Episode 14 - Shannon Whittington - Living in the Light of Gratitude!

Thank you for joining me for another episode of the Nursing Strategies for Success podcast. In this week's special edition, Living in the Light of Gratitude, with my very good friend, colleague, and guest for this week, Shannon Whittington. Welcome to the Nursing Strategies for Success podcast, brought to you by The Nurse Speak, a show where we rally some of our nation's greatest nurse leaders educators, experts, and advocates to tackle some of our greatest challenges that the nursing profession faces. My name is Damion Jenkins, and I'm your host for this show. So sit back, relax, and get ready to learn that nurses can do anything. Okay, so I'm here with Shannon Whittington, and today we're going to talk all about gratitude since Thanksgiving holiday just passed. And, um, because of the holidays, I didn't have a guest for this week's episode, so I'm here at Shannon's place and we're just having a conversation about gratitude. Say hello to everyone, Shannon.

Hello everyone, thank you for having me here today, Damion.

My pleasure, thanks for having me As always, we're up to no good scheming and seeing how we can change the world for the better. Yes. And, you know, just planning, you know, some future goals and working on projects. You know, I thought it would be nice to just take some time to talk about what we're thankful for and what we're so gracious to have in our lives. And so, you know, many of you have already heard some of the things that I'm thankful for, and I'll share some more today, but I wanted to start with you, Shannon. You know, just kind of in reflection, we've had a rough last year and some months now. Lots of change, lots of transition. So just take a moment and, you know, share with us what are you grateful for?

Oh, I'm grateful for so many things. And I think one of the biggest things that I'm grateful for is having my health. I'm grateful for having an amazing wife. Yes. And a great dog. But you know what's interesting is that You know, I always write down what I'm grateful for every day, and I heard something the other day, and this person said, write down what you're grateful for within the last 24 hours. And that really changed things as far as what I was writing down, right? You know, so yeah, those are the things that I'm grateful for. And you know, as many of you know, when you're doing podcasts, you're somewhere, the other person's somewhere else. I'm grateful to be just sitting right here next to you and looking at your beautiful face.

Oh, thanks.

And it's just, you know, collaboration, you know, um, it's wonderful. So I could go on and on about—

hey, we have all the time in the world. Um, typically 20 to 30 minutes is what I like to keep the podcast length at, but this one's going to be a little bit shorter because we are just focusing on gratitude. It's not really about a particular issue or a particular set of strategies in order to gain success. But speaking about gratitude and strategies for success, you just mentioned something that some people may not have in their own practice, which is writing down things that you're grateful for, not only once in a while, but on a daily basis. And that is so true. You know, many of you, if you follow me on social media, you might see the hashtag #livinginthelightofgratitude. I use that a lot. And I do wake up every day and give my thanks for very simple things. I woke up today, so thank you. I'm laying next to the person I love, so thank you. My pets are healthy and well. And even though they may be annoying because they want to be fed, I'm so grateful to hear their meows and feel them pawing my face. You know, I'm grateful to be able to get up and move about. I have my mobility and my health and things like that. And we should always be thankful for those things, but we should also give thanks to, you know, a lot of the other influences we have in our lives. I'm very thankful for all the stuff that my husband does to support us. I'm very thankful for my friends and family who are a constant in my life to provide respite at times, to provide a listening ear, to provide advice or support in ways that go beyond me and my husband's own means sometimes. And so, you know, with this past holiday, we were able to gather with my husband's family again for Thanksgiving, which is always very nice. And we felt safer this year than we did last year doing so with the vaccines. So I'm also very grateful for that. I'm very grateful for the science behind the vaccines and, and the initiatives that have come out of all of that work and all of the scientists and healthcare providers who have developed these vaccines and administered the vaccines. I'm very thankful for that as well. And so, you know, as we're just living in the light of gratitude, you should really just take a few moments each day and acknowledge the things that you're grateful for because we're never guaranteed tomorrow, right?

