• 01 Jul, 2024
• Dr. Heather Drummond

The Proactive Interplay of Mindfulness, Prosperity, and Wellness: A Conversation with Dr. Heather Drummond

Her approach blends care compassion and trauma therapy. Dr Drummond believes in fostering mental health by considering the mind, body, and spirit. So, the core philosophy is that you are not broken. You are in transition and learning. We are thrilled to have her with us today. Please welcome Dr. Heather, Drummond.

Dr. Heather Drummond: Thank you so much for having me. This is such an honor to be invited.

Magazica: In your experience, how can individuals pursue professional success without compromising their mental health and wellness?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Professional success needs to be defined first for each person because there are so many societal and familial expectations of us, and then we sometimes just adopt those as our “should” in life. So, I think that the first thing people need to do is decide for themselves what their why is. Why am I in this industry? Why am I pursuing it in this way, and really kind of examining some of their shoulds?

Shoulds are not a bad thing. They’re only difficult if we don’t examine them. So really think like “I should do this” and “I should do that.” We just need to know why is that our should or is that from our mom, or our dad, or our society, or our faith? There are a lot of messages that come from society, and what we should do. The shoulds that are not our own, or that we haven’t examined are hard to do because it doesn’t align with us.

So, if you want to have a little bit easier path, I’m just saying a little bit easier path to success, it’s really important to be aligned with your shoulds. They still could be aligned with your society, with your culture, with your religion, with your family culture, but they just need to – you need to have some buy-in that they’re also your shoulds, and they fit for your goals.

And so that’s where I would say that in terms of professional success, you’ve got to know your why. Why am I doing this? Because it is hard – school, training, putting yourself out there, networking. It is hard. So, if at least, it’s your why and you should, your own should, then it makes it just a little easier. So that’s where I would start: why am I doing this?

Magazica: How do you see the connection between mindfulness and prosperity? How does practicing mindfulness contribute to both personal prosperity and a healthier lifestyle?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Absolutely. Well, mindfulness in itself is helping you develop awareness. There’s so much stimulus that people deal with day in day like – like sounds, sight, and information from society, and sometimes it just goes unconscious, and we don’t really pay attention. We don’t pay attention to our body signs. We don’t pay attention to our emotional signs. We just don’t pay attention because we just do the things we’re supposed to do in life.

Mindfulness brings us back into this moment right here right now, and your brain loves it, especially if you’re in a safe moment. Your brain loves to feel safe. It doesn’t have to feel so hyper-vigilant. So, mindfulness, in a nutshell, is bringing your mind where your body is over and over and over again, so that we can – our brain can develop that ability to switch between what’s called our default network, future or past, and bring it into this, this direct, experiencing moment.

So, with that, practicing mindfulness, there’s kind of two ways to think about it. There’s like when you actually sit down and practice meditation. I am a meditation teacher, and some days doing a meditation longer than 10 minutes is painful. Some days I could do a meditation for 40 minutes. It really depends. But that’s like the gym, you know, that’s like where you’re really practicing switching the networks in your brain. So that’s like going to the gym.

But mindfulness also can be just in your daily life, like something as mundane as doing your dishes, just being in the moment like the feel of the dishwater, like the scent of the bubbles, like being in that moment over and over again. Your mind wanders, you bring it back into what you’re directly experiencing. This allows us to be a little more aware of our body signs, our emotional signs, that there are moments of peace in our brain that – because sometimes we get into such a busy life, and it just feels like it is – it does feel busy because we’re more in our default network, which is more to the future or more to the past. So we’re keeping the mind busy all the time.

So, mindfulness helps us really get to know ourselves. Kind of what our tells are like, why we feel the way we do in certain moments, or what we’re feeling in certain moments, what we’re feeling in the body in certain moments. So it is such a great way to get your mind where your body is in this moment.

Magazica: What are some common barriers to achieving both prosperity and wellness? And how do you advocate overcoming them?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Well, first of all, I think we also need to define prosperity more holistically. So that’s also where to start. And so again, going back to what’s my why and what are my shoulds – thinking about prosperity in terms of your psychological prosperity, which includes your emotional life as well, as your financial pro-like. So, most people think that prosperity is about finance, finances, and success. But you really can’t get there without, you know, physical well-being, spiritual well-being, psychological well-being because it’s kind of the vehicle that gets you there. And there’s that paradoxical effect. People think if you focus on one thing, that thing will happen. But really, if you focus on all the things, you have a better chance of getting there more successfully.

So, first of all, thinking about prosperity more holistically, that you want to prioritize your mind, body, and spirit, along your path to success, whether it’s financial or whether it’s, you know, achieving certain life goals.

