Beyond Workload: How Narrow Thinking Kills Creativity and Causes Burnout

Richard Zwicky: Hi everyone, it's Richard Zwicky with High on Healthy, the show where we know there's no one path to healthy, so we examine them all. If you haven't subscribed yet, please do so using your favorite podcast listening device. Today's conversation is going to continue on a theme that we started recently, which is looking at the hidden mental health challenges of why do people who appear successful often struggle silently beneath the surface and why modern achievement culture is burning people Joining us today is Dr. Andre Walton who provides and explores a provocative idea. Burnout isn't just caused by workload, it's also caused by how we think. Welcome to the show, Dr. Walton.

Andre W: Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here, Richard. Thank you very much indeed.

Richard Zwicky: Andre, you're a social psychologist but really you focus on being an innovation researcher and studying the science of human performance and burnout. And you're looking at it differently than a lot of other people have perhaps approached it, which is that burnout doesn't come from working too much. It comes from thinking too narrowly. What do we misunderstand about burnout?

Andre W: Firstly that's a great summary. What I think we typically misunderstand two things about burnout. One and we're helped in our misunderstanding by the medical profession and this one is that typically medical doctors will subsume burnout under the heading of workplace stress. Now there are a couple of problems with that. Firstly, burnout doesn't really have any boundaries. If you get stress at home, if you get stress anywhere else in the world, that will contribute to your tendency to have burnout. So, it is not restricted to the workplace either as its foundational cause it's sustaining it. So, that's one issue. The second is I define stress a little differently in that for me stress is when a situation occurs for which we do not have the resources to cope. And so in that sense that does something interesting in that it moves the onus of responsibility the locust if you like from outside the environment to an internal place. So in other words we personally have to take some responsibility. Outside factors of course can be very stressing but we have to take personal responsibility for that. So that's the first way in which I have a slightly different view of burnout. The second is that fundamentally we are ignoring one of our key human drives most of the time and that is the ability to think creatively. We've had this since the days of the spear and the bow and arrow and the wheel right up to, the iPhone and the jet engine and so forth. And it is a really core drive in the sense that it is the source of our human social evolution. We didn't get the iPhone and the jet engine because we've got opposable thumbs. We got them because we've had hundreds of thousands of years of developing this curiosity that causes us to create things. Now, in this highly complex techy world that we've developed, a lot of that the motivation to think creatively is lost. And you can tell this really in the sense that people often trivialize creativity in the sense of it's either sort of something that old aunt Doy did when she retired and bought herself a paint box or they will cite you the product of creativity in the amazing innovations that surround us with the sort of unwritten assumption that those exist because of a few very special people who happen to have some unique creativity gene or something and that really isn't the case at all. So, the other thing that I really think it's important to redefine is this issue of creative thinking because we've all had it. If you watch kids of one, two, three, four years old, they react very differently to things than we do as adults. And the reason for that is that as adults, we've been trained to be very lazy. Oops, efficient in that if we come to a new situation our subconscious scurries off and it tries to see if we've had a similar situation because it uses that as the template for the current things that we do and it's a very efficient way. I mean it saves us a lot of time mentally and also energy. People don't always realize that the brain uses a lot of energy.

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Andre W: I mean, if we think in the way that we did as kids as adults, we'd be using as much energy as going for a stroll. So, it's a very efficient process, but of course, it's very counterproductive for creativity because you're basically saying mixture as before. Okay, there's going to be a few little changes, but it's really a way of suppressing that this tendency to look at all the options to be highly creative. That's what kids do. And if you see them, I spent a lot of time with my granddaughters since they were born and they'll find some sort of object somewhere and they'll wander around thinking what is this thing? And you could see them trying to use it to make sense of their world as if they've got a new puzzle piece to put in a partly completed jigsaw puzzle. And sometimes they try and squeeze the piece into the wrong place. But generally speaking, that's how they look at new ideas, new experiences in their world. And we lose that as adults. But that is creative thinking. And so when I use creative thinking in a lot of areas of my coaching from trauma and grief right through to burnout. And it's a very valuable tool because the other way the deductive analytical process that we've kind of been lured using in our everyday life partly because so much around us is trying to stir up You switch on the TV and somebody's going to frighten you into, taking out more insurance or using this drug or that drug because you've got a pain in your knee or something. And so that process is actually very convergent. We talk about drilling down and focusing in on things and because it's analytical in nature and of course analysis is a drill down process. So creativity is quite the opposite. In fact, social scientists like myself, if we're trying to measure creativity, it is very difficult to measure directly. We often use divergent thinking tests

