The Second Draft

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

Dr. Mia Nakat has been both a friend and mentor dating back to my pre-doctor life. I met Dr. Nakat just before beginning my journey through medical school.  Not only is she down-to-earth and pragmatic, but she is also refreshingly warm and responsive in an industry driven by hard data and results.  Dr. Nakat is the greatest personal and professional cheerleader you could imagine!

For example, Dr. Nakat was researching and educating people to be careful of toxins and endocrine disrupting compounds long before these were household words. She understands that our daily decisions, and the exposures to our environments, can impact our lives for years to come.

In true Dr. Nakat fashion, The Second Draft beautifully and succinctly merges information for both left-brained and right-brained folks.

It is with great honor that I now write the foreword to her debut book, a hands-on How To self-improvement guide with a dash of science thrown in.

The intersection of self-care and self-help is reimagining yourself - and therefore your life.

The impacts of managing your physical and emotional environment, taking control of your time, and building upon your strengths for your personal brand all affect how you FEEL and how you LIVE. These impacts are synonymous with robust mental health.

I once read that Steve Jobs wore the same outfit to work every day (black turtleneck, jeans, and sneakers) to minimize the number of decisions he had to make about his wardrobe. The average adult makes 35,000 decisions per day. Imagine how much can be simplified by having routine, programmed shortcuts in our daily life, thus saving cognitive space for our more important decisions.  As Dr. Nakat points out in Chapter Four, keeping it simple really does work. Overthinking is a huge time sink, energy sink, confidence drain, and impediment to progress.

There is no question that the COVID-19 pandemic created an adverse experience in most of our lives, whether by fear related to the illness itself, or the isolation and life-disrupting changes to our social architecture.

As a psychiatrist, I see daily in my practice the lifelong impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) on physical and mental health.  Adversity breaks down into three categories: abuse, neglect, and household dysfunction. Experiences such as getting bullied, going through the divorce of your parents, growing up around substance abuse or addiction, losing a parent by death or abandonment, physical or sexual abuse, or witnessing domestic violence all have immediate AND long-term impacts on one’s physical and mental wellbeing. We call this Toxic Stress.  Research shows that people with ACEs have higher rates of diseases such as obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, depression, suicide attempts, and addiction as compared to the general population.

As a contributor to our local NPR station, I frequently discuss the intersection of physical and mental health. We are just beginning to scratch the surface of how physical health affects mental health and vice versa. For example, people who have seizures tend to get MORE seizures if they are stressed out, sleep deprived, or physically sick. Then, having more seizures leads to worse daily functioning and increased rates of depression and anxiety. The same applies to migraines, autoimmune conditions, and disruptions to our gut’s naturally occurring bacteria.  So, yes, you can worry yourself sick.

The good news is, Positive Childhood Experiences (PCEs) outweigh the impact of Toxic Stress. The seven PCEs are:  1) Able to talk with my family about my feelings.  2) Felt that my family stood by me during difficult times.  3) Enjoyed participating in community traditions.  4) Felt a sense of belonging in high school.  5) Felt supported by friends.  6) Had at least two non-parent adults who took a genuine interest in me.  7) Felt safe and protected by an adult in my home.

Hmm... don’t these PCEs sound a whole lot like the ideas Dr. Nakat, and Chapter Two contributing guest author Walid Ramady, bring forth to us ADULTS in The Second Draft?  Dr. Nakat gives us life hacks to:

-Improve our Human Quotients.

-Establish motivation, willpower, and self-control in time management.

-Grow through mentorship (giving and receiving mentorship).

-Develop a supportive community.

-Push past our discomfort to reach for what we need, and for what will make us better.

-Acquire more confidence.

Just keep practicing until these changes become second nature!

As famous psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, Dr. Carl Jung said, I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.  This is what Dr. Nakat’s book is all about!

So curl up and get ready for the book equivalent of a fireside chat with your brilliant best friend/role model/mentor and enjoy The Second Draft!

