Signs That You're Burning Out & How To Deal

For many, their work is what gives them semblance. It not just provide you with a financial agency, but gives you better control over your life. Even if not for control, who doesn’t want to be successful? Isn’t it what we’ve been striving for the whole life? However, running that race for success can sometimes make you lose steam. You might feel dragging yourself to work, and once there, it would be difficult to get started, to concentrate, and you might even get irritated often. If you feel the same, it might be a job burnout you’re going through. 

Although not a mental health disorder, burnout can impact your mental as well physical health. Quite understandably, it can also hamper your job performance considerably. You might also turn to food, alcohol, etc, to feel better, which could, in turn, affect your overall health. Hence, dealing with burnout is crucial. But before that, you need to know what symptoms it causes so that you know better if you’re going through one.

What Is Burnout?

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German psychologist Herbert Freudenberger was the first to come up with the term ‘burnout’ in his 1974 book ‘Burnout: The High Cost of High Achievement’. Simply put, burnout is a reaction to chronic stress at the workplace. It is characterised by a lack of motivation, exhaustion, and often, disillusionment with work. Although primarily triggered by work-related stress, your overall lifestyle as well as personality traits, such as if you’re a perfectionist or a pessimist, can add to it.

Symptoms Of Burnout

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When a person starts to burn out, he/she experiences a set of symptoms, which include:

Irritated Or Disillusioned About Work

The primary signs of burnout can be experienced at work itself. These include:

• Exhaustion
• Increasingly critical about work
• Difficulty getting started
• Trouble concentrating
• Lack of motivation
• Difficulty in being productive
• Lack of sense of achievement
• Disillusionment about the job or even profession
• You get irritated by colleagues or clients

Physical Symptoms

Burnout is largely associated with the mind. However, it can cause physical symptoms too, such as:

• You might experience unexplained headaches
• Issues with the stomach such as bowel issues
• Fatigue

Other Symptoms

Some other symptoms of burnout include:

• Changes in sleep pattern
• Increased dependence on food, alcohol, etc to make yourself feel better

What Causes Burnout?

Burnout can result from multiple reasons, such as:

• Work Pressure: A high-demanding job, which includes a high workload, long working hours, can lead to burnout. Not just that, a lack of control over decisions that directly or indirectly impact your jobs, such as schedule or your assignments, can also contribute to the same.
• Work Environment: A work environment such as the one marred by office politics, or an uncooperative colleague, or a boss who is difficult to deal with can also lead to burnout.
• Unclear Job Expectations: When you don’t know what is expected from you at work, you will remain confused, which can lead to stress, thus, causing burnout.
• No Work-Life Balance: This is something many people deal with. When your job takes so much of your time that it leaves you none to spend with your family or to just relax, it can lead to a sense of irritation, and exhaustion over time, which, in turn, can lead to burnout.

How To Deal With Burnout

Although not a mental health disorder, burnout is crucial to be dealt with to prevent your mental and physical health from deteriorating, not to mention, your job performance. Here are some tips that might help you with burnout:

• Talk About Your Problem(s): If it’s something at work that is causing you to burn out, it can be beneficial to talk to your supervisor. If your schedule is a problem, try to get it changed, if it’s the excessive work pressure, communicate about it too, which might help you to take some burden off your shoulders.
• Communicate: Talking to a friend, your family, or a co-worker, someone you can trust, about what you are dealing with, can make you feel better and help you deal with the issue better.
• Healthy Lifestyle: A balanced, nutritious food and plenty of exercise are crucial for better health, which might help you to deal with burnout in a better way.
• Rewind & Relax: Many of us spend most of our working hours at work, at the end of which we need to spare time to rewind and relax. You can indulge in activities that can help you with stress such as yoga, meditation, etc.
• Sleep: Although often ignored, proper sleep is a cornerstone of good health. Hence, make sure you get at least seven to eight hours of rest daily.

So, these were some methods that can be useful while dealing with burnout. However, if unable to deal by yourself, consult a mental health expert. He/she will do a proper diagnosis and will prescribe a treatment accordingly.

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