At the beginning of the summer, right before I took some planned time off, I found myself starting to feel burned out. Despite what I know about the importance of rest and everything I’ve learned from living with a chronic illness, I’d been doing a crummy job of taking care of myself. Luckily, I recognised the warning signs and clawed my way back from the edge. I can’t promise I’ll never stumble down that path again, but I definitely learned some important lessons.
What Is Burnout?
Burnout is a form of exhaustion caused by exposure to prolonged, chronic stress that eventually results in severe physical, mental and emotional fatigue. It tends to be associated with occupational stress, but burnout can be triggered by anything. Parenting, a pandemic, the massive political bin fire we currently find ourselves living in… the list goes on.
I would argue modern life is stressful in a whole new way. I adore social media, but I also believe we’re not designed to consume or carry the amount of information we’re exposed to these days. On a basic level, knowing what hundreds of people are up to every day, what they’re thinking, how they’re spending their time, is a lot. And then there’s all the suffering. Horrifying images, awful news stories, a rapist for a president. All in the palm of our hand, from the minute we pick up our phones.
Within this context, I’m sure our capacity for everyday, run-of-the-mill stress is reduced. Perhaps we’re all living on the edge of burnout right now. Maybe that’s our new normal.
Rest Vs. Recovery
Any discussion about burnout benefits from clarifying the difference between rest and recovery. Although the terms are often used interchangeably, they have distinct meanings.
Rest refers to a period of inactivity or relaxation that allows the body and/or mind to stop exerting energy. Its primary goal is to reduce fatigue and give you a break from physical or mental strain. Through this, it can help you avoid overexertion and… burnout.
Recovery, on the other hand, is about restoring the body and mind to their optimal state after exertion, injury or stress. Recovery often includes rest, hence the confusion, but if we’re only resting when our body gives us no other choice, it isn’t rest, it’s recovery, which means the damage has already been done.
4 Lessons from the Edge of Burnout
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Severe Overwhelm is the First Warning Sign
In an overwhelming world it’s becoming harder to spot overwhelm that’s out of the ordinary and cause for concern. For me, it was an ever-increasing inability to cope with my usual responsibilities, especially those that fell outside of work. Small tasks suddenly felt insurmountable. I couldn’t organise my thoughts, plan our meals for the week ahead or write a shopping list. The simplest decisions became impossible. Everything was too much, and the more balls I dropped, the more overwhelmed I felt.
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Lack of Motivation and Joy Come Next
Apathy was the loudest alarm bell. I am normally a very enthusiastic person. I consider it one of my strengths. I do most things with passion and excitement. When I found myself loathing things I usually enjoy, I knew something wasn’t right.
Cooking was the first thing to go. Feeding a family is hard work, but I love food, trying new recipes and experimenting with ingredients. On the brink of burnout, if I manged to overcome the overwhelm and choose an evening meal, the thought of standing at the stove and labouring over a dish my family would demolish in minutes filled me with dread. I was also feeling unappreciated – another sign I’d been doing too much and failing to ask for help.
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Pushing Through Is Not an Option
I was very lucky I had planned to take most of August off this year. But even if that annual leave hadn’t been in my calendar, I’d have had no choice but to stop working. This is what separates burnout out from other forms of stress and exhaustion – you reach a point where you simply cannot push through.
Often, ‘pushing through’ is what brings us to the point of burnout in the first place. This year, I worked solidly from the beginning of January to early August without taking a proper break. While I’m good at finishing early on a Friday or taking the odd day off midweek, I hadn’t allowed myself a period of extended downtime since Christmas. In 2025, as well as creating small pockets of rest in my working week, I’m going to make sure I take at least seven days off in a row in the spring.
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Rest {Still} Doesn’t Come Easily
Living in a body that point blank refuses to function if I fail to prioritise rest has taught me so much about our collective relationship with the idea. It’s complicated, and it always has been, so most of us did not grow up seeing rest modelled to us. We were taught to work hard, soldier on, and always be striving. Our perception of rest is closely intertwined with notions of laziness.
If we’re able to make peace with the idea, many of us believe rest must be earned. Downtime is carefully rationed and only permitted when we’ve worked sufficiently hard enough. But we keep shifting the threshold and deciding we don’t deserve a break after all. The idea of resting before reaching the point of exhaustion is confusing in a world where exhaustion is taken as proof you’re working hard enough.
Even those of us who are convinced of its importance can struggle to engage in rest. When we do, it can be hard to shake the guilt that comes from feeling unproductive. Then there’s the fact so many of us stay busy simply to avoid the horrors of the world. Slowing down, taking time out or ‘doing nothing’ might require us to confront difficult thoughts and feelings.
In other words, it’s not our fault if we find rest difficult or fail at it to the point of burning out. Making rest a non-negotiable part of your life means unravelling yourself from the dominant culture. It requires you to believe your value as a human being is not tied to your productivity. It means accepting you are important and worthy of love even when you’re not working or doing.
These things are not easy. Teetering so close to burnout despite everything I know and believe about the importance of rest proves this. All we can do is reaffirm our commitment and keep trying.
- Love Audrey xxx
