Hello everyone. This is Liv from Wetun Real, and welcome to this webinar on disentangling your stress. Understand it to tame it.

We live in the world that's incredibly intense, incredibly stressful very often, and for all of us to gain more control over how we feel, how stressed we get, would be very, very beneficial. So this is why I decided to bring that topic closer to all of you. Few words about me, this is me.

I'm a veterinary surgeon and a post-psychology and emotional intelligence coach and creator of Vettone Real. I base all my teachings on all my psychology and emotion intelligence trainings on my clinical experience, and I think it's really important to, to find the solutions that are actually applicable in our veterinary world. I trained with Anglia Rask University and I belong to the International Pos Psychology Association.

And Vettun Real is my platform, my brand through which I support both individuals and teams in the veterinary world. So, how many of you have heard that sentence? Maybe on a daily basis.

Maybe this is how you feel. I'm constantly stressed. And you relate to that.

Is that how you feel, that it always at the edge, always tense. That there's always something that you should be doing that maybe you are already delayed with, that is another duty waiting for you. Some the tension, the stress that can really overwhelm us.

Can you relate to this? Is that how you feel? As a coach, I work with a lot of veterinary professionals and as a human being and a veterinary myself, I know that on clinics, most of our colleagues will be quite tense.

There's really high pace, there's always something happening, something going on, and we are so needed that we we should be in a few different places at the same time, and that can generate a lot of stress and also a lot of decisions. Our Decisions can change lives, and that can generate a lot of stress, plus the dynamics within the team, the dynamics with the clients. All of this can be quite distressing for all of us.

And some of you guys and I do the same, carry that stress with us to our home life. For those who are parents, surely you know that if you had a terrible day at work, your day at home with your family will be impacted by your day. That's the situations that you experience as a veterinarian or a veteran nurse or technician, you will carry some of that experience with you.

So our family life is impacted by our stress. And because of that, our relationships can suffer as well. And the other way around, if there's something happening in our relationships, we will carry that with us to work, and that will impact our performance.

That will impact how good veteran professionals we are, our stress that we bring from home to work. So when I started designing this webinar for for all of you, I couldn't stop thinking about that one question. What is stress?

Cause we talk about it so much, we can see it everywhere and it's kind of like nearly a normal thing to say, now, how are you doing? Oh, I'm a bit stressed, but that is, that is normal. So what does it really mean to be stressed?

What is it? And from again the experience as a coach, I can see that feeling stressed can come in many different shapes and forms. It's very, very individual.

So I wanted to tell you a little bit about how I experienced stress for many years, many, many years before I learned more about this topic because I, before I became more self-aware, before I started managing my emotional life, I used to wake up with a cramped stomach. With that burning hole in my body, which is very strange combination of words, but it's how it feels to me stress, that inner tension, sometimes a horrible headache or trembling hands. This is how stress feels to me.

And how does it feel to you? Feel free to pause this presentation for a second if you want to have a think. But how does it physically feel to you?

How do you experience your stress? Maybe it's a sweat sweaty palms, maybe it is a headache as well. Maybe you lose all the energy and you feel like you need to sit down.

What is it to you? How does it feel? It's very important to understand what is happening when we actually experience stress, what is happening inside our bodies.

And obviously when when I research stress, I find it very important to see what the research says about stress. And there are so many different definitions, but this is one of them, and I think it's really interesting cause stress can be defined as any type of change that causes physical, emotional and psychological strain. Stress is your body's response to anything that requires attention or action.

And when we look at that definition, it's quite benign, isn't it? It doesn't say anything horrible, it just tells us that stress is a response to anything that requires our attention or action, which is very interesting because maybe this means that stress is not always bad. Is it?

That question was also very important to me to answer because if we experience stress as as human beings, if that is part of our physiology, if we're able to generate stress, surely it must have some function. And it turns out that there is something called you stress. And you stress is actually very beneficial to us.

What is it? It refers to stress that leads to a positive response. It is the opposite of distress and can refer to any type of beneficial stress, whether physical or physiological.

It tends to be short term and often feels exciting. People perceive this type of stress as manageable and even motivating. A certain amount of stress can be beneficial when it comes to motivational performance in very simple words.

