Pharmacists: How Are You, Really?
How many times a day does someone ask how you are? It’s a common greeting and the encounter typically goes something like this:
Person 1: “How are you?”
Person 2: “Good. How are you?”
Person 1: “Doing alright.”
Then both people walk in opposite directions and go about their day. But what if you aren’t fine? What if they aren’t fine?
Now, I’m not about to suggest that you start sharing all the difficult details of your life with a complete stranger in the halls of the hospital or at the pharmacy counter, but what if you at least started being honest with yourself.
How many times are you struggling and you tell yourself to pull it together? Or maybe you want to feel emotions but work is crazy and instead you push them down? Yeah, repeat that a few dozen times in a row and people wonder why 80% of pharmacists are considering leaving the profession.
The truth is, being a pharmacist is a difficult job. We hold a great responsibility to patient care that often conflicts the metrics and bottom line that the business side of the job is constantly tracking. So, when someone asks how we are doing, what if we said our typical “good” in passing but took that as an opportunity to reflect more. What if we took it a step further and asked, “How are you, really?”
This is a practice I started incorporating into my life after reading Jenna Kutcher’s book, “How are you, really?” earlier this year.
This book made me realize how infrequently I checked in on myself. Before reading her book the last time I had really checked in with myself was nearly a year prior when I had a breakdown in my car after work, knowing I couldn’t keep working nights. I was exhausted and burned out. However, I had waited until that point to truly acknowledge that I felt that way. When I was a resident, burnout felt different than this did. It couldn’t be the same thing. At least, that’s what I told myself as I continued about my 77-hour per on-week night shift job like a zombie. Turns out, it was exactly the same thing.
As I read, I checked in with myself and realized I didn’t really know I was feeling most of the time. I just “did life” and kept going, no matter how I felt.
After reading her book, I shifted gears. What if I checked in every day? What if I took the time to see how I was on a regular basis? I wanted to know the answer.
While I haven’t been perfect at this, I have been writing in my journal most days. One of the things I incorporate into my evening journaling practice is a simple number by the date which indicates, on a scale of 1 to 10, how I am feeling that day. What I discovered was interesting: patterns on what was impacting my mood the most. I could see how my energy levels shift throughout the month and, now that I have been doing this for nearly 8 months, I can tell the difference in how I show up in different seasons of the year.
This journaling practice of checking in with myself for only 3-5 minutes a day gave me something I never expected: a relationship with myself. (And data to measure how I was doing because the research pharmacist in me can’t resist knowing the numbers…but that’s a discussion for another time.)
The understanding I now have with what triggers changes in my moods (what makes me really happy vs. what drives me crazy) has helped me discover what I want most out of my life and career. It’s helped me identify ways to enjoy my job more. It’s helped me connect to others I care about. It’s helped me become a better pharmacist.
So, if you are still reading this, I’m going to challenge you to answer this question today: How are you, really?
