I’m currently on vacation from the podcast but just couldn’t help myself from recording this episode on working through burnout. My own journey to my career as a coach began with burnout and I truly believe it’s an invitation for you to create work that you love. Although, it feels terrible when you’re in the midst of it, what you learn as you overcome burnout has the capacity to take you closer to your most powerful, joyful self.

To help you see a path through burnout, I share three big picture steps with you. Just seeing what these steps are can help you feel more at peace with where you’re at. You can explore each step on your own or pull in resources and support to help make the process faster and easier.

…..

Here are the resources that I currently offer that can support you:

1. The Wildly Successful at Work Free Guide. This will help you to identify your unique version of success and to create a guide to live into your version: https://www.heidijandel.com/resources/wildly-successful-at-work/.
2. I also have an on demand workshop that walks you through the Wildly Successful at Work process available for purchase: https://www.heidijandel.com/courses/wsw-registration/
3. 1-1 coaching. To chat with me about overcoming your burnout and creating work you love, you can sign up for a Tea Date. You have space to share what's going on with you and we can see if coaching is a good fit to get you to where you want to be. Sign up here: https://www.heidijandel.com/work-with-me/coaching-call/

Hello, my beautiful introvert friend, Heidi here.

I am officially on break right now, but I was so inspired on this

topic of overcoming burnout that I had to create a bonus episode.

So here we are talking about burnout.

Now, this episode is for you.

If you are thinking that you might be burned out or if you know that

you're burned out and and you want to know what to do about it, or

if you're already in the process of working through your burnout.

And you're looking for more clarity, more ideas, more support.

So that you can get to a place where work feels not just tolerable, not just ease

awful, but like aligned and purposeful.

And that you're excited to get up in the morning for work because we

spend a third of our lives working.

So why the heck would we not want to figure out how to make it amazing

and amazing experience for us and for the people that we serve?

Right.

Because when we feel more excited and aligned, then the work that we do just,

it has so much more vibrancy and impact.

That this is a topic that is definitely near and dear to my heart.

I, my whole story really starts as a coach, starts with

burnout from my old business.

And I know I've probably told that you've prob probably familiar with that.

So just suffice it to say that by.

Working with my burnout, trying to figure out, figuring it out.

That opened the doors to my life purpose.

So it really was such a gift.

And yet I, you know, I've been doing coaching for five years.

And I have experienced, especially recently how some of my ways of looking

at things like there's still another layer that I found myself working, not

into burnout nearly like I was, but in a way that was gently leading to it.

So it's very, it's been interesting for me in these past few months, especially

this break in the podcast seasons.

To be thinking about how I'm showing up in my work, my passion work in a way that is.

Creating the conditions for burnout.

So that's for another episode.

Right now, I want to talk about like really looking out at burnout and the

process of identifying and overcoming it.

So essentially what happens with burnout is that you you're working.

In a way that doesn't work for.

You, you as an introvert, you, as someone that might have your energy is kind.

It ebbs and flows.

You as a person who has a different way of seeing the world rather than the norm.

Because what happens is that we, you know, whatever industry

you're in there is a norm.

And those are expectations on how long that you work, maybe

the personality that you bring to the work, the amount of energy.

The amount of commitment and breaks.

Some industries really, they idealized hustle.

They idealized overworking working past five, you know, past the 40 hours.

And into 60, 70, 80 hours, like that becomes a badge of honor.

Or it might be a job where the personality is very extroverted.

And so in order for you to feel like you are a successful.

And like what you're being modeled, it's very energy intense.

It's a lot of outgoing energy, which might be a part of you.

You might be an introvert that does have that ability.

But not to the full, like, full bore all of the time that is seen as the

vision of a success in that industry.

And we naturally, like, we want to be successful.

Right.

When we begin our work, we have an idea of what that looks like.

And since we haven't experienced it.

You know, in our bodies and our lived experience, we don't necessarily

know that it's going to burn us out.

Right.

So if you find yourself there, if now.

Now you're experiencing the burnout because you're, you are a successful.

Like, this is such a beautiful moment.

Of self-discovery.

Right.

It might not feel good.

But it is incredible information to help you adjust course and

discover who you truly are, what success truly means to you.

And what successful work feels like, and doesn't feel like.

So before we look at what to do, when you're finding yourself being burned out I

want to just mention a couple other things that happens that lead us into burnout.

And that is that, you know, the way that we work, the culture of a

job, the culture of the way we work in, in wet in the Western world,

or at least in the United States.

Is, you know, often it is.

Where it's the 40 hour work week.

It is the just having lunch time off.

It is feeling like if you take more time than that, there's

guilt involved with that.

This is especially challenging for parents of children that often need to,

you know, do afterschool activities.

That that becomes a source of, of stress and and contributes to a sense of

overextension of burnout, along with it.

There's guilt and shame, which also requires a lot of energy.

When you feel those emotions, it, it becomes depleting.

