 We do know from the research that over 30% of athletes having mental health problems and there's a high rate of suicide amongst ex-athletes, they move the exercise, the exercise is good for you. So why are they not feeling good? Psychology for the WMHI. I'm Peter Diaz. I'm the CEO for WMHI. Athletes. So here we are in our gym, seemed appropriate. But this isn't relevant just for athletes. This is relevant for everyone. We're going to talk about some of the recent news items that have come up, which have really highlighted mental health amongst professional athletes. But even if you're not a big sporty person yourself, there's still some great lessons to learn as an individual and for workplaces as well, of course. Absolutely. We all know, we all know how important exercise is for your mental health and well-being. But also for your physical health and well-being. Even if we try to avoid exercise as much as possible, we know that movement is good for mental health. We don't just know it intrinsically like it's, we, the part of us that knows that we should be moving more, but we also have the research to say that when people exercise, they feel physically better and they can think better and they can feel better. And psychologically that is really good. But like you say, in the news, lately, we have seen... This is the thing. We all know it's good for us and you know that we all should be probably moving a little more than we do. That's right. But I mean, I know for ourselves, we've been on a physical health journey and I think a lot of people have in the last 18 months decided that now's the time to focus on physical health. But it takes a mental resilience, a mental stamina. I mean, every time you go to a workout, you want to push yourself a little bit. So I can only imagine for professional athletes how mentally strong they must be to get to that level of performance where they're top of the world, Olympians or number one in their sport, that must be an incredible amount of resilience. So it's surprising then when we see items like the recent one, probably the most well-known one is Naomi Osaka, you know, who decided not to participate in media interviews and then ultimately to withdraw from the French Open because of mental health. So it's like... Absolutely. We wonder what happened. This happened. Absolutely. Especially because you think, OK, so she is an athlete, obviously she's exercising. So if exercise is good for your mental health, how come she's depressed? How come she's finding it hard to function? I mean, we don't want to focus on Naomi because this is not a Naomi problem only. We do know from the research that over 30% of athletes, you know, having mental health problems and there's a high rate of suicide amongst ex-athletes. So this is a very interesting phenomenon because you would think they should feel good because they're athletes, they move, they exercise. It's good for you. So why are they not feeling good? Yeah. But I mean, you raise another issue, that's ex-athletes and I think there's probably different challenges at each stage of the journey. You know, perhaps when you're building up your career, you know, there's a goal, there's something to aim for. Yeah. Then you get to the peak and that's when it should be amazing and you've achieved everything you wanted to achieve. It should be exciting. But and to come back to Naomi, apparently this kind of began for her after winning the 2018 US Open, that game against Serena Williams. Yeah. She said it kind of started there. It was a normal, it was not a normal journey for Naomi. Like she won, but the way the media showed what happened, it's almost like she didn't have that enjoyment of her win. It was everything about Serena Williams at the time. So was that an involvement? That caused the problem. Not wanting to participate in the media interviews, it sort of raises an interesting question for workplaces because the officials said, well, this is part of your job, part of your commitment is to do this. So we will find enough for her, 15,000 dollars. It's not much, she's the highest paid female athlete in the world. So, you know, you can kind of understand her saying, well, for my own self-care, I'll cop the fine and look after my well-being. But then... But is that good enough? That raises the issue in workplaces. Is that good enough? Exactly. The workplace kind of still wanted her to do that and said, you know, if you don't come, then you're going to be disqualified and threatened. That's right. So there's two aspects to that. One is why is it that the mental health of people that are exercising, in this case, it's not perfect or really, really good because they are exercising a lot. And the other one is if you do, because for athletes, that's their workplace. So what we have here, so we have taken care of ourselves for them, this would be their workplace. So in the workplace, if you have the mental health problem, how much adjustments can you have to your work if you're depressed or you're anxious? Obviously, there has to be some flexibility, but how far can the workplace go in that flexibility? A million dollar question. Yes. So let's start with the first one. The first one is how come you can be doing exercise and not perfect mental health when we know exercise is good for your mental health? Well, let's examine that. So what do we know having being serious about doing exercise for our well-being for the last two years? What do we know? Well, we do know that you need to be very disciplined. That exercise, in the moment, it's painful. That's why most people are voided. I mean, every time I go to do an exercise session, every single time feels like if I was starting the first day. Every single time. There has not been one single session where there has not been a case. And every time I say, why am I doing this? Exactly. Why do I put myself through this? And you would think, you know, the body is now used to it. You would be okay. But it's not. It is a painful thing. So it's not surprising that most people, we tend to avoid it if we can. We take the lazy option. But we do know that when we do it, we do feel good. What is the difference between somebody exercising three times a week and an athlete exercises five to seven times a week, not just for an hour, but for three, four hours and they get up early and that becomes their life. Well, it's very different this year. One is the pushing their body to the limit and beyond. I mean, athletes like us. Athletes, the body, their reaction, their way of thinking, it's completely different. And it's also they have a winning mindset. Yeah. Which is a good thing. If you're in any workplace, you want to be, you