How to Change Your Life One Tiny Step at a Time

[00:00:00] Rachel: What do you do to unwind after a long and difficult day? Is it a glass of wine and a takeaway or an hour scrolling Instagram? When we’re pushed to the limit, getting quick dopamine hits. Seem to be the easiest thing to do. But we know how small improvements can compound over time. And my guest this week is living proof. So in today’s episode, I’m speaking with Dr. Hussain Al-Zubaidi, the RCGP lifestyle and physical activity champion, who went from being diagnosed with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease in his twenties to losing 30 kilos, to competing as a triathlete.

[00:00:34] Rachel: Hussain shares some really practical tips that will help you find tiny, tiny changes that will help you to rescue your time, help you practice that necessary care, even if you’re stuck in overwhelm

[00:00:46] Rachel: If you’re in a high stress, high stakes, still blank medicine, and you’re feeling stressed or overwhelmed, burning out or getting out are not your only options. I’m Dr. Rachel Morris, and welcome to You Are Not a Frog

[00:01:05] Hussein: My name’s Hussain Al-Zubaidi. I’m a GP based in Warwickshire and I have a portfolio career including the Royal College of GPs Lifestyle and Physical Activity Champion, as well as the Lifestyle Medicine course lead at Red Whale and Parkrun’s health partnerships lead. I have a few other roles outside of that, but those are my core ones.

[00:01:27] Rachel: I’m sure we’ll get to those, those other roles. So Hussein, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. I’m really interested to explore your story, so I’d love to hear how you got into all of this. How did you become like the Parkrun lead and the RCGP lifestyle champion? Have you always been into fitness, healthy living and all that, that sort of thing?

[00:01:49] Hussein: So quite simply, I haven’t always been into fitness. And in fact, when I think about my younger years and going through school and university, you know, movement, physical activity, the exercise was not only something I didn’t do, but I actively hated. Um, you know, like I, I used to despise people running. Like I wouldn’t even give them way when I’d be driving. Uh, and it was raining, just ’cause I just didn’t understand why they were doing it. I thought it was a waste of time and energy.

[00:02:18] Hussein: It wasn’t until I was, you know, on a hospital bed essentially with an ultrasonographer who had just told me that I had the, the fattest liver that he had ever seen, that it sort of gave me the wake up call that at, you know, in my mid twenties to be already diagnosed with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, I thought something wasn’t right. And, and I started to explore and try and understand why I’d gotten myself in that situation.

[00:02:49] Hussein: And as part of that journey, movement was a key element to help reverse the changes that were going on there. And, and although my first priority was correct this issue of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, what I learned on that journey and that process was the benefits were far wider than that.

[00:03:09] Hussein: And now, looking back on it, I’m glad I went on that journey. Not because of improving my liver’s health, but just improving my life, you know? And the way that I enjoy life and, and I get things out of life. And if I’m being honest, if I didn’t have something as, as dramatic as that, I don’t know whether I would’ve ever made that change. I think I still wouldn’t be letting runners across the road, even in the rain.

[00:03:32] Rachel: What were you doing when you, when you had that scan? What, what role were you in at that point in your career?

[00:03:37] Hussein: So that was junior doctor role. So I went straight into medicine. I didn’t do sort of a graduate entry program and like, it really does propel you into life just so quickly. You know, I, I think in my mind, I, I was still a child. I think I was still a teenager, probably in my head because I hadn’t done anything kind of serious.

[00:03:56] Hussein: And I just found it really stressful, not, not just sort of the latter years of medical school, but just taking on all this extra responsibility. I felt quite alone and isolated, and I used a lot of the things that I know now, sort of certain lifestyle behaviors just to cope. Whether it was, um, you know, going out with friends and potentially not eating or consuming the right things there, or just eating takeaways or foods that gave me kind of pleasure in the short term, but were, were causing harm in the long term.

[00:04:27] Hussein: And, you know, before I knew it, I, I developed certain behaviors and traits over a number of years, which had completely changed, you know, who I was, not just visually in that I gained a lot of weight, but just my behavior as well. You know, when, when I think back and, and a lot of the comments that my friends and families were saying, in a nice way, they were trying to let me know that, you know, I, I was, I was starting to head in the wrong direction.

[00:04:52] Hussein: But it only took sort of that realization of the diagnosis for me to sort of actually reflect and realize that I’d, I’d come a long way and I wasn’t heading in the right direction, and I needed to make a course correction.

[00:05:05] Rachel: And in terms of your career, were you, were you sort of very, very focused on, on success or were you not that bothered about career at that point?

[00:05:13] Hussein: I think that was my main priority. I think everything that I did at university and in my early career was I wanted to seem successful and I wanted to be successful.

[00:05:23] Hussein: You know, like my, my parents were very academically focused and throughout my, um, schooling, always pushed me to try and achieve the best, you know, at the real neglect of anything like physical activity.

[00:05:38] Hussein: You know, I remember once when I was in primary school, I think I was year three and I’d, I joined the local football club ’cause I wanted to try and play a bit of football. And I’ve never been in more trouble in my life. You think, so most kids get in trouble for like, you know, doing something wrong. You know, like I remember it was days where my parents wouldn’t speak to me because they just thought, you know, he’s neglecting his, his studies, he’s neglecting his focus that, you know, all I wanted to do is play a bit of footie with my,

[00:06:06] Rachel: Year

[00:06:07] Hussein: with my friends. So going through uni, you know, I’ve really pushed myself and I, I I achieved very well. You know, if you looked at the results and kind of what I was doing, you know, I was achieving fantastically, you wouldn’t think that this person physically is, you know, slowly falling apart because of how he’s trying to get to that result. And in fact, going on this journey of, of reducing a lot of the pressure that I was putting on myself academically, reducing a lot of the key workload and, and responsibilities actually had the opposite effect than what I was trying to achieve. I thought I’d have to let go of a lot of those kind of career ambitions and pushing myself from an academic standpoint. But it’s done the opposite. In fact, it’s, it’s just given me the head space to be a lot more creative.

[00:06:52] Hussein: I find that when I’m, I’m trying to apply myself at work, I can do so far more productively and in far more sort of focused and, and intelligent way. When before I think I was just, you know, putting absolutely everything just to try to get that goal and it wasn’t very efficient. Yes, it was getting results in some respects, but it was doing that at the neglect of my own health and the other priorities of life.

[00:07:16] Rachel: And I know when we spoke before the podcast, you told me that as soon as you focused on, yeah, how do I make my life easier rather than how do I become very, very successful, that was what actually made you successful and that was what I’m so fascinated by.

[00:07:34] Rachel: Because we hear, hear all this leadership stuff around, you know, how to be more productive, how to do this, how to have better conversations and all that. And, and that’s all well and good and we talk about that a lot on this podcast. But it’s something that I have realized pretty recently and pretty late in life, which is really annoying to myself because I’m now maximizing on the self-care. And I did a podcast recently about, you know, I was pretty close to burnout earlier on this year. And since putting the self-care in a, I feel a lot better. But b I’m actually getting more done and I’m, I’m more productive.

