It’s not uncommon to hear co-workers, frazzled friends and beaten down family members wail out, “I’m fried!” “I feel like I’m a crispy critter” “I’m emotionally spent” and the most distinguishing phrase of all, “I’m just burnout!” In pre-pandemic times, we had a tendency to brush off those mental health cries for help as just part of the regular ole work-life-rut. However, post Covid studies on mental health has given us a whole new prospective on why we feel burnout and its devastating effects and shines light on how to bring ourselves back to life! Neuroscience has giving it a new name, Professional Burnout also known as occupational burnout. Professional burnout is not just a passing feeling or a condition that will just go away on its own after a good night’s sleep or a week-long vacation luxuriating on a beach in Cancun. I’m happy to report that these conditions can be reversed with High Flow Peak Performance Coaching.
Professional Burnout is not classified as a diagnosable psychological disorder, but is serious condition that, if not corrected, can lead to mental health disorders. In the workplace, burnout results in low performance, productivity and general irritability and more.
It took decades for us to evolve to the point of where mental health is not a nasty condition to be hidden or ashamed of any longer. Today we protect our mental health as if our lives depended on it, because it does! Leading edge neuroscience studies have proven the brain damaging effects that are sustained because of chronic stress, multitasking, insufficient reward, and workaholism, just to name a few.
Today we understand that being constantly besieged by high levels of stress causes actual damage to our brain, creating undesirable neuro pathways that pave the way to confusion, chronic fatigue anger, isolation, stomachaches, anger and depression. Who knew, right? Studies prove that sustained prolonged stress, lack of autonomy, and Neuroscience behavioral experts say that burnout is a real, giving the name of Professional Burnout.
High performing entrepreneurs and executives who often ‘burn the candle at both ends’ are at high risk. In essence we become like an engine running at top speed, without water in the radiator. And then one day, poof! it is going blow up! Professional Burnout doesn’t leave a visible smoke screen like you see when a hotrod burns rubber off the starting line. Neuroscience has identified Professional Burnout for the pernicious predator that it is, masquerading as depression, low self-esteem and anxiety. It sneaks up on its victims and little by little steals passion, purpose, power and identity. It’s time we expose this pernicious evil so that those who have been affected can renew and re-energize their life to love and be loved again!
Assuming that you love your business, but you keep getting frustrated at parts of it that don’t seem to change, no matter how hard you work; if conditions have changed for you personally, dumping more responsibility on your plate and taking all the fun out of life; if you find yourself engaged in self-destructive habits—even small ones that make you repeatedly wonder why you just can’t get out there and get thing done.
Burnout is defined as physical and emotional exhaustion that takes all the joy out of your business and saps away your ability to be proactive and engaged. In that way, it lies dangerously parallel to depression. It can manifest any time whenever stressful conditions persist to disturb balance in work-to-life or life-to-work routine.
Above all, burnout is characterized by physical and emotional exhaustion.
Warning Signs Include:
o No longer feeling energized by working long hours
o Frustration with your inability to accomplish tasks that were once easy
o Not wanting to come to work (or sit down at your computer)
o Feeling angry with yourself at not accomplishing more
o Procrastination and avoidance behaviors
o A decline in self-worth and self-esteem
o Resenting clients and customers
o Feeling overwhelmed
o Feeling hopeless
Step One: Recognizing You Have a Problem
Think back to the euphoria you felt when you quit your day job and woke up on your first day of running your own business. What made you feel so euphoric? Chances are, it was that feeling of complete freedom; of being your own boss, setting your own hours and not having to deal with toxic bosses or coworkers, or ungrateful or needy clients.
Fast forward to now, one year, two years, three years or more after startup, and chances are that euphoria is gone. The reality you’re facing is that you’re working more hours than ever. Rather than being master of your own time, you’re still fitting yourself around clients, dealing with contractors who don’t run like clockwork, and trying to find time for your family—let alone finding time for yourself.
Your health is suffering. Your sleep schedule has gone right out the window. You’re either up all night, unable to sleep a wink (but too tired to work), or you find yourself sleeping in longer and longer all day; or taking naps when you have deadlines. You’re working far too many hours. And you’re not having much fun at all.
