Hello and welcome back to the Resilient Entrepreneurs podcast. In our world of creating and building our own businesses, we experience a lot of highs and lows with money, with emotions, with people, with stress levels. And you'll often hear that success starts with your mindset. I mean, we say it countless times on this show.
Well, today we are talking with Dr. Nekeshia Hammond to talk about exactly that and to find out what it really means. She's the author of Mindset Training, Conquer Your Mind and the Rest Will Follow. And she's also authored three other books. Dr. Nekisha is a psychologist and executive coach. She's a renowned international speaker and has graced TEDx stages. And she is an expert in mental health and burnout prevention. Dr. Nekeshia, a very warm welcome to resilient entrepreneurs. It's so good to have you here.
Thank you so much. I'm excited to be here.
Well, the pleasure is all ours. Thank you so much. So we love to start the podcast understanding a bit about you and where you come from because our journey shapes exactly who we become, right?
I grew up in a single parent home. It was at that time, it was my mom and my brother and myself in the household. And from a very young age, it was interesting because although on paper, it looked like I was a model student and getting straight A's and doing the community service in high school and sports and all the things, one of the things that was really missing for me was a conversation about mental health and self care. So instead what happened even in my early years was, everything achievement-wise was overly celebrated, but not a celebration of like, by the way, you need to also take care of yourself. So what that led to is going through college and going through graduate school, just this almost like operating like a machine, this go, go, go mentality, which definitely led to burnout for me multiple times before I was able to fast forward to now understand how important it is that yes, while you can be an overachiever or do all the great things on paper, you also need to make sure that you are taking care of yourself. So when I talk about mindset a lot, this is definitely a personal journey that stems from that as well as professional. I've been in the mental health field now for 15 years. I've had a private practice for 15 years and also speaking to different corporations and organisations about burnout prevention because again, I definitely know deeply what that looks like to be on the side of not making yourself a priority, hitting burnout and instead now living a life of a commitment to holistic self care while I'm taking care of others, right? To make sure that I'm making myself my number one priority, which is something I teach. So that has in a nutshell been my journey from childhood to now.
So Dr. Nekeshia, can you share with us what burnout feels like? For those who are listening, how do they know whether they have it or are about to slide into it?
Yeah, there's a lot of red flags for burnout. So one of the largest red flags, if you will, is really feeling it can be physically and or mentally exhausted. So you are at the point and it's not something that's a one day thing. It happens over time, but you feel so exhausted it could affect how you show up in the workplace or if you are, whether you're in corporate or you have a business or wherever it is that you are performing, it's affecting your productivity. It's affecting who you are at home, you are just so drained, again, physically and or mentally. I've met a lot of people that struggle to sleep because of racing thoughts. They're like, ‘I can't turn my brain off. There's so much going on. I'm so overwhelmed. I'm so burnt out’, which of course affects us physically as well. So there's a lot of red flags to look for, but the good news about burnout is that there's a lot of things that we can also put into place to prevent ourselves from getting to that point and that level of exhaustion, where now we're not able to function.
Yeah, I think that's so relatable. I think probably everybody listening has been there or very close to there at some point or the other. And I think we often just try to figure it out, maybe get some help. But what are some ways to prevent it? What are some of those things to put into place before you even get to this stage?
One of the things that I often stress and teach and I, this is not something that's overnight, but it's something to work towards is making yourself your number one priority. It doesn't mean you're selfish, but when you do that and you think about, well, a couple of questions to ask yourself, but you think about how can you work on being the healthiest and the best version of who you are, when you operate in that lane, you are working towards not burning out.
So three questions I often share with people to ask themselves often.
One is ‘How am I doing?’ Meaning check in with yourself. It's so easy to get caught up with worrying about what happened to a parent or a friend or a child or whomever else in your life, you're checking in with everyone else, which is good, but you also need to be checking in with you and ask yourself, how am I doing?
The second question that you need to ask yourself often is ‘What do I need?’ And by need, I mean physically, emotionally, spiritually, mentally, what is it at this point in time that you really need in your life?