[00:08:11] Rachel: But it’s this very, very weird, it, it’s this paradox, isn’t it? And the way we’ve been brought up and everything in us, as medics says, work harder, work harder. That’s how you achieve more, that’s how you’ve been more successful. And like there’s a little boy in year three not being allowed to play football. No wonder that’s the mindset that you had. Right?

[00:08:31] Hussein: A hundred percent.

[00:08:32] Rachel: What else do you think in our training and in the way that we work contributes to that mindset?

[00:08:39] Hussein: You know, like, I think we always feel that if we work harder, we’ll get more. And that’s just not the case. You know, it wasn’t the case for me. In fact, like if we work smarter and actually work on the tool that is going to get us the results, which is ourselves, then you’re gonna get further.

[00:09:00] Hussein: You know, I, I often use the analogy with colleagues and patients of a bicycle in the sense that, you know, I actually have two bikes in my garage. One is a bike that I absolutely rag, you know, it’s like my commuter bike. I’ll just go anywhere on it. I give it no love. I haven’t lubricated it for God knows how long. I haven’t changed the tires for God knows how long.

[00:09:20] Hussein: And I have another bike, which is my, my pride and joy. You know, it’s, it’s carbon fiber, it, it gets more love than even myself or probably even anyone else. And if you asked me to ride a hundred kilometers on each of those bikes, same person, same fitness, I would be able to do it far quicker on the bike that I’ve given a hell of a lot of love to.

[00:09:41] Hussein: And it’s a far more effective tool to get anything done, whether it’s climbing a mountain, covering a hundred kilometers or reaching a top speed. And that’s the same case for ourselves. You know, I’m more able to complete that project, that task, that busy day. If I myself am the well-oiled bike rather than the bike that’s been absolutely ragged. Done far more miles, it’s done far more miles than the, uh, than the nice bike, but it’s not as effective.

[00:10:12] Hussein: And for me, when I was looking and I was making these changes, I didn’t do it with that in mind, but I just quickly realized that the work that I was doing was just to a far higher quality. I wasn’t doing it in two weeks because I just wanted to rush it out and get it done. I was taking a bit more time, but the quality was far, far better. And it was starting to get noticed. It was starting to get rewards and acknowledgements. And that motivates you, but it also helps with that career progression. And a number of the roles that I have gotten, and these are dream roles that I absolutely adore doing, you know, it’s in things that I’m really passionate about, they’ve all come about because of, I’ve been noticed with some of the work that I’ve done.

[00:10:54] Hussein: And if I’m being honest, if I’d done them with the previous mindset, then they just wouldn’t have had the same effect because I just would’ve done that. Yes, to try to do my best. But as we always trying to squeeze it around, not giving it the, the real thought and care that we should give,

[00:11:14] Rachel: I completely agree with that, but I have some yes buts going on in my head. Because I think, you know, presumably this diagnosis came when you were sort of just finishing up being a junior doctor and moving into GP training and stuff like that. There’s an awful lot to get done. You’ve gotta do a lot of surgeries, you’ve gotta do your exams, you portfolios, and then you become a GP and there’s a lot of work to do. And if you’re a partner, there’s all the extra partnership stuff.

[00:11:38] Rachel: And so it’s a bit of a paradox saying, well, you’ll perform better if you look after yourself, but there is so much you’re not gonna be successful unless you get that stuff done that you need to do, which then gives you no time to look after yourself. So how did you navigate that?

[00:11:53] Hussein: If I’m being honest, it’s hard, hard decisions. You need to start really reflecting on both the small and big decisions when they come upon you. You know, often we want to be helpful. We want to look to seem like we are being productive. But what you need to do is decide what is really important, what’s kind of important, and what potentially can be left to one side regardless of how painful leaving that to one side is. So there may be some fantastic opportunities that you’ve had to accept that you’re not gonna take it up right now.

[00:12:31] Hussein: And I think it’s that constant feeling that another opportunity will never come. But if we just focus on achieving things that are within our sphere of influence at this time, and really making tough decisions on potentially leaving really good opportunities that have come at this point in time, to focus on doing what you can do right now to the best of your ability, I promise you those opportunities will come again.

[00:12:57] Hussein: And one of the key things I did was reduce my sessions. I’ll be totally honest. I reduced the amount that I was earning quite significantly. In fact, I, I probably reduced about 40%. Um, so my paycheck reflected that. But at the beginning I thought that that just wasn’t achievable ’cause I wasn’t exactly rolling in money. You know, I didn’t feel like, uh, I, I, I had that much finances to spare, but then as soon as I adapted my lifestyle to accept that I was gonna be earning less, it didn’t negatively impact my quality of life.

[00:13:29] Hussein: Yes, I was buying different things and I was spending my time doing different things. But just that time, that space to not feel like I have further responsibilities and, and to be able to focus it on myself, to do things like sleep, to, to do things like spend time with friends and family, that was worth every pound that I’d lost.

[00:13:51] Hussein: And it enabled me now, whenever I think about how I undertake work, a key part of it is like, what’s gonna be the worth to me of that work? Not just financially, I want it to ensure that it can allow me to work the hours that I want to do rather than have to do. And also the work that I’m doing, does it reward me outside of that financial impact? Does it make me feel excited? Does it push me in a certain way?

[00:14:18] Hussein: So I think when it comes down to it is it’s really difficult decisions. You know, I’ll be lying to say that it’s really easy, you can just reduce this and then you’re suddenly gonna be able to get what you want. I had to say no to things that I really wanted to do that were financially really great. And it’s by saying no to those things that it enabled me to be able to be on a kind of a platform that allowed me to feel strong, rather than constantly chasing my tail. ‘Cause it was just the worst feeling of constantly having things to do. Don’t get me wrong, we’re busy people. We’ll always have things to do, but that list, it needs to feel manageable. That treadmill speed that you are walking on needs to feel like it’s something you can maintain rather than constantly hoping that it’s gonna get better.

[00:15:02] Hussein: ‘Cause that was the other thing I was doing, you know, I was constantly thinking, oh, do you know what? It’s a busy month. Let me just smash through this ’cause it’s gonna get better. December’s better. I remember my wife just admitting to me one day going Hussein, december never comes. It never comes. You keep saying this and it never comes. And, and, and she was totally right. It was, she was totally right. And unless I make changes right now and say no to things that I desperately wanted to do, it wouldn’t change. And I’m grateful that that’s the case.

[00:15:29] Hussein: And it, and as time goes on, you become better at saying no. Um, you, you just realize that, do you know what another opportunity’s gonna come if you keep applying yourself in the right way and doing what you can do more opportunities come.

[00:15:39] Rachel: So what did you say No to?

[00:15:41] Hussein: I eventually said no to a partnership that I was in. So a really well-working partnership at a practice, um, that I’m still at, uh, in, in a different role that I really enjoyed, I enjoyed that partnership. There were a great set of partners doing fantastic work, but at the end of the day, I just, for me, and with the position that I was in and the work that I needed to do on myself, I had to say no to that. I had to move away from that and, uh, allow myself the space. And it was difficult.

