My guest today is Dr. Romie Mushtaq who is a board-certified physician who brings together more than two decades of leadership in neurology, integrative medicine, and mindfulness. She is the author of the recently published book, The Busy Brain Cure.
Dr. Romie offers a fresh approach to understanding stress, anxiety, and burnout from the perspective of a brain doctor. In our conversation, Dr. Romie and I talk about what she calls ‘busy brain,’ a condition stemming from unchecked stress and burnout, and how these can lead to burnout without us even realizing it. We dive deep into the symptoms of a busy brain and I reveal the score I got when I took Dr. Romie’s Busy Brain Test. We discuss what circumstances led to that score and she introduces me to the concept of Caregiver Burnout which was revelatory to me.
Dr. Romie knows the science of the busy brain but she also shows her deep empathy for anyone who may appear to have it all together but inside you are falling apart. She wants you to know that you are not alone and there is help. Dr. Romie provides your next steps to understanding your own chronic stresses to help you create a personalized path to healing.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq is a board-certified physician who brings together more than two decades of leadership in neurology, integrative medicine, and mindfulness. She is an award-winning speaker working with Fortune 500 companies, professional athletes, & global associations. Her brainSHIFT programs improve mental well-being and help to build a culture of wellness. Dr. Romie serves as Chief Wellness Officer for Evolution Hospitality, where she scaled a mindfulness & wellness program to over 7,000 employees. Her expertise is featured in the national media, such as NPR, NBC, TED talks, and Forbes. Her first book, The Busy Brain Cure is published by Harper Collins in January 2024.
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Zack Arnold: I'm here today with Dr. Romie Mushtaq also known as Dr. Romie. And you are a board certified physician, you're a chief wellness officer for Great Wolf Resorts. You're also the author of The Busy Brain Cure of which we're going to talk a whole lot more about today. And just lastly, to add your expertise has been featured in many national media publications such as NPR, NBC, Forbes, you've done TED talks, if I spent the whole time sharing your accolades, I don't know I'd actually have a chance to talk to you. So on that note, let's just leave it there. And I'm gonna say it's really a pleasure to have you here today. Thank you for taking the time
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Zack, too honored to be of service and I don't take your time, but more importantly, the listeners time for granted. So I hold the intention that whatever it is, someone needs to hear, as they put us between their ears today that we serve them.
Zack Arnold: Well, I appreciate that I feel exactly the same way that I think we're in a really unique position where we can get in between people's ear buds. And we can you know, help to change their insights, change their perception of the world and give them some new ideas. And they can pull whatever threads are necessary to find different ways to optimize themselves. So having said that, I'm a little concerned based on the notes that I have in front of you, because I'm going to need about nine hours or less ideally. So some of the topics that I would love to talk about a dig more into our understanding the differences between acute stress, chronic stress, then kind of differentiating between anxiety, depression, burnout, all these things are all these buzzwords, what you write what what contributes to those for my audience specifically, and really, for me, specifically, is how do they affect our creativity? How do they affect our decision making. And then I also want to talk some about obviously, the the protocols and the systems that you have, like, for example, the brain shift protocol. But I also think where this conversation is gonna get more unique than most is that when I picked up and started reading your book, it was the craziest feeling of oh, my God, you've crawled into my brain and you are reading or you're writing to me right now. So this isn't a matter of I'm standing on the pulpit or the ivory towers, the experts sharing this information. I am your ideal client that's coming to you saying Help me understand why my brain feels broken. Why am I struggling with the anxiety, the ADHD, the depression, the burnout, and we can go deeper into it. But you might end up invoicing me at the end of our podcast, is it like a formal session, but I'm, I'm okay, putting that out into the world. Yeah.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Thank you for your honesty and your openness. And I'm getting all the feels and the emotions, you know, it was from the day you and I are sitting here recording today. It was exactly a year ago that I submitted the manuscript and to HarperCollins of this book. And we debated a lot with someone write the foreword to my book, and I said, No, the first words you should read when you open the book, are my own. And it was a really deep meditative feeling. And I want to just start by saying, Zack and to any listeners, you're not alone, and I am here for you. I really wrote this book, because hundreds and 1000s of people like you would now come to me after I gave a keynote lecture and say, I thought I was alone. And I'm the only one going through this because everybody else on social media seems to have it all pulled together even on their worst days. And I want to tell you what I wish someone had told me when I was in that same spot, my brother Zack, your brain has not broken, your mind is not a mess. And hope did not depart your soul. And then session that we're here. If we can anchor back into just even one brain shift or one next step for you, then maybe we've helped your listeners do that. And that was exactly why I wrote the book, I have this knowledge and it shouldn't just be saved for executives that can afford to invite me to their company to speak or athletes that can afford to pay me one to one to work with them. So let's get started. Brother.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, I appreciate all that. And that's the perfect segue into the first area that I wanted to go with today's conversation is that there are a whole lot of self help books and nonfiction books that are read by the quote unquote, or written by the experts, right? And it doesn't mean that the message isn't important, but I'm a big believer that the messenger is equally or sometimes even more important. And I say that because it's one thing for you to be, you know, a science nerd like massive nerd alert. As soon as you wrote that you wanted to be a psycho neuro immune, your endocrinologist. I'm like, that sounds fascinating. I'm going to look into that too. Right? But it's one thing to have the information or the knowledge, it's another thing to have the own personal journey. So I actually want to start with why you wrote this book and it goes far deeper than your knowledge as a medical professional.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Yeah, exact from the outside world. I'm a daughter of immigrants. English is my third language. And to be raised with that what I called a plus mentality was just normal in our culture where an A minus was considering that you failed. And when my teachers tried to label me like my whole life, I've been the one and only in the room so the one and only immigrants daughter in the room. And they gave me this toxic label and kind of tried to dismiss me to the side ESL English as a second language, to which my father, also a doctor arrived in the room and said, I have one daughter, and she will become a doctor. And then there was like this other knowing inside of me. So interesting, I don't think I've really gotten to say this to anybody. It's very deep in the acknowledgments of my book, I didn't know what intuition was. But when you're a child, your Spirit spoke loud and clear. So did mine. And I remember being in the fourth grade, knowing I would write a book one day and be on the stage, I couldn't explain it. And the only people that I saw that gave me comfort in those days that made me feel alone. Were women like Connie Chung and Barbara Walters, and Oprah Winfrey. They sat there and spoke with eloquence and intelligence and a powerful voice, except I noticed there wasn't anyone of South Asian descent in that circle, right. And I think I knew there was going to be this moment. And you fast forward to my adult life. And I had accomplished everything that my aunties expected of me, I became a doctor, a professor and a researcher. And we didn't have words, like the ones you used at the beginning of this show, mental health crisis, burnout. And the worst feeling in the world was that loneliness. I was in a dark, dark place, even though I had this polished, professional demeanor on the outside. And I'd walked the hospital corridors and it was visible that I was different, something was really wrong. And exactly, you know, not a single person asked me if I was okay. Or let me know that they were there for me. My patients did I want to be clear, and their family members when no colleagues in the hospital, they were gossiping about me the judgment that's toxic and workplace cultures. And I just remember what it felt like to be all alone. And I don't want anyone else to feel that way. And so it's why from an open heart, I share my story in the book, including when I have a busy brain, that inner critic or impostor syndrome, which takes on the voice of my aunties, so that, you know, you're not alone. And then also, I'm practical. That's the brain Doctor side of me. I could have written an entire scientific book and the scientific community may or may not have agreed with it. But I was like, I know this protocol. We've tested it. I'm going to put it in this book that cost 20 $30. And here you go. And here's the solution. Because we today in 2024, as you and I record this podcast, are facing a mental health crisis globally. I specifically work with companies, teams and cultures and ain't nobody on this podcast. Want to hear Dr. Rami come on and saved Christine berries and those anti inflammatory foods and breathe and watch another video of puppies hugging babies on Instagram. You
Zack Arnold: just became a tick tock profile right because that's that's what we're told I it's what I call the now the I'm already dating myself because I call them Instagram platitudes. And now they're tick tock platitudes, right. But it's this idea. Oh, you're you're tired, you're depressed, you're burned out, just get a good night's sleep. Do a cold plunge. Do it did this is my favorite one. Have you heard the term forest bathing? Oh, this is a thing. It's an actual thing I do
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: is I know the studies of that. And, and yes, the studies are real. But in today's modern society, we need to dig a little deeper. Well,
Zack Arnold: and it just to me, it just encapsulates the entire mindset of I'm going to take something that humans and all species have been doing for hundreds of 1000s, if not millions of years, which is surrounding themselves with nature. But I'm gonna package it in this kind of new agey thing, which is called forest bathing. You're counting the forest, you're going outside, you're getting sunlight.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Well, and also Zack, can I be really controversial here on the podcast and I hope we don't sound as a woman of South Asian descent. I'm so tired of the cultural appropriation because this is a deep rooted cultural tradition in Japan. And now some you know, as you mentioned, New Age, Caucasian person has written books on it and podcasts and because they were the first one to populate SEO on Google and social media with it, they become the forest bathing expert and you know, we need to stop that and and thank you, by the way for being an ally and and inviting a woman of a diverse background and thought leader onto your Podcast and to say, while there is truth in meditation, or eating clean or forest bathing, there's something deeper going on here that I'm here to help you dig through yours so other people can dig through their busy brain. Yeah, no, I
Zack Arnold: agree with all that. And I'm a really big believer, especially as a storyteller for a living, having worked in Hollywood now working as a coach, I don't believe you can be a great storyteller until you're able to live your own life with your own perspective. But more importantly, you need to understand other people's perspectives and their experience of life, because your reality is very different than my reality. And if I can bring anybody to the show that can either see the world from either of our perspectives, but let's say, and I've had this happen before, where I've had, for example, a very accomplished, female, African American editor Come on, and then somebody that's really young that would say, and reach out, I finally saw somebody that looks like me, they've convinced me maybe I can do this, too. So that's that, that I don't think I'm going to get a whole lot of young physician that are going to be listening to this podcast, but if they do, I want them to see that this is possible. No, no, no, this
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: is more important than young physicians seeing themselves in me, this is also your male listeners, normalizing that a woman of a diverse background can be a global thought leader. You know, because really, my space of functional medicine has largely been held by boomers straight white men, and I know many of them and they're great people, but you, you don't get to break into this world. And, and do that. So we want to normalize this in society that a person can be a serious thought leader, researcher, and be of a different background, and also all the younger women. So anybody that is raising daughters, nieces, granddaughters, that has a sister are listening to this podcast, girls can't be it unless they can see it. And, you know, thank you for modeling being that male ally. So it's so much bigger than just someone who wants to go into STEM listening to this podcast.
