This post may contain affiliate links. Disclosure here.
If you’ve been feeling overwhelmed, tired, or frustrated lately and can’t seem to get out of the pit of exhaustion, your body may be telling you that it’s time for a break. Burnout isn’t an easy thing to recover from immediately, but there are things you can do in the meantime that will help.
Signs of burnout:
If you want to recover quickly from burnout you have to first recognize the issue. These are some of the telltale signs of burnout to look out for.
These are just a few signs of burnout to look out for. Before I quit my job I was experiencing all of these and more and just didn’t know why I felt so crappy all the time.
- Lack of energy or motivation
- Feelings of apathy
- Trouble sleeping or sleeping too much
- Irritability
- Anxiety
- Fatigue
Factors that cause burnout:
- Stressful work life
- Unbalanced work-life. Irregular hours or no time to do anything outside of work
- Lack of control
- Poor work conditions
- Constantly needing to use a lot of mental and or physical energy
- Too many things going on at once in job and/or life
Once you recognize you’re suffering from burn out how do we bounce back and fix it?!
These are the ways I learned how to recover from burnout fast!:
Accept where you are
Acceptance is the first step to recovery. You can’t accept where you are if you don’t know where that is, so be honest with yourself about what’s going on in your life and what needs to change.
Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up; it means taking a stance of openness and willingness towards your situation as it is right now for what it is — this moment in time that will never happen again.
Listen to your body and mind
The first step to recovery is listening to your body and mind. The more you pay attention, the more you will notice signs of burnout.
Pay attention to how your body feels. If you’re experiencing pain or exhaustion, this could be a sign that something is off balance in your life—and that’s good news! It means there’s an opportunity for change.
Pay attention to how your mind feels. Are there any thoughts running through it that are causing stress? Do they come up often? Are they making it harder for you to function? Do these thoughts make sense given the current situation or are they irrational (like thinking about work or school when you’re on vacation)? It’s important to recognize negative thought patterns so that they can be addressed head-on rather than avoided altogether (which won’t solve anything).
Self-care comes first
One of the most important things you can do to recover from burnout is taking care of yourself. Self-care isn’t a luxury, it’s a necessity. When you’re feeling burnt out and stressed, taking some time for self-care is essential in order to feel like yourself again.
Self-care is not selfish; it’s necessary. When we feel like we need to take care of ourselves before we can help anyone else, this means that our health and well being come first. It’s not just about eating healthy or exercising more; it also means finding time for things that make us happy and relaxing when possible—even if that’s just listening to music or reading a book!
Self-care doesn’t have to be complicated either! It can be as simple as going for a walk around your neighborhood or eating dinner with family instead of watching TV alone at home after work every night.
Take a break
Take a break. When you’re feeling burnt out, it’s easy to think that taking vacation time will only make your problems worse. In reality, however, taking some time off can help solve them. If possible, take at least three days off from work and don’t worry about what people will think. They’ll be fine; they’re used to this happening (and in fact, you might find that some of the people you work with are happy for the break). Go do something fun: go hiking or swimming or watch a movie or play video games or whatever else brings you joy in life. You deserve it!
Ditch everything that’s no longer serving you
The first step to recovering from burnout is figuring out what’s not serving you. Your “no longer serving” list will look different depending on where you are in life and what your priorities are, but here are some things that have helped me:
- Quitting my job and moving to a new city
- Giving up alcohol for a month so I could focus on my health and relationships more fully (this was hard but worth it)
- Cutting off toxic friends who were draining me emotionally, professionally and financially
- Having a heart-to-heart conversation with my mom about how her negative attitude was making me feel stressed out
Spend more time with people who give you energy
This is a tough one, because it may mean cutting out some really important people from your life. But if you’re in the middle of burnout, you need to pull back from the people who are draining your energy. The people who drag you down. The negative Nelly’s, and Debbie Downer’s and so on… You have to cut them out if they are doing nothing but bringing you down.
There are two keys here:
- Spend more time with people who give you energy (and make sure they aren’t just telling jokes).
- Spend less time with people who take away energy
Find your why
It’s important to figure out what your why is because it will help you decide which items on your list of things that have caused your burnout can be eliminated.
Why is this so? Because when you are motivated by something meaningful and purposeful, you will be more willing to commit the time and energy required to get yourself back into a healthy working environment.
So how do you find your why? Well, there are several ways:
- Think about what makes you happy in life or at work; what motivates and inspires you; what gets those creative juices flowing? These could be family members, friends or colleagues who give positive feedback in their interactions with you or they could be an activity such as surfing or painting which helps relieve stress after a hard day at work. Whatever makes YOU feel good about YOU is likely worth investigating further!
You can bounce back from burnout and learn to be kinder to yourself.
Burnout is a real thing. It’s not your fault, but it can be hard to admit that and acknowledge when you’re feeling it. You might feel like you’re just being lazy or unmotivated, but really your body and mind are exhausted from trying to keep up with the world around you.
You can recover from burnout if you listen to your body and take care of yourself by doing something relaxing like going for a walk or reading a book in bed (or even just laying there quietly). If this sounds too simple, then check out these other tips that I’ve found helpful in my own journey back from burnout:
- Try meditating for 10 minutes each day
- Do yoga poses daily
- Journal about how you feel throughout the day
Conclusion
Now that we’ve covered what burnout is, how it affects you and your productivity, and some of the best ways to recover from it, there’s one final question we need to answer: How do you prevent it in the first place? The key is actually pretty simple: take care of yourself.
You can do this by listening to your body and mind so that they tell you when they need rest or relaxation time instead of pushing through exhaustion. Self-care comes first! If something doesn’t feel right about an activity or relationship in life (or work), then ditch it immediately because it won’t benefit anyone if left alone.
Leave a Reply