeah, I like that you said as a tool. It's, it's, it's utilizing, it has function.
Speaker 2:An intellectual utility. Yes, yeah, my, my intellect does not need to waste any time wrestling with whether or not God exists. I don't need to think about that, I've settled on it. God exists and I have an obligation to him. And how I work that out and take accountability for that belief in my way is between me and God, it's between each's, between each of us, but, and not just that but. But. You know, I think all of the schools of philosophy, all of the religions, all of the structured ways of moving through the human experience are asking and assigning meaning to the fundamental questions why am I on this rock? Why is it that the moon waxes and wanes? But it's, you know all, it's always there. Why is the sun always? Why are we spinning around the sun? You know, um, these, these systems, that that we necessarily create, we organize. Look at ants, look at any species on this planet. They organize in their innate way. We attribute meaning and we organize around that meaning. So there is an intellectual utility to all of these structures and systems that we create and understanding how, the pursuit of answers through reductionist thinking, meaning.
Speaker 2:I'm going to look at this apple and I am going to define what it is by all of its observable traits. So you look at the apple it's round, maybe it has a stem, it has some dots on it, some, you know. Whatever you cut it open, you see the white, you, you know cellular structures inside. You see some seeds, you see the core. You see all these, all these physical structures. Then, okay, that's an apple. Right, but kind of not really, because you still haven't looked at any of the cellular structures. What's inside the cells? What's outside the cells? How many different cell types there are in an apple? What the molecular structure of the peel is to make it red? Why is it red? You know all of these questions that you have to ask to reduce an apple to its absolute empirical form. And that pathway creates all of the progressive steps that you need to understand to manipulate that thing. So now we're, we get down to a genetic level where we're, you know, you know we, we've figured out how to genetically modify, we've figured out, we figured out all these things. So we've taken away all of the mystery of what an apple is. It's no longer mysterious. And what does that mean? Because we're doing that in every way, you know, we're searching for the objective data at every level to understand the experience that we're having.
Speaker 2:Pause and and and kind of land on on, uh, pop psychology, that one of the really dangerous things that I see happening, uh, is all of these slang terms like gaslighting, um, you know the, the people on on Instagram or or Facebook that are labeling other people as bipolar or any other term that you want to throw out there in just a flippant way. We are not qualified for this like but, but we think because, because we are so objective, we, we, once, you, oh, I understand this idea. No, you, you, you read, you read a few pages on on, uh, you know, a psychology facebook page and now you think you really understand it. There's no, no way.
Speaker 2:But because we are so dependent, is not the word, maybe, pursuing? We are in pursuit of knowing, and that's what objectivity provides us, and so we're constantly scavenging social media and picking up these tidbits of information when we don't have a full picture at all. And one of the problems with objectivity is the siloing. Look at, you know, we've talked about it before, we've talked about it before All of the doctors are so specifically expert at what they doologist that has cured the cancer, standing over the patient in the ICU saying I succeeded, I defeated the cancer, and the cardiologist is saying but he's dead. You know the patient's dead, but you killed the cancer, that's right. You also killed the patient. We're just.
Speaker 1:We have such a myopic view of what we're supposed to be doing and and I think that is one of the pitfalls of of leaning so heavily on reductive reasoning- yeah, and I think that the way that we have to function in a hospital setting because that's what I'll speak on, because that's what I know almost funnels you into that thinking.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1:There's no room, the way things are right now in an acute care setting for any kind of outside the box thinking setting for any kind of outside the box thinking.
Speaker 2:You go because we have all of our pathways are defined by the objective data of evidence-based practice.
