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Welcome to The More than
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Just a Doctor Podcast.
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I’m your host, Lil Surprenant MD.
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I’m a life coach for physicians,
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a practicing
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hospitalist, a wife, a mom of two boys,
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a reader, a dancer, a dolphin enthusiast,
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and all the things
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just like me.
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You’re more than just a doctor.
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And that’s what we’re
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going to talk about each week.
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Doctor stuff regular life stuff
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and all the things that make life
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rich and interesting.
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I’m so glad you’re here.
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Let’s get started.
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Hello, my friends.
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It's Lil.
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This is podcast
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episode number
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15 of more than just a doctor.
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I've got a short but sweet
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episode today aimed at
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creating satisfaction at work.
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But really, my goal here
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is to give you all
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a lighter frame
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for some of the things that happen
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to us in the work world
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in regular life.
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So first, I
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want to start out with a little story.
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So last
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last week on Tuesday,
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I was meeting my friend for happy hour
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for a glass of wine and some
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cheese board. Yay!
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Good, good times.
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So anyway,
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she comes in a few minutes late.
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She is hurrying from a work meeting
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and she's got a text from work
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and she's like a little bit in a frazzle.
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And she tells me this story,
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and I'm sure many of you,
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if you're in health care, can relate.
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But really, customer service,
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anything where you deal with people.
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So she, my friend, is a nurse
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and she is like an administrative nurse,
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actually do direct patient care,
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but she's a chief operating officer
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and she was out on a patient
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consultation
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with the chief medical officer
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and a new hire, a nurse practitioner.
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So the reason
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all three of these people
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are out together, which is not usual,
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is because they were training this person
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and wanted to make sure
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that the new person knew exactly
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how the company did things.
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So like sort of top of the line training.
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So they go into a patient's home.
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They've got their
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they're all sort of
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dressed the same and not quite a uniform,
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but they all have nametags on that
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say their name
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and the name of the company
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and they introduce themselves
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and have a long
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my friend
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has a long conversation
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with the daughter of the patient about
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they've just been to Italy and, you know,
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the daughter is like,
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oh, Italy is my happy place and,
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you know, have a real good connection,
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have a full visit and everyone's
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hunky dory.
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Satisfied, the friend gets in the car,
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comes home,
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which is like an hour and a half drive.
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And by the time she has gotten to meet me
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for the end of the day for happy hour,
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she's gotten a phone call that the
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people have called
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the complain,
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the daughter has called complain
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to the company.
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And the complaint is that three strangers
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showed up
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and didn't introduce themselves,
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didn't know why they were here,
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and nobody had nametags on.
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So, like, of course, my friend, like,
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her head won't explode
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because this is sort of the
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opposite of what happened.
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And she proceeded to tell me
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about how they connected over Italy
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and the whole like the whole nine yards.
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And she's like, Why?
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Like why are people like this?
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Like what?
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What is what happened?
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And I was like, Oh, I know the answer.
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Like, I really do.
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I know the answer to this.
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And she's like, What?
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I'm like, People are trifling.
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It's just like,
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Oh, yeah, I'm like, You know
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the answer is that people are trifling.
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They don't make sense.
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Like,
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who knows exactly what happened
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between the time you left a door
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and they did this complaint phone call.
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My guess
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is that some other family came in
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and said, What are you guys doing?
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You know,
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we got Betty
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Sue's da da da
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you know,
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got them off their rocker
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and got all riled up and called.
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But I have no idea. Really.
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The answer is people are trifling.
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And by trifling
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I mean sort of aggravating.
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They do things that don't make sense.
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They don't make sense
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for their own interest,
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for your interests.
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They want to fight and quarrel.
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So people are trifling
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and I just find
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that is a super useful way
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for me to think about many of the, like,
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nonsensical things that people do
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and say
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in the course of moving through life.
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So I am not alone in this
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assessment of humanity.
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So I'm sure many of you
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have heard of Marcus Aurelius.
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He is a famous Roman emperor.
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Like 2000 years ago,
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but in my mind
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he's to me
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most famous for he's got
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a bunch of writings
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and there's they're collected
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in a book called Meditations.
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And I joked to myself
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that he's the original life coach.
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So he's
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got all these like he's always trying.
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He's sort of serious dude,
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like sort of trying to coach himself
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to improve and understand the world.
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But here's one of my favorites.
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So he says,
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when you wake up in the morning,
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tell yourself,
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the people I deal with
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today will be meddling, ungrateful,
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arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly.
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Okay.
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Right.
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So here's your shortcut for that is
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people are trifling.
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So tell yourself, people are trifling.
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I find it liberating and not aggravating.
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So this is meant to be helpful to you.
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It's not meant to be dismissive and mean.
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So if you're saying people are trifling
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and you're feeling mean,
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that's not the way this is intended.
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It is intended to give you
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a little bit of lightness,
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with the frustrations of the world.
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So then Marcus goes on to say,
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basically it's because they don't
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know good from evil
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and he has seen both good and evil.
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But he also goes on to say that
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he understands that
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their nature is related to his own,
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and we are born to work together
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like hands and feet to obstruct
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each other
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is unnatural to feel anger
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at someone, to turn your back on him.
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These are unnatural.
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And so
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what I take from that is
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a couple things.
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One is
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we are trifling too
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and I wholeheartedly believe this.
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You may not think you're trifling,
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but let me tell you, you're trifling
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to somebody sometimes.
