Announcing the Becoming A True Human podcast!

Posted on August 9, 2024 by davidrkopacz

I’ve been thinking about how we need to build a community of practitioners discussing the problems of burnout, compassion fatigue, and soul loss. Isolation and loneliness contribute to burnout, and social connection is an antidote to burnout. To this end, we are creating the Becoming A True Human podcast. Who is “we”? Well, for now, it is me and my good friend Chris Smith – therapist, meditation teacher, Whole Health educator, storyteller, author (Be a Good Story), founder of the Academy for Mindfulness consulting, and all-around wise guy (and I mean that in multiple senses of the phrase).

The audio of the episode 1, Lost, is at the bottom of this post.

What is burnout? Just what exactly is it that burns out? How can whatever is burned out be re-ignited?

What is compassion fatigue? How does compassion wear out? Should it really be called empathy fatigue? Is the problem that there is too much compassion going out? Or not enough coming in? Or could it be that institutional structures and protocols make us busy with so many things that there is little time left in the clinical encounter for caring?

What is soul loss? Could we think of the soul being the “thing” that burns out? Not necessarily in a religious or metaphysical sense – although it could be if that fits your belief system – but in a metaphorical and psychological sense. If in burnout we lose connection with our souls, how can we reconnect and either go on a quest to find our lost souls, or create a welcoming environment in our bodies and lives so that our souls can return and flourish?

I address these questions in my book, Caring for Self & Others: Transforming Burnout, Compassion Fatigue, and Soul Loss, but we need to have further discussions around these topics as I feel strongly that we need a kind of ongoing practice, a yoga of burnout, in which we continually work in our own practices as well as in building communities of caring to support each other with this human, all too human dilemma.

Based on the topics we discussed in the first episode we titled this episode “Lost,” even before we realized that we somehow lost video of me and only recorded video for Chris! In this episode we explore topics of burnout as an initiation into becoming a wounded healer, soul loss, yoga for the health of healers, and we end with a meditation exercise and a poem, “Lost” by David Wagoner.

We don’t really know what we are doing with the technology aspect.

Let me tell you a story that illustrates the problem.

My high school friend Jack and I drove across the country after college. We were into the beat poets and writers, reading Kerouac’s On the Road, and envisoned a trip full of excitement and philosophical observations. We had a microcassette recorder and would talk into as we were driving, having many deep discussions and creating a record of what we saw.

Somewhere around South Dakota (having left from Chicago area) I noticed that the wheels of the recorder weren’t moving when we were recording. It was then that I noticed that there was a pause switch that was clicked on and prevented any recordings from being made! All of our bits, routines, observations, and experiences were lost! We were a bit crestfallen and we made half-hearted attempt to resume recording, but something had been lost – the energy, the enthusiasm. I think we eventually gave up on it. Maybe you could say we burned out on the idea after investing so much energy and enthusiasm and not having anything to show for it.

From a mindfulness perspective, there is surely some kind of lesson here – about not being attached to goals or outcomes, about being in the present moment versus memorializing experience, and maybe even that the organizing ego is an illusionary construct for creating a reduced and more manageable limited reality (if you want to take it that far!).

Well…I remembered this story after Chris Smith and I had just had our wide-ranging and enthusiastic discussion as we recoreded it on Zoom, only to realize that I had messed up the settings and we only had Chris’ video and both our audio. Well, crestfallen again! Urgh, technology failure again!

So, I think I have figured out how to share the audio of our video podcast, rather than have video of just Chris and my disembodied voice. Titling this episode, “Lost,” was prescient as we lost the video. Chris also spoke of his caring for self routine and how he purposefully skips some days so as not to get caught up in perfectionism, performance, and productivity. We’ll consider the lost video as a sacrifice to the Divine or the Cosmos, a giveaway, in addition to it being a bumbling failure of technology.

