
There Is No Cure for Burnout - dsr12
https://elladawson.com/2019/11/18/there-is-no-cure-for-burnout/
======
falcolas
I can’t say I’m a fan of the classism, racism, and sexism in this article. It
creates and reinforces repeatedly the trope that burnout is an unavoidable but
uniquely millenial problem; that “white men” from Gen X and before don’t get
burned out.

Fuck that; anyone and everyone can and do get burnt out. Isolating yourself
based on your race, class, and generation will not help you get better.

That said, I will take this article as it is - a release valve being pushed. I
wish the author the best on her wellness sabbatical. I have been there, and I
can only hope that she is able to find her way past this obstacle.

~~~
UglyToad
As a white man I feel you're being extremely sensitive here.

You've taken a small part of the article seemingly out of context. The author
is talking about well meaning but ultimately useless advice from those with
the financial means to support themselves indefinitely while they travel or
relax. While a generalisation, the ability to build up a cushion of 'fuck you
money' tends to correlate with being from a generation with higher job
security, (in the UK) free higher education, no dependents to support, etc.

I don't know when everyone got so sensitive to understanding their own
privilege vs other people. I'm in my third month off and have been travelling
for the last month as well without having to work. I'm exceptionally lucky, I
have no dependents to support, free accommodation at my parents, etc, etc.
Instead let's imagine I'm a care leaver or my parents had caring needs or I
had a child to support or medical/student debt or whatever it might be, I'd
have continued to endure burnout until it likely killed me.

Certainly my life has its own challenges, depression, health troubles etc, but
compared to most people I've won the lottery.

Anyway, that aside, I hope you're doing well and staying burnout free!

~~~
falcolas
> the ability to build up a cushion of 'fuck you money' tends to correlate
> with being from a generation with higher job security

With all due respect - this stability comes from age, not generation. I have a
stable life now. As someone born in the late 70's, I have a house, a stable
job, and a 401k.

But I didn't have these things at 20 - I was fighting to keep my head above
water from month to month after coming off being homeless and jobless. I
didn't have it at 25, I had been fired and was couch surfing in CA. I was just
starting to get stability at 30 - I had enough experience to get a steady job
and enough money to start saving, even after paying bills and debt. It took
the next decade to get to where I am today.

Age has re-inforced to me that TANSTAAFL is more than a programming idiom.
I've put a lot of directed effort and energy into getting a stable life. Like
my parents before me and their parents before them.

EDIT: I'd also like to note that my job security is virtually identical to the
rest of my colleagues, a number of whom are in their early 20's. My only
advantage over them for stability are the skills I'm honing to keep myself
useful to this (and other) companies.

~~~
UglyToad
That's a fair point and a flaw in my response.

It's more based off the UK too where job security was higher and previously
unemployment benefit was more generous and more widely available. There's
still a difference here, from the UK the common mass redundancies of tech in
the US seem bizzare and likely to increase work related stress.

I still think the author is using "older white male" shorthand to point out
that we need to structure society and the economy in a way that protects all
people from burnout and provides access to the tools and treatment to recover
from it to all. Rather than assuming all people are sufficiently well off to
take 6 months to do a Jack Dorsey style Buddhist retreat. I'd hope that the
readers are capable of enough nuance to understand that what is meant is an
elite rather than react to perceived racism, ageism, sexism etc. It just seems
like the mirror of widely derided sensitivity of those on the left but even
more bizarre because it claims racism against a group holding power (again in
the UK, US, Australia, Canada, most of Europe, excluding the Roma, whoever
else, but having to caveat to this extent swiftly makes language unworkable)

~~~
forgottenpass
>"older white male" shorthand to point out that we need to structure society
and the economy in a way that protects all people from burnout and provides
access to the tools and treatment to recover from it to all.

That "shorthand" is going to inadvertently open the possibility of the reader
to drawing broader and less exact conclusions than if the writer were more
careful in their choice of words.

Using "older white male" makes it sound like the goal is something that's
already broadly available (and just being artificially limited) rather than a
thing for people with riches or worked hard to get it. They're therefore
statistically older, having worked to get into that position and probably only
have access to limited doses unless they've been phenomenally successful.

>Rather than assuming all people are sufficiently well off to take 6 months to
do a Jack Dorsey style Buddhist retreat.

What's the goal here? How big is the gulf between Doresy's adventure and
"protect[ing] all people from burnout and provid[ing] access to the tools and
treatment to recover"? Outside of fully automated luxury space communism, next
to nobody is going to have the resources to not only not work for six months,
but to also hand over all their regular day-to-day responsibility like taking
care of family, paying their bills and making sure the house didn't burn down.

~~~
BlueTemplar
> next to nobody is going to have the resources to not only not work for six
> months

Why not? We're richer than we're ever been. What happened?

