Use Your Amazing Courage on Yourself!
Physicians and clinicians do heroic things every day for their patients but often lack the courage to fix their own broken job situations. Flex your courage today for your best good!
If you’re stressed out and burning out, you know you need to change your work situation. But fear unfailingly sets in: “What if I ask for an accommodation and my admin fires me? If I leave medicine, who will I be? How will I pay my kids’ tuition?” Once fear hijacks you, you become paralyzed. You do nothing about your stressful job situation and the burnout worsens with time.
But you know what’s funny? How courageous you are when it comes to patient care.
It takes courage to go see an angry, demanding patient. It takes courage to tell a patient they have cancer. Heck, it takes courage just to show up to work every day.
How is it that you have so much courage in your daily work, but when it comes to creating healthy work for yourself, for your best welfare, fear takes over and your courage evaporates? I care for you; I’m not trying to blame you. I just want you to consider that fantastic dichotomy.
When I as a resident, a 19-year-old man was coding with a pericardial effusion. Guided ultrasound wasn’t yet available. I stabbed a needle into that man’s chest to drain the fluid, praying my anatomic landmarks were correct. Was I incredibly frightened? Yes. But I knew it had to be done immediately to save his life. If you’re stressed-out, burning out, what must you do immediately to save yours?
My friend, you do heroic, dangerous, glorious things every single day. You already have great courage. Use it to fix your broken job situation.
Physicians tend to wait until they get so beaten down, so burned out, and so backed into a corner that they have no other choice but to make a change, to use the last of their waning strength to escape. Tragically, other physicians lose that battle. They take their lives because they feel so trapped. They feel like they have no other way out.
Please don’t wait another day to flex your courage before you run out of strength to do so.
Don’t wait until you're backed into a corner and have no choice but to try to blindly swipe your way out or give up in despair.
You are brave. And you are strong.
Use that formidable courage that you demonstrate and exercise every day to joyfully, expectantly, make those necessary changes in your job for your best good. Get the help of a trusted peer, coach, or counselor if you want or need to. You don’t have to walk alone.
What about the fear? The fear is always there. But as you make a decision that honors you, even a little one, the fear gets smaller and smaller. Planning how to handle the challenges that come with the decision to honor yourself gets easier after you’ve made the decision.
Use your amazing courage on yourself. Make a small change in your stressful job today. You can do it!
Background image courtesy of Alina Blumberg of Pexels.
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Are you a stressed woman physician who HATES Mondays? You can make NEW ones!
First, snag the free Evolve Work Action tool to assess your work’s effects on you and to get possible next steps about your work situation: https://www.evolvedphysician.com/pl/279448
Next, schedule a complimentary and confidential 1-hour coaching Discovery Conversation with me:
https://calendly.com/meetwithcathy/new-mondays
This is your no-obligation, no-pressure safe space to get clear about what you want and gain the power to take the first steps to get it. I’m your fiercely committed and encouraging guide—let me reintroduce you to your truth.
To learn more about what coaching with me is like, visit:
https://evolvedphysician.com/coaching-services
If you prefer a private, DIY self-coaching virtual experience to new work, The Evolved Physician Course is for you! To learn more, visit:
I’d love to meet you. Let's connect:
Email: [email protected]
LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/catherinewoodhousemd
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Thank you, and have a groovy day!
Cathy
