Live your Best Life at any Age with Clinical Psychologist, Andrew Fuller

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June 29, 2021 - Episode #70 - Live your Best Life at any Age with Clinical Psychologist, Andrew Fuller
Losing my mom was a major turning point in my life.  It really made me evaluate how I was living my life.  It is one of the reasons why I do what I do today as a health coach.  I know that life is short so I truly want to live life to the fullest and have nothing holding me back!!

So, I was thrilled to do this interview with Andrew Fuller, a clinical psychologist. His newest book is Your Best Life at Any Age.  This is an encouraging discussion about realizing what stage of life you are in so that you can make little tweaks, small changes to shift your mindset, improve your relationships and take control of your health.  It’s all about resiliency! 

Andrew Fuller is a Clinical Psychologist in Australia and has been described as someone who “puts the heart back into psychology”. He specializes in the wellbeing of young people and their families. He is a Fellow of the Department of Psychiatry and the Department of Learning and Educational Development at the University of Melbourne. For his latest book, YOUR BEST LIFE AT ANY AGE: How to Acknowledge Your Past, Revive Your Present & Realise Your Future,  Andrew interviewed more 500,000 people to trace the most commonly identifiable stages of life.  Drawing upon his years of practical experience and the combined wisdom of the thousands of life patterns he’s studied, Andrew has created a blueprint for life that can help us all make the most of it at any age. Knowing the common pitfalls and traps one can fall into at a certain age can illuminate your thinking and lead you to a future you may have never envisioned for yourself.

Be sure and join our FB group - Functional Medicine for Weight Loss - Body, Mind and Soul Wellness for Women.  https://bit.ly/FMwomenswellness to access the incredible handout that Andrew Fuller has provided just for us!

​PS.  And thank you for leaving a 5 star rating and written review for the Healthy Harmony podcast! It helps so much for visibility. I appreciate you!!
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FULL TRANSCRIPT

June 29, 2021 - Episode #70 - Live your Best Life at any Age with Clinical Psychologist, Andrew Fuller

Speaker 1:
Losing my mom was a major turning point in my life. It really made me evaluate how I was living my life. It's one of the reasons why I do what I do today as a health coach, and I truly want to live my life to the fullest. So I was so thrilled to find this guest and do an interview for you guys. He is an absolutely amazing guest. Andrew Fuller is a clinical psychologist and his newest book is Your Best Life at any Age. So what you will hear is a wonderful, encouraging discussion about realizing what stage of life you're in. So you can make little tweaks, small changes to shift your mindset, improve your relationships, and take control of your health. It's all about resiliency. You're going to love this today on healthy harmony.
 
Hey there. Welcome to the healthy harmony podcast. I'm Jennifer Pickett, your host, your health coach, your friend. If you're ready to tap into the healthiest version of you so you can live life with confidence and intentional harmony. Then my friend you're in the right place. As a Dietitian turned Functional Medicine Health Coach. I'm here to walk beside you and show you how to take control of your complete health body, mind, and soul. I want you to live a life. You not only love, but a life where you're truly thriving. This podcast is real. Talk about real life, simple, realistic strategies that will leave you feeling empowered. As we dive into physical health, mental, emotional health, and spiritual health, because addressing these areas equals intentional harmony, AKA happiness, fulfillment, and confidence. Let's do this.
 
Before we dig into this awesome interview, will you please do me a big favor? Will you please leave a five-star rating and a written review on the platform where you could listen to this podcast? Okay. So it makes a big difference with the algorithm and the visibility. So that helps tremendously. Here's a recent review from listener Kim. Hey, she said love inspire healthy harmony. It is a great podcast and has great content. Love, love, love. Thank you, Kim. So y'all follow Kim’s lead and leave a rating and review. Now let's get started with today's show.
 
