Scott Schimmel (00:00)
All right, let's get started. Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of the Vector Accelerator podcast. I am one of your hosts, Scott Schimmel, and I am here with a brand new friend, Shannon Blakey. Shannon, welcome to the show. Please tell us who the heck you are.
Shannon (00:13)
Hi, thanks so much Scott for having me. I'm really happy to be here. My name is Shannon Blakey. I'm a clinical psychologist by training. So that means that I have both a research and clinical degree in mental health and how to understand the best ways to promote it and how to intervene when someone's having problems with that. And I specialize specifically within veteran mental health and well-being. So I'm very pleased and grateful to be on the show today.
Scott Schimmel (00:39)
Yes. Okay. So why the troops? Why, why veterans? How did you get into this?
Shannon (00:45)
It's a great question. I have a grandfather who retired from the Air Force at the DFC. And so there was some idea about the military, but it wasn't really a big part of my upbringing despite growing up in a very military friendly state, which was Texas. But it was through my clinical psychology training path. We do rotations. We call them practica, where we go get supervised training and how to.
diagnosed in treatment or health concerns and I rotated through a VA medical center just down the road from where I was in graduate school, which is in North Carolina, and I fell in love immediately. I think it probably is a dichotomy that you recognize quickly if you can operate in that environment. It's the largest health care system we have in the country and if you feel that calling, it's serving those who served and that resonated with me in a way I didn't anticipate and
been stuck on it since.
Scott Schimmel (01:41)
What is it about veterans you enjoy?
Shannon (01:45)
Well, I'm hesitant to group a whole population of people into a generalization, even though mine is positive. I recognize that, but I think there's the strength and resilience.
Scott Schimmel (01:49)
There. Yes.
Shannon (01:58)
there are these unique skills that they have that, I mean, I was becoming an adult in college straight out of high school and I was learning my ropes in a way very different from folks who when it's 18 went and joined the military. So appreciating that difference and the complimentary skill sets you could bring to the table of addressing what they wanted. And then frankly, I've never laughed so hard during my work life than when I was in the VA working with veterans every day. I get the gals humor, I'm all for it.
Scott Schimmel (02:05)
Yeah.
Thank you for saying that. Yes. Yes.
Yes, I'm so glad you said that. And that's what I was going to What maybe a couple things I've I've certainly appreciated humor that I've experienced the veteran community. And I'll just say all of them. They're all funny. Just just to over generalize. then secondly, think an openness, like a real sincere openness to having thoughtful discussions with people. I'm like you, an outsider. So I
Shannon (02:39)
Okay.
Scott Schimmel (02:55)
I think I always feel like a bit of hopefully like reticence or humility of like, hey, I'm not I'm not on the inside of your community. So trying to be really polite and respectful. But it's the humor that seems to make a bridge really quickly. And I hope I haven't gone so far as to start making fun of them with them. But I can certainly appreciate the humor from the outside.
Shannon (03:20)
Everything
can be part of the Rappora building. Yeah, just listening and learning and yeah, I mean, just being open and never pretending that you don't know something you don't. I've, yeah, just jumping in and think, well, you said XYZ, insert acronym of a thousand that exists in the military context. What does that mean? And yeah, really rewarding work.
Scott Schimmel (03:22)
Yes.
Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
I'm no clinician, but the work that I've done with veterans has been to have deep, honest conversations about what they're going through and what they've been through. And that has meant I've heard quite a bit of real raw, vulnerable stuff. And again, not being a therapist, not being a clinician, don't, number one, don't diagnose anybody for sure, although I might have some hunches and I certainly don't prescribe from the clinical standpoint.
But that being said, I'm curious to hear your perspective about what makes the veteran community unique as a clinician. So what are the maybe unique challenges that you see, the trends? And I'd be curious to hear your thoughts of like most recently too.
Shannon (04:24)
Yes, well most recently and where a lot of my focus is right now is the critical period right after I get out of the military. This started when I was in the VA. I was working in the VA at the time and in clinic and by definition if I was working with a veteran it's because they came to a clinic for a specific identified problem that had been diagnosed and so I was going to be their therapist. But alongside that I had fallen into
I don't know if it was a specialty, but I started working with a of veterans who were new. So they were pretty fresh out of the military. And so adjacent to whatever they were presenting with clinically was this whole notion of readjusting to civilian life, reintegrating into communities that, you know, they had been separated from and gone from for a while and how that was both an exciting phase with opportunity.
There's new things going on and there's a lot of good in that. There's also some challenges in and unknowns. And so how to help someone navigate that in a way that was useful and helpful for them. And so I'm no longer at the VA and I do probably more research now than I do clinical work, but it's all really focusing in on how to just help veterans tap into their strengths because
There's so much of them and how to translate that to the civilian world, whether it's a work or educational setting or other areas of life like relationships or just hobbies. can, you know, things like finding a new tribe, for example, how do you do that when you like if someone had a really positive experience in the military, how do you find something that's meaningful and fulfilling even though it won't ever be exactly what you had before?
