S5 E9: Featuring Dr. Gary Sprouse

Tracie Edwards: All right, we may be going without the the fancy equipment today. Gary Sprouse: Okay, now I can still hear you. Yay. Tracie Edwards: Darn it. No need for me to use the headphones. Gary Sprouse: Get to the now, right? Yeah. Tracie Edwards: So, I have um for quite a long time now been dealing with uh and it must have to do with my Dell machine and the different recording platforms and and such because my audio equipment fluctuates. I've swapped out equipment and all the all the stuff and maybe it's a time to figure out a better platform or something. So, sorry about that. Gary Sprouse: Hey, we'll just get around it. It'll be all right. We'll figure it out. Tracie Edwards: Yeah. Gary Sprouse: Anyway, you're right. Because I've been done a different number of different podcasts that all use different platforms and it's like times it works, sometimes it doesn't. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: It's like, yeah, we had I mean more the video seems to been okay. 00:03:42 Tracie Edwards: Yeah. Well, uh, it's the audio. Gary Sprouse: It's been more the audio that's been the issue. Tracie Edwards: Yeah, I you would think. Gary Sprouse: Yeah, I don't know why that seems like it should be the easy one, not the hard one. But Tracie Edwards: Well, let me come over here to my uh intro and uh we will jump right on in. Hello everyone and welcome to Traceability podcast. I am your host Tracie Edwards. What if the stress you feel about career change could actually become the fuel that moves you toward your happiest, most fulfilling path? That is what we'll be unpacking today with Dr. Gary Sprouse. My guest today is Dr. Gary Sprouse. He is the author of Highway to Your Happy Place and co-author of Mindset Matters with Jack Canfield. Dr. Sprouse is passionate about helping people navigate change with resilience, reduce stress, and use mindset as a tool for success. He works with professionals at all stages of their careers to turn challenges into opportunities and find more fulfillment in both work and life. 00:05:04 Tracie Edwards: Dr. Gary Sprouse, thank you for joining me today. Gary Sprouse: Chase, thank you for having me on here. I'm super excited. I'm here to help your audience live their life a better way. Yay. Tracie Edwards: Yay indeed. Uh we are all looking for um options and strategies to help us uh live our life more happily. Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Tracie Edwards: So, as we jump right on in, uh, your new book, Highway to Your Happy Place, and also in your work with Jack Canfield, um, they both emphasize positivity and resilience. So, what first drew you to focus on mindset and happiness as a career success factor? Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Wow. So, as a physician, right, I just got to retire. So, I'm really familiar with this whole point point of transitioning from being one career to retirement for my wife and myself, right? And we had very different paths. So, I have a lot of experience in this one right now. But as a doctor, I had all these patients that would come in and I was treating their high blood pressure and their diabetes. 00:06:09 Gary Sprouse: But as a primary care doctor, I got to hear about their stresses too, their divorces and their kids and their work life and and I started realizing that their stresses were affecting their physical things, their high blood pressure, their diabetes. And so I was like, you know what, I have to become more than just a regular primary care doctor. I have to become more of a holistic doctor and start incorporating some of these strategies to help people have less stress. And so my big insight that I brought to this field because when I started reading books on stress, they talked about ranking stresses like the big stresses like you lose your spouse and you lose your job and you know and they would go down the list and then they would give you generic prescriptions like hey well exercise or meditate or go to church and I was like yeah there's something missing here. And so I started looking at as a physician going, "Hey, when I give somebody a medication for their diabetes, what I say to them is like this is a great medicine for your diabetes, but it might have a few side effects. 00:07:09 Gary Sprouse: So we'll minimize the side effects and maximize the benefits." So when I took that idea and took it to humans and our stresses, here's what I came up with is that the majority of human stress is a side effect to our skills. You're like, "Wait, what does that mean?" So we have the ability to envision the future. What? What an incredible skill. But the side effect is then we have to worry about it. So my one-year-old grandson, he doesn't have that skill yet. He hasn't figured out how to envision the future yet. So he doesn't sit at the breakfast table eating his banana going, "Dad, how are we going to pay for college?" Like it doesn't come out. So he's because he doesn't have future. He doesn't have worry. He literally can't worry. And so he's doing what psychologists tell us to do, which is live for today. and you're like, well, it's a nice thought, but it doesn't work very well because we spend way too much time in the future and it's one of our greatest skills. 