[00:16:13] Hussein: And it probably took about five months of deliberating, of discussing with my closest friends and family. And even when I sent that email and wrote that letter, I still, a huge part of me did not want to leave. And looking back on it now, I’m so glad that I did, you know, not because there was anything wrong with that role. Because it just wasn’t right for me and what I needed to do .

[00:16:40] Rachel: I guess it becomes a virtuous cycle, doesn’t it? That once you say no once, and then it feels like it, it really benefited you, it gives you a bit more permission to say no again, and, and then it like becomes a real, a real habit. And it sounds like you’ve really nailed the criteria that you use to say yes or no. What, what criteria would you say you use to weigh up a decision about, should I do this? Should, shouldn’t I do this?

[00:17:03] Hussein: Yeah, I’ve definitely massively improved. I, I, by no means have nailed it though, if I’m being honest. I don’t think anyone can. And what often happens is I go through cycles where, you know, I’ve done really well, made those tough decisions, and then things start seeping in. And then you start to realize, oh, wait a minute, I’m starting to carry a bit too much baggage as I like to call it. And then I then have to do another sort of mini purge. But I, I luckily, I haven’t had to do this sort of major purge that I had, that I did back at the beginning.

[00:17:30] Hussein: But the, the criteria is, is one, when it comes to paid work, like. Is it financially gonna allow me the space to not work at other times? Does that make sense? You know, like we don’t often need as much financially than, than we get. And that was my first lesson in trying to actually lean my lifestyle to a point where I didn’t have to earn huge amounts of money to maintain it. So I, I very much changed my behaviors to, to mean that, I can reduce the responsibility that financially work brings. So the work that I do, do I wanna make sure does, is it financially rewarding?

[00:18:07] Hussein: The other element is what I’m taking on, does it fuel me beyond money? Does it fuel me to keep motivated? Does it fuel me to push me actually outside of my, my boundaries of, of what I feel I can do?

[00:18:23] Hussein: And then the final, and I think most important element is will this role, will this responsibility, will this task that you’ve taken on, is this gonna make a difference in five years time? So once this, this is done and you’ve done what you needed to do, or potentially you’ve maintained it, how does it change things in five years? And I think that’s been a really important element because as I’ve seen my career progress to, um, where it is now, often it’s been because I’ve taken on tasks that actually were completely voluntary, i, I got no money for, but they’ve enabled me to get me where I am now.

[00:19:02] Hussein: And I think that’s the key because yes, you need to be financially safe. Yes. You need to be pushing yourself from a academic or creative standpoint. But there needs to be thought about where do you wanna get to because you can’t make those steps.

[00:19:16] Hussein: For example, the Parkrun role, I couldn’t have just walked into that Parkrun job. I had to make certain steps. And a lot of them, you know, a hundred percent unpaid in order to get there. So you need to have that, that, that sort of thought ahead and build those building blocks in early. So therefore, when you’re doing these tasks, they have meaning. I go, yes, look, you know, this is taking up time at the moment, but it’s getting me to an end goal, which I want to try and do. And I want that role because I know the influence that it can have on what millions of people essentially. So I’d really think about those kind of three criteria when you are deciding on taking on responsibilities.

[00:19:52] Rachel: Do you think people use money as an excuse?

[00:19:55] Hussein: Often. Yes. Often yes. And I remember when I was leaving the partnership and I was changing kind of what I was doing, the work, the amount of my friends that said, you’re mad. Like how are you going to survive off, you know, this massive reduction in your income. How are you going to, maintain X, Y, Z?

[00:20:14] Hussein: And, and in reality, I think often we, we kind of always live to our means and we often create a lifestyle which matches the earnings and sometimes potentially even a bit more than what our earnings are which, which forces us to make decisions that may not be right for our happiness, may not be right, for our health, may not be right for those around us.

[00:20:39] Hussein: And what I found by reducing my need for a certain set of earning, by trying to live a different lifestyle, that was a lot leaner from that respect, it just gave me that freedom. It reduced that pressure that I needed to maintain. And yes, it means that I moved to a smaller house. Yes, it means that I sold my Mercedes, uh, for a Mazda, but at the end of the day, I’m, I’m so glad I did. Those things were giving me short-term reward, but in reality, they weren’t making me the person I wanted to be. They weren’t giving me reasons to get up in the morning.

[00:21:18] Hussein: So yes, they’re hard decisions and yes, it can seem like you’re going backwards. And I think even to certain members of my family who are kind of just so academic and career focused, they thought, oh God, Hussain really has gone backwards, you know. But when I see where I am now. I’m actually more financially secure than before.

[00:21:36] Rachel: They do say that, um, freedom of time in good health is, is the ultimate wealth, don’t they? And, and what you’ve illustrated about how you have bought, you’ve used finances to get freedom of time or you, you’ve not tied yourself into getting certain amount of money or you’ve not exchanged masses amounts of your time for money, and actually you could have had that free time off, not had the money.

[00:21:59] Rachel: And, and I was listening to podcasts recently about free fun, about actually the, the fun that people seem to enjoy the most is stuff that comes for free anywhere, like having a laugh with your mates. That is free, isn’t it? And we, yeah, I’ve just been on a, a lovely holiday and it was a really nice hotel and stuff, but I got quite used to it by the end of the week. You get hedonistic adaption, don’t you? No, not he hedonic adaption. I think that’s the phrase. Like your Mercedes, you probably loved it for the first month, then it just became like, it’s my Mercedes. And yes, it’s nice to have a nice car, but a Mazda does exactly the same job, you know. And how many extra sessions would you have to work to get the Mercedes versus the other thing?

[00:22:37] Rachel: So I think this, this thing about money, we use it as an excuse and then we can get ourselves trapped into the lifestyle.

[00:22:44] Hussein: And it’s a taboo topic as well. It is a taboo topic to talk about. And often, like I’ll see friends, uh, and other colleagues and other GPs that, they’re making financial decisions that I just know is gonna tie them into a lot of responsibility and a lot of stress. But I feel unable to really be able to talk to ’em about it in a, in a just an open and, and, and kind of honest way and just discuss things, you know.

[00:23:10] Hussein: These things, it just, it’s very taboo to talk about and I think that we should speak about it more because we get no training really on how to finance our life. Such an important thing. And, and it is important not just for us, but for those around us and the people that we’re responsible for.

[00:23:29] Rachel: And most of us have no idea what we need to live and we have no idea what we spend. And it’s just like the end of the moment. This is sort of this finger in the air thing. And Tommy and Ed from Medics Money, they are absolutely brilliant on this. So we’ve, I’ve done some podcasts, so then they’ve, Tommy’s done, some for, for us just about thinking about what’s the value of your time and actually having a budget.

[00:23:50] Rachel: And when you think about it, you actually do need a lot less often than you spend. And I, I, my one advice for, for sort of, I guess, younger doctors is I, I remember a, a younger doctor talking to me about, um, deciding what school to send her kids to. And they had some really good options, like locally, really good state, state school options. And she thought, well, we might as well ’cause things we’ve got into the private, might as well do it. And I’m like, you’ve got three kids and your other half wasn’t in a really high paying job. Think about what you are now tying yourself into for the next 15 years.

[00:24:25] Rachel: So there are those, there are those things that we, we can, and there’s no judgment around this, no judgment whatsoever, whatever you choose to spend your money on. But I always come back to freedom of time in good health. That is, that is the real wealth.