Speaker 1:Everything is defined. I mean, there is a. You could talk about autonomy, you could talk about doing things, but but everything's set. There's a protocol for this, there's an algorithm for this. You, you know evidence-based practice for this. It's all in a book and you, really, you know you're, you're expected to do it that way and and we do, and so we do, because a lot of the times it does work, but we lose our own process of putting meaning on on the situation, and maybe I'm saying reflecting on how we're feeling about it, because there's no room for the nurse to say how she feels about it or he or she feels about it. It leaves like I'm thinking right now. I'm thinking about during COVID and I'm thinking it felt very robotic what we had to do. It felt very I mean, at this point in my career I've been a nurse for 20 years and it felt so far from anything that I had ever been exposed to, even taking care of a patient on the ventilator sick with lots of drips, very sick.
Speaker 1:I had taken care of very sick patients before and it's like there was the meaning of human life was just lost and I'm sure that it was before. But for what? That just stands out to me because I think your situation, even in the teens, even in the 14, 15 time you know, there was, there was a loss of meaning, and I don't even know. Can those two things simultaneously happen?
Speaker 2:I don't even know. Well, I mean so well one. The spike in nursing suicide didn't start with COVID. It started in 2011,. 12, 13 is when it really the spike really became dramatic, especially, um, actually 2009 for women and I believe 2011 for men is when the spike, uh, the two spikes, happened for nursing Um, and you know, I think that, like so, the one story that was coming up for me as you were talking was the guy. I think that I've shared this before about the guy that we knew he was dying and he passed. I'm standing next to him, I'm looking at the monitor. He's gone. I look at his face and you know when they're gone and I just I leaned so close into his face and I was just like where did you go, bro?
Speaker 1:Where did you go?
Speaker 2:Like. So, like that kind of picture in my mind is that on one side you know, of course, we were not doing a full court press with him, we knew he was dying, skilled in deploying all the means necessary, deploying all of the objective data that I know to answer the questions, answer the answer the the problems that the human body that's in front of me is presenting, you know. So we, we take in all of this data, all of this biological data, and we have all of this evidence-based knowledge in the back of our minds and we're amalgamating that into an action plan to respond to from this angle or from that angle, to take care of this person, to save this life right. Care of this person, to save this life right. When you're standing over this guy that you know is dying and you, you're awestruck, you're awestruck by the fact that he's no longer there.
Speaker 2:What the fuck is that like? Where did you go? Where are you like? Where are you like? Are you right here? Like, because I've got answers for all the other shit, yeah, but I don't have an answer for this. What is going on? Like what? What does that mean? Um, so to me that picture is is really like not only the soul, leaving the physical body, but the, the person, me standing there, experiencing it, witnessing it, participating in it, um, nursing it. Uh, you know, I'm filled with all this objective, objective data and I'm at the meeting point of that where it doesn't mean anything anymore. It doesn't just, doesn't mean anything more. So, yeah, I think I love this conversation.
Speaker 1:Go ahead.
Speaker 2:No, no, you ahead, I'm, I'm at my end, I that. That picture for me is where doesn't matter all the objectivity, all the effort, all the trying, all the um knowledge is it's meaningless um it feels at that point.
Speaker 1:But I look like the way I. I have practiced putting meaning to things over the last several years. It's a practice because I wasn't doing it, I didn't know, but knowing and then applying meaning, making things mean something to me, which means putting emotions to it, being vulnerable enough to put it out there but strong enough to know that it doesn't have to affect me directly. I could probably manage much better these days in because I'm not in the same environment. My nursing environment now is totally different than it was then.
Speaker 1:But managing in an acute care, icu, er kind of type setting my thought process is different now about life and the meaning of life and people's meaning and my um, my role in it, which is almost nothing you matters when I'm there. It would matter when I'm there doing my thing, talking to the patient, holding their hand, touching them, cleaning out their mouth, making sure their body feels and looks good in the bed they're comfortable. You know I've done all my cares, I've done the best that I can to to manage their time with me and rather than being detached from that, I feel like that in itself has meaning for me now and I can. Therefore it has energy for me and I can choose where to send that energy within myself, whereas before I was just doing the things, not really applying any, not because it's in the skill list, but because, like, that's my role, like our role as a nurse, a healthcare provider is being there with our whole person and soul with them at their point and and then being able to like detach from that. So I feel like that that takes practice, because I know that I held back a lot of my attachment to now.
