How The Power of Pacing® Works
“What’s happening to me!?”
“How I felt in those moments [in my veterinary practice] would range from just being in a bad mood, to feeling my body temperature rise until I reached a fuzzy, out-of-body-like state.
Then, I’d usually say something out loud that I would regret, which only made me feel worse.” - Recent Veterinary Graduate
Does this sound familiar?
We meet so many veterinarians who share this experience day after day in their practice.
Without some way to cope with the constant, relentless stress of veterinary medicine, you find yourself constantly exhausted. You feel defeated by the career you’ve pursued for so long.
While you can’t control all of the unexpected stress of the veterinary environment, you can control how you respond to it.
And your journey starts by understanding what’s really happening to you.
Welcome to the Race
In its simplest explanation, all of the stress you’re experiencing in veterinary practice is causing your body and mind to speed up.
And it feels awful.
All of this is a natural, normal response.
The key is to build an awareness of what’s happening to you, and understanding the sequence below is the key.
Trigger
Every one of these events sets off a specific trigger depending on your personality and environment.
These triggers are thoughts we all have like. “That person’s not playing by the rules,” “I can’t believe I’m failing at this,” or “What will other people think?”
Event
Veterinarians are surrounded by stressful, often unpredictable events in the clinic.
Whether it’s from operational overload, negative behavior from owners and animals, or facing your own self-doubt, the stress keeps piling up!
Reaction
Your trigger fires the amygdala and sets off a powerful emotional and physical reaction.
Adrenaline kicks in. Anxiety, anger, fear, and frustration take over. Your body gets tense, and your mind starts to race and get fuzzy.
Maintaining your pace is a high-stakes game.
Event. Trigger. Reaction. It just keeps happening over and over throughout the day. Unless you can figure out how to slow things down, the cumulative effects of this cycle of stress are devastating.
In your practice
You struggle to recall your medical training and treatment protocols.
You say or do things you regret to owners and staff.
You create a negative environment in the workplace.
You see a cascading impact on customer satisfaction, efficiency, and revenue.
In your personal life
There’s little joy left in your work, and you feel like an imposter.
There’s no energy left for the people you love and the things you love to do.
Relationships inside and outside of work are damaged.
You lose sleep over personal and professional mistakes.
Learn to pace yourself and take control of your day.
The Power of Pacing® is a simple technique taught through a private coaching process which helps you slow down during your work day. We teach you to master “The 5 R’s.”
RECOGNIZE what’s happening to you. Something just set you off. Are you tense? Talking faster than usual? Saying or doing something you’ll regret later? Without judgement, it’s time to identify the event, trigger, and reaction you’re experiencing.
REDIRECT by slowing the effects your emotions are having on your mind and body. You need to buy time to transition from an uncontrolled, amygdala-driven reaction to a thought-controlled response.
REPLACE the mental script that’s racing through your mind with thoughts like, “I didn’t do anything wrong,” “I can’t control what other people think,” or even something as simple as, “slow down.” These simple thoughts stop the race and restore calm.
REPAIR the physical effects of the event. Once your mental script is replaced, we need to address your physical state once again through controlled breathing, relaxation, and changing your focal point in the room.
REFOCUS on the task in front of you with a clear mind, a confident spirit, and a joyful heart.
This isn’t therapy, and there’s no mystery about it. It’s a repeatable technique used to reframe stressful moments and take back your day.
Here’s how The Power of Pacing® program works.
It’s an 18-month journey to transformation, but don’t let that overwhelm you. This private coaching process is designed for busy veterinarians and only requires a handful of sessions to complete.
1. Overcome one thing.
For the first four months, we meet monthly to teach you the basics and gain control over one, stressful triggering event you face every day.
2. Overcome the rest!
For the next fourteen months, we meet quarterly to help you gain control of the other daily stresses you face at work and beyond.
3. Thrive!
No more feeling exhausted and defeated at the end of the day. Instead, you’ll maintain a steady pace and reclaim the joy which brought you here to begin with.
Download our free resource
What’s Happening
to Me?
Learn to recognize and understand why your days in veterinary practice are so hard.