“Why am I doing this again?” Celebrating the positives of being a psychologist

[00:00:00] Hey, mental workers. I'm Dr Bronwyn Milkins, and you're listening to the Mental Work podcast, your companion to early career psychology. On this podcast, we talk a lot about the challenges faced by early career psychologists so that they don't have to face them alone. This means that we do talk about the nitty gritty stuff, exploitative workplaces, difficulties with supervisors, being underpaid, or not paid at all. We haven't focused so much on the positives and at this time of the year, towards the end of the year, You might be forgetting why you got into this profession and what's good about it.

[00:00:42] This is what this episode is all about. The joys of being a psychologist or a mental health professional, the reasons why you keep on going in this profession and why you started. Now many people have many different reasons why they love this work and why they got into it. Some people have their own experiences of mental ill health, and they want to provide people with a service that they didn't receive when they were experiencing those tough times.

[00:01:09] Other people, they have family members or loved ones who've experienced mental ill health and they want to be the professional that they wish that they had. Other people, they're fascinated by the endlessness that is psychology. There are so many areas that you can delve into and so many things to learn. They love the complexity of the human brain, and they love thinking about how humans interact with each other and how to derive their sense of self worth throughout their lifetime. I'm gonna go through some of those personal reasons, and I hope that you can reflect on what your personal reasons are.

[00:01:45] I'm also going to speak to the practical side of it. So what are the predictors of job satisfaction for mental health professionals and particularly psychologists? And then we will round off with some tips for how you can remember these positive things when you are not feeling so great.

[00:02:01] Let's first talk about the sense of purpose that people get from being a mental health professional. This is what often draws people into the field. They're like, I wanna do something meaningful, and the most meaningful thing I can think is helping other people when they are in crisis. I think as psychologists, we're really lucky to be in a profession that people recognize as meaningful and purposeful.

[00:02:24] For me, I believe that you can help people in lots of different ways. I see the graphic designer who helps me with my art as very valuable as well, and they are certainly helping me. But people seem to ascribe some special value to psychology and I think that's accurate because when you think about the work that psychologists do, they sit with people in times of distress, nonjudgmentally, and they hold that unconditional positive regard towards them. It's a very unique offering to be able to sit with someone in their distress and not deflect by talking about yourself or by trying to create a silver lining.

[00:03:03] There's lots of value to being with a person and saying, "That really sucks. I understand why that would be very hard for you, and that makes sense and I'm gonna help find a way to to help you with that".

[00:03:20] I think as psychologists, like, we're all pretty good at this. So it's quite nice to be able to derive a sense of purpose and satisfaction for being able to hold that space with somebody and when I think about the most fulfilling aspects of my work, so I mostly deliver therapy, it is the moments I live for. So it's the moments where somebody says that, "Uh, I had a really moment, and I got that", or "I'm no longer feeling the way I felt two weeks ago I'm feeling like I can get through the day", or "I've really changed my way of thinking about this, and it feels much better".

[00:03:58] So I get a lot of satisfaction from when clients connect the dots, and then they're bringing the thoughts and changes that they've experienced in therapy into their life outside of therapy. Another thing that I really value about being a psychologist is being witness to the wide variety of experiences that humans face. I think before becoming a psychologist, I knew generally that people faced a lot of difficulties in their life, but I didn't know the specifics and being able to witness Some of the hardships that my clients have faced without me having a clue of what that feels like, but being able to find some thread of empathy is hugely rewarding.

[00:04:46] To think that people trust me with this very vulnerable information is also very warming and rather than being discouraged by humanity, because as psychologists, I hear a lot of bad stuff that have happened to people. I'm really bolstered by the courage that humans have in facing difficulties and their strides in being able to overcome them. It actually really gives me hope in humanity and I find that therapy helps me to see the best in people.

[00:05:15] I feel really honored to be working along clients with whatever they want to work towards and to be able to share in their joys when they win, and they just they exceed their own expectations. I also really love it when clients start to think of themselves as I think of them and by that, I mean, I often think of my clients as really amazing people. And sometimes when people experience things like depression and anxiety, they get a bit cloudy about their strengths and who they are as a person and I find that therapy is sometimes a process of coming back to the person, who they are and recognizing that, "hey, I'm a pretty alright person, and I've got some pretty dope strengths in these areas" and I love seeing that.

[00:06:04] All in all, being a therapist is a really powerful job. There's nothing really quite like it even when you think of other allied health professions. Therapists are the only ones who sit with clients specifically to talk about their life, their feelings, their thoughts, their history, for fifty minutes at least and integrate that altogether. We focus on a very specific aspect of the person and themselves and no other profession does that. I think we have to remember that that is very special.