00:08:01 Gary Sprouse: So that excuse me. So the idea of the book is then how to keep our skills and get rid of the side effects. Tracie Edwards: I love that because uh I think uh as we get older and as we see what's going on in the world, we understand that there really is a holistic side to um approaching life. um both from mindset from physical um capabilities, emotional, mental capabilities and that kind of thing. So I very much agree that it all seems to be tied together into into one holistic um person. Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Well, you know, you know, it's interesting because I've talked to a number of psychologists now and as a primary care doctor, I have a very different approach because of primary care, right? So, I would have 15 minutes and I'm here going, "Hey, here's your blood pressure. Here's what you're gonna do about it." So, what I've realized as as I've moved more into the psychological world, more mental stuff, I'm taking that same approach. I'm like, "Okay, here's your problem and here's what we're going to do to fix it, right? Whether 00:09:10 Gary Sprouse: that's good or not, we'll find out, right?" But it's like, it's a very different approach than some of the psychologists are trained to sit back and let you figure it out yourself. And I'm like, well, that's a nice thought, but that's not very efficient. Like, you've spent years training, they haven't, and you're like letting them figure it out. like and I get that they do better when they figure it out on their own, but that takes it takes longer than than I would like. So, Tracie Edwards: Yeah. So um for our listeners particularly of our podcast um most of them are uh technology professionals. They've been in their career for a number of years. Um the world today is uh very volatile and a lot of that is being felt in the career space. So they are facing career transitions, challenges with um hiring and and that kind of thing. So why is um to your thinking, why is mindset so critical when approaching career change? Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Wow. So to me the reason I got involved with Jack was because mindset is is how we come with up our perceptions. 00:10:28 Gary Sprouse: And so perceptions are when somebody says perceptions are reality. That is true because that is our reality. And so one of the things that came out of my work was this model of how a brain kind of processes information. And so we have things come into us, lights and sounds and ideas, and they filter. And in our brain, and it's not an anatomical thing, but in our brain, there's a thing I call the perspective prism. And in that prism is our facts and our beliefs and our self-esteem and you know where we're at, like are we awake? Are we asleep? Are we all those things are in this prism and so the information comes in and filters through that prism and it comes out as a perception. The perception is then what drives our emotions and our reactions. So when you understand what's in your perspective prism, now you can start understanding where your perceptions come from. So I use this as an example. I'm sitting in my room with a patient and my nurse walks in with a big giant needle. 00:11:25 Gary Sprouse: So my patient sees the same thing that I see, a nurse with a big giant needle, but our perceptions are very different because in her prism she's like, "Oh, I've seen needles before and when they come in the room that means they're meant for me and that hurts." So her perception is this is going to be a painful experience and so her emotion is fear and then she starts pulling back into the corner. My prism is like wait my nurse is in the wrong room she shouldn't be here and so like so my perception is right wrong room like get out of here because I'm getting angry because she's making my patient nervous. So I'm like get out of here. So we saw the same thing but our perceptions were totally different and therefore our reactions were different and therefore what we did was different. And so what I realize is when you understand what's in your prism, then you can start affecting what's making me nervous about changing jobs. What's right, you can start looking and going. 00:12:16 Gary Sprouse: So if in your prism is like, well, I'm not very confident. I can't really do things very well. Then changing jobs is going to be really big deal to you. If you go, oh, you know what? Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: I've had five other jobs in my life, so what's the six going to do? Then then your perception is going to be this is easy and I can do it. So mindset and to me that means your pers perspective prism is critical to how we've handled the changes in our life. Tracie Edwards: Well, and I think uh one of my main take takeaways for several years now has been sort of the preparation for career change. And I think that is um even more of a factor in this day and age. um people are no longer or very rarely staying in a in a particular role for 30 40 years kind of thing. And um so I I feel like um there's either a preparation or a lack of preparation. And so maybe what might be some of the most common stressors that people experience when they're going through a transition like that, whether prepared or unprepared 00:13:25 Gary Sprouse: Yeah. So, yeah. So, here's what I So, there was a couple books that I'd read and they said that the average person has seven different jobs, careers in their life. And I'm looking at my wife who's had at least that many, right? She's been here. I mean, so for me, I've been in this weird place where I've been a doctor most of my working career, but my wife has been like in telecommunications and she was in selling wiring and she was a telemarket. She did not telemarket, she did um fundraising for a nonprofit and so she's done like like all over different kinds of things, right? The average person has seven. And here's the key. This is an important fact. What it turns out that if you change professions within two years you're as good as anybody else in the field. You're like what? So because most people one of their fears is like oh I'm going to be behind the eight ball. I'm going to I'm not going to know as much as everybody else and I'm going to be look stupid. 