Andrew Fuller has recently described, been described as someone who puts the heart back into psychology as a clinical psychologist, Andrew Fuller works with many different schools and communities in Australia and internationally. And he specializes in the wellbeing of young people and their families. He is a fellow of the department of psychiatry and the department of learning and educational development at the University of Melbourne. Andrew Fuller has a new book, Your Best Life at any Age, how to Acknowledge your Past, Revive your Present and Realize your Future.  For this book. Andrew interviewed more than 500,000 people to trace the most commonly identifiable stages of life. He drew upon his years of practical experience and the combined wisdom of those thousands of life patterns that he studied. Andrew created a blueprint for life. They can help us all make the most of it at any age. He says that knowing the common pitfalls and traps that wine can fall into at certain age, can aluminate your thinking and lead you to a future. You may have never envisioned for yourself. I am honored to have Andrew Fuller clinical psychologist here with me today and he is joining. This is Texas joins Australia today on the Healthy Harmony podcast. So Andrew Fuller. Welcome. How are you today?
 
Speaker 2:
Hello..Australian accent? Yes?
 
Speaker 1:
Please, please.
 
Speaker 2:
Oh, it's great to be with you, Jennifer and everyone.
 
Speaker 1:
So glad you're here. Okay. You have a brand new book, your best life at any age, how to acknowledge your past, revive your present and realize your future. Here's what got my attention about this book. You interviewed over 500,000 people to trace the most commonly identifiable stages of life. So how in the world did you set out to interview half a million people? What did that look like?
 
Speaker 2:
It was quite easy in some ways. So let me, let me explain the background. I started out my career in psychiatric crisis teams where I'd be on bridges with people who were looking rather too intently for my liking at the bottom of the bridge. And I was very fortunate. Nobody ever did anything to harm themselves, but it made me fascinated and Hey, stop people getting into that part of their lives or that crisis point. And that then led me to really research resilience of course, and basically become well, very fortunate enough to run workshops right around the world in terms of that area. And when you run workshops on resilience, people are very kind and they do things for you. They're one of the things that they do for you is they met their lives and there's many stories about their lives. And ultimately of course, that became 500,000 people. Who've done this sort of process. And so I was able to start to gather it together in some sort of coherent way in a book called your best life at any age. So that's, that's the story.
 
Speaker 1:
It that's amazing. And you know, you used one of my absolute favorite words and that word is resilience. It's not that we can avoid the stress, the overwhelm, the anxiety, the bad things that happen, but how can we come back from that? And that's why I just, I love that word resilience at that thing. You use that word on your website and in other teachings. And so I think that word is just absolutely pivotal. So as you interviewed all these people, were there any surprising discoveries? What stood out to you?
 
Speaker 2:
So Jennifer ended up from that, from that kind of moment of being on bridges and so on really trying to have a mission of creating futures with people that they can fall in love with. And that was what I was thinking about. So I then defined resilience as the happy neck of being able to bungee jump to the pitfalls of life. It's almost as if you've got this lesser size rope around you, that draws you back after times of difficulty and hardship. So, so essentially looking at life mapping, the first thing of course, that we started to discover, which I hadn't really thought about at all, was that families have time bombs. What happens when you're lying in that crib or that bassinet all that caught looking so cute and adorable. You're not just gurgling away. You're actually being a very obstructed observer of life.
 
And one of the things that we all observe as babies is ages, and what age do you do particular things. And while, because of course at that stage you're pre-verbal, so you're not kind of really processing it, but you absorb it nevertheless. And so, as we looked at people's lives and then looked at their parents' lives, we'd often find that there were key ages in any family and they were implicit. They were basically, this is the age in this family where you leave home or you get married or you have children or you split up or where you basically get old or frail or retire. And so every family, I think that I've ever encountered has these little hidden time bombs. Now they can be good, but they can also be disastrous. And so one of the things that's useful is to start to uncover those patterns in families.
 
