As the relentless pursuit of "having it all" leaves many professional women teetering on the edge of burnout, I couldn't help but share my own journey from the brink. Through heartfelt narratives and conversations, we explore the silent yet pervasive crisis of burnout and its sweeping devastation on lives and careers. We're stripping back the layers, exposing the "surviving" phase where warning signs are often cloaked in deceptive normalcy, and the stark reality of the "burnout" phase, a forced shutdown that spares no one. In a world where the hustle is glorified, this episode is a wake-up call to stop glorifying busyness and start living with intention.
This isn't your usual talk on work-life balance; it's a deep dive into sustainable change, rooted in self-reflection and Scriptural wisdom. I lay out a blueprint for a lifestyle overhaul that begins with checking your baggage—those negative core beliefs that keep you stuck in harmful patterns. We set up the building blocks of sturdy boundaries to protect your space and energy, and we embark on a quest to discover your unique brilliance, that spark within that's been dimmed by the demands of life. Through a guided self-assessment and Scriptural insights, like the wisdom found in Matthew 11:28-30, we seek not just to survive the storm of professional demands but to emerge more vibrant and alive than ever before. Join us as we chart the course toward not just reclaiming your well-being but celebrating your life's brilliance in every aspect.
As the relentless pursuit of "having it all" leaves many professional women teetering on the edge of burnout, I couldn't help but share my own journey from the brink. Through heartfelt narratives and conversations, we explore the silent yet pervasive crisis of burnout and its sweeping devastation on lives and careers. We're stripping back the layers, exposing the "surviving" phase where warning signs are often cloaked in deceptive normalcy, and the stark reality of the "burnout" phase, a forced shutdown that spares no one. In a world where the hustle is glorified, this episode is a wake-up call to stop glorifying busyness and start living with intention.
This isn't your usual talk on work-life balance; it's a deep dive into sustainable change, rooted in self-reflection and Scriptural wisdom. I lay out a blueprint for a lifestyle overhaul that begins with checking your baggage—those negative core beliefs that keep you stuck in harmful patterns. We set up the building blocks of sturdy boundaries to protect your space and energy, and we embark on a quest to discover your unique brilliance, that spark within that's been dimmed by the demands of life. Through a guided self-assessment and Scriptural insights, like the wisdom found in Matthew 11:28-30, we seek not just to survive the storm of professional demands but to emerge more vibrant and alive than ever before. Join us as we chart the course toward not just reclaiming your well-being but celebrating your life's brilliance in every aspect.
Chapter 3. Disrupting Burnout. When interviewing potential clients, I always ask what will happen if you don't do anything to break the cycle. I've heard a variety of responses. Some women share they've gained weight or lost their appetite. Others share how they battle addictions or have lost significant relationships. Several women have voiced that they feel like they are holding on by a thread. The comment that concerns me most is this will cost me my life. The statement itself is alarming, but the frequency that I hear this statement compels me to do something about it. Professional women are suffering physically, mentally, emotionally and relationally, to the point that their lives are in danger. They're battling high blood pressure, depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, imposter syndrome, isolation and a host of other challenges as a result of burnout.
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The cycle of burnout is detrimental and we must disrupt the cycle. I refer to recovery from burnout as disrupting burnout, which is also the name of my podcast. I use the term disrupt because it's meaning most clearly defines our goal here. A quick Google search for definition of disrupt produced the following definition from Oxford Languages Drastically alter or destroy the structure of. In offering the origin of the word, oxford languages provides the Latin root word disrupt, peer, which means broken apart. The Cambridge Dictionary states disrupt means to prevent something, especially a system, process or event, from continuing as usual or as expected. My goal for you is not that you just step out of burnout. If you merely step out, you may just as easily step back in. My goal is for you to radically change and drastically alter your negative core belief systems. On this journey, you will destroy the cycle of burnout in your life so you can live in brilliance Surviving. I discuss burnout in terms of cycles because that is exactly what happens for those of us who are prone to burnout In one moment.
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You feel fine. You're surviving In surviving mode, the first part of the cycle. You're holding it all together. Your calendar is full, but you're handling things. You're doing too much and feeling the pressure, but you're maintaining. Your focus is on everyone else in your life. You have many obligations and you're not quite sure how to stop. You could really use a rest, but you fear the whole house of cards may fall if you step away.
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In the surviving phase. Everything is fine, life is just fine. You know something is missing, but you can't put your finger on it. How's work fine. How are you feeling today? I'm fine. Hey, friend, is everything okay, yep, everything is fine. Fine is all always a sign when I'm coaching women. When everything is fine, I know the cycle has begun. You were not created to be fine. According to John 10 and 10, jesus came so you may experience life in abundance until it overflows. Fine does not meet that standard.
