It’s hard to lead when you have your head down all the time.

When I worked full-time as a family physician, I had a mentor who I really admired. He was very busy, but he always seemed to have plenty of time. He saw more patients than I did, yet he pursued a number of hobbies and interests with the enthusiasm of an excitable child.

He always had time to answer my questions, from “How long will it take to get a Hepatitis panel back?” to “How do you get it all done so easily?”

I was totally overwhelmed with work, with charts, with phone calls, and I was trying to figure out how to get it all done without feeling exhausted all the time.

When I found out my mentor only slept about 5 hours a night, I actually felt a little better. I thought, Well, that ain’t me! I needed my eight hours, at least on the nights I wasn’t on call.

It took me years to stop asking myself (and others, like my poor husband): “Why can’t I do this without feeling exhausted?”

The truth was, I couldn’t. I wanted to take care of every patient as I would want my loved one to be cared for. So I did. Until I couldn’t anymore. Then I started working part-time. My joy in my work went way up. My quality of life improved. I started to pick my head up and look around.

My problem was never that I didn’t enjoy my patients, my problem was that I felt the urgency of each and every one of my patient’s problems—to the point of exhaustion.

Hey, maybe I could do this differently, I thought. I had ideas for improvement at home and at work.

I educated the nurses I worked with so we could work together more effectively. I learned to use the EMR more efficiently. I taught my stepchildren some life coaching tools I had found helpful. I started researching patient education worksheets for my patients.

I learned that I was a leader–at work and at home–I’d just been too busy and too overwhelmed to lead.

In the Native American tradition, they tell the story of Jumping Mouse (stay with me here, I’m coming back around!) In it, the way a mouse sees and the way an eagle sees is described.

Mouse sees only what is right in front of him: task after task. Eagle sees everything from a distance. In order to be a leader, we need to use both ways of seeing.

When I looked at my life with Eagle vision, I realized I was putting my work before my home life—and, I didn’t want to compromise the care I gave my patients. My solution was to see fewer patients, whom I continued to care for in my detail-oriented, Mouse vision way.

I know you know how to use Mouse vision. What do you see when you look at your life with Eagle vision?

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