Self-Care Society
Self-Care Society
Episode 76: Compassionate Leadership: Embracing Life's Transitions
Discover the heartbeat of compassionate leadership with our esteemed guest Dr. Lesli Johnson, who brings her rich experience from the community mental health arena to her influential role at the Voinovich School of Leadership and Public Service. As we peel back the layers of mentorship and professional dedication, Dr. Johnson illuminates the critical balance between a steadfast work ethic and nurturing personal well-being. Her philosophy of leadership is a beacon for those who lead with humility, encouraging her team to soar while ensuring a vibrant workplace culture.
With Dr. Johnson, we delve into the soulful art of self-care, uncovering the joys of connecting with nature, and savoring time with our cherished companions. Our stories intertwine, revealing the pursuit of serenity through yoga and the shared laughter in community gatherings. This episode is a tender nudge, reminding us all that self-care is not merely a luxury, but the very essence of a life well-lived.
Welcome to the Self Care Society podcast with your hosts Celia Williamson, ashley Kutcher, louis Guardiola and Carrie Shaw, a podcast devoted to those whose job it is to help others get or remain mentally, physically and emotionally healthy, but who also need to take care of themselves.
Speaker 2:How we're going to do this? By first showing you the filtered, pretty version of success and then the real struggles, real work and raw grit it took to get there, how they took care of themselves and also achieved their goals while doing it Together.
Speaker 1:we will work with you to improve and maintain your internal health and growth, while helping you achieve your external goals and your next professional achievement in life.
Speaker 2:And we're excited to show you how to follow your own individual and unique path and achieve the dreams you have, while taking good care of yourself. So let's get started. Welcome to the Self Care Society podcast. I'm the host this week, carrie Shaw, and with me I have the pleasure of having Leslie Johnson. Welcome to our podcast, leslie Hi Carrie, it's great to talk to you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for joining us. So, Leslie, we'll just start off with if you would like to share a few words about who you are and what you'd like for folks to know about where you've been.
Speaker 3:I live in Athens, ohio, and have for nearly 40 years now. I come from Oklahoma, texas, which is an odd place to come from when you live in Athens, ohio. The first half of my professional life I was in community mental health when I started out working with families of divorce, and then, when I moved to Athens, started doing work with adults, families, children and with as most people do when they enter that work a lot of work with people who have experienced trauma. So I learned a lot about trauma. I went back and got my PhD in psychology so I have both a license in social work and a license in psychology and came out of that thinking I would continue to do clinical work and had an offer from the university, from an organization that was then called Ilgard is now the Voynvich School of Leadership and Public Service.
Speaker 3:The names keep changing. We have to remember where I spent the last 26 years and when I started there I said I would do it as long as it was interesting, and it remained interesting. I just retired and I'm deciding what my next gig is going to be, so that's kind of where I am. So I've done work at a clinical level. I've done work at an individual and family level and I've done a lot of work at a macro level. The work with the Voynvich School has been primarily with helping the nation be effective in what they do to benefit people who live in the state of Ohio. So I've done a lot of work in education and in the healthcare space on that kind of macro level.
Speaker 2:So that's the, the mini view, the mini view Fantastic, and I will say, knowing Leslie personally, that you're also a mentor to a lot of social workers in the region and someone that we look up to and seek out for supervision and guidance when we need it. So that's.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So one of the things I'm most when I'm thinking about accomplishments, one of the things I'm most proud of, is that probably 22, 23 years ago, I ran my first social work supervision group because there weren't a lot of LISW in our area, and I've run three of those groups and done supervision at some organizations, including a domestic violence shelter, and that work is very rewarding and definitely allowed me to get to know some pretty amazing and promising up and coming professionals, including Carrie, who I've known since she was a wee child.
Speaker 2:We go way back.
Speaker 3:The privilege to know that she was a wee child. Oh yeah, that's. That's been very rewarding and is certainly part of my commitment to the profession and to keeping skilled and talented people out there helping others.
Speaker 2:It's fantastic. So I will kind of dig into our questions now. Leslie, you know, as you know, we do this real to real framework for our podcast. So when you think about how others see you or what your kind of public persona is, the what's your highlight? Real for our EEL.
