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Dr. Zac Seidler is a clinical psychologist, researcher and leading men’s mental health expert who works as Global Director of Men’s Health Research at Movember and as Senior Research Fellow with Orygen at the University of Melbourne.

In this conversation, we speak about mental health and the Australian health care system, notions of masculinity, and the importance of social connection for wellbeing and resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Some of the content we cover touches on subjects that may be confronting to some listeners, such as suicide, depression and anxiety. If this raises any issues for you, please seek help via Beyond Blue, Orygen, Headspace or Lifeline on 13 11 14.

Interview with Dr. Zac Seidler
20 March 2020
Melbourne

00:00 Nick: Welcome to Bloom, a conversations podcast about anything and everything. I'm lucky to be joined today by Dr. Zac Seidler, a clinical psychologist and director of health professional training at Movember who also works as a post-doctoral research fellow with Orygen at the University of Melbourne.

00:17 Zac is one of Australia's leading researchers into male mental health and is an exciting, emerging advocate for mental well-being, social connection and men's health.

00:26 This podcast was initially named Eudaimonia which is a Greek word meaning human flourishing, so it's particularly apt that we're speaking with Zac today.

00:35 In this interview, we speak about mental health and the Australian health care system, notions of masculinity and the importance of social connection to foster well-being and resilience during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic.

00:48 Just a heads up that some of the content we cover touches on subjects that may be confronting to some listeners, such as suicide, depression and anxiety. If our conversation today raises any issues for you, please seek help via Beyond Blue, Orygen, Headspace or Lifeline on 13 11 14.

01:08 Thank you so much for joining us, Zac, particularly in what is a very stressful and uncertain time for billions around the world at the moment.

01:14 Zac: Thanks for having me, Nick.

01:15 Nick: No worries. So, for our listeners, could you please provide a bit of an overview of the kind of work you do on a day-to-day basis across your many and varied roles and interests?

01:25 Zac: I've actually just hired a research assistant who now has to watch my day-to-day and they're kind of worried about it because it's not your typical job by any means. So, I'll try to break up my different roles of sorts.

01:42 Since September of last year, I've been working at Movember whose offices are in Richmond in Melbourne. A beautiful office that overlooks the city. Despite the fact that everyone thinks that they only function for one month of the year, I can assure you that is not the case.

02:01 So, day-to-day, I work three days at that office and we'll discuss I guess what I do there, and then two days I'm at Origin, Uni of Melb, doing research evaluation. Lots of writing. I write some op-eds, I write research related stuff, papers and publications and then I also do some clinical work currently via Skype out of hours, tele-health related stuff, especially in this current climate.

02:31 Nick: Absolutely, yeah. So, what have been some of the most formative or significant experiences in your professional career to date? I know that you've worked clinically with men of different ages and representations around the country from adolescents in Darwin with early psychosis to older HIV positive men struggling with adjustment.

02:49 Zac: Most formative? Everyone always reflects on like the first few clients that they ever saw. It was actually later on that I really - because you find your feet as a clinician and it's a very stressful period. You can't actually pay attention to anything when you're trying to work out what you're doing because you're so aware of, "What am I asking? How is this going on?" So, you can't actually find your own voice I guess as a clinician.

03:17 So, things really started to take off for me and to hit home for me when I started in private practice and I had what turned out to be a long line of young men with suicidal ideation and attempts.

03:34 So, I guess the most formative experiences there was the ability for change, was the underlying motivation to be alive and to flourish. I have always kind of seen myself in a weird way as a motivational coach in some ways.

03:51 One of my first ever supervisors compared me to Tony Robbins which I took as an insult at the time, but in hindsight I think that many young men are seeking a doctrine or a mantra of some kind. So, I've kind of taken it upon myself to be a type of resilience coach in some ways for them and that's really how I've pushed myself in the research world as well.

04:16 Nick: It's really interesting because I'm hearing some resonances with Jordan Peterson, not that I'm in any way linking him in with you but his popularity certainly suggests that there are many young men around the world looking for a doctrine or ways of living well and meaningfully. It seems as though you're filling a gap in the market in Australia in this way

04:33 Zac: I hope so. I'm trying my best to counteract the Jordan Peterson effect to an extent without any misogynistic undertones. I have - yeah, I have had so many discussions about him and about this vacuum I would say when it comes to masculinity in the western world per se, in that there is not a very clear idea about what masculinity should be. There's a very clear idea about what masculinity should not be.