00:14:25 Gary Sprouse: And you're like no within two years you're up to where everybody else is. And you're like so if you knew that going in gone, hey I'm going to take this new job and within two years I'm going to be as good as anybody else in the field. Well, that takes a whole lot of fear out of the situation, which then allows you to go, you know, I'm not liking where I'm at now, so I'm going to try this new thing, and within a couple years, I'm going to be up where everybody else is. All right, let's do it. Right. Tracie Edwards: Yeah, I think um a lot of that fear arises from uncertainty and uh that stress can affect us both in our professional performance and in our personal well-being. Um, what may be some signs that that's what what's going on as we're um uh dealing with uh change and and what may be a sign that uh maybe they're worried about uncertainty and such Gary Sprouse: So you just hit the right word when you talk about uncertainty really what you're saying is people are worried and worry is and so here's what you have to define worry because what I found was and I I had patients come to me say Dr. Sprowse. 00:15:35 Gary Sprouse: I worry that I worry too much. And I go, well, then you probably do, right? And I'm like, so tell me what worry is. And they were like, well, it's it's I don't And what you realized was that it's actually hard to define for them. And I'm like, if you don't have a definition, how can you possibly fix it, right? So, what I did was I came up with these very concrete definitions. So worry to me is I have this incredible skill of envisioning the future, but then I focus on all the bad things that can happen and then I have this physiological fear reaction right now. Gary Sprouse: And it could be a minor anxiety or it could be a full-blown panic attack, right? But I'm having this fear reaction to an idea, to a concept, to a what if. And like it doesn't exist in reality. it does in my head because the future is so real to humans that it's actually part of our environment. 00:16:32 Gary Sprouse: And so what happens then is you're looking for all the dangerous things that can happen in your environment, but now you're reacting to it. And so you wake up at 2 o'clock in the morning, your heart's beating fast and you're sweating. You're like, "Ah, when I go to that new job, what am I going to do if this, right? What if this?" So you what if yourself and you start getting yourself into trouble. So what I tell people is look, I don't want you to stop worrying. I want you to be able to pay attention that there could be some bad things that could happen, but I don't want you to have the fear reaction. So the answer then is to plan, but without fear. And there's two big tools that I use. One is called realistic optimism. So we have choice. Yay. So we can choose to not focus. We can Okay. So people tend to focus on the negative things and they I would say to p this is my f tell me some things that could go wrong and they go and they're like writing 10 things like right away. 00:17:28 Gary Sprouse: I go tell me some things that could go right and they're like well uh right and I'm like stop right at least give it equal right. So write down the things I can go right so that you can really start choosing to go you know what instead of focusing on the bad things I'm going to focus on the good things but the realism part Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Mhm. Gary Sprouse: is I can't ignore that bad things are going to happen because that gets you in just as much trouble. So like when I was writing my book I was like well I'm going to focus on it's going to be great and everybody's going to love it and you know I'm going to be o Oprah and then she retired and I was like oh man. And so now I had to find somebody else to be on their show. But it's like but I was realistic and go look I know that the majority authors do not make a living out of their books. And so I had to keep my job as a doctor till I was able to retire. 00:18:13 Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And then I was able to then spend more time on focus on the book. So to be realistic then I developed a second tool called a worry organizer. And the worry organizer entails writing things down, which it turns out that when people write things down, it does a whole bunch of good things. It does take more effort. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: So, a lot of people don't like doing it. But once you do it, it's done. Like, you only have to do it once. You don't have to go over your head over and over and over and over and over and over and over again because it's done. And it's organized. So, now it's like, what am I worried about? Why am I worried about it? How likely is it to happen? How dangerous if it does happen? What can I do to make it not happen? And what if it does happen? And so when you start writing all that out, now you've spent now you don't have to think about that anymore. 