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So some of the times that I think
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we can be trfiling
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doctors, a lot of times
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they want to be right.
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They'd rather be
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right than come to a consensus.
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Sometimes passive aggressive.
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We pretend to know more than we do.
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Sometimes
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we make our administrators harass
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us for paperwork, for queries.
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I used to be so trifling about billing.
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I don't know why.
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Like totally didn't make sense,
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even to my own detriment.
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Like it costs me money
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to drag my feet on billing
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and I did it anyway. Totally trifling,
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not making any sense.
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I just
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do want to say now
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I do my billing on time
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because there's a wonderful person
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on the other end
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who's waiting for it
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to make the list for the next day,
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and it's totally cured me now.
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I do it on time every day
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because I'm very motivated
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to be a decent partner
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and I love having the list sorted out
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instead of having to do it myself.
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So anyway, Marcus
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basically is saying
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like we it's in our nature
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we're triflin’ too.
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So you may not recognize us
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how you're trifling,
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but just when you're saying, you know,
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as the start of the day
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or when things come along,
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people are trifling.
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Just keep in mind you're trifling too.
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And the other thing he's saying
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and I'm saying with this is
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you can understand that
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people are trifling.
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They don't make sense.
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Like what they're.
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I have another good story for this
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because I told another partner,
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like the next
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I told a partner the next day.
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People are trifling.
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She was seeing a very elderly person
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who had been admitted
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to the hospital for very soft reason,
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to basically get some outpatient
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studies done
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because the logistic were proving hard.
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Well, she goes to see this
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little lady and they have an interaction
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about like I need my tea served,
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which is like not how the hospital goes.
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And, you know,
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she's not sure she wants this test,
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which is the whole reason
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her doctor wanted her to the hospital
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like this whole thing.
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And my partner was like, feeling very
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frustrated, sort of mad.
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And because, like,
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this whole thing does not make sense.
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And I'm like, oh,
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like, seriously good news.
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Like, people are trifling.
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Like, you don't have
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to understand the whys and wherefores.
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Like, this little old lady is trifling.
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And what we get to do
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is not get angry about it.
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Not like worsen the situation by
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trying to force sense on people
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when sense is not forthcoming.
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What we get to do is decide
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what our job is in that situation,
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which is probably
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like explain
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the choices as best possible.
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Then of course,
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the person
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gets to make their own decision.
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Our job, you know, in our job also,
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when people are trifling
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is to set boundaries
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so they can be trifling.
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And we get to come in, be very clear
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what our job is
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and medical decision making, explaining
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to the best of our abilities
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what the situation is, you know,
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whatever or,
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you know,
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if you're not in the medical field,
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whatever your job is like,
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you get to decide
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your gunna show up and do your job.
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People are being trifling
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and then you get to set boundaries
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so you don't have to keep explaining.
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You don't have to bend yourself
00:10:38:10 - 00:10:39:21
into a pretzel
00:10:39:21 - 00:10:42:12
to keep trifling people
00:10:42:12 - 00:10:43:10
from being trifling.
00:10:45:07 - 00:10:46:14
And it makes
00:10:46:14 - 00:10:49:07
moving through the world
00:10:49:07 - 00:10:50:16
and especially moving
00:10:50:16 - 00:10:52:09
through the hospital
00:10:52:09 - 00:10:54:21
a little lighter and easier.
00:10:54:21 - 00:10:57:15
So that's my little
00:10:57:15 - 00:10:59:15
notion for you guys today.
00:10:59:15 - 00:11:01:17
See if you like to play around
00:11:01:17 - 00:11:02:21
with the idea
00:11:02:21 - 00:11:04:10
in a lighthearted way
00:11:04:10 - 00:11:06:09
that people are trifling.
00:11:06:09 - 00:11:07:18
You don't have to fix
00:11:07:18 - 00:11:09:09
the trifling people.
00:11:09:09 - 00:11:10:22
You are trifling.
00:11:10:22 - 00:11:12:08
And it's all good news.
00:11:12:08 - 00:11:13:02
Good news.
00:11:13:02 - 00:11:14:20
People are trifling.
00:11:14:20 - 00:11:15:09
All right.
00:11:15:09 - 00:11:16:19
That's what I got for you this week.
00:11:16:19 - 00:11:19:19
See you next week.
00:11:21:18 - 00:11:24:00
Thanks so much for joining me today.
00:11:24:00 - 00:11:25:18
If you like this episode,
00:11:25:18 - 00:11:26:22
you're going to love
00:11:26:22 - 00:11:28:23
working with me directly.
00:11:28:23 - 00:11:29:23
Sign up for email
00:11:29:23 - 00:11:32:14
updates from me in the show notes.
00:11:32:14 - 00:11:34:21
I'll send you a fun email every week
00:11:34:21 - 00:11:36:11
called Friday Favorites.
00:11:36:11 - 00:11:39:15
Everyone loves it or if you're ready
00:11:39:15 - 00:11:40:09
to get started
00:11:40:09 - 00:11:43:09
creating your Rich and Interesting life
00:11:43:11 - 00:11:44:18
book a free consultation
00:11:44:18 - 00:11:46:17
with me to explore working together
00:11:46:17 - 00:11:48:00
one on one.
00:11:48:00 - 00:11:50:04
I can't wait to meet you.
00:11:50:04 - 00:11:51:08
You'll find these links
00:11:51:08 - 00:11:53:19
and other resources in the show notes.
00:11:53:19 - 00:11:54:18
See you next week.