Zack Arnold: Yeah. And I think that the other thing to point out, that's even more important, and it goes back to this idea of unique perspective and the power of the messenger. I think that if somebody else that were writing a similar book with similar protocols, you coming at it from the perspective of being only one of I think you said, 5% of females, especially of Indian descent, trying to become a neurologist. You want to talk about understanding and empathizing with burnout, at a much more visceral level, you're coming at it from that unique perspective, which makes you an even stronger messenger, which makes the message even stronger, and clearer. So having said that, I want to start digging into all these concepts a little bit deeper, knowing that we have one of the world's experts on the convergence of all of the things that basically drive my brain 24 hours a day, seven days a week. So where I want to start as first as helping me and my listeners start to understand the difference between what sounds like a lot of the same things, but they're not, which would be acute stress versus chronic stress versus anxiety versus depression versus burnout, it seems like they're all in the same handbag, but they're really not. So let's start breaking these down. Because I find that once, once you can put a label and understand something, it's it helps you better manage it and figure out what to do next. So how do you start to make sense of all of these buzzword topics around mental? Hi,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: I agree, thank you so much. It's like, you know, the difference between driving a Formula One race car or pedaling a bicycle down the street, right, both will get you to a destination. It's entirely different processor experience. And I think that's what thank you for making sure that we know we're not interchanging random words. So let's get started. I think the first myth I want to bust with you here is stress is good for you. These kinds of buzzwords were the pre pandemic type of ways that we approached a peak performance and fake it till you make it. You know, longevity, as stress is not good for us. Acute stress is your brain and your body's response to a extreme change that you need to deal with in seconds, two minutes. So the example that I use in the book is I was born and raised in the Midwest in Illinois, and you had to learn to drive a car in winter weather, including on something known as black ice. So if your car starts to slip, man, do you want that acute stress response to work for you? Because you don't want me looking at oncoming traffic going Hey, Zack, check out that Maserati and the hot guy driving it you think he's single? Can you go fix it up? No. You want me if we hit black ice and the car starts slipping, to remember to take my foot off The brake and steer into the way, you know the car is sliding to get control of the car before we slip into oncoming traffic, that's acute stress, something that needs a reaction that takes seconds to minutes. And we're through it right? That's not stress is good for you. That's your stress response saying Romie, bye brain muscles, everything focused on getting the car under control. That's acute stress response that works. This is in a post pandemic world having studied the busy brain test and 17,000 individuals, this is what we've learned is that our brains are at something we call capacity, Zack the I can't handle it any more. The I was trying to fill a bathtub with a tea cup, and the bathtub is overflowing. And if you add one more acute stressor on to my life that you think I should be able to handle. So in the creative world, you have a deadline, right? For a rough draft for a project a storyboard or something, you're writing a script or something like that, let me know if I got that right. It'll push you over the edge. And that's chronic stress is that repeated things are happening, there's a life change that can be going on, which is most of us in the post pandemic world. And the chronic stress has been there for months or years. So that's chronic stress. That's the difference. They're having two different processes in your brain, two different reactions in your brain and in your body. And I really want to differentiate that. So I love what you called it. What did you call it? Instagram platitudes or tick tock?
Zack Arnold: Yeah, the Instagram platitudes,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: the Instagram platitudes, or as the anti zoo say what is it tock tick, tick tock nonsense going on, you know? Yes, I outdate myself, because I'm not on tick tock. But the when podcasters tell me Give me one tip, Dr. Rami, three tips for your work. I'm like listening to the entire interview. That's the acute stress, peak performance response. And chronic stress, we need to look at Wow, you just burned all the tires off that Formula One racing car, the engine is sputtering. This isn't about quickly changing the tires and the pitstop. This is about repairing the car and your car engine, Zack may have different issues than my car engine. So we need to stop, take a look at it, maybe even get out of the race. And I asked you to do it for eight weeks and say maybe the repairs to your car are a little different than my car. But there's a few common root causes. That's the difference between acute and chronic stress. So I just wanted to break those two down. And then we can go to the other words you are talking for sure. Well,
Zack Arnold: we'll go there in a second. And actually, this brought up a whole lot of questions, but the one that really sticks out, is you must have lived in a different Midwest than me if you're seeing hot guys, and Mazel Rotties because I don't remember seeing any mas varieties when I grew up in the Midwest. So you might you might have grown up in a different part of I grew up in Wisconsin. So that's another
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: thing that I only know a small town in Illinois, there were no Missouri. I think what you're doing is I brain shifted now. And you I end my book saying My hope is that on this journey, I have a second chance at love. Maybe that's the hot guy in the Maserati, maybe yes, but when I'm saying hey, Zack, go find him for me. We won't be slipping on black ice.
Zack Arnold: For Elise, if my audience were my hometown, if you had said, you know, you're looking and you see the scruffy guy in the Ford F 150. Race. Now now that at least that's my world that's probably
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: younger. So these were these big bulk cars like the big long Pontiac Grand Prix series or the minivans? Yeah, exactly. There's minivans.
Zack Arnold: So just rather than this being a tangent, this was just a little glimpse into the ADHD mind and how of all the important things you said, I couldn't let go of hot guys and motorized raazi Masoretes in Illinois. Hmm, I'm gonna have to ask about that. So that's kind of a glimpse into the inner workings.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: I don't call that ADHD brain. I call that so funny. And that this is why you're a creative and you've worked in Hollywood, you have the cracking up laughing right now,
Zack Arnold: it has a little bit of levity and all that information, right. And,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: and also, it's a sign into a busy brain. But see what the difference is, is if you were working on a script with me right now, or some kind of storyboard, and you started to dig down the rabbit hole of the number of minorities or hot men that are single and straight and Illinois, that's ADHD when I'm like, Hey, focus, focus on the interview, right? Yeah, yeah.