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Overwhelm If you don't make a change while in surviving mode, you will easily find yourself in the next phase of the cycle of burnout. Overwhelm In overwhelm, you feel the water level of your life rising as you struggle to keep your head above the waves. Overwhelm is the prelude to burnout, during which you really need help, but you're afraid to ask for it. You battle thoughts of insignificance and incompetence. You begin to feel not good enough, not strong enough, not smart enough, not enough. People in tune with you may notice you struggling. They may even check on you, but you push their concern away for fear of being exposed.
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In overwhelm, you begin to manifest negative consequences of living in overwhelmed life. Your body, soul and spirit send you warning signs. In overwhelm, everything in you is trying to get your attention. Red lights are flashing and the warning signs are blaring. A shutdown is pending. You may begin to retreat into isolation just to catch your breath In overwhelm. You try to convince yourself you can handle it. I got it Becomes your mantra. Can I help you? I got it. Need to take something off your plate? I got it. Are you okay? I'm good. I got it. I Got it is a stiff arm extended to keep people away.
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In Overwhelm you reject the support you desperately need. You're afraid to allow anyone to get too close. You're concerned about what they might think if they truly saw the mess behind the mask. You try to protect the trust and respect others have for you by keeping them at a distance. The mess piles up around you, but you wouldn't dare allow anyone to see it. The mess may be metaphorical or physical Stacks of paperwork piled under my desk at one point in my career, so many that I could no longer put my legs under that desk. Any quick movement and the avalanche of my overwhelm would fall all over the floor. So many people came into that beautiful office with the huge windows and never saw the mess. I didn't feel safe letting them see that side of me. I was overwhelmed and afraid.
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Burnout you will stop when burnout hits. Burnout is forced shutdown. It is involuntary. Burnout is automatic. Burnout is inconvenient. You cannot plan for the shutdown, it just happens. Overwhelming is the whisper, but burnout is the demand.
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In this phase, you can no longer hold it together. Something breaks and the damage cannot be hidden. Your body, soul and spirit are exhausted, your most significant relationships are strained and clutter fills your environment. Even if you want to keep pushing, you can't. You just do not have it in you anymore. Burnout manifests in different ways for different people. My friend, lindsay Ray Perry of Journey to CEO, describes how she collapsed in the street, not knowing who she was or where she lived. Another good friend who serves as a transformational capacity coach, nicole Rohn, describes how she ended up in the hospital after shouldering a demanding corporate job and a work commute that took several hours each day. I walked away from my 20-year career with no income and no plan. Some people turn to substance abuse or fall into depression. Burnout stops you in your tracks. You are forced to stop and there are no more words. There's nothing more to say at this point because you're too tired to even speak. This is rock bottom.
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In the Gallup Workforce Panel Survey of February 2022, 76% of employees report they experience burnout at least sometimes. K-12 education professionals report the highest level of burnout of all professions, at 44%. When we extract teachers from that group, the number increases to 51%, reporting they very often or always feel burned out at work. College and university professionals rank second most burned out, at 35%. 34% of all professionals who identify as female, across all professions, report they very often or always feel burned out at work, compared to 26% of professionals who identify as male. Most research on burnout is focused on caring professionals like teaching, nursing and social work. The body of research concerning burnout in the medical profession is growing day by day. In addition, there is new research on burnout among parents and caregivers.
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Contemporary research shows there is a burnout epidemic, but the traditional definitions of burnout are sorely lacking. Caring burnout is not. In 2019, the World Health Organization included burnout in the 11th edition of the International Classification of Diseases, icd-11, as an occupational phenomenon and called it a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workforce stress that has not been successfully managed. According to the WHO, burnout refers specifically to phenomenon in the occupational context and should not be applied to describe experiences in other areas of life. The WHO definition was derived from the work of Christina Maslach, michael Leder and Susan Jackson, who developed the Maslach burnout inventory in 1981. These researchers define burnout as a psychological syndrome emerging as a prolonged response to chronic interpersonal stresses on a job. They found the three key dimensions of this response are overwhelming, exhaustion, feelings of cynicism and detachment from the job, and a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment.
