Intro to Burnout
Architects and others in creative disciplines are particularly passionate about the work they create. A part of us is etched into our work. We pour over it, sometimes to the detriment of ourselves. Prolonged stress related to our work can cause us to stop in our tracks and burn out.
Q: What is burnout and why does it matter? How do we overcome (or completely avoid) burnout effectively?
Burnout is real.
Rising frustration with office life has become a clear and present danger to our work culture.
Looming deadlines and stressful working environments have eroded worker motivation and effectiveness. When we feel stressed out at work, we often neglect the symptoms and push through. When the push goes unchecked for too long or happens too frequently, we burn out.
Beyond the office, the other parts of our lives can be equally as taxing. Some people will face medical issues, relationship issues, and any number of other situations that can add to the stress of their lives. When left to their own devices, these issues will wreak havoc on a person’s life over time, causing that person to burn out.
So, what can we do about it?
It starts with taking a hard look at what burnout actually is and how to recognize it when it affects you.
Understanding burnout is the power to choose a different path.
Let’s explore burnout and develop a tangible plan for how we can overcome it.
What is Burnout?
To understand the problem, we first need to define Burnout. So, what is Burnout exactly?
At its core, Burnout is the result of stress built up over time, ultimately overwhelming the person who experiences it. However, burnout is NOT the same as stress. Stress is acute, while Burnout is chronic.
To think of it a different way, we all experience some level of stress throughout the day. Maybe someone cut you off on the highway on your way to work. Maybe you had to wait in line longer than expected at your favorite coffee shop. Maybe your co-worker scoffed at one of your ideas in front your boss.
While these events may frustrate you or make you angry, they are all temporary moments in time. They will pass. You will forget about them and move on.
The difference here is that stress can be relieved at the source by either solving the problem causing the stress directly or by releasing stress through activities such as exercise.
Burnout on the other hand is constructed, built up. The ability to break burnout down and get back to ‘normal’ or a baseline is much more difficult.
Burnout is the chronic emotional stress that causes you to become disconnected from your purpose, your joy, and your life.
“Burnout is the physical or mental collapse caused by overwork or stress.”
When you experience stress, you become bewildered, frustrated, anxious. The feeling is real, but the moment is fleeting and will pass.
When you experience burnout, you don’t have the ability quickly bounce back because the problems you need to deal with are systemic, not acute. Dealing with burnout requires you to untangle the mess, not just wait for it to pass. It won’t unless you change the systems that got you there.
Burnout exhausts you both physically and mentally. It can act as a gateway to other, more serious conditions such as depression, anxiety, and so on.
Do more.
Everyone is busy.
When I say that, it probably either energizes you or makes you cringe. It may even do a bit of both.
Since the Great Recession in 2008, things have been progressively getting better in the economy. New technologies have been popping up left and right to help streamline the progress of society.
So, when everything’s good, it’s all good, right?
No.
We live in a time when ‘Do More’ and ‘Hustle’ culture are synonymous with success. Having a good work ethic can help close the gap between where you are and where you want to be in your career. But it’s not the only metric of success. It’s not sustainable when left unchecked.
We can’t sprint the entire length of a marathon.
Instead we must methodically build up our bodies and minds for the long term stresses we put them through.
More.
But, society doesn’t care about that.
Society says, “Do more.”
Clients are moving forward with their projects and we have to be there to serve them at the same levels of high quality as ever before.
More clients appear and require the same amount of attention—or more.
More.
More.
More.
How do we cope? How do we keep up?
We show up harder. We become more efficient. We offer more services.
We do more.
Is the Cause Our Work or Is It Everything?
In Spring 2019, the World Health Organization (WHO) addressed burnout head on. They categorized burnout as a “workplace” condition.
“Burnout is a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed.”
For me, the WHO’s position is a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t quite paint a complete picture of what burnout can manifest in someone’s life.
Think about it this way—does your life revolve entirely around your job?
Regardless of whether you have a spouse or kids, you have people in your life that care about you. You have friends that care about you. You have activities that you enjoy to do in your spare time. You may have faith in a higher power. You may enjoy spending time with your dog.
While I can see why the WHO chose to address the topic of burnout at the workplace, it’s not a wide enough net. Burnout doesn’t just affect you because you work too hard. Burnout affects you because your life is no longer balanced. As a result, everything around you is affected—not just your work.
I know this to be true. I went through burnout myself.
A Burnout Story
Let’s start the journey and discuss a real-life case of burnout—Mine.
You may or may not be aware that I’ve been recovering from burnout for a few years now. It does get easier to manage over time.