So, welcome to the first episode of the Becoming A True Human podcast – Lost – it highlights the vulnerability and imperfection of being human, that we are all a work in progress and that our work is a yoga practice – yoking mind, emotions, body, soul. The practice of Becoming A True Human is an ongoing practice, we can only do it in the present moment and the next moment we are again lost, at sea, trying to figure it out and Keep It All Together (KIAT). We will attempt to have the next episode as video and hope to post it on the Becoming a True Human YouTube site.

Nature & Medicine: Restoring the Balance Between Earth & Health – Nov 12 & 13

Posted on October 6, 2021 by davidrkopacz

I am on the Doctor as Humanist’s conference planning committee for our free, virtual, international symposium – Nature & Medicine: Restoring the Balance Between Earth & Health on November 12 & 13, 2021. Register here.

We’ve got a great line up of speakers and round table panelists, including Bob Lawrence, one of the founders of Physicians for Human Rights and Center for a Livable Future Professor Emeritus in the Department of Environmental Health and Engineering at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the founding director of the Center for a Livable Future; Rachel Corby, author of ReWild Yourself: Becoming Nature; Julia Corbett, author of Out of the Woods: Seeing the Nature in the Everyday; Lewis Mehl-Madrona, author of Coyote Medicine and Narrative Medicine; Qing Li, author of Forest Bathing: How Trees can Help You Find Health & Happiness, amongst many others. Link to the program.

One of the projects we are doing as part of the symposium is the Tree of Medicine – a photomosaic on the Mosaically site. You can post on Instagram or Twitter with the hash tags: #NatureMed2021 and #DoctorHumanist and we’ll upload your photos into the Tree of Medicine. You can write a few words of why this photo is important to you and how it relates to Nature & Medicine. Here are a few of the photos I’ve posted.

An unexpected beautiful scene on a walk through Seattle – reminding me that Nature is here, now.

The face on this tree on San Juan Island’s Lime Kiln State Park reminds me of the sentience of nature.

Cannon Beach, Oregon, a breath-taking & invigorating view.

The idea behind this conference is to highlight the many benefits of nature & health while also expanding our idea of being a medical professional to including the health of the Earth. We are in a symbiotic relationship with Nature and cannot exist apart from Nature. In fact, we ourselves are nature, we are made up of nature, our backyards are nature. I’ll be giving a workshop on Saturday 11/13/21 with a focus on Nature is Here, Now. The care of Nature begins with the care of ourselves, the nature of our homes, the nature of our backyard, and breaks down the artificial separations of humans/nature and city/nature. I’ll be joined by a couple of great psychiatry residents I’ve been working with, Eunice Stallman, MD (who has been doing an elective on Narrative Medicine) and Lewis Kerwin, MD (who has been doing an elective on Nature, Health, and Design). We’ll be joined by my friend, photographer and author, John Riggs, author of Clear Cut – The Wages of Dominion. I wrote a review of his book on 5/8/20.

Each of us on the planning committee recorded a short video on the Tree of Medicine project and the Nature & Medicine: Restoring the Balance Between Earth & Health, here’s the link to my video.

We hope you join us!

Nature & Medicine: Restoring the Balance Between Earth & Health on November 12 & 13, 2021. Register here.

How are you doing…really?

Posted on September 25, 2021 by davidrkopacz

How are you doing…really? New post on CLOSLER: Bringing Us Closer to Osler

This is a reflection piece on the challenge of answering this simple question, asked so many times a day, “How are you doing?” While this is usually asked in passing, the true answer to this question is increasingly complex for health care workers as the pandemic wears on.

You can read the essay, here, and some past essays published on CLOSLER, here. The piece features a detail of my painting, “Planting the Seed of the Heart,” which was published in Walking the Medicine Wheel: Healing Trauma & PTSD.

Thanks again, CLOSLER, for all that you do for person-centered care & provider well-being!