So true.

We're never guaranteed tomorrow. We never know what the next day brings. And we have good days and we have bad days, but even in our bad moments, we can always choose what to focus on and how to respond.

Yeah.

And so if you live in the light of gratitude, you can take what would, you know, be an awful situation and turn it into something not so bad because there's still something to be grateful for. And, you know, speaking about that, Shannon, has there ever been a situation where you felt like you were in a rut, but then you found the good and were able to shift your perspective to live in the light of gratitude versus letting the darkness take over.

Yeah, and it's all about perspective.

It's all about perspective.

You know, I have an adopted mom here, and she's 84, and here in New York City, right? Because I'm from Tennessee, my family's down there, and she always says, Shannon, if you wake up in the morning and you can wipe your own you know what starts with the A. Life is good. And those are things that we take for granted, you know. I was thinking more about things that I was grateful for, and one day I was walking and I saw the most beautiful maple, and I took a picture of it because the sun was shining on it so beautifully, and it just illuminated the tree. And I was like, wow, I'm grateful for nature, you know. I'm grateful for remote working now. Yeah, like that has literally changed my life. Yeah, it has changed. I never realized what I, um, gosh, a rut really, like the commute rut of getting 3 hours back, you know, 5 days a week. Heckfire, that's like a part-time job.

That's a lot of time, you know.

Yeah, and I'm in school, which is really challenging, but I have a wife who says, "Babe, what do you want for breakfast?" "Babe, what do you want for dinner?" "Babe, what can I get you?" Who's just so, so supportive, and I realize that everyone doesn't have that. Yeah, you know, some of the things that we have to do in addition to going to school, I don't have to do because my wife is right there, and my dog Penny is laying next to me with her little nuzzle right under me, and I'm very grateful for that. And I feel like if we can maintain an attitude of gratitude, it really shifts your perspective in life because, you know, some folks just don't have it that good.

Yeah.

And we see it as nurses, we, you know, we see people so, so sick who were diagnosed with all type of illnesses this year, you know. And I always— and, and like I said when we first started out, I'm grateful for my health.

Yeah.

I think You know, we notice the health more because we see sick people. I'm grateful to be able to urinate. You know, I worked on a transplant floor for a while, and one time I had a patient just sobbing to death, and I was like, oh my God, I'm running down the hall, what's wrong, what's wrong? She's on the toilet, she's like, I'm peeing! You know, and I never—

So those were tears of joy.

Yes! And I never took my kidneys for granted. Ever after that. Yeah, you know, things that we just take for granted. So gratitude really does wonders for the mind.

Yeah. And so, you know, so this actually leads into a little bit of some of the issues that nurses are facing with being able to cope with the stresses of the job, especially in today's healthcare workforce, you know, um, with COVID and capitalism and the way that healthcare is run. And for years and years, way before the pandemic, nurses were already crying out for help, that we don't have the support we need. And so what a lot of organizations are doing is they're, they're investing in resiliency programs and things like that to basically tell our, our nursing workforce, toughen up.

Yeah.

And deal with it. And so, but what I will say about resiliency is it is all perspective. It is all your mindset. And when you have better control over the way you let your circumstances affect you, and you spend less time dwelling about the what-ifs or the shoulda-beens or the negativity that is so easy for us to focus on, then we can really take full control over our situation, and we can make better decisions about are we going to tolerate this.

And we, and we do have a choice. Yeah, you will hear people say, you know, I hear nurses say, I don't have a choice. Yes, you do.

We have so many choices.

You have a choice. Yeah, you're choosing not to choose.

Exactly. And, and, you know, anyone following these episodes knows that nurses can do anything. Oh yeah, really anything. So being able to control the way we respond to negative situations and again focus on the gratitude of the moment, the fact that you are a nurse not everyone gets to be a nurse.

Well, it sure isn't easy. It's not easy to become one, right?