But I still remember exactly what burnout felt like for me—I was depressed, overwhelmed, and frankly, lost.
In the Beginning
It was October 2015. I had just completed the last exam for my Architect license and I was 100% ready to move on to whatever came next. Most people might consider taking a vacation or at least a break. Not me. I turned that momentum into something creative and started a blog two weeks later.
I had been planning the overall vision of Evolving Architect on the backs of napkins and in the corners of my sketchbook for nearly a year prior. I prioritized the exams though and told myself I would eventually turn it into a reality.
When it first launched on October 13th, 2015, it wasn’t much to look at—a home page, an about page, and a single blog post—but it was mine.
For over a year after the launch, I wrote multiple posts per week, started a weekly newsletter, developed ebooks and webinars, and launched a 7+ hour course on how to master the 3D modeling software SketchUp. I met hundreds of great people, fostered new friendships, and established Evolving Architect as a sort of “brand.”
But that all changed when I least expected it to.
An April Crisis
In early 2017, I had a very serious “wake-up call.”
I had been doing so much and for so long that I had completely ignored the giant, red flags waiving to get my attention throughout my life.
How did I know that was the case? Simple—my wife told me.
She sat me down, looked me straight in the eye and said, “This isn’t working. You’re running yourself ragged. Something needs to change.”
In that moment, I felt like I had just got hit by oncoming traffic. It was the jolt to the system I needed. I couldn’t see how poorly I had been treating myself, my relationships, and half of the other components of my life. I needed someone close to me (the closest in fact) to help me realize that I was in a bad way.
The next day as I was getting ready, I caught my reflection in the mirror. I barely recognized the man staring back at me. I felt and looked like a shadow of myself.
I was just now able to see the cracks in my armor. My overwhelming drive to do better and better had become obsession. I couldn’t stop and I had to do more.
But that drive was clearly no longer productive. It was ruining my life.
I had burned out.
Burnout for me didn’t have a simple solution. There wasn’t a pill that I could take to just wish it all away. My burnout had been brewing, simmering slowly as it reached a boil. It was then I realized I had ignored the truth for years that I controlled the heat that fueled it.
When you watch those amazing talent shows on TV like America’s Got Talent, people from across the country gather to wow the audience with their fantastic skills. Some make the audience laugh, others amaze the audience with death-defying feats. It’s the type of show where acrobats spin plates on large dowels. They continue adding more and more plates, each following the rotational pattern of the last.
My life didn’t look like that.
Instead, picture that same acrobat spinning plates of food, that are on fire, while they ride a bicycle under water, and whistle, “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”
That’s a bit closer to what burnout felt like for me.
A wrong move in any direction and everything would come crashing down in some kind of spectacular chaos, destroying me completely.
If I removed one of the spinning plates, my first instinct at the time was to add back two more. Like a momentum-fueled hydra, my world felt unwieldy.
I knew it was time for a change.
No more tricks.
When Drive Becomes Obsession
There are two types of motivation. One is drive. The other is obsession.
If you care to wager, one of the two is healthy in moderation and one of them is almost never healthy under any circumstances.
Drive
Soccer Salvation
Near the end of Middle School, I realized that I should join a sport for High School. I was always the nerdy kid who got straight A’s but didn’t really fit into any specific sport. I looked at myself in the mirror one day and knew (without saying a word) that I needed to get into shape.
One problem—I needed to find a sport.
In truth, I had actually played Soccer when I was very young, probably 7 or 8. It was a great memory I carried with me from my childhood.
I thought to myself, “Hey, I could do this again in High School!”
When you start playing a sport from basically nothing (I wasn’t exactly in shape or good physical health), you don’t realize what it will actually take to “make it.”
Even so, I knew that I wanted to play soccer because I wanted to prove to myself that I could.
Life as a Zero
Fast forward four years later, at the team’s senior dinner in my last season as a 'Purple Bulldog' (yes, of course that's a real thing), my coach made his annual speech. He rattled off numbers here and there, each number representing not a literal player’s jersey, but a number that he used to tell a story about each of the Seniors.
After all the other players had been called he said, “Zero. Zero is the number of times that I thought Mike LaValley would ever wear the Varsity jersey when I first met him.”
“Yikes,” I thought. “This can’t be good.” My body filled with panic and embarrassment. “Where was this going? Just let it all end.”
Then he continued, “But he taught me that with hard work and determination, anything is possible. Mike, I always will remember you as one of the highlights of my career. Thank you for doing your best.”
That is drive. I took hold of something positive and (while maintaining my grades, friendships, and life) I transformed that part of me into something even better.
