[00:00:01] Speaker A: In this episode, I'm thrilled to welcome health and community psychologist, mindset coach, author and media commentator, Dr. Marnie Lishman. Marnie is a nationally recognised mental health expert with years of experience. Having run a successful private practice in Western Australia, she's worked with organisations, schools and individuals, helping them to build resilience and psychological flexibility in today's fast paced world. As a regular commentator On Today, Extra, Sunrise 9 News Perth and a columnist for Body and Soul, Marnie's advice is trusted by thousands.
She's also the author of Burnout to Brilliant and Crisis to Contentment, two books I love and highly recommend.
My name is John Littlefair and welcome to this very special episode of Never Just a Dog.
It's so great to have you join me Marnie.
[00:01:11] Speaker B: Thanks for having me.
[00:01:12] Speaker A: Also, thank you for sending me your new book too.
[00:01:15] Speaker B: No worries, no worries. You're. Yeah, not many people have read it yet, so I'm interested to hear what you thought.
[00:01:21] Speaker A: I love both your books, Burnout to Brilliant and Crisis to Contentment and I want to chat about them both. But firstly, I'd love to hear about your early inspiration to become a psychologist.
[00:01:34] Speaker B: Oh, going back a while. Going back a while. Do you know what? I did not have an intent to be a psychologist.
Consciously, consciously I wanted to be a lawyer.
I did my schooling and whatnot and I was, yeah, wanting to be a lawyer. I wanted to wear those power suits and that's the direction I was going to go in. But I think unconsciously something else was happening and was steering me in a direction of helping people. And yeah, here we are, fast forward X amount of years and I am doing that. And I think when psychologists talk as adults we often kind of go, why did we do this? You know, what's this all about? What brought me here? And I think sometimes you can go deep down into your childhood and go, oh, was I just by default helping a parent or someone in my life and have always done that and that became the blueprint in which I operate and now that's what I do as an adult without thought. So that's what I'm saying, consciously I'm, you know, la law inspired, kind of be in the courtroom in a power suit. But unconsciously now I've, yeah, high empathy, you know, of course I'm going to be helping other people because that's what I've always been doing.
[00:02:51] Speaker A: So you had your own clinic for quite a few years?
[00:02:54] Speaker B: Yeah, for over a decade I had a private practice. So yeah, I worked with long lists of clients and learned so much from these clients as you do when you hear those vulnerable stories, most of which you can never hear or read about in a textbook.
This is real people and their stories. And yeah, what I found after working over a decade in private practice is there are so many people out there who probably won't go and see a psychologist for a variety of reasons, whether it's financial or just access or stigma. There's still a big stigma, isn't there, attached to mental health issues. I felt I need to bring this information that I give to people sitting in my room and take it out of the therapy room and start running workshops and seminars and writing books and working in the media.
[00:03:43] Speaker A: And speaking of writing books, I love your new book, Crisis to Contentment. And I learned so much. And there's quite a few tweaks I have to make in my life, especially as it's aimed, I believe, more in people in midlife. Is that correct?
[00:03:56] Speaker B: Yes, yes. Which is quite broad, isn't it, really? Because, you know, someone at 35 could think they're in midlife, but then someone in 70 is like, don't be calling me elderly yet. I'm still in the mid. I'm still midd aged. So, yeah, I can cover like a good 30 years there, can't I really?
[00:04:14] Speaker A: And your book, Burnout to Berlin, I found it amazing.
[00:04:18] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I. I really feel, and I'm sure a lot of psychologists out there would think the same, is that we're seeing burnout more than ever. I think people are just absolutely exhausted. Probably got a bit of pandemic fatigue as well, but just there's so much going on in the world, isn't there? And I think a lot of us are absorbing that. So collective kind of exhaustion from what's going on. But also individually, I think a lot of us have got stuff going on. So you put that all together, and I think a lot of us are mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually completely zonked right now.
