The Moos Room™

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Emily: Welcome, everybody, to The Moos Room. It is the OG3 here. I feel like it's been a while since we had all three of us together, but very-
Dr. Joe: It does feel that way.
Emily: -exciting to be back on with Dr. Joe and with Bradley J Heins, PhD.
Bradley J Heins: Tenured professor.
Emily: I'm, of course, Emily, in case you forgot. No fancy titles or letters. Just Emily works. Anyways, so we are going to be finishing up our mental health series that we do for May, which is Mental Health Awareness Month. I will be completely honest with you guys. We did have a guest lined up for today, but unfortunately, they had an emergency come up and weren't able to join us. We'll hopefully get them on a future episode, so we decided we're going to wrap up May now with a little potpourri. It's been a while since we did a potpourri. We thought we would just sit and chat, and Joe and Brad are going to ask me questions, and hopefully try not to make me look too foolish today.
Dr. Joe: That's the idea. We'll see if we can get there eventually.
Emily: Bradley, oh, he just had a little smirk on his face. [laughs]
Bradley: Oh, you never know what's running through my mind. It's just-
Emily: Yes, that's-
Bradley: -spins and spins and spins.
Emily: -the scary part. [laughs]
Dr. Joe: All right. Well, I'll start because I thought about this earlier today. I think it's something maybe you've talked about on the podcast before already, but I wanted to rehash it because it's something that comes up all the time, at least for me, and once you're aware of it, you hear it more and more. It's using the words "crazy" or "insane" in a context of, not describing a person, but in more of a joking manner, and if that's really is okay is my question because we don't know everyone's history when it comes to their mental health.
It happened in a meeting the other day where someone was clearly the key person for something to happen moving forward, and was going to have to play the middle person and be the center of communication. It was just joked about, "Well, let's do this in a way that doesn't make that person go crazy." Is that okay, or is it not okay? What do we do with that?
Emily: In the specific example you gave, I personally would say that's okay because it was like, "Yes, what can we do to make sure we don't drive this person crazy with this?" Again, if it's something where maybe they've had a big project before, and it didn't go well or there was some sort of outburst, I would say that's probably not appropriate. Like you said, it's really hard because we don't know people's histories.
I would say a fair chunk of people are not going to be bothered by that kind of language, but there are a few that might be. It's that tricky place you find yourself in of, "Do I need to change my patterns based on this?" My general answer is yes. We want everybody to feel safe and protected and not judged. Again, we might say something and not be fully aware of someone's history, and may then, inadvertently, cause some harm in that way with our words.
If you're talking about somebody else and saying things like, "Oh, they're insane. They're a psychopath," that's a hard no for me, that's not super appropriate. Again, this is just Emily personally. In my experience and in conversations I've had with other people who work in mental health, we try to avoid that type of language, I think, especially on an individual-to-individual level. If you're in a group meeting, and it's like, "Oh, we're working on this project. Well, how can we support everybody so this person doesn't go crazy with it," that's one thing.
Being like, "Well, I don't know if we want Joe to do it because he got so crazy last time about it," you hear the difference there, where it's a little more generally versus aimed at someone. That's how I divide it. If it's being aimed at an individual, I don't find it appropriate to say crazy, insane, psycho, et cetera, but if it's the three of us are working on a group project, and we're like, "Yes, this is driving us crazy," that's another thing.
For any type of communication, it comes down to intention. Maybe we don't always realize our intentions might seem malicious to others, but again, for me, the barometer I use is, is it aimed at a general situation, or is it aimed at an individual?
Dr. Joe: That's good. We're in a day and age where word choice has become quite important to a lot of people, so just constantly checking and engaging where I sit on that because it is somewhat common vernacular in certain situations. I can say, "This is driving me nuts." In a certain context, that might be triggering to someone. I mean, that's fairly common language in a lot of situations. I just wanted to make sure that, for the most part, that's okay as long as it's in a general sense, and it's not directed specifically at someone.
Emily: Yes. No, good question.
Bradley: Okay, my turn.
Emily: Oh, boy.
Bradley: Scary, scary. Here's a good question that I've always wondered. We talk about people, I don't know how to say it, dealing with stress and all aspects of our life very differently, and how we should relate to people like that, or what are some ideas to think about when-- I don't know. Here's my example. People go, "Brad, I don't know how you do it. I don't know how you do it."
