Self-Care & Mental Wellness: Misty Buck On The Top Five Selfcare Practices That Improve Mental Wellness

An Interview With Maria Angelova

Rest. We treat rest like it’s a luxury but it’s a necessity. We’re not machines and even machines break when they don’t get proper rest. The most productive people are the ones who take time to rest and disconnect. Give yourself a chance to just be with no agenda. If you want clarity and to be more productive, rest!

Let’s face it. It seems that everyone is under a great deal of stress these days. This takes a toll on our mental wellness. What are some of the best self-care practices that we can use to help improve our mental wellness and mental well-being? In this interview series, we are talking to medical doctors, mental health professionals, health and wellness professionals, and experts about self-care or mental health who can share insights from their experience about How Each Of Us Can Use Self Care To Improve Our Mental Wellness. As a part of this series, I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Misty Buck.

Misty Buck is an athlete mental health & mindset coach; contributor & coach to the Hall of Fame Health (HOFH); international speaker; and author of the “Athlete Mental Health Playbook.” She has also been an entrepreneur for 15 years, as the owner of an award-winning digital marketing agency in Miami, during which time she has developed strategies for maintaining inner balance as a high achiever. For more information, including resources for athletes, please visit PurposeSoulAthletics.com.

Thank you so much for doing this interview with us. It is a great honor. Our readers would love to learn more about you and your personal background. Can you please share your personal story? What has brought you to this point in your life?

Thank you for taking the time to speak with me today. I love this question, and like most people, my story has many layers. I believe everything in life happens for a reason and that sometimes, your pain can lead you to your purpose. Growing up in Miami, I was always around sports either going to college football games or participating in youth sports leagues. I was a cheerleader, my brother was a football player, and my dad was a coach. I fell in love with the athletic environment, the energy, and the camaraderie, and I wanted to be a part of it as much as I could spending hours at the park each weekend during the season and countless nights hanging out after practice. It always felt like I was a part of something special. Later I coached youth cheerleading and that just deepened the love. Now I was a part of something bigger than me and had the opportunity to impact the lives of the young ladies I was coaching. Mindset became a pillar of my coaching principles. For example, the athletes couldn’t say “I can’t” but they could say “I’ll try.” During this time, I was in high school, and I also began to struggle with mental health, specifically with depression. I was tough, but I also had a lot of emotions and was labeled as sensitive. In the sports world, I learned to “walk it off,” “don’t be weak,” etc. So here I was with all of these feelings and not knowing how to manage them while also feeling ashamed for having them in the first place. Even so, it was the competitive spirit that I learned being in sports that helped me fight to heal from the depression. In my twenties, I discovered that I also had been struggling with anxiety for years, but had no idea that was what was going on. Needless to say, it’s been quite a journey of self-discovery, healing, and prioritizing self-care. In 2008 I started my first business, which I still have today, doing social media marketing and content creation. While I was getting this business going, I worked part-time as a recovery coach at an eating disorder residential treatment center. Everything came full circle at that point and I reconnected with a love for helping people, wellness, and coaching. Soon thereafter, I got certified as a life coach. My main goal is to be a resource that I never had for athletes and high-achieving individuals, whether adults or youth. I want people to help people to learn how to perform at a high level while maintaining inner balance, and self-care is a huge piece of that.

What is your “WHY” behind what you do? What fuels you?

It definitely starts with my personal struggles and wanting to use all that I’ve learned to be of service to others. Connecting and helping people, seeing a light bulb go off or a wave of relief come over them, is what drives me. I’ve always been empathic. I realize now that the sensitivity that I once thought was a curse, is actually one of my gifts and so I feel a calling to use it to help others. I’m just drawn to seeing people make transformational shifts in their lives.

Sometimes our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about a mistake or failure which you now appreciate has taught you a valuable lesson?

Let me start out by saying that I’m constantly making mistakes. If you’re going to make progress, you have to make mistakes along the way. I’ve tried and failed at countless things, especially in business. Sometimes, things just don’t turn out like you plan. Truthfully, I’ve had to work on a fear of making the wrong decisions. However, I also believe that everything happens for a reason, even missteps. Given that, even when I’ve made a mistake or failed, and even when that hurts, I don’t let that be where the story ends. I use it to keep going and adjust. Resiliency and the ability to pivot are major keys to success.

