Burnout is not something one needs to feel ashamed of. It happens to the best of us and more often than not, people burn out because they are always putting in 120% into their work. When your work demands constantly exceed the physical and mental resources that you have, overtime, it will cause exhaustion and stress1. And when the stress and exhaustion is not managed, after some time, it will develop into burnout.
In a previous article, we can see how burnout slowly develops, and if it is not addressed, it can get out of hand. Fortunately, there are things and activities that you can do to prevent or recover from burnout. If you or anyone that you know is experiencing burnout, here are some things you can do to recover from burnout:
Try relaxing activities
When you’re burning out, you’re experiencing a lot of stress and exhaustion. You could pick up new relaxing activities that can help you relax. From the usual relaxing activities like meditation, yoga, and taichi, you could also go for activities like art, solving puzzles, or even going for a walk at a park. There are endless possibilities to activities that you can do to relax your mind.
Taking breaks in between work
Whether you already have a working schedule or is planning to make one, it is a good idea to add multiple breaks in between your work. The small breaks in between work can help you freshen up for the part of your work.
Turn to others for help
When you’re feeling under the weather, stressed or feeling down, it helps to talk about it with someone. You can share what you’re feeling with your family, friends or even co-workers, and maybe from sharing it with them they can share something that could help with your situation. In addition, sharing this to people who you trust could help lessen the weight that you’re feeling and show you that you have the support from the people around you.
Do activities that you enjoy or try something interesting
Doing activities that you enjoy can be fun and it can help take some of the stress off your mind. Maybe you haven’t had time to sing your heart out, or bake your favourite cakes for some time, and doing it now might help you enjoy and relax during your leisure time and regain the energy for work. And with the pandemic happening, we don’t get to socialise with our friends like we used to, but now we can still meet up online and have an online movie night.
Unplug from social media and devices
You may not know it, but constantly checking and reading online news social media can affect your stress level. And especially now, with the current pandemic and many other distressing news happening, it can cause you to feel stressed and damper your mood. When you spend a lot of time using your devices, especially phones and laptops, you’re reducing the amount of time for you to relax and destress. This is because those devices are also being used for work, so this association can prevent you from being able to fully relax.
Treat yourself to something nice
When people are focused on your work and performance, and especially if they’re burning out, they sometimes forget to treat themselves to something nice once in a while. So why not take this opportunity to plan something nice for yourself, have a nice dinner, buy the bag that you’ve really wanted, or get a massage and spa treatment. Spoiling yourself once in a while can help boost your motivation and improve your mood.
Eat healthy
Often when we are busy with work and feel stressed, we opt for a quick and simple meal. Those meals might not be the healthiest, but it does the work of filling us up. During these times when we feel tired and mentally exhausted, it is important to eat healthily, as a healthy body can promote a healthy mind.
Get some exercise in
When you’re busy with work, you usually don’t think about exercising, because you might be tired from all the work. Getting your body to move with some physical activities or exercises can be beneficial as it can help reduce work stress and burnout symptoms. The physical activities or exercises can be as simple as walking or running around your house, walking up and down the stairs, to running or cycling at the park, playing sports, and going to the gym.
Set boundaries
Setting boundaries for your work can help with cutting the stress and burnout you feel. By setting up boundaries like the amount of work you can take up, not checking your email or doing work out of office hours and not bringing your work home (in the case of working from home, doing work outside of your working hours), you can limit the ways your work can spill over into your private life. By setting the boundary or limit on the total amount of work you can do, you can avoid taking up more work than what you can handle, and that can prevent extra stress for you.
Create a sleep schedule
Having a sleeping routine or sleep schedule can help you get enough sleep everyday. As we require 7 to 9 hours of sleep everyday, having a sleep schedule can help remind us when it’s time to wrap up our work or activity for the night and head to bed. Or you can even include a routine to wind down before going to bed, like have a short meditation, do a facial massage or read a book.
Reframe your view of work
When you’re experiencing burnout, even the work that you love might feel monotonous to you. Reframing your view of your work can help you regain a sense of purpose and control. If you feel that your work is monotonous or mundane, you can try focusing on finding some value in your work. For example, you can focus on the things that you enjoy about your work or maybe focus on what positive impacts your work has on the company or others. Once you’ve found something to focus on, you can set up goals, either big or small, to work towards.
Take vacation or leave from work
One of the first few things that pop up in our minds, when we’re either swamped with work or stressed from working is: vacation. We just want to take time off and go somewhere nice and do the things that we enjoy. But vacation doesn’t have to be the typical 2 week-long vacation, but a short 4 day weekend staycation can work too. Plus, it’s more forgiving on your annual leave! As for the destination of said vacation, it doesn’t need to be somewhere that’s far away, but can be somewhere near to where you live. Maybe you can explore other parts of the city or state you live in, or maybe even revisit some of the towns that you’ve been to and you can see what has changed since the last time you went there. Or maybe you don’t feel like travelling, you can always use your time off to just lounge around the house and do activities that you’ve been wanting to do, like shopping, cafe hopping or get back to doing some cross-stitching.
Do note that the above are things that could help with recovering from or preventing burnout, and that it might not work for everyone. If you have tried them and it doesn’t seem to be working, or you feel like it’s getting out of control, it is recommended to go for a mental health check with a therapist or psychiatrist; and you can find one here.
Written by: Farah Iliya Zubair (MPS Psychological Services Intern)
Supervisor: Ms. Evelyn Soong
References
Hakanen, J. J., Bakker, A. B. (2016). Born and Bred to Burn Out: A Life-Course View and Reflections on Job Burnout. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 22(3), 354-364. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ocp0000053
Gerber, M., Schilling, R., College, F., Ludyga, S., Pühse, U., & Brand, S. (2020). More Than a Simple Pastime? The Potential of Physical Activity to Moderate the Relationship Between Occupational Stress and Burnout Symptoms. International Journal of Stress Management, 27(1), 53-64. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/str0000129
Carter, S. B. (2011, April 17). Overcoming Burnout. PsychologyToday. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/high-octane-women/201104/overcoming-burnout
Smith, M., Segal, J., Robinson, L. (2020, October). Burnout Prevention and Treatment. HelpGuide. https://www.helpguide.org/articles/stress/burnout-prevention-and-recovery.htm
Knight, R. (2015, April 2). How to Overcome Burnout and Stay Motivated. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2015/04/how-to-overcome-burnout-and-stay-motivated
