The Cut Flower Podcast

The Healing Power of Nature: Mental Health, Gardening, and Self-Compassion

• Roz Chandler / Dr. Menije Boduryan • Season 1 • Episode 108

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Text Agony Aunt Roz with your Cutflower Questions.

Welcome to The Cutflower Podcast!
Hi, I’m Roz Chandler, and in today’s episode, I’m joined by the inspiring Dr. Menije Boduryan, a licensed psychologist from Los Angeles. We explore the profound connection between mental health, perfectionism, and the healing power of nature and gardening.

Episode Summary

Dr. Menije shares her expertise on mental health challenges, including anxiety, perfectionism, and self-compassion, while offering actionable insights into how time spent in nature can transform our mental well-being. We discuss the therapeutic benefits of gardening, mindfulness, and redefining success in a world driven by productivity.

Key Takeaways:

  1. Nature Heals: Time spent outdoors promotes mindfulness, gratitude, and grounding.
  2. Redefine Success: Shift focus from productivity to fulfillment, connection, and joy.
  3. Self-Care is Essential: Treat self-care as a non-negotiable priority in your day.
  4. Embrace Imperfection: Failure fosters growth, empathy, and resilience.
  5. Be Kind to Yourself: Practice self-compassion and allow your best to vary daily.

Resources Mentioned:

  • Books:
    • The Power of Self-Compassion by Dr. Kristin Neff
    • The Gifts of Imperfection by Dr. Brené Brown

Connect with Dr. Menije:

Get Involved:

Did this episode resonate with you? Share your thoughts with #TheCutflowerPodcast and tag us! Let us know how gardening or nature has positively impacted your mental health.

Take one step toward self-compassion today. Whether it’s spending a few moments outdoors, journaling about your values, or embracing imperfection, every small action matters.


[00:00:00] Roz Chandler: So let me introduce my guest to you today. I'm really honoured to be joined by Dr. Menege, and I hope I pronounced that correctly who's joined us from the West Coast of America and she could tell us all about that. So I'm really honoured to have you here. Today we're going to be talking about the whole subject of mental health.

[00:00:19] Roz Chandler: And getting outside and nature and gardening, which I have an absolute passion about. I've had a read a lot about mental health and how it helps you. So I'm hoping Menije will be able to shed some light on that for us. So tell us a little about you and your practice and everything. Just tell us about yourself.

[00:00:37] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Thank you so much for having me here. First of all, it's such a wonderful chance to be speaking with you on all things mental health. And I'm a licensed psychologist, as you mentioned here in Los Angeles, California. And I work with adults individually or do couples therapy and all sorts of mental health issues including anxiety, OCD, addiction, codependency, relationship issues.

[00:01:00] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And one of my favorite topics is perfectionism, specifically overcoming perfectionism. So I'm excited to talk about some of those things. 

[00:01:09] Roz Chandler: Yeah, overcoming perfectionism is a really interesting one because I haven't, I have looked at all of those areas of mental health and my daughter's studying to be a psychotherapist.

[00:01:18] Roz Chandler: And she works with addiction. So I've anorexia in particular and adolescence. So an area I know a bit more about, and I don't really know very much about perfectionism, except I'm definitely not one of them, except I'm probably surrounded by three people in my family who definitely are.

[00:01:35] Roz Chandler: And I think a lot of that goes along with control. And I think that if you're out in the garden and you're in nature or you're doing something that is definitely not perfection and you cannot control, there is no control in nature, you can try as much as you like, but it isn't going to happen, that you will learn some lessons, definitely about perfectionism, definitely about failure.

[00:02:00] Roz Chandler: about anxiety and yeah, so tell us all about, you've got a clinic base there and you're dealing with adults and you've told us about what your practice covers. So I came across your profile when I was looking at mental health and gardening because it was about nature and about perfectionism. Tell us what your thoughts are about getting out in nature and doing a bit in the garden and how that relates to mental health.