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Although I respect this research, my experience has taught me burnout should not be limited to the work context. I have not met one client who only experiences burnout and overwhelm at work. I've had more than one client who says work provides them with respite from the overwhelming parts of their life. My clients experience the key dimensions mentioned above in parenting, in marriage, in caregiving in their family roles, in serving at church, and the list goes on. I have clients who have left an overwhelming work environment to pursue working for themselves and still struggle with burnout. Work is often not the original onset of the cycle of burnout for my clients. Many of them can trace overwhelm back to middle school or high school.
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You can burnout in ministry, even if ministry is not your primary occupation. You can burnout on a passion. You can burnout while serving your purpose. Burnout is invasive. It impacts every part of your life. Burnout is a thief. It comes to steal and destroy everything that means the most to you.
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Burnout is deeper than workplace factors. Burnout is a heart issue. Its root system is stored in your belief system. Surface tactics bring temporary relief but leave you vulnerable to recurrence. Recovery from burnout is deeper than workplace culture, time management, resilience and work-life balance In my study of burnout recovery, these are the typical areas of focus and each one falls short of a remedy in one way or another. To disrupt the cycle of burnout for good, you must do the heart work. Let's look more closely at why standard strategies so often fail to resolve burnout Workplace culture Changing your workplace culture is not the solution for your burnout.
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Workplace culture can be a major contributor to burnout, but it's not the solution. Even if your work culture changed for the good, today the damage is done and your body keeps a record. Your workplace may create an environment for burnout to flourish and it's probable your job is a major contributor to your burnout. Your workplace may also add to your personal trauma, magnifying the risk and extent of your burnout. However, you do not have to wait for a culture shift in your industry before disrupting your burnout. I've had clients who still struggled with burnout and overwhelm after leaving a toxic work environment. When we traced their steps, we found a history of survival and overwhelm, even prior to the toxic job and after their transition out of the toxic space, they still needed the heart work strategies to locate and address the root of the problem in their hearts.
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Some people are drawn to toxic work environments because of the firestorm they carry in their soul. If you go from job to job and you always find yourself surrounded by chaos, you need to ask yourself why you continue to be attracted to those environments. If you worked in a toxic work environment for a long time, why do you stay? You may need to leave that place, but do not expect another workplace to heal you. Even when you leave, you take you with you. That baggage goes where you go. Your workplace may be the catalyst of your crisis, and institutions, schools and organizations have a responsibility to promote and support wellness for their employees in measurable ways. However, you do not have to wait for the workplace to change for you to be well If they start prioritizing wellness today. You still need the heart work strategies to recover from the impact of your journey so far. If they never prioritize wellness, the heart work strategies will be your healing, your protection and your guide as you continue to navigate challenging environments. You are your first advocate. Friend, take the responsibility of protecting your peace back into your own hands. Do not hand your right to be well over to any industry. Decide to be free now. Whether the culture changes or not, the hard work strategies will teach you how.
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Calendar tactics Disrupting burnout is not about calendar tactics. Many great books out there focus on managing your calendar, but this is not one of them. I wrote an e-book on the topic several years ago, but I have to let you know, none of those tactics prevented burnout. Burnout is more about the quality of engagements on your calendar than the quantity of engagements. I have more responsibilities today than I did when I was overwhelmed and burnt out. The difference is everything I do today flows from my unique brilliance and is secured by my boundaries. Therefore, I do not overwork and I do not work outside of my innate unique value. Anytime I attempt to step out of those boundaries, I immediately feel misaligned and I run back to safety. So this is not the place where you will learn to manage your calendar. This journey is a deeper work.
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Resilience More resilience is not the solution for burnout either. Most of the proclaimed experts I hear speak on burnout immediately resort to a session on resilience. In my work, coaching professional women, I found you do not need another lesson in resilience. You know how to fall and get back up. You know how to be pushed into a corner and fight your way out. You know how to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. You know how to keep pushing in the face of adversity. Your problem is not lack of resilience. The problem is you've had to be resilient too often. You have bounced back so much your bounce back is broken. You know how to fight. You know how to bounce back. You know how to be resilient. I didn't write this book to teach you how to be resilient. The woman this book is written for does not need another lesson in resilience. You're already good at that, maybe too good.
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New normal Disrupting burnout is not about rushing into a new normal. Human beings don't like to remain in discomfort. We prefer to fix it or mask it and move on. A premature new normal that ignores the need to recover is not the solution for burnout. Through my doctoral research, I studied the five phases of crisis management. According to FEMA, the fifth phase of this process is recovery, during which you heal and rebuild. Human beings often want to skip this step. After 2020, many people wanted to rush into a new normal where we didn't have to wear masks or walk around in fear for our health.
