Resilience Unravelled

Host Dr Russell Thackeray interviews Georgina Woodley in Perth, Australia about her background in big-four consulting, strategy, and 20+ years in market research, and her interest in applying personal-development “energy” concepts to organisations.

They discuss how people sense workplace culture, how individual mood and “underlying human state” affects meetings, authenticity, and leadership responsibilities to support mental wellbeing.

Woodley introduces Joy-o-meter, a measurement framework/program that assesses customer and staff experience plus the underlying human state to reveal patterns, capacity, and friction points affecting performance, loyalty, burnout risk, absenteeism, and turnover.

She argues joy is a strategic advantage linked to creativity, flow, and psychological safety, and contrasts joy measurement with satisfaction and NPS. Joy-o-meter uses succinct quantitative surveys with open-ended comments, can isolate current issues from past experiences, and is delivered flexibly via reporting, workshops, or dashboards.

Contact is via LinkedIn and joy-o-meter.com.

00:00 Summer vs Aussie Winter

01:39 Meet Georgina Woodley

02:30 What Energy Means at Work

06:19 Authenticity and Mood Responsibility

10:11 Measuring Joy with Joy-o-meter

12:59 Why Joy Drives Performance

16:36 Beyond NPS and Satisfaction

19:34 How Joy-o-meter Works in Practice

21:57 Finding Friction and Burnout Risk

26:30 Expectations and Better Signals

29:08 Where to Learn More

29:56 ROI Proof and Closing Thoughts

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

Host Dr Russell Thackeray welcomes Fort Lauderdale–based visual artist, therapeutic arts practitioner, author, and two-time cancer survivor Nerissa Balland, who discusses her work at the intersection of creativity, resilience, and personal growth.

After being diagnosed with metastatic melanoma in 2016 while pregnant and parenting a toddler, she navigated surgeries, immunotherapy, later recurrence, chemotherapy she stopped due to low odds and side effects, and advocacy challenges including being told to terminate a pregnancy; she is now 8.5 years NED.

Balland distinguishes therapeutic arts from art therapy and reframes resilience as engaging with adversity and moving forward, focusing on process over product, identity, and what can be controlled.

She describes interviewing 100+ young mothers with cancer and her book, "Canvas of Courage," featuring 19 stories with practical “grace notes,” addressing gratitude, creativity, and how to show up for others.

00:00 Heatwave Welcome

00:48 Meet Nerissa

01:47 Art and Resilience Mission

04:07 What Visual Artist Means

05:20 Redefining Resilience

07:24 Therapeutic Arts Explained

10:24 Identity and Honest Expression

12:12 Corporate Toxicity Lessons

17:51 Control and Moving Forward

19:38 Creative Coping Stories

21:48 Melanoma Diagnosis Journey

30:14 Advocacy and Treatment Choices

32:28 Canvas of Courage Book

38:14 Where to Find Nerissa

38:57 Final Thanks and Goodbye

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

Dr Russell Thackeray interviews Melbourne-based clinician and BBM (Brain Benefit Movement) founder Aram Cargill, a father of nine and former musician who developed a protocol to improve self-regulation and executive function, informed by raising a daughter with level 3 autism and two sons with ADHD and publishing multiple journal papers.

They discuss ADHD diagnosis via DSM indicators, how ADHD traits vary by individual, and how ADHD-like symptoms can arise from stress, trauma, environment, and modern “base load” pressure.

Cargill differentiates ADHD and autism, describing autism as more insular and emphasising expectation management and transition “thresholds,” and explains hyperfocus and detail-noticing as strengths.

They explore higher burnout in neurodivergent people, concerns about short-form scrolling (including a child’s stutter resolving when iPads were removed), and his book “Seven Pillars of Mental Fitness,” arguing for proactive mental fitness in schools and a physiology-first lens; he outlines pillars including vision, attitude, awareness, adaptability, grit, recovery, and connectivity, and shares where to find the book and his research.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

00:27 Aram Background and BBM

01:58 What ADHD Really Is

04:01 Symptoms vs Diagnosis

07:10 ADHD and Autism Differences

08:23 Autism Expectations and Safety

12:16 Hyperfocus and Tech Careers

15:41 Burnout and Modern Stress

18:21 Social Media and Kids Brains

22:20 Why Mental Fitness Matters

27:10 Seven Pillars Overview

29:45 Physiology First Psychology

31:14 Who the Book Is For

33:51 Where to Get the Book

34:58 Find Aram and Closing

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

Host Dr Russell Thackeray interviews Dr. Kim Foster, an MD and former family doctor now living on Vancouver Island and spending summers in London, about identity and change.

Foster explains identity as the “I am” stories people tell themselves, often inherited from parents, teachers, or society, and argues even positive labels can be limiting.

She shares her own shift from being “the artistic one” to embracing science and medicine, and describes her current work as an author, speaker, YouTube creator, coach, and educator.