And this is the beautiful thing about getting burnt out, is that it makes you start thinking about what's working, what's not. You know, I didn't feel like this five years ago, what's going on. And then you can kind of start looking at the context of your life and your behaviors within that and then start thinking, oh, maybe I need to do some things differently. And all the things that we're doing in our spare time, anything but rest and relaxation and all of that. A lot of us are just filling our time with stuff and being at the beck and call of our devices that we're not having those moments of stopping and recharging at all these days.
[00:05:31] Speaker A: Another element to your books, they have these sprinklings of humor throughout which make them so enjoyable to read.
[00:05:38] Speaker B: Oh, am I funny?
[00:05:39] Speaker A: You are very funny. The best. So the best bit, and it reminded me of my childhood was when you went to the beach with your family and you could have floated to the next suburb.
[00:05:49] Speaker B: Do you remember those days?
[00:05:51] Speaker A: I, well, well I do, but I grew up in a farm. We didn't have a beach, but we had a dam that we'd play in and, and also if it wasn't the dam. So we'd be up the bush, which is close by us, myself and my two brothers, we would disappear for hours up there. Mum and dad wouldn't know what we were doing. And we were building a BMX track downhill with this massive quad jump. Yeah, we'd come back injured and you know, but in time for dinner.
[00:06:15] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, we'd do all of that. It was fun, wasn't it, back a few decades ago where your parents didn't know where you were and you were just mucking around and with no, almost no outcome. Like you weren't doing it because you needed to do it for a reason. You just did it like you were digging holes and making traps and making, you know, BMX tracks and not really thinking much about it.
[00:06:37] Speaker A: And isn't that the thing that ply. Where did that happen?
[00:06:40] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. So if our kids aren't doing it these days, how are us adults going to be thinking about doing it?
And you know, like every baby animal plays you look at, even a rhinoceros. A baby rhinoceros in the zoo is still doing zoomies around. So yeah, you know, and the same with children and dogs, you know, we all engage in play and it's for a reason. So play is, you know, it's, it's often funny. It's there for not any apparent reason. There's no, you know, kind of definite outcome from play. It's spontaneous. Anything could happen when we play. So if you think of being playful as an activity, is it. It's preparing us for a world that keeps changing. It actually helps you build an adaptive mindset. So being playful, being silly, having fun for no other reason but just because is powerful.
[00:07:40] Speaker A: Play is one of the key reasons. We love dogs because they know how to play. They are the absolute geniuses of play.
[00:07:49] Speaker B: They certainly are. They're like having a four year old child around all the time. No matter what age your dog is, it's like a kid. You're mindfully in the moment. Aren't you totally engaged in the now, physically and psychologically when you're mucking around with your dog.
[00:08:03] Speaker A: Tell me about your dog, Chilli. Tell me how Chilli came into your life.
[00:08:06] Speaker B: Oh, Chilli, my baby. Yeah, she's beautiful. So chilli is my 6 year old husky Cross. And she. I spend more time with her than anybody else on earth because she's always with me. And now because I work from home predominantly, that's my base and I kind of shoot off from there to different organizations and things. But my, my home is where my workplace is and there's Chile. So I've always had dogs. I've always had lots of animals. And yeah, Chili's my current. And hopefully long. She'll live a long time. But yeah, I've always had dogs. I've always loved dogs. They've always been a part of my life.
[00:08:46] Speaker A: And yeah, Chili's the one, the special one.
[00:08:48] Speaker B: Yeah, she's probably the special one because I've. Yeah, she's just by my side all the time. Whereas in other years I might have had two dogs at once. You know, when you have two dogs at once, they kind of bond with each other more. Whereas Chili's by my side all the time and you know, the cats don't cut it for her. It's.
[00:09:04] Speaker A: I was going to ask you about your cats. Did you lose one recently?
[00:09:08] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I've lost a couple, yeah. During the pandemic. A 20 year old, my 20 year old Mowgli and Freud, who I spent thousands of thousands of dollars saving from a tuba and he still passed away, so that killed me.
And. But then recently I've rescued two litter buddies. So I've got my boys now.