Emily: I say that personally to you, so yes, how do you do it?
Bradley: [chuckles] Exactly. How do you manage your job? You go home, you milk your cow, which I'm doing again, you milk another cow, you run to softball, baseball. I have students and all that stuff. They go, "I don't know how you do it. How do you manage it? How do you manage the stress?" Everybody can see my hair has definitely got grayer over the pandemic in the last three years.
Emily: [laughs] No comment.
Bradley: Exactly. [chuckles] Frankly, I don't really know how I do it. I wonder that myself sometimes. I probably internalize a lot more things than what most people do. Is it easy to recognize how people deal with stress, mental health differently? There's probably not a one-size-fits-all type thing for everybody. I don't know where I'm going, but that's my thought.
Emily: I am not 100% sure where you're going either, so I will give an answer, and if you're wanting something-
Bradley: That's normal.
Emily: -different, just tell me, and we'll regroup. [laughs] First thing I want to say, Bradley, I would say a lot of people get that, where people may comment like, "How do you do it all? How do you manage it all and not just be totally overcome with stress?" I know. I've been asked that. I, obviously, know you have, Brad. Joe, I'm sure you have as well. What you said, Brad, that really stuck out to me, is the thing I always hear people say when asked that question, "Honestly, I don't know."
That, I think, really speaks to just how it is different for every individual. We sometimes assume or think things like, "Oh, they make it look so easy. They must have no stress." Or even making comments like that, like, "Well, you must not be stressed. You have the perfect life." We're not going to fully go down this road today, but I think part of that is spurned by social media.
I think it's more in how we approach those questions, like the last question Joe asked. It's really about intention. When we go up to people and be like, "Your life is so perfect. How do you do it all," well, we're setting them up to, "We have you on this pedestal as perfect." Are they going to go, "No, my life is actually a disaster, and my house is a filthy mess," and blah, blah, blah?
I think it's more about approaching that conversation a little differently, like saying, "Wow, you do so much, and that must cause you stress. Is there one thing you do that you feel keeps you level-headed?" It's still the same conversation, it's just approaching it in a different way. I think, too, that is just a better way for us to open up communication with each other also.
It's recognizing that, yes, everybody is going to experience stress differently, and it's just approaching that conversation if that is going to be a conversation we want to have somebody a little bit differently, and not focusing so much on the like, "Wow, you're Superman. You're Wonder Woman. How do you do this?" and more on like, "Wow, you balance so much, and I bet that is a struggle at times. What advice do you have?"
Even just saying, "You balance a lot, and I bet that can be stressful," and just leaving it at that and see maybe that opens up a conversation for them to talk a little more about it, especially if they are somebody. I think we all have that friend or that colleague that just on the surface looks very perfect. I'm thinking of a friend of mine from college right now. I think people are aware when people think that about them, and so they try really hard to maintain that image.
Then what we are doing is actually supporting them in taking poor care of themselves instead of really stepping back from that and recognizing, as cheesy as it sounds, hey, they're human just like us. We all have a lot going on, and we all have stress, but we all want to appear to be fine or whatever it is. I think we just need to approach those conversations with a little more compassion and less focus on this high-performance perfection idea and focus more on, "You balance a lot of things, and I'm curious how you do that." Did that answer your question at all, Bradley? Is that at all what you were asking? [chuckles]
Bradley: Yes. In my roundabout confused way of, yes, definitely. I think it helps just to recognize that other people respond to things differently, and it's different for everybody else. We all have our lives outside of work, and how some of us can't leave work, work comes home with us and deals with it there too. I just think everybody has different situations, and we just don't know what's going on. That's the hard part about what's happening in everybody's lives from day to day that can trigger things or make you feel good or make you feel not so good.
Emily: Like I've said on this podcast many times before, too, it's like we all have our different thresholds. I will share a personal story, actually. This is with a friend and talking about being stressed, and they're stressed, and they're like, "Oh, at least you don't have kids." Just throwing this like, "I'm more stressed than you because of X, Y, and Z conditions."
That kind of thing is just like, friend, I know you're stressed, and your kids are a big cause of that, and you're very busy running around with them, but I'm also busy running around doing things and have commitments to things and people and all of that too. I think it's just recognizing that we may look at somebody and go, "Why is that stressing them out?" Because I've handled that and this and the other thing and been fine. Again, like I always say, it's not a contest.