[00:02:26] Dr. Menije Boduryan: I think there's a strong connection between nature and our mental health in the sense that nature is so grounding. I think one of the ways that I introduce nature to my clients as I work with them on anxiety, is how nature is a way for us to find a way to be centered and grounded. So to me, nature helps people practice mindfulness and helps them be in the present moment because what happens often that deteriorates or deteriorates worsens our mental health is our tendency to live in the past or over worry over plan for the future.

[00:03:05] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And that's again, how perfectionism sometimes come into the play is we think that if we just do things perfectly, as you mentioned, we may have this false belief that we can control the outcome. And along with that, if we falsely think, if we do things perfectly, maybe we can prevent something bad from happening, or if we do things perfectly, we can feel a sense of safety, security, a sense of confidence.

[00:03:29] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And nature, I think, is a wonderful way of telling us or reminding us that we have to be where our feet are. You have to be present. In the work you're doing in the nature and in the gardening. And it's such a great way of, again, finding a way for you to ground yourself and center yourself.

[00:03:47] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And I think that's just, this is one of the best way you can do that for your mental health. 

[00:03:51] Roz Chandler: Yeah, I absolutely agree. If I get stressed during the day, and sometimes, yeah, I have an awful lot on, and I have all these to do lists, and I'm not gonna do anything, I'm not a perfectionist, but I, and even in that state, like today, I suppose I got to about three o'clock, I thought, I'm just going to take the dog for a walk.

[00:04:05] Roz Chandler: I do not have time, but I'm going to do it. And I'm just gonna go out there in the simple, in the leaves, and the freezing cold, and I'm going to just absorb everything there is. And you come back half an hour later thinking, I'm glad I did that. Why don't I do that more often? But sometimes we have to force ourselves out to do something.

[00:04:24] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Yes. It becomes quite easy, sadly, to delay things that are good for us. And I think somehow over the years, and I'm sure there's so much unpacked there, how much of it is society, how much of it is our own doing, where we come to believe that things like this can wait. That it's more important for me to stay at home and cross something off my to do list cook, cook dinner or do the laundry or get back to an email is more quote unquote important than me going for a walk, me stepping outside and getting some fresh air, me watering my plants, we, again, I always, explain it like we have attached value to things.

[00:05:08] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And we overvalue importance of completing tasks and we undervalue the importance of doing these self care activities, these coping activities. That are actually rejuvenate us. And again the kind of the trick here is actually, if you go ahead and make these things a priority and again, change the value attached to them and remind yourself that going for a walk with my dog or by myself, or going for a walk and calling a friend.

[00:05:37] Dr. Menije Boduryan: is as is important or more important and it will actually rejuvenate me and I will come back to the task I want to do with much more mental kind of clarity because a lot of times what happens is we have mental fatigue as the day goes on. We get more exhausted so we forget that these things that we think can wait will actually rejuvenate us, refresh us and we will actually do the task With so much more energy.

[00:06:05] Roz Chandler: I wonder how do we get that self care on the top of our list? Obviously that's what you're very good at is getting people to put it at the top of their list and making it a priority, but so much in our world doesn't do that. It makes it, we do have massive to do lists and we've got systems and we've now got online models where we can put all our tasks in and we can cross them off and we can become really important.

[00:06:28] Roz Chandler: And somewhere down there, for me particularly to have taken a dog for a walk sort of seven hours after I should have done, the poor dog was waiting all day. It's not good. So it's how you turn that upside down and go, okay the first priority in my day is to do this. And how you do that without, and it isn't the first thing isn't to pick up your mobile phone.

[00:06:48] Roz Chandler: That's another thing we're very bad at is our society is picking up and looking at before we've even got out of bed. We're creating our to do lists and we're responding to emails and we're looking at how many new Instagram followers we've got and we haven't even moved yet. So it's, I don't know how you would what would be the simple steps to turn that on its head.