Speaker 1:
That's so interesting. Those time, those, those time bombs, right? It just said those different, I mean, that's very fascinating to me. So your was to understand just how people deal with that passage of time. And you're right. We're all kind of stuck in that, in that time to understand the stages of life. And you've said before, because you've discovered that understanding what stage one is in will lead them to making changes. They can improve our relationships, create better health and develop a more resilient mindset. And that is so fascinating to me. So tell me just, let's just go a little bit more in depth to that.
 
Speaker 2:
Sure. would you be, would you like to, we could be in with Jennifer. So
 
Speaker 1:
I think let's start with the create better health
 
Speaker 2:
So basically life is an improvisational art, and so essentially life throws up at you, different challenges at different times of life. Now, humans have been doing this thing called human life for a long time now. And so there are some set patterns they're not set in concrete, but we know that basically the things that you need to do to advance your wellbeing and your health at various stages differs. And so one of the classic errors, I think that minister, the people that I've worked with have made is to assume that the life in the future will be pretty much what life is like now, and that's not true. And so unless you actually put in some planning to think about how to maintain, sustain, or even increase your health, you tend to let it slide a bit. And so thinking about the sorts of exercise, the sorts of activities that engage you say as a 16 year old should be very different than those that engage a 46 year old or a 66 year old.
 
And so it just starting to be to some extent, mindful of what phase of life you're in, because otherwise you can sort of start acting like a teenager with do yourself an awful lot of damage. And that would be that's silly because you then have as just a setback and you can't do anything. And so you really got to shape roots. So, you know, for example, we know that in a more senior years of life, having certainly vigorous walking is incredibly valuable, but we also know that some minimal weight work makes a gigantic difference. And of course, if you've got access to a suite that's incredible, but also the social connections that go along with those things are also just as important. And so trying to put those key bits into place. So, you know, you don't want to be on a skate park when you're 60.
 
Speaker 1:
Yes. Yes. And I think, you know, what I'm, what I'm thinking of is we just kind of get stuck in that complacency that we end assuming, as you said, that life in the future will be, we'll be just like life as it is right now, unless we do something and it's that doing something where we get stuck. So how do we get unstuck if we're, if we're experiencing these different challenges, how can we get unstuck? So that life in the future can look different Kind of way.
 
Speaker 2:
It requires us to look into the past first. I think there's a great value in mapping your life. And basically going back and in the book, I talk about this a lot, but it's very simple process. Really what you do is you draw a graph of a vertical excesses, sort of tens your highest well-being and zeros, your least time of wellbeing. And we've all had probably a time of zero, even though we don't admit it. So it's relative to you. And then across the years you start to map, well, when were the times when I was really looking after myself and when were the times when I didn't, and of course we've all had times when we didn't that's okay, this is part of humanity, really. And so it's not about kicking yourself about those times. It's about going, okay, well, what have I notice about this path?
 
And then you might want to look at your family's past. And I go, well, when did people in my family typically stop taking care of themselves? Now, one of the things that we know is that when we have tough times, when we have traumatic times, we tend to store it in our bodies. And we often, often when people look back and they go, well, I've gained a whole lot of weight around that time, or I became incredibly unfit around that time. And then when we uncover it in my, in my therapeutic work, we often uncover that basically that was a time of great emotional difficulty for people. And so at least you can kind of clear that time. It's hard to get a kickstart into your future. So in a way, sitting back and taking stock of yourself, not in a kind of looking in the mirror and sign, but in a way of thinking about your life and what the patterns have been is helpful, because that then allows you to step forward into the future and create a well-being plan for yourself.
 
