#22: Being A Physical Therapist: Why We Do What We Do

You hear me say it all the time on this podcast: we all need to be a geek about something! And in case you don't know, I am a massive geek with all things pertaining to physical therapy. I'm not ashamed to admit it, either.

The truth of the matter is that life is so much better when we have passion for our daily work endeavours. So, I thought it would be a fun idea to make a podcast episode about why physical therapists (such as myself) enjoy our jobs so much. Sure, it has it's challenges, just as any job or career does, but the goods far outweigh the bad, and having a positive impact in the lives of others is just the coolest thing ever.

So, in this episode, I'm covering some specifies pertaining to what makes being a physical therapist the coolest job ever (yes, I am biased), along with what many other physical therapists enjoy about the profession as well.

And by the end of the episode, I'll have hopefully provided you with some really cool insight that can perhaps help you to find a bit more meaning and fulfillment within your life, even if you're not a physical therapist or within the healthcare field. 

So, if you have any interest in the world of physical therapy, or you're thinking about becoming a physical therapist, or you're in physical therapy school, my hope is you'll get some valuable insight out of the contents presented within this episode!

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS:

0:00 - Intro

7:08 - The “problem” to solve & big takeaway

14:35 - Just to be clear on a few things

16:46 - Definition, basics, & specialties of a physical therapist

21:55 - The big “why” behind this job

31:33 - Speaking to prospective physical therapists & students

37:42 - The joys of self-discovery

40:44 - Job satisfaction rates of physical therapists

42:00 - The realities of burnout as a physical therapist

45:50 - Occupation vs identity as a working professional

49:15 - Helping vs empowering others as a physical therapist

50:50 - Income and being “rich” as a physical therapist

54:00 - The Japanese concept of Ikigai (a reason for being)