~~~
sgt101
Rent, debt and inequality. There is much more wealth, but it's concentrated in
places that are expensive and distant from traditional safety nets and social
support networks.

------
GarrisonPrime
I left my job as a physician 5 years ago. Of course it was a hectic life, but
the hours and pressure wasn't as bad as my lack of control over my life.
Everyone thought I was crazy to leave without something else lined up already,
but I knew if I stayed I would die. Just as she says in this article; not
suicidality, but rather some odd sense of existential doom.

I'm still angry. Angry at every imposition anyone dares to make on me. Angry I
essentially wasted 13 years of my life following a societal program rather
than being brave enough to figure out what I actually wanted from the start.

Like the author, I'm also not sure if there's a cure for burnout. Five years
on, I'm still living a sub-poverty lifestyle off of odd jobs and creative
pursuits. Whenever I get an urge to do something more involved, I get exposed
a bit again to the world of registrations and resumes, licenses and HR
departments...and I lose all motivation again.

But I don't think it's a problem. I don't think of my burnout as a defect.
More as a wizening up to the view that most of what I hussled myself over was
bullshit, and it was right to leave and not look back. I'm just sorry it took
me so long to start living for myself.

I'm sure I sound spoiled and selfish. I don't care. Just be glad I left before
you or a loved one had the unfortune of having me as your doc.

~~~
agumonkey
"funny" I do feel similarly cheated about my studies (computing) and the
missing information about adult life that totally change my view about
job/career.

I'm also a bit schizophrenic about computing. At my current min-wage job, I
started thinking and writing some code (some topic I never done, on a new
platform mind you). I'm both happy and unhappy about it.

Back to burnout, this brainless job I have allows me to wander as I see fit
without stress. It's a freedom of creative thinking without pressure to be
compared to the forced burden of juggling with things I wouldn't enjoy in a
mainstream programming job. Even for a big check I'm not sure I'd be as
peaceful as I'm now at times (it's not stable yet).

I also keep intellectual and creative pursuits on the side. Somehow I
decoupled financial duties and intellectual growth. I can read about
mathematics and electrical engineering on my own pace, and it's often a joy.
The lack of pressure and the choice of topics I find interesting is a much
better and much more natural energy source.

Do you think about keeping medical pursuits on the side ? maybe not as a
physician. I don't know, joining a lab, going to conferences.

------
m_st
I think I had a burnout at home. It was just too much: 90% to 100% job, 3
kids, house, and the constant feel of (self?) pressure to make it all better,
always be prepared and such at home. My wife and me separated almost a year
ago, and since then share the care of our kids by 50/50\. She works a lot
(80%), I work a lot (90%). It only works because the kids go to school, I can
work from home 2 days and we have grand parents that help when in need. I just
feel so free and unleashed. She too. And the kids are fine as well. Finally no
one is putting any pressure on me at home except for myself. I have such a
great time with the kids and I really enjoy it. And I still love my job, as I
always did, working more or less 8.5h a day.

Anyway what I wanted to say is, that you can also have a burnout at home. I
was such an emotionless dead guy. I'm not sure there is no cure, and I agree
that whenever I feel this "pressure" again in a new relationship (not that I
had many), I feel like I'd like to run away and stay single. Which makes me
sad. But on the other hand I rarely was as happy and free as I am now.

Edit: Bookmarked this article and will certainly read it. Thanks for sharing
such stories.

~~~
origami777
There definitely are things you can do, but in my experience when you feel
this way it is really hard to do them.

I've been reading and listening to a few things that are helping me. One thing
I've been learning about recently are the body's responses to chronic stress,
such as the release of cortisol in the body, and the long term damage that can
do. And about allostatic load, which helps explain how it gets perpetually
worse as time goes by.

The author's experience is real of course, but it doesn't sound like she is an
authority to discuss if it can be cured or not.

~~~
thenaturalist
Would you mind sharing sources?

I'd be interested in reading what you found on those topics.

~~~
origami777
Rick Hanson has been a life saver. He is a psychologist with lots of
meditation practice.
[https://www.rickhanson.net/](https://www.rickhanson.net/)

Also I've really enjoyed Heart Math. That book is where I learned about the
physiological explanation of stress. And it has exercises that have helped me
in moments of aniexty. Like waking up at 3am with worries and stress.

