Follow These Tips to Cure Burnout

What Burnout Is

You know you're burnt out when you feel a wave of fatigue that you can’t shake. This unshakable feeling lingers because of the constant, overbearing, stress you’re experiencing. The official definition of burnout is: the reduction of fuel or substance through use. With your body in mind, we can understand that fuel for us comes through sleep and good nutrition. Furthermore, when it comes to the mind, sleep is still good, though we need other experiences to refuel ourselves. View burnout as your body running on E and you needed to fill up 50 miles ago.

How Burnout Occurs

Everyone has different stressors in their life. Work, family, partners, lack of free time, or anything you can think of. And when those stressors start to combine and become overwhelming, the feeling can be physically taxing. Working overtime, dealing with people and their bad energy, or getting through emotional turmoil can be draining day after day. For most people we don't know how to say “NO” to those things that drain our energy. We stack up the bad instances and overload ourselves with everything that takes from us. Even though we might finish what needs to get done, we aren’t able to revel in our accomplishments. Our emotional battery depleted; we keep going as though nothing is wrong. Almost robotic in nature.

What Burnout Looks Like

Feeling the weight on your shoulders, as everyday feels longer than the last. A nap would help but that won’t fit in the schedule. Your brain working overtime, all the time, you can become manic. You forget things on your laundry list or lack the energy for everyday tasks. All you can think is, “I’m tired”. Burnout looks like not enjoying things you know would usually give you that serotonin surge you need. The brain fog lingers, and you find yourself possibly lost in your phone, achieving nothing but brain rot. The tasks you want to get done seem more tedious than usual. You have no sympathy for others' problems because you can’t even figure out your own. Everything about you is either numb or overwhelmingly stimulating. 

How to Get Over Burnout

First off, realize that its burnout that you’re feeling and you’re not going crazy. Once this realization occurs, shift your mind and body to what fuels it. What brings YOU life?! For me, it's the gym and great music. Sometimes it's just music because even the gym can be a part of my burnout problem. I turn my music up and just let it move through me. I get up feeling refreshed every time. For you it could be going for a walk or run. It could be knitting that sweater you’ve been wanting to finish or sitting down and watching your favorite movie under your favorite blanket. Burnout is cured by seriously putting your needs first, by actually putting in the action that fuels your fire. It seems counterintuitive since we’re already talking about lacking effort. Remember, the things that fuel your soul will never feel like a burden if you prioritize them.

Don’t allow anyone to make you feel bad for letting loose, when you know you've been wound up tight. You can’t be a dominating force in this life if you’re succumbing to its pressures. Reaching burnout looks different for us all. If you’ve reached it once, you can tell when you begin to approach it again. Your main responsibility is to take care of you, then everything else. 

Filling your cup means nothing if the cap is still on.

-J