58:03 - What winds my clock as a therapist

1:02:34 - Key takeaways of this episode

1:04:16 - A small request

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Alright, so this life is short, and much of it is spent working for a living. And since life is hard enough as it is, I believe that finding meaning in our daily pursuits is essential for fulfilling life. And as I often say on this podcast, we all need to be a geek about something. And us movement specialists love to geek out about the human body. So in this episode, I'm diving into some of the reasons why us physical therapists do what we do. That is, why we find meaning in our pursuits of helping others overcome their physical challenges and dysfunctions. And with any luck, by the end of the episode, you'll have a better understanding of how you can integrate your passion, mission, vocation, and profession in meaningful ways for your pursuits, just as I have with mine. So let's talk about it. Hello again, everyone. Welcome back to the Strength Resurgence Podcast. This is episode 22, Being a Physical Therapist, Why We Do What We Do. There's going to be an interesting uh episode here in a couple of different ways where, you know, this one's really going to be driven by a lot of personal insight. Uh, we often, you know, I should say I often have a lot of uh these episodes geared in a way where talk about a lot of kind of scientific stuff pertaining to the human body and physiology, uh, which I love doing, but it is fun also just to really kind of share with you guys my own kind of personal thoughts and feelings on a few things. And I figured that's what we would do for this episode. So uh, you know, grab some coffee or just anything that's gonna help you get a little bit comfortable here, because I think this is gonna be a pretty fun episode. So thank you for tuning in. If you don't know me, real quick, my name's Jim. I'm a physical therapist, uh, strength and conditioning specialist, which just means I'm a super geek when it comes to the human body for health and wellness and physiology and anatomy and basically helping people get out of pain, uh, help them understand and learn what their body is capable of so that it can help them live a stronger, uh more fulfilling life. And not just stronger physically, but just in the other domains of life as well. Man, I love what I do. That's exactly why I've kind of drummed up this particular episode that we're diving in today. So, and I appreciate you being here. Uh, Lord knows there's no shortage of podcasts out there for you to listen to. Uh, so the fact that uh you're tuning in to spend some time with me, uh, man, that means a lot to me. It really, really does. And so as we get going here, you know, this whole podcast exists, as I always say, because we all need to be a geek about something. And so in this podcast, not just this episode, but in all the episodes, what I'm really trying to do is create conversations around pain and injuries and explore kind of the life-enhancing effects that can be gained as we work to write our own comeback story. So that's exactly what we're going to get into here. But real quick, fun fact about me, just so you get to know me a bit more every episode and help you realize that I'm just a normal dude full of my own little quirks and proclivities. Um, my fun fact for this episode about me is I quite enjoy the flavor of black jelly beans, which I know many people don't, but I think when I was a kid I didn't, but I think we had a pretty unique taste and quite like them. So I'm not one to shy away from the black jelly beans if there's a bunch of jelly beans sitting in a bowl. So there's a fun little fact about me. All right, so now, what's in this episode? What are we going to talk about here for being a physical therapist? Why is it that I do what I do, or my colleagues uh or others in the profession? Why do we do what we do? I think there's a lot of fun things to pick apart and break down. So we'll be uh doing that here. So the contents of this episode, I always like to give them up front, help you know what you're getting into here. So talk about the basics of physical therapists and physical therapy and all that, just to give you a brief rundown in case you don't quite know what it is that a physical therapist does, or physiotherapist if you live here in Canada like I do. That's that's how we say it. But physiotherapist, physical therapist, they're they're one and the same. So we'll talk about that. We'll talk about some of the kind of job satisfaction rates that you find across this profession. We will also talk about the difference between occupation versus identity, which I think is a really important thing to distinguish for any of us who uh you know are in our formal occupations, because I think sometimes we equate our identity with our occupation, and I think we can love what we do for work, but to say that identity and occupation are the same thing, I think there's some room for some discussion on that. But then also quickly talk about helping versus empowering and what the differences might be, whether it's as a physical therapist or maybe some other type of line of work that you're in, whether it is the Allied healthcare professions or just anything else in general. I think there'll be some good things to talk about there. And then we'll talk about being rich in other ways, uh, not just kind of financially rich, but other ways that I feel quite rich in terms of what it is that I do. Uh, we'll set money aside on all that because money is not the most important thing in my life by far. Um again, you can be rich with money, but plenty of other ways that you can be rich as well, and that's that's what I want to talk about there. And then perhaps the coolest thing I think we're gonna talk about in this episode is the concept of Ikigai, which is uh a Japanese concept that I just think is a beautiful one. So uh we'll get into that in a little bit. And then we're gonna talk about winding the clock. You know, what is it that kind of gives us some great feedback in what it is that we do, and then we'll we'll wrap it all up with some key takeaways from there. But as we get going, I figured I'd throw just a fun little quote at you here that ties into my profession for sure, but perhaps your profession as well. So the quote that I'll give you here, whether you're in the healthcare profession or the service industry or any other line of work for that matter, I think this is an interesting quote. I don't know who said it. It's probably been said by a lot of people. Uh, you can probably find different uh attributations uh for this quote from many other people online, but I don't think it's as important as who said it versus what we get out of it. And that quote is that people don't care about how much you know until they know about how much you care. And I think that's uh just a beautiful way to kind of sum up the fact that you know, in this life, it's you know, knowing knowing what makes you good for work is certainly good. You have to have your knowledge and your skills and your training. But at the end of the day, if you're trying to serve other people, yeah, that knowledge and expertise is very important, but I think it needs to rest on the foundation of you actually caring about the other person that you're serving. So quite like that quote. I think I first heard it way back in grad school, but I carry that one around with me because I think it's uh it's a beautiful quote. So, uh, real quick here, the the problem to kind of solve in this episode, if you've listened to these episodes before, you'll know that I always kind of give you like the main problem to solve and then the quick takeaway, and we really dissect it from there. We really pull it apart. But you know, in this particular episode where we talk about why do physical therapists do what they do, you know, maybe it's not so much this time uh as a as a problem to solve, but maybe as a question to ask. And I think as I was putting this episode together, the the question I found myself asking here, you know, in terms of tying it into like why make an episode out of this concept about why physical therapists choose this profession and why do we choose to do what we do? Well, I think the question really is why do we find meaning in helping individuals regain their functional abilities or you know, improve their physical health and ultimately improve their quality of life? Like, why do we find meaning in that? What it like, what's the reason for that? And spoiler alert, there's no one individual answer. I think you know, there's there's a multitude of answers that we could get into here. But I think um realistically, it's I think this time it's more important to ask a question rather than to try and just solve, solve a problem. I mean, at the end of the day, if people are physically hurt, in pain, they have an injury or a physical condition or ailment, the problem to solve, you know, is ultimately like how do we how do we get them better? How do we improve them to the maximum extent possible, whether that's a full recovery or just you know, preservation of function for that matter, because