Lean Out Podcast

Harmony with Tamara Beckford

• Dawn Baker • Season 2 • Episode 39

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In this episode, Dawn Baker talks with Tamara Beckford. Tamara is an emergency medicine physician, burnout coach, author, speaker, and CEO of UR Caring Docs. She helps high-achieving women break free from burnout so they can restore peace, joy, and a sense of meaning to their lives.  

Tamara shares her journey from full-time EM physician to nocturnist (and all that goes along with that type of schedule), to being an entrepreneur who helps other doctors with burnout. We also talk about great tools to live a more balanced, harmonious life despite working in an un-ideal schedule or with limited resources.

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Welcome to the lean out podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Don baker. Are you looking for a new approach to finding authentic and sustainable work-life balance? You've come to the right. Place. For inspiration. information. and a community. community. of like-minded. Professionals. Let's get to the show. Hello? Hello. Thanks for being here. How's the last month of the year going for you. I'm already starting to think about little changes I want to make in 2025 things like habits. I want to incorporate into my day. I want to release my course and some changes that I want to make to the podcast structure. I recently had a prospective client say something to me. Like I don't want to let 2025 go by without taking action. If you're feeling this way, go over to practice balance.com/coaching and schedule a call with me. During the month of December, I'm offering 20% off my coaching fees and I'd love to chat with you about how we can work together. My guest today is Dr. Tamara Bedford. Tamara is an emergency medicine physician, a burnout coach, author, speaker, and the CEO of your caring docs. She helps high achieving women break free from burnout so they can restore peace, joy, and a sense of meaning to their lives. She's been featured in Forbes, Yahoo, finance, voyage Houston, LinkedIn news rollout magazine, and Kevin MD. Dr. Beckford is a recognized expert in wellness and stress management. Tamara shares her journey from full-time emergency medicine physician to knock turnas and all that goes along with that type of schedule to also being an entrepreneur who helps other doctors with burnout. We talk about how to live a more balanced, harmonious life despite working in an unideal schedule or with limited resources, she gives some great advice as well that you can incorporate today. Please enjoy this conversation with Tamara.

TB-Dawn

Tamara Beckford, welcome to the Lean Out podcast. Happy to have you here.

TB-Tamara

Hey, thank you so much for having me. Can't wait to get into all that it is about me and my journey and also to be able to impart some things for your listeners.

TB-Dawn

Great. Well, tell us a little bit about your current work life balance and how it's different from other peers in your profession.

TB-Tamara

Absolutely. So I'll start off by saying, you know, I'm an emergency medicine physician by training. However, in addition to doing emergency medicine, I do have a business, which is Your Caring Docs, where I do a few things. So I see. And I consult and then I'm also coach. So in the speaking realm, I actually do all of this around burnout. I speak about burnout to organizations. I consult and doing burnout workshops. And then I get to coach our women who are suffering from burnout, where it's stealing their peace, their joy, and their sense of meaning in their work. So I get to help them to restore all of that. Um, in doing so. I actually get a great balance. I know that balance is one of those hard words to get by when you're talking about career and life. So we can either use the word balance or harmony, but whatever it is, I actually get it. And I'm excited about, you know, talking about how I did that. For my life in particular, everything I do might not be someone else's journey, but it's working very well for my journey right now. As an ER physician, you know, that the training is brutal. Um, in the year 2020, we went through even more harshness. It was a year of a lot of uncertainty and a lot of unknown. And that's the year that I actually started to blossom. into my own. I started to learn about all the things that I wanted to contribute to the world that was more than being a physician. So that's where my journey begins and I can't wait to let you guys hear about it.

TB-Dawn

Awesome. Now, as an aside, before we started recording, you were talking about how you are currently out of the country. So tell us what you're doing.

TB-Tamara

So I am in Mexico. I'm actually in Cancun. At this recording, I'm on a table, but I'm actually looking right out at the beach. With the beautiful different layers of blues, um, the, the beach itself, it has the deep blue, it has the aquamarine, it has the sky blue. And it's a really great balance, if one were to say, of what life can be like when you Start to orchestrate it the way that it works for you. It's not easy. So I'm not gonna sit and act like, you know, all of a sudden, this is something that came by very, very easily. No, it takes a lot of, um, internal turmoil, guts and, you know, discomfort, but it also takes you moving through that discomfort and starting to align with the things that you feel that matters most to you and to what you're doing. you want to achieve in life and the legacy that you want to leave.