Speaker 3:Well, I think, in terms of accomplishments, as I said, I would say the ability, both in terms of the social work supervision, but also in terms of working at the university and at the one of its school. I've had the opportunity to support the growth of many, many, many very talented people and I feel very, very proud of that. The work that we do in this region is hard and it takes a lot of minds and a lot of hands and a lot of effort, and I feel good about having been a part of that. Somebody asked me once about leadership styles and I've taught leadership courses now since then and I said well, my leadership style is to find really talented, smart, self initiating people and hire them and then get out of the way, make sure they have the resources they need and then get out of their way and let them do really important mission driven work. Most of the people I know, and certainly the people who are listening to this podcast, do work that feels very mission driven to them making widgets in factory or selling World Book Encyclopedias, which will be a dated reference for many people. You're doing really important mission driven work and I think that is one of the things I've learned is that's very rewarding in and of itself, and it's very easy to go overboard. It's very easy to allow that work to overtake you, and I think it's important to.
Speaker 3:No matter how much you love your work and it's great if you're privileged enough to love the work you do but no matter how much you love your work, you work to live.
Speaker 3:You don't live to work and when you cross that balance, then in my experience, when I've crossed that balance, that work life balance that's when I get in trouble and am not my best, either in my personal life or in my work life. There's a lot of attention paid to whether or not the organizations that people work at expect them to do a lot of over and above kind of work. My experience is that most of the organizations that we work for don't expect you to do over and above, but they're never going to stop you. They're not going to reward you, they're not going to praise you for it, but they're never going to stop you. They will let you do as much free work as you want to, and so I think that was a hard lesson to learn and one I would really encourage people to pay attention to. That it's important to take care of yourself and it's important to have boundaries, and it's a great blessing to have work that's mission driven and it's still work.
Speaker 2:Right, I know you have. You have said to me in the past that we all have limited capacity and I think that was. Those are some words of wisdom from Leslie that I can hear Sometimes, when I'm feeling really stretched, really thin, that just I can do my best work when I'm trying to, when I'm saying yes to everything and I, yeah, I really take this to heart, this, this message of free work that we, we are willing to give away because we feel so committed to what we're doing and it's hard to say no.
Speaker 3:When I was on internship with, there was a very wise woman who did a consulting group with us, which was really invaluable, and one of the things she said which is that same idea is when the cup run at the over, it is not the fault of the cup. So if there's too much, and time is a finite capacity and the energy is a finite capacity- Absolutely so.
Speaker 2:My next question is the. I guess, from my perspective, knowing you for so long, like we do, we do seek you out, I think oftentimes as a leader and someone who does watch out for hours self care as social workers and helpers in our community, and so I'm wondering who is the real Leslie, our EL? But also, like, what does self care mean for you and how do you strike that balance? And what do they feel like when you know that you're not where you need to be?
Speaker 3:I think there's a couple parts to that. I, as I'm looking at, what has really made things work for me, both when I felt challenges in my personal life and in my professional life, is connections to people and having multiple solid connections to people people I can reach out to, people who reach out to me. Those relationships with people that where you, when you spend time together, it feels like the energy just flows, as opposed to when you spend time with somebody and it feels like the energy is all just going one way. I would say that, in general, in most of my mentoring relationships and other professional relationships, the energy is just flowed. It's restorative, at the same time that it is giving something.
Speaker 3:I think social connection is certainly key, having those people that you can talk to candidly and who will tell you the truth about yourself, which is really helpful. You don't always find it, but there are certainly people who will tell me the truth when I need it To be told, and that has been really valuable. The other thing is that you don't have to do everything yourself, which is related to that connection.
Speaker 3:One of the things I often do when I'm providing support to other people is helping them think through who else can help with this, who else can carry some of this burden, who else is interested in this, and trying to connect them to other resources, other kinds of connections, Because we can't do it alone. The whole American mythology of individuality is just overblown. There's nothing we do by ourselves. There's not a single food we eat that we can do by ourselves. There's not a single piece of clothing we put on that comes just from our own effort. There's not. We're connected in every way to everybody else. I think once you recognize that interconnection, you can get energy from that and you can also have a greater appreciation and humility. The whole idea of one person being indispensable is really a dangerous myth.
Speaker 2:Yes, that's a lot.
Speaker 3:This is what happens when I have a couple of bucks to think.
Speaker 2:Right? Yes, that's one of my questions. How has it been moving from a place of doing really meaningful work as employment into a retirement space? I know for a lot of people it is really challenging. How are you reframing your time?