Zack Arnold: And I'm one step away from while you were talking going to Google and saying percentage of Missouri it is to total vehicles in Illinois. That's where my brain would have gone. But I've worked on mindfulness and presence and I'm here for the interview. But the default setting would have been I don't know what you saying. But how many miles or audios are in Illinois, that would have been the default setting, right? And then my
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: default setting is some man is listening to this going, Hey, Romie like Maserati, no. issue with the brands that I picked was Zack and I, between Ford f150 Pontiac Grand Prix or a Mazda Rottie. Please, social media tag Zack and not Dr. Romie.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, I love it. So I want to move to this next to the next topics in a second. But I want to stick with the acute versus chronic stress and go into one a little bit deeper, nuanced. And this was you mentioning that this idea that stress is good. And a buzzword that you hear in the biohacking life hacking world is hormesis, the hormetic stressors of which I would argue there are some like you could say if if you're in a perfectly healthy state exercise, like working out running, that's a positive hormetic stressor where it's increasing my cortisol, but it's helping me rebuild. Again, I would also even argue that when your cortisol is dripping out of your ears, certainly like and I'm kind of in that state at the moment, and we'll talk about that later. But it's like, oh, I'm dripping cortisol, because there's nowhere else for it to go. But even then doing things that will usually be a hormetic stressor, even those become too much. And they're that last drop in the bathtub.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: And thank you for that. Because I know you've had a lot of the peak performance biohackers on your podcast before, and this community listens to a lot of them. And you're wondering why that's not working for you. We'll get to this in a second. But I delineate it by Do you have a busy brain or not. And if your score is below 30, it means you're in peak performance. And we can start working on these longevity proven exercises or nutrition protocols. But for the vast majority of people that take this test that score above a 30, these additional acute stressors can actually create more harm. And we don't want that. So so thank you for clarifying that. Yeah.
Zack Arnold: And I'm glad that you brought up the test. I was gonna get there a little bit later. But I know we're gonna make sure that first link in our show notes is to this this busy brain test. And it's I think it's free. Yeah, it takes about five minutes. It's super, super easy. And the thing that drew me to it, obviously, was the book and you talk about how anybody that scores over 30. And I was thinking, let me go ahead and let me take this test myself where I'm prepping for this interview. And my reaction to the 30 is hold my beer. I got it. I scored an 86. Okay, Zack, I got you. Now you see why you and I are talking today?
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: I do I do. And I think you know, the energy I felt from you in our pre interview and right now is your that Romie that was walking in the hospital corridor feeling so alone. And that it does anybody see me or hear me. And I'm here to say that this book was written, because 82% of people score above a 30, which is a sign you have a busy brain scoring above a 50 means you're trending towards burnout, which was about 45% of the people in our research period between December 2020 and December 2022. That number has been holding pretty steady throughout 2023 As we're still looking and wrapping up the data of people that took the test during that time. And so I just want to remind you, you're not alone. And it's why we become cynical, have the quick tips, or you spend a lot of money to try some peak performance supplement or taking cold plunges and you don't feel better, you actually feel worse. So thank you for sharing that.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, and one thing to clarify, I think just as much for you, but also for the listeners that might be newer anybody that's been around a long time. They know that kind of my origin story of starting the podcast, making a major career transition, is if we're going to use the analogy of Doctor Romie at the beginning of this journey, I was also there about eight 910 years ago thinking I'm alone, there must be something broken. I don't know what else to do. And it was that journey that brought me to do what I do now. So I don't feel like that's where I am now. I feel like where I am now is there's been so many acute stressors that are chronically happening over and over and over that are outside of my control that my basically my sympathetic nervous system has just said we're done. So it's I think that emotionally there's a better understanding of what's going on I've got I've got plenty of support. And I share this because I know other people feel alone at the beginning of that journey I am I'm a decade into it. So I just I just wanted to clarify that for you. But I still want to dig much much deeper into all of it. But I guess the the next thing that I want to make sure that we don't lose sight of is I love your differentiation between acute stress And chronic stress. But now there are these three different but seemingly similar things anxiety, depression, burnout, I want to at least very quickly start to dig into the differences between these three, because it's so easy to say, Oh, I'm this one, it might be a lot more of another one. And I want to help people understand how to differentiate.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: First of all, I'm gonna say this, and you don't bring a board certified doctor onto the podcast without me saying this is to diagnose depression or anxiety takes a professional who's been trained to ask the symptoms put you through a test or a scale like the, you know, the busy brain test and give that diagnosis. It doesn't come from watching someone on social media or listening to this podcast saying those symptoms sound like me, I must be depressed. There are feelings that we can have, that are temporary, saying, in this moment, I'm feeling depressed, I saw something on the news cycle that made me feel that way. I'm feeling a little anxious. Because I'm about to get on a big stage and give a keynote address. Those are feelings and they are all valid. When you're asking me, I assume about a clinical disease, the clinical diagnosis of depression, the clinical diagnosis of anxiety, of which there are eight subtypes, by the way, or the clinical diagnosis of burnout. So, in my world, those are three very different diseases that can coexist. So I'm gonna go back to the automobile analogy if I can, and not one is better than the other. So I'm gonna say, let's see if I get this right, Mercedes, BMW and Porsche in the garage, right? There are three different cars, and they're all in the garage, you could have a three car garage and have all three of them, you could have one of them, you could be looking on the outside and going to achieve this compare depression and anxiety to a luxury car, I just I was I was raised with two younger brothers and three cousin, brother, younger cousin brothers who are all car obsessed. So that's where my brain goes to simplify these things. So I just want to make that clear. The second point, I'll say, is burnout, hot is a diagnosis from that was now finally officially in 2019, made an ICD diagnosis by the World Health Organization that really has to do with occupation your job, so that you are emotionally exhausted or cynical from a job that you used to love to do, right? That if you win an award, or someone gives you gratitude, you can't feel it anymore, you've just become cynical towards your job. You no longer have joy, or gratitude or fulfillment, in a job that used to do that once for you. Those are symptoms of burnout. That can exist with or without the anxiety symptoms. So I just want to go there, when people are chronically stressed. And it is happening from your job or from I want to acknowledge parenting being a taking care of a caregiver, that you become cynical, lack of joy, emotionally exhausted. That's burnout.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, you basically just hit the epicenter of all of it for me. Yeah. So I'm gonna dig into this a little bit deeper, because I think you're really going to be able to help me better understand a question that I've been workshopping for a while, which I'm assuming I'm not the only one, which is why we're talking about it publicly. But full disclosure, I've talked about this before, but I work with a therapist regularly. And we've been we've been trying to differentiate between the depression and the burnout. I know burnout, I have been burned out before, like I like I hate my job. I spent my entire career trying to become this thing. And now I've reached the top and why am I here? What's the meaning of life? I've been through all of that. But I've gotten to the point where I, at least personally, I feel and differentiate the difference between depression and burnout. So I'm going to explain it in a similar way that I did to my therapist, and from your perspective, understanding a lot more of the nuances of the neuroscience, I want to see how far off I am. I honestly don't feel like I'm burned out nearly as much as I'm dealing with depression. The reason being that, and I haven't talked too much about this publicly. And I won't go into details, but when you mentioned being a caretaker, I have essentially become the primary caretaker for both of my parents simultaneously. And it's been this just acute stress after acute stress after acute stress that's basically lasted for 14 months, over and over and over and my body is just like I just did like you just said I literally cannot handle one more thing, not one more phone call, not one more email. But I love what I do. And I feel like the lack of energy or the physical or the emotional disconnection from it stems from the depression, but I have all these ideas, all these things that I want to try. I love working with my team. I love all the things that we're doing, but it's like I don't have any gap. is in the tank to do it. Whereas with burnout, you just look at the screen and you're like, I just don't care. This doesn't interest me. I'm not passionate about it. So to me, it's. So that's my personal experience. I don't know if that helps differentiate or not five for you. Yes, please.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: What if I said, you could, obviously you love your parents, and you're honoring your elders and doing this, that you're experiencing caregiver burnout. And very true, and you're at mental capacity for caregiving, and you love your parents. But it is at capacity and overwhelming, that it's not leaving you anything to give to a job you love. So it's actually caregiver burnout. And I see this in the workplace all the time, because we're either dealing with men or women that have young children or children with special needs at home, that are differently abled, or myself to a caregiver to elderly loved ones, that you're at capacity. So instead of this job, you and I both love, and being able to bring 100% of our physical, emotional, spiritual energy to a job, you're like, Girl, all I got is 30% for you today, and I gave you 30%, because that was all I had left. So what I would say is, could we look at it from a different perspective is you have caregiver burnout, you're at capacity, it's leaving you less mental, emotional, spiritual, physical space to do a job, you're really good at that you love that you have creative ideas, you can't give it everything you have. And yes, could it be making you depressed between the two things and feelings of depression? Yeah, because if you tell me you're depressed, you know, your brain and your body and your spirit better than I do, right. And then we can get into the questions around depression in a second, if proper, or your therapist may have gone there. But I think I'm gonna differentiate the two for you, but then show you how everyone that I deal with that's just like USAC in the corporate space, or other entrepreneurs are dealing with the same thing. There's an area of your life that you're at capacity, and you could be burned out from, and it's bleeding into affecting other areas of your life. For other people that may be job burnout, that's now putting a strain on their marriage or their ability to parent teenagers, it can go either way. Okay,
Zack Arnold: that was immensely helpful for me, because you're you're spot on. Because I've I've, it's funny, because I've had this conversation, slash debate with team members in the past, were a part of the messaging of the work that we did is we help people with creative burnout. And I remember somebody challenging me, and they're like, well, what's the difference between creative burnout and just burnout? And I didn't really have a great answer. Now, I think I have a better one, because I am not experiencing creative burnout at all, I have so many ideas. And if you give me the space to get in front of a whiteboard for half a day, so many things I want to do, but the caregiver burnout has essentially run the machine into the ground. So when the time is like when I need to turn on the spigot for the creativity, my my nervous system and our brain are like there's there's just nothing here right now. But so yes, caregiver burnout nailless,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: we see that when you're living in a chronic stress response, or burnout from any area of your life, job, parenting, caregiving for elderly, financial stress, whatever that burnout may be, it doesn't allow for the processes or the state of flow that the brain needs to be in for that creative space. And let's also talk the practicality of it. You just said you need a half day uninterrupted just with a whiteboard to do this, that's really difficult to do when you're caregiving and you're running a business. And even if somebody helped to come in and take care of your parents, and gave you half day, in your brain, the checklist of everything that needs to be done for your parents hasn't been taken care of. So you're not going to be able to focus and that's being a human.