05:03 So, I do my best to try to fill that and make it clear that flexible masculinity and, you know, your dominant, traditional norms of strength and power and self-reliance and stoicism, whatever they may be, are really useful depending on the time and place.

05:19 Nick: Yeah, and to that degree I imagine you'd find Peterson's work problematic given that he occupies that revanchist articulation of and advocacy for those traditional male values which I think in a lot of your work, you've identified as being the kind of root cause of a lot of male mental ill health.

05:34 Zac: It's a very, very complex space and I'm finding that more and more. I'm very lucky that Movember is apolitical in many ways and they've succeeded on the basis of not getting into the nitty gritty of this stuff because gender politics is a shitstorm and a half at the moment.

05:52 So, I've kind of been very safe in many ways in kind of realising that I cannot distance myself from that male audience who really actually needs my help, who are the ones who are extremely disengaged, disconnected and angry.

06:10 So, I try to be a voice for them and to connect with them while also, you know, talking to the women and, you know, other community members about the fact that if we improve men’s health and wellbeing, we're going to better their lives as well.

06:26 So, I kind of, you know, skirt around the issue and go through the middle but I do believe that Jordan Peterson has not done a good job I would say at trying to bring together these divisions. I think we’re seeing a more divisive culture than ever before.

06:45 Nick: Absolutely. So, before we move on, could you reflect on the unconventional nature of your early career? I think you're under 30 but just talk a little bit about how you're balancing working as a researcher, a clinician, an advocate, whether it be through your work at Movember or Man Island? So, how do you hold these things together when in our twenties, most of us are still finding our feet and trying to work out what it is we really want to do?

07:09 Zac: That sounds weird getting it relayed back to me. I think that I - I've thought about this quite a bit. I've never had any doubt about what I've wanted to do and what I've wanted to achieve.

07:24 I was very lucky from the age of like 15 or 16, I knew that I wanted to be a psychologist. I had no idea that this was going to be the path of sorts but people ask me how this has all taken off and I really think not having a plan B was very useful to me.

07:40 So, I think that's how it started but how this has kind of taken off is that I think that there are not enough scientist-communicators out there. There are not enough scientis-practitioner-communicators specifically. So, I get to do the clinical work and see people on the ground and then I get to go off and research this stuff.

07:58 The real key to everything that I've done is that I have a deep, deep curiosity, interest and investment in this stuff. It's not a matter of - you know, it's not my day job. I've never seen it as my day job so when people, you know, at the office are working nine to five, this is - you know, I think about this stuff all day long. I read about it endlessly. It intrigues me but it is problematic in some ways, especially now that I'm working from home.

08:27 Nick: Yeah, certainly, and your interest in men's health, mental health and psychology isn't just informed by your professional work and academic interests. You've spoken openly, sensitively and quite beautifully in the media about the fact that your father died by suicide. So, could you please tell us a little bit about your father and the kind of man that he was and his influence on your life?

08:48 Zac: I'd love to. So, I guess, yeah, I didn't - I was already going down the psychology path when dad was unwell. So, I've had a bit of an internal, not crisis, but internal discussion with myself about whether or not I'd be in this if it wasn't for what had taken place. I think that I would. I think that it was pretty clear. I was already doing gender studies. I was already very much into the masculinity space. I guess it just clarified it and made my vision and passion much clearer and gave me a dialogue.

09:26 My dad was the most incredible man. I think that he gave me everything that has led to my success really. So, he was a General Practitioner in Kings Cross. He pretty much started the methadone movement. So, he was in the Cross in the eighties and nineties when the heroin situation was booming and he had just such great respect and kindness when it came to the homeless and disadvantaged and drug affected.

10:02 So, I got to watch that from a very young age. I was working as a receptionist at his clinic and I watched, you know, as a 14-year-old people on heroin coming in and just - it didn't matter if he saw famous movie stars and then he saw, you know, a homeless man straight after. He responded in exactly the same way.

10:22 So, despite the fact that I've had an extremely privileged upbringing, I really got to interact with all types of members of society and it gave me a real respect for and understanding of the fact that humanity varies but there is something underlying which is just a respect for everyone's worth that he really taught me.