sometimes that's the reality of what we're up against. But I think you can't just you can't just say, well, here's how you solve that problem, because that pertains to so many, you know, there's there's thousands of different types of injuries and physical conditions and ailments and all these things. And the best way to help people, and it's it's man, you could you could write a whole entire encyclopedia on that type of stuff. So I think it's more fun here just to ask, you know, why why do we find meaning in these pursuits for us as physical therapists? And again, this can be the same question for anyone else in the healthcare profession, or just in any type of line of work of serving other people. And that could be serving people if you're a barista in a in a coffee shop, or maybe um, you know, you're a you're a plumber or you're in the trades serving other people. Well, I think as we'll we'll really kind of dial this particular episode into physical therapy, but you can extrapolate a lot of this, and that's what I'm gonna try and do here to maybe your line of work, whether you're in a similar field as me or something completely different. Um, you know, I gear these episodes around physical therapy and the human body and physiology and anatomy, but I do always try and construct it in a way that uh anyone can kind of pick apart at the contents and walk away with some concepts and some some kind of general thoughts to chew on. So uh so a question for you, the uh the listener here, is do you currently find satisfaction and meaning in what it is that you do for work? And you know, if so, uh why is it that you do what you do for work? And I think you know, we're all in different phases of life and situations in life. And I think some of us are probably in our dream jobs. I think some of us are probably using our current job as you know, a stepping stone to the next level, or it's just a staging area for the time being to make ends meet, right? Sometimes you just have to find a way to do what you gotta do to make ends meet. But I think the beautiful thing is even if you're not in your dream career, you're not at that final destination of where you want to be just yet, you can still find meaning and satisfaction in what you do. Uh maybe it's a bit harder, or maybe it's not quite how you uh would intend it to be. But I think oftentimes we can find ourselves, if that meaning isn't there maybe on its own, I think we can choose to find it, to hunt it down, and to bring it to the surface and find that meaning in our current job or our current occupation, our current career for that matter. So yeah, I'm curious, uh, you know, why is it that you do what you do for work? And I'm hoping the vast majority of you will uh you know, say that you do enjoy what you're doing for work. And if not, say just remember that you know you can always uh choose to uh choose to kind of keep moving along until you get that that dream job or occupation that you want. Now, the big takeaway here of all of this, of this whole kind of episode here, is really that, you know, perhaps with all this, why do we do what we do stuff? Maybe it's because we can enrich our own lives by enriching the lives of others. And I would say that for many of us, uh, this is quite personal since we ourselves, uh, as physical therapists, we've had to undergo physical therapy at some point in our lives. I think that's how a lot of us wind up getting into this profession. And we'll talk about that more uh in a moment. But that was certainly me. I think you could put me in that category for sure. And, you know, I think in that regard, as physical therapists, uh we are part of the allied healthcare profession, and I think we do tend to find immense satisfaction in helping others, and I would certainly hope so, because that's basically what the job uh is all about is helping other people overcome what they're up against. And you know, I would also say um maybe helping others learn why we love this stuff so much uh can help to inspire uh other people in their own ways. I've had it where um as a personal trainer for years, I've actually inspired a lot of clients I was working with uh for them to uh kind of change, uh actually kind of change their line of work or change their career. I had a girl come to me uh a few years ago, and I hadn't seen her in a very long time, and I used to train her back before I was a physical therapist, and we reunited some years later. And she said, Hey, I, you know, back in the days when we used to train, and she said, You used to train me, and you had so much kind of joy and passion for what it is that you did, I felt that I needed to find that same uh same joy in what I was doing. And she actually wound up uh switching careers. And I think, if I remember correctly, I don't remember what she was in at the time, but she actually went over to uh the study of kinesiology, so the study of human movement and kind of you know human body sciences. You know, and it was it was really cool because it was one of those things where I I never in a million years thought that I was uh having that influence on her. I mean, I certainly wasn't trying, just loved what I did, and I loved the the opportunity to help other people strength train and learn how to lift and uh be physically active with physical activity. And I think that's a cool thing about when you love what it is that you do, it can rub off onto other people uh without you even knowing or without you even trying, for that matter. And I think I think that's a beautiful thing. Now, just to be clear, you know, I think it should be quite self-evident, but uh let's mention this real quick here. As I talk about all this stuff about why as physical therapists do what we do, uh, I'm not speaking for every physical therapist out there. Um this is this is all about why I do what I do, but I will phrase it in a way where I would imagine that a large collective of other movement specialists out there uh would kind of say that uh to a certain extent, uh, generally speaking, with the broad brush that I'm painting with that, they would say that, yeah, that's that's me too. But this is really about me. And of course, I am biased in my responses about whether physical therapy uh is a great career. Of course, I'm gonna say yes. I love this stuff. I'm a mega geek. But if you're someone who's not, and you're an electrician uh or you're an architect or whatever, I hope that you love what you do enough to say that you would be biased in your own answers as well. So that being said, also I can't cover every nuanced aspect of the rewards of being a physical therapist in terms of why I do what I do. Uh, but hopefully, a few of the topics that are going to follow here will help to craft an understanding for why this profession can be so fulfilling. And I do also I want to be very clear and be mindful of the fact that uh there is nothing wrong with going to a job simply because it pays the bills. And, you know, if if if you're a physical therapist and you say, yeah, I mean, this gig's okay, it pays good money, and it's not my true passion, but I like it, I like helping other people, but really it's paying the bills as I work on um another aspect of you know my life or my side hustle or or or my kind of dream passion, that's perfectly fine. Um I I don't judge people if they're going to work because it's it's what's allowing them to pay the bills, but they have other things that they love to do. Um that that's totally fine. Just so you know I'm this mega geek about what I do and I'm I feel fortunate and I feel blessed. But in no way am I saying that everyone is supposed to feel like me or has to feel like me. Um, not saying that. So I do want to be very clear on that. Okay, so this whole physical therapy thing, just real quick, if you if you're not quite sure, you have like kind of a fuzzy picture of maybe what physical therapy is or what physical therapists do, just gonna briefly run through this so we're all kind of oriented at the same starting point as we kind of work through this uh this discussion here. So, according to dictionary.com, the definition of a physical therapist is a person who is qualified to treat disease, injury, or physical conditions by methods such as massage, heat treatment, and exercise rather than by drugs or surgery. I think that's a pretty reasonable definition. I would certainly expand on it a little bit, but by and large, uh, we are people uh who are trained up on the human body in terms of how it moves and how the body systems behave, uh, what influences movement, common diseases, injuries, and conditions that can change or alter how we move, and knowing all the strategies and ways that we can help to regain what has been lost or to help control or decrease or eliminate physical pain. Um, you know, that's kind of the broad brush to paint with here when we talk about what it is that we do. Um, but also there's we collaborate with doctors and everyone else because there's times where drugs are necessary and surgery is necessary. Uh so um we're just part of that allied healthcare profession. And um this stuff all always works better uh when we're all collaborating across the