Speaker 1:
Oh, yes. I love that. And it's something that that's, that I'm doing daily with my coaching clients is can we develop that mindfulness? Okay, where am I at? What's my pattern. What's my family's pattern. What bad habits have I fallen into and taking into account the challenges that we've had in life and looking at what that's done to the body. And so often I will ask a client, okay. Was there a time that you had a really good morning routine? What did that look like? But most importantly, what did that feel like? And can we go back to how that felt and how it made your day start very positively? You felt stronger, you felt more confident that you are moving forward on your health journey just by starting off your morning strong. So I think that that mindfulness of looking at where we're at and what is influencing our life really helps us to be more intentional about our future. And that's what it sounds like. That's what you're talking about here is how can we be more intentional and, and create more resilient future? Yes,
 
Speaker 2:
That's right. So that basically, you know, I think we're all a bit like plants. So if you've ever been to a garden nursery and bought a plant, it's probably like that, that came with it sort of some instructions. If you plant this plant in the shade and give lots of water, it will flourish. And it specified the optimal growing conditions for that plant. Now we're like that plant, we all have optimal growing conditions and it's worth taking some time to think about what they may look like for you because they differ so well. What, what worked for me won't necessarily work for anybody else it's worth thinking about what stage of life and what are the processes, but what are also the lessons from your past about what those optimal growing conditions might look like now, we all have blockages. And so it's interesting how, while we can have the best of intentions, quite often, it's difficult to follow through.
 
And that's the thing perhaps that we need to become a bit aware of, not blaming ourselves about, but essentially just aware that there are patterns in life. There are times when we drop the ball and give up to other things and get too busy and all we all are at risk of that front jobs done, but we need to then be mindful of those or aware of those. So we can then go, okay. Yes, that distracts me. And my family basically had a pattern where they all got tired and exhausted at 42 and, you know, whatever it might be. And so you're starting then to kind of just embrace your life as it is, and then go, okay, what's, what's down the track. What do I want to look at? And so one of the values of your best life at any age is that it's almost like being able to look around the corner into the future, because I think it's very helpful to see how many people have managed different stages of their lives.
 
And so in the book, and I didn't start out with this theory, but I basically, as I'm, as I looked at 500,000 life maps, it fell roughly into about a seven year cycle of life. That about every seven years, you get a chance to reorient re reconsider your life in a very powerful way. And so often the turning points that occurred for people in their lives, there's roughly, I mean, people are just, they have individual individual lives, but roughly about every seven years. And so, while we're not trapped into waiting for another six years before you can change anything, it does mean that that seven years cycle typically requires you to think about particular things and emphasizing for your wellbeing. And so, for example, if we take the time between, I'm sure, Jennifer, this is nowhere near your current age, say, say 49 to 56, which is a time of turmoil in many people's lives, where they have to reinvent who they really are. And partly it's, it's an inward journey. So it's thinking about basically, who do I want to be? What are the values that I represent, but it's then also about creativity. And so it's not just about slogging it out in a sort of, you know, just exercising for your own sake and thinking, how do I embrace some creative pursuit that relates to some physical activity as well. So just being aware of what those stages are, makes drag any difference.
 
Speaker 1:
It really, really does. And I think it's just being self-aware and reflecting on your life, reflecting on your family and your, your tendencies again, that mindfulness is so powerful. You said so many wonderful things there. The internal battle really stood out to me that you said that most of us an internal battle occurs right. In, you know, right around our fifties. So go more into for that person. They are right there. They are having that internal battle. They, I mean, we can call it a midlife crisis, whatever we want to call it, but they just feel stuck. They know they need to do something different. What would you tell that person? What is their next step?
 
Speaker 2:
That's right there. They're all at sea. So basically what we've typically find is that people hit points of their lives, where they're betwixt and between there, but wielded, they're just not sure how to move. What's the next step. And okay. Yes, we can kind of then urge them on and do this, but in a way, if, unless it's the right thing for them to do it, won't sustain. And so what they have to do first is a process of going within themselves. There's that interesting about what aspects of their life to this stage, do they want to live beyond this stage and what parts of ourselves have passed their used by date? And I think it's important to kind of, it's almost like doing an internal stock-take, isn't it and going, okay. Well, yes, there are some parts of ourselves that just basically we don't need any and we need to fail well.
 