The fact that you're, you're giving yourself to others, you're helping others, that's a gift. That was a gift you were given to be in that position. Um, but you don't have to be a victim of your circumstance. So if you're working in a healthcare facility that does not support you, you can focus on the positives. Focus on your skill set. Focus on the fact that everyone needs good nurses. That you'll always have a job. You just may not be fitting well with that particular situation or place. So there's always an option. And again, you know, perspective is everything. And so if your company or institution or organization is trying to send you to resiliency workshops and telling you to toughen up, some of that can be helpful. Maybe you don't have those tools or tricks under your belt to kind of get through um, some of the issues. I find that's really more with our newer nurses, with the reality shock of getting into the profession. Some of our more seasoned nurses have kind of figured out ways to deal, and a lot of us, we, we recognize our worth and then we leave. That's how we deal with it. And I think that's what's happening right now with this mass resignation, right?

Yeah, but we're tough by nature. Yeah, like Being a nurse means you are tough. Like, you've got to get into situations where you don't fall apart.

Yeah.

You know, and they teach us that. Listen, I worked on a heart floor for quite a few years. When the patient codes, you don't fall apart.

Right.

You may fall apart after, but not during. And if you're in a place where you don't feel like you're being supported, then go to a place where you are. I really think there's a perfect job for everyone. One. And sometimes that job is nurse entrepreneurship.

Yep.

Maybe it means you're not supposed to be at the bedside. There's so many other things that we can do besides that. Now, is that important? Absolutely. Yeah, it really is. But there's— I mean, look at me and you, we both have our own companies. I'm a consultant. You have what you're doing with getting nurses to pass NCLEX, which is like amazing. We're developing programs. We're writing books. I'm a best-selling author, multiple-time best-selling author. I mean, you know, and we're both nurses.

Yep.

So there's, there's— the sky's the limit when you really think about it. Yeah, you don't have to be stuck anywhere, honey.

Yeah. And so, you know, for any of the nurse leaders out there who are listening, who are considering buying into the resiliency programs, um, just take a step back. That's just what I ask for you to do is take a step back and remember what it's like to be on the floor. Remember what it's like to be there calling out for the additional resources and ask yourself, is a resiliency workshop really going to improve workflow? Is it really going to take away the, the stressors that are getting your staff to leave? Is it helping them create the professional career trajectory that they want? Do they have room for growth in your organization?

Do they feel supported?

Do they feel supported?

Do they feel valued?

Are they getting the compensation that is, you know, that translates to the work that they're doing? These are all the things that we really should be addressing versus, you know, giving them strategies on how to toughen up and how to cope with the fact that our workforce is horrible and our working conditions are horrible and the amount of support we have is virtually none beyond the nurse manager and the staff themselves. There's not much that an organization has, you know, nursing education perhaps, but we know how nursing education departments have been slashed because of costs. So, you know, just take a step back, and before you sign off on some kind of, you know, nice-sounding program, let's see how we can actually transform the way that we're doing business on a daily basis.

Yeah, it's not that complicated. Having been in the field, on the floor, and then in the management and leadership side. Listen, when I was on the floor and in the field, I would always say to myself, I'll never do that if I ever become a boss. Yeah, I'll never do that if I ever become a boss. And once I became a boss, I wanted to give what I never received, right? Just giving what I never received allowed me to have a number one team in customer satisfaction, allowed me to be number one or number two in quality indicators allowed me to have zero turnover on my team and a waiting list of people who wanted to be on my team, and it didn't cost a dime.

Yep.

You know what it cost me? A thank you.

Yep. Right?

I appreciate that. Come here, let's talk about that patient you had yesterday. Wow, you were amazing. Do you know that's all it takes? Appreciate them. Let them know how valued they are. They're sick. Hey, um, "Sorry, you're not feeling good." "Oh, I'm gonna try to come back tomorrow." "Take another day." Yeah. "Damion, take another day. Listen, don't come back until you're better. It's really all about you, Damion." Do you know what that does?