Zack Arnold: Yeah. And then I mean, I can resonate with all that. And I think that to go back to something you said earlier that I partially corrected, I'm now going to uncorrect myself, and that if we look at the unique circumstances that I'm in, not in the here's the thing is that they feel unique. So when it's a matter of talking to me feeling like I'm not alone, when it comes to the caregiver burnout, and being a parent and running a business, that's an area where I feel like I don't have any peers. When it comes to other creative professionals that are struggling with the job market struggling with creative burnout. That's a 10 year journey that I've been on and I've helped people through. But this this new area, I'm stalking you does feel like I'm the only one that stuck here. So I'm glad I'm gonna uncorrect myself. You were right. I was wrong. Dr.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Auntie always knows her intuition better.
Zack Arnold: I love that. So the next question to even get a little bit deeper into the nuances and I'm not even sure there is an answer to this. It's kind of like I'm asking does the chicken come first or the egg? But depression and burnout does depression to lead to burnout? Does burnout lead to depression? Do they all lead to anxiety symptoms, like, how do we start to parse this out? One
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: is Please sit with a therapist or a doctor that can do the screening tests. Right. So I want to say that to anybody that's listening, please don't use my session here with Zack. And also medically legally, I'm not your doctor. So I'm not giving you a diagnosis, I have to give all that. I
Zack Arnold: do that like at least three times a week with my coaching students. So I'm right there with you.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: And the next part I'll say is they're unrelated. You're asking me the wrong question. Hmm. Okay. So someone can have depression for a myriad of reasons, there could be a life circumstance that started to feel stressed for stressful and triggered depression. We know the five top reasons in someone's life that can trigger really severe stress is loss or death of a loved one, change or loss of a job, marriage having a child's moving to a new city, right? Those are examples of the top five stressors in life. And some people can get depressed from those not everyone, right? There are other people that were quote, I'm going to put in air quotes, no reason at all, because there isn't a life change or circumstance, that they become depressed now in neurotic bringing my neurology and integrative medicine together, we can get to the root cause of that. And what I mean by that is, maybe they had an undiagnosed thyroid disorder, their gut health is out of balance, you know, and that can be making depression worse, they have a genetic tendency towards it, all the things, right. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna allow you to uncouple those things for the sake of this podcast, even though I know that was like your intention when you knew you were bringing me on because I feel like we're going to do a disservice to the listeners. And that anxiety. Your other question I really want to get to was, people can have depression with anxiety features, or vice versa, have a primary like panic disorder with some depressive features, please allow a psychiatrist to sort through all of that. It's not the reason we're on this podcast, there are eight subtypes of anxiety. And then there's this confusion that I see a lot. I'm a chief wellness officer to over 12,000 pack members and a lot of Gen Z and millennials in the company that are watching Social Media. And we we don't normalize that there are moments in the day or in life where I can feel anxious, and that is normal. But when anxiety is limiting me from being present on this podcast with you from doing my job from being present with my dog, or my elderly loved ones, when a panic attack or anxiety attack is coming out of the blue, when anxiety is hurting you from test taking, that's an anxiety disorder. And there's eight different subtypes, which I'm not going to either get into in the podcast, work with a therapist, but the examples are, you know, panic attacks, anxiety attack, their situational anxiety that can be you know, due to tests or high pressure, et cetera. What I want to define and why I'm here today, is what I call a busy brain, that I think we are missing in the entire conversation of chronic stress and Burna. And that in our research, we found that no matter what age group, but I will be honest, most of the people that tested for us are younger millennials older so let's say age 30 Older is where I would put the target audience into boomers is high achieving success driven professionals like you and Isaak, right? Success, I want to make it sexy, I don't get the soft life trend that's going on. And I don't apologize for my ambition and my goals that I'd like to set. So your success driven professional, you want to be able to pay your mortgage or your rent every month, whatever that may be. Something can start happening. And that's somewhere on the path of chronic stress. And we'll talk about a particular pattern of neuro inflammation that happens in the brain and your hypothalamus in a second. If you want to unpack the Geek Girl Geek guy science. A triad of symptoms starts to happen. adult onset ADHD, you did not want to repeat you do not have ADHD as a child or add as a child. Coupled with ruminating anxiety, the thoughts swirling in your brain and you're like is that impostor syndrome is that inner critic and you just can't stop ruminating. You can't let go of your to do list. You can't let go of one conversation you had in the middle of your day. That's ruminating anxiety that the thoughts are racing before you go to bed, coupled with a insomnia difficulty falling asleep or you wake up in the middle of the night and you can't go back to bed. Those three things make up a busy brain that we You see happen in chronic stress on the path to burnout. And this is the audience are the people that I'm here to grab? And say Yes, life can be hard and a gig economy. You're waiting for your next, you know, project to come along that entrepreneurial roller coaster. Why is it that some people can ride the gig economy and remain in a state of flow and calm and adjust to economic environments, and others of us, the version of me you read in the book, get a busy brain. That's what I'm here to address today.