Scott Schimmel (06:08)
Where is the line do you think? Because again, the nature of conversations that we get into is often pretty deep and vulnerable. like give me advice as someone who's working with veterans, that's not a trained clinician. Like what's the line? When do we A, like say, hey, this is above my pay grade or beyond the scope of what we do. And then two, what is that? What is your advice? Like what do we do when we hear something that's especially worrisome?
Shannon (06:38)
I think the best way can answer that is with a visual metaphor. I've been so fortunate to train from really expert people and there are two constructs for subtlety relevant that I want to share that theory would suggest are really important. We know they're important for people in general, but theory would say it's really important for this military to civilian transition. And that is increasing a sense of purpose.
Scott Schimmel (06:45)
Awesome.
Shannon (07:06)
and increasing a sense of social connection. So these are things that are good for humans and really important during transition periods. And so I talk a lot about these ideas with someone named Phil Gant and he and I have been talking about this as imagining a gauge. So you have red, yellow and green. And so if you think about applied to the military transition, if a veteran is getting out and if we take for example,
green, you know, maybe the relationships are going well, they've landed a civilian job, they feel like they're able to contribute and they're able to do the physical things they want to do and have hobbies and things just feel like they're going well and they won't be perfect because veterans are also humans like the rest of us and life is never perfect but things feel good. They have coping resources and things that they can turn to if what they have in their immediate skill set isn't readily available.
Scott Schimmel (07:50)
Yeah.
Shannon (08:01)
And then if we move along the gauge, let's take the yellow and maybe a veteran who's getting out in the yellow just has bit more obstacles they're navigating in that. So that could be financial strain, like new bills they're learning to pay or a relationship strain, which could be difficulty making new connections or just the original relationships operate differently now given time and just given change that happens. And
you know, maybe some other coping strategies aren't optimal for what we would really, really want for someone, but they're getting by and they have supports and they can recognize when things feel a little too tense and they need to reach out for support. And then maybe we move further along into the red, which would be someone who's really having difficulty filling that void. They haven't found their tribe, maybe thoughts and emotions and memories that they just really didn't have time or the space to process.
Scott Schimmel (08:48)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Shannon (08:56)
on active
duty status or just there and it feels overwhelming and a lot and things can feel really intense and then if things go in the deep red, then you know, someone could feel like I just wish I wasn't here. So we have this whole spectrum. I have not transitioned out of the military, an ally of the community, but I've not experienced it. But think the yellow is a really common place to be when coming out and so I think, you know, resources and tools like
Vector Accelerator and others that can help equip veterans to get and stay in the green. But recognizing when you slip into yellow and red, think it's into your question of, it looks like we might need to pull in some other supports. What are they and can professional services be on the table in that?
Scott Schimmel (09:45)
That's so helpful. I've never heard that red, yellow, green. And that's like a real easy, like intuitive level of like, I don't know, auditing, even to self assess where you're at. think that could be, could be a real helpful piece for what we do, especially as you get started in vector accelerator. That's, that's a part of, think the advisor group that's helped in shaping this for the last few years. One of the thoughts we've had of, you know, seeing vector accelerated more like a
portal than a program per se. And by portal, it's like, want to, you know, kind of filter people into this and then filter them to the right spots. One, we don't, we're not trying to replace really any veteran service organization. There's number one, there's so many, but two, we really think what we're doing is kind of a unique niche on the front end of a lot of these things. So the idea of knowing how to route people in the right directions that I mean, I think that
that grid or that code system could be super helpful for us to be like, hey, how about, have you thought about this? And if we can kind of narrow it down to from 40,000 something VSOs down to like, hey, here's the top two or something that we know and we know these people and we know how to make the contact, that could be an easy kind of gift for them.
Shannon (11:02)
Absolutely, it's yeah, it's a continuum and people move in and out on that but like you said being able to support transitioning service members and new veterans and recognizing that and whether it's a skill like a psychological skill or practical resources to move back into that green state or closer to it. I mean that's nothing happens overnight. That's the good stuff bit by bit.
Scott Schimmel (11:18)
Yeah.
Would you, so I just want to get your take on this throughout transition. There are these little things that get triggered in people. And one, think I'm curious your thoughts on this. It seems to me that there's like for many kind of a survival thing that gets triggered one, because it's about your, your livelihood, your, your income's going away.
where you live, like there's just so much about like the tent has been packed up and now, you know, you might not have a map or even a compass. And I'm just curious, like, what are your thoughts on what happens to someone then? Because, you know, especially our work, we're trying to help them make some pretty high level decisions and thoughtful reflection. And if someone's kind of in this, like, I don't want to use the red, yellow, green for this, but if they're sort of in this overwhelmed zone and they're feeling
threatened by survival. And we're trying to have conversations about values and priorities. I just wonder, I just want to, I just love to get your take on that.
Shannon (12:26)
Yes, I think it's making the values and priorities feel more doable. if someone's in the water and you're saying, we've got a lifeboat right here, and they can't because they're just trying to then convert, can we make that a lifesaver that we throw out? And with the tug rope, we pull them in. Can we make values more accessible and bite size? Because I do think that that is the way to help people move forward.
