The degree of professional burnout is also determined by the stages. The dependence is direct – the higher the stage, the worse a person feels.
First stage
For a good worker, the work must be interesting, then he/she is completely immersed in the flow of current affairs. But the beginning of burnout is also marked by increased involvement in work when there are so many ideas that there is a catastrophic lack of time to implement them. As a result, family, sports, socializing with friends – only the all-consuming work is left without attention. Interest in it is so high that even knowing the consequences, it is challenging to resist total immersion. It’s the same situation with our studies. Often we are completely immersed in it, thereby depleting our bodies. Websites to help write essays will always give you time, so you can easily combine your studies and personal life.
Stage Two
Working 24 hours a day, over your normal capacity, often with a lack of resources or budget, but with an enormous desire to achieve a brilliant result, puts the body into a state of sustained stress, to which it cannot help reacting. Especially, when you’re trying to combine work and study. Its ok to delegate some of your assignments and a lot of students use college essay helper, ask friend or family for help.
This is the beginning of the second stage of professional burnout – fatigue. Because of chronic stress, a person develops irritability, anxiety, acute lack of strength, immunity decreases. Hence inevitable problems with sleep – insomnia at night and constant sleepiness during the day. Taste habits may change: Stress causes a painful craving for very high-calorie foods with large amounts of sugar, salt, and fat.
Stage Three
At this stage, the very symptoms about which the WHO says are fully manifested: unwillingness to work, complete apathy to everything, reduced efficiency. The organism tries to get through to you with all its might: “Take a rest! Take a break from work! It’s urgent!”.
And if we continue to plow like an ox (which is most often the case), then the body has no choice but to go into a critical state of illness. Then a severe depression quickly appears on the horizon, various psychosomatic symptoms manifest themselves: back pain at work begins to be unbearable, problems with the digestive system arise, etc.
The fourth stage
And here is the final stage – full emotional burnout. At this stage, the main signs of the disease show themselves: ignoring everything that concerns work, apathy, embitterment, aggravation of relations with colleagues, reduction of productivity. Sometimes the person’s appearance also changes – if before he served as a model of business style in clothes, now colleagues are shocked by his slovenliness.
The emotional state at this stage is so neglected that it can provoke depression, isolation from society, and withdrawal into oneself. Such people find solace in alcohol, drugs, or on a wave of hopelessness to end their lives.
Tips to fight a burnout syndrome
So what to do about the signs of burnout at work? Protection from emotional burnout exists at each stage of its development.
Stage 1
Here, the rules of simple psychology will help to cope with the beginning of the burnout process and not allow it to develop further.
Lead a balanced life. In other words, along with work, find a place for family, friends, sports, rest. But in this case, try to understand why most of the time is spent on work anyway. Setting all kinds of tasks and successfully solving them is a great way to raise your self-esteem and feel like a hero.
Reduce the pace of work. If you like to rush at full speed to fulfill the next plan, try to look at this situation from a realistic perspective. It’s enough to spend two or three months writing down everything you do to see if you need that pace.
Provide yourself with the support of others. More often it is close to you, friends, and family members who can support you in a difficult moment, but it can also be colleagues at work. For example, one of the most susceptible to emotional burnout is considered to be the work of a psychologist. Professional help from colleagues is a powerful support factor. With them, you can sort out a difficult situation, ask for advice or simply complain about a heavy workload when a wave of fatigue hits.
Stage 2
Learn how to properly rest. In the second stage, it is very important. Just don’t think it will be household chores, self-development courses, or workouts at the gym.
Proper rest should be to the same:
A full-fledged rest should also be:
- You’re charging your smartphone every day, so you have to find time for yourself to recuperate, too.
- Make at least one day a week off and try not to think about work during this time.
- Take a vacation every year. Let it be not a full month, but a week, but four times and at different times. During vacation periods the isolation from work must be complete.
- A complete rest without worry implies two factors: irresponsibility (no need to be responsible for the execution of the plan or the delivery of products) and carefree (no need to take care of customers). Fulfill both conditions in real life is not always possible, but it is worth striving for.
- Build boundaries. In theory, it should be done all the time, but it is important to distinguish between personal life and work, separate them from each other by a thick line. Try to fix in the minds of your employees and clients the idea that it is useless to call you after hours, do not take urgent tasks, and do not throw yourself at the ambuscade. That would be ideal. But if you try to build boundaries, very soon it will become clear that 90% of the “burning” tasks are not so urgent.
Stage 3
It is too late to drink “Borjomi” when your kidneys have failed. At the stage of exhaustion, only a full-fledged vacation for three months will help. It is impossible to cheat your body. Restoring the exhausted nervous system is possible only with long rest, which can last up to six months.
Stage 4
How to fight the signs of burnout at work in this case? Only a high-quality rest and a full reconsideration of the activity will help, possibly up to a change of profession. Because burnout syndrome will make you hate what you did before.
Prevention of emotional burnout
Like many diseases, you can protect yourself from burnout syndrome by using preventive methods.
You must fully realize that preventing emotional burnout is a top priority. An irresponsible attitude to it can take away both your work and your health. You determine how much time you need to rest, protect your boundaries at work, and put into practice tips for preventing possible burnout. Here are just a few of them:
Keep a mindfulness calendar.
Use your usual electronic calendar to create one. Allocate your tasks for a week or a month and color-code all your tasks and activities. Let your work plans be yellow, your vacations are green, your communication with your loved ones be pink, and your sports activities be blue. You will immediately see which color is dominant and which is lacking. Make the color palette more even, then along with business meetings and calls you will get time for rest and sports.
Monitor the energy drain.
Every day of our lives is filled with different events, meetings, and activities. Some fill us up with energy, others empty us. Make it a rule to record each of these events on your phone. Write down what makes you feel happy and full of life, and what, on the contrary, causes irritation, emptiness, unwillingness to do it. Develop a grading system for people and events – one plus, two pluses, or two minutes. This will help you keep track of how each of the situations affects your condition.
Fill out such a diary for a month, and then see what you spend your energy on and with what you replenish it. To your surprise, you may find that arguments with your boss are more exhausting than the preparation of the quarterly report. Try to minimize communication with the toxic person, or think about how to recover from it.
Analyze your weaknesses.
Try to find out what exactly contributes to the development of professional burnout syndrome. Analyze your behavior: maybe you are a passionate person who finds it difficult to tear yourself away from an interesting job to take a little break? Or you just don’t know what to do with your free time? Do you have a boundary between work and personal life? Can you turn down the boss who decided to call in on a Sunday at work, or do all the work for the employee who asked for help?
If you are difficult to carry out such an analysis, effective help will be provided by a qualified specialist – a coach or psychotherapist.