[00:24:39] Hussein: Yeah, I think that’s so important. ‘Cause like every decision in this, there’s no right or wrong. You know, everyone will have different set of circumstances will mean that a different decision is right for them. But what they need to also think about is not just the outcome of spending that money, but what’s the outcome of not. What are the benefits for potential? For example, let’s just use that example of that family of having more time to spend with each other and the growth and the development that that will have on the child, compared to the child goes to a great school, fantastic. But do they see their parents or are their parents constantly working? And when they see their parents, are their parents stressed? Are they able to give them the time and, and the energy? So all these kind of things, it’s so important.

[00:25:19] Hussein: I remember when I looked at my own finances and I was making cutbacks, I couldn’t believe the stuff that I was paying for, something I didn’t even realize I was still paying for it. And it wasn’t until I just brought an Excel sheet, it was like, okay, what are the things that I have to pay for unless someone’s coming to the door to, to sort myself out? And, and I actually found out that a good chunk of what I was spending were things that I no longer was really using. And if I was using, I wasn’t really getting much from it.

[00:25:46] Hussein: And it’s, it’s now that whenever I look to spend again, I always go back to this Excel sheet and just go, okay, look, what am I gonna get out of it? What do, how do I maximize, if I do spend my money on it, how do I really maximize the outcome from that? And it’s about having that thought process always going through, because I know that it’s not just about spending money, but it’s the impact that that does on the time and space in your life. That is also a commodity that you should measure rather than just the bank account.

[00:26:16] Rachel: The problem is, and I’m gonna challenge you back here, is that it sounds like you had this wake up call in your late twenties. And while obviously nobody would, would, would wish health problems on anybody, you say it actually was good for you in terms of it made you change your life. What advice would you give to people like me? I’m about to turn 50 next year. I can’t quite believe that’s happening.

[00:26:37] Hussein: can I.

[00:26:38] Rachel: I know. I’m so young looking. Okay. But I’ve got, you know, three kids and my kids are at, you know, school, university, you know, we’ve got mortgage. Um, lots of people my age are in partnerships, maybe leading partnerships. PCN directors, clinical directors in hospitals. So, a lot of financial responsibilities. But even if they got their finances totally sorted out, which I believe that people, that people can do that with a bit of, a bit of, you know, let’s just cut out that skiing holiday, let’s not do this, you know. You can make it work.

[00:27:08] Rachel: So if you’ve got that sorted out, there are other things stopping you, like the responsibility you feel to your, to your practice, to your colleagues and just feeling that you, you’ve got to do it all. And I guess when you did your change, you were just coming up through that and yet made a decision not to, not to be the partner, but what can people do who are in that position and who thinks, well, I would love to do any of that, I’d love to have that mindset, but I just can’t ’cause I’ve got so many responsibilities to employing all these people, perhaps?

[00:27:36] Hussein: I think first message is that, you know, it doesn’t matter what point or what stage you are, I think focusing and, and refocusing potentially on, on not just your health, but the health of those around you. It’s something you should do at, at, at any age, regardless. ‘Cause there are, it’s not just the long-term benefits here, there, there are short-term benefits and kind of relief that you can get by just reducing that burden.

[00:28:01] Hussein: Now, the ability for, from person to person of how much weight you can essentially shed. I’m not talking about weight on the weighing scales, I’m talking about weight of responsibility. That varies and I think we have to be totally open and honest with ourselves that for some of us it can be really challenging to, to, to shed significant bits of responsibility and, and for others, maybe potentially a bit easier. I think I was lucky. I think I was, because I was, I was, I was far younger and I had other options. It was easier to shed that, but still felt very difficult at the time.

[00:28:33] Hussein: Now if you do feel like you’re in that camp where those kind of key responsibilities are very difficult to share and maybe you don’t want to, maybe you want to, uh, stay in, in those kind of high pressure, high stress roles, then really consider even the small things. Because it can be even tiny little decisions if stacked up upon each other over time, that can make a difference. And for many of us, it’s about trying to go below a threshold point. You know, for me, I know that there’s a certain threshold that when I go over things start to present themselves when maybe I’m a bit more irritable, maybe I’m, uh, less compassionate, et cetera. And so it’s about being aware of that fresher point.

[00:29:14] Hussein: So it may be for you that you just need to make lots of little decisions that may seem insignificant, but they help. And if I could just use an example, I had a friend of mine who has two kids in fact, but one of them’s four, and has joined the football club, unlike me. But, um, he was asked by his, uh, kids’ football team if he would be up for coaching and, and, and, and supporting them., ’cause he was a pretty decent footballer himself. And he said yes, and he didn’t even think about it. And he told me later, he goes I’m really annoyed that I’m, I said yes because I have no time. You know, like I’m, I’m, I’m working eight sessions, I’m doing out of hours. I’m, you know, doing X, Y, Z and, and I don’t have time to do this coaching. But then, you know, he asked and I wanted to be helpful and it’s my kid’s club. And, and I didn’t wanna say no.

[00:30:06] Hussein: And so now he, he’s doing something that, don’t get me wrong, he enjoys, he likes coaching and he loves obviously doing it where his kid does it. But actually that was the wrong decision for him. And it was a discussion that I had with him a few times, and eventually he made the realization that he had to say no and, and, and give that role back. And it was the right decision for him because now he’s got that space and that bit of time and, and that just put him over the edge. So it’s little things like that.

[00:30:33] Hussein: And, and it may be that it’s about taking decisions going forward rather than cutting things that you’ve currently got, if you’re finding that really difficult to do. But where possible, even good decisions, even decisions that seem like it’s the thing you wanna do, just stop for a second and think, how is this going to interact with everything else that I’ve got going on? Will this enable me to get my goals and my outcomes? Because I think we often don’t make those priority decisions at the right time, and we’re just thinking about that specific decision. And at the time it seemed like the right thing. He loves football, he loves his kid, he loves coaching. So it seemed like this is a no brainer. But when you then put it in the context of his life, it was the worst decision.

[00:31:19] Rachel: That’s a really interesting example because it’s something he really wanted to do. And I think, you know, when, when we talk about saying no to stuff and, and, and leaving decisions, I’m often talking about the guilt and the shame of saying no to stuff. But often that’s stuff you don’t wanna do. it, it, it is much, much harder saying no to the stuff that you do want to do, or, or you do, you do partially want to do.

[00:31:41] Rachel: Uh, and I think one of the problems that a lot of us have is that we’re generally pretty competent. I think medics, people work in healthcare are pretty good at everything. And, and there are skills that you, you have built up. So you’re quite good at doing this, you’re quite good at doing that. And that, that quite good or that even pretty good is really dangerous because that, that zone of excellence just detracts from your zone of absolute genius, ’cause you’ll just end up doing it and end up doing it. And the problem is as you go further on and you reach the, my age, you’ve picked up this role and then that role and then this role and you’re pretty good at doing it. And then it becomes really, really hard to say no.