different professions as needed as we serve those whom we're treating. Now, when it comes to being a physical therapist, you can actually kind of have all these different specialties uh about what you specialize in as your physical therapy practice. Just as doctors, you can have uh you can specialize in surgery, you can specialize in internal medicine, you can specialize uh in neurology, you can specialize um in neurosurgery, you can specialize uh in um you know so many other uh aspects of human health and and well-being. Be a family doctor, kind of you know, a generalist, but um, us physical therapists, it's the same way. We have designated specialties uh that we can uh that we can pursue and kind of become our area of expertise. So someone like me, uh I specialize in orthopedics, so muscles, bones, joints, tendons, ligaments, all that type of stuff. Um, but you can get specialties in pediatrics, so working with young kiddos. You can be a specialist who is a physical therapist who specializes in neurology, so nervous-based uh nervous system-based issues and disorders and treatment strategies for that. You can specialize in geriatrics, you can specialize in sports, cardiopulmonary, you know, heart-lung type stuff. Uh, you can specialize in women's health or pelvic health, since that does pertain to men as well. Uh, you can specialize in oncology, so cancer and cancer-related effects. Uh, as a physical therapist, you can actually specialize in what's called clinical electrophysiology, um, which is probably not the most common uh specialty out there, but it is one. Uh, you can specialize in wound management and how you help to heal up uh wounds, so chronic skin wounds and lesions and these types of things. But at the end of the day, know that this is all based around the ability to help people get out of pain and to help regain their function, uh, move to the best extent possible to ultimately have better physical health and experience a higher quality of life. And so, in that regard, you can also have sub-specialties. And uh, you know, there's there's a lot of them. You can be a hand therapist, which I think hand therapy is really cool. You think about how important our hands are and how intricate they are, and a lot of conditions and diseases and injuries can affect the hand. And so you can specialize in that. Uh, you can actually have a sub-specialty in performing arts therapy, which, full disclosure, I did not know was a thing until I was putting this uh uh this episode together. Uh, you can have a sub-specialty in something called vestibular rehabilitation, which is really cool stuff. So the vestibular system is one of the systems in our body that helps us to orient ourselves and stand upright and maintain our balance. And when that vestibular system acts up and things go wrong, you can get horrible dizziness, um, all this kind of vertigo type stuff, uh, and it can just wreak absolute havoc on your life and bring it to a standstill. So I have some friends and colleagues who are vestibular rehabilitation specialists, and you get to know some really cool stuff and do some really cool stuff uh with that. Great uh subspecialty. And there's other ones too, but I don't want to drag out too long on all of this stuff. Just want you to know at the end of the day, there's a lot of ways that we specialize in this. Um, so that's the takeaway there. But let's kind of get into what I think is the really interesting. Interesting stuff now. So, okay, Jim, you've put together another episode on this whole physical therapy thing. Why? Why is it that you, Jim, choose to do this stuff? And it's interesting because I don't know if I can give you a perfect answer. I really spent some time thinking about this as I was putting this episode together. If you're listening to this episode, uh, I always put together these episodes with a bunch of slides and text and pictures on them so that one, I can turn it into a video podcast, but two, it actually just kind of helps to orient me and work my way uh through an episode rather than just reading off a script or looking at paper. Um just do it through these slides. I feel it's um I feel it's more engaging for anyone who wants to watch, but also helps me to be a little bit more ordered and organized in these episodes. But so as I was putting that all together, you know, I couldn't really narrow it down to a single exact reason why. Why it is that I choose to do what I do in terms of being in this profession and um and serve others to my to the best extent possible. But a couple of things that came to mind were that ultimately I do feel that life is hard enough as it is. Um, being a kid, man, I miss a lot about that because I just, you know, being an adult, there's a lot you got to stay on top of. It's stressful. Uh, there's money, there's relationships, there's um, you know, just there's no shortage of unending stressful factors in life, I find. And so you get to deal with all that as an adult, uh, but throwing extra pain and maybe movement dysfunction into the mix doesn't make it any easier. And I know a lot of people out there are struggling right now with the stress of life and trying to stay on top of things. And, you know, hey, how am I going to make my next rent payment or pay these bills? And for some people, it some people, their their biggest question is, well, when and where do I get my next meal? And I think about that a lot. And, you know, I can't solve those problems for people, but if if I can help orient them uh in a manner that gets their pain under control or gets them to move better, um, whether it's you know physically in the clinic or just even through these podcast episodes, if that eases the burden in someone's life by 1% or 2% or 5%, um I mean that's one of the big reasons why I do this stuff. I know how challenging this life can be. Um, I've got my own challenges going on right now. Just came back from a uh session with my um therapist talking about a lot of the challenges in my life. And I know was making a joke of them. I don't know how to deal with a lot of kind of mental pain that I sometimes have, but I know how to deal with a lot of this physical stuff. And um I think about how hard life can be. And if I can just ease that burden on people from a pain standpoint, um, that's a big reason why I do what I do. And working off of that, you know, really, I guess I'm just fascinated by the concept that we've all been given these bodies that are always fighting on our behalf. Um, and that we can actually help influence this fight for the better. We can help our body out. And no matter how unhealthy you are, how much pain you're in, your body is trying to get the job done and get corrected and taken care of. Now, sometimes it goes a bit haywire. You know, you get something called an autoimmune disease where the body is attacking itself, but it's it thinks it's making something better. It it says, hey, look at what I'm doing, and I'm I'm helping out when you know it's actually attacking itself. But um at the end of the day, your body always wants to fight on your behalf. And the fact that I can help influence that fight, you know, really help your body just have more ammunition to work with, in a sense, help your body have uh less of an uphill battle in that fight. If I can help kind of push it uphill rather than make your body have to kind of do all the marching uphill itself, you know, I'm just fascinated that we have these bodies that can heal. And someone like me, who never thought he was smart enough to be a physical therapist and never thought he had it in him to do it, can get to a point where I know all these cool things and I've still got more to learn. I'm not saying I'm some super rock star physical therapist. I've always got more to learn. But that people will trust me and that I have over the years had so many people say, Hey, you know, you you helped me figure this out. You you didn't give up on me. You you um you helped get my life back on track. The fact that I can do that, it's just the coolest thing ever. It really is. And you know, I think the other reason why I'm so fascinated by this stuff is because um, you know, I've been through this myself. And when you feel the difference of not knowing what's going on with your body and why do I have this pain? And you go to someone and someone figures it out, and you start working with them, and you go, wow, like that does feel better. That you know, my shoulder's moving better, it doesn't hurt as much. You know, the fact that it makes you so grateful that people study this stuff and figure it out. And I remember when I was much younger and I went to these physios who helped me out with the stuff I was having. I was like, wow, how do they figure that out? And I think that's so cool. And I hope that I can give people some of that excitement when they come to me or they go to my colleagues or anyone else in this profession. And we can hopefully kind of help them go, wow, that they they figured that out. That's super cool. And it's funny because when you really ask any physical therapist, hey, you know, why did you choose physical therapy? Why did you choose to be a physio? Um, you