[00:06:39] When we look at the research about how effective psychotherapy is we know that we've helped at least eighty percent of people who have sought our assistance. You might be thinking, oh, only eighty percent, but that's actually massive. In comparison, some medical treatments you'll only be helping two out of ten people. There's another study which has looked at how effective psychological interventions are, and the researchers found that psychological interventions are thirty two times more effective than money at making us happy. Thirty two times.

[00:07:14] That's incredible. So the fact that I can sit in a chair In a room across from somebody and help them to feel better just by holding this space to them it's freaking nuts and also awesome. I would encourage you to think and reflect on the clients who you have helped. Even when I think about administering a questionnaire at the start of therapy and the end of therapy and how often I look at the person's graph, and it has improved dramatically, and I can say to them, "look here above this dotted line that says that you are in the depressy range. Now you're in the probably normal range. How exciting is that?"

[00:07:56] And it's really cool and I would encourage you to reflect on how you contributed to that improvement because I used to disregard this in particularly when I first started out as a psychologist, I'd be like, "Oh, it was just the environment", and I think that's because I read some research that said in a pie chart of what creates change from clients, therapy is pretty small, and it's mostly external factors but I think I took that to heart too much, and I was like, "I do nothing". Whereas now I try and flip it, and I think, look, I did do things to contribute to their improvement.

[00:08:30] Being here and holding space for them was very important. Being a safety net so that they could go off and extend themselves and go outside their comfort zone was important. I helped them to feel like they were seen and they were valued, and that is incredible. So definitely building strong therapeutic relationships with our clients is a huge plus of being a psychologist.

[00:08:54] Another aspect of being in this profession is, like I said earlier, there's so much development and learning opportunities for us to explore. I honestly still feel like I've barely scratched the tip of the iceberg in terms of learning in psychology.

[00:09:10] There's always new aspects to learn that I'm like, "wow, I've never heard of this term", or "I've never known that this existed", and it's a bit daunting, but it's also really exciting. A huge reason why I stay in this line of work as well is because it's very mentally stimulating for me. As someone who is neurodivergent, I have ADHD, it just it's just cool. It it provides a lot of the the dopamine. It gets exciting. I I like talking with people and nutting things out and trying my best to assist them in ways that make sense to them. I find therapy a really cool thing to tailor to people and not deliver cookie cutter approaches.

[00:09:51] I think I'd get very bored if I was doing the same thing with every person, so it's very fortunate that every individual is unique. I encourage you to reflect on what keeps you going in this profession. What are the things that make you smile? What are the things that make you feel proud? When you think back to why you originally got into this, Are you doing what you sought to do? And if sorry, can you give yourself a pat on the back? Because that's freaking awesome. Not everyone enjoys the privilege of being able to engage in meaningful work, but we do, and that's really cool. Okay.

[00:10:30] Let's move on.

[00:10:32] Okay. Let's move on to the practical side. Another one of the reasons why I really enjoy being a psychologist is because it really fits with how I prefer to work. So there has been a study which has looked at the predictors of career satisfaction in psychologists and these are the top predictors of satisfaction.

[00:10:52] Control and sense of autonomy around treatment decisions, work life balance, administrative ease, so not having to worry about paperwork or client payments, and reflection on satisfying work outcomes.

[00:11:05] Outside of psychology, the main predictors of work satisfaction are a sense of autonomy and control over your work, opportunities for growth and development, a fair and competitive salary, a reasonable workload, a flexible schedule, a work culture that aligns with your values and a good work life balance.

[00:11:25] I believe that as a profession, we have the capacity to fulfill most, if not all of these predictors of work satisfaction, and I particularly find that's the case for me in private practice. I get a sense of autonomy and control over my work, which suits me very well. I don't actually think I could survive if I was doing a nine to five grind in an office. And I'm very happy if if that's your jab, of course, but for me, I think just being neurodivergent and being quite creative in my thinking, I need the flexibility to chop and change what I do. When I was employed by someone else, I remember changing my schedule a lot because I was trying to figure out the specific client hours that worked with me and how I was gonna structure my day and I remember emailing my manager being like, "this is the fifth time I've done this. I am super annoying".

[00:12:18] So it's really good to be able to have that autonomy and control over my work. In psychology, we also have the capacity to have a fair and competitive salary. Now underpayment in the psychology profession and the mental health professional as a whole is an issue. We don't get as paid, and we're not as valued in terms of monetary compensation as other allied health professions or other professions where we demonstrably have incredible outcomes for our clients. It's just not in the capitalist thing, we just don't, like, produce the material object. Instead, we are producing people who are happy and fulfilled.