TB-Dawn

Absolutely. So I know that a lot of the listeners will be very interested in finding out how you got to this point where you have a life doing so many things, but also able to take a trip to Mexico for your own pleasure. So tell me what incited you to make changes in your career from the emergency physician by training to where you are now.

TB-Tamara

In 2019, I realized I'd been practicing medicine at that point for almost 10 years. And I think that with anyone who's done, um, um, One of the careers, a professional careers, it really takes a long time to get there. After you have done so and you get into the meat of your career, you start to get a little bit uneasy because you're looking at life and you're starting to question if this is all All that it is that I have to offer. So by year five, I got a little uneasy, but I didn't know what it was. By year 10, I was figuring, I'm like, I know what I'm doing. I feel comfortable in my career, but I also want to be able to do more. So that prompted me to start just looking at, other things I do. I want to open a practice. Um, do I want to, you know, Like to speak in like what is it that I want to to really add to what I was doing as an ER physician. And this is 2019 mind you. So I started to look into a lot of self development and I learned about Mel Robbins of course Tony Robbins is out there, and, you know, a lot of the other self help gurus started listening to the older ones to Zig Ziglar. And, you know, for anyone who's listened to them, you know, these are really, really good. Great guys. I have great one-liners. And, um, as time progressed I really realized, like, wow, as much as I felt that I knew what I wanted in life, because I mean, I studied it to get to medicine and for those who don't know me, like I'm an, I'm a black female physician. In emergency medicine. So to get to that level, it really they're only roughly 2 percent of physicians who are black females so you can imagine like the dedication and the zone that you had to put yourself in. So once I looked at that and I'm like, well, what else can I do? What else? It's almost as if like, what else can I conquer in life that will add to the fulfillment that I currently have? And that's the exploration of entrepreneurship. In 2020, I joined a group coaching entrepreneurship physician group. And it started to open my eyes as to different things that I can do. And that's when I started to explore. And because of the fact during that time also COVID came on, I was exploring this portion of fulfillment and I still took care of patients. I just continued working. And as I looked around, I recognize that these personal, the personal development, the connection that I started to have, I was fearing out COVID. pretty well emotionally during COVID. I wasn't burning out. I wasn't suffering from anxiety. Like, you know, I was just really at a great point where instead of having the worst, I was actually thriving. And that's the opposite of what an ER physician should have been doing. During COVID. And, as I kept looking back, why is it that I was thriving, you know, and then I started to notice certain skill sets that I developed, certain personal development tools that I tapped into, certain ways that I, my outlook on life, and then also the way that I approached different situations. Transcribed It was different than my colleagues at the time, and therefore, I thrive, and that's when I realized. I cannot keep this to myself. I have to be able to just show some people because there are many people who are going to be suffering and they still are. During that time they were suffering. Afterwards, now we're post COVID, um, a couple of years and people are still having, you know, challenges that's knocking them down. They're still burning out. They're still having a lack of fulfillment in their life, especially for those who've worked so hard, given, given, given. And I said that I need to be able to help these people. So I wanted to do it through organizations. I went, did it that way. It's not easy to tap into organizations to do the work that I want to do, but at the same time the individuals. who work at these organizations are still suffering. And that's when I did the coaching and I made that available for any woman who is suffering and wants to take back control of their life to have the ability to do so. And in doing that, it helps me to balance. So I use my clinical brain when I'm doing emergency medicine, but then I also get to use this, it's almost an additional altruistic part of me. When I'm doing my coaching and my speaking and my consultant. So that's how I bring that harmony to my life. Mhm.

TB-Dawn

I definitely resonate with what you're seeing about the altruism because, uh, you help a lot of patients in clinical medicine. However, you can reach a whole different group of people when you do coaching and you speak and you go to organizations like you're talking about and you have a podcast and you share these ideas, then you're reaching a Other people that are then helping patients. So you're indirectly helping even more patients as well.