Planting the Seed of the Heart, D. Kopacz (2016)

What Does it Mean to Be Human? The Role of Psychiatrists in Philip K. Dick’s Life & Writing

Posted on July 10, 2021 by davidrkopacz

This is the title of my presentation from May, 2012, at the Royal Australian New Zealand College of Psychiatrists annual meeting, held in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. This is a timeless topic and applies as much as ever to us as we work to come out of this pandemic which has changed how we relate to others and how we relate to ourselves. The struggle to “stay human” in medicine is an ongoing practice and we can learn from the life & works of PKD.

Every Thought Leads to Infinity:

Posted on July 9, 2021 by davidrkopacz

Perspectives on Personal Growth, Psychosis & Spirituality:

Carl G. Jung’s Red Book & Philip K. Dick’s Exegesis

I presented this paper at the International Society for Psychological and Social Approaches to Psychosis, New Zealand/Australia annual conference, August 2012 in Auckland, New Zealand. I thought I would share the slides from the talk.

Video available from Toward a New Way of Being with Plants conference!

Posted on July 2, 2021 by davidrkopacz

My sister, Karen, and I presented at last month’s Toward a New Way of Being with Plants conference.

The video of our presentation is available here.

Our overall presentation was called, “Remembering Our Living Relationship with Plants,” my talk was entitled “Toward an Ancient Way of Being with Plants,” and we also featured video that Karen created with Joseph Rael, “Becoming Medicine Initiation Ceremony,” and Karen’s talk was “Shifting Into a Relational Mindset With Nature.”

The conference was great! Very interesting, bringing together scientists, artists, poets, writers, and naturalists from around the world. There is a YouTube channel for the conference where you can watch the presentations.

Thanks to all the organizers and people who brought this great event together! It was very enjoyable, inspirational, and educational.

Making America Healthy Again: Indigenous Perspectives on Land & Health – new article About Place Journal

Posted on May 7, 2021 by davidrkopacz

Making America Healthy Again: Indigenous Perspectives on Land & Health

By David R. Kopacz, MD & Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow)

About Place Journal from the Black Earth Institute

We have a new article published at About Place Journal for their Geographies of Justice Issue – Volume VI, Issue III, May 2021! We are very excited to be published in this excellent and important journal.

We look at the relationships between land and health, private land/private health, and public land/public health.

When I spoke with Joseph about the topic of Geographies of Justice he immediately resonated with it. “All humans are looking for that – some justice, a just place where we can feel adjusted and feel safe. A just place is where you are adjusted to justice,” he said. Here are a few excerpts of Joseph’s thoughts on Geographies of Justice:

“There are a lot of resources on the land that we take care of and they take care of us.

We need to start with the origin of the land, the place before everything broke apart – Pangea. We start at 1 – that’s Pangea. Then the scientists say the continents broke apart, and then people came out of Africa, then the Indians walked across the Bering Strait into the Americas – that’s how the scientists tell it.…

We can learn from our environment, from our geographies. We cannot have justice unless we learn from our geographies. Pangea was created and all around it was Panthalassa, the great ocean. Then Pangea spilt and you had the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans eventually, and the Americas, North, South, Central, and then you had all these tribes in North America, and you had tribes in South America. For all these tribes, their religion was based on geography. The Eskimos had igloos and they would have ceremonies that reflect where they live, all the tribes would have ceremonies that reflect where they live.

There are different areas of land. You become your place before you live in your Mom and Dad’s house because they come from the land and you come from them. They teach you about the weather. The ceremonies are related to the climate of their place. First there was Pangea, and then it split and you had Europeans and Americans, but we are all from Pangea, we are all related...”

“Justice is right here in the room with me and it is right there in the room with you and it is right there in the room for all the people on the planet – it is here.“

To read the whole article, follow this link to “Making America Healthy Again: Indigenous Perspectives on Land & Health” in About Place Journal.