[00:12:57] We definitely have the capacity to earn a fair and competitive salary and that is something that is good about the mental health profession. We also do have the capacity to have a reasonable workload. I've talked about this many times in the podcast, but there is this kind of martyrdom that if you're not sacrificing yourself and your well-being, then you're doing it wrong, and I don't think that is a really good approach to being a mental health professional unless you really wanna burn out and then leave after six months after spending several years training to be a mental health professional. So in psychology, if you can find workplaces where you can have a reasonable workload or you're definitely seeing no more than six clients today, and for an early career psychologist, no more than four to five, and even then, that's tempered depending on the type of client. Like, if you're seeing NDIS clients, it's three to four a day, then that is more likely to lead to job satisfaction.

[00:13:56] Now one of the areas of job satisfaction with psychologists that can be a bit tricky is work life balance and this is partially due to us because we are a very caring folk and sometimes it's really hard to switch off from our clients. We think about whether they're doing okay, are they going to be okay, and we can take that home with us. So it can be difficult to have that home life balance as well as doing our administrative tasks, and that can creep into our home life.

[00:14:28] But, again, I think we, as psychologists, we have the capacity to have a good work life balance and this is something that I'm always working on, trying to engage in hobbies that are outside of work. And working on my own thoughts around being a saviour, and spoiler, I'm not. So I can be proud of what I do provide in my work hours and not have to feel like I need to be "on" outside of it.

[00:14:55] That said, I think it's also really good to be able to talk about your work frustrations and your feelings with trusted others. Now this can be done in peer supervision if you are talking about clients, but you can talk about, like, I had a rough day today, and I'm feeling really spaced out, and I just need to play a video game for an hour. So you absolutely can talk about feelings. Of course, we need to uphold confidentiality and not share any information about clients to people who are not mental health professionals and when you're not engaged in peer supervision.

[00:15:30] Overall, if you are feeling like one or more of these predictors of work satisfaction is not happening for you, consider what you can do. Do you need a bit more control and autonomy around what you're doing in your work? How could you achieve that? Do you need to talk more about the frustrations of your work, or reflect on the satisfying good stuff that you do in your work. Something I'm going to make sure I implement next year as a perfectionist, and I'm sure many of you are as well, let's not deny it, I'm going to start implementing stopping and being proud of myself.

[00:16:07] It makes me feel gross to even say that as a perfectionist, but we all know we need to do it. We all know it's good. So next year, I'm going to make sure that at least weekly, I stop and pause on things that I'm proud of myself for in my workday, and I'm hoping that this will keep the joy alive.

[00:16:25] I wonder what you're going to do to keep the joy alive over the next twelve months. Is it going to be reminding yourself that psychological therapy is a really powerful treatment for mental ill health? Is it going to be remembering that people really value the work that you do and how you make them feel in sessions, and that is unique.

[00:16:45] I know for me, whenever I feel down on the work of a psychologist, I just remember back to my first therapist, and I remember her name. I remember how she made me feel when I was scared, and it gives me a lot of comfort and my hope is that one of my clients can remember me in ten years' time and think of the comfort that I gave them.

[00:17:06] If you wanna share with me why you love being a psychologist, then feel free to message me on the Patreon, or you can send me an email at mentalworkpodcast@gmail.com. I would love to hear the aspects that you enjoy about being a psychologist.

[00:17:23] If you are listening via Spotify, You can also comment on the episode now. Isn't that cool? It's got, what did you think of this episode and you can write a little message there. I would encourage that as well.

[00:17:35] And listeners, this is a wrap for 2023. Thank you so much for listening throughout the year. If you're a new listener, welcome aboard. Next year, we got some cool stuff planned. I've got lots of new episodes, some really cool guests, and I'm really excited to share with you all the information you need to help you along in your early career journey, and I hope that you can stick around. We'll be recommencing episodes early January 2024, but one thing you can do for me is to, one, share this podcast with a colleague. That's the best way that we can get the podcast out there.

[00:18:13] And I would love it if you could write Mental Work a review and do a five star rating. On Spotify, you can do a five star rating. On Apple, you can do a five star rating and write a review. It really helps people to find the podcast. I really wanna get it in as many ears as possible next year.

[00:18:30] Thanks so much again, and I really hope you have an excellent end of the year and that you really get a good rest, some time off, and I will see you in 2024. Catch you then. Bye