Add to that the pressure of always having to achieve. Everything becomes a competition: With peers, with top influencers in your field that you aspire to be like; with yourself.
You’re cranky with family, friends and staff. You can’t take a vacation or even a full day off. You eat lunch at your desk (or skip meals completely) and answer emails and texts from your phone while out with your family.
Meanwhile you find yourself getting annoyed with clients and frustrated by day-to-day business tasks. You don’t feel creative any more. In fact, you might have even started fantasizing about getting a JOB.
Guilt creeps in, because you’re procrastinating, putting off, not achieving. You tell yourself you “should” be doing more. Your logic now runs along the lines of “I should be achieving as much as so-and-so. She’s a success” and “If I work harder, I’ll be more successful, and if I’m more successful, then I’ll be happier.”
And these very same super-successful, celebrity influencers you’re modeling yourself on compound the problem by giving you negative messages about yourself: That if you can’t afford a high-ticket course, you’re not an action taker.
Where there’s guilt, there’s depression. Where there’s depression, there are many more negative self-messages. Where there is negative self-talk, there’s procrastination and paralysis. You’re on the fast track, not to success, but to burnout.
If any of this resonates with you, if you’re here because you know you’re burning out, it’s important to shift our focus not on our woes, but on how we can create a mindset shift that will banish burnout and all its attendant symptoms. Sure, we can talk about changing the way we view happiness and success to create a positive new reality. But there are also simple actions we can—and should—take too. Steps to put us in the position of being able to look at things with optimism and a positive mindset, so we can become enthusiastic and energized again.
Step Two: Make YOU Your Top Priority
Talk to any entrepreneur about his or her business and inevitably the problem comes around to not being able to shut off one’s mind at the end of the day, disturbing one of the ‘big four’ essential elements to peak performance, sleep. Instead of taking breaks, or relaxing for the evening, your mind is grappling with how you’re going to tackle various problems or tasks..
Poor sleep quality is linked to many chronic health problems including anxiety, heart disease and depression. Feeling down and out a lot is one of the first signs you might be heading for
professional burnout.So, number one, pay attention to your own physical and emotional health. You can’t effectively serve clients and grow your business if you’re struggling yourself. You owe it to them (and to your family and friends) to put your needs first.
And let’s face another misconception on that very subject. Paying attention to your own physical and emotional health is not something you do after you’ve “earned” the right to free time. It’s not something that will come, once you’re successful. Take that approach, and it’s pretty much guaranteed that day will never come. Why? Because you’ll burn out long before that. So, start now. Make non-negotiable appointments for self-care.
Essential self-care activities include:
o Physical motion
o Time for meditation and reflection
o A daily self-care routine
o Social time
These are not luxuries, even though they might feel like luxuries right now: Might even make you feel guilty. These self-care activities are basic essentials. Without them, you’ll start to feel, even if just on a subconscious level, deprived, tired and foggy.
It’s fun to work in your PJs if you choose to—but don’t work in your PJs because you’re so pressured writing that speech, you feel like you don’t have time to get bathed and dressed. Sure, it’s wonderful to work in your most comfortable track pants, curled up on the couch with your laptop and your chihuahua, but do dress up and go out. Balance: That’s what it’s all about.
Even if you have to schedule yourself more rigidly than you like, build these four essential self-care routines into your life every day. Let’s go through them again.
- Physical Motion
I’m not going to insist on “exercise”, because when you’re in a state of burnout, exercise sounds more like torture. Instead, think about a way to break your slavery to your desk or consulting room, and fit in some form of physical motion that you find at the very least, oxygenating. Even if it’s just going for a twenty-minute, brisk walk during your lunch hour.
Yoga is a wonderful way to stimulate not only your blood cells, but your mindset too. Tai Chi, Qi Gong—any type of activity that shifts your brain out of overwhelm and raises your positive energy is well worth the investment.
Swimming is another wonderful way to give your brain a break while rejuvenating your body—and if you have your own pool, there’s no excuse not to use it.