Richard Zwicky: But as I'm listening to you,

Andre W: Which have been found to correlate very closely with creativity so you've got these two ways of thinking one is very convergent and the other divergent

Richard Zwicky: One of the things that strikes me is, the perspective on creativity and that it's lost. I'm not sure I agree. I think it's different in adulthood and We're looking for the old markers, not recognizing the new ways they appear. I find people are incredibly creative, but it's not seen in the same way as we would have looked at creativity a few decades ago. I do look at critical thinking skills aren't being taught and developed enough, but creativity wise, I'm amazed at what I see, We see the youth applying look at what people create on Tik Tok. It is incredibly creative. It's just a complete different application and it's being embraced for its creativity. But where I do see and I've more and more of the data because I've built a predictive analytics platform the stress comes from the inability to communicate on the same level with people. So we don't understand how to build those bridges the way we used to. So I see it fundamentally. Am I looking at it differently or are we seeing things from a very different perspective or where's that gap? Okay.

Andre W: I'm not sure there is much of a gap. Firstly, I use creative thinking because I don't have another phrase for it. In some cases, critical thinking and creative thinking really in the sense that creative thinking isn't just about being creative in the way that we've trained ourselves to think So it may have nothing to do with what we would call a creative output. It's the ability to think in a way that sees all options. It's a process of thought that doesn't constrain us with boundaries. And so think of it as personal brainstorming. And so, you don't have to sort of plaster your living room wall with post-it notes, but the concept is there in the sense of being able to have a very broad vision. And, in adults, you see this. I mean, they will happily sit around a table and brainstorm, but they won't use that same process when they get out of that room. When you're deprived of the post-it notes and the p and the person saying, "This is what we've got to do." That ability switches off and we go back to the analytical stuff.

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Andre W: One of the reasons I think that you're seeing a lot of creativity, on Instagram and Tik Tok and so forth is that a lot of that is done by teens and they haven't lost that creativity that they had as kids. They are losing it typically, not always, but typically, but they haven't lost it. So, that's really why you're seeing the creativity in that position. But you are exactly right in the sense that creative is a little different from thinking to have a creative output to have to be an artist or a sculptor or a writer or a painter. So it's a phrase there is no real phrase that captures that and critical thinking is part of the process but there is no real word for this divergent process. So I would certainly agree with everything you said there are plenty of signs of creativity. One of the crucial things though in today's western society is that we don't give that much priority. It is still the case that, somebody wants to make a living at painting or writing or being a musician. There are plenty of people that will frown a lot and suggest that, that's okay if you really want a life of poverty, for instance. And so, if prioritizing something becomes a social norm, then the whole society will tend to take that on. I mean as technology became that way a few decades ago and you've got many more technology based classes in universities and so on and so forth and so with c I'm talking about creativity rather than just creative thinking now taking a back seat there are so many different indications that we just simply don't prioritize And this has not always been the case. I mean, if you look back to, the first century in China, the Italian renaissance even the industrial revolution, when you saw technology evolving in terms of innovation, you also saw the creative side of life doing I mean different techniques of writing, of painting, of music and so on and so forth. And we really don't have too much of that now. We can route around and find those things, but they're not front and central in our life. There is an imbalance. Yep.

Richard Zwicky: I mean we reward business and operations and organizations reward analytical efficiencydriven thinking which leaves the creativity for the most part to our personal lives. Now that's not exclusive. There are people, who are very creative and their job allows them to be creative and innovative, but it tends to be more towards creating solutions so everybody else's analytic and processes can go to work. Right?

Andre W: And also what you do find I've had some quite substantial clients who recognize the need to be more innovative. And one of the problems that all of these particular clients m not saying every company does this but my clients was they didn't take on creativity as a core value. They were quite happy to have sort of a separate padded room in the back of the building and get somebody who was previously seen to be innovative and let them get on with it. But in terms of actually taking it on as a core value, one of these clients, for instance, would be called to sit in on some of the board meetings. And he complained to me that, it's fine. They'd ask I answer the questions. I could see that eight out of nine of those board members were bored. And seven out of those nine just simply thought I was a waste of time. I was a window dressing for shareholders to say, " look, they've got this person in there." So they're being innovative. He was not taken seriously and it was a very frustrating few years of his being in that company. So when you're on your own being creative you've got some outside pressures of course but you can generate your own internal energy and in a corporate setting it needs to be a core value as it is with Google for instance.