And so, for example, if you've been, say a mother and you've been raising kids and you're taking care of partners and you've been managing a household and so on, hopefully there comes a point where that job is not as needed in your life. And it's hard because it's a bit heartbreaking to fail well that phase of life. But unless you do that properly, you can just be on endless repeat. And so it's partly going, okay, well, your devotion to others is not necessarily going to be the same as it was in the past. Doesn't mean it lessons, but it changes. So how do we change that? And how do we incorporate into it, a devotion or at least some Revere of yourself. And I find particularly the women find that transition quite difficult because it is odd after a life of focus on everybody else to spend some time focused on you. And so they often have to then do a stocktake with somebody who's caring enough to say you don't need restaurant answer, but you do need to take the time to investigate it and be curious about it.
 
Speaker 1:
Most definitely. I hear you. And I can, I can feel our listeners just kind of leaning in a little bit, because I think that's where a lot of women are at the ones that listened to this show. They're like, oh goodness, I've been, I've spent my whole life taking care of everyone else. And I have found that my health has slipped to the side and I know I need to do something, but my role is different. So you referenced just kind of saying goodbye to that phase of life. What does that look like to say goodbye to that phase of life and look forward with hope and anticipation to the next phase of life?
 
Speaker 2:
Well, the first thing that surprises people is there is a sadness about it because of course it's an indication that time is passing and roles have changed. And so we need to be respectful of the sadness of leaving a role as much as embracing the future. And I think it's okay to take some time to go, okay, well, you know, I've done that part of my life. Well, I, you know, I need to come celebrate it. And I will be a bit sad that basically they don't need me in quite the same way that they did, even though it probably drove me nuts at times. And now I need to sort of start a ritual, which will help me to move to the next part. And so that ritual tends to be a very small shift. It may be life mapping. It may be thinking about just taking some time to consider and look at your life and review all the photo albums and kind of consider where you've been.
 
But it can just be saying, okay, well, I'm going to start to basically, you know, walk an extra mile or so a day or so. It doesn't have to be, you know, you don't want to kind of charge into something full headed and full of steam and join up, sign up for this and sign up for that. You can do that if you like, some people thrive on that, but, but often when you do that, it runs out of puff fairly quickly. Cause there's not got the real truth around it. And I think, and so it's got to be fun for you. There's no point, you know, enslaving yourself to something that's going to make your miserable or another form of duty and obligation.
 
Speaker 1:
I love that it does. And there needs to be some joy involved. And I think it's, it's so important. You know what you said to acknowledge the sadness, to acknowledge the emotions that go with that? Yes. It's sad that that phase of life is over that the kids are growing and, you know, cause I know we're in the phase of life. We have teenagers, God help us. We have two cats, two dogs and two teenagers. So it gets a little bit chaotic. And then sometimes I just pause and I think we're going to miss this because I think the, the kids get, the more I realize this is going by so quickly, like cherish it. And I think it's okay. Cause sometimes we get a little bit sad that they're not little anymore. You see, I could entertain them with some popsicles and some, some fun, little, you know, water balloons and water toys and everything.
 
Speaker 1:
Everybody was happy and there everything's different now, but it's, I think it's having that joy in life, enjoying the phase you're in. And when that phase is over looking and saying, yes, there's sadness, but there is there's hope and there's promise in the future and what do I need to do different so that I can move forward with resilience. So I'm just, I'm loving this conversation. You have such a a way of encouraging and, and a soothing out way that you speak. So I know our listeners are gonna really enjoy this. So one of my last questions is how would you suggest someone lived their life to the fullest regardless of the stage that they're currently in their or their current circumstances?
 
