Burnout: How to deal with it
World Mental Health Day is coming up on Sunday, October 10, 2021. This day in October has been used to raise awareness and normalize asking for help around the world. A mental health phenomenon that has seen an increase in recent years, especially during the pandemic is a condition called burnout.
What exactly is burnout?
Burnout is a state of mental fatigue. You feel overwhelmed and exhausted while still worrying about not having done enough. Burnout is the result of overwork and stress build-up from not properly addressing stressors in your life.
According to Emily Nagoski and Amelia Nagoski, the authors of Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, burnout is extremely common and anyone can experience it, but the experience and symptoms can vary from person to person.
Let’s talk about stress
To understand how to deal with burnout, you must first understand how stress and the stress cycle relate to burnout.
Two components of stress
Stressors: things that cause you to stress
Ex. Money, family problems, work, commute, unmeetable goals, future, etc.
Stress: The physiological reaction of your body as a result of stressors. Typically known as the fight, flight, or freeze response.
A cycle of stress begins when your body perceives something as a threat to your wellbeing (a stressor), this activates your body to provide a physiological reaction (a stress response) to the threat in the form of fight, flight, or freeze. The cycle ends with your body receiving the signal that you have responded to the physical stress and that you are safe.
For example, if the stress response to feeling stressed out from work is flight, an individual may alleviate the problem by going for a run or exercise to communicate to the body the stress response is solved, thus ending the stress cycle.
Burnout often happens because the stress response is left unsolved and thus, the cycle of stress is left incomplete. This leads to chronic stress piling up, overwhelming your body’s ability to properly respond.
“Feelings are a tunnel, you must get through the darkness to get to the end of it. Stress is a cycle, you must complete it to deal with it.” - Emily Nagoski
How do you complete the stress cycle and deal with stress?
The key to completing the stress cycle is to respond to your body’s physiological reactions to daily stressors and deal with them before they overwhelm you. Use your body to communicate compassion and kindness and listen to what it needs to deal with the stress. Simply “relaxing” is not enough, you must implement the following coping strategies to allow your body to understand it is safe and no longer under stress.
Here are four simple things you can do:
Physical Activity
Moving your body is one of the simplest ways to alleviate stress. Physical activity utilizes your muscles and communicates to your body a sense of completion and safety, which helps to complete the stress cycle.
Try these: Exercise, go for a long walk, do some yoga, cycle at your favorite park, do at-home full-body workouts like these, this 10-minute meditation, or any physical activity you enjoy.
Use your imagination
Guiding yourself through a thought where you visualize some type of accomplishment can connect the brain to the body to understand that you are safe and not under threat.
Try these: Read a book, watch a movie or tv show (that involves completion of a journey or quest), listen to a podcast, and anything where you can activate your imagination and follow along with a journey to the end and feel a sense of completion and catharsis.
Indulge in creative self-expression
Find a form of creative expression outside of your professional life or stressors so you are not constantly surrounded and hounded by stress-inducing activities.
Try these: crafting, cooking, painting, knitting, or these activities.
Use the power of connection
Self-care may be important but it is not always the solution to everything. Emily Nagoski emphasized that the power of connection from others can help more than you know. It reminds your mind that there is more to life than work and can help complete the stress cycle.
Try these: Vent to a friend for 15 minutes, compliment others, a warm hug from someone you’re close to, or turn to a spiritual connection if that is your cup of tea.
Remember: simply telling yourself to “just relax” is not an effective way to deal with stress and burnout. Complete some of the activities above to communicate to your body and change its physiological state to feel safe.
Check out some of these self-care plans for more ideas on how to complete the stress cycle and create a plan that works for you:
5 Self-Care Practices for Every Area of Your Life
How to Practice Self-Care on a Busy Schedule
Through the DE&I Lens: Women and burnout
In the latest findings from the extensive Women in the Workplace report from McKinsey, they discovered that although the representation of women in the workplace increased in 2021, women are feeling significantly more burned out than men. One in three women says they have considered leaving the workforce or downshifting in their career this year to cope with burnout.
Broadly speaking, anyone can experience burnout and the way it manifests can vary from person to person but burnout in men tends to manifest as depersonalization whereas burnout for women usually manifests as emotional exhaustion. Women often feel the need to go above and beyond at work by supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion without recognition. The report suggests that inequitable promotion practices cause women and specifically women of color to lose ground for higher-up corporate representation in the workplace.
When management supports employees’ wellbeing and takes steps towards prioritizing DE&I, employees are happier, more productive, less stressed, less burned out, and less likely to consider leaving their jobs.
Managers can take these steps to support employees and avoid burnout
Incorporate check-ins in meetings: “Where are you at with [project] and how are you feeling?”
Promote and normalize expressing clear feelings in a group
Reach out to mental health support groups and promote them to employees
Management should be trained to have resources ready when employees come in with expressions of stress and/or signs of burnout.
Understand that connection with one another and sharing support is the way out of feeling burnout in the workplace
Create a safe environment where employees can ask for help and have the flexibility to adjust work situations to alleviate stress.
Go ahead and complete your stress response cycle today! Get a good night's sleep, exercise, use your imagination to pummel the stress away, do something creative and fun, but most importantly surround yourself with a bubble of love, and remember you are a valuable individual who deserves resources, care, kindness, and love.