And then the third question to ask yourself is ‘What action step do I need to take today in order to work on fulfilling these needs.’ And for some people listening to this, the action step, you might be like, I am feeling so overwhelmed and so burnt out and exhausted, and your action set might be taking a break, which is okay. Like that is an action step. If you're like, I need a break of some sort, that is an action step. Burnout prevention is about honing in and checking in with yourself and taking the necessary steps, sometimes it's baby steps, those count too, towards making sure that you are healthy in those domains, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally.
Great questions. They're big questions too, aren't they? Because I think, how am I doing? If you're teetering on the edge, that could just finish you. How am I doing? I'm terrible. It's soul crashing down. I'm laughing about it, but I'm laughing because I've been there, right? And you know, I think it just makes it very real. And it's such important questions. So checking in every week or just whenever you remember or have it on your wall and ask yourself every morning what's your prescription?
Yeah, ideally, ask yourself at least weekly, but daily, something small that you can start with, because I know a lot, I understand what it means to burn out. And I was definitely in a space of saying like, I didn't have time and I was overwhelmed. And sometimes we think this self-care thing has to be this huge elaborate thing we do.
But something I always recommend for people to do daily is what I call Take A Minute. And in that minute what you do is you make sure you have that time. You can even time yourself with your cellphone, 60 seconds. You have that time for yourself. So if that means taking deep breaths, which is a highly underrated thing to do, very beneficial physically and mentally, emotionally and spiritually for you to do. But if it's just taking some deep breaths, if you believe in prayer and it's prayer, if you want to take a walk outside, I'm a big nature lover, whatever it is for those 60 seconds a day, you start to retrain your brain to understand that you deserve to reset and recharge yourself - and you deserve to be emotionally healthy - and you deserve to have joy. Because some of us are struggling, understandably, there's a lot of different things that happen to us in our lives, some of us are struggling with worthiness issues and self-love and self-forgiveness and all those sorts of things. But if you start with taking the one minute daily for yourself, you really will start to see positive changes in your life.
Yeah. Do you think this experience is different for women than it is for men?
Absolutely. Unfortunately for women, for many women, we've been programmed to honestly run ourselves ragged, make sure everyone else is taken care of. That's something even the research shows it's take care of your - fill in the blank - your parents, your significant other or the friends, the family, everyone else we're trying to take care of except for ourselves or putting ourselves last on the list. But the problem with that is that is not a sustainable model. You will crash and burn when you do that, which is why it's important to put yourself first so that you can show up powerfully for you and for all those people that you're helping around you, especially as a woman. Because again, there's and I know I've been guilty of it as well, this superwoman mentality or super mom or super wife and all these capes that we always want to wear, but it's very exhausting if you're not doing things to fill your cup back up. And you're not going to be the best version of yourself when you're working on managing what's going on in everyone else's life, but you're completely drained and depleted. That doesn't best serve the people that you're trying to help in the first place.
So Dr. Nekeshia, is all of what we're talking about in the mindset bucket? I'd like to unpack this word mindset, because I think it can be flippantly used. “Just have a different mindset, just be positive.” I think it's probably more robust than that. Can you help us unpack that?
Yeah, because of my personal bias as a psychologist and being a mindset expert, to me, everything starts with your mindset. So mindset is a pretty broad term, but it affects so many different parts of you. So there are people who are really struggling with mindset, meaning like a lot of negative self-talk, a lot of thoughts running through their head, not managing their emotions. All those things affect your mindset, but the issue with that is it could also affect your physical health as well. So there's plenty of research studies that show how mindset is linked to cancer and diabetes and high blood pressure and all these different chronic health issues. Because when you're not managing the stress that's going on in your brain, when in your mindset, it can physically attack you in your body. There's a whole three hour discussion we can have on that, but it really is all linked. But to me, the umbrella of everything is your mindset. The same thing with managing your emotions emotionally, or the same thing with having whatever spiritual journey that you may be on. Everything is linked to your mindset. Where do you start off? How do you start your day? Are you being intentional with your thoughts? Are you being intentional on growing as a person or growing your business or your family life or whatever it is for you, that's most important for you. But it really all stems from how is your mindset.
How does one change their mindset though? I wonder if someone is a fairly negative person and the woe is me and everything's difficult as life can be, how does one change their mindset into a more positive uplifted one?