know, you want to have a team of high performers who are willing to work hard to do a great job. The more people with a winning mindset, you'd think better. Yeah. So one of the questions, and we've seen this come up in some of our training courses recently as well, is managers asking, well, how do I support those people to perform really well at the highest level we can. At the same time, I do care about mental health and wellbeing and I don't want to burn out this person. And especially in recent times, you know, people have been asked to do a lot. And so how do we keep up with just the sheer volume of work and look after our teams at the same time? Yeah. How do I get that balance right? What if I'm the cause of their mental ill health because I'm giving them all this work to do, you know, only a small amount of time to do it in. That's right. So athletes, their status is when they win gold or silver or bronze, but especially when they win gold because gold, everybody remembers number one, but nobody remembers number two. So number one is what they go for. But how many number ones can you have? That's the problem. You have so many athletes trying to be number one, but only very few would become number one. And what happens if you do become number one and the limelight is taken away, like in May on this case, the limelight was taken a little bit away a lot from the occasion because of what happened. Yeah. So that's not how to psychologically... But you've also got to maintain that as well. The problem with that, you know, wanting that we all love appreciation and we all love recognition and, you know, most people like others to acknowledge that some people don't want to be in the limelight and that's fine too, but the problem then is what happens when the feedback's not great. It's very public, isn't it? And this is the thing with doing the media interviews but also social media as well. I don't know how many of us would cope so well if every day we were getting a whole bunch of people commenting on our work performance, you know, who aren't even in our workplace. Imagine if you do your gym sessions with a camera following you around and picking up everything that you do wrong and you do right and people making comments about it. Or every type you make on an email or a ring, you know. So you want recognition and you want feedback and I think that's an important thing. Workplaces and for us, for our own mental health, we want recognition, we want certain status, but we also want feedback. So this is important, but we talk about recognition, we don't talk about praise. You have to be able to take that feedback too, whichever way it comes. We can't just as managers tell everybody it's all wonderful all the time. We have to be real. But just like with exercise, yes, you do it for the benefit of the physicality of the psychology of it. But you know, as people, you know, am I losing weight? That's a feedback mechanism. Or am I getting muscle? Am I looking a little bit better? Am I getting stronger? Am I getting healthier? Do I have less colds? Do I have less physical issues? So that's kind of feedback. You also get the feedback from your trainer, your form, are you doing it right? What do you need to do? What are the sense? What's the repetition? In the workplace, we can learn very important lessons from that. So people need that recognition. They need the status, not necessarily recognition status. Do they feel important? Do they feel that their job is important? Is this that being done? And the other one is, do they get enough feedback to know that they're doing a good job? So this is the problem between school and universities and workplaces. You go to school and university and you get feedback. You get a lot of feedback. You get told exactly how you're doing. Then you go into a workplace and you don't get... You don't get an A or B or C? You don't. Sometimes you're flying solo, sometimes you know people are not happy with you, but you don't know exactly why they're not happy. Because people are afraid to tell you or we're politically correct or we don't like to hurt people's feelings. So that's a good thing for managers to think about and to remember. People need status. They feel that it's important what they're doing, but they also need good real feedback. That is not sugar coated, but presented in the right way. And then if we have these elements, that's not just the movement or the work that we're doing, but there's certain elements that need to be observed or good mental health to have. Let's go back to the athletes. Alright. What is it? Are they getting enough status? You would think so, yes. Yes, some of them do. What happens is they don't. When you lose game or... Or you come in second and nobody remembers your name. So what's that even? What happens if you train your body too hard and you burn your body? Because you can burn out physically and psychologically in sport. So what happens if you do that? So we know that a lot of kids that start... that are athletes that start playing rugby and they're taken on by the clubs, the majority of those, never even make it to the field to play. So what happens then? That's not a very good situation to be in either. Being an athlete is not a guarantee of mental health. But it's a reality of life as well. We've spoken about this before, how artificial it is when everybody gets a participation award. The nature of competition is there's going to be a first or second. The nature of sport is there's going to be a team that wins and a team that loses the game. That's how it is. I probably wouldn't be fun for most people if it was, there was no competition at all. Even little kids want to know that somebody has won. So if you take it to the field then what do you do? We've got to, as individuals, be able to handle that when it's not a great result. Accept it when it is a great result and it's good feedback but handle it when it's not. But should there be more onus on the clubs or should they change the system to be more aware of health and well-being? That's a good question. How much can you change the system? Obviously it's working at a certain level. Would people actually want to attend games where no one wins? I don't think they would. So there might be some non-negotiable. So there's so much you can change but what can people do what can athletes do and what can people do to support athletes and ex-athletes? I guess one of the questions is how for example with the media interviews how crucial are they to, again, take it to a workplace setting to the core requirements of the job. These are the core requirements of the job and so there's one of the things in workplaces we need to