On those days, weeks, or even months, when your job is getting you down, do you ever consider who you are outside of the job?

Yes, we do spend the majority of our day at work and spend more time with the people we work with than our families, especially when working full time, but we also have many hours outside of work every day. It is in these hours that we can build our sense of self and happiness to overcome the resentment and irritation of our working day. Building in time for ourselves and the activities that lift us, even for a few minutes, is really important to improve our resilience to the harder times.

So, who are you and what do you do outside of work?

I still remember the first time I was asked to do this as it led to such a powerful realisation for me- that I completely identified with being a dentist, there was no other part to me. All the difficulties I was finding within dentistry, I took on as if they were wrong with me. I wasn’t doing anything apart from dentistry, and whilst that was a struggle, my whole life became a struggle.

So, I am asking you to make a list of all the roles that you play in life- your job, being a mother/father/sister/brother, husband/wife/life partner, daughter/son/grandchild, aunt/uncle, carer, shoulder to cry on for others, problem solver, runner/book lover/artist/baker, every role you can identify with.

Now remove all those roles from yourself and your life, imagine who you are without those roles? If you took these roles out of your life completely, what is left? When you strip away everything that you do for other people, what is left for you? Who is it that you really are under all that doing for other people?

For many people, there isn’t much, and that is why they burnout.

So, from this place build yourself up, strengthen who you are, not what you do. What is it that you want to do for yourself? What do you really enjoy doing without it being for somebody else? What qualities do you have that you want to build on?

In the short term, developing resilience to get you through where you are right now is really important. This then gives you a better base to strengthen and build the rest of you.

There are many things that I and my clients have discovered to help build resilience and a life that they are happier with, here are just a few:

• A happy playlist, as soon as we wake up or during your commute
• Meditation
• A hobby, such as playing an instrument, baking, cooking, art
• Making a list of what went well that day
• Spending quality time with loved ones or call someone you care about
• Get moving in any way, dancing around the house, doing yoga, going for a run
• Getting out into nature
• Watching a comedy or feel good tv programme/film
• Volunteering

How can you incorporate something that makes you feel good regularly?

How can you build who you are underneath all the roles you play?