know, the standard just quick answer is, well, I want I want to help people. And that's a beautiful thing. I think that's human nature that we do want to help other people. Um, but it's kind of this generic answer. And while there's nothing wrong with it, uh, I think it's worth kind of picking that answer apart even more. And I know for a lot of us, uh, a lot of people I went to school with, um, and a lot of you know, people I've worked with over the years in the physical therapy profession, a lot of us have said that um we had to go to physical therapy as kids or teens or young adults, uh, basically in our younger years, and that we got to experience that healing process. And it somehow highly influenced us, maybe because we thought the body was super cool and we wanted to learn more about it. Or we just um, you know, we said, hey, wow, if if I could help someone overcome this condition that I have and kind of pass it on, you know, we we find that that's a really cool thought. And maybe that pulls us down the road that we find ourselves going as we go through our undergraduate degree and our graduate degree to kind of get our um our designation and ultimately, you know, get our license as we pass all our certifying exams and all that type of stuff. But you know, when you've experienced firsthand the positive difference that something has made in your life, I don't know about you, but I tend, I believe that when you do, when you experience something that makes that positive difference in your life, you tend to want to help others become aware of how it might be able to help them as well. Whether it's uh something as simple as, you know, hey, I I learned this simple little way to fix up my car and it saved me a bunch of money, and I I want to show my friends, or uh anything else along those lines, or in this case of becoming a physical therapist, you feel that difference. You feel like you get a part of your life back, or you've eliminated that that pain or that dysfunction, or you became you were able to move better in a way that helped your performance on the field as an athlete, um, better performance physically. You want to share that with people. Hey, I did this and I did that and I got better, and it's an exciting thing. And so I think uh any of us who have gone to physical therapy as kids or whatever, and we feel that difference, I think that's one of the big things that kind of pulls us down the road of um being a physical therapist. And it was interesting to think about that as I was putting this episode together, because uh in episode eight of this podcast, we talked about the concept of the wounded healer, which is a concept that I believe, if I remember correctly, was popularized by Carl Jung, famous uh psychologist. I think it was him, don't quote me on that. But the concept of the wounded healer in terms of psychology is um a lot of people who are psychologists choose to become psychologists uh because they've they've experienced something uh you know psychologically uh troubling or or harmful in their life, and they want to help out others overcome kind of those same things that they had to overcome. And so the concept of the wounded healer is beautiful. You are someone who um goes through something, but then chooses to help others who will go through that same thing down the road. And so I think in physical therapy we do that quite a lot, at least it certainly applies to me and uh I would say probably a lot of other people out there as well. Now, talk about me being a geek with all this stuff, and I'm a geek with it in terms of I want anyone who's ever thinking about becoming a physical therapist or going to the profession to know that a job and a career, especially as a physical therapist, it's so much better and more satisfying when you bring your passion into the mix. And years ago, I well, a couple years ago, I wrote this little book. And um, it's on my little uh buy me a coffee page if you do want to uh purchase it for $5. Um and it's written for those individuals who are interested in becoming physical therapists, uh particularly um being a physical therapy student in school. And um I wrote this book because my story to get into physical therapy school, and you know, I should really do a whole podcast on this at some point, pretty crazy story, and I'm not gonna really pull it apart and dissect it here, but um, I got rejected 19 times over a three-year span before I finally got accepted into a physical therapy school. And I wasn't a dummy. I had pretty good grades, uh, I just wasn't getting in anywhere, and I had years of real world experience, and not every school looks at that, and that was the one of the frustrating things. And I knew if I could just get in, and other therapists were telling me, hey, if you can just get in, that's the hardest part. And I chose not to give up in the three years that it took me and all these rejections. And um, but I was I like to say that um I was either incredibly smart or just too stupid to quit when it came to applying. But you know, the long story short is I finally got in. I I killed PT school, wrote my board exams early, all this other stuff. Um, but what I want anyone who's gonna go into this profession to know is that this stuff is so much better when you find a way to take your passion and insert it into your practice in a way that is meaningful for you. And so I'm gonna read you a quote from that little book that I wrote. And it's it's all about, you know, if if it's me speaking to someone who's thinking about becoming a physical therapist and um, you know, either going to be a physical therapy student soon or who currently is one. But maybe even if you're not anyone who's going anywhere near this profession, maybe just take the concept of what I'm gonna say here. And I hope maybe uh you can you can get something out of it. So this is a quote that I wrote in the book, kind of right at the very start. I said, the profession of physical therapy doesn't need students who ultimately go on to become therapists, doesn't need students that are haphazard about learning or who are casual at becoming movement specialists. Our profession is plagued with enough struggles and problems as it is. And what it needs are students who have an outwardly evident passion for becoming the best individuals and professionals they can ultimately become. And our profession needs students who proudly exude their desire to take their love of the human body to new levels. Fearless towards the ridicule of others, as students and practitioners, our passion for what we do must be demonstrated by a sincere and yet relentless desire to learn all things pertaining to healing the body through physical medicine. So that was the quote. And what I was really, I think, trying to say in that quote was that, man, you can be anything you want to be. And if you're gonna choose to be something, and you spend all this time and money, you know, becoming a physical therapist and going through school, or anything else for that matter, why would you resign yourself to go through all this work and pay all this money and not find a way to bring your specific passion into it? You you passion can look different for everyone, but to just resign yourself to a career where you say, yeah, I guess I'm just gonna do it this way because that's what everyone else does, or this is how they've always done it in this clinic, and that's how I'm gonna do it. I won't go so far as to say there's anything wrong with that, but I feel we're leaving out something beautiful if that's the way we choose to do it. There's something so beautiful that we're leaving off the table in terms of this gift of life and how we can enjoy it more. And dare I say, when we bring our passion into the mix, uh it inspires people more and you get better outcomes with those people who you're working with. Um, maybe maybe some people would say, okay, Jim, you're just being a bit silly. But I think you can burn out in this career pretty easily, and and we'll talk about this stuff in a moment. When you're just doing it a certain way, um because you're maybe a little bit too timid to go, man, I I I've got this way that I can do this, or I've I love serving this demographic or you know, these people, or doing it in this way. And I know I just I know this is what I need to do. And you just kind of say, Ah, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna bring that into the mix. Uh and I think that's I think that's unfortunate. And it's not to say you have to figure that out and know it right away before you enter practice. Uh or you might know what it is, but you have to kind of get settled into your career a little bit first. I mean, that's fine. But at the end of the day, I think you just, if you love something, why wouldn't you just be bold enough and brave enough to take it and take it to a new level in terms of how you can do it that maybe no one else can? I don't know. I I guess I'm a little frustrated with myself. I can't word this better. But uh point being is if you're gonna do something as a career and you volitionally chose to do it when you could have done anything else, but in that process of