My favorite quote about failure comes from Zig Ziglar. He said, “failure is an event, not a person.” It took me a long time to learn that and, in many ways, I still am learning that. Failure and mistakes happen, but they don’t define who I am as a person. One of those pivotal moments that comes to mind is when I started my marketing business. It was January 2008, I was 26 years old, and I was ambitious. But, I didn’t realize just how clueless I was about running a business, never mind the fact that the great recession was upon us. I struggled terribly at the beginning. I was extremely shy, could barely get the words out of my mouth when it came to public speaking, I didn’t know how to get clients or price services or sell, or many of the fundamentals that a successful business owner needs. Several months in, I thought I made a terrible mistake starting the business, but I wasn’t ready to give up. The good part that came out of that struggle was that I started studying and taking workshops. As a result, I learned how to build a business and do it during an extremely tumultuous time in the economy. The silver lining is that I learned how to navigate economic cycles and I began to study this new thing called social media networking, which no one had thought of as “social media marketing” before. As a writer with a background in PR, it made sense to me to make this emerging technology the focus of my services because I was great at creating content, and I could see that social media was going to disrupt the way marketing was traditionally done. So while I was broke, working part-time jobs, and struggling to get on my feet, I had to do two things: First, I had to get into the right mindset by believing in myself and being coachable to learn the things I didn’t know. Secondly, I had to be resilient enough to just keep going. Luckily for me, after a few years, people began to understand that social media wasn’t a fad and it was in fact an important marketing tool, the economy began to recover, and my business began to grow. Was the timing and my ignorance about business a total mistake? Yes, but also no, because again, I believe it’s just the beginning of my entrepreneurial story. Mistakes are never the whole story. They are just part of it.

You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

1. Collaboration. I am a very independent person and many years ago I struggled sometimes with listening to people and letting them contribute. But, I’ve learned that my contributions are only a piece of my success. I have a phenomenal team working with me. They aren’t employees, they are colleagues. Secondly, I have a network of people around me, and together, we are able to bring the best of our abilities together to comprehensively serve people.
2. Growth mindset. Leaders set the tone for the entire team so if you’re in a fight or flight or survival mindset, your team is going to feel that. There are days when I am discouraged or not feeling myself. But I know that if I bring that energy into the day, it’s going to permeate to my team, my clients, and beyond. So, instead, I’ll go over my affirmations, and give myself a chance to take a few breaths and reset. A good leader looks for solutions and trusts that the right answers will come. Some days the mindset comes before the action and some days you have to take the action to get into the mindset, but either way, a leader has to lead with hope, flexibility, discipline, and grit.
3. Communication. Growing up, my mom taught my brother and me to “say what you mean and mean what you say.” This has taken me far. If you can communicate clearly and do what you say you’re going to do, success will follow. As a coach, my clients depend on me to show up when I say I’m going to show up and provide a space for them to have courageous conversations. Clear communication is what sets leaders apart.

What are some of the most interesting or exciting new projects you are working on now? How do you think that will help people?

I have a couple of new projects at the moment. For starters, I recently launched a comprehensive transition program for athletes called 360 Pro Athlete Transition™. It’s basically a one-stop shop where an athlete can enroll and be matched with coaches who will work with them one on one in a variety of different areas from financial literacy to mental wellness to career coaching and beyond. We also have accountability partners and a weekly peer support call. I’m really excited because I think this is going to help a lot of athletes who are making the transition from sports to the next chapter of their life but don’t quite know what steps to take. Many athletes struggle or even suffer with mental health issues like depression after sports in large part because they have to reevaluate their identity and purpose and overcome challenges like isolation. It’s really a huge life-changing transformation, and so I believe that supporting people through this will go a long way in helping them build a path to success with the support of a team. I think providing a one-stop shop is a major key to that because instead of feeling like support is fragmented, the goal is to make kick-starting the next phase of their life’s journey as seamless as possible.