------
rusk
There is no “immediate” cure for burnout. Burnout is the result of
environmental stressors, but once it sets in it's like a broken leg. It takes
time to heal. The _textbook_ cure is rest, effectively abdication of your
responsibilities, and you could be right again after a few months, but as the
author points out not everybody can be so privileged. In my experience, and
that of others I’ve spoken with, recovery can take about 18 months if you can
_radically rethink your attitude to work_ and reach out to colleagues and
_solicit their support_. If you’re going to be trying to shoulder this all on
your own and expect to go around day-to-day with your same (perhaps
maladaptive) attitude to life as you did before you will find recovery a lot
harder, and perhaps that’s what she means by “no cure”, but to me that’s akin
to wanting to repeatedly hit your own leg with a hammer, hoping that taking a
load of pain killers will help you get by ...

I would contend that if you must continue working, as it is for most people,
perhaps changing jobs isnt the best idea - it is after all considered to be
one of the most stressful life events (see _holmes-raehe_ ) and is not to be
taken lightly.

But we have to appreciate that not all workplaces are amenable to open
displays of personal vulnerability. Which is truly sad.

The sunscreen song comes to mind: _”leave before it makes you hard”_

But nevertheless, don’t give up hope, you can find human kindness in the
unlikliest of places, but first maybe you have to be kind to yourself <3

~~~
gonzo41
I think the only way to catch you breath while running is to pace yourself
correctly.

Keep a strict routine of just enough 9-5. Find a low stress app / tech stack
to maintain. Leech off others when you need to. Don't code at home. Make sure
you try to eat well and drink a little less. See family. be with people. Don't
play WoW ;) Work is just something we do to let us have other things.

------
aschampion
I went through a 4-5 year period in my late 20s working 60 hour weeks while
_also_ doing grad school and independent research for 60 hours a week, not
getting enough sleep or taking enough time for physical and mental health. It
was ultimately very damaging; it left most of my personal relationships and
social life in dysfunction. While I made it to the field and work I wanted to
be in, I burned out quickly. When obstacles came up, rather than being able to
give bouts of dedicated, strategic effort to navigate them I often ran
headlong into them.

It's not something that can be undone, because it becomes both a benchmark and
a scar. Any period of concerted effort can seem inadequate because you know
you're capable of more, while also inducing anxiety because becoming very
involved in a task reminds you of that trauma, even if you know you're now
disciplined about not overextending and stepping back when you need to. Often
this results in the classic burnout symptoms of giving too much time to work,
accomplishing less than you would with less time, and perceiving what you do
accomplish as even less than it is.

Being fully absorbed in a challenging problem for weeks or months on end by
making sacrifices elsewhere in your life can be an exhilarating and fulfilling
experience, but it's no different from extreme distance running or olympic
lifting. It's only fulfilling and sustainable if it's done with proper
preparation, long period cycles of high and low difficulty, caution, rest, and
recovery. And if it isn't what you're doing with most of your time.

~~~
agumonkey
Your analysis is very well worded. Do you think you could not readjust your
internal compass to value partially limited efforts (efforts that you said you
considered were under your maximum capabilities) so that you take a long time
averaging view on them. Sure you could go 99% and destroy yourself but no
human should destroy himself[0] so it's totally acceptable to chunk your work
into "good enough for now" and keep going at a smaller pace.

I used to suffer from social anxiety due to the need to outperform everything.
After personal grief I realized I owe nothing to nobody and it made my brain
infinitely more focused about my internal pleasure and sanity rather than
external constraints. I'd rather be nobody and smiling than suffering. It made
me balance things and put limits on things. I still value being active and
working good and hard but only to an extent.

[0] I'm not talking about absolute freedom to destroy yourself if you ultimate
think it's your desire.

------
not_a_moth
I think the cure just takes a long time, maybe years, if we assume work place
burnout is basically the same as athlete burnout from years/decades of
overtraining: you develop terrible endocrine imbalances from habitually frying
your system.

The "cure" is to take it easy and pay attention to sleep, nutrition, stress
levels, and perform easy exercise... and know it could take a really long time
to change your endocrine profile.

~~~
growlist
Alcohol is a big one, at least here in the UK. From my observations many
people, including plenty of middle class professionals with families, live
their daily lives in a temporary state of non-inebriation between drinking
sessions. That they prefer this to reality says something pretty depressing
about the average person's life in an advanced economy in the 21st century.

------
Bombthecat
I'm in consulting. And I can't count the times where I told people to say no
to the client! (learn to say no)

But they can't... Some just can't say no to save there life.

Some just want to work looong hours.

And some are just too nice and avoid conflict.

Its frustrating, especially they could work on long term valuable stuff..

