Ep. 11 Overcoming Emotional Burnout

This is Lacey Jones and this is episode Eleven Overcoming Burnout. We are going to talk about emotional burnout this week and we're going to talk about how to overcome it if we're already there. And hopefully along the way, maybe some tools to prevent emotional burnout, whether it's in the workforce or in the home. And as we talk about burnout, is this a fact? Is it a thought? Is it a feeling? Is it an action? Is it a result? Where does it fit in our lovely model that we like to work with? And so for today's discussion, I want to put it in the feeling line.

I want to put it in the emotions, right? This is an emotion that we can feel well. If it's an emotion, what creates that feeling of burnout? If we know the model and we look at the model and how it's created, our feelings are created by our thoughts about a situation. So I am burned out is a thought. It's not necessarily a circumstance or a fact, which is really important to, I think, distinguish between the two of those. Because if it's a thought versus a fact, we can change a thought, right? Facts we can't change. We can't mess with that, but we can choose a different thought. We can also see how we got there and we can take ownership of digging our way out if that's what we want to do.

So this feeling of burnout, how do we get there? I was kind of drawing a map of the emotions that can get us to burnout. And if we draw a line on our paper and we start with just a neutral emotional state, right? And then below that line is kind of the negative, uncomfortable feelings, and above that line is the positive, more energizing emotions that we experience.

So if we're at neutral and we're trying to understand how we get to the bottom of the ladder to burnout, here's kind of the path I thought emotionally we might take, right? So we start to get a little bit uncomfortable and move south of neutral. And from uncomfortable we can start to feel a little bit of doubt and then the fear kind of starts to creep in as we feel a little bit behind. And then maybe we're a little frustrated and then a little bit of inadequacy pops in and then overwhelm, we start to distance ourselves. We withdraw from our responsibilities. We might be feeling dismayed or powerless or victimized. We might start to feel paralyzed as we develop more into a burned out state.

So it's an interesting thought process. I want you to kind of think about the emotions and what would get you or what has led you to emotional burnout. Where did you start? Because usually when we start a new job or a new life situation, if we're happy and gleeful and joyful and excited for what the future can hold and as we dig in, we start dropping down the emotional ladder to more neutral and down into the more of the negative emotions and into burnout.

That's a process, right? It doesn't always happen overnight. So if you find yourself there, just kind of look at how you got there. Our first thing with overcoming burnout is, I want an awareness. Where are you currently? Are you just feeling maybe a little bit frustrated or overwhelmed? Or are you at the complete bottom, paralyzed by emotional burnout? Awareness is the first step. We got to know what we're working with, all right? And we got to know where that piece fits on the model so we can figure out how to take responsibility for the change that we're going to take with it. All right? Once we find our awareness of what's going on, I want us to move to acceptance. And sometimes acceptance can be hindered if we start to pile the shame on, right? The shame and the blame.

Blame sounds like, well, I'm feeling burned out because my boss keeps piling all these different assignments on my desk and is expecting me to do it, and I don't have the resources for it, and there's no way I can do it, right. My boss this, my boss that. Or this would be better if my boss did this, or if so and so did their job, I wouldn't have to do their job, and my job, I wouldn't feel so emotionally burned out. So blame is putting the responsibility for your emotional state onto someone else. We call that emotional childhood, and we want to start taking responsibility for our emotions, which can kind of feel like a tall order when that's not how we've been raised.

We've been socialized to believe that other people create our emotions. Other people kind of put us in this position. But guess what? Life is so much better when we start to realize what we're in charge of and we kind of take the wheel. So another thing with that is we want to put blame behind us, drop that bag of weight. We also want to be real careful that shame doesn't start rearing its ugly head. Shame can send you further and further down the burnout ladder. Right of, oh, if only I were a better this, a better boss, a better manager. If only I was better. I'm not good enough. I shouldn't be acting like this. I know better. I know how to control my emotions, right? This shouldn't be happening to me.

That kind of shame can just really keep us, like I said, down on the bottom rung of the ladder, and we want to crawl out of that. So we need to stop packing that weight around. So we go to acceptance. Right of, this is where I am at.

And then asking, what is my role in it? How can I change? And am I ready for change? Or do I just need to sit here for a bit, right? So in acceptance, we want to talk about kind of processing our emotions. Because if we just say, okay, I'm at the bottom of the rung and I don't want to be here, I'm going to zoom right up to the top, to a more neutral, more content state, it's not going to work if we don't first process how we're feeling.

So with an awareness and acceptance, let's look at that emotion. How is it showing up in your life? How do you feel physically when you're experiencing burnout? Do your shoulders hunch over? Do you round your body? Do you kind of go into this protective fetal position? Do you feel heavy? Is your stomach tight and knots? Is it hard to think and you just feel foggy and you just can't move forward? Is it just confusion? Right? And heaviness, I wish you could see my body language right now. I talk with my hands. And so just curling into that fetal position of all the weight and the struggle that you're having to carry as you feel burned out, that's how burnout feels for me. And it feels like I can't move forward slugging through that mud with a big old weight on my back. Okay, notice it. Notice how it's showing up for you. Now from here, another piece of acceptance is understanding that in life we're going to have difficult experiences. We're also going to have beautiful, wonderful, amazing experiences. Life is 50 50. Sometimes a day can be beautiful and wonderful.

