Life has that way of keeping you on your toes. There are some things that jump out at you from nowhere - an accident, a new relationship, a surprise baby (more on that one later). And then there are other things that creep up on you slowly, sneak in through the back door and before you know it, they are as much a part of your life as your morning cup of tea. And no, I'm not talking about the stray neighbourhood cat that we seem to have adopted (to my partner's delight). Burnout is one of those things. It is insidious. In fact, it would be considerably easier if it landed with fanfare and made its arrival known. But no, it slowly slowly builds, undermining your sense of self, energy levels and enjoyment of life. One of the hardest things is identifying when you are suffering from Burnout in the first place. Some of us call it stress, some of call it overwhelm. Some of us might not even really have the words for it, but just know that something it not right.
I now know that I have experienced Burnout three times in my life – not that I would have known what to call it the first two times. The third time round, it was a new friend, who works in the world of well-being, who very gently said, after I sat crying on her lounge floor one morning bewailing the disaster that I felt my life had become, “Is it not just Burnout though?”. “Hmmm maybe” I replied, not really knowing what that entailed. I had heard the term, but always just assumed it was for people who worked 80hrs week and barely slept, not people like me, just tackling normal life, right? Ah, how much I had to learn.
She was right of course, it was exactly that. Maybe I wasn’t working 80hrs a week, but work was less than ideal, I had some major family drama going on in the background, we were due to be kicked out of our rental, still in the middle of a pandemic, oh and did I mention – we just found out we were having a baby – Surprise! Maybe like me you assume that Burnout is always linked to work, but it is just not true. It can happen to anyone, at any time. When your plate is just too full, and you are not creating any time for yourself, your mind and body will send you MANY signs that something has to change. For me, I had felt numb, I had stopped caring about my work, I was hiding from my friends and family (and not just because of COVID) and my sleep had gone to absolute S&*%! I had felt similar previously at two major intersections in my life and I had treated the individual symptoms with some success. But here I was again, and this time with an even bigger change on the horizon, I knew it was time to sort it for good. Burnout runs deeper than just the surface symptoms and you have to address the whole picture to see lasting results.
It has been a while since then, and I can happily say that life is wonderful and my compass is pointed towards some truly exciting things. Naming what I was going through, and doing the work to identify Burnout at its root has been the launch pad for my success in this journey. I am really excited to share more with you.
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