Preventing Burnout
Have you ever felt so exhausted from all the work you’re doing or the daily activities that you can’t seem to avoid? Are these things putting a strain on your mental or physical health — or maybe even both? If that’s the case, you may be experiencing what a lot of others face too — burnout.
What is Burnout?
Burnout can happen when you are overworking your body and inevitably, your body forces you to take a break and rest. Everyone is different and so “symptoms” of burnout may show up in various ways for each individual. But in all cases, your body is detecting when it can no longer function properly due to the strain you’ve put on yourself. It’s telling you to take a break so that your body can recharge and revive itself from all the stress and labor you’re been putting on it for some time.
My Burnout Story
Speaking from my personal burnout experiences, I would feel extremely depleted, tired, overwhelmed, mildly depressed, and have skyrocketing amounts of anxiety every day. And I’m sure some of you have felt at least one of these things when you were burning out too. Even though I love the work I do and our clients, when I’m experiencing burnout — to candidly put it – I start to dread attending meetings, loathe looking at all the things on my calendar that I previously agreed to, and start losing grip of my WHY and the bigger picture.
During my first year of being an entrepreneur, I burnt out nearly once every quarter like clockwork. I was running around doing everything I needed to start up my passion – Recloseted. But because I loved it so much and had ambitious goals to strive toward, I just couldn’t stop working. I went full throttle – working past midnight all the time and self-funding through another job so that I could bring Recloseted to fruition. I don’t want to be glamorizing hustle culture because I would fizzle out and deplete my energy to its lowest levels every day.
To be completely transparent, the first couple of times that I burnt out, it sucked. Even though I tried to go easier on myself, I continued to burn out and it got to a point where I became frustrated at myself. I didn’t know how to properly take care of myself and felt stuck – like I was in a vicious cycle of battling myself. It took integrating therapy into my life and learning to treat myself with more empathy and compassion to grow awareness of my own body and when I needed to rest. Through years of self-awareness and understanding the signals that my body is telling me to take a break, I was able to get better at taking care of myself and preventing burnout.
How Do You Prevent Burnout?
As you can tell from my story, burnout is not a place where you can show up as your best business self, think creatively, or make the kind of change or impact you wish to in the world. I always say you need to take care of yourself before you can take care of your to-do list and business. Otherwise, your ability to strive toward your goals and ambitions may start to fizzle out as your body shuts down. As such, I will share my tips and advice to prevent burnout.
Tip #1: Monitor Yourself
Self-monitoring is super important! You want to be checking in with yourself daily (at the very least). By being aware of the status of your body and health, you can prevent burnout versus reacting to it once it hits you. Notice the early signs that your body may be signalling to you such as constant fatigue, drained energy levels, constant stress, low motivation, or whatever it may be that personally affects your mental and physical health. By observing these “symptoms” of burnout beforehand, you can take the necessary measures to prevent digging yourself out of burnout.
Tip #2: Empathy and Compassion
Make sure that you are treating yourself with love, empathy, and compassion. Remember, you are not a productivity machine! It’s okay (and necessary) to give yourself a break and it’s okay to make time to recharge yourself after a day of work. You have been working so hard and you need to treat yourself with kindness even if you have a million things you haven’t finished yet or deadlines that haven’t been fulfilled. Acknowledge everything you’ve been doing so far and make the time to celebrate your small and big wins!
Tip #3: Advanced Planning
To prevent feeling extremely overwhelmed or confused as to where you are headed or what you need to get done, plan ahead of time. By planning out your monthly, weekly, and daily tasks beforehand, you will feel much more organized and have a clear set of realistic goals and to-do lists to accomplish day by day. And if you don’t think you can accomplish everything, then push any deadlines you can back, delegate it to someone else, or delete it if it’s not necessary. You don’t ever want to jeopardize your health and if it means removing something off your plate to take care of yourself — you and your body deserve it!
I like to use a tool called ClickUp which has changed the way I plan and strategize my work. ClickUp allows me to organize all of my tasks and goals – yearly, monthly, weekly, and daily — in a way that is super clear and structured. This has helped me feel less stressed and anxious about what I need to get done and how I am going to execute them in a timely and realistic manner. I highly recommend you try this tool out to help you plan and be methodical with your workload!
Tip #4: Put Yourself First
If you are the type that agrees to do things that you don’t want to so that you can please others, you need to stop! Your energy and time are so valuable and you need to protect them at all costs. Don’t agree to do something you know you don’t want to or have time for — this is not your responsibility! Learn to say empowered no’s and decline work or extra tasks that you don’t need to be adding to your plate. Keep things easy and simple.
Tip #5: Self-Care
Even amid a super busy month, week, or day, you have to make time for yourself. It’s so important to integrate self-care into your daily routine and not just make it a monthly thing or whenever you have time for a vacation. Don’t take an all-or-nothing approach. Bake in a simple hour or two in your day to do something for yourself will make a huge difference! This doesn’t have to be expensive or even time-consuming. Implementing more sleep, meditating, eating healthy, going for a walk, taking a bath, or cleaning your bedroom are just a few things you can do to take care of yourself. Bring your body back to a parasympathetic state whenever possible throughout the day. Maybe you could try taking a pause and doing quick breathing exercises before a meeting or even meditating sometime in your day. Whatever it is you need to do, do it!
Book Recommendation
Now that I have shared with you my best tips, I have one last thing to tell you about. I read a book that helped me with my self-care journey. It’s called Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle. This book highlights the importance of “clearing out” your stress buildups. Block off 20-30 minutes each day to clear out the stressors you encounter every day in your life. You can exercise, meditate, be with loved ones, etc. but the ultimate goal is just to create a space in your day for downtime so that you can get through each day without a buildup of stressors that could affect your mood or even productivity.
Knowing how to prevent burnout or manage such situations can be hard! I can speak from experience and I want you to know that you are not alone. But hopefully, these tips are helpful to you and you can implement them in your life to alleviate the stress and overwhelming emotions you may face. Just remember, so many people have this shared experience and the Recloseted team is here for you! Don’t hesitate to reach out if you ever need to talk about it — our emails and DMs are always open.