[00:32:15] Rachel: So I love that thing about, about going forwards, you know, think about what you’re saying yes to going forward. In the back of my mind though, I’m thinking, what a shame that your friend had to say no to something that potentially was probably more life affirming than doing an out of hours shift. And wouldn’t that been nice if he’d had the, the head space and the time in his week to be able to do that?

[00:32:36] Rachel: Because like, I think doctors should be able to, to coach a football team, they should be able to, you know, I mean, don’t coach 10 football teams, be a member of the local choir, orchestra and run this charity as well as being a full-time partner, no. But you know, we should be able to have a life and do stuff like that. So, sounds like his life was just at capacity with work, and we actually want to be working a little bit below capacity, so we’ve got the time and space is, is that something you’d be advising people to do?

[00:33:03] Hussein: Precisely. And, and that’s what we talked about, in fact. We said that, look, this was the right decision at the wrong time, and why it’s so important that if you’re going to add something, you make sure there’s space. And so hopefully this is gonna trigger him to consider what can he reduce within his capacity at the moment to take on things like that. So therefore, when the next opportunity arises for something that he’s passionate about, that as you say is, is is life affirming, that he’s able to pop it on.

[00:33:32] Hussein: ‘Cause at the moment, too often I see people just adding, they’ll just add this on, they’ll make it work, they’ll make it work, you know, we’ll find the time, but you don’t find time. You know, like time is just there. And so it’s really important that when you are thinking about taking on something new, consider what, where is it gonna replace? Rather than constantly adding it in. And so it can be really useful to constantly reflect.

[00:34:00] Hussein: And often I do it like on a six monthly basis. Every six months I’ll just take a moment and I’ll look at my kind of calendar and I’ll think, where am I currently spending all my time? Is it where I want it to be? Are there things that I can cut back? And I’m always looking at things where I can cut it back. Because I know that if I create that bit of capacity, it enables me that when I get that email, that message, or someone gives me a ring with an opportunity that is fantastic, I’ve got the space to go, okay, yeah, let’s give that a go.

[00:34:31] Hussein: But if you don’t constantly consider and refine and tidy up your time, then it will always just be added on, added on, added on. And before you know it, it’ll be bursting from the seams. And then you won’t be able to do the things that you really want to do, spend time with your kid teaching the local club football instead, as you say, you’re doing an out of hour shift, which you know, I doubt most people would rather do.

[00:34:56] Rachel: Getting sort of back to practical and reality of people that probably do have too many roles and they probably can’t change it overnight, and as a lifestyle medicine guru yourself, I wanna ask you, right, if, if I’m that overwhelmed doctor working all hours, and yes, I’m gonna start to say no to stuff, I’m gonna do a bit of a, a tidy up of my time. I’m gonna start looking at where I’m spending my time, but what’s the low hanging fruit in terms of making myself feel better and practicing some, well, I don’t call it self-care anymore, I call it necessary. Necessary care. What would you start with? When I’m thinking about I need to focus on oiling oiling my bike, making my bike a high performance bike, where would you start then?

[00:35:35] Hussein: I’m gonna stick to cycling on this one because the best cycling teams in the world, they use a philosophy called marginal gains, which is the fact that even small, absolutely tiny changes when stacked up over time, make a big difference. And when I think about my initial journey, one of the key reasons why I had failed in the past to make changes was I’d always try to make big sweeping moves, which invariably never got me very far for very long. And in fact, when I just changed my mindset to going, okay, let me make some tiny changes, little things that on their own they’re gonna do nothing, really, nothing on the grand scale of things. But when you combine them and, and, and you, you allow yourself to increase with confidence as you move from goal to goal, they get you far.

[00:36:27] Hussein: And I remember one of the first things I did was I gave myself 15 minutes more time to sleep, 15 minutes. And it sounds crazy, but what was happening was something that’s called rev revenge, revenge procrastinating.

[00:36:41] Rachel: bedtime, revenge, procrastination.

[00:36:42] Hussein: Oh man, I was the best at it. I was absolutely the best at it. ’cause I was just constantly working, constantly stressing, constantly doing stuff that when it came to it, even when I could have gone to bed, I was just like, do you know what? I’ve had no time to myself. And I’m now just going to not do actually something that’s gonna be useful and feed me. It was generally just scrolling through Instagram or watching something on Netflix or whatever and I just decided that okay. I’m gonna give myself 15 minutes more sleep, and that’s where I started.

[00:37:11] Hussein: And I can tell you that just getting better sleep enables you to do that a little bit better the next day, make little bit better decisions and feel a little bit more like you’re coping. And then I moved from 15 minutes of extra sleep and I said, okay, now I want to spend 10 minutes in my day doing something I actually really want to do. And so in fact, those 10 minutes was spending time in my garden. And at that time reflecting on how terrible it was because I didn’t have any time to look after it or prune it. So then what ended up happening was those 10 minutes was, okay, I’m gonna spend five minutes just sitting in the garden and five minutes doing something in the garden. No matter how small it was, ’cause hell, it took more than five minutes. It would probably take days to sort out that garden at that time. But just five minutes, I just felt like I could just fix that little bit that’s there. Let me just weed it out, and then I felt like I was accomplishing something in that day. So at least I’ve tidied up maybe a half square meter of the vegetable patch.

[00:38:11] Hussein: And so it just, it just, it just snowballed from there. And then I’ll just move on to something else. And I kept stacking on little things and I kept a little Excel sheet of all the things because, you know, we’re doctors, we like to tick things off.

[00:38:22] Rachel: I would love to see your Excel sheet.

[00:38:24] Hussein: Oh, it is amazing. And red had various shades of orange as sort of, I felt increased confidence, uh, to eventually green. And, and I, I just kept stacking them up. And then when you look back at it, now, what, 10, 12 years later, like those little things have made a massive difference. And in fact, there came a point where I had enough small little changes and I got more confidence to make bigger changes. And I said, do you know what? I’ve, I’ve created and carved out a bit more energy, a bit more motivation, a bit more time. I can now take this on. And then it just slowly, slowly, eventually snowballed.

[00:39:00] Hussein: And it’s can seem a bit demoralizing to take on such small things to start off with that on their own, that 15 minutes, it didn’t do that much, but it was the start. And I think that’s what’s really important is that you make those little changes, not thinking that they’re gonna sort out the world. But thinking that what will 50 little changes do in six months time if I take on a new thing every, let’s say week or whatever time you wanna have interval between it? ‘Cause I promise you, you put them together by God, it makes a massive difference.

[00:39:31] Rachel: and you start getting the rewards quite soon. I remember coaching a, a GP who, um, was yeah, his senior partner had had no time in the day whatsoever. And, um, I think at the, the end of one of the coaching sessions, he’d come to the conclusion that he was so stressed in the afternoon and staying so late and not get anything done, he just said he needed to get out in a, a lunchtime into the local park. So we left. He was gonna go for a walk at lunchtime.

[00:39:53] Rachel: And, and so six months later I got an email from him saying that every day he goes to the park for 45 minutes, started off 10 minutes, 45 minutes, eats his lunch under a tree, and he was in the afternoon, getting home sooner, getting more done, and the practice income had gone up.