I think if we start with being able to just define what is my definition of prosperity holistically, what am I aiming for? And then there inevitably will be barriers in life, and whether that be financial barriers, or maybe you don’t have, maybe you’re living in a different country away from your family, you don’t have the social supports. Human beings have multiple barriers in their life. And so, if, as long as we kind of know where we’re going and we know what we’re kind of up against, we can then navigate with that.

Like, for example, I didn’t grow up in a family with money. We lived in poverty for a long time, and so I had to pay for my own university education. So my undergrad degree took way longer than everybody else who was able to go 4 years because I had to stop, and I had to work, and I had to make some money, or I had to work full time while I was going to university.

So that’s how I dealt with a barrier. Yeah, so I was born into a situation where my parents didn’t have a lot of money, but I still wanted to go to university, so I knew where I was going. I knew my why, and so, even though it took a long time, it was really important to keep all those aspects of prosperity of where I was going. Why I’m doing it. How do I stay healthy while I’m doing it? For example, I stepped out of university for a year sometimes, so I could make some money because it was just not healthy for me to keep working full time and going to school full time.

Magazica: Could you share how your workshops help participants align their career ambitions with their overall well-being goals?

Dr. Heather Drummond: I think because I worked for a long time with students – and I think students are probably the hardest to convince that they need to really get to know themselves. And it’s not just a singular goal. There are multiple things you need to focus on in your life. So especially because I worked most of my career with post-secondary students, it’s really starting off any kind of workshop or coaching or counseling is kind of what’s in it for you as the individual, so really making it relevant to that person, their lived experience, their developmental stage in life. Because, you know, somebody who’s 20 is very different developmentally than somebody who’s 25. There’s a lot of brain growth that happens at that time.

So yeah, there’s really trying to appeal to someone’s like their current lived experience to get them to buy into understanding their personality a bit better, working with who they are. That’s a tough one because people think that they need to be someone else to be successful when really it’s just like, who am I? What do I like to do? What do I do naturally when I’m not getting paid to do it? What do I do naturally when I’m procrastinating? What am I naturally drawn to? Let’s see if we can harness some of those skill sets just really work with who you are, and that’s kind of how we get around our barriers. Kinda knowing our why, knowing who we are like, and working with who we are is so important.

Magazica: What strategies do you suggest for finding prosperity in one’s career, while also ensuring that these strategies contribute to their overall wellness?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Yeah, especially when I work with students to career professionals – and I work with a lot of healthcare and helping professionals and teachers. I work with a lot of people like that. And so, I’ve worked with compassion fatigue, meaning like people who’ve just – like their whole job every day is showing compassion and empathy. It’s a lot. And so, it’s really again appealing to the person – what’s in it for you because there’s a lot of shame in our society to think about yourself and especially to think about yourself first.

The thing is, though, if you are a helper or a giver, or somehow you are putting out lots for other people, you have to fill your own cup first, and so kind of getting people to shift their thinking around take care of myself so that I can take care of others because there’s that notion of selfishness, or I’m being self-centered, and it’s like – it. Self-care is very important in anything that we do, and it doesn’t – it doesn’t mean selfishness. It just means, that if you know yourself, you know what you need, you can then start to – as you get a little older and a little more experience, you can start to ask for what you need or create scenarios at work, you know, to be able to take breaks in your day, cause you to know you work better if you have even just a 15-minute break from something.

So really going deep on: who am I? How do I function best? Am I a night owl? Am I an early bird? And when do I have most of my energy? What things do I love to do? Because we can also, if you – if you’re more of an introvert – introverted person – if you – and again, that doesn’t mean shy. That just means that they process more internally. They think about things a lot before they put it out in the world. If they have to do a weeklong with people, people, people, people, people, people every day, they need to have carved out some time. It’s a priority for them to fill their social battery back up. So really, it’s without going into a whole 3-day workshop, it’s like who you are. Let’s really work with you – who you are and not have a sense of shame. The goal is you have to take care of this before you can take care of anything else in the world.

Magazica: How can post-secondary institutions foster an environment that supports both student success and well-being?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Absolutely. I’m one of the writers for that CSA standard, and it’s one of the first in the world. And I mean right now we just met in Vancouver to talk a little bit more about what comes next, if we’re going to revamp it a little bit to make it easier for campuses across Canada to implement. And so, we’re still – that’s what we’re going to be doing this year because it was a first of its kind. And with the first of its kind, it’s always a little bit – we don’t know how it’s going to land, so we’ve got tremendous feedback. What’s really cool is that across Canada campuses are very interested in making a mentally healthy campus.