[00:07:07] Dr. Menije Boduryan: There are really two good ideas that I would like to at least introduce. One is, as I just described it, looking at our thoughts around it, because one of the modality I, I utilize in my therapy is cognitive behavioral therapy. So short, it's called CBT and cognitive behavioral therapy looks at the way we're thinking about things.

[00:07:26] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Cause it affects the choices we make, right? Like the way I think it impacts the actions I will take. So again, I think we have to really take a look at our thoughts and our And start to challenge and ultimately rewrite them, re reframe them to say going for a dog, going for a walk with my dog is important and good for me because in the opposite, people do carry thoughts and beliefs that say self care is selfish.

[00:07:55] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Self care can wait. Self care is not important. I need to be productive. That's more important. Even worse. I work with people who have the following belief. My worth is based on my productivity. So the more productive I am more worthy. I am more productive. I am. I am more, more successful, more productive.

[00:08:18] Dr. Menije Boduryan: I am. I am more worthy. I am more lovable. I am good. Only if I'm productive. And then if that's your belief, look at what we define as productivity is all the tasks, all the errands. We don't say going for a walk meets that productivity definition. So again, long story short, I would first encourage people to really.

[00:08:40] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Acknowledge how did he really think about these self care activities? Because if you don't change the way you think about them, they're never going to change the way you prioritize them. And my other favorite tool is this idea of making decisions based on our values, not our fears. So for example, if I'm afraid of falling behind, if I'm afraid of not being successful, then I would make sure that my tasks are my number one thing to do.

[00:09:08] Dr. Menije Boduryan: In the morning or throughout my day. So again, that's what like fear driven decisions are. Fear based decisions are versus value based decisions. Value driven decisions are looking at the values in my life. I value connection. I value a relationship with my friend or my pet, or I value relationship with my body.

[00:09:27] Dr. Menije Boduryan: So I'm going to make sure I don't skip lunch or I don't just make something fast or whatever that fast might be. Okay. So I can get back to work. So I would encourage people to really revisit what their values are in life and make sure that they're making decisions that align with those values, not with their fears.

[00:09:49] Roz Chandler: That's really interesting. Yeah. I think predominantly people make judgments based on their fears. And I will be successful if I do all these tasks and then that goes back to what does success look like. Is success a garden full of beautiful flowers and walking down the path and smelling them and taking time and picking them and giving them to friends and enjoying that part of the day?

[00:10:10] Roz Chandler: Or is success ticking off something else that's on your to do list that allows you to perhaps make another little bit of money? Which one is it? Is it about living a simpler life, which is quite interesting subject. But, oh, I find the whole thing really, because a lot of it obviously comes from our childhood and the way we've been conditioned and my, our script, our childhood script, I think they call it.

[00:10:31] Roz Chandler: And just find the whole thing Amazing. And I think in the soil, there's, there is a bacteria or something in soil, which helps the endorphins and helps you actually, it is proven. It actually does work. It's not even a myth that having your hands in soils is a good idea. Having your hands in soil is a really good idea.

[00:10:50] Roz Chandler: And so I would encourage everybody to just go outside and put their hands in soil. And I did read an article that the happiest people on this planet were gardeners and florists. And if you put the two together, which is what a flower farmer does, if you put the florist and the farmer together, you have the happiest person on this planet, because actually they are outdoors and they are creating something beautiful and they are gifting beautiful flowers, which people often cry at, if you do a wedding and people are crying at it.

[00:11:20] Roz Chandler: So there's a great amount of joy in that. Taking that one step further, growing as well as an achievement in itself. If you take a seed and you get a flower and you cut it and you bring it indoors, you've achieved something amazing. 

[00:11:31] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And I think what, when you were just talking about this idea of how do we define success?

[00:11:38] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Could we also, again, give value to doing things out in nature and therefore remembering that is also another way you can be successful. It also makes me think of the word feeling fulfilled. I think that we have to really ask ourselves, what can I do today that will help me like fill up my cup?