Foster outlines her three-step process—recognise, redesign, ritualise—emphasising building “identity evidence” through small daily actions rather than affirmations, illustrated by her learning golf in her 50s.

They discuss gendered identity pressures around work and motherhood, the risks of over-identifying with diagnostic labels, and her new book, "Redesigning You: Change Your Inner Story, Transform Your Health," plus her website drkimfoster.com.

00:00 Welcome and London Intro

00:31 Canada UK Summer Life

02:07 From GP to New Career

05:10 What Identity Means

06:59 Identity Shifts in School

08:58 Reclaiming Your Identity

10:47 Building Identity Evidence

12:18 Golf and Bridge Identities

14:30 Gender and Role Identity

19:20 Three Rs Framework

21:51 New Book Redesigning You

24:39 Labels and Being Unwell

26:55 Client Success Story

29:04 Where to Find Kim

29:39 Closing Thanks

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

In this episode of Resilience Unravelled with Dr Russell Thackeray, Antonio Michael Downing discusses growing up in Trinidad and Tobago with his grandmother, who taught him to read from the King James Bible and to sing Anglican hymns, before her death led to his move at age 11 to rural Northern Ontario.

He describes the shock of migration, being renamed “Michael” at school, and how losing familiar culture and language prompted questions about identity, belonging, and the self, shaping a lifelong focus on fluid identity and resilience.

Downing links resilience to flexibility and performance across contexts, from multiple musical personas to a corporate career at BlackBerry, and notes that those who migrate between ages 9–14 often become “a third thing” between cultures.

He connects these themes to his memoir Saga Boy and novel Black Cherokee, explains his creative process as a “visitation,” and shares that Black Cherokee has an Audible audiobook, a paperback coming in August, and that he can be reached on Instagram @antoniomichaeldowning.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

01:24 Growing Up in Trinidad

02:22 Grandmother’s Gifts

04:26 Move to Canada

07:01 Reinventing Identity

11:17 Neither Here Nor There

13:45 Two Jackets Life

19:08 Resilience Through Fluidity

23:13 Themes in Music and Books

26:24 Toronto and Belonging

28:37 Writing as Visitation

33:35 Books Formats and Where to Find

34:53 Final Thanks and Goodbye

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

#resilience, #burnout, #intuition

In this Resilience Unravelled episode, host Dr Russell Thackeray interviews Chris Hill, a London-based “lived experience practitioner” who helps people with mental health and addiction by teaching an educational “separation model” that distinguishes the conscious self from mind/body mechanisms.

Hill shares his own 20-year history of addiction and explains addiction as dopamine-driven habitual wiring that can be harmful when it causes damage to self or others, spanning substances (nicotine, alcohol, drugs) and behaviours (gambling, sex, porn, shopping, social media).

He argues modern society “hacks” survival mechanisms, highlights environmental risks such as youth vaping and its gateway effects, and criticises willpower-only approaches.

Hill outlines his book Get Your Life Back, his private mentoring via beatmyaddictions.com, and his charity robhillfoundation.org, founded after his twin brother’s fatal overdose in 2014.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

00:37 Chris Hill Background

01:10 Personal Addiction Journey

02:49 What Addiction Means

05:46 Physical vs Behavioural Addictions

08:24 Who Is Most Vulnerable

10:33 Environment and Youth Vaping

13:48 Education and Rewiring Solution

16:59 Separation Model Explained

22:13 Natural State and Breaking the Cycle

23:38 Book and Program Options

26:24 Support Community and Faith

28:01 Charity Links and Closing

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

#resilience, #burnout, #intuition

Host Dr Russell Thackeray interviews Dale Atkinson from near Reading, a former finance compliance consultant who now works as a patient advocate, audits companies for “patient trust leaks,” sells adjunct wellness modalities, and writes.

Dale recounts that in 2024 his partner was diagnosed with small cell lung cancer and surgically cured, then he was found to have a large esophageal tumour and later told he had terminal, metastatic cancer (T4b N3 M1) with 11.5 months to live, after years of GP visits for GI symptoms and a long wait for a “routine” endoscopy.

He pursued chemotherapy and immunotherapy alongside extensive research, next-generation sequencing, off-label medications, nutrition/naturopathic support, and modalities such as hyperbaric oxygen, high-dose vitamin C protocols, ketosis/fasting, and medical cannabis, while warning against social-media “snake oil.”