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Sandra Vexler, MD

ABPN Board Certified

Adult and Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist

INTRODUCTION:  What Could Be

Livie, you are running the wrong way, stay in your lane, we talked about this.  Livie’s father was trying to keep her from colliding with other kids.  She was running in circles on the track while waiting to pick up her older siblings from school.

Livie is five - almost five.  She will soon learn that it is not okay to color outside the lines.  She will know that running around haphazardly is not the safest or most productive.

By now, we have run the straight lines, strived to accomplish our projected goals, and settled into our roles and responsibilities on the track of life.  What comes next?  The focus of this book’s methodology is based on lifestyle improvements and creating meaningful life balance.  The Second Draft does not represent medical opinions.  Be sure to consult with your doctor before taking on any new changes.

A global study by Qualtrics found 42% of people have experienced a decline in mental health. Specifically, 67% of people are experiencing increases in stress while 57% have increased anxiety, and 54% are emotionally exhausted. 53% of people are sad, 50% are irritable, 28% are having trouble concentrating, 20% are taking longer to finish tasks, 15% are having trouble thinking and 12% are challenged to juggle their responsibilities. Forbes, 2021¹

Depression and somber feelings are at an all-time high both at work and at home.  Qualtrics described mental health as the other COVID-19 crisis.²  At a professional level, many employees are experiencing burnout.  Burnout can be associated or confused with depression.  The American Psychological Association (APA) describes burnout as a physical, emotional, or mental exhaustion accompanied by decreased motivation, lowered performance, and negative attitudes toward oneself and others.³

Contradictory, our work driven culture proudly associates burnout signals with hard work and excellence.⁴ Yet burnout is counterproductive to success.  True excellence comes from efficient productivity and positive interactions with others.

Happiness requires harmony.  We cannot attain harmony without work-life balance.  We forget that companies play a large role in achieving this healthy balance for their employees for a win-win outcome.⁵  Healthy, balanced employees can better execute in both their work and personal life.  As a consequence, the employer benefits from creative, innovative, and resourceful employees who become excellent negotiators, critical thinkers, and problem solvers.⁵  A tired workforce that is burned out is overworked, stressed, and unhappy - whether they are at home or in the office.  They lose their sense of harmony and purpose.  The world around them either becomes monotone and routine with work stress or becomes chaotic and unpredictable in an overwhelming way.

The COVID-19 pandemic has cooped us up in our routines and new normals.  We re-emerge into an inflated culture and economy.  There is a great resignation all around us, and our coping skills are suffering.  How can I even measure my success? Am I happy? I feel disconnected yet overwhelmed.  Am I in a rut?  How am I even relevant? I cannot even relate! I feel depleted.

By the time we graduate from high school, we would have spent thousands of hours receiving instructions and building up our skills and character with the support of educators.  After college, we continue to grow and mature in the work field.  Some of us are blessed to have mentors along the way.  However, many adults lack mentors in various stages of their lives.  Mentors can provide a framework for open and trusted communications, accountability, and competency.

Mentorship can come from peers, professional networks, counselors, relatives, or religious leaders.  Yet the idea of adults receiving one-on-one mentorship seems to be overshadowed by busy schedules and the presence of influencers stealing the spotlight.  Even when companies assign supervisors, team members on projects, or someone to shadow, they do not formalize the importance of being mentored.

When is the last time you approached someone you respect to ask them to be your mentor?  With many of us working from home or in hybrid schedules, it is even more challenging to establish that mentor-mentee relationship.  Mainly because we are not observing this person interacting with daily situations.  This is especially true for young adults out of college who have transitioned from having advisors, counselors, coaches, professors, and research directors to simply having a boss at a new job.

Would you like to be a mentor?  Being a mentor is also rewarding not just for the mentee, but also for the development of the leadership skills of the mentor.  Mentors are more open minded, understand various viewpoints, help with problem solving, and are great at organizational