So, there is a commitment there. And so really, I think any university or college has to think about the wellbeing also of the staff, because if the staff and faculty are taken care of, and they’re treated, you know, respectfully, and mental health is also prioritized with the staff, it flows to the students, right? Because the students interact with so many staff and faculty on campus and then start to think about what’s it like to be a student. Also, we’re falling in this developmental age that is very difficult in the brain. That’s the last kind of push till we’re 25 to develop our emotional regulation, our decision-making, and our cognitive flexibility like seeing many options.

It’s like, so we throw a lot of young people into the university and then say, make all the decisions for your whole life. And so, it’s a bit stressful. And so, I think that high-caliber education can be alongside mentally healthy education. And so, whether that’s, you know, really thinking about teaching students who have to do presentations in class, teaching them how to do it, not necessarily removing the presentation because it’s great for humans to push themselves outside their comfort zone a little bit, but to do it – how you get there doing it in a mentally healthy way. Throwing people into the deep end is that, you know, the proverbial saying of just jumping the deep end – not usually helpful for the brain because it freaks out a bit.

So there are many things to think about on a campus like, how things are taught, how they’re delivered, how students interact with professors, how professors interact with students. Can we do things a little bit differently and still keep academic integrity? And I have spent my career working in post-secondary, and also, you know, I’ve gone to school for a long time. I think you can do both quite easily, and academic integrity is not at all harmed. It’s actually bolstered.

Magazica: Can you offer some actionable advice for how our readers can achieve personal growth that leads to both prosperity and wellness?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Yes. Well, I know this sounds – it depends on your lens in the world. Self-compassion is a very important place to start. So it’s – it really grows out of knowing who you are. It takes a while to accept who you are, cause that’s just kind of the developmental arc, you know, as we get to know each other, but really being compassionate toward ourselves, and really starting to celebrate our uniqueness of each human being, regardless of whether they’re part of a family or a part of a culture, a part of other world. We all have our own unique brand. And so, we also get a unique sense of circumstances. So that’s kind of where I start with people. Let’s work with your circumstances, your lived experience, and who you are, and then from there we can calibrate.

You know what our expectations are like. For example, going back to my experience, I would love to have gone to university for straight 4 years when I got out of high school. It wasn’t the life I got. That was not the life I got in this world. So I had to calibrate my expectations. So it’s going to take me a little longer, but I can’t compare myself – that maybe from somebody from a wealthy family who had their life, you know, covered and financially covered and supported to mine. Mine was different.

So I had to do things differently. So that’s a really hard area of coaching to get people to work with who they are, under the circumstances that they have, and kind of calibrate their expectations because there is a social comparison that is very strong in humans, because we are socially connected. And we need those connections. But we also compare how well we’re doing compared to others. And so, I do – I have to kind of blend sometimes coaching with psychotherapy, to kind of help with those pieces.

Cause if we could – just because the thing is I could – I could have said, “Nope, I can’t do a university degree. I didn’t get that life.” I could have just stopped, but then I wouldn’t be where I am doing what I absolutely love for the last 28 years, working, you know, in mental health. And so we – where are you going? I always ask people, where are we – where are you going? And we got to calibrate with your life, and who you are on, how we’re going to get there.

Magazica: In your view, how can we use technology to enhance our prosperity while also safeguarding our health?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Okay. First of all, I’m just going to make a big statement. I love technology. I think technology, it’s fantastic. It’s – but I think the problem is because it’s so fantastic, people are very drawn to it, and I mean, the brain is very drawn to it. We get a dopamine response when we get rewards. I mean, it’s a lot of good stuff. It’s just using it more as a tool and an extension of ourselves, which means we have to intentionally put it down once in a while. Do a tech detox like you said you go out to Gananoque, the 1000 Islands. I’m sure at that time you’re in nature, you’re doing a tech detox. You’re not answering emails of students that you’ve been answering all semester.

Getting back to this brain is about – scientists think at this version is about 35,000 years old. It loves nature and social connection. It’s used to exercise. So there’s the things we like – we do need to get ourselves back into nature. We do need to get ourselves a break from technology. Absolutely. So it’s just – but it’s intentional.

Well, humans are not crazy. Humans are not broken. We just – this brain really does respond to the current environment in a way that it knows best 35,000 years ago. Hence loneliness. We’re wired for social connection because that is a big part of our survival. If we got kicked out of our social group, we literally could die, right? You know, when we were more nomadic as human beings.

So, we’re still wired, and that fight or flight response it was – it’s really good in our modern-day if you’re about to get hit by a bus. It isn’t great, you know, just for a deadline for work, or that that sense of shame that you’re – you’re going to be shunned from the – fired from your job, kicked out of a social group, so forth. It’s not necessarily the best fit for our modern society. The beautiful part of the human brain is we can override that. It’s just a lot of work like going to the gym. I would love to be just amazingly fit from one time going to the gym. But that doesn’t work. I have to be diligent about my physical health as well mental health. We need to start looking at it that way.