00:18:59 Gary Sprouse: You don't have to like remember what you're supposed to worry about because now it's all written down. And now it's written on a piece of paper so I can show it to you and say, "Hey Tracy, can you think anything else that I could add to this? Is am I am I getting the right numbers or could there be different numbers? Do I really need to?" So now when it's written down, you can get help from other people much easier. And when you wake up in the middle of the night, you're like, "Oh, nope. It's not a new thought, so I can go back to sleep." Or it is a new thought, and I'm going to write it down. Right? I think those two tools help you then plan using your future, but without fear. Tracie Edwards: Right. And uh that's where that mindset shift comes in. um when we're dealing with things that are unexpected or disruptive, right? Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Tracie Edwards: Um you've uh you've thought about it enough in advance that the the fear factor is uh maybe not quite gone but lessened. 00:19:57 Gary Sprouse: Yeah. No, absolutely. That that's ex and that's my key. Like I can't make I am the less stressed doctor, not the no stress doctor. Right. So it's like Yeah. So what I find is some people get worried and it starts affecting them physically and mentally. If I can just if I can take what there there's this level and I can take them down to that level. Okay. So now they can function Tracie Edwards: Well, one of the things that I in particular am big on um it's been important for me in my career is to prepare for career change really before that career change becomes was necessary and uh you know there are things that I do to to make sure that I am ready and able if something unexpected happens for me. Um are there mindset shifts that you think are most effective for folks in those situations? Gary Sprouse: Yes, two things. So, first of share a personal experience experience which is what I wrote in the book on mindset matters. 00:21:04 Gary Sprouse: My chapter was involved with um as a primary care doctor. I was in a rural area and so I started doing pain management 40 years ago before there was a pain management specialty and then over the years I was told initially like hey doctors aren't treating pain aggressively enough and then the whole pendulum switched and then it was like oh you guys are making everybody drug addict which was not true but that's what they said. So now I'm getting in trouble with my board for doing all the things that I was doing that I was getting praised for before. Well, so when I get in front of my board, there's things like huge fines, big lawyer fees, suspensions, taking my license away. I'm like, what? Right? So, I had I didn't want to change, right? But I'm like, oh, I need to be prepared in case something stupid happens. I need to know I got to have some things. So, there's two things that I did. One was that I looked at my identity because identity is important to people. 00:21:59 Gary Sprouse: We do a lot of stuff to maintain our identity. And so I've seen a lot of doctors when they retired like, "Wow, what am I supposed to do with myself now?" Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: All I've ever been as a doctor. So I don't know what to do with myself now. So while I was in the process of dealing with this board stuff, first off, I kept my realistic optimism, right? But second off, what I said was like, wait, what else do I what else what else defines me? So what I did was I started going, wait like like I can do real estate transactions. I can do karaoke. I can play basketball. I can like I'm a father. I'm a husband. I have all these other identities that I can apply to myself. So being a doctor, it's a great identity and I love it and I really enjoy it. But if if I couldn't be a doctor anymore, I got way other things that I can identify myself as. 00:22:50 Gary Sprouse: Okay. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And the second thing is what I call reserve. And what I find is way too many people are living on the edge. Like like I've read some statistics that 50% of people don't have $400 in their checking account. So if they got a flat tire, they're out of luck, right? Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Okay. Gary Sprouse: I'm like, "Oh, see. So when so then when you see something changed and you have no reserve, that's way worse, right? It's way more anxietyprovoking." So my wife and I decided at the time, you know what? We're gonna do everything we can to prepare ourselves in case the board does something stupid and we're gonna have reserve. So we So I was while we're going through the process, I'm still working. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: So somebody came to me and said, "Hey, I want you to come down to this nursing home. It's an hour and a half away, but we really need help." And I'm like, "An hour and a half away? What?" 00:23:43 Gary Sprouse: Like not you know what our goal was? Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: We're going to make some money, so we have reserves. So I'm like, "Yes, I'm going to make that decision." And it in the end it turned out to be a good decision. I made money at the nursing home. It ended up I got into I got I went out and got a real not a real estate license but I became a real estate investor. And so all those things then contributed. So I got real estate properties. So now I'm a real estate investor and I'm making money that way and I'm got this nursing home. I'm making money that way and that opened the door for three other nursing homes. So it's like so I was working my butt off but I was like no I have reserved. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: So then fortunately the board didn't do anything stupid and so then I was able to retire because then all that reserve I had was like oh now I don't need to work anymore so now I can retire but 00:24:28 Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: having that reserve having money in the bank having physical reserve having you know like I would exercise so I have my body was strong right so reading books and learning about yourself and learning about group dynamic all this Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: other stuff it contributes to having reserve which then makes you more resilient Yeah. Tracie Edwards: Right. Well, one thing that just occurred to me while we were talking is um in technology, many of us are accustomed to well and doctors as well, working all hours and um running to emergencies and and uh that kind Gary Sprouse: Yes. Tracie Edwards: of thing. and and not just our financial and emotional and intellectual reserve, but maybe also a time reserve that we need to get accustomed to maybe having some downtime. Gary Sprouse: I was I'm just reading this book on stoicism and that's one of the things it talks about is that we fritter away our time. Like what one of the lines in the book was like if somebody tried to move their fence a foot into your yard, you would get all upset. 00:25:39 Gary Sprouse: But if somebody comes in and takes over some of your time, you don't even think about it. You're like, "No, time is important." Yeah. No, you got to really make sure you do that you use your time as wisely as possible. Tracie Edwards: So what is the role of self-awareness and personal values uh as it applies to resilience? Gary Sprouse: Wow. So self so to me self-awareness is there's there's two things that I say. You need to become self-aware. And what that means to me is when I was talking about that perspective prism, you need to know what's in your prism. You need to know what your beliefs are and why they're there. You need to know what your facts are and why they're there. You need to know like what biases you have and why they're there. And as you understand now, you can start because you know how many people come to me and go, I don't know why I do that, but I do it. And you're like, you need to know why. 00:26:34 Gary Sprouse: Because turns out it's usually in that prism. So psychologists talk about cognitive therapy. Tracie Edwards: Hat. Gary Sprouse: And part of that is is going really is evaluating what's in your prism. Because if you have the thought that everything's black and white, you're either on or you're off or you're up or you're down. And that's your that's what's in your prism. Well, that's going to change how you perceive things. And so what by self-awareness, what that really means is learning what's in my own prism. Now, sometimes that's a little bit tricky because there's things that are in our prism that were there when we were three years old and we didn't know that, right? Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And so, like there was a book I'd read about a patient who had a problem with heroin addiction and he learned when he was two years old he'd had multiple ear infections, but the doctor at the time didn't recognize it. So when they got to a new doctor, excuse me, when they got to the new doctor who who diagnosed him with ear infections, what he realized was the reason he'd been using drugs so much was because he had this beast that would come up inside of him and he had to quell the beast and the only way he could do it was with drugs. 00:27:38 Gary Sprouse: Well, when he realized the beast was his two-year-old self screaming in pain from his ear infection, well then he didn't need drugs anymore. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And so it's like so by understanding what's in his prism then he was able to change his perceptions which then changed his actions. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And so that's why it becomes critical. The other half that coin is knowing what's in other people's prisms. So if I know what's in your prism then I can understand why you do what you do. And so then our interactions become much more cooperative and much more effective because now I know why you're doing things and you know why I'm doing things. Yeah. The world works better. Tracie Edwards: Yeah, that whole um context thing um helps us to have grace for ourselves and hopefully grace for other people as Well, so for someone who um may be feeling stuck in a Gary Sprouse: Yep. Yep. We call it empathy, but really what empathy is known within your prism. Tracie Edwards: in their current role, maybe unsure of their next step, what might be the the first action that you'd recommend? 