10:46 You know, he brought about the safe injecting rooms in Sydney as well. He was just the best public speaker you would ever hear. He used to complain that he would get up and just talk shit for half an hour and everyone was waiting for every word that he had to say. I was like, "None of that was evidence based, what are you talking about?" I was going through that early twenties, "I know everything," stage but I'm very lucky that I got as long as I did with him.

11:14 I know that he was struggling for a very long time. It was the worst period of my life but I've taken it in my stride and I think my family has as well. We're here to grow and develop from it rather than let it crush us.

11:29 Nick: And to live his legacy in a way by being able to see the humanity in each of your patients and I guess in the broader population, right, by seeing through people's circumstances to the humanity inside and the potential that's within them.

11:42 Zac: Fundamentally.

11:43 Nick: Could you tell us a bit more about your work with Movember because you obviously had a lot of really defining personal, academic and professional experiences in men's health and mental health, but how did you come to work with the sort of iconic, global movement for men's health.

11:58 Zac: Definitely. So, I was finishing up my PhD at the University of Sydney last year. It started out, my PhD, as an experiment into looking at why men don't seek help. That was literally the research question of sorts.

12:19 In starting out with that question, it turned out very quickly that was a very biased, socially driven response to what I was witnessing.

12:32 So, what became clear over time was that was actually the wrong way of viewing this whole situation and that in fact many men are seeking help, they're just not getting what they want and what they need when it comes to mental health services. I think in many ways, that is because mental health services have been created - were created early on by men who I think were avoidant of their own masculinity and placed the emphasis on female hysteria in the case of Freud for instance so that they could avoid their own neuroses and issues.

13:07 So, that kind of developed over time into a female oriented profession with, you know, we've got over 75% I think of psychologists are women. That's not to say that they can't treat men well by any means but it just means that the whole profession and the whole experience has been deemed a feminine, emotionally communicative experience which I don’t buy.

13:31 So, I started to look into the literature and then started to speak with men themselves who had been in therapy. It just didn't hit the mark. It really didn't provide them with what they wanted, what they needed and really what they expected either. So, the question was should I tell men how to do therapy better or should I tell the system how to approach men in a more male-sensitive way? It was very clear that it's not fair to continue to put the onus on men to adapt. You never go to a physio and the physio goes, "Sorry, I can't deal with that elbow. That elbow is not one that I understand."

14:16 So, what became clear was that I needed to find a way to update the system to be male focused and to understand masculinity. The best way of going about that I think was to create a training program for mental health practitioners, you know, some form of continuing education because there is nothing out there throughout every degree...

14:40 Nick: After you've done your base qualifications, you mean? So, like online modules?

14:42 Zac: Exactly, but even within base qualifications, there's nothing about gender anywhere. Gender competency is just not a thing that is taught because it's believed to be general knowledge I think in many ways.

14:56 So, Man Island was really my PhD project. I just decided to market it because, yeah, I guess that's again my dad's legacy. It's like just don't be mediocre and do something different and forge a path for yourself. So, I didn't want to just be another PhD that grows dusty on the shelf. So, I came up with a brand and I came up with a message and I think that's what sparked the interest of Movember.

15:28 Nick: Absolutely. So, they sort of found you and came across you?

15:31 Zac: Yeah, well I was making noise. As you can tell, I do that. So, I kind of - people - this is the thing. When I reflect on how I am where I am, it's because I didn't ever really fall back on deference. You know, I have respect for people but I never really was like, "Oh, I'm a first year PhD student, I can't talk to this person."

15:51 Nick: They are big claims that you're making as well, by saying that there are systemic failures in the way that men's health is provided for in the health care system in Australia but globally as well.

16:01 Zac: Definitely, but I think that the time was right. We're looking at a suicide rate that's just through the roof.

16:07 Nick: That's interesting because you're saying that the rate of suicide I think is three times for men what it is for women but at the same time, it's a perfect storm because there are those systemic shortfalls in how we treat men's mental health.

16:19 Zac: In how we treat men and how we diagnose men specifically as well. There's also - there's just all of these mismatching statistics that just sparked my interest. There's this really famous quote by two reliably German psychologists who wrote, "Women seek help and men die." They wrote that in 1990 and I just - it was so inescapably morose that I was just like I cannot buy into that.

16:45 Nick: And final as well. It's just so emphatic.