Scott Schimmel (12:37)
Yeah, yes.
Shannon (12:54)
becomes the compass, to use your analogy, values as the guiding force. And there's a ton of research in the mental health phase backing that up that drives a lot of what I do and how I think about this. that value is what's most important to you about something in life, who you want to be, who you're striving to be, and what you stand for in those areas. And if, yeah, I can't imagine a way of getting out of that
Scott Schimmel (12:56)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Shannon (13:24)
sense of threat are stuck without the values as the clarifying direction of how to do that. You have to then make it step by step. But if you don't know where to go, how are you going to get out
Scott Schimmel (13:26)
Hm.
Let me get you taking this speaking of values. So I love this conversation values like what are they? So let me just give you two. Okay. So if you were one thought about values, if you were to follow me around like a creep and you were to watch how we spend my time, if you were to like get into my internet search history, you would see my bank account. Like that would be, I think you can kind of develop this makeup of
clearly what's important to me based on how I spend my time and money, etc. Are those values or is it more like the idea of the vision board of like the aspirational? This is the kind of person I want to be and and is there sort of a tension in between both of those?
Shannon (14:19)
Yeah, mean, can be. The first thing you described, I would say, is just how someone spends their time. And this feeling of mismatch and discomfort, misalignment can often stem from what I'm doing does not line up with what I care about most. And so those were the values in your actual action, your behaviors. They're not in alignment. That generally doesn't feel good to us. And can it feel?
Scott Schimmel (14:32)
Yeah.
Shannon (14:45)
hopeless and get even more intense and severe than that. So I would say more to the vision board. I'm not familiar with that language, what's most important to you in your life about something? in terms of like, that's a kind of fuzzy answer. What does that even mean? Finish the sentence. It's important for me to dot, dot, dot. And maybe that's important for me to be a good spouse or it's important for me.
Scott Schimmel (15:05)
yeah.
Shannon (15:11)
to be a team player, or it's important for me to be self-sufficient financially. We can think about values across so many different important life domains, and that's the start.
Scott Schimmel (15:21)
Yeah,
yeah, that's awesome. Okay, I'm sure you do what well, okay, you're doing research, but in your in your kind of clinical work sitting down with somebody, I'm guessing you don't spend a lot of time giving advice or lecturing. You probably spent a lot of time listening and but if you so okay, let me just set you up if I want to give you the chance if if you're a transitioning veteran listening and they get to hear you.
And what is your like, I don't know, what's your charge? What is your, what is your quick Ted talk? Like what does a veteran need to do? Must do, must avoid. Like what is your like real clear lecture?
Shannon (16:05)
a good psychologist, I can't give you hard firms do's and don'ts, but really because it's tailoring. So in my role specifically as a clinician, it's a guide, but this role could be brought to life by someone who's not a professional, so a friend, a trusted buddy, a spouse, a sibling. So someone to help guide and ideally just create the space, the safe space and the sounding board to explore what is it that matters and what can I do to try to do that and
Scott Schimmel (16:07)
Hahaha
Shannon (16:35)
When do I recognize that I have opportunity? And when is there a problem that I can systematically break down? And then when is a problem not necessarily solvable and not yet and I to bring in outside supports? Again, that could be low intensity like a manager to help navigate a work conflict or a situation, or again, it could be a professional for a health or mental health consideration.
Scott Schimmel (16:49)
Yeah.
What's your hope for veterans transitioning?
Shannon (17:07)
My hope for veterans in transition is that the community of supporters can better close the gap. have DOD, which offers so many wonderful things for service members on active duty status. And we have the VA, which is not for everyone, but it offers so many wonderful things for veterans. And we have VSOs who really helped to fill that in the community yet. And there can still be this feeling that, like, what do I know what's out
What are their resources and how do I access them? Maybe for some people, they know they're out there, but it's hesitancy to ask for the support or feeling like I don't need it or I don't deserve it. I think society needs to do better of the wraparound. But I think at an individual level, just what would you tell your best buddy or your kid?
Scott Schimmel (17:47)
Yeah. Yeah.
Hmm.
Shannon (18:03)
or your life partner,
if they were feeling how you felt, what would you tell them? Because we tend to have more grace or fuel we care about than ourselves, unfortunately.
Scott Schimmel (18:10)
Yeah,
yeah. Well, okay, so someone wants to connect with you, learn more from you, like what's the best way?
Shannon (18:17)
Yes, I love connecting with the community and catching me on LinkedIn would be the best start. We can switch to phone or email based on what's best and it's Shannon Blakey and that probably has my degree PhD after that.
Scott Schimmel (18:28)
nice. Well, Shannon, thank you so much for reaching out. Thanks for being a friend to veterans and connecting with Vector Accelerator. And we're going make sure to have some resources in the show notes as well as your LinkedIn and look forward to staying in touch and serving more veterans together. Go America.
Shannon (18:45)
Thank you so much for having me. It's really great to be part.
Scott Schimmel (18:48)
Thanks.
Awesome. Hey, thanks.