choosing, you also choose not to be bold enough and brave enough to really put your passion out there. I don't know. I just I think that's unfortunate. So moving along, um, you know, I think what's so cool about this job, too, as I work with other people, people who come into the clinic, is this whole process of self-discovery, where uh the human body, and it is capable of so much more than we often give it credit for, uh, or that we often realize. Uh, I've seen that as a personal trainer for so many years, and I've seen it as a physical therapist for all these years as well, too. And you can help people discover what their body is capable of. And when they realize what their body can overcome, and when they realize what their body is capable of, you almost see it, and it's the coolest thing. Um, and people's lives is like infinitely better for it. Um, I could tell you so many stories of that, I really could, but if you're all kind of get lost in the sauce as I do that. But, you know, this whole process of what the discovering what the body is capable of, you can tie this into a concept, and I've got an episode coming up uh about this concept, is the concept of anti-fragility and how it applies to the human body. So the concept of anti-fragility is just that um there are systems that when given stress uh and stressed and challenged actually become stronger. They don't just kind of meet that stress and resist it, they actually grow from that stress. And the human body is one of those one of those systems where you know you can have something that um is robust in terms of resisting, but then not necessarily growing from. But the human body, if you stress it in the right ways and you challenge it in the right ways, is anti-fragile and it actually grows and becomes stronger from that stress. Um, you can also kind of tie that into a concept of what's called supercompensation, where you challenge the body and you give it time to recover and it becomes stronger. Um, anti-fragility and supercompensation, they kind of synonymous in in a lot of ways. But I got an episode coming down the pipeline on that, uh, meant to be a little bit of an inspirational one for anyone out there who needs it. Uh, so stay tuned for that. Um, but you know, when you just help people discover that they got this kind of anti-fragility superpower within them, that's probably my favorite part of all. Uh, you have to know how to stress the body based on the injury and the conditions and all these other things. But that the right amount and the right type of stress done repeatedly over and over gives a type of progress that can really get people back on track. And you can sometimes see the exact moment when this occurs for a patient uh in the clinic or a client in the gym. And I never get tired of it. It's like you just see this light bulb go off. And I've had people come back to me and tell me how much better their life is or how much more confidence they have or less anxiety because they've learned what their body is capable of. So, with that, you know, kind of spiel taking place here, uh, let's quickly talk about the job satisfaction rates of physical therapists. Uh as a general takeaway, physical therapy typically ranks pretty high for overall satisfaction for what it is that we do. Uh, you can kind of find different stats based on different studies and all these other types of things, but in the research that I was briefly looking at, as I put all this uh stuff together for this episode, the studies tend to indicate that between about 66 and 75% of physical therapists report that they're either satisfied or quote, very satisfied with their careers. Now, what those, you know, what does satisfied mean? What does very satisfied mean? Well, um, I guess uh you'll have to we'll have to leave that for what you'd interpret that as, uh, but certainly not dissatisfied for that matter. Uh, so it typically ranks pretty high as you know, one of the more satisfying jobs out there. Um, and again, lots can go into these stats and studies, uh, but it's generally considered to be quite a rewarding and fulfilling career by the majority of physical therapists. Now, the profession has plenty of its own problems, don't get me wrong on that. Um, but we're not gonna spend lots of time on that, but let's quickly talk about burnout, because burnout is a real thing in any job, in any career, and it's especially real in the healthcare professions as well. So if you're unfamiliar with the term, uh burnout is a type of fatigue, frustration, or apathy, typically resulting from prolonged stress, overwork, or intense activity. Again, that's from dictionary.com. That's where I tend to pull most of my definitions for uh these episodes. Um and so, you know, as physical therapists, man, burnout uh is a reality for sure. And there can be a lot of reasons for why that is. Um, you can have, you know, hey, look, I have to, I'm I'm just I'm busier in the day than I want to be with how many people I need to see, or all the paperwork I have to do, or the stress of, you know, I'm trying to help people, maybe they're not getting better. Whatever it's gonna be. Uh, there's there's the reality that uh burnout, if you're not careful, is gonna happen. And so the reports that I was looking at suggest that up to 82% of physical therapists experience burnout. Now, I don't know about that. That sounds that sounds high. Again, I didn't look into it super, super deeply. I think at the end of the day, you gotta know that any one of us in the healthcare professions, we need to be careful because burnout is absolutely a reality. And compassion fatigue can also occur. That's just where it's your compassion for others, just wears low, and you really just you can't feel compassion for them anymore because you're burnt out, you're overworked, uh, you're stressed. Um matter how much you love what you do, these things are realities. And I think this is where, if you think back to that quote I read a few minutes ago, this is where I was really trying to go with this, where I believe you can protect yourself so much better if you can work your way. Into your career and do it in a way where it's a little bit more on your own terms. And maybe for some people that means that they're going to be their own clinic owner. Or they say, hey, I'm not going to be a clinic owner, but I'm going to choose to work at a clinic that aligns with my values of and beliefs of how the human body should be treated and all of that. But if you're just, you know, you're working as a physical therapist in a clinic where you don't like the philosophies or you don't like the way that you have to do things or whatever it's going to be, these things all grind you down if you're not careful. And so in that book, I was really trying to let students know if you're going to spend the time and the money and the blood, sweat, and tears that goes into being a fully licensed physical therapist, you're going to stand a much better chance of surviving this career if you are brave enough to move in a direction where you have an element of your practice that's really on your own terms in terms of that autonomy, right? That ability to say and acknowledge, hey, there's different ways to do this, but this is a unique way that I feel meaning in doing, that I can bring something valuable to the table and I can give my patients better service and outcomes through the angles that I'm choosing to practice. Because I think if you just your whole career is, hey, I'm this square peg trying to jam myself into this round hole in terms of how I want to do it, but how it actually needs to be done in this clinic. I don't think if you don't align with that, that's tough. And there's a lot of ways to get people better. It's not that there's only one way it can be done. I mean, this is heavily scientific, yes, but there's an art to this stuff too. And if you're not allowed to kind of bring the art into it, that's uh that's a tough career if you're going to be doing this for your entire career. Now, as we talk about all of this and when you love something, I think it's very important, and I've had to really rein myself in on this over the years, to distinguish occupation versus identity. Because I think oftentimes we we think of these can kind of be overlapping in the same, um, but I really don't think they are. So I've had to remind myself and tell myself over the years that my identity and my occupation are actually two very different things. So if we look at my occupation, and maybe this is something for you as well, if you want to put yourself into this uh this topic or this kind of discussion here. My occupation involves helping others make physical improvements through my knowledge and skills via formal academic training. Um, that's ultimately what I do, right? That's my occupation. And no, I do not enjoy it when people get injured or hurt. Sometimes it drives me nuts and people say, Oh, you must love it when people get hurt. It's more business for you. No, absolutely not. Um, there's a lot of other things I would do in this life if people didn't get injured that I'm interested in pursuing. So, no, I'm not happy when people get hurt or