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Richard Zwicky: Ear one of the points brought up is stress. And 40% of people leave their jobs because of stress. But the data that I've been collecting and looking at points to the fact that almost all stress has its roots in Either toxic or poor communications or inability to communicate your own needs and your own thoughts in a way that the organiza the others in the organization can understand and build bridges That creates a chronic stress situation though over time. And they become compounding issues. It's not just a matter of solving communications, but if we solve communications and reduce stress, it would be phenomenal. But the organization sees when these things happen we see a person's abilities drop because they're under chronic stress. What happens to the brain? Yeah. Mhm.

Andre W: Under chronic stress. Not typically always we suffer from something called seizing and freezing and it's a known social science phenomenon whereby if we have a decision to make however big or small or something of that nature we seize the first option and freeze our search for any other options which if you think about it is the exact antithesis of thinking creatively.

Richard Zwicky: Where I was going because that forces us to become more rigid and less innovative.

Andre W: It does. And I think your statistic on stress is really fascinating. And what I would say is one of the things that we have happen to us in our lives quite frequently is that, we're very adaptable creatures, humans, and in the 20s, this adaptability will often be taking sort of any job that's the shiniest object. And then by the time we sort of creep around to maybe the late 30s or 40s, we sit there thinking this just doesn't feel the right thing for me. So, a lot of people are you by social norms or just by their enthusiasm and their adaptability, they feel stuck in a situation whether they realize it or not that to which they're not really terribly suited. Their internal person is frustrated by the fact that they're not doing things that are really satisfying and that more to the point, they're doing lots of things that aren't satisfying specifically.

Richard Zwicky: Which is a terrible place to be because we have one life and we should, find ways to enjoy our work and our personal lives. And too many people think they have to work to live but they never get to live. Mhm.

Andre W: And there they are stuck with a mortgage that they can't afford if they change if they start on the lowest rung of a different ladder. They're simply not going to make the money to meet all their means and so forth. So it's a very frequent problem and it's a creative thinking problem as well because it results from not being able to see the options. More down that tunnel you go, the fewer options that you're likely to see. And so there are several layers of stress. And I think that particular layer is something that is quite dangerous because it'll typically become more and more stressful at a subconscious level and then it will suddenly take its ugly head in the form of burnout. For instance, I don't see people who are really enjoying doing what they're doing, however hard they work, then frequently very infrequently are they burning out.

Richard Zwicky: But when you get an organization where too many people fall into that survival mode thinking what happens to the organization as far as we know what'll happen to the people. What about the numbers that as you mentioned you sometimes talk to boards and some of them glaze over and don't get it. How are you able to relate it to the bottom line? So they do right?

Andre W: I think my process really is to find people who will actually take this idea into the organization. That might be one board member. It might be one senior manager. It might be and these are champions for the idea because it's got to come from internally. They can listen to me till they're blue in the face, but ultimately,

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Andre W: The shareholders have got this mythical head that they rear, in any sign of change. And so I think the real idea is that you get into the organization through these champions and you really educate them as to how they can start to make small changes. This doesn't have to be a quantum leap. These can be very subtle changes that build up to an organization that is much more open to the idea of creativity or creative thinking. And I think that the other thing I just want to add to the comment that you made is that it is well established in social science that productivity and happiness go hand in hand and they also go hand inhand with creativity. Now I'm not talking about any causality there but creative people Happier people tend to be more productive. And so, once you start to get a person or a group of people because I think it can be a little bit catchy who are not satisfied with what they're doing, it's really a triple whammy in the wrong direction.

Richard Zwicky: No, it is. And the individual who's though under stress they're looking for relief. How does creative thinking calm the nervous system so they can take that breath and maybe recognize what really needs to change?

Andre W: It's really all down to this divergent nature because one of the things you don't have to be incarcerated to know that not having freedoms to do things is very stressful in itself. And that comes in our personal lives from not seeing options. Once we get stressed we become like a racehorse with blinders on and that is in itself stressful. So let alone any of the environmental factors. So really creative thinking and it starts in very simple ways but once you start on that journey your view of your world and your life starts to open up and you see new options and when you start to see new options the life that you're actually in that you is causing you to be stuck or in some way is not satisfying that takes a different place because these options mean that if you took that journey, you could actually take one of these options. So once you've actually seen perhaps it is, a profession that you sort of missed in your 20s or it didn't pay enough or whatever and that now is of interest to you. You start on that journey and just the fact that you've got this option and you've got this goal and you've got this journey to follow is in itself empowering. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.