So there's a couple of options. I always say there's really about three options when it comes to changing your mindset. And we all have different strengths. So for some of us, we can do it on our own and work on, there's self-help books, right? There's a lot of information online now, different apps that help you to learn how to replace your negative thoughts, if you will. Actually the research shows the majority of our thoughts are negative. So we're not replacing every negative thought, but we're working on increasing our positive thoughts. And also when we catch ourselves in those negative thinking moments, how to move and replace those with positive thinking, not the easiest thing to do in the world. It is definitely possible. And again, plenty of research on it, but you can either take that journey on your own or the second option is you can have a trusted friend, family member, colleague, someone that you know for you like motivates you, inspires you, uplifts you and can help you with that process, almost like an accountability partner to help you with your thinking process. And then the third level, and there's no right or wrong, with whatever level you choose, but the third level is you could also utilise a mental health professional to help you with that journey because sometimes negative thinking or thinking you're not good enough or I'm not worthy, I don't deserve joy, all those sorts of things are deeply rooted in trauma. And sometimes it's not enough to have a friend because they can't help you on that level. You need the help of a mental health professional, which is completely okay. Right? So you take that journey and those steps, which are more structured and have the person that connects best with you and can help you on a professional level to work on changing your mindset. So again, those are pretty much the three options. And again, I just want to stress to people listening, there's not a right or wrong. If you're like, man, I can't do this on my own, don't blame yourself. That's okay. For some of you, you're like, you know what, I've tried on my own, this is hard, this is difficult, I'm going to work with a friend or I'm going to work with a mental health professional. That's completely okay. Just celebrate. I most celebrate people who are working, whatever that journey looks like working on being a better version of who you are. That's what counts at the end of the day, because this is going to affect you and all the people around you and your community, which is a beautiful thing.
I absolutely agree on that. And I have to say, I've been someone who's used all three myself in different stages of life and different things. There's definitely been moments and traumas that I needed professional help. And I want to help reduce the stigma around it so much because I know the difference it made in my life. And just a few sessions with a really great trained therapist or counsellor, psychologist, whoever you find, can change your life completely because they can give you such a different perspective, but people still feel there's some stigma around it, right? And that makes me sad because so many more people could get themselves out of difficult spaces with just a little bit of help. And I think that's the message too. I think some people think you have to go to a psychiatrist for the rest of your life, right?
Yeah, for sure. And you're absolutely right. The majority of people are not in therapy for their whole entire lives. That's just not the case. We tend to think of mental health as the most extreme versions of mental health, which actually still to this day, when people think of mental health, they're thinking like extreme bipolar disorder or schizophrenia or hallucination delusions. The majority of people are not in that boat. The majority of people have issues like anxiety or depression or they're going through a divorce or they're going through a loss or grief or struggling at work or struggling with their children or whatever that issue that the vast majority of the population is dealing with at the time, that is the main reason that people typically go to therapy. And a lot of people actually go to therapy or a life coach or whatnot to prevent burnout as well that's ideal. Sometimes I think, well, that's a whole other issue when it comes to the stigma of mental health, but I think unfortunately we're trained to wait until the point where we need a hospitalisation, we're breaking down or falling apart, then go to therapy and it's well no, we could have utilised that service to help us be better cope with the stress more at the beginning of whatever it is that was stressing us out, instead of waiting until now we can't go to work can't function and those sorts of things so it really is not what people think it is. Like you said, there's so many benefits I've been to therapy myself, which was absolutely life-changing. I talk about it in my next book a little bit in my 20s, but it was absolutely life-changing.
I do feel like this whole conversation feeds into what you said earlier, which was about being the best version of yourself. And that doesn't always necessarily mean producing more or being more productive or being more successful. It could be being happy.
Yes, it's so true. We forget about that part. We're so trained and don't get me wrong I think success is important and success is defined differently depending on who you are, but that can be one of the things that's important for you, but your happiness level is important too - is finding the joy for you and what that looks like. You are allowed to have joy. I always say there's no reward out there for burnout, being the most stressed out person, having no time and hating your life. There's no reward for that at all. We don't give trophies for that, right? You are allowed to thrive. You're allowed to be happy. And what that looks like, you're allowed to show up in a beautiful form of yourself for the people around you who need you, and who are counting on you. You deserve that. But it takes you being intentional to get to that person, whatever that version of you looks like, that you want to create.