Speaker 2:
I think at various points it's well, the first thing I think is really useful to do actually, can I just say one more thing about that, Jennifer, that basically when you move away from an area and start something else often there's a feeling, excuse me, a feeling of betraying someone. It's almost as if you as being so devoted to other people that somehow the focus on yourself is a betrayal. And I think it's important to realize that your heart is big enough to love more than just one person or one group. You can actually enlarge your heart to love yourself as well. Okay. so basically, oh,
 
Speaker 1:
Thank you for saying that. Thank you for saying that. I love that. And
 
Speaker 2:
So I think it's important to do a couple of quick, quick things as you start to think about it. The first key critical one is what were my parents doing when they were my current age and is that what I want to do or not? Because of course that's the family time bombs, right? So uncovering that is an incredibly important. And then it's basically, well, what are the major questions that have ruled by life? And that might be making money. It might be being a professional. It might be having a great relationship. It might be raising children and who knows what it is. Okay. That's fantastic. They're the major questions that are basically preoccupied by life up until now, then the second question really is what were the questions that didn't get answered because you were busy during those first set and that will be the childhood dreams, the things that as a young teenager, you thought about doing and never really flourished.
 
And I think it's important to access some of those things that got a bit sort of squished along the way and the busy-ness of life, because there is a time to reinvent them, to revitalize them and to bring some of those back into your life. There are some, you probably shouldn't as well, but there, so be discerning, but at the same, you know it's important to kind of start to embrace some of that earlier spirit, because what that does is it really emanates people and livens them. So that they're fueled not just with the sort of duty of being an adult, who's cared for everybody else and taken all those sort of responsible measures, but there's another part of them, which is prepared to dream a bit more wildly. And I think when we take care of ourselves, we do that a bit really, we do dream wildly on our own behalf. And I think that's such an important thing to do.
Speaker 1:
Just so powerful. This has been, this conversation has been just absolutely excellent. I think it's been so encouraging and exactly what people need to hear because I think so many people just feel stuck. They are mired down by the challenges and the hardships of this life and they don't know how to move forward. So I think you've given them just a very, very clear understanding of what they need to do to honor themselves and move forward. And I love that. I love that word revitalize, like you're using some of these key words that I use often that ad that I love. So as we wrap up today is there any other words of encouragement that you would give our listeners?
 
Speaker 2:
Well, one of the things that I often say to people and suggest to them is never to lose sight of their dreams. And I think life has a nasty way of knocking some of our dreams away from us. And I think it's important just to reconnect that
 
Speaker 1:
I just love that never lose sight of your dreams, Andrew Fuller. This has been absolutely amazing. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate you. I know our listeners are going to want to connect with you and thank goodness for our social media and email and technology, because it doesn't matter where we're located. We can easily do that. So please tell people where they can connect with you and most importantly, where they can buy it.
 
Speaker 2:
Thank you, Jennifer. It's been a total delight this conversation. I agree. I've really enjoyed it. And so yes Andrew for the.com that I, you Australian at, Hey is one place where you can get a hold of free downloads. Your best life at any age, I think is available through Amazon, Barnes and noble all good and bed bookshops, as far as I know. So that would be worth having a look at and considering just the knowledge of 500,000 people and how that might be able to help you out. Now also I'm on Facebook and LinkedIn and all as usual suspects. So look me up, leave with me. That would be fantastic.
 
Speaker 1:
Wonderful. And I'll make sure to link all of those things in the show notes. So you guys can easily go there and click and connect with Andrew Fuller. Thank you so much for joining me today. I appreciate you. Thanks.
 
I just loved that interview. And since I recorded it a few weeks ago, I've been so excited for you to hear it. So I cannot wait to hear your feedback. Now, Andrew has provided a fantastic handout for my listeners. I'm going to post that on our community page, functional medicine for weight loss, body, mind, soul wellness for women. If you're not a part of that page, girl, you're missing out and you're going to miss out on this incredible tool that he provided just for us. So go to bit.ly forward slash FM women's wellness again, that's at them. Women's wellness. I'll link it in the show notes and join this amazing community today. Like right now sister. Okay, go join right now. Cause I want you to be a part of this. So until I see you again in two weeks where our topic is living in freedom, don't let your health hold you back. I want you to go out there and live life to the fullest. So I'll see you again in two weeks, y'all have a great day.