TB-Tamara

it's phenomenal. And I love being able to tap into that in the way where it's almost like a more of a well being than the sick care that I do in emergency medicine.

TB-Dawn

Well, since you just mentioned that, are you practicing on any sort of regular schedule right now?

TB-Tamara

Yes. So I do still practice emergency medicine. As of this particular recording, I just went down to PRN, which is an as needed basis. So I, worked fulltime, even during COID up until, last week. We still working full shifts in the ER as a nocturnists at that. Point two. So for those who don't know what that is, like I literally, I am the doctor who works the night shift only. So, and we all know what happens at night, anything just shows up in the nighttime. So I, I did, um, work as a nocturnist, for approximately six years. And I recently, have resigned from the nocturnal, full time space to going down as an. As needed, which is a P. R. N. Clinical space. So that will give me a little bit more time to tap into the additional part which we're talking about, which is the non clinical part, which is my, um, your Karen Docs business and any other ventures that I might do.

TB-Dawn

No, that's great. And, you know, I have to say that I ask people a lot that come on the podcast what incited them to make a change in their work life balance to get them to where they are today, like I asked you, and I have never had anybody answer quite in the way that you did. And I want to ask you a little bit more about it, where you felt like Like 2020 showed you that you had these tools already that you had developed that you needed to share with other people. I really want to know what tools in specific, if you can name a couple of them, that you found were the most helpful for you and that you now share with others.