- Time for meditation and reflection
This can take as little as fifteen minutes. One problem is that when you are in a state of burnout, particularly if it’s associated with overwork, taking fifteen minutes just reinforces your message to yourself that you just don’t have time. Do yourself a favor and make your meditation time at least thirty minutes. It might take your brain at least twenty minutes to slow down.) Music can help greatly in fast-tracking your brain out of hyperactive thought patterns. You can sample and find your ideal music for relaxation (and yoga) easily on YouTube.
Also choose the right time of day to meditate. Does it feel more energizing or relaxing if you meditate in the morning? Or do you want to schedule this right before bed, to help you with your chronic insomnia.
Choose music that either energizes you – try music that stimulates your brain’s alpha waves – or slips your brain into a delta or theta wave pattern, if you’re more interested in trying to sleep.
Even sitting in your garden, gazing at plants and trees, can put you in a reflective state … particularly if you make a daily habit of doing so at the same time, every day.
- A Daily Self-care Routine
If you don’t have time for self-care, you are telling yourself that you don’t matter. Not only is that a harmful and undermining message to yourself, you’re teaching those around you that you
don’t matter either. Without a good self-care routine, you will find yourself feeling more stress and less self-worth.
Self-care essentials differ for people. “I wouldn’t be caught dead without a manicure and pedicure,” one person will say, while another insists that getting six glasses of water a day and maintaining healthy skin is her most basic self-care need.
A severely-depressed person might concentrate all her energy just on brushing her teeth every day while, to another, getting her teeth regularly whitened at the dental clinic feels like a ground-level necessity.
It spills over into the area of health. It makes sure that you go to that dentist for a check-up every six months, take time for medical appointments and allow yourself time daily to get enough sleep.
Self-care doesn’t just apply to the physical, but to emotional routines and allowances too. It’s taking that twenty minutes for meditation. It’s treating yourself to a fun, cozy mystery every Friday or having your Reading Hour every day. Self-care re-charges you and keeps stress down.
Self-care keeps life fun and reassures you that you are beautiful, inside and out.
That is not a luxury. It’s an absolute necessity. Identify what is important to you and decide how to make that happen.
□ A daily skin care routine with quality products
□ Pedicures and manicures
□ Regular hair styling appointments
□ Dressing well in clothing you love
□ Eating healthy meals and snacks
□ Social activities; time to develop relationships
□ Regular massages or health treatments
□ Taking your daily vitamins
□ Personal development
□ Time off; vacations
Do plan a vacation. If you can’t imagine being able to take time off, then book it for six months from now and do the necessary work to make it happen—starting with the next step.
I saw a funny sign, “Let me drop everything and put my life on hold to solve your problems” Stop doing this, unless you are a Coach, hahha. If you’ve been lax in this area, or let other peoples’ priorities (including clients) over-ride your own, stop the downward cascade now and start adding missing self-care routines into your life, one at a time. Make self-care an enjoyable habit—and its own reward.
- Social Time- Schedule It!
Taking time to socialize is not frivolous. It is essential. Without it, we slip into loneliness. We have no one to rub our rough corners off; no one to reassure us we’re fun to be around and worthwhile knowing; no one to laugh with—and laughter is a huge stress reliever.
Online entrepreneurs in particular seem to have a habit of systematically cutting out or delegating social activities. “I talk to people on Facebook” is not the same as going out for lunch with your best friend, or taking time to volunteer at your local nursing home, or baking your famous Cocoa Fudge Brownies to take to your weekly Thursday Night Book Club meeting.
And you have to ask yourself why you let yourself slip into isolation. If it’s because of your work load, that’s setting yourself up for stress and burnout. The only recipe you’ll be cooking up is one for disaster.
You also have to assess whether or not you’ve fallen into any bad habits, such as workaholism (something entrepreneurs are particularly prone to). And don’t just cut out toxic relationships—relationships where you walk away from an encounter feeling put down, frustrated, tense or any other negative emotion: Replace them with positive relationships. Seek out the sort of people
you want to become yourself. Hang with people who have a “can-do” attitude, or who simply make you feel good about yourself.