16:48 Zac: Exactly, and we look at the stats now and there has been a 10% to 15% increase in the number of men seeking help thanks to Movember and Headspace and RUOK day. They are doing their job as, you know, health promotion entities

17:01 What is not working - and this is what I sold I guess to Movember in my conversations with them - was you cannot tell men - you know, you cannot go into footy clubs and just tell everyone that if you're feeling down, go and seek help and then just leave them there with the system that is not catering to their needs.

17:20 So, I think that's what really got through to them and was a very clear way forward to go, "Alright, we can now target." It's not in the clinical space itself. It is in the training and education space to provide something, hopefully globally, to be able to upskill a workforce that is going to hopefully again be dealing with a huge increase in the number of men seeking help because they're struggling. There's no doubt about it.

17:49 Nick: So, how do men and boys experience mental ill health differently and secondly, how are the kinds of ways of asking for help or indicating distress different?

18:00 Zac: Well, firstly the word 'help' is not often one that's used by men so I can throw that out there. We'll discuss - I think language is a really important part of this whole thing and that's something that my training responds to.

18:15 To start with the first question of how do men, you know, show and manifest mental ill health? I think the easiest way - the easiest diagnosis to start with is depression. There's lots and lots of research out there. One of my colleagues, Associate Professor Simon Rice, has done some incredible work looking at the way that depression manifests in men and the fact that while there is the typical understanding that depression is you sitting on the couch, eating ice-cream, crying yourself to sleep while watching a rom-com, you know? It's like there are these ideas of darkness and of endless sadness and despair and hopelessness that the DSM, the Diagnostics Statistical Manual that all psychologists and psychiatrists look to for their diagnoses, that's what it advocates for.

19:11 We don't buy that when it comes to male depression and that's from our clinical experience and more broadly now within the research. Internalising depression which is that, "I feel hopeless, everything is very internal," tends to be actually quite a feminised response to depression.

19:30 Men actually tend to show an externalising response which is anger, aggression, irritability, substance misuse, violence. So, what is boys being boys is actually often a cry for help and is misunderstood and is misdiagnosed. The amount of men that I get coming through my door with, you know, anger issues written down on a referral and then you deal with it for three sessions and then suddenly they're bawling their eyes out.

19:57 Nick: Is that because those behavioural manifestations are actually symptomatic of a deeper psychological issue?

20:03 Zac: Precisely. Society advocates for the fact that men are allowed to show anger, pride, irritability and so that's what they show. You know, you get a 70-year-old grandpa who is just grumpy all the time. God forbid there's actually something going on underneath that.

20:22 Nick: That makes me think about what you said before about language and the importance of thinking about linguistic or stereotypical conventions or straitjackets that we put around men and the impacts on their wellbeing. So, there are ways of being or ways of behaviour that men are allowed to express - that anger or grumpiness, the substance abuse - which are kind of normalised behavioural problems, right, without actually fully allowing men to inhabit and express or interrogate those deeper psychological ailments that they might have. So, as a link to that, could you speak about the kinds of language that we use to describe masculinity and men? Particularly, I'm thinking of the terms 'fragile masculinity' but also 'toxic masculinity' which I think sometimes contributes to that polarised Jordan Peterson view of the world and gender politics and gender relations.

21:10 Zac: Yeah. God, I have so much to say. Okay, let me structure this. I think - okay, there's two dialogues there. One is around the way that we address masculinity and what it looks like and what it sounds like and how to talk about it within society. The other is about how to talk about men's mental illness and how to talk about what they're experiencing, what their symptoms are and what it looks like.

21:34 For instance, the term 'depression' doesn't sit very well with many men. You know, distress or stress tends to be a word that resonates a bit better. The blues, whatever it may be, and that's...

21:49 Nick: good days, bad days...

21:50 Zac: It could be due to stigma. This the problem. We don't want to perpetuate that stigma. So, if we need to push through and use the word depression, you know, so be it but I think there is definitely something there when it comes to if men are experiencing that anger/irritability/grumpiness, you know, and that's just the way that men are going to show their distress.

22:15 We don't need to force men into this box of, "You need to be vulnerable. You need to cry. You need to be emotive." I think that there is a time and a place for that and they need to have that in their repertoire by all means, but suggesting that we need to - this is what Jordan Peterson jumps on which is the idea that we don't need to feminise men. We don't need to get rid of masculinity and turn everyone into a little girl.