TB-Tamara

Absolutely. Absolutely. Great question. So I'll preface it by saying a lot of our tools that we have and I think he might have been zigzag, but even though it's also said this, which is it's easy to do. Actually, it's Brian Tracy. It's easy to do, but it's also easy not to do, right? So they're simple tools that have powerful effects. You do it. For example, a great morning routine prior to 2019. I number one would hit that snooze button like it was going out of style because I just felt as if that 30 seconds was going to have such a huge impact on the rest of my day. And it did, but not in the way that I thought, right? When you hit that snooze button, you're putting yourself back into a cycle. And now instead of your brain being awake, it's now on its way back down. So you're doing yourself a disservice. So what I started to do is I started to move my phone, which I used as an alarm, across the room. When the phone went off, I had to get up, walk across the room to turn it off. Once I began to walk across the room, I was already up. The likelihood of me going back into my bed decreased tremendously. And then, as time progressed, I no longer used snooze button. And I looked around, and I thought, well, that was Interesting. So now I'm up. Now, the next thing is the additional part of a morning routine. Now I'm up. What am I going to do? Think of the morning as my blank slate. And now, instead of me just entering into the world, I go ahead and I build myself up so that the thought The negative, all the negativity of the world does not come into me first. So what do I do? For me, I'm a spiritual person, so immediately I started to read the Bible. That's the first thing I did. As I woke up, I'm adding things into my mind. Remember, my mind is a blank slate. Then the next thing is that I added positive affirmations. Wow, I have now built this mind up. The next, after that, I might listen to a podcast. That's like, you know, inspiring, do some movement. By the time I'm ready to do my day, I can now check that email and the email won't affect me the same way as it would if that's the first thing I did in the morning. Why? Your mind is a blank slate. You check that email and you get an email that had a negative connotation to it. You forgot something. Oh, by the way, you know, any, any email that comes in that stirs that emotion immediately, your day has been thwarted. Because of that email, what happens during that time? Is your mind now starts to what we call perseverate on that email at eight o'clock you looked at it, you got angry, because it's something that you probably already completed and the person who sent it to you couldn't find the file and it annoyed you. So then at 930 you're still annoyed, although you had responded to that email, you're still annoyed and you're still reacting. at 12 35 you're still cannot believe that person had the nerve to send you that email and you're still upset at the 8 a. m email at 4 30 you're kind of getting off the hook but it reminded you and you have to just go home and tell your spouse about it can you believe what happened at 8 a. m now when we think about it You just ruined your peace of mind for an entire day based on something that happened at eight o'clock in the morning because your mind was not fortified. Before you started your day, once you fortify your mind with the steps that I talked about either reading something that's inspirational, meditating, some people might do a gratitude practice writing down things that they're grateful for, because it's hard to be grateful and anxious at the same time, those two emotions can't work together. Simultaneously, but you do all of those things and build your morning. Now you enter into your day without allowing your day to enter into you. So what happens when you see that email? You read it. Your mind is already fortified. And then you respond. Oh, hi Jan, thank you for sending this email. I don't know if you saw that I did send it on this date. Here's the attachment. Boom. Gone. And what do you do for the rest of the day? You do the rest of your day. You're no longer perseverating over this email from Jan that you were upset about because your mind is fortified. That's now just 35 seconds. It's gone. So this is a powerful way to really build oneself up, which is the morning routine and something that people often just get up and enter into the day, which is more of their having their day enter into that they wake up and read social media. So someone even, you know, they might wake up and they see a picture, I don't know, maybe I should take a picture on the beach and post it up and someone will say, like, Oh, look at her. I can't believe Dr. Beckford she's out there at the beach and I'm in here in this snowy mountain. You know, and Instead of you really focusing on what's going on and all the positive things that's going on in your life, then you start to project all the things that are unfortunately negative. And now your mood has changed. Why? You woke up and the first thing you did was go on social media and started looking at other people. Not good, right? Another powerful tool that I often would teach is something that helps people who are during the day, they're having a day where everything was looking great and boom, something just stirs, and it brings a disruption. And what I teach is this technique that I call the pause technique. So the pause technique is the P is to literally pause. and be present with what's going on. A is acknowledging whatever it is, the incident, the email you might have gotten that's causing you to feel this way. Then you, you're going to understand how this incident or email or whatever it is, is affecting you. So understand, say, is this causing me to feel anxious? And you're naming it. Am I feeling anxious? Am I angry? Am I sad? Am I disappointed? Based on this poem, like, you know, understanding of this incident. And then the S is that you're going to set a self care goal, a self care directed goal. So what is that? I am feeling angry because Jan sent me this email, and she obviously never checked her inbox before sending it, or she would have known I responded to this a while back. Instead of me now just getting upset, I have acknowledged that I'm angry and why am I angry? So now I'm going to set us up your goal. I'm going to take a few minutes to do whatever. For me, it might say I might take a few minutes to go take a walk outside and to just look at nature because that always calms me down. Or I'm going to take a few minutes to listen to a I have a few set of music that I put together that helps to just change my mood whenever I feel upset, or I'm going to take a few minutes to do a breathing exercise because it always brings me back. To being centered, whatever it is that you normally do, or you do to help yourself. You set a few minutes aside, and then the E is execute. So you're not going to say, Oh, as soon as I finish this particular thing that I'll go ahead. No. You take it. Take give yourself what I'm going to give myself five minutes to do a quick breathing exercise. I'm going to give my festival five minutes to listen to my, um, playlist. I'm going to give myself five minutes to just take a quick walk and to remove myself from this situation. And then I'll come back. And that pause technique usually helps to refocus oneself. It's kind of moving from that sympathetic, which is that fight or flight, and bring you back into the parasympathetic, which is the, you know, rest and restorative portion of one's system. Those are a few techniques.

TB-Dawn

Those are great. Thank you so much for sharing those. And they really get to the concept that it's simple, but not easy, and that these things take regular practice,

TB-Tamara

Absolutely. Absolutely.

TB-Dawn

I definitely, I'm gonna try in 2025, this is one of my goals, doing the morning routine, because I have lost sight of my morning routine, for sure, I definitely open my phone and start looking, and first thing I look at is email, uh,

TB-Tamara

No, don't do it.

TB-Dawn

Yeah, exactly. I need to get a better routine there. And I definitely have some mindfulness tools in my toolbox where I'm able to

TB-Tamara

Yes.

TB-Dawn

I think that setting yourself up for success by having everything in the most optimal way is better. So like, just don't even look at it yet, you know, wait, Wait till you do a mindfulness exercise or a prayer like you're seeing.

TB-Tamara

Yes, and that's the thing about it. Even the mindfulness exercises in the morning, it is so powerful. We look at it and we recognize its power, but it's not until we really use it in the way that we can. I mean, there's one thing that we're doing mindfulness so that we can feel good and, you know, bring clarity and to step in. But when you add it to an additional purpose, Within your day. That's when it enhances its usefulness. It enhances how it really, really amplifies what you're doing and how you amplify your day and how you feel throughout the day. So it's very powerful.

