Book excerpt: Develop resilience and thrive as a care professional! Root Strength: A Health and Care Professionals' Guide to Minimizing Stress and Maximizing Thriving discusses principles of self-care that can help you prevent emotional fatigue and job burnout in highly stressful workplaces. An evidence-based approach examines how the care professional can develop self-compassion, mindfulness, relationships with co-workers, and perceived satisfaction with one's career. Written by noted educator and researcher Shannon Dames, this practical manual shows how you can apply these insights on the job and enhance your personal well-being in real-world health care settings. With the prevalence of mental health issues among care professionals — including rates of PTSD and major depressive disorder (MDD) — appearing much higher than that in the general population, never has a resource like this been more required! - Focus on both theory and practice allows for self-assessment and the ability to build resilience and thrive, with concepts underpinned by research. - UNIQUE! Journeys case studies highlight a care professional's real-world experience/concerns, encouraging you to think about how you would handle the situation as you read through the chapter; the chapter closes with an effective method to handle the real-life situation, demonstrating how to apply the lessons learned. - UNIQUE! Clear and conversational writing style and metaphorical roots/tree framework makes it easier to understand concepts. - Practical exercises throughout the text allow you to build and strengthen your own metaphorical roots. - Vignettes demonstrate how concepts apply to real-world scenarios. - Attuning for the Journey Ahead sums up the content at the end of each chapter, ensuring that you understand the key concepts. - UNIQUE! Special boxes contributed by Dr. Crosbie Watler, MD, FRCPC help you understand and navigate through professionals' mental health challenges.