It was hard. At times, it was even excruciating. I watched as guys who had played soccer all their lives ran literal circles around me.
No joke—literal circles.
It didn’t matter to me whether we won or lost, whether I was the best player on the team. I was playing because I could feel that everything around me was in a kind of harmonious state and that the game was improving my life.
Obsession
Time Passes Differently Here
As an overeager architecture student, I always equated more time with higher quality of a project.
At the time, I recognized there was never really enough time to make it perfect. As a result, I threw myself into my work to bring it as close to perfection as I could in the time I had. It was a race to maximize my time before the Professor would insist I pin up at the end of each semester.
It's like I knew that this was the time in my life to experiment without limits. I had no real obligations other than my studies. I could see that this was the moment when I wouldn’t have a job, a family, or any of that “life” stuff. Now was the time to push those limits and see how far I could go.
My Thesis Project is Everything
Time passed.
I used to blame everything on “Thesis.” During thesis (or fifth) year at Syracuse University, I was living by myself in a studio apartment. I basically just commuted to school each day with the focus that my project had to be the best it could be.
I lived and breathed Thesis.
I had fast food more often than regular food. I watched as my sleeping habits sometimes turned into no sleep at all. I worked and worked and worked and worked. Night and day. 24/7. Thesis.
By the end of the year, I made my final presentation to the esteemed jury and my Thesis was selected for what all the students called, “Super Jury.” In simple terms, it was a second round of critiques where guest jurors from around the country were invited to review your project.
I worked that much harder between the two presentations to make everything better (even though I had already run myself into the ground), to present the best version of my design—whatever that’s supposed to even mean.
For years (even after my Thesis Project was over), I blamed it for all the late nights I tinkered on design competitions, community service, and the like. Every day there was a window of time that I had a knack for filling between my 9-5 job and the time I went to bed.
I told myself just one more project and somehow everything will be great. I lost the passion for the actual process and found myself at the mercy of just doing work.
I could no longer see the forest through the trees.
I could no longer justify that the work I was doing was for anything other than the architecture and my ego.
The work had taken over.
That’s the difference between drive and obsession—letting the work run you rather than creating the work from a place of balance.
The Pros and Cons of My Actions
It became clear to me that I was experiencing burnout (though I didn’t really call it that until later when I was searching for answers). I could see both the positives and negatives of what I had been doing for years. It was as though my life had become two sides of the same coin.
Here are some of the ideas that came out of that self-reflection:
Negatives
Self-Neglect
Health Issues
Strained Relationships
Increased Stress
Sleep Deprivation
Positives
Academic / Professional Achievement
Moving My Career Forward
Career Insulation
Making a Name for Myself
Making Professional Connections
The most important thing to note about this list is that I don’t weight these items equally.
For me, “Health Issues” eclipses any and all of the positives. Sure, I appreciate all of the successes I’ve had, but I’d much rather be around as long as possible to enjoy them.
“People who burn out are often high energy, high givers, high achievers, and all of a sudden they can’t do anything.”
Understanding the Problem
Now that we’ve discussed burnout from one perspective, let’s expand the conversation. Let’s unpack the bigger picture of burnout.
The Symptoms of Burnout
While there are many potential symptoms of burnout, the most common are:
Exhaustion with no energy to do anything
Difficulties concentrating, often zoning out
Feelings of irritation and frustration
Overwhelm in familiar places
Feelings of detachment from things you used to love
(Credit: Rachel Andrew and Brian Rock, Psychologists)
I couldn’t tell in the moment what was happening to me, but I distinctly felt three of these symptoms in my own burnout journey.
It’s important to realize that burnout is not the same for everyone.
The same symptoms of burnout for me may not be the same as those for you. However, given a certain amount of stress over long stretches of time, we’re bound to see some of these symptoms creep into our lives.
The Three Types of Burnout
It may surprise you, but Psychologists say there are actually three types of burnout, not just one—overwork, lack of development, and neglect.
1. Overwork
Overwork is the most common type of burnout.
It’s the type that pushes you dynamically towards failure while the other types of burnout tend to be more passive.
The only real solution is to stop, assess the types of responsibilities in your life, and move forward with a plan that can bring harmony to the chaos.
2. Lack of Development
In the workplace, it can be frustrating to work on the same tasks over and over again.
Left unchecked burnout can build up from that repetition. Imagine being frustrated that you’re not moving forward or upward in your career. Imagine not pushing yourself and expanding your skills. That is burnout born from a Lack of Development.
You can still experience the same symptoms as overwork, but the way you reach burnout is quite different.