We also don’t know as much about mental health as it’s – as it appears, the way we talk about it. There isn’t, I mean, the Diagnostic Statistical Manual, which is kind of like the manual for Mental health. It’s still very subjective. It’s based on whether I think somebody’s functioning and or whether a test thinks somebody’s functioning so honestly in my own practice. I just want to know someone’s story, how they made sense of it, and what they did with it.

And that’s – that’s a more modern way of starting to look at our mental health a little bit more like we react to our environment exactly how we’re supposed to. It can be so painful, though, when our brain gets into a depressed state or an anxious state. But it was supposed to be painful so that we could get out of the state – that’s evolutionary function. So your brain is doing what it’s supposed to do. And there are lots of amazing things in this world. Your social connections, work that you’re passionate about, or feel like you can handle your family support. So you don’t always have to just go to a therapist. I mean, therapists are amazing. But it’s – there’s so many things being in nature, detoxing from technology, exercise, healthy eating. This – this whole body is connected to the brain as well. So, we have to look at ourselves more holistically.

Magazica: What self-care strategies do you recommend that not only nurture health but also contribute to one’s prosperity?

Dr. Heather Drummond: Well, I think that first and foremost, as you said, we need to look at our mind and our body, our brain, and our body as connected because it’s – we’re not – our brain is not separate from the body. We’re very aware of it. When we look at another human being, it’s all connected. We have to think of our brain that way. There’s a common narrative that you know, mental illness, mental disorder. There’s a lot of discussion and contention within my field on whether we should do the medical approach or whether we should do other approaches. More biopsychosocial approaches.

So, really starting to – self-care has to start from your mindset around mental health. You’re not broken. You’re reacting to your environment and being curious. So that’s where mindfulness comes in – being curious about it. Wow, like, I’m getting a lot more tension headaches, or I’m really feeling like, I can’t think through things like I – I don’t have a lot of clarity. I’m feeling my – my chest is really tight all the time, like more of like a fight or flight, or an anxious response, like just being curious because you’re – you’re reacting consciously or unconsciously to your environment. Your brain is doing exactly what it should be doing.

So I think, starting with that – that mindfulness paying attention to how your – your tells. I always call – my call to my clients. Your tales – like if you’re frustrated. Well, what’s that about? You know there’s – something is going on for you, and I talk a lot about primary and – yeah, there’s a story that – that gets there. And so, knowing that this brain is about 35,000 years old, it’s still very evolutionary. And it reacts to things to keep you alive.

So yeah, it’s threats assessment all the time. Is this going to hurt me? Is this going to hurt me? But the beautiful part of how this brain – it’s very adaptable. It hasn’t evolved very much, but it’s very adaptable. And so, what I try to tell people or work with people is that you just have to commit yourself that you will live a balanced life, that prosperity means more than money to me. I will examine my shoulds. I will know my why.

And there’s this really cool technique by Dr. Rick Hanson. Amazing Neuropsychologist. He – he wrote – he wrote the book Hardwiring Happiness, and I would say of all the books I could recommend, that is very kind of client-centered easy, and approachable to read. I would recommend Hardwiring Happiness. He has this technique, called HEAL.

Have a positive experience. Enhance the positive experience. Absorb the positive experience. Link the positive experience. And what that does beautifully is, it helps our brain that just wants to do the negativity bias like what’s wrong – looking for threats. It helps us wire in the positive. That’s why sometimes people can get very tunnel vision. All they see is the terrible things – the human brain does that well because your brain is trying to keep it hyper-vigilant.

We got to wire in, and it’s hard work. But after a while, once you’ve had a positive experience, and then you enhance it, meaning you could just sit with it, recall it, enhance it like, who was there? What did it sound like, what did it smell like? What – what – how did I feel like? Bring in all the information. And then, when I – I lead clients through the – the absorbing part, and I get them to walk around in it, just walk around in it, and then see and see if you can see it from different angles. You’re just living in this experience. And then sometimes it doesn’t – I don’t always do this part. It depends on where they’re at. I link it to a negative experience because the negatives are there already. So we want to wire it together. And so essentially, you bring up the negative experience and then shift back to the positive.

Bring up the negative one, shift back to the positive a couple of times, and then what ends up happening is whatever in our brain fires together – neurons that fire together wire together. So basically, what you’re trying to do is the negative’s coming up anyway. So, you may as well have some positive that comes up with it. So our life lens is a little bit more holistic. And so that’s essentially self-care, being in nature, exercising, eating well, that keeps pulling your life lens out so that you see more than just the threat assessment.

Magazica: Thank you very much for joining us today, Dr. Drummond.

Dr. Heather Drummond: So wonderful to be here.