[00:12:01] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Will feed my soul. And I think nature does that. And I think there's something about nature that's again, nonjudgmental. There's something about nature that is like I was saying earlier in the present moment, nature doesn't live in the past. Nature does not live in the future. Nature is here. And now the way the wind move the tree branches and the sound of the wind or the way the sun feels or the sound of the raindrops.

[00:12:28] Dr. Menije Boduryan: It's all in the present moment. And so I agree with you. I think nature is very fulfilling. It feeds the soul. And you mentioned it feeds the soul because it makes us feel like we accomplish something maybe beautiful too, because when something grows, it grows to something quite magnificent, that it's beautiful.

[00:12:46] Dr. Menije Boduryan: It's not beautiful in an attractive, societal, pretty kind of way. It's beautiful in a. I think in a very majestic kind of way I think it's just wonderful. Life is wonderful. 

[00:12:56] Roz Chandler: Yeah, I think absolutely. I wonder I've always said it'd be lovely if we could get gardening on the NHS in the United Kingdom.

[00:13:03] Roz Chandler: So you go to your doctor and you've got anxiety, for instance, and they might give you antidepressants. It would be a better idea if they said, the best thing you could do is go outside in your garden, stand there for 15 minutes every day and see what happens. So I think there's a lot of work being done on that.

[00:13:19] Roz Chandler: And I think, there's a lot of publications coming out on it. And I'm really intrigued by that whole mental health and outside and nature and the connection between the two. I think there's still a lot of work to do there, but I think we're definitely moving in the right direction. 

[00:13:36] Dr. Menije Boduryan: What's so interesting and such a fun coincidence because we're here, we are talking today, and I heard of this yesterday and in the radio that they did a study in Poland.

[00:13:48] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And they wanted to see how walking in winter wonderland would affect people's, self esteem because they were looking at how there's already enough research to show how walking in green spaces like parks or forest is positive and what they call blue area like lakes and river and, the beach.

[00:14:08] Dr. Menije Boduryan: We know those are all, um, boosting positive mood and helping people feel better. So they looked at what they called winter spaces, like snowy areas. And what was interesting is just like again, green and blue, the white spaces had a very positive impact on self esteem. And they saw that people, and I think they did, I, again, to be to be clear, it was a group of participants who were all female.

[00:14:34] Dr. Menije Boduryan: So I'm sure there's more to be done to generalize this results, but they had about 100 women walk in this snowy area and they found that at the end. of the 40 minute walk, there was an improvement in their self esteem, improvement in like their confidence and part of that they believe had to do with it shifted their attention from how my body looks to how my body's moving, and there isn't they ended up having an appreciation for their body's functionality.

[00:15:04] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Which is, I think again, nature helps us with gratitude as well. Nature doesn't just help us get grounded in our breath and where our feet are. I think we end up also walking away, like you were saying, proud to have grown tree or a rosebush. It's also like that sense of like appreciation for our bodies' capabilities and for bodies, abilities.

[00:15:29] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Whatever part of your body you might be using for your activity, I thought was super interesting that they got these very positive results that proves nature's good for us. 

[00:15:41] Roz Chandler: Yeah, definitely. Definitely. I've, there's a book written quite recently called The Well Gardened Mind, it's called, by a lady called Sue Stuart Smith, who was, I think, in the, I think she was in medicine, I think she was a doctor, and then she converted to being a psychologist.

[00:15:59] Roz Chandler: And she's written the World Garden Mind to her great belief and I've spoken to her and she said there were people in World War II and World War I in the trenches in Europe who were growing flowers in the trenches, which I find like what they were there that long and they were growing, and they were there long enough for the plants to grow and that gave help their mental health and it was just so staggering that Even, then in those conditions awful conditions.

[00:16:26] Roz Chandler: People were growing something to get some pleasure out of it, and it's, yeah, it was quite startling. 