If we take a tiny little step outside of our comfort zone, not a huge leap, but tiny little step, we start feeling something that is new. That is a bit unknown but potentially good. This is where we start generating that you stress which is our physiological reaction to something unknown, unclear, but potentially positive, and that can ignite motivation.

It's that excitement inside us, those butterflies in our stomach, as they say when we fall in love. This is a you stress, and that can be very helpful for us when we strive towards something, when we want to remain motivated and reach out for for success, however we define success, it can be very helpful. But the negative version of stress is that distress.

What happens to us when we experience distress? As human beings, we've got certain brain structures that are right there waiting for the environment around us to Present a threat. And years and years and years and thousands of years ago, a threat was a wild animal that could have hurt us, but now a threat can be anything really.

It can be an email that starts with Words, feedback from the client. It could be a new medication that we see and we don't know what it is. It could be a client that is looking at us in a specific way or a colleague who kind of frowned when we try to join them during the lunch break.

Anything can be stressful threats these days, and our brain still perceives them in the same way as if that was the tiger that was attacking us. So the brain structures, mainly the amygdala in our brain, they create the reaction of the whole body to that threat, our adrenal glands that they impact the rest of the body and they prepare us to fight, to fight, or freeze. And to many of us that that state of flight or fight or face it's kind of become.

Something that we experience on a daily basis. A typical state. I don't want to say normal state because it's not normal and healthy, but it's become so common that we kind of stay within that fight flight free response.

And when we get to the point where threat is so big, so overwhelming that we cannot think clearly anymore when our prefrontal cortex is not functioning well anymore, this is where we reach the state of amygdala hijack. It's the moment in which our emotions, ignited by the threat, they take over. The stress is just too high for us to think logically.

So it can be that one last comment that someone dropped among friends or among colleagues in your workplace that completely threw you off that ignited so much frustration and anger in you that you can't handle this anymore and you need to leave the room, or it could be that last bit of food thrown on the floor by your child and you just want to scream and shout and slam the door. This is where we cannot make healthy decisions. We cannot think clearly, and this is the amygdala hijack state.

So what happens when we experience the chronic state? Those daily little doses of stress. What happens to our bodies, to our minds?

Is it healthy? Is it unhealthy? What is it?

And research has shown a plethora of psychosomatic signs of stress that we experience when it's chronic, when we feel the tension on a daily basis, and these can be decreased sex drive, difficulty sleeping, dizziness, digestive problems, things like diarrhoea, obviously the clammy sweaty palms of things that we experience in that very moment, but at night grinding teeth. Frequent sickness, debilitated immune system, headaches, very low energy, maybe be raising heartbeat. Sometimes even when the threat, the perceived threat is gone, the heart rate is still really high, trembling hands.

Also dryness of mouth, muscle tension. We accumulate that stress in our body. It doesn't go away.

It has impact on our physical body. But there's also impact on our brain function. And research shows that a variety of cognitive disorders were worsened by stress exposure and involve dysfunction of the newly evolved prefrontal cortex that I mentioned.

Exposure to acute uncontrollable stress increases cateholamine release in that cortex, reducing neuronal firing and impairing cognitive abilities. So that is that that moment when we get so incredibly distressed that we cannot think clearly. We shouldn't be making any important decisions at that very moment.

So we can see that that impact on our physical body and on our brain, it's really, really debilitating for us as veteran professionals because the brain function. Is decreased. Our working memory, our attention, response, inhibition, cognitive flexibility, all of those have been found impaired by stress.

And at work those impairments, they can be the matter of life and death, for especially for us for veterinary professionals because we can't concentrate, we can't control our impulses. We can't remember things too well. We can't plan.

We can't be a good colleague when we are under very severe or chronic long term stress. We can't be good to our clients and we certainly cannot serve our patients. So it's crucial to understand our stress, especially that it's so individual, that's so subjective, the way we experience it, but also to tame it, because as we can see, it's very harmful.

So we want to have a better control over our stress. So what do you exactly mean when you say I'm stressed? If you've ever said that to someone.

