Wellness seminars and self-care initiatives are well-intentioned but insufficient. They place the burden on individual nurses to “manage” stress within systems that continue to generate preventable distress, thus “weaponizing resilience.”

The journey to embracing imperfection isn't about lowering standards – it's about expanding possibilities. In coaching, we call this "creating and increasing capacity for joy."

A trauma-responsive approach to physician leadership and wellbeing.

In a groundbreaking 2021 study published in Anesthesiology, researchers from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center revealed that nearly 60% of U.S. anesthesiologists were at high risk for burnout.

We can acknowledge and embrace our humanity and summon our compassion into places where high-stakes decisions are made while simultaneously holding ourselves and each other accountable.

"When you don't know what to do, just do the work in front of you. At the end of the day at least your chores are done."

Everyone has a system so primed by the compounding, cumulative toxic stress and trauma of recent years that activation misfires are happening more frequently.

In the absence of mitigation, trauma will discharge disguised as behaviors that further amplify harm and drive disconnection:  Anger. Aggression. Apathy. Avoidance. Disdain. Disengagement. Self-injury. 

Maybe Broken is an opportunity to sift through the pieces, mindfully choose the beautiful and useful bits of value, and build something better.

Our processing may look a little … weird … for a while.

And humor helps.

Learning to connect and intentionally hold space in a manner that responds to and mitigates the trauma (Big T or little t) that shows up in others is an essential skill we all are capable of learning.

The chaos cracked systems that were long overburdened and strained. The harm – the trauma – can no longer be denied, and relief can no longer be delayed.

Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it.

Too often, though, we give our feelings free rein. And too often (especially right now), the traumas we've experienced are showing up as anger, avoidance, or apathy.

What do we need to ReLearn, and how can we support one another in the relearning?

Our job, then, is to find and create and nurture relationships with other adults who will share the joy and a piece – no matter how big or small – of the responsibility.

Not everything is a Face-Eating Bear.

Most of us appreciate the importance of Joy – and of sharing it with others. It simply has become habit to overlook or ignore in the chaos, the stress, and the trauma of these times.

At this moment in time, our threat detection systems have been so activated for so long it is becoming difficult to distinguish between a Face-Eating Bear and a Cute Little Chipmunk.

What can we do to notice when we are heads down and busy DOING? Sometimes we have to turn to others in our lives who have a better vantage point than we do.