Speaker 1:We didn't have a lot of long-term patients but it didn't matter, even even if you took somebody care of somebody for two of your three nights or three of your nights, and then you come back and they might still be there the next week. But you know, typically in an ICU they are really sick and they get better. They go to four. But you might have someone really sick for three nights and you might see their progression of getting better. You know surgery better and better or maybe whatever, but I didn't allow myself to have a lot of attachment.
Speaker 2:Well, that's a necessary, yeah, it's enough necessary, but but but still, like the fact that we're sitting here having all of these conversations like means that we couldn't fully detach.
Speaker 1:It's true, but I feel like if you can notice the attachment right then and there, that it would be easier to then let it go, like if you can notice and name it and feel it for right there, and then then you can let it go and you could go home Rather. We now have all of this. It's like you know, it's like still attached weirdly to us A thousand percent. We're still trying to like get rid of it, all of this. It's like you know. It's like still attached weirdly to us a thousand percent still trying to like get rid of it.
Speaker 1:But if you could have a practice of being there, present with the patient, knowing I don't even know how to explain like knowing that you are giving them what they need because you're meant to be there. I've talked about that before when I go to work. Now I know that that's my shift. I was scheduled for it. I'm supposed to be there because I feel guided. Now.
Speaker 1:I had guidance, then, and whether your guide comes from your higher self, your God, whatever you feel led by. I feel like you could use that in your work, in your daily work, and when you are there, you're meant to be there, you're meant to. Whatever happens is meant to happen for them and you, so you're meant to be presented with this situation and they're meant to meet you, and so you're always wanting to give your best self, and if you're grounded in your best self, then you don't have to try too hard and you don't have to pretend and you don't have to go through the motions because you know that you are there for purpose.
Speaker 1:There is a purpose for you being there. I lost a lot of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. I think for me one realization that I have come to, it really becomes spiritual in nature, in the sense that the life that I create outside of caregiving, informs my ability to provide care. So me taking care of myself and what that means. So all of the internal structures that I have going on in my day to day, I again this is an intellectual utility, like intellectual utilities.
Speaker 2:You know just a term that I've adopted to define these efficiencies of life, meaning my day off during the week is Thursday, so I meal prep for the weekend on Thursday, I meal prep for the week on Sunday, and so, like that, that structure, I don't have to, I haven't, I don't have to apply any intellect to the the issue of eating or feeding myself, because I've already got, I've got the system built to do it, because we build systems that's what we humans do a system for my life that has automatic efficiencies built into it that I don't have to worry about when I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this on this day, and and I've built the routine which becomes a spiritual practice. That is a spiritual practice, it's a mind, it's mindfulness, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's what mindfulness is and it's the intention that you're putting into it, because otherwise you could go through those same motions as a robot and have no meaning to it absolutely. You're intentional with it and therefore it's a spiritual practice uh-huh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So I think I mean, I think that's the the issue with the, the objective thing, like you know, make it that that system that I built is very objective. Like I have to do this in these times so that I can I'm free to go give myself to to my patients, or I'm free to go give myself to my kid or whatever, whatever it is, whatever it is that I'm going to um invest my time with, I don't have to worry about those things. So that's very objective, but it has. So there's there's like this this gets to what you were talking about earlier with medicine and how we're so leaning on objectivity. There is none of that. None of the spirituality exists in the system. I mean, we have spiritual care people Today, I'm for sure more willing to talk to spiritual care providers than I was back in the day. How many times do we run away from them?
Speaker 1:Yeah Well.
Speaker 1:I mean it felt very separated, though, from our practice. So to me they were there for the patients and maybe gave the patients a little bit of the feeling of being held and comforted spiritually, because the nurses aren't doing that. But it didn't. But it doesn't. It didn't have anything to do with the, with our job like it, or medicine in and of itself, and I probably would look at them different today as well, but I feel like they could be used even more than they are.