I'm stressed. What did you mean? And the reason why I'm asking this is because stress it's such an umbrella term.

There's so many other emotions under that stress. There is so many flavours of stress, so many reasons for us to experience stress, that bodily reaction to the threat. There are so many versions and it's crucial to understand which version it is so that we can actually take action to alleviate it.

And in order to start taking that action, to manage our stress, to control it better, we need to internalise, truly understand this psychological and behavioural cycle, and I call it a T cycle. Every single thought that we have in our life, every single realisation, conclusion, something that we created based on the environment around us, but also our past. Every single thing that came to our mind, our thought that ignites emotion.

If I see someone rolling ice when I'm standing next to them, and I, in the past, I experienced a lot of incivility. I will create a thought around this this person. They don't like me.

Maybe they don't respect me. So everything that I see in front of me and what I experienced in the past, it will make me think something, and that will make me feel in a certain way, maybe doubtful, may be less confident, maybe angry, maybe upset. There's a lot of emotions that can be created based on that one thought.

They don't like me. They don't respect me. And because of that emotion, our action will be changed.

Our emotions totally impact our actions. Everything that we do in life. Has the foundation of some emotion and every emotion has a foundation of a thought.

So once we understand that, we can start managing our stress better because if stress is emotion, if it's a specific emotion under the umbrella term of stress, then we can start investigating this whole cycle and managing it. So the first step is to actually feel it. We very often feel that tension.

And we feel, oh, I'm getting stressed. But on the other hand, we are taught that I shouldn't get stressed, I should be professional. I should just put it on the side and keep going.

We don't allow ourselves to feel it. But there are moments that where we actually can allow ourselves to feel it. Maybe can cannot be in that exact moment where I'm giving the injection to my patient, but there must be a moment where I step on the side and allow myself to feel it instead of rejecting that emotion, pretending it doesn't exist because it does, and it will impact our actions as we could see in a tea cycle.

So if we don't, if we pretend that it doesn't exist, we kind of allow it to control us. Instead of us controlling it. So there are different ways in people approach their emotions when they come.

And Susan David in her book Emotion Agility, she mentions two different ways. One is called bottling up, and the other is brooding over. Bottling up means that I experience emotion, it is there, but I'm not going to think about it.

I will put out a back burner and it will sit there. And it will accumulate, accumulate, accumulate, and at some point. It will explode when we don't expect it, when we expect it the least, when we need it the least, it will explode.

And the other version of managing our emotions, it could be the brooding over emotions, so feeling anger towards someone or feeling hurt by someone and then thinking about it constantly again and again again. Ruminating over that thought, ruminating over that emotion and making it bigger and allow it to control us again, just like in bottling up, we are giving away that giving up the the control over that emotion because we don't manage it. But there's also a way that is effective in dining our emotions, and that is the scientist approach, how I call it.

What it means basically is that when our stress comes, when the emotion comes. We start looking very closely into it. We take a a mental microscope or a magnifying glass, and we start observing, and instead of getting carried away by that by that hurricane of emotion, no, we look at this we're like, 00, I am actually experiencing something in here.

This is strong. What is happening to me? Become curious, instead of maybe judgmental, or instead of pretending that doesn't exist.

Become a scientist. With your emotions. And the second step is to name it.

So like we said, stress and umbrella term, there are so many flavours of it, there are so many different shades of it. Now it's time to find a proper name for it. And in order to name it, we need to gain something it's called the emotional granularity.

What is emotional granularity? When we experience emotion, there are some cramps, sweatiness, tension in there in our body. It can actually be very similar for many different emotions.

So am I angry or am I frustrated or maybe I'm disappointed or maybe fed up. Which one is it exactly? We need to be able to name it.

I think. I think I'm probably disappointed. Or I feel.

That sense of failure in here. This is the one, not just in general stress. And thankfully we have a lot of resources to learn more about that granularity, the names for for the emotions we can read the descriptions of them.

We can learn a bit more about what what that specific emotion, that name actually means. And one of those resources, the wheel of emotions, like this one in here, quite simple. It shows you the the basic emotions, but also the combinations of those.