injured. But if you look at my identity, okay, my identity is much bigger than my occupation. And, you know, part of my identity of who I am, there's there's kind of flavors of that in my occupation, but my identity is distinctly different. Because my identity is being an individual who shows compassion and care for others, and that can extend beyond physical care, and it can extend beyond care within a physical therapy clinic. Okay, I can help someone uh, you know, carry groceries in from their car uh to their house because their back really hurts. Okay. I can care for others by um buying them a meal if I see them on the streets, right? Whatever it's gonna be. Um, I don't need to be in a clinic to help improve the quality of life to others and make their life a little bit better. And the reason why I choose to make this distinction specifically for myself is because if something ever happened where I couldn't be a physical therapist anymore, but I rooted my whole entire identity in that, and then that occupation gets taken away from me, but I feel it's my identity that gets taken away, that's tough. Um, you know, if my occupation got taken away from me, okay, I'd have to find something else, and and like that'd be that'd be tricky to do uh in terms of finding something I feel I'm I would love and you know would want to commit myself to the deep levels that I'd like to, but it ain't my identity. And so if I say, hey, my identity is going into a clinic and helping other people in a clinic and formal skills and academic training and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, that's that's a dangerous place to put myself. Because if something happens where I get injured and I can no longer be a physical therapist, uh, you know, I'm in a horrible accident or something like that, um, well, now my identity and my occupation are taken away because I've lumped them together. So I would say anyone who wants to become a physical therapist or who is, or even for your own job if it's not anything like mine, your occupation and identity are two different things. And I think that's very important to keep in mind. And this does tie into the concept of icky guy, which we'll talk about in a moment. Uh, but real quick, talking about all this physical therapy stuff, um, you know, I mentioned a moment ago, it's funny, what the general answer is, well, I became a physical therapist because I want to help people. And so to help people, if we look at the definition of to help, you know, it's to give or to provide what is necessary to accomplish a task or satisfy a need, uh, contribute to strength or means to uh to render assistance, to cooperate effectively uh with, to aid, to assist. You know, that's kind of what it means to help. But I feel that as physical therapists, at least for myself, it goes beyond helping others and it it goes into, I do this because it's you empower people in this profession if you do it right and you have passion. And so to empower means you give or delegate power or authority to authorize. And you you help people realize, hey, I'm not helpless in this battle. There's things that I can do, there's actions I can take that will get me to where I want to be. And so you give them the ability uh to do something or the um, you know, you enable them uh to permit something. And in that, it enables people to not solely rely on me to help them become better. They can often take an element of control for themselves, and that's very empowering. And I love that idea that, yeah, I help people, but at the end of the day, it goes a step further and it's helping them realize that um they can take action for themselves because then you don't feel helpless and you're not as scared and you know that you can fight back. So let's talk really quickly about being rich in other ways. So, as physical therapists, are we in this for the money? Talk to a bunch of different physical therapists, you get different answers from everyone. Uh, what I'll say, you know, for my kind of beliefs around this here, for myself, is yeah, you can make a good living as a physical therapist. Um, but if you're primarily in it for the money, it's likely not going to be your best bet. Um, and maybe medicine or med school might be a better way to go because you can make a good living in this profession, uh, but it typically takes a while uh to get to a point where you're making um, you know, good money. Now, good money is by definition different for every person, but it takes a while, you know, if you're in private practice, to build up a caseload or to um, you know, start to have things um being done in a manner where you where you've got that income up to a higher level. Typically don't start out too high. And unfortunately, many physical therapists are burning out uh because we're working really, really hard and the pay increase is not necessarily there based on um the amount of years you've been practicing and the knowledge and extra skills you've acquired. You know, we can make a whole episode on that, but that's not the point. The point is if you're strictly in it for the money, uh I would say probably find uh another profession because you might be disheartened uh with kind of how much you make right away, or maybe what your your overall annual income is going to be. But it's different for everyone, and there's quite a spectrum or range in kind of what your annual earnings can be based on numerous factors. Now, we obviously need to pay our bills, uh, but I don't think a lot of us, or certainly not all of us, got into this purely for the money. And this is that whole concept of being rich in other ways. Um, job satisfaction is is kind of you know one of the other ways in which we're we're pretty rich uh with personal satisfaction and we're rich with personal fulfillment. And you know, that's the pro tip right there, if you want the um the extra little insight, is that you know, you can be poor financially, but you can be rich in meaning and you can be rich in happiness and fulfillment, and you can be rich in many other categories of your life. And I've certainly met many people in my my life, and I'm sure you have too, people who are financially rich, but just poor in just about every other aspect of their life, and that's pretty sad. Um, it's it's very unfortunate. Um I love the the saying that um money can't buy happiness, but everyone wants to find out for themselves. Uh I've always liked that quote, but yeah. Um you can you you know, you can be uh not overly financially rich, but man, uh the I think the coolest people out there are the people who might not be financially rich, but are just um excessively rich in many other categories of personal fulfillment um and meaning uh within their lives. I think that's a really cool thing. Now, another cool thing we'll talk about here is the concept of Ikigai. And this is uh a Japanese concept, which is a concept all about a reason for being. And um, you know, it's super beautiful. I if you're not familiar with this, uh look up the concept of it, I-K-I-G-A-I. Um, really cool stuff. It it basically combines um life uh with value or worth uh in terms of its philosophy to act as a framework for this kind of personal fulfillment and purpose and joy in life. And it's got a few key aspects, and I won't really unpack this too much, but it's kind of this four-part uh intersection uh that that it really kind of hammers home. And so uh it's often visualized as a Venn diagram where you have four pillars meet. You have passion, which is what you love, you have mission, which is what the world needs, you have vocation, uh, which is kind of what you can be paid for, and you have profession, which is what you're good at. And so um, you know, it's really kind of viewed as a way of life, uh, where it's considered this holistic lifestyle rather than just a career goal or you know, something simplistic like that. Um, it's kind of um promoting longevity and resilience and happiness as well. And so it does go beyond work, but work ties into it. So uh it's it's this concept where it's not dependent on career success or in uh high income, uh, but it can also be found in small daily activities like gardening, uh, spending time with friends or pursuing a hobby. Um and it talks about a couple other things, but I'm gonna try and speed this along here. But basically, if you're listening to this episode right now, um, I've got a Venn diagram up on the screen where if you think back to you know high school, we learned about Venn diagram where you have circles that are overlapping, and where the circles overlap is where you have kind of commonalities between these two different uh things. And so I've got this kind of four-circle Venn diagram up on the screen right now. And it just kind of shows the unique overlapping uh between uh you know what you're good at, what you love, what the world needs, and what you can get paid for. And the certain overlappings kind of create these categories within this whole concept. So if you look at the overlap between what you love with what you're good at, the overlap there is passion. Okay, what you love and what you're good at, that's passion. Now, if you look at