Toward a New Way of Being with Plants Conference – June 17-18, 2021

Posted on April 16, 2021 by davidrkopacz

I am very excited to announce that I will be speaking at the Toward a New Way of Being with Plants conference on June 18th! This is an online conference and registration is free.

I will be presenting along with my sister, Karen Kopacz. Our talk is called “Remembering Our Living Relationship with Plants“ and is from 1:20 pm-2:05 pm US Central Time.

My part of the talk is called “Toward an Ancient Way of Being with Plants“ and will review some of my work with Joseph Rael (Beautiful Painted Arrow).

The center of our talk will feature a video of Joseph Rael Becoming Medicine Initiation Ceremony video (5:16) that we filmed and Karen produced.

Karen’s talk is called “Shifting Into a Relational Mindset With Nature.”

You can check out the speakers, here, and the agenda, here. The conference is put on my a number of international partners, including the University of Minnesota.

Maybe we will see you there!

Also, I just had a post up on CLOSLER, “Making the Most of Your Daily Nervous Breakdown,” where I write about taking a mini-rest cure connecting back to nature.

A Review of A Place Inside, Poems by Judith Adams

Posted on April 4, 2021 by davidrkopacz

Whidbey Island poet, Judith Adams’ new book of poems, A Place Inside, covers the full range of human emotions & experiences, bearing witness to the tragedies and celebrating the joys of life.

Poems such as “Visit to the Doctor” and “Letter to my CPA” bear witness to the dehumanizing mania of turning human beings into numbers. The poems are rooted in the earth, not only in harvesting potatoes in “Pommes de Terre,” but walks through the ferns and forest with grandchildren, rescuing a hummingbird that got into the house, and a poem “For Mary Oliver.” Death and life come into full circle relationship in poems such as “Two Reasons for Weeping,” when attending a Covid-era “circular drive-by” funeral, the poet gets a call from her daughter about new life, “Mom, I’m having a girl.” The poems look backward and forward, remembering the pain of leaving a mother behind in the UK, burying her under quince tree, and the birth of granddaughter, Brigid.

What could be more natural and human than giving birth and dying, gardening, mourning, rejoicing, kayaking―the land, the body, roots and bones, growth and hibernation? “All the things I have loved, as I love the human face,” ends the poem, “Roots.” The poet imagines a God who wants you to have “a wild night on the town” and not to try to get into Heaven with “love letters/you never sent,” (“Love Letters Only”). The poet reminds us that we need the trickster as much as the saint to keep us human and sane in a world that tries to classify the complex interweaving of suffering & joy into the question, “What is my pain level out of ten?” To the young doctor/computer technician, asking questions to quantify and reduce complexity to certainty, “Her fast fingers wait to classify my/existence on a screen,” while “oblivious/to the bend I have just rounded,” the poet suggests questions instead that open and deepen into life:

            “Ask me instead who I am,
            what my mornings are like,
            if I am working towards a future,
            who in my life has just died?
            If you don’t have time, and you are
            backing out of the room with your computer,
            at least ask me if I drink alone.”

Judith Adams knows what healing and comforting the soul is, in contrast to the often cold, heartlessness of contemporary medicine. She created The Poetic Apothecary project, offering “poems for healing and comfort,” throughout Washington State via the Humanities Washington program. A video of this talk can be found on Judith Adams’ website.

The center of the book, and the title as well, is “A Place Inside,” a poem, brief and wonderful, which embodies a love of life, bringing inside/outside, human/divine, and body/spirit together.

            “You have a place inside you
            no one can touch.
            It’s where your tools are kept.
            In this divine workshop
            you chisel at a raw day
            in deep devotion to yourself,
            and there you allow some unruliness,
            your share of sore complaint.
            And there you follow
            your own footsteps
            through the dark”

(A Place Inside)

A Place Inside is a wonderful book that reminds it what it is to be human, to be alive, to be grounded in the Earth, and to breathe starlight.

Watch for an interview I did with Judith Adams to be up on The-POV soon!

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