00:28:43 Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Well, so there's a couple things. So first off, I would say what's making you feel stuck. So a lot of times people aren't feeling fulfilled and so then they're like okay so that's why they're feeling stuck and you're like so then you have to understand what fulfillment is and fulfillment is learning, giving, and having a purpose in life. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: So sometimes it's just a matter of understanding what fulfillment's about which will then allow you to feel unstuck. The second is having gratitude. Because if you have a job that's paying you some money, that's helping pay your bills. Maybe not enough, but how nice is that that somebody's giving me some money for me to do some some work. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: Thank you very much. Now, you might say, it's not enough. And so then you go, well, maybe I should find a different job that I can make more money with the same amount of effort. Great if you can do that. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. 00:29:37 Gary Sprouse: But feeling stuck gets you, you know, makes you feel bad. out. Second thing is, and I I saw like I'd read this somewhere. This guy was in the he was in a hospital because he was sick and he's sitting there in his bed and the the cleaning guy comes in and the guy's, you know, he's cleaning the floor and he's like, he introduces, "Hey, I'm Bill and I'm here to help you, right? And he's mopping the floor and then he starts rearranging the pictures in this room." And the guy's like, "What are you doing?" He goes, "Well, my job is to help make you get better." So having a clean room and having artwork that makes you feel good will make you get better faster. Which so what this guy did was instead of calling himself a cleaning person, he said, "I'm here. I'm Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: part of the team that's here to make you better." So he actually increased his job responsibilities. And that made him feel fulfilled because now he had a purpose. 00:30:27 Gary Sprouse: His purpose wasn't just clean the room and get out. It was that I'm going to make friends with this guy. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: I'm going to introduce myself. I'm going to change the artwork in his room. I want to make sure his room's clean so he could be comfortable. So, anybody can do that. Like I've seen this like if you're a factory worker. Like I was just in Iowa and we went to the Iowa State Fair and I'm like there is like cows and sheep and goats and there was a they're famous for a lifesized cow that's made out of butter, right? Tracie Edwards: What is it? Gary Sprouse: But what I realized was if it wasn't for these people, I would be hungry on the East Coast. like I would not have food to eat. And it's like so if you're, you know, a farmer, you're like, dude, like people on the east coast need me. Like I couldn't survive if I wasn't there. So that tends to make you feel unstuck when you feel like what you're doing is actually important. 00:31:19 Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: Uh so those are the things that I would talk about if you're feeling stuck. And the third would be then to say, look, if you're feeling that bad and you can't get out of that, then we talked about this earlier, you know, it's okay to change. Like if this isn't working, it's okay to change. and within two years you're going to be up to snuff. So, it's good stuff. Tracie Edwards: Okay. Gary Sprouse: So, don't be afraid to change, but make sure you're changing for reasons that make sense. Tracie Edwards: Good. right? That aren't going to have you feeling stuck a couple of years down the road. Gary Sprouse: I'm watching this with my stepson. He was in a job that he liked for a while and then he stopped liking it. Then he switched to a different job and he started liking it, but then he stopped liking it. And I'm like, it's not the job. It's your mindset. And so, here's what I said. I told him, "Change your mindset." 00:32:02 Gary Sprouse: He was working as a bartender. And I like, "Go to work tonight. Put on this mindset that this is great. You're going to have all this gratitude that you're going to enjoy meeting some new people and providing them a service and you're going to talk to them and helping with their problems." And he came home that night and he was miserable. I'm like, "What happened?" He goes, "I didn't do a single thing you said and I was miserable and I got no tips." And I'm like, "Yeah, it matters, right?" Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Tracie Edwards: What What happened the second night? Gary Sprouse: I so I haven't fig this is what happens when you deal with family like you have I don't have the same credibility with my family as I do with my patients. So it's like yeah so it's so one of the struggles that I have is how do I get people to shift their mindset? Tracie Edwards: Yeah. Gary Sprouse: It's not easy. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: I mean there people get stuck in a place and they and so change is difficult and and they have to they have to see that there's a better life out there like there's a better way to do this and then be willing to make the changes to get to that place. 