[00:40:10] Rachel: Amazing. So you, you think, oh, I haven’t got time to do that. Actually you get that time back. It’s almost like you haven’t got time not to do it and I can imagine, yeah, the benefits of the tiny benefits from a tiny amount extra of sleep actually that probably, that probably balanced. That’s like exercise, isn’t it? We know that the productivity you gain from doing that exercise is, is huge. I mean, would you be looking to go across all of the, well, five ways away, wellbeing? I think there’s eight ways to wellbeing, but uh, you know, or do you, would you like try and maximize movement or maximize ice or what would you be focusing on?

[00:40:46] Hussein: I would encourage the person just to consider what they want to do most. Whether it be they want a bit more sleep and energy, whether it be that they wanna try and focus on their diet, let their motivation be the trigger to that first goal. It’s so important that we consider all the pillars, absolutely. But when it comes to those first small goals, just go bare bare where you wanted to go. For me, I just wanted to wake up in the morning and not feel like I’d been run over by a bus every day. And so for me, I wanted to start off with that bit more sleep. And then, you know, my next goal, I wanted to just sometimes feel like my head wasn’t constantly going to explode with thinking and decisions, so that’s where the 10 minutes of doing nothing came from.

[00:41:32] Hussein: And so just be guided based on what do you want to try to work on right now? Create a goal based on that. And then as time goes on, consider where else you need to move into. And so I actually got to my nutrition and diet. Quite late, even though it was probably the biggest problem. I, you know, my diet was hideous and it was probably, if you were looking at it from an root cause analysis, you’d say that’s where you need to put in most of your effort or work. But I actually got to it much later on because I knew that I had such a, like a emotive connection with food and such an unhealthy relationship with it, it needs time. And I needed to improve my confidence. I needed to have a bit more energy and head space through the sleep. I needed to reduce my stress before I even think about tackling on it. Because in the past I would always just focus on diet and I’d be like, okay, that’s it. Mediterranean diet tomorrow. Like here we go, you know, no more takeaways. And I would maintain it for like four weeks and then it would just go, it would just vanish.

[00:42:33] Hussein: And so I knew that I couldn’t just keep doing that. I had to build the space and the time and strengthen all lots of other elements in my lifestyle and resilience, so therefore when I did approach nutrition, I felt stronger. And again, I was still still making small changes in nutrition, but I knew that I couldn’t make even small changes in nutrition until I did lots of the other stuff, lots of the accompanying work around it. Because I’m telling you now, sleep stress, they have huge, huge drivers on the reasons that we eat the food that we eat. And it was just creating this sort of cycle of guilt for me, because I would eat something and feel hideous about myself for doing that and think that I’m useless and, and why am I not doing what I said I was going to do? But then you realize that there’s other strings at play.

[00:43:22] Hussein: You know, the reason I I, I clicked that takeaway was because, you know, work was really stressful and I didn’t have much time and, and my sleep was just awful. I had no energy. I just wanted something quick and easy. I didn’t have time to prepare. So really think about what you can do around a difficult area before you just dive into it.

[00:43:42] Hussein: We often really think about how, let’s say if you want to lose weight, people just focus on, okay, you know, how am I gonna change my diet, how I’m gonna increase my activity, et cetera, et cetera. But they don’t think about why am I here? And I think that’s, it’s, once I realized that, look, I gained nearly what, 30 kilos because, not because of just what I was eating. Because you have to think about why was I eating that? You know, why was I not moving my body? Why was I not getting restorative sleep? And once I started to focus all my little goals on trying to correct those underlying drivers, the weight came off. You know, the weight came off not, not quickly, it wasn’t like six weeks. And I was better. Over six years, just consistently, just slowly lowering the weight to a point where I stopped weighing myself and instead measured where I was going based on the, that Excel sheet, the outcomes that I was trying to create, those little goals. I just said, look, if I focus on that, rather than looking at the weighing scales, that’s where I’m gonna get my reward.

[00:44:42] Hussein: Because not everything we need to do in life needs to be focused on having an external outcome like weight loss. You know, it could, there’s so much more to that. And so really do consider those kind of surrounding environment that you are putting your body in. Rather than just what you can do. Because we always want to do more. I’m now going to eat more fruit and vegetable, I’m now going to exercise more. And those are great, but they’re also difficult. So think about what could I do less? What could I potentially have less of that’s going to drive less stress?

[00:45:15] Hussein: And I remember be back 10 years ago, if you left like an entire, let’s say 24 multi-pack of crisps, I’m telling you now, I would eat all of them. Now, if I go to, let’s say, a function, there’s crisps out, I don’t even touch it. And it’s not because I’m saying, look, you can’t have a crisp, oh my God, have one, no, knock yourself out. But that craving that was so strong before where I would literally be killing myself trying not to eat them yet, still doing so, now, like it when I look at them, there is no emotion anymore.

[00:45:47] Hussein: And that didn’t come through sort of a short term psychological intervention that came through actually reducing the stress and the pressure, that, that valve just letting it release to a point now where I’m in better control, you know, I pick the things that I want to eat and don’t get me wrong, I eat some crap sometimes, but I do that now in much better control. I don’t do it because I have to have it because I’ve been craving for it for days and months. And so therefore I’m now better able to make those changes on nutrition. And I just realized I had to just change that environment before I make those changes.

[00:46:24] Rachel: And what I’m realizing, and I think what you’re talking about a lot with the goals as well, is it’s, it’s much more about process goals, isn’t it? Than outcome goals. So, you know, I signed up for, I think I’ve done a podcast or this is, well, I signed up for Cambridge half marathon, which I hate running, so that wasn’t gonna happen. And, you know, two months before I’m like, mm, this isn’t gonna happen. Whereas if I’d have set the process goal of three times a week, I’m gonna go put my trainers on for 10 minutes, well, that would’ve, that would’ve happened that I’d been more likely to hit the, the outcome goal anyway. But I think we are quite driven by results and achievement and success, aren’t we? So we just always make that mistake of going for the outcome as opposed to the routine and the process and the habit.

[00:47:01] Hussein: Precisely. And my top tip is gamifying that process, so therefore it feels like a reward. So for me, changing those colors, I know it sounds silly, but it was lovely, and I could see an Excel sheet and I’d look back. I’d be like, look at all the things that I’ve managed to do and maintain. And that is the reward.

[00:47:19] Hussein: And you are absolutely right. The, the outcomes, they will come as a result of hitting those kind of goals. And so, you know, when I think about where I started, my first physical activity goal I remember was just, you know, going for a walk for five minutes after food in the evening with my wife. Now, that’s now stretched to, we probably go for about 30 to 40 minutes. That sort of happened over time. ‘Cause initially I thought I had no more than five minutes. And it’s amazing how, you know, your, um, person that you were coaching, how he’s now walking 45 minutes when initially it was just 10 minutes in the park. It’s amazing how time opens itself up if you change your direction of priorities.

[00:48:00] Hussein: But, you know, that initial goal, that’s where it started. And if I look now this year I’ve, I’ve, I’ve competed in two world championships at long distance triathlon. And that started with five minutes of walking with my wife after dinner. Now, if I set the goal of I’m gonna do a marathon, or I’m gonna do a half marathon, then there would’ve been so many things that could have stopped me from achieving it, because it’s really difficult. It’s another thing that I’m adding rather than thinking about how I can support and remove.

