During this 30-Day Challenge, some of the ideas you have about business, life, and productivity will be seriously challenged. However, what you’re going to get out of this challenge is how to recognize the signs of burnout, know how to avoid burnout, and if you’ve let it go too far, how to overcome burnout.
Burnout is a problem that entrepreneurs sometimes develop. The following symptoms characterize that problem:
• Exhaustion – Do you feel tired no matter how much you sleep? It’s not just tiredness; it’s not able to get up at all.
• Fatigue – Are you tired whenever you get stressed out about something?
• Lack of Energy – Do you notice that you lack the energy you had previously when completing specific tasks?
• Sleep Issues – Do you have trouble falling asleep, or are you sleeping more or less than usual. Adult humans need from 7 to 9 hours of sleep each evening for optimum performance.
• Poor Performance – When you are doing your work or doing tasks for your family, you aren’t doing them correctly and are making more mistakes than usual.
• Memory Issues – You’re late for appointments or miss meetings or just cannot remember your thoughts as you speak.
• Problems Focusing and Concentrating – If you have circular thoughts in your head, it can affect sleep but also affect your daily life keeping you from focusing on one thing at a time.
• Indifference – You’re starting to feel as if you really don’t care about anything, whether business, family, friends, or fun. You don’t really get anything out of anything now.
• Disillusionment – You don’t think anything you thought was true is true now, and it’s causing you problems with getting joy out of your chosen business.
• Restlessness – You keep looking up something new instead of focusing on your business choice.
• Loss of Empathy – You notice that you aren’t able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes right now due to your own issues overshadowing everyone else.
• Cynicism and Bitterness – You feel downright bitter about the situation, and you can’t overcome it because you think nothing can change, including you.
• Relationship Issues – What is happening in your business can also affect your home life and vice versa. If your friendships and family relationships are being affected, it’s time to get some control over it.
• Less Initiative – You just can’t be bothered to do anything because it’s just too hard, and you don’t come up with any new ideas.
• Lower Imagination – It’s hard to imagine anything because you can’t focus, you’re tired, and your mind won’t relax enough.
• Poor Health – Burnout can affect your physical health as well as your mental health and sometimes even be due to your physical health and poor nutrition.
• Heightened Anxiety – When you are experiencing burnout, sometimes you’ll also feel very anxious whenever the subject of work or the thing causing the issues comes up.
• Depression – Burnout can be either caused by a severe major depressive episode or produce one. If you feel depressed or find yourself idealizing death, please seek professional medical care.
You can also call a national suicide hotline to get help if you need it.
In the US, call 1-800-273-8255.
You may also feel as if you are the only person who can do anything to solve the problems that have developed. You tend to make it your job to do everything as if you’re indispensable, and due to that feeling, you never have enough time, resources, or ability to do everything needed.
You may feel like you cannot say no, and due to that work for free, or feel resentment about the work you are doing due to the lack of recognition you’re getting. These are all actually normal feelings if you don’t set up your life to recognize and avoid burnout and treat it if you should experience it.
While true burnout may need professional treatment, you can do a lot to help yourself, including seeking professional intervention if everything else you’re trying is not working for you.
In the next thirty days, you’re going to receive a blog post every day with a link via email to remind you, as well as be invited to a private community to help you work through the 30-Day Challenge.