Zack Arnold: Well, as soon as you started to break down the busy brain talking about the adult onset ADHD, the anxiety and the insomnia, I was double checking to make sure that you didn't have our surveillance camera inside my brain. Oh, my God, this is my entire life experience right now. And to go way back into the archives. I don't know if I was undiagnosed with ADHD or it was adult onset, the more that you and I are talking, the more I've read, I think it was adult onset. There were certain symptoms growing up, but it was the only symptom that was present. My whole life was crazy, obsessive hyper focus. I've always had the ability from preschool until today, you put a project in front of me, the world disappears, and I disappear to it. So that I've always had but as far as the the anxiety, that disorganized thoughts and not being able to get homework done all the kinds of things that manifest in kids, I had none of that. But it's also because I was nurtured with a tremendous amount of discipline. And it was as soon as the discipline and the structure were removed from my life, ie when I went into the real world, that I became an absolute disaster of a massive human being. Okay,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: I want to unpack all of that. So yes, a lot of people can get missed in childhood, and it's really hard to go back and figure it out. What I want to say is most patients or clients I work with, it was very clear that they had Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, what was previously known as a DD Attention Deficit Disorder without the hyperactivity component without the inattentiveness right, we all from time to die may have one or two of symptoms wondering was that ADHD as a child No, to its, yes. Most human brains, not everybody craves structure and discipline. So when we were younger, we had systems in place like school or parents that give us that structure or that discipline. And when we become adults, that goes away, especially if you're an entrepreneur, right? There has to be this self motivation. And for many, then that deadline, or that stressor that's going to keep us honest, to get up and work and not do what we want to do, you know, that may not be contributing to business or health or well being, that, again, doesn't make ADHD that's just normal human response. We, most people require some kind of structure, some kind of deadline, some kind of discipline to say, hey, it's bed, it's dark outside and past 11 midnight, maybe it's time to go to sleep, you know, most of us need that kind of discipline. That's still not ADHD. So when I first went to medical school, and as you mentioned in the show, and entered entered neurology in the late 1990s, less than 5% of brain doctors at that time were women. And back in those days, we did not acknowledge adult onset ATD or ADHD, we would meet adults in clinic. And then and then it was very obvious it was missed in childhood for women, especially right because women tended not to be impulsive. And that would get missed. And let's not get into girls and women not getting adequate health care and my generation and even today, that's a different subject for a different time. What is different in today's world, when we see the last seven to nine years of psychiatry, neurology and neuroscience literature, what's different in today's world than in the 1990s? What's the biggest obvious thing that's really different to you?
Zack Arnold: I don't know. Enough to think about that for a second. He said while staring at his phone that's connected to the internet and every human being on the planet. I don't know what is different
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: is the multi digital device use right that even I'm sitting here in my home office today, and I have two mobile phones, I have my laptop, I have my desktop, I have another desktop over here. There's multiple digital device use, and multiple screens and our intention span has been reduced because of that, right? And in one screen or multiple browser windows that are open and by the way, I just lost focus because my dog is with the sitter and is that a cute puppy that's on the sofa behind you right now. You can see I'm having a loss of focus moment, but I'm going to bring myself back. That doesn't mean I have ADHD. It just means I'm having a human moment. I'm missing my dog and I just saw your sweet dog cuddle on your sofa behind you, right? But if now I was going to get deeper Old and completely lose track of the conversation and spend the rest of the podcast talking about your dog and my dog, well, then maybe we need to talk about busy brain, right? So adult onset ADHD is real technology is is the biggest component. And it's in Chapter Nine of the book, we break down what's happened there and a lot of the literature. But aside from that, when I've been pushing myself, I'm just going to use myself. So I'm not projecting on you, or the listeners right now, when you're living in chronic stress or capacity, because life is hard. Like Zack, you are, thank you for being so honest, you are a parent, you're a caregiver to elderly parents. And it sounds really complex day to day, week to week, you never know what you're dealing with. And you're trying to run a really successful business, life gets hard. That is chronic stress brother, and you are handling it with such grace. But with a score in the 80s. It's telling me you're there. And I want to know Did something else happen in the pattern of inflammation? Did it throw off hormones did we never check for a methylation disorder did your vitamin d3 levels drop is the stress eating in some people causing insulin receptors to get, you know, burnt out in the brain or overstimulated in the brain that it's spiking and dropping blood sugar with your cortisol causing that inability to focus. That's what I want to look at in a busy brain. Because when we fix that, guess what happens? The focus comes right back.
Zack Arnold: I'm so glad that you went here because now we're really going to start to nerd out. Because I this is this has been the path I've been on for 15 years. And as soon as you said methylation pathways, I'm like yep, been there done that done the genetic testing, I can send you the results to show you which snips show the my methylation pathways don't work. So I'm not gonna get into too deep into the details and number one, because I'm probably going to say the wrong words and you're going to be like that's not actually right. But the gist of it and I want to share this because I've done multiple episodes on this in the past in breaking down my the genetic code, basically you do answer ancestry.com 23 and me you can take that and send those raw results was just looks like a bunch of gobbledygook, you can send it to specific companies to have an interpreted and I do have very poorly functioning methylation pathways, meaning I have the genetic predisposition already set for the depression for the anxiety for the attention issues. Right so it's it's there in the genetic code, right and then on top of that, I can't remember what the the exact like what the code number whatever it was, but whatever the the technical diagnosis is, I'm really horrible at sleeping that process of like the your lymphatic system and everything cleaning itself out during the night. I me horrible sleep, just like Thank you. Yes, the glymphatic system. I genetically am horrible at sleeping, meaning when I wake up in the morning, I feel like I get hit by a truck. And it takes me like an hour and a half to wake up. And it doesn't matter. If I slept six hours, nine hours, 11 hours, whatever that process is of cleansing the way that we described it in a past episode as your brain is like a dishwasher. And you run the dishwasher at night when I wake up in the morning, all my dishes are still dirty. And it's like did I even run this thing? Right? So the all those components I know that are there at a much deeper genetic level on top of all the situational issues. So I've gone deep down the rabbit hole I've it's funny that we're talking about this, I literally have a meeting this afternoon with my integrative medical doctor who I've worked with for 15 years. And I'm going to make sure we have links to all the conversations with him. Because we could we could easily talk for three hours just about traditional medicine versus integrative medicine. And I don't want to spend too much time on it. But I want to I want to
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: go there. Could I could I truncate what you just said, please do so yes. Because I don't want people listening to this who have a score above 30 to go panic and do all these genetic tests. And I also want to have some Dr. Romie real talk. You and I are blessed with the funding to be able to go see integrative functional medicine doctors. That's like the top 1%. And if somebody is in this gig economy right now, or I think of our community is largely they work in corporate America, they may not have the 1000s of dollars it takes to do these tests and see these doctors. We created a lab slip in chapter 16 of the book that you can take to your primary care doctor and ask them and my prayer this year. We're a national USA Today audible Wall Street Journal. Amazon best selling book right now is that this branch of protocol labs live just starts showing up in primary care doctor's office and why is that important? Because if you have traditional health care insurance in the United States, even if you're self employed and Have that these labs are covered. If you're having something, I just look for the MTHFR deficiency, and even there's 40 genes under that, then I want to double click on something else, you said you can have the genetic predispositions for these issues. But remember, it's our environment and our actions that turn those genes on and off. And that's why we wrote this book. So I don't want someone to go running and spend 1000s of dollars on the tests unless, really, you're moved to do so you have the funding, you have a doctor that can fix it. I think there's elsewhere to focus our knowledge on and fix the simple things that we see results with really quickly. So I'm going to pull you out of the rabbit hole with a respect but have a little bit of anti discipline and say, Let's not go down that rabbit hole beta combat. You know, I
Zack Arnold: love that. I'm very, very, very glad that you pointed that out. Because it's a conversation that I've had just to it's more for the sake of illuminating that there are other options out there that people don't even know exist, but especially given present circumstances, I don't want somebody to walk away thinking, well, the only option I have is to go the integrative medicine route, which is not the only option. So I'm really glad that you pointed that out. And no,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: I have both to over the listeners. I'm board certified both in neurology and integrative medicine. But until we fix the US healthcare system, most integrative functional medicine doctors I know not all most don't even take regular health insurance. And it's really unaffordable to see those doctors and that's one of the reasons I wrote this book. And we put the protocol in place like this, right? So I really want to make that clear. And and do that. Because it's a place of privilege. You and I get to go see those doctors and not everybody does. You know, I
Zack Arnold: very much appreciate you. You pointed that out. So I'm I'm glad that you gave me a little bit of that Auntie discipline. So thank you. Yeah.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Yeah, go ahead. So we want to talk specifically, in mess in in the methylation disorders, it's MTHFR deficiency. Yeah, that's exactly what I have. You nailed it easy labs to check. Honestly, you don't even need the fancy genetic testing. It's, we look at homocysteine levels, you can check quickly for the MTHFR deficiency quickly, inexpensively, when that's it. And that medical data, we do see that in the right setting with chronic stress and other things that it can lead to symptoms that are related to mood, and your ability to pay attention. That is adult onset add or symptoms like that attention deficit disorder, hyperactivity disorder, and mood disorders, anxiety or depression. And you may need traditional prescription medicines, I want to be clear, there's no shame in that here. Please let a doctor decide that and you decide that you may be wanting traditional medicine you may not. But then we also need to treat the root cause of which there our ability to do that for MTHFR deficiency. Sorry,
Zack Arnold: I wasn't paying attention. You lost me for the last 30 seconds. I'm kidding. The really important thing that again, this could be the entire conversation on I don't want it to be but understanding that there's a difference between treating symptoms and finding root causes. Because it's much simpler to treat a symptom and a 10 minute conversation. Oh, this is the symptom. Here's the solution to that symptom root causes take time
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: medicine, yeah, and root cause and then it isn't an either or, you're not gonna say well, I'm only going to do the root cause and not take the medication for ADHD or depression. Please talk about that with the doctor is I live in this unique world where I want to bridge both can be normal. And what do I mean by that, like, you will read in the book that I had a high busy brain test score, I kept pushing through it because I just didn't see a path out I single divorced. You know, supporting my own household, burning the candle at both ends, like anybody here listening is when you get a project you could easily be working 80 100 hour workweeks with, outta control. And I ended up in life saving surgery. So I am alive today, because of cardiothoracic surgeon saved my life. There have been many traditional medicines that I have taken that have helped me along the way along with having wonderful therapists so you can live in that traditional world. And you'll read in the book and were you finding the path to global healing traditions before there were even podcasts around or Lululemon stores such as yoga and mindfulness and integrative holistic medicine and healers, and that both can heal disease and keep us healthy and well. And so let's meet each other in the place of that bridge. So
Zack Arnold: we can go further down the rabbit hole for sure of understanding different protocols, simple labs that we can get to understand all this, but it seems like the simplest solution would just be an equal dosage of caffeine and Ambien. Is that a good place to start?
