Find Recovery from Burnout in San Francisco, California.
You’re working a ton of hours just to keep up at work, staying up late at night to work and it’s automatically expected of you. You deal with difficult personalities at work that no matter what you do, you cannot make positive changes the way you see fit and managers are controlling and unreasonable. The expectations are confusing and you’re constantly trying to get it right. The work is tedious and uninteresting, or there’s a new drama everyday and you’re on edge, all the time.
You’re not alone dealing with burnout.
Workplace dysfunction is not new or uncommon, but the effects have become worse the past few years, especially during the pandemic. There can be so many different types of stress at work and different types of toxic environments in the workplace, but the effect is usually some awful experiences of burnout.
What is Burnout?
Burnout is the emotional, physical, and psychological exhaustion that is a result of taking on too much stress for too long a period of time. Burnout can look different for each person.
Burnout can make you think negative thoughts about yourself, your work, and your life. You might find yourself criticizing and judging yourself and others and having thoughts about needing to work more or work harder. Your thoughts might revolve around work most of the time, and you might have a hard time turning off these thoughts even when you’re not at work. Burnout can make you feel depressed, anxious, upset, frustrated, impatient, intolerant, and unhappy. Burnout can also make it difficult to get sleep even though you’re exhausted. You may find yourself staying up at night, drinking more alcohol than usual just to cope with stress, or eating unhealthily to numb feelings. It can make you feel like you are not yourself and you don’t like the person you have become. It can be sad and scary. And because stress is so bad for our health, it can also lead to or worsen health problems such as heart issues, hypertension, diabetes, and early signs of aging such as hair loss.
Burnout doesn’t just affect work.
Dealing with these signs of burnout can affect you at work by reducing your productivity, effectiveness at work, working with extreme anxiety, and treating other people at work with irritation and impatience affecting your relationships at work. Unfortunately, even if work is the culprit of how you feel, it doesn’t just affect work. It affects your relationships with friends and family and your personal life. You might unnecessarily snap at loved ones. You might be missing out on family events or be so distracted while with family and friends, that you don’t enjoy anymore. You may be isolating yourself from friends and family or you may have stopped doing things you love like hobbies, activities, and exercise.
Burnout can lead to depression and anxiety.
Signs and symptoms of burnout, can also look like signs and symptoms of mental health conditions, such as depression and anxiety. What can happen, is that burnout symptoms can lead to depression and anxiety disorders. And unfortunately, having burnout and depression and/or anxiety, makes everything that much worse and that much harder to deal with! This can further feelings of burnout and cause a cycle of burnout, stress, depression, and anxiety.
Fortunately, there are some simple ways you can reduce burnout, stress, and anxiety, right away.
Re-evaluate your expectations. Burnout is often caused by pushing yourself too much for too long. Look at your to-do list and see what you can eliminate or delegate and focus on your top priorities. Pace yourself so you are not working excess overtime, which has been shown to reduce performance and efficiency.
Find allies at work. Burnout can take a toll on your relationships. If you’re feeling isolated at work or having conflicts with co-workers, find trustworthy people you can talk to.
Take your vacation time. Vacations and breaks are essential for reducing burnout because it helps to be away from the source of stress and break away from our routines for a while. Use your vacation time to visit family and friends or go to another city. Even a staycation where you spend the time at home doing something you enjoy can help alleviate feelings of burnout.
Set boundaries around work. With the move towards doing more work from home, work can really blur the line between business and leisure activities. Let work know the hours when you’re unavailable. Try not to check work calls or emails outside work hours, and if you have to, limit it to a certain time so that you are not constantly checking and responding to work messages.
Prioritize Sleep. Burnout and crazy work hours can wreak havoc on sleep schedules and getting quality sleep. Try to get at least 7 hours of sleep a night and go to bed on time, so you can wake up feeling refreshed. Stick to a consistent sleep schedule as much as possible, even on weekends and holidays.
Exercise relieves stress and gives you more energy. I know that it can feel like exercise is the last thing you want to do when you’re burned out and exhausted. Even if you want to, you feel like you can’t. However, moving your body is one of the best ways to move stress and exhaustion out of your body so you feel energized and relieved. You can start slowly with walks or stretches and gradually work your way up to more exercise as you feel more energized.
Practice relaxation tools. Breathing exercises and listening to guided meditations can help reduce stress and anxiety, relax your body, and refocus your mind. Oftentimes, work stress makes us preoccupied with work, but relaxation methods help us to reconnect with ourselves. Even just a few minutes a day can help you feel more balanced, grounded, and calmer. Numerous meditation apps are available free of charge or at low cost.
Burnout can seem overwhelming, but there is so much you can do that can help. Taking constructive action on these things can help you to regain balance in your life again. But if you find it hard to deal with burnout or your burnout symptoms won’t go away, talking to a therapist can be extremely helpful.
Therapy in San Francisco, CA, can help you with burnout.
I work with many people dealing with burnout, and I help guide them through some of the challenging situations they are going through. While many people go through work stress and burnout, you can recover from it. I listen to the unique problems you are going through, help you talk it out and process the things you are going through, and help you acknowledge other perspectives so that you can find more helpful ways to approach these difficult situations. I help you focus on yourself so that you can recover from these stressors, and work with you to reduce the depression, anxiety, and relationship stress it may have brought on so you can regain your self and get your life back. I also help you learn ways to approach work so that you can more easily avoid burnout in the future.
FREE therapy consultation in San Francisco, California
With burnout, the longer it goes on, the worse it can feel. I hope you feel more informed about burnout and have some ways to help yourself by reading this blog post. If you or someone you know would like help recovering from burnout, work stress, depression, or anxiety, find out more about how I can help here. Contact me for a free 15-minute phone consultation to see how therapy in San Francisco, CA, can help you.