3. Neglect
Have you ever worked for a supervisor or boss who just doesn’t listen to the requests you’ve made? Have you ever felt like you don’t have a voice at a company or that your voice isn’t important?
In a similar way to Lack of Development, Neglect can lead to burnout by causing resentment, fatigue, frustration, depression, and anxiety.
Building the Solution
Now that we can recognize burnout, how do we move past it? Answer—we build our way through.
It’s Your Choice
When I first experienced burnout, I had no idea what to do next. I had to claw my way out of the dark to my way back to the light.
The one thing I did understand: for a positive change to be permanent, I’d have to change the systems that got me there. I couldn’t make the change temporary because I would settle back into the same patterns.
If I wanted to avoid burnout in the future, I had to become someone else with a new set of patterns.
While it may oversimplify the issue—someone who wants to lose weight and keep it off can’t just “go on a diet.” They need to change how they think about and appreciate food, nutrition, and their health.
Put simply, it’s your choice whether you take yourself out of burnout or not. It’s a clear and conscious decision you need to make for yourself. I can’t make it for you and neither can anyone you know.
The road ahead is tough. The road ahead is permanent.
Be brave enough to walk the path.
Full Stop.
Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.
The very first step is to stop taking on anything new.
Cut whatever you’re able to out of your life right now. The process out of burnout requires you to break down what you know and start fresh.
For now, the only things that matter are the most pressing responsibilities in your life.
If you can postpone things in your schedule—Do it.
If you can get help from someone on your team to take over some of the workload temporarily—Do it.
If you have a way to take an extended period of time off from work—Do it.
Clear everything from your mind that doesn’t truly matter. You’ll have time to come back to it. Set importance to the work now for a better life tomorrow.
Strive for Harmony, Not Balance
It seems like everyone is trying to achieve the mythical state of “work/life” balance. I call bullshit.
I don’t believe that work/life balance actually exists and that trying to achieve it is impossible.
When I think about balance, I envision the Scales of Justice. I think about a black and white decision that needs to be made. But we know that our lives are anything if not rainbows of grays. You don’t make decisions in one part of your life without those choices affecting another area.
So rather than a scale, think of your life as a series of buckets. If it helps you even more, imagine those buckets tied together like a mobile. Each bucket you fill requires the others to compensate for it in order for the entire mobile to stay upright.
While a someone’s life may differ greatly from person to person, a few of the most common ‘buckets’ we are likely to share include—Family, Work, Faith, Hobbies (Note that ‘work’ is actually a part of your life in this model, and not separate from it).
“Happiness is a byproduct of certain behaviors. Harmony is saying my life has many components. All of those limbs have to have tone. That brings about harmony. That brings about satisfaction.
If we only have one limb that is buff and the rest of us atrophied, we have disharmony and we have dissatisfaction.”
4 Steps to Building Harmony in Our Lives
If ‘harmony’ rather than ‘balance’ is our goal, how do we achieve it?
1. Establish Better Habits
Change begins by addressing the systems in our lives that dictate who we are. By curating our habits, we can begin slow (but rewarding) change for long-lasting results.
Remove Bad Habits
When dealing with systemic issues, it’s sometimes easier to remove the bad habits before we ever start new ones.
For me, my biggest burnout symptom was my health.
At the time of my burnout, I was the heaviest weight I’d ever been - 315lbs. Even at a height of 6’-4”, that kind of weight is no bueno. Being tall only distributes weight so much.
So I asked myself, “Mike, what’s the easiest way to start losing weight?” (and yes, I do talk to myself sometimes).
My solution—stop drinking soda.
It wasn’t easy at first. But every day it got a little bit easier until I didn’t even think about it at all. Those extra calories and mountains of sugar were holding me down. It was time for me to let go of a habit that was slowly killing me.
As of this essay, I haven’t had soda of any kind for several years.
A simple change in behavior can have a profound effect on a life over time.
Reinforce Good Habits
The funny thing about stopping bad habits, is that they have a positive compounding effect. Removing a bad habit can easily inspire us to start and build up good ones.
After I stopped drinking soda, I started eating something green at every meal (broccoli, salad, asparagus). I motivated myself to exercise (slow and light at first) at least once each day.
Over time, I started building up more and more good habits. Stop snacking after 8pm. Intermittent fast until Noon each day.
Since the beginning of my journey through burnout, I’ve lost over 80 lbs and have kept it off years after. I don’t attribute this to a type of fad or diet. Rather, I’ve fundamentally changed my lifestyle to match the vision I have for my future self.
2. Define Better Boundaries
If you want to change your life, you need to define the parameters that will help you get there.