Secondly, in early 2023, I’ll be releasing my second book called the “Athlete Branding Blueprint.” The book is a holistic guide to developing a brand but to do so in a way that its authentic. There are also mindset topics in the book including how to remove negative blocks like imposter syndrome. The first half of the book is about authenticity, purpose, and mindset and the second half focuses more on how to begin building your brand. I think a lot of athletes are interested in building a brand for a variety of reasons. There’s a lot of information on marketing out there, but I wanted to provide something that starts with building the foundation of authenticity and a growth mindset because those are keys that a lot of people miss and they wind up feeling disconnected or stuck.

OK, thank you for all of that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview, about the interface between self-care and mental health. From where you stand personally or professionally, why are you so passionate about mental well-being?

I am passionate about mental well-being because of my personal experiences as stated earlier, but also because I believe that everything that happens on the outside, first happens on the inside. What I mean by that is that whatever you want out of life, you have to work on the inner game first. I say that because I think everyone wants to feel peaceful, fulfilled, happy, and healthy. That’s an inside job. If you work on the inner stuff first, no one can take that away from you because those are the things you can control. So let’s say you tell yourself you’ll be happy when you get a certain job. You get that job and then you get let go. Now, you’re suffering because the thing that gave you happiness is gone. You gave up control of your happiness to a job rather than learning how to be happy with or without it. It’s not always quite that simple, but I think that’s a good way of beginning to think about the things that you rely upon for fulfillment. People often depend on uncontrollable factors to determine their self-worth and overall life satisfaction. Also, many people haven’t quite learned how to manage emotions. So, I’m passionate about showing people that even when it isn’t easy, there is always a solution and you can have that inner balance that you seek if you’re willing to work for it.

Based on your research or experience, how exactly does self-care impact our mental wellness?

Based on my experience, I think self-care is directly related to mental wellness. Burnout is really high right now and I think part of that is because of people sacrificing their needs for a goal, a relationship, their family, etc. Most people I know are overcommitted and even if you’re just trying to keep up with responsibilities, life in general, can often feel like a blur. Another big issue is that we are overstimulated with distractions and this keeps us disconnected. Self-care isn’t just bubble baths, it can be anything that helps you connect with yourself and validate your voice. It might look like having a tough conversation because you need to advocate for your needs or it might look like taking 5 minutes to do a quick meditation in the middle of the day to release stress hormones. For example, I gave a workshop on burnout and one of the audience members was concerned about the burnout they were facing. We’ll call her Sally. It turns out that Sally was supporting a loved one financially and also working in a high-stress job. The loved one was in a high-stress situation themselves so Sally often felt that to be supportive, she had to keep her stress to herself. In this instance, we talked about how voicing her feelings and validating her own struggles might be a helpful step in avoiding future burnout because she has to honor and be truthful with herself and her loved ones about her needs. If she’s able to do that, she can keep tabs on how she’s really feeling and take steps to destress before she gets to the point of crashing and burning.

Here is our primary question. Can you please share your “Top Five Selfcare Practices That Each Of Us Can Use To Improve Our Mental Wellness”?

1. Take pockets of time for inner stillness. Not everyone has a bunch of time to spend each day on self-care. I get that. I also understand that sometimes you might start out your day doing well and then well, life happens. Take 5–10 minute breaks to meditate, breathe, listen to a song, go on a walk, or whatever to let go and reset your mind. Get out of our environment and take a break.
2. Rest. We treat rest like it’s a luxury but it’s a necessity. We’re not machines and even machines break when they don’t get proper rest. The most productive people are the ones who take time to rest and disconnect. Give yourself a chance to just be with no agenda. If you want clarity and to be more productive, rest!
3. Prioritize your physical health. Hydration, nutrition, and exercise go a long way in self-care but also in improving mental wellness. We often neglect this and look for quick fixes because we have “more important things to think about,” or we’re “too busy,” but I’ve learned that if you don’t take care of yourself, your body will make you whether that’s through injury, illness, or a mental health issue. There’s a whole field of study about how your mental wellness is connected to gut health. Also, there are studies on how if you’re depressed, exercise can help relieve those symptoms. Your body is a sophisticated system that works together.
4. Talk to someone. Whether it’s a friend, a coach, a spouse, a religious leader, or a therapist, make sure you talk to people about how you’re doing. It doesn’t matter if you’re doing well or going through a hard time, talking to someone can help you relieve stress, clear your mind, and oftentimes will help you discover things you never would have otherwise. The sheer experience of validating out loud that I’m a person going through a human experience is absolutely an act of self-care because it is an act of connecting to yourself by connecting with another soul. There’s a reason that humans are social beings; we all have emotions and we want to feel like we’re not alone in our experiences.
5. Allow for unstructured time. I think kids and adults are struggling to keep up with demanding schedules these days. When we were young, free time was a given. It wasn’t something you had to schedule. Today, oftentimes, we have to search through our crowded calendars for free time. I adamantly believe that an act of self-care is allowing yourself unstructured free time with no agenda. This way you’re not checking off a to-do list even if it’s fun. You’re allowing yourself the freedom to see what happens. Maybe you need a nap or want to binge-watch a TV show or go to the beach or who knows, but that freedom is precious time for mental rest and enjoyment. To do this, you’ll have to say “no” to some things, which might be difficult in the moment but you’ll be happy with the reward of the ability to just be and go with the flow.