The title of your book, Dr. Nekeshia, Mindset Training - Conquer your mind and the rest will follow. So what we've been talking about is a bit of training, but what are the, I mean, I suppose the questions you gave us might be a part of it, but what is your secret recipe?
There's a lot of parts to this. I definitely think the biggest thing to think of is like an umbrella, mindset relates to so many parts of your life. So in the book, I talk a lot about what I call holistic self care, meaning how are you doing emotionally, physically, spiritually, mentally, and the book is divided into those parts actually with practical exercise and things for you to think about in your life for you. Because if the goal is to make yourself your number one priority, I hope for everyone reading it that they take the steps that they need to become a better version of themselves, then it really is about how do you work on changing your mindset to make sure that you are working on your mental health, your mental wellness and your self care. Which is something that not all of us have had those conversations growing up. I know for sure I definitely did not, which is why I had to unlearn a lot of things and understanding self care isn't selfish, understanding that this is a benefit for myself and for the people around me. These are things that I learned myself as well. So I share a little bit of my personal journey in the book as well, but also practical things that you can do in each of those areas to improve in those areas of your life.
Can I ask why is this so important to you?
Yeah, at this point, 15 years in, it's almost a moral obligation. I feel like in a good way because I know that I have information that can literally save people's lives, make people's lives better, make people happier, more fulfilled, more productive. So I want to share that with as many people as possible. That's my goal right now. I'm like, how can I reach as many people as possible. I was giving the analogy the other day on another podcast, and this is an extreme example, but if you had the cure for cancer, you're a decent human being, you would want to give, share that with as many people as possible. And while I don't have the cure for cancer, I have information that can prevent burnout, prevent heartache and prevent emotional pain and have people live better, happier lives, then I'm just in a mode of, let me try to share this with as many people as possible because I do think people deserve to have that. And because of my own personal journey, I know what it's like to hit the burnout. And I wish someone had told me earlier, yes, it's fine to do all these things and achievement and all the things, but take care of yourself. I wish someone really deeply had that conversation with me earlier. Honestly, I wish I had that in my teen years which is why I'm passionate about youth as well.
Is it okay with you if we get a little bit personal? I mean, you've mentioned it a couple of times of what you've been through. Would it be okay with you to share with us what that was? And because we get raw on the show, we talk about the base of resilience. There's only one reason we need to be resilient, it's because life happens and we bounce around with it.
So again, I shared a little bit about high school. It was just go, go, go. I was in a very rigorous high school program, in an international baccalaureate program, and it just, everything was school and everything else I was doing, not taking care of myself. Moving into college, I was diagnosed with low blood sugar with hypoglycemia and all I needed to do was just eat an extra snack. Like the doctors were like, okay, eat an extra snack a day because your blood sugar drops very rapidly. Which I did not because that wasn't the mentality to actually take care of myself. Instead I was running myself ragged in all these organisations and doing all things school. And so I would literally get to the point where I would just, I would pass out. And I did that several times just because I wasn't taking care of myself and I remember there was a point, we were in a Walmart or something, I passed out and my boyfriend at the time had to physically carry me out of the store because I was just so drained, so exhausted, blood sugar dropped very low. Thankfully I wasn't hospitalised, but it was just a pattern of, don't take care of yourself because everything else is more important. Fast forward when I started my practice 15 years ago, I started a business, it's a lot of work for a startup, of course. But again, I didn't have yet the mentality of work hard and also take care of yourself. And I got to a point where I was choosing because I have no issues with sleeping, but I was choosing at the time to get like two, three, four hours of sleep on average, which made sense to me. Yeah. It made sense. I was like, hustle hard, sleep later. Yeah, that was my mentality. So I did that and I literally got to the point, I still remember, it was like an Eat, Pray, Love moment, I feel like. I don't know if you've seen that movie, but in the middle of the night, I was praying to God. I was, okay, God, I can't do this anymore. I am so physically exhausted. My son, I think, was like maybe three or so at the time. And I'm like, I am so tired. I need to get sleep. I have to change what I'm doing. Please help me. I literally said that prayer in the middle of the night. When I was up working and doing all these other things. And so it was really, honestly, at that point, I was like, okay, this is not going to work. I want to be a better version of who I am as a mom to my son. I mean, as a business owner, a wife, like all these roles I'm playing, there's no way I can do all of this if I continue on this path, I was definitely on the crash and burn path, which I did hit the burnout.