There's no trophy for the person who is the most stressed. There's no trophy for the person who has suffered the most. We like to turn it into a contest for some reason. Don't get me wrong, I do the same thing. You should hear the three of us before we start recording. It's just some venting time. I do it too. I'm not saying I'm above all this, but just being mindful that it might not be stressful to us, whatever that situation is, but it's stressful to them.
That should be a good enough answer for us. We are all different, and we're all going to handle this differently and process it differently because we all have different baggage and background that we're bringing into things. It just really comes down to that mindfulness of this is another person and this person is not me, so they're not going to be just like me, and then being okay with that.
Dr. Joe: Okay, my turn.
Emily: Yay.
Dr. Joe: You said it a couple of times, actually, and I had it already written down in my questions here. You said mindfulness a couple of times. This last month during May, I've heard that term several times. I'm not quite sure what it means and if it means the same thing to every person who says it. I've heard it described in a lot of ways. Before I tell you what I think it means, let's hear from the expert on what is mindfulness.
Emily: All right. I'm not an expert, so people may argue with my definition, but it is based somewhat on the actual definition. When we think of mindfulness as a practice, what we're really talking about is technically a form of meditation in which what we're doing is drawing our mind completely onto ourselves. When we've talked about grounding exercises and stuff, that's a type of mindfulness because it's about bringing yourself back to the present.
You've heard me talk on the podcast before about doing a gut check or doing a quick body scan for how you're feeling. That's mindfulness. Really being aware of what you're feeling, what you're thinking, what you're experiencing, and putting that into practice. I have used the word mindful and mindfulness a little bit today too.
Thinking about just the words we use before we say something and being mindful. I shouldn't put a lot of pressure on this person because I know they're under stress and I maybe don't understand all of their stress, but I understand that they need patience. To me, that's really mindfulness is just being in tune with yourself and how you are showing up and how you are reacting to things.
This idea of practicing mindfulness is really about another phrase I say is like, just sitting with yourself. A great example of mindfulness. This happened to me earlier this week. This week was the anniversary of the passing of somebody that I knew in my life. I could feel actually the day before that anniversary, I just started to not feel very good just from a mood standpoint.
I was feeling blah, that's the best way I can say it. I was like, "Why am I feeling this way?" I actually went outside, and I just sat down outside, and just started thinking, "Why would I be feeling this way?" Then I landed on, I think it's this anniversary's coming up, and I just have some grief that I just need to experience for a little bit. I went on a 15-minute walk, and I cried the whole time. I got back from the walk, and I felt 100% better.
Afterwards, I had a conversation with myself, why do I think that worked? What was it? I landed on the conclusion of because I felt I needed to feel those feelings, and I let myself do that. Then my brain was ready to move on, but it wasn't going to get past that spot until I let myself feel that. I could have ignored it and just trudged on with my day and been grumpy because I couldn't figure out why I was feeling off, but I took the time to just ask myself, "What's going on? What do I think this is?" I was able to figure it out.
I know what works for me. It's grief. I needed to cry. I cried, and then I felt better because I just needed to feel those feelings. People may think that sounds silly, or that sounds almost too simple, feel your feelings, but you'd be surprised how often we don't let ourselves feel our feelings. I think that's a really big piece of mindfulness of just saying like, "I'm sad, and I need to feel that way, and I'm angry, and I just need to be angry for a few minutes," and still channeling that emotion in a positive way.
Maybe it's angry you need to take a walk to let off steam, whatever it may be. For me, that's how I think of mindfulness is really us being in tune to ourselves, and then that will allow us to show up better for others. How much do you want to argue with me on that one, Joe?
Dr. Joe: I think it matches what I see. Most of it that I've seen and related to this month has been mindfulness and what you talked about more of a meditation standpoint and being there. That's an appropriate label for it. I think it's a label for something that I think we all do and just don't know it, whether it's going for a walk or, for me, it's sometimes fishing or sitting in a tree stand where I'm alone, and I get a chance to just think. To me, that's a form of meditation, which fits with that word mindfulness.