work out when people are saying I struggle with this part or that part or can we amend this can we do flexible arrangements here or there? Is this a core requirement of the job? A firefighter for example needs to be able to climb a ladder that seems to be a core requirement whereas other things you might have some flexibility. Some workplaces you need to be at a certain place at a certain time whereas others you can have flexible staff finish time and so on. So one of the things to remember here for anyone that is going feeling that they're being burned out by the job whether they're an athlete or because they're in a job that they've been performing at a very high level for a long time and they're starting to feel burned out the one thing that you must remember is this you don't have to do that job you don't have to do that job you don't have to stay in that job you don't have to be an athlete you could just exercise three times a week and get a benefit or exercise and if you enjoy that that's probably better for your mental health and trying to push through now that doesn't mean that you should run away because there was a time before you had this job you haven't always had it at some point you went to an interview you put in your application form you answered the question you got the job and you were really excited that you got the job and it happened but it was a choice and so any choice you make you can make another one you can make it and you can change it and you can have another one so that takes the pressure off you just drop the job because you're feeling stressed out no no because it could be a really good opportunity to learn some really good things about yourself how you handle pressure how you handle stress and how to become more resilient but you're not a saint you're not a magical being and sometimes the best thing to do is to change jobs but make sure that you get a mentor, a counselor or somebody that you can talk to to make sure that you've learned as much as you come from the situation about yourself and how you handle yourself because it could be in my own life looking back sometimes I got stressed out about things that really didn't matter now that I look back it didn't matter that much I mean how important is it a person's opinion on social media whom I don't know that could possibly be the village idiot somewhere but I don't know because it's on social media how important is their opinion but not a lot if my best friend says something about me knowing me well and loving me that's important but somebody there doesn't know they can say whatever they want and this is the thing, the more public you are the more fans but also the more enemies the more criticism yes there's a lot we can do individually to strengthen our own resilience to not take that stuff personally et cetera but we talk about that mutual responsibility of the individual and the organization they have a responsibility too I do think there are some cases where places are simply asking for impossible absolutely if you previously had three people doing this job and now you're asking one person to do it it may not be possible to get everything it just may not be enough hours in a day for example the last 10 years we've seen that getting worse getting people offiring someone or getting rid of a position and now there's two positions being taken care of by one person or even three positions being taken care of by one person that is absolutely unfair it is not just not right but a person can only do so much they could excel they could push it for a little while and you see in where there's a good culture you will see a team of people who are willing to say alright there's a particular demand right now we'll step it up, we'll do that over time but you need to have the recovery time as well, the rest time again just like with a gym a muscle needs to break and then have some recovery time to repair again that's how it works so as a workplace I would be asking the question okay fine I have one person doing three jobs now how much time and how much focus can they give properly to one thing I mean if you went to a specialist or to a surgeon for an operation and the surgeon had to do the job of the surgeon of the nurse and of the anesthetist all in one, how safe would you feel that they how how certain would you feel that they're going to do a good job that they can actually focus on what they're doing probably not very much so that's why you don't have the surgeon doing three jobs you have the surgeon doing one job and then they have a support team so that's something to think about in workplaces do we want a good job done here and then how much are we supporting this person to do a good job and that also raises this idea of team as well so looking at the wellbeing for people who work within teams versus wellbeing of people who work individually and again there's individual sports and team sports and we have that sense that when you're on your own there's a lot more isolation you know if the whole team loses the game or the whole team fails at least we can all commiserate together and support each other through that but as an individual you're very alone so there's a lot of working alone now working from home, isolated geographically it's interesting we need to make sure keep that in mind they call it a hybrid workforce yeah some people are doing the hybrid work and home and summer purely home and everyone's in a very very different situation now so some changes can be done at the workplace level but some changes are in the individual world at different places in our touring, in our growth both psychologically and physically and it's good that we look to ourselves and say what do I need to take responsibility with and also not expect that the workplace will do everything to keep us I've seen sometimes workplaces doing everything possible to keep the job for a person when the best individual time for that person would have to help them out of the work so don't fire them and just forget about them what might not put together a plan in which we help that person look for another job yeah and this kind of relates also to what you were saying earlier about ex-athletes and the challenge they have going from one job to having to find something new and I think for a lot of people there at that point now reassessing what's important to me what do I want what works for my whole of life not just for generating an income and a lot of people going through that so the transition which is a shift in identity because work is so much a part of who we are but to say well now I'm going to do it many times radically differently I think that identity shift is interesting