00:33:05 Gary Sprouse: So that becomes my job and it's not easy right? Tracie Edwards: Right. Right. it it's not and uh you know I I think it goes back to that uh fear and uncertainty factor the the prism that they're in. So how do you coach people to really balance of the risk that they Gary Sprouse: Yes. Tracie Edwards: may be feeling with the pursuit of changing their mindset and going towards that fulfillment and growth? Gary Sprouse: Right. So we talked about one which is to reduce the amount of fear that would be going in with changing. So you're going to have reserve and you're going to have u the confidence that you you know within a couple years you're going to be fine, right? So you reduce the amount of anxiety that it takes. But the other half of that is how confident are you that you can do something new? And what I see is a lot of people like again you're looking into the future, right? So you're going so here's what humans do is we make up these patterns and then we run the pattern forward and that's how we predict the future, right? 00:34:09 Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And so I go, okay, well what's the pattern been? And they're like, well, you know, I didn't do well in this and I didn't do well in that. So then their self-confidence is low because they don't think they can do it. I'm like, wait, did you learn how to tie your shoes? I'm like, well, yeah. I'm like, "Did you learn how to read and write?" Well, yeah. Did you learn how to drive a car? Like, people don't understand how many successes they've had. And so, what that does then is it starts changing the pattern. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: So, the pattern is, oh, I can learn, I can be successful at learning different things, learning new skills all throughout my life. And we are I was thinking what you were saying earlier like people in technology, their jobs are our jobs are changing. Like if you went back 300 years ago, like you were a blacksmith and your dad was a blacksmith and your grandfather's a blacksmith and your kids going to be a blacksmith. 00:35:03 Gary Sprouse: You had one job and that's all you did your whole life, right? So nowadays people have six and seven different things they can do in life. And the amount of skills that we've had to learn are amazing. But you have to give yourself credit like, "Yes, I did it. I learned how to tie my shoes. Woohoo." Right? I learned how to drive a car. I watched my daughter learn how to drive a car and she's now in her 30s. But the first time she's driving, she's turning left and cars are coming. I'm like, "Oh, right." I'm like, "You don't realize how hard it is until you watch somebody try to learn how to do it." Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And then you're doing it. You don't even like pay attention anymore and you're able to drive your car. So when you start giving your successes awareness, then your pattern goes, "Oh, well, I have learned how to do stuff. So why shouldn't I be a So now your prediction changes because now the patterns change. 00:35:48 Gary Sprouse: The pattern is shoot I've had a lot of successes in my life and the pattern changes. One of the books that I'd read was talking about a growth mindset versus a fixed mindset. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And a fixed mindset is well I'm born with these skills and there's nothing I can do about it. And if I try to do something new and it doesn't go right, I fail. Well, okay, that's not a good way to be, right? So, what we talk about is a growth mindset where you go, you know what, all skills are learnable. just depends how much effort I want to put into it and I'm gonna that process is going to have some bumps and side steps and it's not going to go 100% but they're going to be the they're going Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: to be setbacks not not permanent setbacks they're just going to be temporary things and they're just going to teach me how not to do something so that I can now learn how to do it and so as I go along I'm going to get better and better and better and and so these setbacks are not failures they're just setbacks and they just prompt me to learn more and get better. 00:36:47 Gary Sprouse: And so when you take that mindset, then you're like, well, I the pattern hasn't I've learned a lot of stuff. So my prediction is I'm going to learn more stuff. It's not going to go smooth, but it's okay because I am smart and I have energy and I'm going to put my mind to it and I'm going to learn these new skills. Well, then you're like, okay. So then jumping off from that old job to a new job isn't nearly as scary. Tracie Edwards: Right. So, could you maybe talk about the role of mentors and coaches um that uh support teams can play in in helping us reduce our stress and improving our outcomes? Gary Sprouse: This is one of the humans are amazing, right? Like we have words, we have books, like we have information. So we can learn from somebody who's been there before. So when we're trying to predict the future, I can go, "Hey, you've been here before. What happened?" Right? So like learning from people who've already been there. 00:37:42 Gary Sprouse: What? That's like amazing. Plus they can help us focus our thoughts and add things information that we didn't pay attention to. So when I read a book like I just finished reading this book on um post-traumatic stress, right? It's called The Body Keeps. Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: And I'm like and I'm like is like I'm like wait I've been a doctor for 38 years and I didn't read this book before. Tracie Edwards: Right. Gary Sprouse: Like what? Like I would have been a way better doctor if id read this book. So as you keep learning, you add more information. Well, and Tony Robbins said this. He goes, "Somebody took 20 years to write that book and it took you 20 hours to read it. You got 20 years of information in 20 hours." What? How freaking nice is that? Yeah. So meners and books and all other Yeah. Awesome stuff. Like if you don't take advantage of that, then you're going to make your life more of a struggle. 00:38:34 Gary Sprouse: Let other people help you. Like I think as a kid, I don't even know why I did this, but I learned early on that my parents knew more than I did. So I learned from that, right? My kids were like, "Dad, you're stupid. What do you know?" And one of my friends said, "Dude, when my kids got to be 25, I went from being stupid to like, oh my god, how smart you are." Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: Like, right? So meners are manners in any fashion, right? Teachers come in different ways. They'd be could be a video, could be a podcast, could be a book, it could be a seminar you went to, could be your friend next door, could be I've been at books fairs where I didn't sell any Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: books. I'm like, this is depressing, right? But then the guy next to me started telling me how he got his four TED talks and I'm like, wait, what? Give me the secret sauce. 00:39:18 Gary Sprouse: So like, yeah. So now I have the secret sauce. So like now I'm flying for a TED talk, right? So yeah, mentors are amazing. Tracie Edwards: That's great. And and when I think of uh you know my my coaches uh over the years, they're really good about helping me understand the fundamentals and have those fundamentals be repeatable so that then um I can I I can sort of uh enhance my capabilities the more I have this repeatable uh process of of accomplishing this skill kind of thing. Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Tracie Edwards: So Gary Sprouse: Well, so and teachers, um, just because they're teachers doesn't mean you have to do it the way they do it. Like there might be better ways out there. So teachers are helping you and they're focusing you and they're giving you some skills, but that doesn't always mean that you have to do it exactly how they did it. And so but they become a springboard that you can then learn from them and go on and move go to the next step. 00:40:16 Tracie Edwards: Mhm. Gary Sprouse: One of the things that I found is like I have a different model for how addictions should be defined. And it's like but I had to understand what the first model of addiction the disease model what that means and how it works because if I'm jumping off and trying something new I need to know what was there so I can compare and contrast what I'm doing. So, I still need people to teach me what addictions are in the disease model because then that makes my model even that much better. Tracie Edwards: Right. So, as we wrap up today, uh if someone is listening who may feel overwhelmed by the thought of change, what's maybe one small shift they can make this week to start moving toward their happy place? Gary Sprouse: Yeah. Well, couple things. First off, you have to know where your happy place is. And so what I found was the happy place is made up of rooms and everybody's rooms, everybody's happy place is different but the rooms are the same. So the rooms are gratitude, fulfillment, feeling safe, feeling connected, right? 00:41:19 Gary Sprouse: Having hope all these things that make up your happy place. So when you understand what your happy place is, what like I can get there. And then second is realizing that our stresses are really side effects to our skills. So, let's give gratitude and thanks for the skills that we have and let's do things to get rid of some of the side effects so that then we can put a beaming smile on our face and be in our happy place. Right? Look, I like that smile. See, that's the definition of a beaming smile. I like it. Right? Tracie Edwards: And then finally, Gary Sprouse: But the third thing I tell people, please, please, please do not resign yourself to being stuck, being stressed out. There are ways out, there's mentors, there's books, there's all these other things. The books that I've written will help you, but they're just one tool, right? Your podcast will help. Like, don't resign yourself. Don't get don't be like, "Oh, there's no way out." No, there's ways out. Tracie Edwards: And that is a perfect bow to put on our conversation today that uh there is always a way and uh do whatever we need to do to um make sure that we're controlling uh our stress and and controlling our reaction and um enjoying more of our happy place. So, Dr. Gary Sprouse, thank you so much for being with us today. Gary Sprouse: Well, thank you for having me on here. Well, we have to do this again. There's a whole bunch of stuff that we didn't get to talk about. So, and I hope you Tracie Edwards: Abs, absolutely, for sure. So, um, for our listeners today, your call to action is to, uh, go to either Apple or Spotify, wherever, uh, you do your podcast listening, leave us a review, let us know how we're doing. We would love to hear from you. Dr. Gary Sprouse, thank you Gary Sprouse: All right. Thank