Let’s say, for example, that your primary issue with burnout is overworking yourself. One of the boundaries you set for yourself could be working hours a given window of hours that you don’t waiver from.
If possible, either minimize the hours you’re working or adjust the schedule to sync better with your time outside of work. This will clearly define when you’re in “work mode.”
Be sure to let those around you know what your boundaries are and to keep them. Over time, boundaries such as your working hours will put everyone around you and yourself on notice for when you’re in ”work mode.”
When you’re not at the office, don’t check email or do anything that blurs the boundary you’ve set. The harder the line you draw for yourself, the better you’ll likely feel outside and inside of work.
3. Set Better Goals
When it comes to developing who you are in a post-burnout world, you need set goals for how to get there.
While goal-setting can be an extremely nuanced topic by itself, something that helps me is to think of ‘S.M.A.R.T.’ goals.
Developed by Robert S. Rubin, a professor at St. Louis University, “S.M.A.R.T.” is an acronym for the five metrics: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound.
If all five metrics are woven into how you conceive your goal, the goal will be far more likely to succeed.
For example, it’s not SMART to say my goal is to “lose weight.”
The SMART version of that goal could look like: “I will lose 75 lbs in order to regain control of my health in 12 months.”
Achieving your goal isn’t the end of the line. There will always be work to be done when it comes to self-development.
But not setting goals at all for your future may lead you right back to burnout.
Think of a goal as a tool. You’re still the person deciding on what tool to use for the project overall.
If the goal doesn’t work as planned. That’s ok. Don’t give up. Always keep moving forward. Experiment and figure out a new way to get to the goal.
“If the plan doesn’t work, change the plan, but never the goal.”
Anonymous
4. Be Kind to Yourself
One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned in this process to date is to simply be kind to myself.
That means accepting that not everything will work out according to plan. That means that things will get really, really difficult. That means sometimes you’ll want to give up.
The trick is to give yourself a break every now and again. We’re not perfect and you don’t need to even try to be.
Instead, never waiver from the ultimate goal—to rid yourself of burnout and change your life in a permanently positive way.
If you have a bad day, don’t worry. It happens. Getting beyond burnout is about creating a lifestyle.
One day is ok. A lifetime of bad days isn’t.
Final Thoughts
No one starts at burnout. As human beings, we get bogged down by our responsibilities. Sometimes we forget to take care of ourselves.
Consider the following:
Burnout can happen to anyone and at any time in your life.
There are three types of burnout, not just one. Any of the roads will lead to burnout.
You’re not alone when it comes to burnout. Either you or someone you know has dealt with or is dealing with burnout right now.
Build harmony into your life, not balance. Your life will never be completely be in balance. That’s ok.
Establish habits. Stick to your boundaries. Create goals. Be kind to yourself.
If you find yourself in burnout, know that you can build your way out of it. It won’t be easy, but you’ll be the better for it on the other side.
You have the power to change who you are.
If I did it, you can too.
Epilogue
Four Years In (2021)
In the time since I journeyed through burnout, wrote the original version of this post, and began to open up more publicly about my experience, I’ve reflected on where I am today.
You might think from the tone of the message that I lived happily ever after and rode off into the sunset with all of my questions answered. I can tell you that’s far from the case.
Keeping up with all of the self-improvement is a true work-in-progress.
I have good days. I have bad ones. There have been months at a time when I didn’t exercise as much as I wanted to. There have been times when I felt overwhelmed again at my job.
I have experienced burnout at least one time since my first bout. It wasn’t nearly as severe because I knew how to recognize the symptoms and reset my behaviors. But it was still burnout.
One lesson stands above the rest—be kind to myself. I sometimes forget that I’m human and need to slow down.
For me, the message of this essay still rings true.
Understand what burnout looks like and you can choose to overcome it. The work is hard and sometimes you will falter.
But in the end, you can create a better life for yourself if you accept the work ahead.
Additional Resources
(Website) The World Health Organization
(Videos) Talks for When You Totally Burned Out // TED, Various Speakers
(Article) Are You Burned Out—or Just Exhausted? // Locke Hughes
(Book) Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle // Emily and Amelia Nagoski
(Article) How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation // Anne Helen Petersen
(Article) The Cure for Burnout // Michael Hyatt
(Article) Meet the Psychotherapist Who Says Her Career Burnout Saved Her Life // Rebecca Muller
(Article) 3 Types of Burnout, According to Psychologists (and Signs You're Headed For Trouble) // Melody Wilding
(Article) The Age of Burnout // Thomas Oppong
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