[00:48:29] Hussein: And so don’t think always about the reward. Think about the process. Think about doing those elements, because I promise you, the rewards will naturally come. And they will be amazing when they do come. And you will always be rewarded for work that you do in yourself. And, and sometimes they’ll be in areas that you hadn’t even imagined in, in, in subjects that are not even related to that initial goal that you haven’t quite connected.

[00:48:53] Rachel: Oh my goodness. I just think it’s so amazing that you’ve gone from like this person on that, you know, ultrasound couch to competing for your country in triathlon. I mean, that, that’s just such an amazing story and I think it’s very useful for people to know you didn’t start off like this, did you? You’ve, you’ve, you’ve had that journey and you’ve obviously got amazing natural capacity for it. But it is amazing

[00:49:16] Rachel: ‘Cause I think when you first start, it just does seem impossible. And particularly when you are in overwhelm, it seems really difficult. And I guess this is the same with patients as well. They, you know, busy lives, working two, three jobs, haven’t got much money. And that’s the whole thing about lifestyle medicine, isn’t it? That, we know what a, a big change is for, for people. But actually I’m thinking, you know, when we are trying to tell patients about it and we are not doing it ourselves, that’s really, that’s really hard, isn’t it?

[00:49:41] Rachel: What else do you think is stopping us from, from doing this necessary care, from making these changes from, from working on ourselves? Is there anything else that you’ve come across with doctors?

[00:49:51] Hussein: Yeah, the, there’s so many reasons why it’s really difficult to, to do this and, and one thing that’s the case for not just doctors, but everyone is just the environment we live in. You know, like whether it be the fact that movement’s been engineered out, that we now need to somehow bring it back in intentionally, that’s, that makes it really challenging. You know, when we think about some of the healthiest places on, in the world, they’re active, not because they’ve gone to a gym or they’ve signed up for half marathon. They’re active because it’s just, you have to be active to get to the next town. You have to cycle or walk or to wash your clothes. It’s manual.

[00:50:30] Hussein: And, and don’t get me wrong, I’m not going back to manually washing my clothes. However, we need to realize that look, movement’s been engineered out. And before you take on a new task, like a hit session or you’re going spinning or you’re gonna go for a run, consider how can you just engineer movement back into your day? Maybe it’s that walk to work as you described. Yes, it’s 20 minutes extra, but that was 20 minutes that you potentially were gonna need to do exercising and now you’ve done two things. You’ve got to your destination and walked. Um, maybe it’s around deciding that you are not gonna take a lift or an elevator again. And that’s a rule that I stick to unless you are in New York and you’ve got like 22 flights of, of stairs to do that, that I’ll allow.

[00:51:16] Hussein: And then think about the things that are advertised. You know, when, when I’m on my phone in the evening after stressful day of work, what’s being pushed to me? Well, it’s, it’s takeaways. It’s, you know, fast food. It’s all the things that I crave but don’t really need for my health. And so all these factors is why we’re living in, you know, what’s called an obesogenic environment. And we have to be compassionate to ourselves that we are essentially living in a casino. We’re living in a world which wants us to make decisions that are not gonna be helpful for our long-term health, or even our short-term feeling. And they’re trying to offer us a reward that unfortunately. Is, is, is lined with a lot of baggage. And so I think we have to be compassionate to that.

[00:52:01] Hussein: And, and when you look at physical activity levels, when we look at weight levels, we look at nutrition over the decades, you can see that there’s been a huge change in what we eat and how we move. And that’s not be because we’ve suddenly become lazy and greedy. Um, we’re still the same people, we’re just living in a different environment. And that is the hardest thing to crack because there’s no point creating a preventative medicine, um, revolution that Labour wants to do, which is fantastic. Not until you’ve corrected the environment, there’s no point doing that unless you look to fix the root causes. And so what I always tell to patients and to colleagues is be compassionate to that reality that you are not making bad decisions for the sake of making bad decisions. You’re making it because they are being advertised to you, encouraged to you, you adding in stress, then you’ve got a terrible cocktail.

[00:52:57] Rachel: And whatever barriers there are that will just just stop you very, very quickly when you, you know, our local hospital, there was only a Burger King for years and years, and now there is an M&S Food so you can get your salad, but it’s like hungry doctors on call. What are they gonna get? You know, they’re not, if they’re, if that’s all there is, you know, you, you’re

[00:53:16] Hussein: Precisely and just, and, and, and, and that’s the issue. And you think about then our people in population that are in our lowest socioeconomic groups, and you think, what do they have on offer? Because you know, they can’t afford M&S Food for that salad. And what alternative options do they have to really access that kind of high nutritious food that’s affordable?

[00:53:37] Hussein: And I remember, um, so Michael Marmot, uh, had one of his research projects which sort of outlined the amount that you’d need to spend of your income in order to live a healthy lifestyle. And for the bottom 20% from an income category, it was nearly 70% of all the earnings would need to be spent on that. And you just think this is not an environment, you should not have to be wealthy and affluent to be healthy.

[00:54:05] Hussein: And I, I feel really passionately that as clinicians, we should be advocates for them. And we have a role, don’t get me wrong, like whether it be speaking to your counselor, speaking to your MP, promoting that because we’re not just there to serve appointments, we’re there for the health of our communities. And we need to start really raising our voice and our message that we gotta do better. We gotta do better for everyone in our society because it’s actually a failing to need an appointment. Don’t get me wrong, we always need appointments, but every extra appointment that we need to put on, that’s a failing. And so we need to consider, rather than just constantly going, reduce wait times, increase appointment numbers, we need to think about how can we actually help our health, our health from the root causes.

[00:54:50] Rachel: And, and it strikes me as well, you know, there is something about leadership as well, because doctors, yes, they have, they have money to spend on stuff or, or more money maybe than other people. They don’t have the time. And we do have the time. It’s just we make time for what, for what matters.

[00:55:05] Rachel: You’ve given me some practical tips, um, before the, the session. Can you just talk about those three before, just before we wrap up? ‘Cause I’m quite interested in, in your top three tips for, you know, making some of these changes.

[00:55:20] Hussein: my first tip would be to speak to those closest to you. ‘Cause often they will pick up on signs and on changes that you may have not understood. And they may also help to identify where you want to focus your initial goals, because you want them to be as meaningful, as impactful, as possible.

[00:55:40] Hussein: Um, my wife was really helpful in actually, you know, informing me things that I just didn’t fully appreciate and I didn’t realize I was doing or not doing. And so my first tip is speak to those that you trust that are close to you and find out, you know from them, you know, what’s their opinion. You may not, you may not follow it, you may not agree with it, but you definitely not gonna lose out in getting that perspective.