[00:09:31] Speaker A: Do they get on well with Chilli or they. You have to keep them separate quarters?
[00:09:34] Speaker B: No, no, they all get along.
[00:09:36] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:09:36] Speaker B: Yeah. Yep.
[00:09:38] Speaker A: And do the cats sleep on the bed or does Chilli sleep on the bed?
[00:09:41] Speaker B: Everyone does whatever they want.
[00:09:42] Speaker A: Do they? That's a good plan.
That's how I used to roll with George and Monty. Ye, go for it.
[00:09:50] Speaker B: Just, yeah, live the life that you want. Yeah. No, Chilli probably rules the school. Yeah. So wherever the cats have to kind of work around what Chili wants, but she's usually literally top dog. She's on the bed, does whatever she wants.
[00:10:03] Speaker A: You obviously a big lover of nature. So tell me about that.
[00:10:09] Speaker B: Yes. You know, us human beings are wired to be outside, aren't we, we're actually not supposed to be coot.
You know, when I'm talking to clients and this, this happens a lot is sometimes you just got to strip back what's happening to the basics, don't you? And think from an evolutionary point of view. What were our ancestors doing? They were outside, they were getting some sunlight, they were moving their body, they were out in nature, they weren't sitting inside all day, were they? Without any sort of greenery or blue scenery around them.
If you look at the research that backs up nature and the benefits for the human psyche, it's massive.
There's so much research on blue spaces and green spaces, isn't it like just in terms of. On the impact it has on psychological well being. So I think anything where you're in an immersive experience in the wilderness, whatever you're doing, whether you're swimming or walking, you're getting both benefits, aren't you? And the thing about just being out and also swimming. And I talk a lot about that in my burnout book. I think it pulled me, water was pulling me. The particular year that I wrote burnout because I was so exhausted and I had some people in my life had passed away. There was so much emotions bottled within me for a long period of time. But then I was so busy, I had so much work on. So I just, it was calling me. I just needed to be at the beach or somewhere even green just because I felt like I needed to be soothed. And by doing that I felt better. Yeah. So a lot of people are exploring, just being totally immersed in nature to actually help them. They're trying to remove themselves from cities and the built up areas.
[00:12:02] Speaker A: Walking's your thing.
[00:12:04] Speaker B: I walk a lot, yeah. I do a lot of walking. Yeah. Do swimming and I. I've got a reformer Pilates machine in my house.
[00:12:13] Speaker A: Have you used it or is it sitting in it? Has it got like clothes or whatever?
[00:12:18] Speaker B: No, it's got its own special room. I was doing Pilates a lot and I absolutely loved it. And then I hurt myself and then as you do, you kind of stop doing things. And so my New Year's resolution is to get back on that reformer and do the hard stuff. Because I still do the easy stuff on my reformer, like the stretching, but I'm not doing the hardcore stuff. And it was just so. It's so good for you and I really miss that feeling.
[00:12:44] Speaker A: So there was something that stood out in your crisis book, the link between hobbies and mental health.
[00:12:52] Speaker B: And it's such a funny Word, hobby. And even when I was working with clients a lot and I'd mention the word and they just roll their eyes. So I work a lot with, like, very busy professionals, you know, often leaders of companies and things like that. And they'll be like, what? Like, as if I've got to like. And it's a silly word. So I'd be like, trying to think of extracurricular activities or, what do you do just for fun and. Or what do you love doing? And so many adults don't know how to answer that.
So I will say to them, okay, let's have a think about your childhood. What did you do back when you were in primary school or high school that you did just because of. You just did it.
[00:13:31] Speaker A: You.
[00:13:31] Speaker B: Just because it was good, it was fun, it was enjoyable. And, yeah, so they have to almost skip decades of having no fun, no play to tap into that. But, yeah, it's quite interesting. But. And I think. I can't remember which book. I talk about this, that we kind of finish our teenage years, don't we? And then we. We kind of just jump into this socially defined pathway of working and paying bills and being serious. And we might have a family or, you know, whatever we end up doing, but often we're just doing it unconsciously. And these things that we love doing actually just dropped off and we didn't even think about it. There was a point where we last did something that we loved and we never looked back.