We are conditioned.

To think of.

Being successful as in work, as staying committed, staying focused, staying

present, and ignoring our body's signals.

Ignoring pain ignoring your energy.

Right?

I did this for so many years.

I, you know, I worked on the computer.

I remember actually, when I was.

You know, I think.

It was maybe just out of college and I worked.

As an administration for a bed, a temping, and I would sit at the

computer for four hours straight and just type it out and go, go, go.

And that's what I thought you were supposed to do.

That became for me.

The baseline of like, this is how one works.

This is what efficiency is like.

And so I did that in my own business.

And boy, like my body was not happy.

I had, that was the beginning of back pain I had chronic Pain in my wrist for years.

Of course that led me to two occupant teacher.

Her and yoga and to.

Some other modalities that now have our foundation.

They are, what do you call them?

Pillars.

Pillars in my own self care.

So I'm grateful for that.

But my, my point is, is that we are taught to ignore ourselves.

And like, with this idea of just a hour for lunch, if you're lucky.

Oh my gosh.

Like now that I am in control, mostly of my own schedule.

I take two hours for lunch because I use that time.

I use all of it.

Two exercise, I eat and I rest, sometimes I take a nap.

When I was really burned out , it took me a few years to really

get over the exhaustion around the burnout that I created.

I would take naps almost every single day or a yoga nidra because I was exhausted.

Right.

And that was so much more productive than pushing through

it or trying to go to caffeine

. That whole way of working of, of

That's a signal that something is out of balance because our bodies don't actually.

Need that.

And if we, if we structured.

Breaks into our day.

We can actually get through without the caffeine, without affecting our sleep.

You know, there's a whole chain reaction that happens there that I also spend a

lot of time per perfecting or improving.

That's the word improving and wow.

I feel like such a different person now that I'm not dependent.

Caffeine pushing through my days all of the time.

So.

We also just get conditioned to behave and work in ways that are not natural to us.

You know, that might be your energy, your personality that feel

otherwise in a FinTech and unaligned.

You know, I know those are kind of woo words, but if you are sensitive to that,

they are incredibly meaningful alignment.

Is incredibly meaningful because when you are aligned, there is ease.

It's like writing.

On the writing on a canoe.

Down a river so much easier than rowing upstream, rowing against alignment.

Against who you are.

In your job.

Okay.

So.

What to do, if you are burned out.

So let's start at the beginning with simply naming it.

Recognizing that you are in a state of burnout.

And this, you know, that you're here.

If you feel exhausted.

Most days.

If you feel bitter.

Frustrated.

Trapped.

If you find yourself complaining to your partner after work every

day or every time you meet up with your girlfriends for a drink, you're

constantly complaining about your work.

You aren't doing anything fun.

You don't have time or energy to do art, to hang out with

your kids to go on vacation.

And life feels a really hard.

You're probably also not sleeping.

Well, not eating well.

You're overweight.

Your body hurts.

You're feeling anxious, depressed, worried all of the time.

And yeah.

You've got questions.

You're questioning your job, your career yourself, you know, whatever that

you're like, that looks like for you.

There are some self doubt or just doubt in general and some

like existential questioning.

Either happening or on the horizon.

So.

By naming it.

I want to offer that.

This is a way for, instead of being like, oh, this sucks.

Like being able to name it is incredibly powerful.

Because when you can name it and see it.

And hold it and take a nice deep breath and like, oh yeah, I am burned out.

That is the beginning of change.

And that burnout as you work through it you will grow,

you will rediscover yourself.

You will experience life in a new way that there is this

amazing journey ahead of you.

That burnout it's the door that is opening for you to go outside and start traveling.

So finding a way to reframe your burnout.

To move you away from the bitterness, from the frustration

and into a place of curiosity.

Because it's going to be easier.

It's going to feel better to approach your burnout from curiosity.

From compassion.

So that you can figure out what the heck to do.

All right.

Sometimes to get there.

You need to take a break.

So you might need to take a vacation.

You might need to, if you can go part-time or work less days, if you can.

Work less during the day or take a nice big break for a nap or for yoga

nidra or for a gentle yoga class.

Find some way to give yourself deep rest.

This is where having alternative therapies can be useful, like acupuncture,

like Ayurvedic body treatments that will help you to replenish your energy because

it's a really hard To do the detective work when you're just so exhausted.

Right.

So if that is where you're at.

I give you so much permission to give you theirself luxurious amounts of rest.

Recharge.

And know that it doesn't have to be up to a hundred percent.

You don't have to recharge your battery up to a hundred percent, but just fill

up your cup enough that then you can start to do some deep thinking and

take some, take some action steps.

So once you have enough energy to, to do some regroup detective work.

You're going to want to spend time deeply thinking about what got you to burn out

and identify particular habits, identify particular ways of thinking, of behaving.

Identify external stresses and internal responses.

So external stresses might be the cultural expectations around work.