what you love and what this world needs, well, the overlap there is mission. But if you look at what the world needs and what you can get paid for, that's your vocation. And if you look at what you can get paid for and you look at the overlap with what you're good at, that's your profession. And it makes a lot of sense when you look at the Venn diagram. And um, you know, and the the the the in the center of that is the icky guy kind of concept, where if you can hit all of those, then um you're you're in a perfect spot. So you found what you love, you found what the world needs, you found what you you're good at, and you found what you can get paid for. And so the intersection of all these uh overlapping parts are the elements that allow for the manifestation of this whole concept behind this icky guy concept that we're talking about. It's a beautiful thing, and I think what makes it so beautiful is it's so simple, but it seems to me, at least myself, so accurate and so kind of bang on. And I look at this and I feel that, yeah, I'm I'm kind of in this uh the dead center of this Venn diagram. I feel like I've been fortunate and blessed and been able to work hard enough to kind of land right in the middle and check all these boxes. And I think that's super cool. So just to kind of give you a little bit more conceptual insight about what winds my clock for what it is uh of what I do. I'll give you some examples of my most fulfilling experiences that I've had. And I mean, I I think this is probably self-evident, but an example would be the moment when I see a patient, as I alluded to earlier, truly realize what they're capable of overcoming. You know, it's it's amazing. Sometimes people come in with they think um the world is like their life is over, the world's gonna end because they have this injury that will never get better. And there's no judgment for people having kind of um a lack of understanding about their body or their condition, uh, because that's not their job to know. But it is my job. And it's it's it's so wonderful when people come in and it's something simple and they think the, you know, they're gonna have to live with this forever. And you show them what's going on and you say, look, this is super common. See it all the time. Pretty straightforward. Let's get after it, let's fix it. And they, you know, a couple of sessions they're going, I can't believe that that got taken care of. I thought, you know, I thought my life was over. Um, man, it's it's just a rewarding thing to see people do this kind of 180 in terms of anxious and scared to wow, look what look what my body can overcome. I love that stuff. Um, I also love it when I see a patient achieve a long-term goal that they've worked very hard to achieve, where they've had to put in crazy amounts of effort and undergo lots of pain with exercises or manual therapy or modalities, wherever it's going to be, but they finally achieve that long-term goal. Um, man, just what a cool thing. Or you you there's times where I'll work with a patient who's had a terrible injury, and then they we finally get them back on the field or the court or the rink uh for their first game after an injury. And I will try my best often to uh to go and watch my athletes for their first game back, uh, if it's something I can do. And I will tell you guys right now that when I see what some of these athletes go through in the clinic with the pain they've been through, their injury and what they've had to work through, and they they're on the field for the first time back, or they're on the the rink for the first time, I get emotional. Uh, I really do. I remember um one hard-working hockey player had to rehab them through a terrible injury and went back. And the first time they stepped on the ice and I got them, you know, saw them skating around. Man, um, my eyes were not dry because I know how hard that that young man worked and I know the physical pain he went through and what he had to push himself through to do that. Um, you know, that that's why I do what I do, right? Uh or when a patient tells me that they're no longer fearful of doing an activity that they've been avoiding, um, that can that's the coolest thing ever. You get someone who comes to you and says, Hey, you know, last night was the first time I was able to bend over and put my kid down into bed. Um, my back's been killing me for years. Um, I couldn't get down on the floor to play with my kid. Now I can pick him up, I can put him back down on the bed when I'm putting him down for bed for the night. You help people not only get their lives back, but you're enriching their life and the life of their loved ones. Um, you can get someone who can spend more time with their kid, their kid gets more time playing with their dad or their mom. Um man, that's hard, that's hard to beat. Um or again, you know, when a patient sets a personal best for an activity or an event that is important for them, whether they're trying to be competitive for a sport or they're just competing against themselves. I never get tired of hearing a patient come in and say, Yeah, you know, um, you know, I achieved this, I did that, I've never done it before. And I was hoping to set a personal best on this activity or this event or this personal leisure activity, whatever it's gonna be. And you hear the excitement in their voice and uh you know how hard they've worked to make that happen, what they've had to overcome, that just that stuff never gets old. Uh or what else, what also doesn't get old is when a patient tells me that their mental health is improving after um reducing their pain. Uh, because men talked on a couple episodes here about um you know mental health after an injury and the anxiety that can come from that, among many other things. And I get patients telling me a lot that, hey, you know, did this activity and it was the first time I wasn't fearful. I feel like I'm kind of getting that under control again. Um that winds my clock. It really, really truly does. So if we look at the key takeaways here, we'll get ready to kind of land, land the plane. The first key takeaway is that education needs to have passion, right? Um, passion is a slow burning high octane fuel that allows many of us, physical therapists or otherwise, to do what we do. So you can be the smartest person in the world, but if if passion's not coming along for the ride, I just don't think it's the same. Uh the second key takeaway is that uh the foundation for why I do what I do, and maybe a lot of us at the end of the day, is self-discovery. Because when we help others discover what their body is capable of, then that's arguably the most rewarding aspect of my job personally. And I guess I wonder if maybe that's the same for you. Not in terms of the human body, if you're not in the healthcare professions, but when you help people discover like how you can make a difference in their life, um, that's that self-discovery, I think, is super important. Uh takeaway number three, you know, as physical therapists, we're humans, just like you. So we experience the highs and lows within our job. Uh, we celebrate uh with our patients, we mourn with them, um, and we love our jobs, but our profession and our job's not always perfect, and uh we can experience burnout because we're human, just like you. And then the fourth takeaway here is the concept of Ikigai applies to all of us, where I think it's important we align our passion, our mission, our profession, and our vocation. And if we do that, it's a great recipe to ensure fulfillment in various aspects of our lives. So, with that being said, thank you very much for staying to the end of this episode, real quick, before you take off here. Um, if you got something helpful out of this episode uh and uh and you know you found it valuable in some sort of way, uh, please consider leaving a review. That would mean the world to me. And if you feel that uh this uh content could help others and they could benefit, uh, please feel free to share this episode with them or any of these other episodes. Um I'm not looking to be famous, I'm just looking to be helpful and helping others through this stuff, you know, as you've just listened to me uh talk about, it's my passion. I am on YouTube uh and Instagram if you want to follow me for more content there. My handle for both is Strength Resurgence. I got a website, strengthresurgence.com. If you do want to read a bunch of blogs and other information I've posted there, um, you know, I'm a one-man show. I do this all uh out of a massive labor of love. So any support uh you do want to um show uh would would just mean the world to me. And that can be as simple as leaving a review. Um, or if you do want to buy me a coffee um with a small donation, uh I have a buy me a coffee account, buymeacoffee.com slash resurgence. Uh, there's some other stuff there if you want to kind of look at some other content I've made. But as it stands right now, we'll leave it at that for this episode. And as always, I'll end it like I always do. Please keep looking after yourselves, keep looking after one another, keep making great things happen, and then I'll see you in the next episode.