My daughter plays basketball, so she spends a lot of time training. And I often go, you know, I'll go and watch her games and think, oh, my gosh, why didn't I continue?
[00:14:25] Speaker A: Were you a basketballer?
[00:14:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I was a basketballer, but I stopped when I was about 16 or something because I just started working, going to uni and things like that. So there was a moment that the thing that I love doing, I just. That was my last game. But I never remember thinking too hard about it. I just stopped doing it and just got busy doing other stuff. And now I look back going, oh, my gosh, I would love to get back into basketball. And often when I'm working with people who are kind of riddled with anxiety or they're burnt out or they're depressed or they're going through some sort of adversity of some sort, I'll get them to think about what they love doing. And it's amazing when they start thinking about how much they miss those things, because I think we get conditioned quite early. You know how I said we kind of jump on this socially prescribed pathway where we're supposed to be earning income and we're supposed to have a house or whatever. All this adulting stuff that we're supposed to do, it's all these things that we love to do that had no apparent outcome, just drop off. But I think it's almost like we, because there's nothing comes, nothing tangible comes from these activities. Like we don't get a wage. But yeah, if you think about it, we get everything from that. We get enjoyment, we get, you know, psychological well being, we get mindfulness. There's, there's, you know, just. There's so many other feelings we get from engaging in these activities. A lot of them are. There's a camaraderie with the people around you when you're doing them. So you're actually dropping off all those sorts of things because you're doing your adulting stuff.
There's a big pushback. So over the last few years, there's. There's been this hustle culture. So everyone's busy, busy, busy. But it's push, push, push for work. You know, like it's just been full on. And this year, funnily enough, we've been talking about burnout is people are like, I've had enough of that. I'm sick of the hustle culture. And this is the thing is that when we're just push, push, pushing for life, you're missing out on just stopping and listening and leaving room for opportunities to come in. Because you're trying to create and you're trying to make things happen. But maybe sometimes you need to stop and listen to what, you know, the universe or whatever is whispering to you to tell you what to do next. And I am a big believer in that. He's carving out time in your day just to do nothing and just stop.
You become more in alignment that way. So sometimes someone else is telling you or the universe is telling you what you actually need, but you're thinking in a different way in your mind and trying to create what you think you need, but it might be wrong. And this is what I write about in both books. And probably if I write more books in the future, it's always there's an adversity or a challenge that we go through. You know, whether it's burnout, whether it's mid, a midlife crisis, whether it's or pandemic or whatever the challenge is. And then if you kind of sit in the challenge in the uncomfortable emotions rather than just, you know, drinking them away or being in denial. If you sit in it and hold space for it, ideas come.
So my take on burnout is any of those perceived negative emotions. We're not calling our emotions negative at all, but the ones that society tells us to kind of keep to ourselves. You know, whether it's sadness, whether it's anger or fear or whatever it is, instead of feeling that and tapping into the information it's giving us, we just sweep it under the rug or we work our butts off and pretend that we're not feeling like that, or whatever advice that we reach for to dumb it down. So my take is we can get burnout from not tapping into those emotions and not working through them and learning the lessons from them and applying our life going forward.
I think a lot of us are just moving through them too quickly.
Challenges give us so much valuable information about ourselves, and we've got to tap into it a little bit. And it's amazing when you do, ideas come to you about what you're going to do next.
[00:18:40] Speaker A: You write about this in both of your books, and that is the importance of sleep.
[00:18:46] Speaker B: Yes. So common now for people to have sleeping disorders or be medicated for sleeping issues or just spending the day angry because they haven't had a good sleep. It's really problematic in society, and I think it's exacerbated just by the device usage.
[00:19:03] Speaker A: Now, something that you mentioned about, is it backlit light? The backlit light, that was really interesting.