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Hi, hi, I thought well, you're going to give auntie a migraine here. You didn't pay attention to anything in the book. That's what we call the stimulant sedative cycle. In the busy brain you're like, how do I know I have it other than taking that busy brain test is we find that most high achieving professionals are like, Jack me up on something that'll boost my energy in the day. And we can say, hey, sack, it was just one latte from Starbucks or my local coffee shop this morning. And I had non dairy milk in it. But maybe it was several energy drinks, no judgment. But now you're, you're having bursts of focus and bursts of difficulty focusing with anxiety and between you're on edge. And then you need maybe wine to calm down at night. And if you don't drink at some overpriced supplement from some Instagram influencer, there we go again. Right. And when that fails, what did traditional medicine do, and I take credit for this, like, we messed it up, we started to prescribe the stimulants Adderall, Vyvanse. And maybe not everybody needed it, because guess what 85% Of the prescriptions of stimulant medications in the world are taken here in the United States. And guess what, it's not just our children, it's adults, using it as peak performance medications to get through medical school, law school, work in the tech world and not sleep. And then you need a prescription sedative at night instead of alcohol because the supplement didn't work. So the Ambien, the Xanax and that. So you need a stimulant all day and a sedative at night. That's the stimulant sedative cycle, that is a sign you have a busy brain.
Zack Arnold: It's funny, because for most of my life, neither of those were an issue. But over the last few years, and specifically this year, when I was reading that cycle again, I was like, how did she get the camera inside my brain? Because that isn't that is not my default ritual tonight, any default habits that I've had, I didn't touch a cup of coffee until I had my second kid. And I was at the point where I just with all the lack of sleep in the working I'm like, I gotta find something just to perk me up enough that I can get to work during the day. And even to this day, it's only one to two cups. I don't have like a coffee habit, so to speak. Yeah, but the going to sleep at night up until all of these acute stressors started happening over the last year. So going to sleep at night was foam rolling or some form of light meditation or just, you know, journaling, whatever it was, and all that seemed to work with just a couple of natural supplements. Because I was doing a lot of really vigorous exercise, I'd spent about five years training for American Ninja Warrior. So you know, high dosage of magnesium and other things like that. But over the last year, I have found myself slipping into the same tendencies as everybody else where it's, you know, not a bottle of wine, but it's you know, a glass of wine or just something to help regulate the nervous system. Because the healthy options that I know to be able to regulate and soothe the nervous system. They don't work anymore.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: That's a busy brain. Yeah,
Zack Arnold: like I said, I read the book, I'm like,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: at at something, you know, burnout, you're showing some of the mental physical symptoms of burnout. And it's different in everyone. You know, for you, it may be your mood is affected. Your sleep is affected. For me. You read in the book, it was my digestive system, I had Achalasia and it was so severe became precancerous lesions. And so, you know, that can happen to anybody. It could be your hormones that are off or somebody's asthma gets worse, all of a sudden, you were fine. And how did I get high blood pressure in my 30s or 40s. That's what happens. When the airport traffic control tower in the brain. The hypothalamus is under chronic neuro inflammation that we see in chronic stress, specifically, your Sen nucleus that moderates the circadian rhythm, right. So now, you're not in a normal biological clock where your energy hormones are boosted in the morning. So hey, if one to two cups of coffee are going to do it for you. Okay, right. But most people I know. It depends on the size of the coffee, if you tell me to venti lattes, right, I mean, that's what the honesty is, and it's okay. And what if I gave you you may be surprised at the sack. But I think for me for you, I want to even go in a place that I really didn't go in this book, we can go through the week protocol for the listeners. But what if I just gave you permission, Zack to say this is the season of life you're in, and that as much as your heart wants to give 150% to your business, that the universe is saying your love and your energy is needed for your elderly parents and your children. And until you can find a system to get help for their care and or more help than you already have a nanny an out home nurse the people that can come in caregiver, the you know caregiver.com They something like that they can help you find these doctor's appointments and sort through prescriptions and all those things, that that would be your focus. And that maybe sometimes for as high achieving professionals, we think I can still run my business or be in the C suite at this high performing level, when all of a sudden, all of our time and our heart space is going to another area of our life. And it's okay to have seasons like, this is my season, it has been for the last four or five years for my career. And if I were honest with you, and it isn't really easy to say, I am sure the universe presented me with like, amazing men that really had everything to be potential great partner, but I wasn't not only emotionally available timewise I wasn't available. Right now I'm in one to four cities a week because of my role as chief wellness officer speaking and press for the book, right? That I didn't have the capacity in my physical schedule, in my brain in my heart to give properly to a partner. Maybe that's it for your business, or, or I'm, you know, there are systems that you know, you can work on to get additional help with your parents and children. And not everybody has that financial privilege, I want to be clear about that. Like, how does that feel for you.
Zack Arnold: I mean, you're, you're basically digging into the epicenter of all of it, and I want to I want to break down, it's, I'm having a very emotional reaction to it, which means that it's resonating. And I want to help the audience understand why. So at first I'll give give some logistics, when it comes to the caregiving side, for my parents, that's been the last 14 months has been cracking that code. So for the most part, they're now at a place where they're safe, they're taking care of it took almost a year to be able to get there, there's still a lot of logistical day to day like I'm I'm it was, without, I'm not gonna go too deep into details. And I'm not sure how much the family would want me to share. But the shortest version is, the both of them hit that wall at the same time. So it wasn't you've got one healthy parent and want like they both at the exact same all at the same time. So I've had to manage care for both of them. And I have now been activated as medical power of attorney for both simultaneously. That's a lot to handle on top of the fact
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: not just one person, it's two people with two separate things. So that's caregiving. Even though we lump parents into this, I really want to be clear. Normally, that doesn't happen. It's one person that you're caregiving for, you've got two going on. Okay, so
Zack Arnold: there isn't the support of the one with you to help the other ingredients, both of them simultaneously say, pat,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: pat, like a different issues, right, different doctors, different issues,
Zack Arnold: for the most part, same issues, that's the other challenge. But then on top of that, they're over 2000 miles away, and I have to do all of it remotely. So now the day to day is do a couple of calls with clients record a podcast, spend two hours on the phone, making sure that a parent gets from this point A to point B to point C, and I'm on the phone to talk. So that that's kind of like I told my team, it's kind of like somebody saying you now have a new part time job and you have no control over your schedule whatsoever. Right?