Isn't that amazing?

It is incredible! Yeah. I remember I had a therapist who his husband had lost his father, and he drove, I don't know, like a few hours to go there for the funeral and everything., and then he was coming back Friday to work, and then was gonna go back up there for the weekend. And I said, Peter, just stay up there. You need to be with your family. He burst into tears on the phone. You know, and he was like, oh my God, Shannon, do you know that therapist would move mountains for me, just for that small act of kindness that I gave to him. It didn't cost as much as resiliency training costs, let me tell you something. Correct. It's servant leadership, you know?

Yeah. And for all of the nurse entrepreneurs out there that I know who are working on resiliency workshops, the work you're doing is very valuable and it's very much needed. But we need leaders and, you know, the people who balance the budget and put money into the nursing workforce to realize that just telling nurses to toughen up is not the best thing to do. And honestly, we all know with resiliency coaching, comes, you know, the nurses having more power to make the decisions that best aligns with what they want. So another tip for leaders out there is if you get these nurses to cope better, they're also going to have a clearer mindset on what they will and will not tolerate. So when they come with that, you know, peace of mind, they're also going to have a very clear idea of what they want. And what they don't want. And so you might still see people leaving, especially if you're not putting in the work to change the process.

Yeah, I mean, there's definitely something to be said for resiliency training. We're not knocking resiliency training, you know. I think there's a time and place for everything, but I think it really starts with appreciating and valuing the staff.

Absolutely.

It's the, it's the basics 101. It works wonders. And, and, you know, like, some of the younger nurses do need resiliency training.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's a skill that they still have to develop. You know, you got to be tough out there in those streets. Yeah, you really do. And you got to deal with what you're— you know, when you get on a new— on a floor and you're the new nurse, you just graduated, you're green, you know, someone going to help you or what's going to happen, you know? Right.

And we know there's a lot of gaps, you know, with transitioning from nursing school to practice, even from nursing school to NCLEX. If there weren't gaps, then I wouldn't have my clients, I wouldn't have these services. But that's why I've also gone into creating a 6-month professional development program that coaches, mentors, and tutors new graduate nurses so then they can get the support that they need in the event that their institution is, like many others, overwhelmed and the amount of support that the individual gets is limited. Um, because I know when I came out of school, and I'm sure it was the same for you, when you come out of school, there's a lot of things that you wish you would have learned or you wish you were assigned to a mentor who could take the time to give you that information besides your preceptor who's still in the numbers, who's still taking care of patients and trying to train you at the same time. And there's just a lot of opportunity for missed gaps and missed opportunity to really hone those skills, the essential skills, not just your hands-on skills or the role of the nurse, but more how do you deal with these complex situations.

I'm glad you're dealing with that, Ana, and glad you're offering that program because you know what I would have liked to have learned or would have liked to have known when I graduated from nursing school?

What's that?

How to be a nurse. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

How to be a nurse.

How to put it all together. Yes.

I mean, talk about clueless. Yeah. And listen, NCLEX was the most stressful time. I was traumatized by that. Well, the whole thing.

Most people are.

Nursing and the NCLEX. Forget about it. Like, if I think my license is about to expire, you will see how fast I'm on there trying to get that done. Because I was like, oh my God, I don't know if I could pass that again these days. Yeah, it's insane.

So, and the difficulty level is increasing as the difficulty level of taking care of patients is increasing, um, the complexity of illnesses, the more autonomous nurses become. And, and hey nurses, we want our seat at the table, right? We want to be an autonomous profession. So with that comes the responsibility of leveling up the expectations. So just keeping that out there for some of our seasoned nurses who might be tuning in, we have to step it up.

Yeah. And demand a seat at the table. Like, so many decisions— this boggles my mind— so many decisions are made, you know, at the leadership level, and they don't even consult the nurses. And the nurses are the one that's going to be utilizing the technology or whatever it is that they're instituting. And you're like, dude, Like, why didn't you ask me what I think about this?

