burnout

“I feel like I have no soul left after my day’s end.”

Stages of Burnout

exhaustion

  • emotional exhaustion

  • chronic fatigue

  • feeling stressed

  • emotional dysregulation

  • irritability

  • heavy sighs

cynicism

  • dehumanization of others losing meaning in work

  • distrust of systems

  • reclusive behavior

  • interpersonal conflict

  • lots of scoffing

inefficacy

  • projects take forever

  • never feel caught up

  • success feels empty

  • reduced personal accomplishment

  • apathy

  • despair

  • really really heavy sighs

Burnout is caused by “chronic interpersonal stressors on the job”

There is a common misconception that burnout is primarily caused by being overworked. However, that’s not quite true.

It’s not about how many hours we work but how we feel about those hours.

But burnout might have nothing to do with hours worked at all. Or workload.

The culprit is interpersonal stress: the stress that comes from our interactions and feelings about others.

This includes troubling interactions, unresolved conflict, manipulation, coercion, toxic behavior, unethical behavior, cruelty, bullying, harassment, etc.

But it’s also the more subtle socioemotional stressors, like perceptions of fairness, justice, value, worth, or feeling exploited.

So it’s not necessarily about the hours worked; it’s when we feel we’re giving more than we get back. It’s when we don’t have the support and resources we need to satisfy the demands being made on us.

It’s the result of the chronic feeling that our labor, skills, and personhood aren’t valued, honored, or cared for.