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: By the way, this isn't one of those jobs where there's an easy deadline to say Finish this report or record this podcast, you never know day to day what you're dealing with. And if the solution you come up with works so I want to for the listeners be clear. The last 12 to 14 months, you've had an ongoing chronic stress, yes, from two different sources like because each parent has their own and and and it is more difficult. For most not everybody to have chronic stress from a person you love in your life compared to a job. Yeah, it is something very different. Because there's a different emotional component there that most people don't have with their job. I have that with my job because I now am in a purpose driven mission in life. So if you were to take something out of my job, it feels like it is a part of me my soul's purpose, but not everybody has that. Okay, keep going. And
Zack Arnold: that's and that's as far as the job is concerned or what I do for a career. Now I'm at that place too. And we might get there as well. But to continue breaking this down because not everybody listening is in the position of having to simultaneously caregiver for two parents, right. But just about everybody listening is in the position for for the last year and a half. They've watched our industry completely crumbled to the ground and their identity is a creative that tell stories has been obliterated because through multiple industry strikes, and now the introduction of artificial intelligence. Everybody's staring at the wall saying Who the hell am I anymore? Yes, that in and of itself is enough to break people down.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Agreed. Agreed. It is hurt your identity and your joy and what gives you a purpose in life and change is hard and it says If something you love, and your identity was taken away from you, and you read that in the book, because I was raised from birth to be a doctor in a hospital seeing patients, my first toy was a neon, Fisher Price stethoscope, if I would lose the stethoscope or not have it on me, I would have an like emotional meltdown as a child. And to have what it felt like that taken away from me, because when I got sick, in those days in toxic medical culture, there was no such thing as medical leave, if you leave and something's wrong with you, they could take away your license, like they didn't with me, right. But it's hard. And now today, I'm an entrepreneur, and I'm at peace, thank God for therapy, but my identity was going to a hospital or clinic to see sick patients every day. And that is a change in your career, whether you choose it or life chooses it for you, such as in the creative industry, a piece of your identity, you are now grieving, that will create chronic stress.
Zack Arnold: So the idea of you're basically born to the world, if you're going to be a doctor, you've got the neon stethoscope, this brings up what I believe is one of the root causes of burnout. And this is coming from the non professional medical background. But I've been saying for years that one of the root underlying causes of burnout is improper expectations. There's an a misalignment between expectations and reality. And there's this expectation, and that this comes back to what you've given me as advice before and why it really hit me. There's nothing harder, at least in my opinion, to ask somebody that's super type a high achieving professional to do than to reset their expectations. And for my expectation is that right now I'm supposed to slow down on all of these goals and these visions that I have in my mind, and all these things that I was working towards, and to say this isn't the season of your life, like as a type A over achiever. So I can't, I could never reset those expectations. Those expectations are what drives me. I know that that that's what hits me so deeply. This misalignment of my expectations and my reality,
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: look at those now I came on this podcast to be healed by you child, you're helping it I'm just gonna slip on the giant keep listening to you. And by the way, people are wondering why I slipped into this traditional Indian accent you're going to hear in the book is I have a deep belief that we need to heal chronic stress in busy brain that that is at the root cause of the inner critic and impostor syndrome. And it's why in Leadership Studies, no matter how many impostor syndrome inner critic confidence classes you go through, it doesn't work. If you heal a busy brain, you do. And you see, in the beginning of the book, the voices of my quote, inner critic with a busy brain are harsh. And they take on the tone of my elders my undies, right. And as I heal my busy brain, they turn to ones of wisdom and love and compassion. And that is the inner voice of what happens when we have an is busy brain. And so one I want to say that but to you just Thank you, Brother, you just healed me. And you're right. And it was when I let go of that attachment to outcome or what something is going to look like mindfulness teaches us to have non attachment. So I had to heal that non, that attachment that I had, that I was going to be an academic professor in a medical university, doing research and see patients and then I thought, Okay, I'm gonna go to Community Hospital, and then something was calling me. And now I will say in this entrepreneurial journey, the more I practice non attachment. There's also non attachment to a timeline. And could I give you a true example here? Yeah, please. I think it was when I went into integrative medicine and I started to see integrative medicine patients back in 2014. Here in Florida, I'm no longer seeing patients one to one, I can't do it all nor do I want to. It was back then I was like, oh, I should find something and write a book. The idea of piecing things together came from speaking engagements. Now in 2017. I started to research this book and 2017 We had a book deal in 2019 that got washed away with a pandemic. It was suffering. I was like, what I need to wait to do this. And that attachment came back again. And that expectation that by now, I've been speaking all these years I have a successful like the top 1% of producers of professional speakers in the United States. And this book deal isn't happening. And I can only now in this moment, look back and say thank God it didn't happen then. Because the pandemic happened and it made me do honest research. So I didn't sound like another Instagram platitude, professional And I did authentic research, and then found the solution in this eight week here called Brain shift and tested that in 1000 people. And then I spent another year paying a developmental editor, so we could write the stories even better. So that it was science stories and spirituality all wrapped up in a book. And that's why you say, girl, do you got a camera inside my head? That was the process. Now, attachment as an entrepreneur should have been like, do the research, write the book and under a year, get a ghostwriter. Get a researcher. I mean, that's what some of my entrepreneurial medical colleagues would tell you. And they did fine with that. That wasn't my journey. So I say this to you, Zack, you have an idea that in the next quarterly sprint, and the next year, these are your rocks in your business that you want to move. And I'm saying, it's okay to practice non attachment. Because one thing has to go or another and it is not easy. It hurts my heart that I'm having the most amazing APEC celebration moment in my career. And my parents, my brothers are here to celebrate with me, my, my global circle of sister friends and brothers like you, but that I don't have a life partner, and I'm okay with it, I'm at peace. At some level, it was a subconscious and conscious decision, I will say, I would not be having this rockstar success. Starting a big new job inside Great Wolf resorts as chief wellness Officer of over 12,000 employees, that's a full time C suite level job for most people, and I'm running this full time speaking career. And this book launch like three full time jobs. We're calming it down now. And figuring out how to do it so that there is space in my life. Because intuitively I feel the universe is going to deliver that life partner. And I'm ready to make space for him to I want
Zack Arnold: to dig a little bit deeper into a few practical things that anybody can do before we wrap up without saying give me one to three tips. I want to do that. So I want to make it very clear. We're gonna get there. But you've brought up another question that I think it's way, way deeper. And it might take us a little bit past our usual time. But if I'm choosing between these two questions, this is what I want to know more. How did you get to be at peace with that? Because that's right, it's very clear that you're very emotional about this. Yeah. How is it that you are at peace with the fact that you've reached the apex of your career, and you don't have somebody special to share with you?
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: I, I think everything I do and brain shift is what are you doing for your brain, your body, your spirit and your team? Okay. And it started in my spirit that I start each day with prayer and meditation. And that mindfulness has taught me that non attachment, and that when suffering comes because I didn't have time to do something with family or loved ones I was busy with work or, or the book took years instead of one year to do that suffering because of attachment. Right? So I think a combination of my mindfulness practice and a good therapist, a damn good therapist, I've had a great therapist, she's the same person for the last 10 years. So that's, that's one thing I came to peace out with. And then this piece came to me. I think, from therapy and from spirituality, and from age and wisdom, as an auntie, no, I would tell you is that when we have a timeline of what we should be doing in our life, society has put that timeline in us. And that true joy and peace is like when I go on God's timeline for me, which is going to look differently. So I'm going to be celebrating my 50th birthday this year.
