A couple of thoughts on Burnout, for the final burnout QuitCast.
First, the ladder is the way out of the pit, but it is not the end of recovery.
That last step off the ladder is a precarious one, because it can last quite a while. Typically, as people hit those last steps of burnout, they end up slowing down a little. This has two causes.
1) They tend to think they’re out of the pit when they’re not, and they slide down a few rungs, then have to rebuild them and keep climbing, refilling, climbing, refilling, so they can fully exercise control over their energy tank again.
OR
2) They are so afraid of burning out again, they’re afraid to return to 100%. These writers typically end up putting off their real “return” until they feel more than 100%.
Of the two, the first one tends to take the longest. But the second one can be the most daunting. Because… how do you tell? How do you know when you’re done?
One significant indicator is, something about your “inertia wave” has changed. You’ve either re-set your goals, or you’ve released unrealistic expectations that were leading to the burnout. You are no longer expecting the things that got you into the burnout. Your inertia has leveled out. (Otherwise, you’ll keep falling back into the pit.)
Another indicator is, you’re aware of self-care or self-development. You’ve integrated some kind of self-care into your system.
Another is, you’re feeling like something has shifted. You’re getting up in the morning and feeling like you have the energy to tackle the day. You’re making plans (to be executed, or to be felt). You feel like there’s psych-up music playing behind you.
It’s very likely that one thing will NOT happen.
It will probably never be okay that you went through burnout. You might feel sad, angry, disappointed, frustrated… for a long time. Why?
Because there are always consequences to burnout.
You might have lost money. You might have lost your preorder privileges. You might have lost readers. Momentum. Friends. Trajectory.
At the very least, you’ve lost expectations. Time. Even if that’s all you lost, it’s still going to be hard to square with those unrealistic expectations that this shouldn’t have happened.
I hate to quote Morpheus, but: what happened happened and couldn’t have happened any other way.
As much as we don’t want you to have to pay those consequences, you do. And that’s hard. When truth is hard, it’s super important to deal with the emotions and momentum shifts that come up around it.
You had goals or hopes or strategies that got you into the pit. There was something really exciting and fun about that. And it’s also very possible that you did not “get yourself” into this. It’s possible that life hit you with something hard. It’s possible that something happened to someone you loved. Or that something happened to Amazon or the industry that you had no control over.
Those are the hardest things to let go of.
But burnout recovery is the place where we do this. Release the expectations. Let ourselves be who and where we are, and deal with the reality we’re facing. It’s rarely fun, but it will always help us out in the end.
Because if you hold onto the expectation that it “shouldn’t” have happened, you can never deal with the fact that it did. Trust me. Nothing will change what did and didn’t happen. It’s time to make peace with the past.
It’ll never be good that it happened. But it can be fine. Or okay. Start there.
Here’s a quick story.
I burned out in a massive way in my mid-twenties, trying to open a non-profit organization in my hometown. It mattered a lot to me and I over-spent all of my energy pennies. After the first year in that job, I got hit with a big piece of bad news (not related to the job), and it decimated me. I could barely make it to the hours I had to put in, let alone show up for the kids the way I should have.
It will never be okay that I phoned in those hours. It had an impact on those kids that year that I am still aware of. Responsible for. But all of my emotions about that have passed. I don’t feel sad about it. Or angry. I don’t feel disappointed in myself. I did the best I could. I learned my lesson. It still doesn’t mean it’s okay that I did it. I wish it hadn’t happened. But I am taking responsibility for it and making the best use of the sacrifice that I can.
I had to feel the feelings first, though. I had to release the expectations of what I should have been able to do and what I shouldn’t.
My unrealistic expectation that I “should” have known held me back for many, many years.
I almost cycled back down into burnout twice in two years, from this expectation that I should have known not to run myself so hard. From the expectation that I should have paid attention to what had happened to other people.
But here’s the thing.
That wasn’t me, at the time. I wasn’t the kind of person who listened to the warnings of other people. I had always been a high-functioning, successful person. I could easily keep being that person. No one could get through to me, until I learned it for myself. That’s not unusual.
Because I was like that, it meant I had to learn the hard way.
So I had to release the expectation that I “should” have known. It’s not easy.
I say all this to say, if you are in recovery, and keep sliding back in, take a look at your unrealistic expectations. Are you expecting yourself to know things about the market you couldn’t have known? Do you expect yourself to adapt quicker than you can? Do more than you can? Be more than you are? Be different than you are?
Is it really realistic to expect that?
QTP. (Question The Premise)
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