TB-Dawn

yeah, definitely. I agree.

TB-Tamara

Mm

TB-Dawn

I'd like to go back to your personal journey. There was something you mentioned about feeling like you really needed to be at the top of your field and, improve. In this change of your work life balance, going from maybe full time ER practice to nocturnist and then to PRN, if there's been any difficulty there, any kind of blowback any difficult, mindset shifts that you had to deal with?

TB-Tamara

Mm hmm. I'll say that for the mindset shifts. One of the mindset shifts for any physician who is working, moving from the standard work shift, especially for someone who's an ER physician, to working solely nights. There is an understanding that you probably will get some of the more challenging patients. So, And it will also come along with less external support because most of your team, if you think about medicine overall, emergency medicine is a, cooperative and communal sport to say, right? We rely on our colleagues in the other specialties to help, when challenges arrive. However, we also understand that our colleagues in other specialties, they need to sleep because they have to get up and have clinic in the morning, do surgeries in the morning. So you can imagine as an ER nocturnist, The mindset had to be, okay, I know that my colleagues are readily available, but I might not have access to that particular specialty, because my hospital might not have that, but the patient still comes in, and I still have to take care of it. And with it being the night, Services such as social work it's not available. You're going to have to tap into, maybe even having to, to move them to another hospital. And that can sometimes be challenging because night. So knowing that you might not have the backup consistent backup, you have to just do the best you can with what you have. And you have to develop that mindset of. I know that I have the training. I have the ability to do this. I am using all the resources that are available. I'm taking care of this patient to the best of my ability. I'm giving them the very best care that I can and that I will move, mountains to ensure that they get the best care that you have to do. Knowing that your limitations are different than your colleagues who work days. So,

TB-Dawn

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Did you ever have any issues with Imposter syndrome when you change to this limited resource type of a schedule.

TB-Tamara

I think that everyone gets a little bit intimidated at first and move into a new situation. And so I tap into it more of, um, feeling a little bit of uncertainty, but not dwelling in that uncertainty. And I guess I have learned not to dwell in that level of uncertainty because I have to tap back into it. All my additional training and knowing that I did the years of training for this. Number one, I do have my team around me such as my nurses at my tax. Number two, you know, I am a person as a collective mind, personality. So I, although I am the team leader, this is, uh, a team in its truest respect because others within the team might have great ideas and maybe ideas that are better than mine. I respect that. So I also set a tone where my, those who are working on my team, they feel comfortable enough to come to me and to add, you know, What they're thinking to the situation because when it all boils down, it's care. It's patient care. I might not have all the answers. They might have heard something that I didn't hear. You know when I stepped out the room and after I finished, you never know what the patients might be saying to the nurses, and then that's additional information that they never gave. So, it's true care in its overall sense. So at the time, yes, you'll see you step in and you may feel an initial sense of uncertainty, I might cut out for this, but I don't dwell in it, because when it all boils down to I am. I'm well trained. I have a great personality. I'm great with team. So let's get this party started and let's take care of these people. That's how I look at it.

TB-Dawn

I love that. It's a really good attitude and it applies to not just the situation you're talking about. It applies to doing anything new. And I love that you're saying, remember your resources, even if they are limited, at least just remember that they're there and that you have these other people that you can tap into, whether those be mentors or just staff members and focus on the fact that you are qualified to be doing what you're doing.

TB-Tamara

Absolutely. I think a lot of times we focus on our lack versus, versus what we actually do have. And this is an exercise for those who are right now who may be feeling a little bit insecure, I would say, take a moment. And just write down all the things that you're good at. And then all the things that you don't think you're good at. And look and see. Now if your list Of all the things that you do not feel you're good at is excessively long, you need to tap into and figure out why are you feeling this way. Because I'm pretty sure most of us, the things that we're good and great at, far supersedes, pardon me, the things that we don't. But it's the lens with which we're seeing ourselves. So what lens are you seeing yourself in? And that's important.

TB-Dawn

Absolutely. Well, Tamara, you've given us some great tools today. I love the pause technique and the morning habits, and I'm going to be using those myself. Is there any last advice on the podcast today that you would give women who are feeling burned out, overwhelmed? Excellent.

