“I used to love my job… I don’t know what happened.”
Have you ever said that before?
I have. Trust me, I’ve been there.
How many times have you started a new job with the best of intentions? Maybe the job sounded like a great idea. Maybe it had great benefits, great hours, decent pay, you had nice coworkers, and it gave you the opportunity to learn new things. In other words, the job sounded perfect on paper.
But as you went all in on this new job you were so excited about… something starts to shift inside of you.
Turns out, actually doing the job feels a helluva lot different than what you imagined it’d be.
And the confusing part is that you still like the idea of the job, even though it no longer feels good to do it.
Part of you still wants to give a sh*t, but you also feel some resistance to doing what you gotta do to truly excel in your work.
You still feel like your work matters, but you question whether you should be the one to do it.
These seemingly conflicting thoughts and feelings are common among folks who are burnt out by work, so if you’re experiencing them right now, know that you’re not alone.
There are three red flags I always pay attention to - in my own work-life and when working with clients - that tell us we’re already burnt out, or that we’re dangerously close to becoming burnt out.
Are you experiencing these 3 red flags right now?
1. Fatigue
Contrary to popular belief, simply “overworking” or having a “heavy workload” does not in and of itself cause burnout. Some of my most energizing and fulfilling periods of work have been when I was pulling 12-hour workdays.
And exhaustion does not only come from working a lot or being overstimulated. Exhaustion can also come from understimulation - like when you’re bored, stagnant, or doing tedious or unfulfilling tasks. Because at the end of the day, you’re still putting more energy into the job than you’re getting out of it.
What I’m trying to say is that what one person experiences as fatigue might be different from what someone else experiences as fatigue. What one person finds energizing might be depleting for someone else.
Fatigue is a purely subjective, very individual type of experience.
Listen to your body. Does your body feel low-energy, sluggish, and unproductive every single day, in a way that even the strongest cup of coffee can’t fix?
2. Cynicism
This is the birthplace of thoughts like, “I don’t care anymore” or “Nothing I do matters.”
Or, more colloquially, “No f*cks given.”
It feels like you can’t control the world, and everything will end badly anyway, so nothing you do has any significance. (Think: Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh.)
Cynicism is also often linked to feelings of resentment.
Take this example: imagine you’re working at a customer-facing job, and you spend much of Tuesday bending over backwards to track down a product that one of your customers requested. Then on Wednesday, you find out that the customer decided to go with another company after all, which means you had basically spent all those hours helping this customer for nothing.
If you’re feeling healthy and balanced at work, you’d probably just label this as a normal part of the job, and move on.
But if you’re experiencing burnout, this situation would likely reinforce this painful thought cycle: “See? I KNEW I’d be wasting my time” → “I might as well stop caring” → “Nothing I do matters, anyway”.
You may even dread going into work every morning, because it no longer feels meaningful or fulfilling to you on a personal level.
3. Feelings of incompetence
I’d like to draw a distinction between feeling incompetent and actually being incompetent. For our purposes of identifying burnout, the feelings of incompetence are what we’ll focus on.
In my experience, these feelings often stem from the two other red flags we just talked about.
Maybe you’re too exhausted to up your game at work, and your coworkers seem to be moving up that ladder faster than you. Your head tells you that you could do better, but your body and spirit can’t seem to muster up the energy to improve your skills. So you end up sitting with that uncomfortable feeling that you’re lagging behind your colleagues.
Or, maybe your cynicism morphs into a very personal self-fulfilling prophecy that you specifically are playing a role in sending the world (or at least your job) to hell in a handbasket.
And while these thoughts and feelings are painful and uncomfortable, here’s the thing --
They’re great catalysts for change, especially during times when we’re lacking motivation or energy.
The discomfort of burnout forces us to ask the tough questions.
Like…
Is this job meant for me?
Am I doing what I’m meant to do?
Something feels off… but what is it that’s missing?
Is this something that I’m willing to power through, and what would make this discomfort worth it if I do?
Am I willing to stick it out until things get better? Will things get better?
At what point should I leave? If I decide to leave, what would I do instead?
Only you can answer these questions.
I know, I know. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could just have someone (or a crystal ball) tell you: YES, you should find a new job because I’ve seen the future and I’ve seen that what you’re doing right now will be a colossal waste of time and it’ll never get better and you’ll totally regret sticking with it for so long.
Or: NO, you’ll find a way to make things better at your job and now you’re doing exactly what you love, and sticking with your current job will be one of the best decisions you’ve ever made.
We do not have crystal balls, but we have our intuition. We have our body wisdom. We have our values and our natural talents, which can guide us to where we belong.
Here’s the good news: burnout is almost always temporary.
It usually happens in cycles, because humans were built to heal. We burn out, we recover. We burn out again, and then we recover.
I’ve personally gone through these cycles more times than I’d care to admit, but for a stubborn mule like me, sometimes it really does take waaay too many lessons before I finally try something different.
Sometimes, the burnout phase would last three straight months, and then I’d feel okay for one and a half weeks. And then the cycle would start all over again.
What we all have the power to do is to observe our body, spirit, and energy levels so we can figure out what we will tolerate, and what we won’t.
While burnout is common and even inevitable in some cases, how many cycles of burnout are you willing to tolerate? Is it worth it to stay and power-through these phases of burnout, or would it be more worth it to brave the uncertainty of leaving? Is it enough to feel good on-the-job for five or six weeks out of the whole year?
Is it time to try something different?
There’s no right or wrong answer here. There’s only the right or wrong answer for YOU, given your unique blend of wants, needs, and purpose.
You decide. You’re the boss.
Much love,
Diana
P.S. Are you sick and tired of going through endless cycles of burnout, and you’re ready to make a change? You might be interested in Get Aligned at Work, a 7-week program that helps introverted empaths to find or create the soul-nourishing job they deserve.
P.P.S. Only interested in helpful FREE stuff right now? Ready to revamp your resume so you can start exploring other work opportunities? You might be interested in the 6-Strategy Checklist for Selling Your Quiet Skills on Paper.