He reports no visible signs of disease, has made major lifestyle changes to reduce stress, and is launching a charity, Beyond the Standard, to push NHS change; he emphasises self-advocacy.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

00:28 From Finance to Advocacy

01:34 A Shocking Cancer Cascade

03:38 Years of Missed Symptoms

06:09 Turning Anger Into Research

09:24 Snake Oil and Red Herrings

11:57 Chemo Immuno and Realistic Goals

13:17 Next-Gen Sequencing Explained

16:41 Integrative Care vs NHS Pathway

18:30 Lifestyle Overhaul After Diagnosis

20:03 Where to Start Without Rabbit Holes

20:41 Avoid Social Media Gurus

21:26 Find Credible Integrative Experts

22:08 Vetting Doctors and Directories

24:27 Biohacking Hype and Supplement Scams

25:30 Bloodwork Guided Supplementation

26:31 Ketosis and Fasting Strategy

28:23 Medical Cannabis for Symptoms

31:31 Access and NHS Change Efforts

33:51 Prognosis and Staying on Protocol

34:37 Hyperbaric Oxygen and Red Light

36:43 Self Advocacy and Final Takeaways

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

Host Dr Russell Thackeray interviews Jodie Herbert in Canberra, Australia, founder of Ability Pathways Australia and a carer of three children on the autism spectrum.

They discuss neurodiversity as natural variation in thinking, differences in autism categorisation (ASD 1–4), and how modern workplaces with constant digital channels can make neurodivergent needs harder to accommodate.

Jodie describes practical, low-cost adjustments employers can make—written follow-ups, clear SOPs, and quiet workspaces or work-from-home options—and explains her data-driven “longitudinal study” approach: clients complete daily questionnaires for 30 days, producing visualised recommendations to help employers close the “implementation gap.”

They also cover Australia’s disability legislation and the NDIS, noting proposed 2026 funding cuts and a pending parliamentary bill, with concerns about service loss, economic impact, and participant wellbeing.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

00:21 Life in Canberra

01:28 Jodie’s Story and Mission

02:50 What Neurodiversity Means

03:56 Autism Levels Explained

06:37 Workplace Overload and Inclusion

11:33 Simple Adjustments That Work

14:57 Remote Work and Real Needs

17:31 Closing the Implementation Gap

20:56 Australia Disability Policy and NDIS

23:32 NDIS Cuts and What’s at Stake

27:16 How to Connect and Final Thoughts

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

Dr Russell Thackeray welcomes Dr. Denis Cronson, a South African-born medical doctor now based in Switzerland, to discuss leadership through a biological lens.

Cronson describes moving from trauma surgery into 20 years of organisational health and executive consulting, observing how overcommitment, “success but sacrifice” cultures, and failure patterns deplete leaders and spread dysfunction through organisations. They argue many leaders respond with “hacks” (supplements, sleep programs, workouts) that increase capacity without changing the underlying system creating unsustainable load. Cronson links leadership attributes like judgment, empathy, adaptability, and working memory to neurobiology affected by sleep, nutrition, and chronic stress, and notes normalised distraction and phone scrolling. He outlines “Leadership 3.0” as the biological and psychological condition required to lead, and introduces his book, The Executive Condition, released internationally Sept 1, 2026, aimed at leaders, boards, shareholders, HR, and coaches.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro

00:30 South Africa to Switzerland

01:23 Culture Humour and Humanity

03:30 From Trauma Surgery to Exec Health

05:29 Why Hacks Miss the System

09:06 Neurobiology of Leadership

12:56 Working Memory and Doomscrolling

15:20 ADHD Normalisation Debate

17:11 Leadership 3.0 Framework

19:35 The Executive Condition Book

24:57 Wellbeing Programs vs Redesign

28:09 Resilience Band Aids and Culture

29:11 Where to Get the Book Closing

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com

Host Dr Russell Thackeray welcomes Andrea Carter, a Canada-based organisational scientist known for validating a way to measure belonging and leading studies across 3,500 people in 13 companies, later extended across eight industries and 150,000 employees. This is a genuinely fascinating episode and worth a full listen..!

Andrea argues resilience is often treated as a solo sport—“exile with a deadline”—and that the real breaking point is facing hardship alone. She defines belonging as a measurable performance metric co-created by individuals and systems, distinct from “fitting in,” and explains five neurological indicators: comfort (clarity/predictability), connection (trust beyond transaction), contribution (evidence you matter), psychological safety, and wellbeing/recovery, noting “resilience without recovery is delayed collapse.”

The discussion covers measuring belonging at organisational, team, and individual levels, focusing on shrinking belonging “gap scores,” and cites a plant intervention improving gap and discretionary effort, plus faster safety reporting.

They also touch on DEI measurement issues, cultural differences, schools’ rising anxiety, and social media’s negative effects.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro

01:00 Andrea Background and Research

04:34 Resilience Is Not Solo

07:04 Fitting In vs Belonging

10:35 Measuring Belonging Science

11:44 Five Indicators Explained

20:59 Teams Leaders and Culture

26:36 Belonging Drives Performance

30:39 Friction That Grows

39:32 Schools Youth and Social Media

44:05 Wrap Up and Contact Info

You can contact us at [email protected]

Resources can be found online or link to our website https://resilienceunravelled.com