[00:56:03] Hussein: My second tip is, I, I, I highlighted a bit before, but is gamifying things, you know, like gamifying anything just makes it more engaging. If we think about what has been the most impactful tool to increase physical activity in the world. It’s been Pokemon Go. There’s a really interesting study that was published and it just demonstrated, if you look at the US population and what they did in that study, there has been no campaign, there has been no intervention, no matter how well funded, that has been more impactful than Pokemon Go at increasing physical activity levels. It just shows you the power that gamification has. You know, it increased, I think it was somewhere between two to 3000 steps a day compared to what the user was doing before. That is huge. And so gamifying things, whether it be your goals in that Excel sheet with the different colors or whether you are gonna build in certain rewards based on achieving certain of those goals or whatever that may be, there’s lots of apps out there that can help you to gamify movement or nutrition. Just do that. Don’t consider it being silly. Actually, you’ll, you’ll get engaged with it and you’ll find it funny and you’ll find it much more rewarding.

[00:57:12] Hussein: And then the third and final tip is accept that you are going to fail at a number of the goals that you set. My Excel sheet is not full of green. There are a number of, of dead goals on there that I’ve tried over and over again to do, and I still can’t do them. And you just have to accept that. There are some things that we will be able to do, some things that we’ll partially manage and some things that we’ll be successful in. And that’s, that’s just life.

[00:57:41] Hussein: And it doesn’t mean that you’re just gonna leave it. You may return like I have and try it again. And some of the things that I’ve returned to, I’ve managed. Some I’ve still not managed to do, but it’s appreciating that it’s not a straight line. It’s this sort of constant spiral and fall down and spiral and fall down. And eventually you will get forward progress over time. And what it can often do is when you fail at things, it can help you maybe reshape your future goals to be more achievable. But don’t be hard on yourself.

[00:58:11] Hussein: And even actually now when I think about my, um, sporting career, it’s the races that I have failed at that, that have truly enabled me to progress and to grow. And in fact, the races, which I’ve absolutely nailed, when I think about what have I learned from them, not really that much. So, you know, those failures, cherish them. Don’t think of them negatively and use them positively.

[00:58:34] Rachel: Oh, such, such brilliant tips. Thank you. The one thing that’s made the difference to me is actually planning. So, you know, actually sitting down at the beginning of the week and going, right, when am I gonna do my self-care? When am I gonna do my exercise? What am I gonna eat? That’s probably made the biggest difference. ‘Cause then, then it’s in, and I’ve thought about it rather than just being reactive when I’m, when I’m hungry, or when I’m tired and then not doing anything. So that’s really

[00:58:56] Hussein: And plan, like for me, like includes actually popping it in my calendar. So in the days that I have blocks where I’ve popped in, I still do my 10 minute garden. So for example, that’s actually in the calendar and it stops me from putting a Teams call or putting in a meeting or whatever over it because it’s there and I find it difficult to replace it. I don’t like deleting it. ’cause then it feels like actually I’m not prioritizing that. I’m not giving it the time. I’ll move it around sometimes ’cause I’ll be like, well, okay, I need to move around. But it always needs to be in there between nine to five at some point. Whether it be walking outside of, of the practice or whether it be, uh, when I’m working from home, you know, going out into the garden, whatever that may be, think and prioritize in the same way. So whether it be a calendar, whether it be a diary, whether it be you write it down, you know, be intentional,

[00:59:44] Rachel: Now I know you obviously the RCGP lead for lifestyle medicine. You do the course for Read, well, you run the course for, for, for healthcare professionals who, who deliver lifestyle medicine for patients. And presumably it’s, it’s this sort of advice that you’ve been giving us now, is it, is there anything that extra in that.

[01:00:02] Hussein: Yeah. yeah. Because I think what’s beautiful about Lifestyle medicine is that when you train in that you develop so many skills for your patient, but these skills are 100% transferable for yourself. And I’d really, really recommend anyone working in healthcare to consider doing the lifestyle medicine course because it just, it enables you to get a better understanding on topics that are so fundamental and so core for health, but when you think back on it, how much time have you had to train yourself up on it?

[01:00:35] Hussein: And in fact, one survey asked patients, where did they get the lifestyle advice from? Would they get it from their GP or from another healthcare professional? 80% put Instagram. And come on. You know when the World Health Organization says that 7% of the content on there is actually accurate?

[01:00:54] Rachel: Seven. Oh, I thought you was gonna say 7% is inaccurate. 7%

[01:00:57] Hussein: 7% is accurate, okay. You know, we, we can’t accept that. And, and can you blame them for accessing it there? Because we don’t have the knowledge, the confidence, or the skills. So it’s really important that we consider doing it. And in particular for GPs, um, in April this year, I co co-authored the role for an extended role in lifestyle medicine. And I really recommend going on the college website, having a look at that framework. It details really kind of what the role involves, what training’s required, et cetera. And. I really feel passionately that all GPS should have that lifestyle bow in their hat. And the more we can get, the more we can show within healthcare and within primary care that we care about it, that it’s important.

[01:01:40] Hussein: And that can be such a important message when it comes to policy makers and decisions. If healthcare is taking lifestyle seriously, then hopefully we can have the policies that impacts our environment, and not only for ourselves, but our patients.

[01:01:54] Rachel: And I can imagine, um, for doctors and nurses and other healthcare professionals that train in lifestyle medicine, it’s a, it’s a really rewarding field to be in. You probably get a bit more time with the patients. Actually, it’s something that you probably could say hell yes to in your day.

[01:02:11] Hussein: Really enjoyable, and it just feels. Like it feels like compound interest often. Because when you make lifestyle changes with patients, often it’s to try and remedy something specific. But what the patient and both the clinician realizes is that you get compound benefits. So for example, when you support a patient to join a community walking group because they wanna improve their fitness, for example, yes the fitness will improve, but they’ll also improve the connection with community. They’ll also have a space to improve their mental health. They’ll also be able to sleep better because they’re being active regularly through the day. It just compounds. So instead, unlike with medication where you have negative side effects that compound the benefit that you’re treating, the side effects in lifestyle interventions are positive. They’re often things that the, the clinician or the patient hadn’t really focused on, but come about.

[01:03:04] Rachel: Yeah. And we are right back to where we started this podcast with you saying you make the lifestyle change, actually, you find yourself more successful, more productive, happier. You are not just thinner and fitter and more relaxed, but there’s all that other stuff there. So, thank you so much. That has been so, so inspiring to me. There’s loads of stuff I’m gonna do. Um, we’ll have to have you back another time if that’s okay. There’s loads more to talk about. How can we find out more about you and your work and all that sort of stuff.

[01:03:29] Hussein: I have a kind of, uh, an Instagram account which is focused on trying to promote healthy lifestyles, give factual and important information, try to boost up that 7%, and the account is Iron Doctor HAZ, which is my initials. And on LinkedIn is where I share a lot of the kind of professional developments in terms of what the college is doing, and so just search that through my name, Hussain Al-Zubaidi,

[01:03:53] Rachel: Thank you so much and hopefully we’ll speak again soon.

[01:03:56] Hussein: Take care.

[01:03:56] Rachel: Thanks for listening. Don’t forget, we provide a self-coaching CPD workbook for every episode. You can sign up for it via the link in the show notes, and if this episode was helpful, then please share it with a friend. Get in touch with any comments or suggestions at hello@unnotterfrog.com. I love to hear from you. And finally, if you are enjoying the podcast, please rate it and leave a review wherever you are listening. It really helps. Bye for now.