Can you please share a few of the main roadblocks that prevent people from making better self-care choices? What would you suggest can be done to overcome those roadblocks?

For starters, I think people take their health for granted, and we think that we can do it all or that we have to at least appear like we are strong enough to do it all. Also, we’re constantly connected and so our balance is all out of whack. We’re very focused on what other people are doing or appear to be achieving and we’re losing that connection with ourselves. We want to keep up and belong so we’re afraid to be alone or slow down. It’s a total disconnect and we’re suffering because of that.

The best suggestion I have is to give yourself permission to be human. Allow yourself the space to connect with yourself and the time to do the inner work to achieve inner balance. Give yourself the grace to validate whatever it is you’re feeling, accept it, and then let it go. And most importantly, ask for help. You don’t have to do it all alone. People have exercise accountability partners, so why not get a self-care accountability partner?

In one sentence, what would you say to someone who doesn’t prioritize their mental well-being?

If you can maintain your car with oil changes and plug in your phone to recharge, you can certainly treat yourself like a human and not a robot by prioritizing your maintenance needs.

Thank you for all that great insight! Let’s start wrapping up. Can you share your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Why does this quote resonate with you so much?

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.” — Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.

The quote really speaks for itself. For me, it’s incredibly humbling and comforting to acknowledge that I am a spirit first. I’m living a human experience and all the lessons that come with that, but maybe don’t be so wrapped up in that experience that you put your ego in the driver’s seat and leave your soul in the dust.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? They might just see this, especially if we both tag them :-)

Viola Davis is an absolute Queen and a treasure. I am certain I could learn so much from her, but more than anything, I would be honored just to be in the presence of her energy. Her soul is so magnetic. I can feel it when I watch her onscreen and hear her speak in interviews like the one she did with Oprah.

I truly appreciate your time and valuable contribution. One last question. How can our readers best reach or follow you?

Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/themistybuck/

LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/mistybuck/

Website — purposesoulathletics.com

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent on this. We wish you only continued success.

About The Interviewer: Maria Angelova, MBA is a disruptor, author, motivational speaker, body-mind expert, Pilates teacher and founder and CEO of Rebellious Intl. As a disruptor, Maria is on a mission to change the face of the wellness industry by shifting the self-care mindset for consumers and providers alike. As a mind-body coach, Maria’s superpower is alignment which helps clients create a strong body and a calm mind so they can live a life of freedom, happiness and fulfillment. Prior to founding Rebellious Intl, Maria was a Finance Director and a professional with 17+ years of progressive corporate experience in the Telecommunications, Finance, and Insurance industries. Born in Bulgaria, Maria moved to the United States in 1992. She graduated summa cum laude from both Georgia State University (MBA, Finance) and the University of Georgia (BBA, Finance). Maria’s favorite job is being a mom. Maria enjoys learning, coaching, creating authentic connections, working out, Latin dancing, traveling, and spending time with her tribe. To contact Maria, email her at angelova@rebellious-intl.com. To schedule a free consultation, click here.