[00:16:33] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And I wonder, in a state of war, which is quite obviously a severe state of being, I wonder, nature and planting and growing gives us a sense of hope that things can get better than what it might be in that moment for a soldier.

[00:16:53] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Or a person who is in, as we know, what's happening in the Ukraine, like for a person who is, whose country is in a state of war, I can't imagine that again, gardening and nature gives us. It's a sense of hope that things can change. 

[00:17:09] Roz Chandler: The future, isn't it? Is what's next year. You're always planning.

[00:17:11] Roz Chandler: It's almost like a fashion designer being in nature, certainly for us as flower farmers because we always plan in advance. So we are growing now in the hope in the, we're growing hardy annuals or we might be doing ranunculus in the hope that come next year. Spring, we are going to be, we're going to be rewarded with beautiful blooms.

[00:17:29] Roz Chandler: We haven't got them today. We have to wait. That's another lesson. And we have to hope another lesson and some will fail. So there's another lesson and it is that whole perfectionist thing is quite interesting because. In some of my free Facebook groups, they'll come on and they'll be devastated that something hasn't worked.

[00:17:47] Roz Chandler: They'll be like, I planted all those Lysianthus rose and only 2 percent pass and I'm, what did I do wrong? What did I do wrong? And you say, you didn't do anything wrong. Nature decided at that point in time that they're not ready to grow, and it's so I think so many parallels and so many lessons for us all to learn And there's a big thing.

[00:18:06] Roz Chandler: Mental health, you must have seen mental health issues increasing. They're not decreasing, they're increasing. And our society is producing more people with mental health, certainly adolescents and going into early adulthood. We see massive rise in mental health. And so there must be other answers.

[00:18:26] Roz Chandler: There must be other ways that we can work with our own mental health. 

[00:18:30] Dr. Menije Boduryan: I definitely resonate with this idea of failure and how nature can help us cope with it because bringing into that perfectionism is about pursuit of doing things perfectly, which means to avoid at all costs or prevent in any way you think you could.

[00:18:50] Dr. Menije Boduryan: any future failure and it's obviously a fail like it's a vicious cycle it's very debilitating because you're going to fail no matter what you do no matter who you are and that there that everybody fails in any way every day so you're right i think nature can help us understand that failure Is part of the journey.

[00:19:11] Dr. Menije Boduryan: I know that sounds so cliche, but it does help us understand that's part of the journey, part of the process. And we all know the truth here that if everything I did turn out exactly how I wanted it, I would become less appreciative of the results. So the truth is that we do appreciate and feel a sense of pride or joy after having failed a test.

[00:19:40] Dr. Menije Boduryan: It has to stink a little bit in order for it to feel good when it works out. 

[00:19:46] Roz Chandler: Yeah. Yeah. If every single seed you sowed came to fruition and everything came to a flourish, it would be pretty boring, to be honest, because there wouldn't be anything to learn. There would be nothing around what if you perhaps if you'd watered a bit more or you've done this next time I'm going to do this, there'd be no learnings at all.

[00:20:04] Roz Chandler: And there'd be no, yeah, it would be, it wouldn't be a challenge. It would be boring. 

[00:20:08] Dr. Menije Boduryan: It would be. And I often tell my clients, at some point in therapy, I, one of the exercises I ask them to do is. Really journal about benefits of failure. And that's how I title it. I want you to look for benefits of failure, not just like the pain or the disappointment of failure.

[00:20:27] Dr. Menije Boduryan: What are some of the benefits? And the truth is we are absolutely more empathetic because of our past failures, because we understand how it feels when something doesn't turn out the way you want. And we become, as you mentioned, better problem solvers because we become better critical thinkers.

[00:20:44] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And we also have a little bit, maybe, opposite of boredom, we have a little bit of a drive. We have a little bit of that motivation because We're hungry for positive results because we haven't had them for a little while. So we're like, I'm actually motivated. But like you said, if everything I want turned out exactly how I wanted it, like eventually I get complacent, I get bored, I get indifferent about life, about relationships, about myself.