I think that's what people struggle with in making a transition from one but yes it's been said there's a whole school of psychology that says that it is people's identity movement that causes psychological problems so um called an existential approach yes it's a bit of an existential identity focus approach in which says through life we keep changing identities so at one point I was a two year old and now I'm not how do I deal with that I have got a lot from when they turned 30 that magic number 30 and they have a hard time dealing with being 30 other people have got a hard time even though they're very happy when they get married but after they marry they go oh who am I in this relationship I was single now I'm married how do I feel into this I was free and now I'm a parent absolutely parenthood it's very big not just for mothers but also for fathers how do I fit into this into this little nucleus family now that we used to be two I used to get all the attention and now I don't there's another little third person that gets most of their attention and it's not being spoiled see a lot of people immediately go and accuse people are they being spoiled or Naomi I feel like I said it too good or no it's not true it has nothing to do with that just identity changes can be very high for people and while they're finding out and they're trying on their new identity there's a lot of learning that happens there's a lot of challenges psychological challenges that come to the person same thing as when people get a job they were not a rehab counselor now they're a rehab counselor and they're happy about it but then it starts hitting them have you heard of the imposter syndrome but that's what we're talking about but also a promotion when you're in one workplace and then now you're the team leader and you used to be part of the team and now you're the team leader and so on now on the executive board I think sometimes we forget at the senior level they're still human too and have few struggles as well exactly, leaders are people too and they're not necessarily all knowing they don't have all the right answers and they're learning with us so we gotta cut themselves like two and same thing, like that's what we learn from athletes that's a normal natural human process they're working at the edge of human performance so that's why they're very interesting study this relates to the hero's journey as well which we won't go through right now but that's a really useful kind of understanding to have of that transition process and how we can make that easier for ourselves and for others as well overall I'm not I'm not saying people shouldn't aim for high performance I think there's one of the beautiful things about being a human being is our capacity to shine at the right moment and in the right circumstances and I call that high performance and that's beautiful you want a team of high performance but you need to understand that we're biological beings and psychological beings we can't be high performance 24 hours a day at some point we need a rest at some point we need a time out and we need to get our breath and this is the important lesson you know is it time to have a little break the psychological model that sort of demonstrates that so nicely is that support challenge we talk about this when we talk about resilience that you want to challenge yourself but you also need to do the self-care support because that balance of push and grit and stamina and hard work and perseverance alongside self-care and nurturing and being kind to yourself and you've got to get that balance right and it's very individual some people may err more towards the push push push I mean I see a lot of people that I work with the high performance of perfectionism and the non-stop and that doesn't work for a long period it works to a point but not over time and then you've got other people that are too perhaps too much on their little take it easy they're off here and there and it becomes more and more and more until they're not able to achieve the things that they want either so you've got to get the balance and either extreme is not good for your mental health I see it too often or you can't be a high performer because that's not good for your mental health that's not true most high performance have got a really mentally healthy nothing wrong with them now there are cases where some high performance should have had a break they should have stopped and smelled roses a little bit but it's up to them that's their decision we can't be the judge of them now I also see a lot of problem with people being very soft soft and too soft and we should not have any requirements from us ever in our lives nothing should be hard I shouldn't experience a negative feeling well that's hogwash that's bad mental health a non-functioning a non-functioning human being it's not a normal thing we need to help people to be functioning but it's good for them it's good for us it's good to be part of a society it's good to be part of a community of a tribe and be productive and it's not about making money it's about we feel good when we give to others and that's good for our mental health so let's remember that let's keep it in that we don't want to be at that extreme it's extreme we're going to be in this comfortable middle and allow ourselves to grow yeah but look I would be very interested in knowing if people have questions they can just send us questions in the comments and looking forward to that what is your experiences around this have you been high performers and you burnt out or are you high performers and you're still high performers and non-type performance people I know you, frustrate you that's also problematic what is it that or if you've made that transition and that sea change, green change career change that would be an interesting one as well and in the area of workplace adjustment have you had a person that was really difficult don't get names of course have you had a person that was really difficult to make adjustments for how did you solve the problem I know a lot of managers are always interested to hear what other people have done because it's a tough one for managers it's a very tough one because most of the managers I've met, I know it's not very popular to say so but most of the managers I've met are very nice people and they're going through the journey with us so they really try to help so it would be very interesting to see what people's experiences around that is thanks very much for watching we'll see you next time hi I'm Emmy Golding director of psychology for the workplace mental health institute we hope 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