So really that was, well, my son's almost 12 now, a while back, but at that point I really started just taking a minute, taking a moment, trying to work on mindfulness. I went to different retreats throughout the world, frankly, and doing a lot of inner work, working on how do I better myself, healing through some things and just working on understanding like I can put myself first. So I now have non-negotiables where 95% of the time I'm getting seven hours of sleep, which is healthier, right? Taking care of my diet, making sure I exercise, workout, be in nature, all the things now because of all of that, because I had to unlearn all of that.
Yeah. I think that's so relatable for anyone, especially in the startup phase of business, work hard, and sleep when you're dead, and all that crazy mentality. I mean, it's so, I've said it myself, been there myself. I too prioritise sleep now. But I'd like to know because, thank you for sharing your story and now I'd like to, if you have mine sharing, what's been the benefit of having this big change, this mindset change on you because let people know what the other side is like. I think a lot of people's fear is if I back off, if I don't work hard, I'm going to fail, my business is going to fail, I'm going to lose money, I'm not going to be able to pay the... You know, they have the fears, right? So let's tell them what the other side actually can look like.
Yeah, and I will say from a business perspective, the last couple years honestly have been the busiest, hectic, craziest schedule. So that has obviously not changed, but the change for me is making sure that I'm prioritised. I've reprioritized my life. So the non-negotiables, as I mentioned, are sleep. I'm getting my sleep now, 95% of the time. Making sure that I take care of what I'm eating - I've been working out the last couple of years more than I ever have before, because again, it's about re-prioritizing things. So even though I have a crazy hectic busy schedule, that is non-negotiable because I know I have to take care of my physical health. There's no way I can be on a plane half the time running around doing all the things that I'm doing if I'm not healthy. So, that has changed. And also what's happened, which happens to you when you actually get sleep is you have more clarity. Lack of sleep affects your clarity, it affects your creativity. So I don't have as much brain fog because I'm actually getting sleep.
I'm involved in a lot of different things still, but it is bringing a better version of me to the spaces that I'm in. So that's what excites me the most. So it is, how do I become a better mom? How do I become a better wife? Board member all the roles that I play, but also at the core of it now, I am my number one priority. That's the shift for me. So I have to make sure that I'm taking care of myself so that I can show up in all the other roles I play powerfully. So that's the positive of it. And I feel so much better because I'm actually taking care of myself.
Not to say that I don't have stressful days. Absolutely I do. Like everyone else, there's still days where I'm like, my gosh, there's 500 things and 24 hours, how is this gonna happen? Right? It just happens. There's only 24 hours in a day. But it's a really big shift, healthy shift, very intentional. I'm very intentional in the mornings now. I'm not on Instagram or my email as soon as I wake up. The phone has to wait and I do my gratitude practice and my devotional and the things that I need to do to kind of recenter and set the stage for the day along with my take a minute practices and all the other self-care things that I've implemented now in order to really live a healthier life.
Thank you for sharing that. I think that's really going to help a lot of our audience too. And you've been sharing this message on platforms and networks like NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox on the US side of the world, that hemisphere, speaking from Down Under, and in magazines like Essence and just really getting the message out to the mainstream audience.
How else? What's your big mission? You're clearly on a mission to get this message in front of as many people as you can.
Yeah, I'm definitely on a mission. So obviously, I'm an author, so writing books. Right now, I've been creating some online courses that are going to come out this year, working with corporations, working with organisations, podcasts, of course, but as much as I can, I'm working on finding the outlets for massive output, if you will. It's a calling at this point. It is a mission, like you said, to reach as many people as possible. There's a huge stigma, of course, like you mentioned before, Laura, with mental health and with treatment. And so it's like, how do I reach people? I can't do this alone. Of course, I'm grateful for your platform, for example, and podcasters and all the entities. There's a platform that I'm on as well, Black Women Empowered Incorporated, their Facebook, YouTube and LinkedIn lives every Tuesday, 8 pm Eastern, I'm on there, which has millions of followers. So it's just, like I mentioned, finding ways to reach people globally at this point with this message to make sure you're taking care of yourself, to make sure that you hopefully prevent burnout, but even if you are in that stage that you're getting the help that you need.