[00:21:12] Dr. Menije Boduryan: So again, sometimes failure is a wake up call to recharge you and get you back into what, why am I passionate about this? Why? I'm sure for those people you just described. When something they plant doesn't turn out, it's a great reminder of like, why am I doing this again? Can I come back to my true reason and passion so that I can come back to it from that authentic place of, it's not about what grows and what doesn't grow.

[00:21:38] Dr. Menije Boduryan: It's about maybe the time I spend in nature. It's the time I spend in my garden. 

[00:21:43] Roz Chandler: I think that's what you need to assess your why. Let's move on to the lovely topic of imposter syndrome, which is another thing that people, I have I'm running a business group at the moment called Blooming Business.

[00:21:54] Roz Chandler: And I have actually some from, some members are from the US and some from the UK and it's cross border. The number one issue I face, I'm trying to teach them about business and how to have a profitable flower farm and so on. And I can tell them all the marketing and I can tell them all the, Websites and SEO and all the things they have to do.

[00:22:14] Roz Chandler: But the one, one thing that always boils down to is they all think they can't do it. They have imposter syndrome. Definitely. They have a confidence issue. Definitely. And I think because they are career changes in the main, so they might be 40, 50, so they've had a career doing something completely different and now they've decided they're going to be a flower farmer.

[00:22:37] Roz Chandler: Yeah. It really is challenging about why they don't believe in themselves. And I find that interesting. I spent a lot of my time, I sent them a postcard this week saying, you are enough. You are enough because I'm doing a business course here and we're talking marketing and I'm being all serious and this is how you have to do it.

[00:22:56] Roz Chandler: But actually, fundamentally, they work, unless they overcome this, can I, can't I? They won't really ever have a successful business and it's quite difficult and challenging for me because I'm not trained and I understand that they can't, they really believe they can't. 

[00:23:14] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Yes. It's very interesting this negative beliefs we have that we are not worthy of our dreams and that we don't have what it takes to pursue our dreams or make that dream into a reality.

[00:23:30] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And one of the things I've heard in a podcast a few months ago that really resonated with me. And it said, we all have dark corners in our mind. So I think we have to come to terms with that inner critic, that negative voice that will say you look foolish doing this, or you're too young.

[00:23:49] Dr. Menije Boduryan: You're too old. Nobody will take you seriously. And ultimately, you're not good enough. You're not smart enough. You're not funny enough. You're not creative enough. You're not good with words, whatever the, again the critic is saying, I feel like sometimes we just have to like, know that they exist, but don't believe in every word.

[00:24:07] Dr. Menije Boduryan: That are inner critic says I don't, I'm afraid the end result or the solution can never be to make those things disappear. I think we all going to have those dark corners in our mind. I often encourage my clients and if this resonates with them, I tend to play on it and say, the goal is to make sure that dark corner doesn't become the whole space in your mind.

[00:24:30] Dr. Menije Boduryan: That it doesn't become like every corner in your house, in your mind is dark and negative and unloving and unkind and mean to you. My goal in therapy is to shrink that into a corner that yes and the other thing I often tell my clients that there are going to be things happen in my life that will take me to that dark corner.

[00:24:49] Dr. Menije Boduryan: For example, a rejection, I apply for a job, I get rejected that will take me to my dark corner, or I miscarry. Or I get into a car accident and, put myself in a financial distress. So we have to accept that there are going to be life stressors that will take us to those dark corners.

[00:25:07] Dr. Menije Boduryan: For example, you, I know this is a little simple. But speaking of marketing and social media presence, you post something, you think it's going to go great because you spent so many times creating it on Canva, and then it gets dead silence, right? Or five people love it and those are your best friends.

[00:25:25] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And then you think, again, that will be a stressor. Or you put out a blog or you put out a offer online with the holidays, right? and nobody buys it. Whatever it might be that fail or failed attempt or rejection is, that will take us to our dark corners in our mind. And it's our self compassion is a way to get out of that dark corner.