Bradley: I agree. I just go outside some days. There's a little pasture out back. It's got a little creek that runs through it. I sometimes just go down there and sit and think and let my mind not worry about what's happening so I can sit in the pasture and, I don't know, watch the cows, watch whatever. It's very calming, and it helps relieve a lot of the stress of the day and makes things a lot better.
Emily: Those are all great ways to practice mindfulness. The thing I heard and what you guys are saying is these are things that you're maybe already doing, or it's already like, "Hey, Brad needs to walk a pasture." You can integrate mindfulness into the things you're already doing is just it's a matter of if you are doing something where you're walking or driving somewhere, then use that time to just check in with yourself and go, "Hey, how am I feeling? What's on my mind today?"
Those are all great ways to practice mindfulness. I think you guys are right on track with that. This is a potpourri episode. I'm aware it's getting long, but, Brad, do you have any other questions? Joe has gotten to do two. Otherwise, it looks like Joe might have another one.
Bradley: We'll let Joe go. He seems to be inspired today.
Emily: All right.
Dr. Joe: Just today. My next question is, and I think we've talked about this from the standpoint of the person who recognizes someone else who has a mental health issue, and we've told that person a lot of what they can do and how to help and what the resources available to them are. Now, from the opposite side, the person who's experiencing the mental health issue, what if you have someone who has all the best intentions in the world, wants to help you, even has advice that's backed up by evidence or whatever it is, but it just isn't helping?
How do you disengage with that person knowing that you need to find your own thing that's working for you? What do you do with a person who has all the best intentions and wants to help, but they're just not-- If you're the person in that situation, how do you handle that?
Emily: How do you do the thanks, but no thanks?
Dr. Joe: Yes, exactly.
Emily: Yes. I would recommend not just doing thanks, but no thanks. That is something as, again, just saying something very honest of just, "I can see you really want to help me, and I so appreciate that, and you've given me a lot of advice, but I'm finding some other things that are working a little better for me. I appreciate your help. If you want to hear about what I've been doing that's been working, I'd love to share with you."
Very much letting them down gently. Thank them because that's really important because we don't want them to feel discouraged from helping somebody in the future. Maybe in that situation, their advice will be useful. Thanking them and like, "I really appreciate that you're someone who cares about me and wants to help, and I want you to know that I am finding that help. Thank you." Saying it that way of like, "Yes, I am good, so you don't need to keep coming at me with advice."
Yes, again, it's just really about being mindful in how you phrase it. There's not a cookie cutter, here's what to say, but I think it's important to thank them for wanting to help and letting them know that you are okay or you are looking down different avenues for help. Maybe it is somebody who's a really good friend of yours and maybe them tried to help you has become a bit of a distraction to them that that's all they want to talk to you about.
Maybe you can say, "Hey, I found some other help. The thing that would be the most useful to me is if we can just go back to having our regular conversations about our days. I want to restore some of that normalcy again," things like that, that are like, I still value you as a person in my life, and I appreciate you want to help, and I'm getting that help, and then the best way you can help me now is by just being my friend again. No perfectly right way to approach it. I think, yes, it's, again, all about intention, and so just being honest, but you can be honest and not be hurtful.
Dr. Joe: Perfect. Yes, I feel like that situation happens more often than we think, and especially the last thing you said where it's like I need normalcy in my life where we're just friends, and we don't have to talk about that all the time, which I think applies to a lot of situations. There's a lot of people I think that get overwhelmed with people wanting to help, which is good, you need that at a certain time, but eventually, you need to get back to, hey, we're going to sit around and have a beer and BS and talk about whatever, and we don't have to talk about that at all. That's just as helpful at times as well.
Emily: All right. Any more questions, you guys, or let's wrap up this potpourri, close out our mental health series. Thank you, oh, as always for listening, but especially to this series, I think you all know it's very near and dear to me. With that, if you have any questions, comments, or scathing rebuttals about today's episode, you can email those to themoosroom@umn.edu. That's T-H-E-M-O-O-S-R-O-O-M@umn.edu. You can also call and leave us a voicemail at 612-624-3610. Again, that's 612-624-3610. Find us on the web extension.umn.edu. Find us on Twitter @umnmoosroom, @UMNFarmSafety, and find Bradley on Instagram @umnwcrocdairy. That is a wrap. Bye.
Dr. Joe: Bye.
Bradley: Bye.
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