How to Beat Burnout

Highlights:

Job burnout is a state of physical or emotional exhaustion that also involves a sense of reduced accomplishment and loss of personal identity
Keeping your work phone away, creating a work-free environment, meditation, engaging in activities like cooking, going for walks can help with burnout
If all else fails, talking to a professional can help you recover from burnout

Burnout has reached new heights in recent years. Burnout is a psychological syndrome emerging as a prolonged response to chronic interpersonal stressors on the job. The three key dimensions of this response are an overwhelming exhaustion, feelings of cynicism and detachment from the job, and a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment.

It’s often correlated with anxiety and depression and predicts other mental health challenges. The challenge in reducing burnout or addressing it before it worsens is that when individuals are most in need of recovery, they are least likely to engage in recovery activities. This is because they are already overwhelmed and trapped in a vicious cycle that prevents them from changing their behaviors or seeking help ().

Burnout - Kill it Before it Kills You!
Burnout is an emotional and physical tiredness which is caused by stress.

‘Burnout is common and can be draining. The holiday time can be a great way to recharge and refresh.’

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One of the main causes of burnout is toxic work culture. This happens when an employee feels unvalued and psychologically unsafe. It is also crucial to learn what increases the likelihood of having burnout symptoms and practice recovery.

Unwinding and recovering from everyday work is important for sustaining employees’ well-being, motivation, and job performance.

Ways to Recover from Burnout

Learning Triggers Which do not Allow you to Detach from Work

Switching off notifications from your work phone or laptop temporarily can help. Try not to carry your laptop and work phone everywhere with you.

Creating an Optimal Environment for Recovery

Create a distraction-free zone. During your free time, keep work-related items out of sight. If you want to relax, close the door to your home office, travel somewhere, even if it is an hour away, or go for a walk-in nature. Spending more time outside in the sun or in rooms with good natural light can help you recharge.

Ways To Stop Burnout
If you experience a burnout acknowledge your problem, calm your nerves and take steps to take control of your life.

Replace Work with a Fun Activity

Reading, running, or cooking allow you to completely focus or stay in flow and mentally disconnect from work. If you are doing something you do not genuinely enjoy just to share it with someone, you may not feel fully engaged and may return to thinking about work. Make an effort to select something special for yourself.

Choose Activities That Require High Effort

While it may appear that relaxing, watching TV, or other ‘passive’ or ‘low-effort’ activities are the best for recovery, research indicates that more active activities can be even more effective. Pursuing a hobby that requires effort or mastery, such as learning a new language or skill, allows you to stay in flow for longer periods of time, replenish depleted resources, and have an optimal experience away from work. It's also a good reminder that having fun isn't limited to work.

Burnout is the Result of Stress Due To Mismatch Of Employee Needs & Job Demands
Burnout can be controlled at workplace by positive interventions that prevent mismatch between individual needs and job demands.

Take Rest

Take mental, spiritual, emotional, social, sensory, physical and creative rest.

Practices Intentional Recovery

Learn a system that allows you to reset. Meditation and mindfulness are activities that can be used at work as well. It takes time to get used to and enjoy them, so you won't be able to start any of them during a stressful period. However, having several days off may be the ideal time to begin a new practice. It will then be easier to continue doing it for 10 minutes every day during your workday.

Multiple Stressors Associated With Physician Burnout
Hospitals should listen to the frontline for insights about work environments that support clinician integrity and promote better outcomes for patients.

Get Help if Required

Do not be ashamed to seek help from a professional if required. There is nothing wrong in seeking help if you are feeling anxious or depressed about work. A professional can help you and might be the best if nothing else works out.

Effectively recovering from periods of stress positively impacts your emotions, moods, energy, performance, and relationships. So, don’t think of it as a waste of time but as a long-term investment in you.

Reference:

Recovery from Work: Advancing the Field Toward the Future - (https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-012420-091355)

Source-Medindia