Of course, there are times when you can’t avoid toxic people: For example, close family members. If they’re truly toxic, you might need professional help in cutting the ties, and you might have to cut the ties to save your own life or at least sanity, but we’ve all got relatives who like to gossip, or undermine, or judge. The best thing to do in situations where you feel you don’t want to sever ties completely is to stop accepting negative behavior. End the phone call. Leave the party. Or simply walk away. “Excuse me, I see cousin June. I need to go catch up with her.”
Most of all, successful self-care boils down to stopping long enough to listen to yourself. Listen to your own needs. Where do you feel you’re de-valuing or neglecting yourself? What do you wish you had more time for?
Respect yourself. Don’t interrupt precious time with your child to field work-related phone calls. Switch the phone off. Set a particular time every day—during work hours—to check your stats. Shut your phone off too when you’re going for a walk in that forest or having a massage.
Stop right now. Identify what you need to add to your self-care routines: What you have been deliberately (or perhaps not deliberately) cutting out. Schedule it back in. Make the time, if an aspect of self-care is important in making you feel like a whole person. The world won’t stop if you take an hour off to dye your hair. After all, you can’t love and appreciate others when you don’t love and respect yourself.
Step Three: Get Help
We talked about not being able to shut your mind off, resulting in actions like taking business calls in the middle of self-care or family times. This is also a big sign that you cannot run your business all by yourself, and be all things to all people. It’s time to seriously consider getting help. The solopreneur dream might feel romantic but the reality is that no one can be/do everything. It’s exhausting and eats into your profits. Stop workaholism by getting help.
Hire a High Flow Peak Performance Coach and Get in to Flow! Top Talent Coaching is solely based on leading edge neuroscience High Flow Peak Performance Coaching methodology. We help professionals recover from professional burnout and reclaim their zest work and zeal for life. You’ll feel the same way when you triple your performance and see your productivity skyrocket by up to 500%!
Make a list of the tasks you procrastinate on the most. it will be a relief simply to have these off your plate and out of mind. And if you can’t delegate, automate or outsource all of them at once, start with the tasks that drain you the most.
Here are common suggestions for outsourcing—that is, giving the task to a freelance contractor who not only specializes in that task, but who is also an expert. (Remember, what drains you might absolutely energize someone else!)
Outsource your:
□ Customer service
□ Bookkeeping and accounting
□ Technical and technological aspects of your business
□ Graphic design
□ Website creation
□ Website maintenance
□ Social media management
□ Affiliate management
Easier said than done, especially for the do-it-yourselfer or perfectionist, but you got this! Start with small projects if you’ve never outsourced before. Look for talented team members who can work independently – the last thing you need is someone you have to micro-manage – get
referrals from trusted sources. And decide which specific aspect of each category you want to outsource. Do you need to outsource that entire category or just one troublesome task?
For example, you might want to split your customer service between answering easy questions in your Facebook Group, and a ticket-based Help Desk. Or you might hire someone to specifically handle refunds, or customer questions. If it’s the latter, consider hiring someone to set you up a great FAQ section you can point customers toward.
Do you need all your regular bookkeeping outsourced, or do you need an accountant at tax time only? Do you just need someone to set up your autoresponder lists, or do you need someone to handle maintaining and uploading to them? Do you need one-shot website creation, or are you more interested in regular website maintenance?
A good position to take is this: Any task that does not directly need you to implement it in order to build relationships, grow your business, or make money can—and should—be outsourced.
The real key to getting the right help lies in understanding:
o Which parts of your business energize you—and which parts stress, depress and drain you
o Which parts absolutely need your personal touch—and which parts can be automated, delegated or outsourced
Then again, it might be parts of your personal life that are stressing you out and causing you to feel you’re working night and day without seeing any benefit. Insuffienct reward is one of the many causes of professional burnout. Consider outsourcing areas of your life, too. If the weekly grocery shop knocks you flat, or you’ve run out of key items in the middle of the week, consider ordering groceries online and having them delivered. These days we don’t have to worry about picking up meds from the pharmacy, choose a pharmacy that delivers.