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After a divorce, a woman desires to create a new normal for herself and her children that mask the impact of the split. After the loss of a child, a mother desires the grieving process to end so she can live without the constant pain in her heart. After the abuse ends, a survivor desires to move on with her life like it never happened. You may desire to skip the pain of recovery in your story. Imagine there was a hurricane in your area yesterday. Today the rain has stopped and the winds have ceased. Would you look at your neighbor and say go back into your flooded house and be normal? I imagine you think that sounds ridiculous. The same applies to prematurely rushing into a new normal after trauma. So much has changed, you need to recover. So no, friend, rushing into some version of normal after your burnout crisis will not disrupt your burnout Work-life balance.
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Finally, friend, we will not focus on work-life balance. During my disrupting burnout workshops, it never fails that someone normally several folks mentioned their need for balance. Let me show you why work-life balance is not the answer. Imagine every responsibility in your life is a dumbbell weight. Now imagine holding all of your weight at the same time for an extended period, holding them in your mind, holding them in your heart, trying to hold all the things all the time all at once. Eventually something will fall, and when weighty things fall, damage occurs. You may get hurt. Someone you love could get hurt. How often have you asked someone how are you? And they answered I'm just tired. I'm just tired doesn't necessarily mean that person needs a nap. I'm just tired means I'm worn out from carrying all my stuff at the same time, all the time. Balance is not realistic, not sustainable and not a fair expectation. It's a myth of strength. No person, not even the strongest woman, can carry everything all at the same time and still be okay. So balancing work and life is not the solution to burnout.
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Disrupting burnout strategies. There are three proven strategies that truly disrupt the cycle of burnout for good. Number one check your baggage. Number two build your boundaries. Number three discover your brilliance. Notice these are strategies, not sequential steps. You might work on all three strategies at the same time or dig deeply into one strategy, while the other two run in the background. These strategies are not a one and done solution. They are a lifestyle. As you evolve in purpose, you'll revisit the strategies as a form of quality control in your life.
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Burying burnout requires constantly walking through these three strategies. Each strategy is rooted in Scripture. This journey is an intimate walk through your soul with Holy Spirit. If you experience distress or triggering emotions during this journey, stop and take note of the feelings. What triggered the feelings? What sensations do they create? Where did you feel them in your body? Take those notes to a therapist or other licensed professional who can help you process what's coming up for you. Allow the Word of God to restore the life he created you to live. Our foundational Scripture comes from Matthew 11, verses 28 through 30, which is stated so beautifully in the Message translation.
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Are you tired, worn out, burned out on religion? Come to me, get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me. Watch how I do it, learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly. We will study this Scripture along with several others throughout this journey.
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Friend, regardless of where you are today, you can recover from burnout. You can disrupt the cycle of burnout so you never have to hit rock bottom again. You can discover the life you were created to live. You can live in purpose and freedom by checking your baggage, building your boundaries and discovering your brilliance. Let's walk through each strategy together. Do the hard work.
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How are you Know? Really, I want to know. More importantly, I want you to know how often we ask this question in passing, just as a greeting, but not really wanting an answer. One of the greatest mistakes I made was never checking in with myself. I was so consumed with the needs of others that I completely ignored my own needs. Friend, before we begin this journey, I need you to check in with you. You need an answer. Today, I want to challenge you to do a little self-assessment, a bit of a walkthrough, to answer the question how are you right now? If you're willing and if you're safe to do so, sit comfortably with both feet on the floor, close your eyes for a moment and take a deep, cleansing breath. Take another breath, open your eyes Now, take a few minutes to answer the following questions in your journal.
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Do not edit your thoughts. This is just for you, so no need to judge yourself. Write exactly what comes to your heart. Here we go. How's your body? How are you feeling physically? Are you accommodating any ache or pain? Does any system or function in your body seem just a bit off? Have you been ignoring any medical concerns? How's your body? How's your mind?
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What thoughts do you think as you wake in the morning? What thoughts do you think as you attempt to rest at night? What thoughts do you push away as you work during the day because you don't have time to deal with them? How's your mind? How's your heart? Not just the heart that beats, but the heart that feels. What emotions are you wrestling with? Have you had reactions that feel outside of your personality? Is there any unresolved anger, shame, fear or confusion in your life? Do you find your emotional reactions are out of control? How's your heart? How are your relationships? I'm talking about the ones that mean the most to you. Think about the relationships you want to be with you forever. Is there any discord or division? Are you experiencing any breaking communication with the ones you love? Is there any relationship you feel like you're losing. How are your relationships? Download the Disrupting Burnout Journal for a fillable copy of this activity at patricebutnerjaxsoncom slash journal.