Yeah, it's so important. And I just love your mission and being on a mission, I think changes everything in entrepreneurship, because every day you wake up, right, with something powerfully important to do, powerful work, important work, impactful work. I think that's such a great driver for anyone who's trying to figure out maybe what their business should be or what direction they should take. Do you have that passion? Do you have this drive? Do you have some impact you wanna make in the world, even in small ways, every ripple has an effect. You have been amazing so far and I think it might be time to flip the script and give you a little rest from the hot seat and invite you to put Vicki and I in that seat and ask us a question.
Yes, I would love to hear from you all. What do you do in your practice of working hopefully to prevent burnout? So what do each of you do to prevent that as far as your self-care routines and things that you enjoy doing to better yourself as a person?
Okay, I'll start if that's good, Vicki. I'm definitely prioritising sleep these days. As you know, Vicki and I work on two opposite sides of the planet and sometimes we work late into the night. One of us is often up late. And it was taking a toll. I was feeling brain fog and a lot of the things you mentioned. I was probably getting pretty close to burnout, to be honest. So that's a big one for me. I love yoga. Actually, if you read our values page at our website, it's one of the first values Vicki and I came up with was our mutual love of yoga. Yeah, and stretching ourselves, is the metaphor for it, but it's also the practice of movement, self-care, it's mindfulness, as well as physical exercise, it's kind of perfect. And for the mental side of things, I've mentioned on this podcast before, I do some journaling and especially when the mind gets racy. Like you also mentioned the sort of mad journaling where I'm not really trying to edit anything, I'm just writing it out to get it out has really helped me in the past. So those are sort of my top three that I've really helped recently.
I love that. I can learn a lot from you. Maybe start to implement some of that in mine. The question is, what do I do for self care? The first thing I would say is I write down what is in my head as it relates to to-do's. I have an ongoing to-do list. It seems to get longer than not shorter, but that's okay. I'm not stressed about it. At least I know everything that I feel is pressing me is documented and I know where to go to pick up. So that's been my number one stress reliever. Because otherwise there was just a lot of things floating around and feeling pressure and I'd be in the middle of something and it would pop up and say, hey, you haven't done that, you haven't done that. No more, it's all calm in there, it's lovely.
And then the rest of the time I schedule, so I plan around make sure that I'm working enough hours but not too many hours and then we got a puppy a year or so ago and she just changes everything and if there's ever a moment of stress I just go and have a little cuddle or a play and get chewed on and it's fun. Simple things. So I think it's for me about the prioritising. That's what keeps me even.
Yeah, I love it.
Thank you for asking the question. It's a great question. I think we can all be asking ourselves so out there in Podcast Land, check in with yourself. Are you okay? And what is it that brings you mental balance? And yeah, those three questions, I love them. How am I doing? What do I need? And what action do I need to take today to fill my need?
I would love anyone listening to maybe comment. Give us some feedback on that. What are you doing? How are you doing? Let's answer some of those questions and share. Because one thing Vicki and I believe and we mention often is that when you share your story, when you share your light, you allow others to do the same. And it's time to stop stigmas. It's time to stop hiding. It's time to stop brushing things under the rug that we don't talk about in polite company, those days are done and we need to be open and honest and authentic and real because when we are, we help others to do so as well. So conversations like this, I think really helped to do that tremendously. This is very normal. Pretty much everyone gets very close to burnout, if not fully burnout at some point in their life, because it's just almost inevitable with all the stresses of work and life and children and elderly parents but there's definitely things to do to prevent it.
So Dr. Nekeshia, thank you so much. We really appreciate you coming on, to Resilient Entrepreneurs and giving us all that great advice. We'll share in the show notes about your book so that people can get themselves a copy as soon as it's released, very exciting for you and your other books as well. We believe in your mission and we're glad to have the opportunity to give you a little bit of our platform to share it. So thank you so much for joining us.
Thank you so much. Thank you guys for what you're doing also.