Richard Zwicky: It is. It's empowering to anytime you're doing something you're passionate about, what are some you talked about you need to go in the organization through an individual and that individual who's looking at these things is a leader in some way leaders aren't necessarily people who hold titles it's actually people who hold roles and

Andre W: Influences in some way.

Richard Zwicky: The role is assigned by the people around them. It isn't exactly. But how do leaders create the environment that restores the thought of possibility when the environment is under too much pressure? It' it's not toxicity, it's burnout, it's stress, and it's everybody's operating on the mission of what has to be done, not why or how we could do it better.

Andre W: I mean that's a very common situation, isn't it? Especially when the economy is kind of closing in a little bit and people are feeling stressed about whether their jobs are going to be there next month and

Richard Zwicky: Go. F\*\*\*. Mhm.

Andre W: All that kind of thing. I think influencers can help in a lot of ways. And especially obviously if they're leaders, but just the idea for instance that you could be allowed to do part of your job between sort of 5:00 at night and 9:00 at night on this particular day because you wanted to see the US Open Tennis Championship on TV live. That just having the freedom even if you don't actually use it to feel that you've got flexibility in your life that your work is going to be flexible enough to allow you to take half a day to take your kids off to goodness only knows where for their soccer game and not have to take half a day off your holiday your vacation allowance because you're going to make up the time at some

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Andre W: More convenient time. So, some of that kind of productivity, flexibility is very powerful in allowing people to feel empowered as opposed to be and that's the key to all of this, isn't it? Yeah.

Richard Zwicky: I think people recognize they are empowered. It's ownership. Right. I have a friend who wrote a book a number of years ago. A friend. She's an acquaintance by now. I haven't spoken to her in a few years but her whole system is built around I own me and too often we give control to others and we shouldn't

Andre W: It can start in very simple ways.

Richard Zwicky: But that being the case and we are running low on time what practices can people do people take adults take to reconnect with their creative cognition to recognize hey I can do this And this is how it's going to benefit me across the board. Right.

Andre W: I mean the goal here is to get out of ruts. So, it can start with saying, "Okay, there are several different ways I could get to my place of work. I'm going to take a different route today. When we go out to our favorite restaurant tonight, I'm not going to choose the same thing from the menu. I'm going to choose something different. In fact, why don't we go to a different restaurant?" So, in these subtle ways, we're planning the family vacation. Let's do choose a different place and we'll do a dream board. Will put up all sorts of pictures of, this place and the activities around it and all that kind of stuff. And all these things particularly the latter is something that brings the family together. And that's one thing that characterizes stress that we can do something about. People under stress, especially burnout, will push away those people that can help them. And so activities that are towards something a little bit different vacation, different thing to do at the weekend, whatever it is, that involve the whole family really solve two problems at the same time. But it's this getting out of the rut that is the important and this is neurologically sound. I mean fMRI imaging shows us that these kind of activities are distinctly different neural pathways to the kind of analytical deductive ruts that we get stuck in.

Richard Zwicky: And so how does your banish burnout framework differ from traditional burnout solutions?

Andre W: I don't know of any other burnout solution that uses specifically being creative or creative thinking to because what you're doing is you're taking somebody who's looking at the world down a microscope and you're saying, "Okay, we're going to change that. We're going to open that to being a wide angle lens." And that can incorporate anything. I mean, if anyone's ever told you, when you go for a walk, look up rather than sort of down at your feet because that will make you improve your mood. And sound shows us that's true. But what's it doing? It's going from looking at a few square feet to looking up at a huge horizon. So, anything that expands your horizon helps you to look at the world in that different way. And that counteracts that literally is like taking a different lens, putting in front of the microscope lens and opening it all up.

Richard Zwicky: So individuals who are struggling or just maybe sitting there and listening to this and going I'm not create activities that really I want to learn more how to proceed your book and How do they start exploring that? How do they reach out to you to learn more?

Andre W: The easy way is to go to my website which is planned the number four and then the word change planforchange.org and they'll find a lot of information on the website. They'll also find a button on every page. They can make an appointment and have a free consultation with me 30 minutes to talk about where they're at, best way of getting over that. And I can go through some programs that will help them if they would like some external help.

Richard Zwicky: Fantastic. Thanks for joining us today on High on Healthy, Andre.

Andre W: Thank you very much and thank you for your podcast. I think it's really excellent.

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Richard Zwicky: Thank I appreciate that. And thanks everybody for listening. I'm Richard Zwicky with High on Healthy and we'll be back again with you soon.