How To Deal With Burn Out

By Carly Jacobs

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Burn out is a rather ubiquitous concept. It’s everywhere, all the time but do we really know what it is? To me, burn out is the point of empty exhaustion. You’re almost too out of control to realise you’re out of control. Burn out isn’t hurried or stressed. It’s slow, painful and breathless. It’s breaking point.

A few weeks ago, I was absolutely burnt out. I’m still balancing precariously (I have serious issues with saying no to work which is why burn out happens) but I’m okay. Because I acknowledged my burn out and did these things.

1. Ask for help

If you’re anything like me, you will HATE asking for help. I don’t know why it’s so hard for some people but it is. Most decent people are super keen to help people so it’s kind of weird when people are weird about asking for help. If you need help, ask for it. When I’m burnt out, I forget really, really simple things and I hate asking people to remind me how to do things but it has to happen. Just deal with it and move on.

2. Manage people’s expectations

Let your friends know you might not be seeing them as often for the next few months. Let your partner and family know they need step up and take on the brunt of the running of the house hold. Let your boss know you really can’t take on any extra responsibilities for a while. I’ve found that if you tell people you’re going to be a bit shit for a while, they tend to not get too grumpy when you’re a bit shit for a while.

3. Don’t self medicate

This isn’t a problem for everyone but if you’re burnt out don’t reach for your emotional crutch, whatever that may be. Pizza, chocolate, booze, cigarettes. Just don’t. It won’t help – I promise. You also don’t have time to feel like crap when you’re burnt out and nasty food, alcohol and drugs have an extremely short pleasure cycle. It’s not worth it.

This week on Straight & Curly, Kelly and I are talking about burn out. What causes it, how to avoid it and how to fix it.

Is anyone feeling burnt out right now? I do feel like that’s the general feeling in November yeah?

P.S Also you should totally sign up for my newsletter. It’s full of cool stuff.
P.P.S Don’t forget Crochet Coach has a free trial offer period at the moment so make sure you sign up!

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About Carly Jacobs

Carly is the founding editor of Smaggle which launched in 2007 back when blogging was weird. She has appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, Cosmopolitan and Cleo magazines. Hoop earrings are totally her thing and she almost got run over by Myf Warhurst while out jogging one day.

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