[00:25:46] Roz Chandler: So it's learning self compassion. Yes. Reminding ourselves. We all need to come into therapy. 

[00:25:52] Dr. Menije Boduryan: I, I would say so, but I know I'm biased. And to me, self compassion, speaking of reminding ourselves we're good enough, like to me, genuinely, self compassion is reminding myself that my best is going to change, but for the moment, this is my best and that's good enough.

[00:26:09] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And I know you know this. And so this idea that like our best changes and that's where I feel like perfectionism really comes into place where people falsely believe they must have the same mood, same high mood or positive mood every day. They must have the same high energy every day. They must have the same concentration attention span every day.

[00:26:30] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And there's no room for fluctuation. Can I have an anxious day? Can I have a down day where I don't feel like doing this blog or this post or this. Lie. So I think part of self compassion is accepting that we fluctuate. Okay. Our mood, our energy level, our attention span fluctuates and give ourselves that kindness that we're really doing the best we can today with where we are.

[00:26:55] Roz Chandler: We're just not very kind to ourselves. We're really not. We're just not kind. There must be animals in the kingdom which are much kinder to each other than we are. And if we just studied that for a while, it would be very interesting. No, we're quite horrid to ourselves, actually. 

[00:27:10] Dr. Menije Boduryan: No, it is. It is.

[00:27:11] Dr. Menije Boduryan: I have to admit there's a wonderful book I have not read yet. I have a copy of it. So I try to be very honest, like the books I have not read yet. Again, that's my imperfection. And the title of the book is Why Zebras Don't Have Ulcers. So there's interesting studies that show animals do not stress as much as we do.

[00:27:31] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And why is that? And often it comes back to they live in the present moment. They are right here and there. They don't live in the past or the future like we do. So 

[00:27:42] Roz Chandler: That brings me on to my next question. What is your favorite book? 

[00:27:46] Dr. Menije Boduryan: So it's funny cause I think this is going to be such a compliment to what we're just talking about.

[00:27:50] Dr. Menije Boduryan: So I do have two favorite books. One is what we just talked about, self compassion Kristen Neff, who is a researcher in Texas in the States, and she is an expert on self compassion. Her book called The Power of Self Compassion is, And must read that walks us through how to be kind towards ourselves, meet ourselves where we are.

[00:28:11] Dr. Menije Boduryan: And the second book that I have to mention, cause obviously. It was a book that taught me about my struggle with perfectionism and it was by Dr. Brena Brown, The Gift of Imperfection.

[00:28:24] Roz Chandler: Okay, I've made a list of both of those and my daughter hopefully won't be listening to this podcast. It'll be on her Christmas list. But the power of self compassion, maybe I'll read them first and then I'll I'll hand them over. Yeah, it's interesting where they end up, but once you, if you're struggling with perfectionism the gift of imperfection would be lovely.

[00:28:45] Roz Chandler: Oh, they're brilliant. Any advice you can give our listeners before I let you go to carry on your day, your morning and my evening? 

[00:28:53] Dr. Menije Boduryan: When you when people listen to this podcast, they can do something one thing kind to themselves that I would like to leave them with. Be nice towards yourself. You're doing the best you can and you deserve the love, the affection you give to others.

[00:29:10] Dr. Menije Boduryan: So freely to give it to yourself. 

[00:29:13] Roz Chandler: I want to thank you for joining me all of your your social media channels and your YouTube channels will all be in the show notes. Cause I know you've got a YouTube channel, which I actually found you on and went to have a look around, which is why I asked you to be my guest today.

[00:29:26] Roz Chandler: So all of those will be here. So people will know how to find you. And I hope we keep in touch and we keep talking about the way forward, but that would be brilliant. I want to thank you for joining me today. 

[00:29:37] Dr. Menije Boduryan: Thank you so much for having me here. I enjoyed it so much. 

[00:29:40] Roz Chandler: Thank you.