Zack Arnold: So take very good care of yourself, for anybody that's only listening, like Well done.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Thank you. Thank you, thank you for honoring me with that. And because I practice what I preach, right, so to the best of my ability, I'm not perfect. My internal world spiritually, physically, brain health, all of the things but I will say that like, maybe for other people, they would have been like by 50, you should have had a family and done all that. But I'm like, I feel like I've had enough career success, all praise to God and my life for two different lifetimes, Mike, like my medical career success, and now my entrepreneurial success. And that was my path. And I'm going to give gratitude in the universe that I got to do this, and I got to break barriers for women. For the dreamers, I'm breaking barriers to show others what's possible, and that this is my journey, and that that's a societal norm that will cause suffering. If they say, well, by your age, you should have done 123 And so when you let go of society ad and you say this is my life? And how can I be of service today? That that will keep you honest, rather than to say, how can I make a million dollars today? How can I get a million followers today, I run a business, you run a business, there are creatives listening that need to find a job and pay their mortgage. All of that is true. But when you start from this place of peace and non attachment, and you say, How can I be of service, and I'm not going to give away what I do for free. So you're getting paid, and there's an energetic exchange that you come to that peace, and that my life does not look like any other 4950 year old woman you're going to be interviewing, and guess what, I'm at peace with that. And I, I will now that I've healed my busy brain, and I'm in a place of brain shift, I say we become the whole Poulter's, Zack, my brother, I will hold this hope for you, that you have this piece already within you. But when you have a busy brain, it's fooling you to think you are failing because you didn't record so many podcast episodes, you didn't get so many sponsors, you didn't get so many coaching clients, and that you're giving attention to your beloved mother and father and children instead. That is a busy brain that is ego that is society, you get to live your life. And when you live your life authentically and say, This is the season or the day of the week, that belongs just to my mother and father or just to my children, or this is the day of the week that someone else has got to help with the kids. So I can be a podcaster and an entrepreneur, you're living your life on your terms and not society's terms. Man,
Zack Arnold: I think you just drill into the center of my soul there for a second. And that's that's definitely what I needed to hear. And I think that part of the acceptance that I have already come to over the last several years is the and this is something that I talked about with the podcast and my coaching program. It's really a core foundation of the mission statement of this company is to be able to pursue a successful creative career but without sacrificing family relationships, sanity in the process. And I've come to terms for a long time with if I want to be a present father and a present husband, I can't do the 90 hour weeks Mark Cuban style to build a billion dollar business. So I designed a lifestyle where I felt like I could for the most part integrate work in life not necessarily work life balance, but work life integration was working really well for a long time. Then the parents come along, obviously this and it's and I think that what I haven't done yet is just accepted it. Yeah, it's this yeah, sorry, go ahead.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: So that's the closing three pages of my book, that there is no end destination that you're like, Oh, I heal my busy brain, I brain shift and guess what another life circumstance will come along, just like you're sharing, you had a system in place for being a father, your children, your physical health and well being your mental health and well being and your business. And then the last 14 months, your life has also been given to your elderly parents. And that if your business or your time as a father is now feeling not in control, then we can get a busy brain all over again. And you just go back through this eight week protocol that we've laid out for you so that you're taking care of the chronic stress response in the brain and in the body. And you go through that, and, and allow and in that place. As you're doing that journey, all of a sudden, a certain meaning on your calendar isn't going to be important. Or if your intuition is telling you get on a plane and go see mom and dad for a week, you're going to do that if you're going to say I'm going to take a full day off for the kids or I'm going to hire the nanny an extra day for the kids so I can do something else. Like it just becomes clear that I'm at peace that I gave all that time to being a chief wellness officer or a professional speaker or researcher writing this book. Because well how do you I feel blessed right now being of service to humanity? Yes, this was my thing. And I also want to be very candid to listeners and you're going to read it in chapter four of the book. Part of my journey of chronic stress and burnout was infertility and I didn't find a pathway to integrative medicine and correcting my Hashimotos thyroid and and hormones until it was passed. And so I will be honest and authentic for any man or woman listening right now. I have the privilege of getting to do what I do, because I don't have young humans that are dependent on me.
Zack Arnold: I preach You're sharing all of that. And I want to be very respectful of your time. But I'm going to have to share one other thing that you just mentioned that I think is so important. And this is basically again, me hijacking this conversation. And I'll expect an invoice afterwards for today's session. Because this has gone far beyond helping you publicize a book, I hope that I've done a good job of that, you know, this
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: wasn't that was about, I go to bed every day saying did one human breathe easier because I've lived and if I could be of service to you sack because you serve so many in your community, then this was my aunties job right now. That's all I
Zack Arnold: appreciate that. And what the the realization that you helped me come to us, I think I'm closer to the acceptance than I thought. And here's why. You said if you have an intuition, you should listen to it. And this was the weirdest experience I've ever had just two weeks ago, I had this intuition I said, it was for my mom's 80th birthday. I said, Something's telling me I need to fly home and go to this birthday party this weekend, we were just going to do this thing over zoom. And I said to my wife, I'm like, this is going to be really weird. Do we have anything going on this weekend because I'm gonna fly home. She's like, why you're you were just there a couple months ago, I said, Something is telling me to fly home. And I flew home. And I didn't even go to my mom's 80th birthday party, because I ended up in the hospital with my father. And had I not been there, I don't know how it would have gone. So I think what that tells me is that there's, there's maybe more internal and emotional acceptance in the emotional side. And I felt that and I listened to it. But the logical brain is saying, Yeah, but look at the spreadsheet, look at all the goals, look at the projections, like, that's what you're supposed to be working towards. And it causes the friction and the anxiety of that being a distraction rather than that right now being the purpose and the business being a distraction.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: So I'm going to be your home holder for you as I talk about at the end of the book. And I my whole hope for you is that as you take the season of your life to give your time and your heart and your energy, caring for your beloved elderly parents and your children simultaneously with the help of your wife, that your business goals are going to be met on a non attached timeline that your financial and physical needs will be met through the business we can trust and divine, that's what I do. But that whatever timeline you have is causing you suffering on your spreadsheet and your goals and your projections, let it go. Because what comes back is abundance bigger than you will imagine because you were doing good. I decided to do good and study the busy brain help over 1000 people go through the protocol before I even wrote the book. And when I get off the line with you, I'm signing the contract for now the eighth language that the book is getting translated to now it's Japanese as well. Congratulations for that. Thank you. And I would not have imagined this and that would not have happened had I push through the timeline and said screw the pandemic. I'm going to write the first version of the book and get it out and force the publisher know. allow the universe to give you a timeline, you'll have a clearer idea of what should happen in your business. What if if you'd let go of some of it and said universe is saying focus on your mom and your dad?
Zack Arnold: Well, I again a very much appreciate all that and we'll expect the the invoice at the end of today's one on one session, I realized that the simplest answer to this is read the 200 pages in the book. But you and I both discussed beforehand, we want there to be concrete action steps. So before we leave, I'm not going to say give me 123 tips so anybody can solve their busy brain. But where can somebody get started? I'm already way down this rabbit hole for somebody that's really being introduced to this for the first time. What's a simple way to get them started? I
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: want you to have self compassion to whatever life circumstance is happening to you right now. You've heard Zack and I mean, it's just Zack. I'll be honest, like, I don't know that I've gone this deep about my journey of choosing a career rather than focusing on a life partner at this stage in my life. And you've been so authentic about the challenges of caregiving for elderly parents and children and running a business so have compassion. I think you've heard both of us come full circle of having acceptance and compassion for the stage. We're both in and life number one. So whatever you're facing right now listening, acceptance and compassion and love Zack and I hold that hope for you. Step two, if you're wondering, okay, my brain is on fire and I can't get out of this anxiety, difficulty focusing because I'm so stressed out, take the busy brain test, we'll put it in the show notes. And for free you get week one of the protocol which is our, the essence the shift, and that's the sleep protocol to reset your circadian rhythm. It's a powerful place to start. And the last part is in chapter 16, and the book you can take out and they're in the appendix of the book, a lab slip and online as well to take to your doctor and get some basic labs, check that if you've been under chronic stress, it's a solution right there between your hormones, inflammation, markers, etc. Those are, I think, three steps to take. And the last place I'll end with and then hand it back to you is remind people, the way that I started is whatever is happening in life because the world is not an easy place right now, my brothers, my sisters, I assure you, your brain has not broken, your mind is not a mess, and hope did not depart your soul. It just starts with one brain shift. And Zack and I are here to hold that hope for you that you find that brain shift.
Zack Arnold: Couldn't have wrapped it up any better myself. And just to double down on what you said, go to the show notes, you're going to find links to everything that we're talking about, send them to the test, send them to the book, I'm going to make sure that people can find you as a resource. But I can tell you with 100% level of confidence that I'm at a better place in my life than I was 94 minutes ago. So I appreciate you taking the time to to be so honest and candid with me today and with my audience and means a lot and I have a feeling that you and I might connect again in the future. So thank you so much.
Dr. Romie Mushtaq: Thank you
This episode was edited by Curtis Fritsch, and the show notes were prepared by Debby Germino and published by Glen McNiel.
The original music in the opening and closing of the show is courtesy of Joe Trapanese (who is quite possibly one of the most talented composers on the face of the planet).
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