Speaker 1:Well, and even when I was working, they cut them down. Like you know, you should be multiples. Multiples would walk around and they had this and they could come here and they could come. You know, there was someone on duty all the time you could call when there was someone dying, and you know, then it like towards the end of my career, it got to be where, like they were on a pager and you had to get go google supervisor to call them because they just weren't available. You know right, and it's like, yeah, yeah, I'll leave a message on your machine and let you know that this guy passed away, because clearly no one gives two shits that he's here with no family and I have five other patients, you know.
Speaker 2:God, you have a way with words.
Speaker 1:Well, but I can really get into it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, yeah, so. So, yes, I think that the medical system and the in-hospital care system does not provide a pathway for nurses, caretakers, to feel a spiritual presence, let their presence even be spiritual in nature. I mean, I hate to say it but, like you know, when doctors come into the rooms and I am not speaking for every doctor, nor am I speaking for every hospital, but many that I have observed go in quickly and go back out, and then they want to talk to me about what my assessment was Hmm, what it, what, yeah, and then what they do yesterday, and then what were their labs, and then what they, what he. Then what were their labs, and then what they he, what he say about the chest x-ray. And what did speech therapy say about the blah, blah, blah? You know what I mean. Like it's so they're so far removed from the actual caring, touching feeling of the patient these days and, honestly, they're overworked. They have too many patients.
Speaker 1:I mean some of those HINTS doctors have like 30 on their list for the day Including patients in the ICU. It's just, it's too much, and so you know it's the overall system and we can complain about that for the rest of the podcast, but we're not going to do that of the podcast but we're not going to do that. We are going to say is healthcare workers have the choice to practice some kind of mindfulness, spiritual practice, to, to give meaning to what they're doing, Because in that meaning it just creates a more robust life, a happier life, happier patients, happier nurses, happier nurses to go to work, happier nurses to be around. Things kind of roll off your shoulders because it doesn't really matter that much as long as you're putting some kind of meaning to it. You're putting some kind of meaning to it and then that will overflow into your, into your home life, and so if you need to start with your home life and find meaning there, then hopefully that'll kind of spill over into your, into your nursing career.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I've said it before you can't have chaos at home and at work. It just doesn't work.
Speaker 1:No, and sometimes there's chaos in both the hospital is necessarily chaos.
Speaker 2:Right, it absolutely is chaos.
Speaker 1:Right and, if you let it, my whole life was just chaos. It felt out of my control. I wasn't in control anymore. But even starting just to find the meaning in who am I, you know, what do I want? What do I want my life to look at? Look like what, what, what makes me happy?
Speaker 1:what gives me a fulfilled feeling of purpose. How can I make myself feel better? How can I, what can I do that will make a difference in my life today? You know, starting to answer some of those questions that nobody asks us. And you know we were not raised to take care of ourselves, we were raised to take care of other people. And especially, you know, if you're like me, are you the oldest Caleb, or no? No Second.
Speaker 1:You know the oldest of your siblings probably divorced parents. You know, born in the 70s, probably divorced parents, young kid raising your siblings. You know mom's working, dad's in a different state, what you know you, that's your bread. That way, like that's what you do. And we do it because we're just trying to be good. You are just trying to be good humans and you're just living. We're just trying to be good humans and you're just living. But if you're not living intentionally and if you're not living for yourself and what makes you happy and you have to know that first then you can't do any. You can't make anybody happy or you're stripping yourself completely down to just make everybody else happy.
Speaker 2:I mean. That's I mean for me, that's the gift of rock bottom. That's one of the gifts right, it's one of the gifts Like I have to take care of myself. I have to, I have to choose for myself, not for anyone else.
Speaker 1:No, and it seems selfish. But someone else is asking you something to do to not do for yourself, but do for me then they're selfish. So, like, what's the difference?