22:40 I have issues with the way he goes about talking about that but I do agree that we are socialised differently and we have different responses to things and so let's not pretend that these are, you know, apples and apples. There's a different game going on here and we deal with things differently.

22:56 He draws on the testosterone argument which I think is a bunch of crap but that is to say that there is - he believes that testosterone and evolutionarily men responding through hunter-gatherer situations leads to men’s behaviour being fundamentally different.

23:14 You look at boys at the age of three and they're crying much more. They have much more emotive, you know, capability than young girls do often as well. So, you watch it restrict. Judy Chu, one of my colleagues, followed a number of boys throughout preschool and started to see that restriction actually take place before her very eyes.

23:37 Nick: Is it a socialised kind of...?

23:39 Zac: Exactly, exactly. So, I think that we really need to start to understand that we can have both. We don't need to move towards something else. We can just incorporate. I think it's a matter of 'and' rather than 'or'.

23:56 So, when it comes to though the idea of toxic masculinity or healthy masculinity or positive masculinity, whatever it may be - fragile. You know, I did an ethics debate around fragile masculinity. I really made it very clear that I think that's a great term because I think that the whole idea about masculinity needs a rebranding and that is that fragile masculinity should be seen as a great positive. Everything that is fragile is beautiful. Everything that is fragile is respected and is sought...

24:30 Nick: And precious...

24:31 Zac: And precious, exactly, and feminism in the 1960s, 70s and 80s sought to seek out the fragility of femininity. That's what it did. It sought to go what are the pressure points here? What is this thing? I think we're at a reckoning of masculinity now where we are going to go what is underlying these cracks here and how can we actually start to inhabit that space and understand it because it has been too long of see no evil, speak no evil. You know, Harvey Weinstein has cracked this open for everybody and hopefully we're going to realise that this is to our great benefit over time.

25:13 Nick: Yeah. The use of the word fragility reminds me of the Japanese artform, Kintsugi, which means gold joinery. It's a form of pottery repair where broken ceramics or fragile objects are knitted back together with gold bonding material. In that sense, they actually become more beautiful, more precious. I think this is a lovely image for thinking about men and vulnerability and fragility, especially when it comes to things like mental health.

25:36 Zac: That's lovely and that is the idea of restoration. What I think the, you know, me-too movement should be focusing on is the fact that those men who are doing, you know, despicable things are not fragile. They're not the fragile men. The fragility is in the people who are aware and willing to look at their, you know, weaknesses and look at what is underlying those and seek self-betterment. That's masculinity and that's fragility and that's what we're aiming for.

26:04 Nick: So, I'd like to change tack a little to focus on the themes of mental health and social connection in the time of Coronavirus, the global pandemic which has disrupted the way of life of billions around the globe. Our new normal seems to be one of social isolation, social distancing and self-quarantine coupled with extreme anxiety about the economic future of our countries and households, as well as existential anxiety about the health and wellbeing of loved ones and humanity at large.

26:31 So, there's a lot to unpack in there but what are your thoughts broadly on the pandemic and its implications for mental health and wellbeing in Australia?

26:38 Zac: Well, as I said before I've noticed a shift in my own mental wellbeing. I've never been one to be overwhelmed by the media or overwhelmed by reading anything at all and I, the past couple of days, I've just been like, "Nope, I'm done with this. I can't..." Yeah, it's too much.

27:00 I think I heard John Mayer actually of all people say it's - you know, reading this splintering of the news is like being reminded not only that your favourite ice-cream store has closed down but that chocolate, salted caramel, strawberry, vanilla, every one of the flavours is gone, you know, and that we're reminded of that every day and it's exhausting.

27:23 So, I think that one thing, while we're on the masculinity train, to remember and for all the listeners out there...

27:31 Nick: Ten subscribers, yeah.

27:34 Zac: There is something to be said for the way that masculinity interacts with health behaviours is really, really problematic. We're seeing that in the fact that men are dying much more readily from this illness than women are.

27:48 There is a reliable trend of men dying more often, even if women are diagnosed at the same rates. So, it comes down to the fact that I think women are much better firstly at communicating obviously when it comes to some of these issues. Secondly, the lackadaisical response that many of the men in my life that I've witnessed - you know, the back-slapping and the high-fiving and the lack of - you know, there is plenty of evidence to show that men do not wash their hands.