Yeah, some facilities will have a director of nursing or chief nursing officer that they run everything through, which is fine. At least you have some nurse representation. But we also have to consider how far removed are those individuals from the clinical space. So if we're including charge nurses, nurse managers, some of our senior nursing staff that have been there for a long time and have been able to identify all of the barriers to, you know, good practice, that these are the individuals we need to be leveraging for that insight. Not to say that CNOs or DONs don't have the insight. Maybe they are very in touch with what's happening on the clinical level. Some— I know some that I've worked with that have been excellent, and they can hit the floor running just like anyone else.

Yeah.

But I also know many who have been so far removed that they are clueless on what's going on, and if you ask them to take an assignment, they wouldn't know how to.

Yeah, you'd be scared.

Yeah, so we have to make sure that we are tapping the right people for this type of consultation.

Yeah, don't make a decision about us without us.

Exactly, because then you're not going to receive the positive outcomes that you're looking for.

And the cost savings.

That too. Hello? That too.

The cost savings, right? We have to think about that too.

Yeah, you don't want to implement an entire system that's not going to work. Yeah, because then the nurses are not going to use it, right?

They're going to figure out—

wasted all that money.

Yep, they're going to figure out a workaround because we're good at that.

We're very, we're very good at MacGyvering. Yes, the work. So if you need an affordable solution, you should definitely have us at the table.

Yeah, definitely.

Um, yeah, so again, you know, Shannon just said a few minutes ago that it's all about the basics. And, you know, to summarize this special edition episode, it's just going back to gratitude. And so if the leaders who run these healthcare organizations can follow suit and just jot down the things that they're grateful for, I bet nursing staff, nursing personnel, nursing as a profession would be at the top of the list. Because without nurses we have no healthcare.

So true. I think I am grateful for the nurses who are out there.

Yes.

Right now during this very difficult time. When I graduated from nursing school, it was the AIDS epidemic, and I remember being so scared. Yeah. I got peritoneal fluid on my arm. I nearly scrubbed my arm raw because I was so, so afraid. So to all you nurses out there who are in the thick of it right now, I am grateful for you, and I say kudos to you, and it gets better.

Yeah, we're all very grateful. Um, I wasn't at the bedside during the height of the COVID pandemic. I have not been at the bedside since, uh, September of 2018. But as a nurse educator at the beginning of the 2020 pandemic, and then also supporting the education team remotely since all of this, and then having friends and colleagues in the space. So grateful for all of the work that we're all doing to keep our community safe. And it's been an ugly road. We know that this pandemic has pulled off the Band-Aid to a nasty wound, and now we can fully assess what's going on. I think the general public has a much better idea of what we do and the types of conditions where kind of forced to deal with. And now it's our time to change the narrative and change the way we do things. And so everyone should start their day in the light of gratitude, focus on what they're most grateful for, what they're thankful for, and what they would like to be thankful for, so you can work on those goals and develop those strategies for success. So thank you so much for taking your time to speak with me today, Shannon. I really appreciate it.

Oh, I'm delighted, and thanks to all the listeners who are tuning in.

Yeah, we're grateful for you as well. So all of our followers, colleagues, friends, advocates, supporters, we are so grateful for you as well. We hope that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday, whether it was with your friends, your family, or even your patients or residents. Uh, we hope that you live in the light of gratitude, and we look forward to next time. Thanks so much, Shannon. We'll talk soon. And that concludes episode 14 of the Nursing Strategies for Success podcast with this week's guest, Shannon Whittington. We decided to record this week's episode about gratitude, so we hope that everything we shared with you will help to inspire, motivate, and empower you to live in the light of gratitude and lead the charge. I will have all of the ways that you connect with Shannon in the show notes of this episode. And as always, if you have any questions, visit thenursespeak.com/contact and get in touch with me. I would love to have a conversation with you. So until next episode, take care, be well, and remember that nurses can do anything.