Speaker 3:It's been really interesting and I think I was really ready for this shift. I spent the last several years, and certainly the last year, working very hard to get everything in place so that things would continue well without me being there, putting people in positions, putting getting work and taking care of things so that I could step out and it'll be fine and that's truly helped. But it also was pretty exhausting. So it's been. You know, when people have said, are you bored, Are you tired? It's like no, I'm really resting, it's okay, I'm really enjoying taking a break and thinking it through, and I'm also just didn't.
Speaker 3:I've watched, which is what I did with parenting too. I watched people who go before me and see what they did and how it worked out. I've watched a lot of people go into retirement and some of them fill up their plates full really quickly and I decided I really don't want to do that. I want to take some time. I want to see what's out there. I want to connect with some people who I haven't been able to connect to because I was so busy with work. There's some things going on with my family and I wanna be available to help with that, so I know there are gonna be opportunities down the road and I'm kind of waiting and seeing what would work, what would be the best way to contribute, and you know I just want some time to like watch the birds and read and take it easy.
Speaker 2:You know, when I think about you and I think I'm not alone in this the word that comes to mind is always wise, and so it doesn't surprise me at all that you're moving into retirement in a wise way and very reflectively, I guess, if that's a word. So my next question you know I had I had and Carrie knows this.
Speaker 3:I had a major personal loss about five years ago and at that point some people encouraged me to take sabbatical and the idea horrified me. It was like, oh my gosh, the last thing I wanna do is sit home alone during this time. So work was a real coping strategy at that point. And then we hit the pandemic and and there was another opportunity to retire at that point, but I'm really glad that I didn't, because it would have been really isolating for me. So this feels like the right time. We've gotten through some of the major changes in my own life and we've gotten through the pandemic mostly, knock on wood, get your vaccine and it feels like it's an okay time to step back and take a breath and give it some time to figure out what's next.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I know that we were running down on time. Do you wanna just share a little bit about what your personal self-care looks like, leslie? I mean, I think you've talked about it kind of Sure In one layer, but what does it look like in actual kind of day to day life?
Speaker 3:Well, I'm looking around, I'm looking nearby, but I have two pups. They're not puppies anymore, but they're small dogs, so they look like pups and they have gotten me through a lot and they. The plug I'll make for pups or dogs over cats is that they make you get out and move, and so they make me get out every day, no matter what the weather. Those are definitely one of my coping mechanisms. I live in the woods and walk in the woods or, as Carrie gave me the frame some time ago, I saunter. So definitely nature is one of my go-tos being able to be outside, being able to walk in the woods, being able to watch the birds In the summertime.
Speaker 3:I have a couple of kayaks that I throw out on a nearby lake really a large pond and float around out there with friends. It was a great pandemic activity because you could socially distance in kayaks, so that was perfect. I have friends that I get together regularly with. I will say one of the things I hadn't heard the wise thing, which is really interesting I'm not sure I can own it, but one people have said that I do own is that I know how to have fun, that I do build in. I do build in fun things. I do build in time with friends and time to laugh and relax.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 3:I was frustrated with the recent snow that it wasn't really quite deep enough that we could go take the sleds out and go sledding. So I don't mean fun with a lot of dollar signs attached to it, but just some every day. Get out there and enjoy yourself and enjoy life and enjoy the people that you love. I think that's really important.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Yeah, occasionally I do yoga, but I'm not very good at it.
Speaker 2:Oh gosh, so we should only do those things when we're good at them? I hope not.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, I know Well, I'm not very good at it. I'm also not very good at doing it regularly, which probably is why I'm not very good at it. I have some retirement goals around getting better at doing doing either yoga or something related to strength and balance. So yeah, but at this point it's an unrealized goal.
Speaker 2:There's time. So, as we wrap up, do you have any final words of wisdom or things that you'd like to share with the listeners that you haven't covered yet?
Speaker 3:Just that. Nobody can do this alone. Reach out. Reach out both for support for yourself, but also reach out and offer support to your colleagues and co-workers. You don't have to fix things, you just have to be present. There's a famous quote that we're all just walking each other home, and I really think that's true, and it's good to have good company on the walk.
Speaker 2:Oh for sure. I'm so glad you're on the walk with me, leslie.
Speaker 3:Absolutely yes, one of my bonuses.
Speaker 2:Mine too. Well, thank you so much for joining us today and you're listening to the Self Care Society podcast. My guest is Leslie Johnson and we hope to connect with you next time. Remember, self care isn't selfish. Thank you all and have a great week, thank you. That concludes this week's episode. And remember, it's not selfish, it's self care.
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