If housework makes you chafe at the bit and interrupts you in the middle of creativity—or you’re just tired and stressed with having a perennially messy house—hire a cleaning service. Delegate driving kids places to your partner; or conversely, if you really love watching your daughter at her hockey practices, outsource an aspect of your business so you’ll really have the time to do this.
If some part of your business is begrudgingly holding you back, get qualified help with it, straight away. Don’t think of it as “spending my profits”: Think of it as making you money by making your business more productive. Qualified assistants and professionals add value and authority to your services. They save you time by making sure every part of your business runs like clockwork.
In short, done properly and wisely, outsourcing will grow your business and make you more money.
Step Four: Say No
Another important step to take in reducing burnout: Drop anything that drains you, stresses you or doesn’t make you a good return on your investment in it.
Allow yourself to be choosey. Learn to say ‘No’. You don’t have to accept every client or lunch invite or volunteer opportunity.
And here’s another important point: It’s ok to say no without explanation. “No” is a complete sentence.
Don’t give in to the pressure of taking every client. For every new invitation or opportunity, ask yourself:
o Does this take me closer to my goals or further away?
This is especially important in terms of ideal clients, partnerships, or speaking opportunities, training or memberships. Also ask yourself:
o Does this fit with my current schedule? If not, then you are probably wisest to make it a “no”.
You may really want to fit in a particular client or activity. Before you say yes, ask yourself:
o Will I be able to give this my full attention and the best of me? If not, then it’s a clear no.
On top of this, learn to really listen to your body’s own reactions. You’re keen to join a neighborhood project. It’s a cause you believe in … but a wave of weariness sweeps over you at the thought of committing two nights a week, when you’re already busy.
Someone talks a good game and wants to hire you as their coach … but you get that little warning bell at the back of your mind. Don’t rationalize it away. Listen to it.
Be choosy! Just say no. And never, ever let them argue with you. Remember…
Step Five: Control Your Calendar
Adding one simple habit to your work routine can reduce stress and overwhelm while also creating clarity. This significantly reduces the chance of burnout, or helps you recover if you’re already on the way there.
At the start of every week, take a hard look at your calendar and your commitments, and assess the coming week’s needs.
o Decide in advance how many hours a day and a week you want to work. Then decide exactly how much unscheduled overtime … if any at all … you will set aside for real emergencies.
o Set specific daily and weekly goals. What one thing is your absolute priority for each day? For the overall week? Reaching these goals can energize and inspire you—as well as building self-worth.
o Block off your own non-negotiables, including time for family, health, exercise, meditation and personal development, before you fill in ANY client work or appointments.
o Identify your top priorities from last week’s To Do list, and block these off first.
o Use calendars and online scheduling systems that send out automated reminders.
o Make managing your calendar both a regular routine and a habit.
It isn’t so much about making more time as about using the time we have available more efficiently and wisely. To paraphrase the old saying, “A foolish man wastes time; a wise man makes use of it.”
Remember that work never finishes, especially when you are an entrepreneur with your own business. You could easily work twenty-four hours a day and there would still be more to do. So, when you’ve reached the end of the work hours you’ve allocated, reward yourself. Stop for the day, and recharge for tomorrow. Top Talent Coaching is solidly based on leading edge neuroscience of High Flow Peak Performance Coaching methodology. We help professionals recover from professional burnout, remote workers syndrome and better manage ADHD symptoms so that they reclaim their zest work and zeal for life.
Imagine how you are going to feel when you triple your performance and see your productivity skyrocket by up to 500%! What would racking up those numbers mean for you? Now take a quick mind-moment to spread those numbers throughout your C-Suite and upper level management. When you do the math, it’s mind boggling, right? Top Talent Coaching is uniquely equipped with leading edge knowledge, developed by neuroscience so everyone is performing at the speed of flow-light for greater influence, impact and income!
Executive Coaching has already proven as a great investment since companies across the board are claiming 788% ROI! Find out how Coaching with Top Talent Coaching can help you rise above the competition, recover from professional burnout and heal Remote Workers Syndrome so that you enjoy greater job satisfaction, influence, impact and income. Find Out More Here: https://calendly.com/toptalentcoaching/free-consultation