28:20 So, I think to all the men out there, I think it is about time that we realised that altruism is an incredible male trait that we should all be looking to include in our current climate

28:38 Nick: Yeah. Just on that notion of altruism and traditional values, I skipped over this question before but it might be good to link back into now. So, you write and speak a lot about stoicism, vis-a-vie mental health and societal attitudes towards the notion of masculinity or manhood. What kinds of philosophical or historical trends or works informed our conventional understandings and stereotypes about masculinity which we've established can be quite restrictive or circumscribing?

29:06 Zac: What's really interesting is that stoicism obviously stems from the philosophers in ancient Greece back in the day. Back in the day? "When I was a wee boy..."

29:18 I think that it died off - like it obviously went through some kind of renaissance. You know, throughout time it's been picked up by various people over time but I think really the way that stoicism has been repackaged is not what was intended. We're looking at it now through an industrial revolution lens in many ways, an American industrial revolution lens. That's what traditional masculinity is now. We're stuck with 1930s masculinity. That's what the stereotype is. That’s what we're breaking.

29:57 Nick: A stiff upper lip, capacity for suffering emotional...

30:00 Zac: Yeah, that's not what stoicism was meant to be, you know? It was meant to be a respect for your circumstance I guess if anything and understanding of your own limits.

30:13 Nick: And impermanence and kind of ultimately, you know, non-importance in the grand universal scheme of things, right, like Marcus Aurelius’ meditations?

30:21 Zac: Yeah, where did we lose that existential understanding of where we're placed and get lost in this selfish me-me-me idea of stoicism which is I don't - and I really do believe it's underpinned often by, you know, self and societal stigma which is to say that it goes, "I am not going to be seen as weak or vulnerable by others because I will be shunned."

30:52 So, it doesn't even take on that altruistic trend which I think it really was founded with in mind, and now it's really gone towards a fear. Stoicism is underpinned by fear.

31:06 So, my whole idea around reframing masculinity in treatment or in my research is to say that this is not something that should be weighing you down. It should be something that is a superpower and how can you shift these values that you carry around to be beneficial for yourself and society rather than limiting?

31:30 Nick: So, coming back to the subject of men's mental health and the extraordinarily high rate of suicide amongst men. Thinking on those communities around Australia who have been affected by the triple whammy of drought for many years, now bushfires and obviously now an unprecedented global pandemic, what's the importance of social connection in these difficult times to maintain mental wellbeing and resilience?

31:53 Zac: I'm really worried about how things are going to go this year. I believe - and this could just be the pessimist within me - that we're going to see a really frightening spike in the suicide rates.

32:09 The climate when it comes to risk factors for male suicide, it's often thought that distress and mental illness are actually the underlying main cause of suicide in men. It's actually situational factors like unemployment, financial distress, social dislocation and relationship breakdown. This is prime time for all of those things.

32:35 So, I really, really caution everybody to be on high alert for anybody that seems to be - and this is a hard thing, that actually - you know, if we go into lockdown, it's very hard to make sure that we can connect with those in our lives who might be at risk. But I think the fact that there is a camaraderie here, the fact that there is a global camaraderie and that this is some really fucked up social experiment of sorts means that this isn't - this kind of gets rid of the marginalisation I hope in many ways because it places the most privileged in a very similar situation. Hopefully that will mean that that type of hierarchy I guess when it comes to people talking to lots of people and leaving others out is going to die off and we're going to be able to see a new kind of mateship in many ways grow out of this.

33:32 Nick: Two points of encouragement for me have been that this is a common global problem we're all facing, that every country on earth is united or ought to be in solving this together.

33:42 Secondly, in some ways, we've become more united as neighbours, citizens and human beings. There's been a proliferation of online community support groups on Facebook, people checking in on neighbours, reconnecting with old friends and family.

33:56 So, I think we need to hold onto those positive stories when we do think how difficult these times are and will be.

34:01 Zac: Yep. Catastrophe breeds humanity, I think. I'm looking forward to seeing - you know, we saw that with the bushfires and then we've - you know, ScoMo loves to point out now the fact that everybody is just going and hoarding and what's wrong with all of you but I think that there are - besides that horrible behaviour, there is very clear underlying benefits to the connectedness that is taking place now.