But to be honest, there's so many different lists and resources. There's, there are books that describe emotions that help us understand what those means, just like the Atlas of the heart, that is a fantastic book, but also the lists are very long and very interesting, and we need to have that vocabulary if we want to actually be aware of what is happening with us in that very moment and also what might be happening with others. So that we can cooperate with them.

And the third step is to really truly investigate it, investigate the thought underneath that emotion if I feel. Like a failure. I feel like I'm failing.

I'm disappointed with myself probably. What am I thinking about myself or the world that that that makes me feel in such a way that's such a severe unpleasant way. So we know from the muscle pyramid of needs that as human beings we've got basic needs that need to be fulfilled for us to feel well, to be happy, but to be healthy in general.

And in the middle of that pyramid, we have the psychological needs, which is belongings, but also esteem needs. We need to be appreciated to feel well. We need to feel that we are a part of the tribe, otherwise we cannot be healthy.

So maybe if I'm feeling. Disappointed. Maybe that is because something happened around me that made me think.

They don't see my hard work. They don't think this is worth. Recognising They think very low of me.

There might be so many different versions of a thought. But knowing that these are our needs and very often when they are in unfulfilled, we experience those very unpleasant emotions. That helps us to to find what is the source of that emotion.

What am I actually thinking. And we need to train ourselves. It becomes easier the more we do that, but the actual thought behind that frustration or the fear or being lost, that thought can tell you how you will actually manage your state of distress.

So for me, for many, many years when I was waking up with that cramp in my stomach feeling so shaky and unable to focus, the thoughts that I had were those, I don't deserve to be here. Or I'm terrified of being on my own. That was the relationship anxiety that I had.

Or they think I'm silly. I'm inept. I'm not worth the respect.

These were the thoughts that I actually had in my head. These were the reasons why I was experiencing all those emotions, all that stress, and that obviously changed my actions. We behave differently when we are.

Terrified And we behave completely differently when we are super peaceful or we can be somewhere in the middle quite neutral. We also will behave in a certain way. But once we detect those thoughts there, we need to ask ourselves, is it true though?

Am I 100% sure that this is what they are thinking about me? Or that I am unable to be on my own? Is it true?

And how would my life look if this thought wasn't actually true? If I was thinking some something opposite. How would my life look?

Probably better. And this is very important to question those thoughts, because we know that thoughts are not facts. Thoughts, they will come.

We create conclusions based, like I said, on everything around us and everything in our past that stayed in our minds, but those are just thoughts. They are not peer reviewed. They were not printed in a magazine, and it's these are not scientific elements, they are not facts.

So we can change them, and we can control them. But what is definitely data, something incredibly useful is those emotions. Cause emotions are data, they come to us for a reason.

They come to us to prompt certain action as a response to those emotions. They prompt us to get to know ourselves better. And knowing yourself better is the self-awareness.

Self-awareness is a very important, the biggest probably the foundation. The the big part of emotion intelligence, and that is the focus of my work as an EQ coach and a well-being coach, is helping people to develop, to grow and to utilise much more their emotional intelligence. So what is it?

What is EQ? Goldman in 2001 proposed four key domains of emotion intelligence that help our Groups of people or individuals, our workplaces, our families thrive. And the first one is self-awareness and then self management, social awareness, and relationship management.

And today we're talking about self awareness, how incredibly important it is, because without this one, we cannot progress with the rest of the elements of our emotion intelligence. Emotion intelligence that shapes our relationships with ourselves and with others, that basically shapes our whole lives. And Daniel Goleman identifies self-awareness as being made up of the emotional awareness.

So this is what we're talking about today, the accurate self assessment, so knowing your strengths and your weaknesses really realistically and also self-confidence that can be built upon. The strengths that we know about and our ability to grow in the areas that we need to grow in our so-called weaknesses. In other words, it is all about knowing your emotions, your personal strengths and weakness, and having a strong sense of own worth.

And like I said today, we talk about the emotional awareness. And why is self-awareness so incredibly transformational? Because people with strong self-awareness are neither overly critical nor unrealistically hopeful.

Rather, they are honest with themselves and with others. In simple words, you deserve to know the truth about yourself. So that you don't have to beat up yourself unnecessarily.