Speaker 2:I know, I actually, I mean, I have, I, we have been taught that selfishness is bad, and I don't think that it is. I think there, I think that there's absolutely a malignant form, but to be selfish is, I mean, that's. I almost talked about this earlier. I try to remember exactly where, but oh, it was the. You know, being a productive citizen, I actually, you know, being a productive citizen, I actually, I used to think that money was bad and that I should.
Speaker 2:You know, I think there's this idea that making a lot of money is you've somehow done something unethical, or like you're. I had a negative view of having a lot of money. I have shifted my perspective. I think it's a moral imperative. It's a moral imperative for me to provide well for myself, better than well, yeah, because if I'm not taking care of myself and living in abundance, then I'm a, I'm a drain to someone, I'm hurting someone by not being, by not taking care of myself. So money to me. I've, I've radically transformed my view of my, of the role money plays in my life. I think it's like I said, it's a moral imperative to be living in excess, not excess in the sense of I need, you know, 50 sports cars I don't need. I would like one sports car. I'd like to drive fast. I like a sports car. That'd be fine, but I don't need.
Speaker 1:Fine, but I don't need 50, I don't need five or two well, and even if you did, you would, you would want to share that, like you would want to have people over to see the cars, but or you would be sharing in another way with your wealth. I mean, I think you know wealth and abundance doesn't always just mean money and things. It also means an abundance of love for yourself, an abundance of love for humankind, an abundance of happiness and joy and ease and feeling satisfaction with life and and feeling your purpose and feeling grounded to where you are and where you're going and what you're doing and you have. You know some, and it's it's just a reflection of your own self-worth and being selfish or self-care, and those two words, for whatever reason we've grown up in, is. You know they're like. You know self-care is bubble baths and I don't know treating yourself whatever, but you know it isn't. Though.
Speaker 1:And neither is being selfish. You have to. So they'll say we don't want you to be selfish, but if you're in the air and the plane takes a dramatic drop, we want oxygen mask on yourself first, then on your child. What is that? That's selfish? That is selfish. You're taking care of you so that you can care for others.
Speaker 2:It's responsible. It's responsible. It's not selfish.
Speaker 1:No, well, it needs to be. I mean, you could say selfish, because we don't like the word selfish, but but it but it is. It means the same thing, and so you're being responsible by caring for yourself first, so that you're here and aware and can then give care to others and it's just such a jaded thing, and if you don't, if you are not capable of doing that for yourself, I don't really know what to say.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's just it. It's not good, it's not looking good for getting out of any kind of deep dark night of the soul or whatever you're going through and it takes practice, because we're not taught to put ourselves first.
Speaker 1:We're not taught that, um, we need to be of sound and body and mind first in order to to care and to give our whole selves to the purpose of why you're here and for a lot of nurses that is taking care of people and so you can wrap that all up into meaning. I mean, that is what you're doing. You're giving meaning to your own life in order to see the meaning in others when it's hard, but it's so necessary.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It was fun.
Speaker 2:I think it's good. I don't know. I think it was a good episode.
Speaker 1:I think so. I think that we can say like share and follow, comment. If you want to hear about a topic, comment what you think about the episode. Comment. If you want to hear about a topic, comment what you think about the episode. Comment if you have found meaning.
Speaker 1:You want to come on the episode, right? I was going to say if you found meaning and you're fully back in full-core press taking care of patients and you do it a different way now. You know I asked the question and we don't have an answer. Kent, is it possible? Is it possible to to have a meaningful life and how does that look when you're caring for patients? How does that look? How to find balance how to find the balance. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:All right.
Speaker 1:I hope everybody has a great week.
Speaker 2:We'll see you next week we hope you've enjoyed this week's episode remember, the conversation doesn't end here keep the dialogue going by connecting with us on social media posted in the links below or by visiting our website together, let's continue to redefine, nursing and shape a brighter future for those we care for.
Speaker 1:Until next time, take care, stay curious and keep nurturing those connections. Together, let's continue to redefine, nursing and shape a brighter future for those we care for.
Speaker 2:Until next time, take care, stay curious and keep nurturing those connections, and don't forget to be kind to yourself.