How to notice the symptoms coming on to prevent it from getting too severe…
Knowing how you and your body hold onto and show stress is going to be very helpful in being able to prevent future burn out breakdowns. If you ignore these signs that your body and mind are sending you – you will eventually hit the burn out phase because the systems inside just can’t anymore.
Even though a lot of us have all sorts of thoughts and past experiences to back up the “just push through it” stage - continuing to just push through the exhaustion (or whatever other symptom(s) is there) and keeping as is will cause further emotional and physical damage to you.
We have got to pause – slow down – see what’s going on – listen to it – ask for help – maintain and repeat.
PAUSE
Literally might mean stop what you are doing and just pause.
SLOW DOWN
Maybe even close your eyes for a few moments and focus on your breathe. Coming in and out of your body. Not trying to change it but just noticing if it is rapid, or slow, or coming from your mouth or nose or up in your chest or down in your belly. Taking note of this automatic process and just being with it.
SEE WHAT’S GOING ON
Notice what is going on in your mind and body. Certain thoughts popping up? Sometimes people get to this stage and notice thoughts popping up that are FREAKING OUT about having their eyes closed or have taken a break in the first place and immediately exit this space and get back to whatever they were doing before. That is okay. THAT GIVES US A LOT OF DATA! Shows us that it is literally so scary to the internal system to pause just for a bit - what I would get most curious about (and maybe with a trained mental health professional) is what is the underlying belief or fear behind that? What is it so concerned will happen if we press pause and slow down and explore.
Maybe you check in with your body and notice that your chest is feeling really tight and almost like an elephant is sitting on it. So just notice that - maybe even bring your hand to you chest and see what its like to focus your attention on that sensation.
LISTEN
When focusing on that specific body sensation or thought - just listen. What else is going on in your mind and body? Do certain things like this sensation? Hate it? Want it to go away? Curious about it? Just take note of all the other thoughts and feelings coming online and be there with them with no expectations or pressure to do anything.
ASK FOR HELP
Dependent on whats going on in your head and body and how comfortable it is for you to have awareness and approach yourself with non judgement - it may be best to start some of this process with a trained mental wellness professional. These individuals are trained to walk by their clients in these ways and assist them in separating from these thoughts, feelings and sensations in order to gain perspective and learn about them.
Burnout doesn't have to just happen to us – it can happen to part of us maybe we have some thing inside of us that is a big doer and planner and preventative thinker and that thing has just been working really really hard nonstop 24 seven for the past 29 years… It's bound to get burn out if we don't get curious about it and help it.
The issue sometimes as we don't know how to help or we don't have the awareness that the doer is so tapped out because we are just too close to it all. It takes slowing down and asking for help to be able to see the doer as one of the many parts of our internal system that keeps us going. So of course we don't want to get rid of the doer but we want the doer to know that there are other parts of the system that can help it out when it's exhausted.
We just have to know and believe that it's OK to be tired it's OK to take a break its OK to ask for help.
Written by Shannon Gonter , LPCC
I specialize in working with individuals aged 18-35. Some presenting concerns that I most commonly work with are stress, relationship issues, difficulty saying “no” to others, difficulties recognizing emotions and emotionally connecting to others, anger, and intimacy issues, among others. I am trained to help you become more aware of your emotional responses to these challenges and help you recognize problematic relational patterns and new ways to cope. This awareness will create new opportunities for learning more adaptive ways of relating to others and coping with life’s stressors.
The information and resources contained on this website are for informational purposes only and are not intended to assess, diagnose, or treat any medical and/or mental health disease or condition. The use of this website does not imply nor establish any type of therapist-client relationship. Furthermore, the information obtained from this site should not be considered a substitute for a thorough medical and/or mental health evaluation by an appropriately credentialed and licensed professional.