There’s No Badge for Burnout
YOU CAN FEEL BETTER THAN YOU THINK, DESPITE THE CIRCUMSTANCES.
Last weekend I had the honor of presenting a workshop for the Preventive Cardiovascular Nurses Association in Duluth. The problem I was hired to help alleviate? BURNOUT with a capital B. Nurses and anyone in front-line healthcare, in particular, are faced with an extraordinary amount of stress on the job….so much so that many folks in this field are so used to their nervous systems living in fight or flight mode that they may not even know what a regulated nervous system feels like.
Makin’ Your List: Your Unique Burnout Indicators
Mindfulness can help remind us that the first step to making any meaningful change is having greater awareness of our situation. The very first step to restoring your energy on the job is asking yourself the critical question of, “what are the initial indicators that I am feeling burnout?” Make a list of the ways you feel burnout in: three places: 1) your body 2) your mind and 3) your relationships. Just simply noticing how it shows up for you can help you catch it further upstream—hopefully preventing you from getting too far down the path of no return: the cortisol stress spiral.
Mindful Microhabits
Once you have exercised your burnout awareness muscle, you are ready for some actual intervention—or what I like to call “mindful microhabits” These are strategies you can put to use right away during your workday that can help you feel more connected, joyful, purposeful and energetic throughout your day.
1) 3.4.5 Breathing. It truly doesn’t get any easier than this. Three times throughout your day (or after a stressful interaction), the extended exhale breathing pattern can help you engage your parasympathetic nervous system to help you re-settle and refocus on your next tasks with more ease. Simply inhale through your nose for 3 seconds, hold with expanded lungs and a soft belly for 4 seconds, and slowly exhale out the mouth for 5 seconds. Commit to doing this three times a day for one full work week. But don’t take it from me. See how it feels for you.
2) Gratitude Re-Wire. Have you ever noticed how your mind can get completely wrapped around a negative experience or opinion someone has about you? This intrusive thinking can become so dominant in our work lives that we don’t even realize how much energy it is taking up in our minds, hearts and connections with others. Author Dr. Rick Hanson has given us a beautiful process in his practical and inspiring book, Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom. Dr. Hanson suggests:” rest your attention upon is what will shape your brain the most. That’s because “neurons that fire together, wire together”. Gratitude shifts your attention away from resentment, regret, and guilt – and therefore stops you from building up the neural substrates of these known factors of mental and physical health problems. Gratitude also focuses your awareness on positive things, simple good facts such as having enough water to drink, the laughter of children, the kindness of others, or the smell of an orange.
To reap the rewards of gratitude, rest your attention on a good fact, noticing details about it, staying with it for at least a few seconds in a row. Then allow a natural emotional response of gratitude to arise. Continue to pay attention to this feeling of gratitude for another few seconds – or even longer.”
4) Burnout Buddy. Finally, during our burnout workshop, I asked participants to reflect on how they know they are burnt out. One of the prevailing indiciators they shared was that they found themselves being inpatient with others, lashing out, not listening, etc. In other words, they didn’t become aware of their own burn out until their behavior was reflected by a co-worker or patient. So often we don’t even realize the state of our own minds until someone holds up a mirror for us.
So to get in front of this, find someone in your work place you feel you can trust talking to about your burnout tendencies. This is usually someone you know has your back and your best interest in mind. Ask them if they are willing to be your burnout buddy. Your role is to show up in a vulnerable way and share with them the different ways burnout shows up in your body, mind and relationships AND to give them permission to gently and compassionately call out when they are seeing some of this emerging before it gets out of hand. Their reminders will will help you become more self aware sooner in the burnout cycle and can help you get back on track quicker before you hit the spiral.
Leaning on these new habits can help you feel greater joy, purpose and connection. But remember, it takes a minimum of 21 days to build a new habit and several months longer than that to make it a lifestyle change. But if I had to guess, I’d figure you will start to feel the effects of the changes in less than 2 weeks.