TB-Tamara

Yes. First, I would love to let All of our women know that you're not alone and no, you're not imagining it because that's the first thing you're like, am I imagining this? No, you're not. Once you are in that zone, once you're feeling that way, once you're getting into that realm of burnout, you probably are entering into it. So what are some things to do? One really sits And look at your why. Why are you doing X, Y, Z, right? So even if you want to take a time and do an audit of all the tasks that you're doing within a 24 hour, 48 hour period, which of these tasks brings you energy? Which of these tasks gaps energy from you? When are you energized with someone? When does that person sap energy from you? Who is the person that energizes you? Who's the person that saps energy from you? Really just take time to do a quick energy audit. And that's a great way to start to eliminate things. that suck in the energy from you and start to find ways to add more of the things that brings you back that energy. You might not be able to, you know, turn back the hands of burnouts in a 24, 48 hour period. And it's because it did not happen to you in the 24, 48 hour period. It was a slow progression, you know, it occurred. So give yourself a pace of grace to undo what burnout has done. And you will get back to that point in your life where you're happy, you're fulfilled, and you have the energy to connect with all those loved ones in your life. It can and it will happen. So don't give up.

TB-Dawn

Give yourself the pace of grace. I really love that. Tamara, can you tell us where we can find you if we want to connect with you or learn more about your work?

TB-Tamara

Absolutely. I'm very active on LinkedIn. So I'd love for you guys to connect with me on LinkedIn. Um, that's, Dr. Tamara Beckford on LinkedIn, or if you type my name, you'll see my picture. Connect. Just let me know how we connected. I love to meet new people. And if you also want to find out more about what I do, you can go on my website, yourcaringdocs. com. That's U R C A R I N G D O C S dot com.

TB-Dawn

Thank you so much for your wisdom today and for this conversation. It's been excellent.

TB-Tamara

Thank you for having me.

Tamara shared a lot of pearls from her work in burnout with us today. And here are my takeaways from our conversation. Number one, you can be in difficult situations, but still adopt a positive attitude. If you want to shift from surviving to thriving, you need to change your mindset and some habits. The no snooze one is pretty easy for me because I like to get up early, but the one I really want to incorporate in 2025 is the morning spiritual or creative routine before looking at the phone and emails. I've been wanting to do this for a little while, but my conversation with Tamara was just the jolt that I needed to get started. Number two. When you're going through a period of uncertainty, don't dwell in the worst case scenario. While I do believe that imagining worst case scenarios can be helpful because you can then plan some actions. And also you can realize that. Likely you're going to be okay. No matter what. But the thing that tomorrow brought up today. That I need to remember is to focus on your strengths and your resources when you're in an uncertain situation. You likely have more of both these to employ than you remember. I'm going to link an episode to the mindful healers podcast that I also liked, which talked about shifting your mindset from scarcity to one where you're abundant with resources. Number three. Energy management is key. I think I've had this in my takeaways before, but it comes up so often. And I also use this so commonly with my clients. Figure out what gives you energy and what takes away your energy? I have people do this as an audit for a couple of days. They write down everything they can think of, that they did in the day, whether it be interactions with certain people, work tasks, et cetera. And they write down if it was an energy gain or neutral or an energy drain. The reason to do this is to maximize your energy gaining activities and minimize the energy depleting activities in your life. And when you do need to do some of the negative energy ones, because there are inevitably going to be things that take away your energy, that you still have to do. You've then identified ways that you can refill your energy bank account. This goes a long way in getting out of burnout and getting to a place where you feel you can work towards sustainable work-life balance goals. My partying question to you today is what is one thing in your life that takes away your energy and what is one thing that renews it? Thanks for listening to the lean out podcast. If you find these conversations inspiring and useful, please forward them to a friend and also leave a review on iTunes or Spotify so that other people can find them easier. If you want to get in touch with me, you can find me at my website, practice balanced.com, where you can subscribe to my newsletter and get updates regularly about new podcast episodes, blog posts, speaking, engagements, and coaching services. You can also support my work by buying my book, lean out a professional woman's guide to finding authentic work-life balance for yourself, a friend, family member, or coworker. Have a great day and we'll see you next time