Then the next day can be not so beautiful or amazing. And that's the 50 50. Sometimes it's hour by hour, minute by minute, year by year, kind of different depending on where we are in life. It doesn't always have to be 12 hours will be amazing and 12 hours will be awful, and it's going to repeat that pattern every single day. So as we learn to process those emotions and expect the negative emotions along with the positive emotional platter that we receive in life, that can help us move up that ladder to a more neutral state or towards neutrality away from burnout.

All right, so we've become aware of our situation. We're accepting that we're here. We're accepting that life is 50 50, right? We're learning to process the emotion. We're learning how it shows up in our life. Now, is it time to create is it time to create momentum, moving towards that neutrality and eventually content and happy and joy? Right? That's for you to decide. Are you ready for that? Well, let's go. Okay, so this is a point where you might be able to do this on your own or you might need to hire a coach.

I know a really amazing one, right? You might need to hire a coach to just kind of listen to all the pieces to the puzzle and start sorting them out and start plugging them in the right place so that you build your model in a way that it serves you. We call this the intentional model, where we really start to look at what emotion you want to feel, even what actions you want to take. So we look at what you want to do moving forward. Now, if we climb out, we climb up from the bottom of that rung and we're getting out of that paralyzed state of burnout.

If I've been withdrawn, how can we open up to being more included? How can we show up rather than withdraw? Well, it's going to take a different story. And maybe the story that we started with that led to burnout is, I just can't do this anymore. I'm not good enough. Well, let's challenge it. I like to challenge thoughts when we're trying to make progress, when we're trying to create an intentional model to change a feeling, to change actions, and to change our results, I like to challenge that story and that thought that we're holding on to.

So if you can't do this anymore, challenge it. What can you do? What is one thing that you can do to move yourself forward? Just one thing. When you narrow in on specifics, like we talked about in the podcast last week, the generalizations versus specifics, when you hone in on specific things that you can do, you'll find progress.

You'll find the ability to create change. Let's say you're burned out in your job right now. I want you to look at one thing that you can do today that would put you on a path of progress. Is that one thing just responding to an email that you've been putting off or cleaning up your desk and your workspace so that visually there's a little more organization? It's interesting how even just that can help with feeling more calm and peace in our life.

Or is that one thing following up with a client? These are action line items and sometimes doing that one small step can get you in the headspace to move forward. And as you move forward, we're going to create a more intentional model. The intentional model is where we decide, okay, this is the circumstance. The circumstance stays the same as it did before when we looked at the unintentional model. But with the intentional model and the circumstance being what it is, we get to decide another piece to the puzzle, an intentional choice.

Do we want to decide the story that we want to create and believe? Do we want to decide what emotion we want to take actions from? Do we want to decide what actions we want to take? And do we want to decide the result? Sometimes we're working towards a goal. So with emotional burnout and trying to climb the ladder out of that space, I would recommend a new emotion that you want to operate from. So if kind of the paralyzing burnout is at the bottom, you can decide how many rungs up that ladder you want to move. And as you move up that ladder, pay attention to what feels genuine to you. We're not forcing you to go to sunshine and rainbows right out of feeling burned out for who knows how long. The more genuine steps you take to honor kind of your own emotional growth and maturity, the more likely it is that this change will stick.

I can't force you to love life all of a sudden when lots of stories and thoughts have been ingrained for so long. So look at where you want to go next. From Burnout, do you want to go to overwhelmed or maybe push past that to just some frustration with life's circumstances? Or are you ready to just kind of go to disappointment of, well, this is where I am. It's not where I thought I would be, but I'm here. Notice that it's not just this, oh, I'm not where I wanted to be. There's also an acceptance of I'm here. Yep. It's not where I wanted to be, but I'm going to accept the fact that I am here.

Now what? And when you can work from that place of acceptance and, okay, now what? You're going to move back up that ladder, you're probably going to scamper right back up that ladder a little bit faster instead of resisting, oh, this is where I am, and I don't want to be here. So as we move out of Burnout, acceptance, no matter where you are on that ladder, is key to creating the emotional state and actions and results that you want in your life. I know it's kind of a lot to think about, but I also know it's so important right now to be talking about emotional burnout. We're seeing it in homes and families and moms and in probably every profession, career, job out there. We've experienced a lot of emotional weight with the circumstances life has thrown at us the last couple of years.

But let's work through it. Let's not just throw in the towel and surrender. Let's work through it. And if you want help, please reach out. This is something I love to do. I love working with my clients each week. I never know what they're going to bring at me, but that's what's fun, because we can use the principles of coaching and the model to provide hope again that you aren't stuck, that you can change, that life can be amazing and beautiful and wonderful.

All right, friends, holler at me if you need help. Other than that, I'll see you next weekend.