So that you can know your triggers, the elements that will probably make you very distressed, make you maybe uncivil, make you want to leave the room. You deserve to know, but you also deserve to know how to control and manage those situations. Because emotions undiscovered, they remain uncontrolled, and emotions uncontrolled, they become dangerous.

And the state of razzle. Has been described by neuroscientists and it's a neural state in which emotional upsurges hamper the workings of the brain's executive centre, that is that lack of logical thinking when our emotions take over. The neurobiology of frazzile reflects on the body's default plan for emergency.

So it's so natural for us to come kind of become frazzled under the emotions because we need to be always so attuned to the emergency to the threat that is coming. But we don't have to get to the state of frail. We don't need to get to the situation where our logical thinking is not working anymore.

And it's incredibly important to catch it early, so it that is not hurtful to us and to others. And on this picture, that is, that is me, and that's me in my, let's say, the previous life, where I was a full-time veterinarian and I was doing my surgical internship at that time. And I was completely distressed every single day, every single day.

I was barely hanging out there. I was at the verge of depression. For a very long time.

And I was spreading that negativity on others through emotional contagion. And that is because I didn't really investigate my emotions at the time. I left them uncontrolled, and they could have been very dangerous, and I would say life threatening to me at the time.

And that shows that having a higher emotion intelligence, higher self-awareness, and all those elements that follow, it is protective for our mental health. In the industry where we are so at risk of suicide ideation. Where so many of us suffer mentally.

Having high emotion intelligence can really protect us, can prevent getting to that most dangerous moment. It's useful, it's necessary, it's crucial for our well-being. So going back to the impact of the stress of our own brain function, our attention, our cognitive flexibility, all of those elements that impact that stress has on our brain that obviously impact our performance.

Because emotions can be the biggest distraction, like Daniel Goleman said. And we all can see that because when we go to work and our mind is still at home, completely distressed, completely distracted, or if someone makes us very angry or very upset at work. We suddenly lose that focus.

Our whole focus goes towards survival instead of our patient's health and life. If we have higher emotion intelligence, so that the self-control of our emotional life, we can perform better. And this is why it's so incredibly important for us as veterinary professionals.

So the next time you feel that stomach cramp, you can see your hands shaking, your heart is racing. Or you're feeling just really, really low on your energy. When you are incredibly distressed, you feel that within you.

I would love you to take the control back, to be more powerful. To go back to that tea cycle. And start investigating why am I feeling like that?

How am I feeling? What is the thought that makes me feel in such way? And how can I change this so my action is within my control and within my power.

So feel it Allow yourself to feel it. Be a scientist. Then name it and investigate it, investigate the thought because you can work on that thought.

So for me, if I had those moments of self doubt. If I had those moments of fear of being on my own. I could actually develop a process through which I learned that this is not true, that the truth is different.

I could have become more self-aware, and I keep working on it every single day because we are not puppets. We are not, we cannot be puppets thrown around by our emotions. We can really gain control over what we do and how we do it, how we approach our life, how we show up in our work.

And family life That allows us to tame it. But first we need to know what we are fighting against. What is it?

The distressed monster for me individually. Cause EQ is your power. It is something that we all already have.

We can really utilise it more, and we can increase it. We can really, really work on increasing that self-awareness, and there's so many different ways and tools and methods that I teach people how to increase that awareness. But the very basic thing that you can always do is go back to that cycle to understand much more about your own distress.

And once you practise that, once it becomes really easier over time and you will be ready for whatever wave and obstacle and danger and threat comes your way, whatever will be there, you will be ready. You will be more powerful, and this is what I wish to all of you, and for all of you, and I'm hoping that it is something that Will happen for you in your life, professional and personal. So if you have any questions about this webinar or about becoming more human savvy, how do I call it.

So more emotionally intelligent, please feel free to send me a message, send me an email, or check my website behumanSavvy.com. And I'm really happy that you stayed up up until now with me, and I hope that you found it useful and interesting for with any comments and questions, I'm here for you.

And I really wish you to become. Powerful And control your own distress, because you really can. Thank you so much.