34:26 Nick: So, what kinds of practical things can we be doing to foster a sense of social connection during these moments of social isolation or even lockdown? When all the simple things we took for granted are unavailable to us such as, you know, having coffee with friends or going to the gym for instance and seeing people.

34:43 Zac: I think the key is firstly to not revel in the 'what if' situation and to not really get lost in that, "Oh, I've lost this," and start to list all those things. People tend to do that. You know, my brother's wedding is cancelled.

35:00 Nick: Sorry.

35:00 Zac: Yeah, you know, it's horribly upsetting but there is a sense of solace I guess in some ways just around the fact that there is, you know, so many others going through the same thing.

35:16 So, I think when it comes to practical tips, what I've been doing is I've been doing three 15-minute times a day just getting my heart rate up. Let's be very clear, the evidence suggests by all measures that exercise is the best answer to your low mood. So, that's always been very useful for me and has been good to just keep my mind active, so I've been scheduling that in.

35:45 I've also been doing meditation, morning and night. It's weird because I'm in control now. Everyone should realise that - you know, everyone complains about going to work and now everyone complains about not going to work. There is something to be said for the fact that you’re in control now of your days. So, I think that structuring things purposefully is going to be really good.

36:07 I've been doing really dumb Zoom calls with heaps of people.

36:11 Nick: Me included.

36:13 Zac: We don't have a fun background on. I've been wearing my speed dealer glasses for most of my Zoom phone calls which I'm thoroughly enjoying.

36:20 Nick: Great. Just linking back to the opening part of our conversation today. How do you think the social and health systems will permanently change as a result of our need to rely on digital technologies to both work and socialise?

36:34 So, we're already seeing really significant changes such as, you know, discussion about the Medicare Benefits Schedule being expanded to include tele-health services for general practitioners and psychologists but also huge numbers of people are working from home as we've discussed and, you know, the normalisation of virtual social catch ups such as, you know, Friday drinks over Zoom for instance.

36:55 Zac: Oh, it's a weird time, isn't it? I said that to my brother before. He was like, "Everyone just keeps saying that." I was like, "Yeah, I know."

37:02 Nick: It's like a bad 'Black Mirror' episode honestly.

37:06 Zac: It is, but the word weird doesn't actually mean anything. I always say that to clients when clients come in and I'm like, "How are you feeling?" and they go, "Weird." I'm like I literally don’t know what that means. It means everything to everyone, so like I guess that's why everyone is saying it because we're all in this state of limbo.

37:22 I think that really this is going to be - I'm very, very privileged and I've made that clear to everyone. No matter how pissy I may be on a certain day, I know that I am in the best possible position right now when it comes to firstly my job security. You know, I know so many people out there who are freaking out and I send my condolences to them because this is frightening, but I really do think that the healthcare space is going to learn a lot in the coming months and is going to benefit a lot because we were moving archaically really slowly towards telehealth movements. We were moving towards understanding online education as well. You know, all of that stuff has now been fast tracked through necessity. I think that is going to be something that everyone benefits from in the long term.

38:20 So, there are going to be some gains here I really do think and there is a silver lining in many ways. Lots of people will get sick and lots of people will die and that's horrific but hopefully we can find something out of this that is going to move society forward.

38:34 I think when it comes to telehealth, when it comes to the fact that the government is willing to support mental health services, you know, not only for people in regional areas but now for anybody, anywhere to be able to contact a psychologist. We need to break down barriers and get people in and talking.

38:51 Nick: Finally, putting Coronavirus to one side, what kinds of things do you do to keep happy and healthy in your daily or weekly routine?

38:58 Zac: I just love to do Zoom podcasts.

39:04 Nick: Start your own!

39:04 Zac: Yeah, I should, but I - the ocean is my respite. Despite moving to Melbourne and people thinking I am insane for swimming here, I typically swim here every day. The cold-water therapy really does wonders for me. Running as well. Movement, progress. I really align them in many ways and then I play drums as well to exert some other energy. It's the only time when my brain does something and is not at all engaged, it just relies on some lizard brain situation. Yeah, and then just chatting with mates is always enlivening in many ways and finding your tribe that has very similar values and interests to you really, you know, gets me up in the morning.

39:53 Nick: Yeah, fantastic. Well, Dr. Zac Seidler, it's been a pleasure talking with you today. Thank you so much for your time and for being part of Bloom's very first podcast via Zoom, so thank you.

40:03 Zac: My pleasure, Nick.