[00:19:09] Speaker B: Well, that's. But, but you think if, like this is most people and I, and I talk to my clients about this all the time, is that, you know, people go to bed when they're tired. Right. So we've got like, there's cues, isn't there, for when we're ready for bed. And then instead of just going to bed, we pick up our phone and we scroll on it for another half an hour, hour or whatever, or we might get our laptop out and start streaming something. And then inevitably they always those watching a TV series that ends on a cliffhanger and we have to keep going. Yeah. So if you're doing that every night for say like an hour or two, you're losing over a night's sleep per week.
[00:19:55] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:19:56] Speaker B: Isn't it like if you do that for an hour, that's seven hours across the way. That's a whole night's sleep you're missing. So a lot of society is actually in sleep debt. And the magic happens to our brain when we're sleeping. And if you're not Getting enough sleep, you're not resetting, you're not rejuvenating, you're not recharging, you're not relaxing, your brain's not getting rid of all the waste. You know, that's where it's all marching out, all the, all the waste in the night. So can you imagine what people's brains are like over a course of a few months?
[00:20:27] Speaker A: What do you recommend instead? Is reading a book conducive to helping to get into that sleep mode?
[00:20:33] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Because often our phones, there's light that's coming through. Whereas I often say to people, obviously, put your boundaries in place, put your mobile in another room and create a healthy ritual before you go to bed. And one of which is having your light behind you so you can have a lamp behind you, not in front of your face, and just read in a low lit environment.
So an hour before bed, have all your lights off, like your ceiling lights. And yeah, just lie down, read and then have your lamp behind you.
Because when you. The sleep hormone melatonin needs to actually be released for sleep onset. And if it's still light, it's mimicking daylight, isn't it? And even in the day, a lot of us spend, we're indoors a lot, aren't we, with lights on. And then at night we go home and there's lights on. So if you tap into what our ancestors were doing, when the sun goes down, the melatonin starts increasing, that brings on sleep. So everyone hides away to sleep. Then that's when you reset, relax, rejuvenate, ready for what you've got to do the next day.
[00:21:46] Speaker A: What do you know about dreams?
[00:21:49] Speaker B: There's so many different theories around dreams and one of which is it's not the actual thing, it's actually the meaning or the feeling that you've got around the thing. Is there something on your life that's getting that feeling of or thinking about Other times it's just your brain's just randomly firing.
Dreams are interesting, but the scary thing is a lot of people aren't getting the dreams that they actually need because they're not actually getting into the deeper sleep cycles because it's getting so interrupted their sleep. Yeah, it actually cuts off the deeper, the most powerful parts of sleep where all the magic happens. Like your dreams and your memory consolidation. All of that is getting missed out on lots of people because they're going to bed so late. And then still, because society tells us we still have to get up early, they're missing out on that rich sleep the kind of the restful sleep that needs. That the brain actually needs you missing out on that bit.
[00:22:52] Speaker A: That's interesting. You're an early sleeper. Are you pretty strict with your sleeping patterns?
[00:22:57] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a big reader at night so I read at night but I get up really early.
[00:23:03] Speaker A: That sets your day up. Plus it keeps you healthy.
[00:23:06] Speaker B: And we're made to move. We're supposed to move. Yeah.
[00:23:10] Speaker A: We're sitting in chairs now but after this we're going on a 10k run.
[00:23:13] Speaker B: Are you ready?
[00:23:14] Speaker A: I started running recently again, not just in small patches. Yeah, that's one thing I miss.
[00:23:19] Speaker B: Running, running. Yeah.
[00:23:21] Speaker A: Need to be careful. You don't want to get injured.
[00:23:22] Speaker B: Well yeah, you don't want to be tripped up. We become fools wrists as we're middle.
[00:23:27] Speaker A: Aged just fall over for no reason.
Yeah, I know the only reason I fall over is because I'm clumsy.
What would you be doing if not. If you weren't a psychologist?