And the internal responses are the way that like, maybe you, you just

take it on and you do overwork and that comes from , people pleasing,

you want to make others happy and to have them like you or perfectionism,

you want to do the best, right?

You want to be the best at what you do, but those are based on someone

else's definitions of success.

do You want to also look at your energy and personality.

So, I am a human design projector, if you're familiar with, with

that, I'm also have a strong Vata.

If you're familiar with Ayurveda but really just instinctively you can look

at your own energy and patterns and see how much energy you have to sustain

effort over a long period of time.

Maybe you do some mapping of your energy to get a sense of what

depletes you, what fills you up.

You know, there's a lot of exercises you can do here to get to know yourself

and your body , just do an inventory.

If your sleep is off, if you're in pain.

Those are some of the first places that you can start to to address your burnout

because ideally, before you change your job before you change careers.

You actually do this internal readjustment and regrouping so that whatever changes

you decide, you're, you're making those decisions from a place of being

more resourced, having more energy.

And having a better idea of what you truly want.

So Like the solution of changing your dog jobs.

Change your burnout.

I recommend waiting on that until you've done some of these other things.

You also want to figure out what your version of success is.

And like, what does success mean to you?

Like letting all of the external voices turn down.

And, you know, maybe it's not.

It's not making $200,000 a year.

Maybe it's actually only working part time, making much less, but with the

rest of that time, you're doing your art adventuring taking care of your family.

And that that is actually what brings you true satisfaction,

true purpose in your life.

You know, or maybe it's that you're doing completely different

work than you're doing now.

If you want help with this, with identifying what success means to

you, I do have a free guide called the wildly successful at work guide.

I'll put a link in the show notes that you can download.

Their coaching questions to help you identify what success means to

you in an aligned, authentic way.

And then from there, create an action plan to make that happen in your life.

Also, this is a phase.

This is a discovery phase where you are you're, you're looking at, what's worked

for you, what hasn't worked for you and what you're gonna do differently.

And it's a great time to get assistance.

Coaching can be extremely valuable to help you ask the questions , to

help you see beyond conditioned ways of thinking and showing up to

your work and to really expand your sense of self-worth and possibility.

And then do the work to make the changes that will lead you out of burnout.

Because once you have some ideas, Then you want to implement them.

You want to change your habits, change how you think,

how you show up in internally.

And then from there, identify what you need to change externally.

And this is where you might start with habits that you have, and then that

extends into the relationships were adjusting other people's expectations.

Maybe in your family.

And then with your current job seeing, is there opportunity for you to request

what you need so that you can achieve your version of success in your current job?

Or do you need to start restructuring what your work looks like so that it takes you.

So that you can create.

That life that you love work, that you love.

And this might look, this could look so many different ways.

It could look like having two, two different jobs.

It could look like.

Having a side hustle or just going all in on being self-employed.

That's the option that a lot of us are taking these days because

traditional corporate environments operate on old values, old ways of

working that , can be very extractive.

I do notice that nonprofits seem to be doing a better job of thinking about.

Employees as being whole humans and.

Considering bringing into conversation, topics like burnout, like self

care, like like work, not being the center of everyone's life.

So to sum up.

The steps in a very broad level to overcoming burnout.

The first is to identify and name that you are burnt out.

From a place of compassion.

And curiosity.

The second is to do some detective work on why you are feeling burnt

out, going deep looking at not just the, you know, that it always, my

job is asking too much of me, but.

All of the deeper ways that you're showing up, like people

pleasing, like Overworking.

Like not sleeping.

Well, not eating well.

Like not taking time off.

I look at all of these behaviors so that you can see like, oh my gosh,

Like no wonder, I feel burnt out.

And now how can I change this?

So the step three is to begin to experiment with making changes.

Changes within your habits within the way that you think within your

relationships, within your work and learn from that, give yourself time.

Give yourself deep rest.

If that is something that you need to do.

Build in rest, build in play, build in fun.

There's so much that you can do.

Here to experiment and.

Live your life in service of a vision of success that is truly deeply yours,

not just on a professional level.

But also personally spiritually creatively, all of the Lee's right.

You have one beautiful life to live.

Your work is a way for you to serve the world in a beautiful way.

And you want to figure out how to be the person that can do that beautiful

work in a way that feels good.

All right.

My friend.

That's what I have for you in this special bonus episode.

And if you want to download the free guide to wildly successful at work,

and that will be in the show notes.

If you'd like to talk about coaching, to get through burnout, to go through

any of these three steps of burnout, you can contact me for a Tea Date.

This is just a chat where you share what's going on with you.

And so we can see if coaching is a good fit to get you to where

you want to be- out of burnout and into a life and work that you love.

So that will be also in the show notes.

All right, friends.

I hope you're enjoying your summer.

I'm headed to Hawaii on a couple of days, so I'll be off for a bit,

but I'm thinking about you and the next season of the podcast.

So thank you so much for joining.