[00:23:42] Speaker B: Oh, I don't know. You know I've thought about this before and I never come to.
I often think it would probably be with animals but then I think I'd get too attached so I'm not sure I would have. Something would have broke my heart along the way there. So I probably would have cut that off. You know, whether I became a vet or something. I don't think I would have emotionally coped very well.
So it probably not that but that, you know, when you, if someone was to kind of analyze me a little bit and go, you know, what's in your flow? It would be working with animals. But I don't think my heart could cope with that. So I think it'd probably be create something creative that I stopped doing a long time ago because I was very creative and stopped because I just became more on academic. I've got a rescue bird that I saved so I got my bird.
So yeah, and I donate and I do what I can and I probably as I get older probably will steer in the direction of you know, volunteering at charities and things that that's probably where I will go. Or having more pets, you know, moving somewhere and having. Saving more animals or having 100 cats I probably will. Do you know how good that sounds to me?
[00:24:54] Speaker A: Probably pretty good. I know it's in your book. That's why I'm asking. Move into the bush and have a hundred cats.
[00:24:59] Speaker B: I'll just, I'll just be quite happy, quite content having animals all around me in peace. So that's. Yeah, that's what I aspire to be, but other than that, I'd be doing creative work. I think I'd like to, you know, tap into doing art again or something like that.
[00:25:16] Speaker A: Did you used to do art before?
[00:25:17] Speaker B: I did, yeah. But I stopped, kind of as we do. As we do, yeah. And again, it's something that I'm seeing my daughter do, you know, like, I can see my kids doing things because I'm trying to steer them in a direction of things that I love doing, and watching that society doesn't steer them in another direction. I keep kind of bringing them back and going, I notice how you love doing this. Why don't you do more of that? You know, don't do what school's telling you to do.
And I talk about this in the crisis book because, you know how we were talking about feeling certain emotions as you get older, and that's what I've been doing is. And I'm noticing it in my clients as well, is like tapping into that and going, what's it telling you? Because there's things in your life in the past that you can bring into the future with you, and there's things that about you that have been laying dormant for such a long time. You know, we might be totally halfway through our life or have even less time.
What, like, you only got one life. Like, what can you bring?
What's whispering to you that you love doing or that you. Miss. Miss. Or what are you nostalgic about in the past that you need to do again? Like, bring it in now? Because we don't know how much time we've got left.
[00:26:27] Speaker A: True.
[00:26:28] Speaker B: So use that angst. Do something about it.
[00:26:32] Speaker A: This is a statement from one of your books. And also then there's a question I have for you. So it's the Serenity Prayer. Yeah. Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
[00:26:50] Speaker B: That's amazing. It is, isn't it? I think that resonates with lots of people, doesn't it?
[00:26:55] Speaker A: Definitely resonate.
[00:26:56] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:26:56] Speaker A: It'll resonate with my friends and hopefully the audience.
But to go on from that, do you now have the wisdom to not go shopping on a Saturday?
[00:27:08] Speaker B: Yes, I do.
I hate it.
[00:27:14] Speaker A: If anyone's wondering about Marnie's Laughing now, it's in her latest book. It's really helped me personally, so I'm sure there's someone else out there that's going to really help as well.
[00:27:24] Speaker B: Yes, yes. I think I hope it will. You know, I think my stories of yeah, being a grumpy middle aged woman and pushing myself through it, I think.
[00:27:33] Speaker A: It will resonate without a doubt. Thanks so much for joining me today.
[00:27:37] Speaker B: Thank you for having me.
[00:27:39] Speaker A: If you're looking to dive deeper into Marnie's work, I'll be posting links in the show Notes where you can purchase her books Burnout to Brilliant and Crisis to Contentment. Both of these books are filled with practical strategies and personal insights that can help you navigate challenges, increase your well being, and bring more contentment into your life. Something we could all use a little bit more of these days. Simply scroll down in your podcast app to find the links.
You can also contact me directly via email. My address is
[email protected] thanks again for tuning in to this very special episode of Never Just a Dog.