~~~
mjfisher
I think there's two kinds of situation this occurs in. There's the "not yet
learnt" kind where people don't know what they can deliver, over-promise, and
end up in an awkward situation.

There's also a trickier, structural situation that I think is more common. If
managers don't have real ownership of their client relationships, they learn
they become effectively unable to say "no". If they try, someone else will say
"yes" instead.

------
coretx
Loads of psilocybin and a strict daily regime containing both low-stress &
high-rest did wonders for me. Having a budget of hours for when "allowed" to
crunch and burn at things even returned most of my eagernes and enjoyment
within a short timeframe.

~~~
rusk
Stinky plant based substances can also help counteract getting stressed over
things you don’t need to also!

~~~
coretx
And the things you do need to (...)

~~~
rusk
if you didn't do it, it didn't need to be done!

------
RickS
My experience is that there is.

I tend to be really intense about my job, and as a result I've left almost all
of my jobs due to burnout, usually related to frustration that my dept isn't
prioritizing what I feel is important to be successful, and that my time isn't
well spent.

I recently went through this at my current gig, despite having good pay, good
manager, and as close to a non-toxic environment as I think is possible. In
other words... I couldn't easily scapegoat the org. The problem probably had
to do with me. So I tried a new thing: to actually salvage the gig and fight
to get my needs met instead of throwing my hands up and abandoning the whole
affair.

It took a few months of failed compromises before I resorted to being totally
upfront about it. I tried to ask for things like "one sprint on, one sprint
off" and hearing that "we don't have bandwidth" until I finally said "look,
i'm not having a good time, my productivity is on the floor, i have no morale
and things that should take 10 easy minutes take a miserable week. i'm gonna
take a month, and when I come back, i'm gonna work on other stuff (with a
large, thorough doc of what "other stuff" should be: the intersection of
things i find valuable/interesting + would also be valuable to the team).

Management was on board this time. I think they could tell that I was pained
enough to walk if I had to, like most of the people in these stories. We also
have a new engineer that unlocked some bandwidth. They asked me to move my
month off to December instead of November, but greenlit my new work effective
the next sprint.

The turnaround was astonishing. Overnight, my output went from unusually low
to unusually high. I wake up excited to work on stuff, and care enough that I
can be self-directing without needing to be fed tickets or have a PM
prioritizing goals. My demos hit heavy, I feel great about my job, and I
haven't even taken the vacation yet. I'm still taking it, but it no longer
feels like I'll have a breakdown if I don't.

Point is: sometimes burnout comes from feelings of helplessness,
arbitrariness, lack of autonomy, and misalignment of personal and company
goals. Then you get bitter, and fatigued by constant bitterness, and the hole
deepens until you can't see a way out anymore.

But if you can recognize whats got you down, come up with a viable
alternative, set and defend boundaries on your time, and fight for them with
adult conflict resolution skills... that crippling dissatisfaction is VERY
actionable.

"Burnout" is a catch-all term for many nebulous forms of psychological
fatigue. The idea that there's no cure for any of those things is pretty silly
to me.

~~~
mettamage
This is an amazing example for the “autonomy” part of self-determination
theory. And it shows how intrinsic motivation relates to mental health. It
also shows to some extent “relatedness” and “competence” part of SDT.

Other than that this post shows a potential issue that many people with
burnout face: adult conflict. Without conflict one’s course of action is to
change themselves. With conflict, one can change their environment. This
(probably) only works in a healthy environment like the parent described.

~~~
RickS
It wasn't mentioned in my post, but the "relatedness" aspect was definitely a
big component. I felt like I was letting myself down by not working on what's
important to me, but I felt like I was letting the team down by being
ineffective in my regular "keep the lights on" role, and so _everyone_ was
being disappointed. I disliked the work, but I still like my team, and didn't
want to be responsible for making their jobs harder. One of the goals here was
to remove that conflict of interest.

SDT is interesting – I hadn't read anything about this before, so thanks for
the keyword.

------
amykhar
Most of us don't have any choice and have to continue to work - burned out or
not. I've found that burnout comes and goes in waves though. It doesn't
necessarily take changing jobs to help resolve it. Sometimes, it's just a
matter of putting one foot in front of another for a while and just staying
afloat until something sparks and work becomes interesting and fun again and
not sheer drudgery and anxiety.

~~~
rusk
I think part of what it takes to innoculate yourself is recognising it for
what it is, and knowing the signs so you can at least put it in its place and
manage it.

Symptoms are physical, emotional, behavioural - author touches on some of
these, but for me its noticing I’m being continuosly negative about things,
raised heart-rate and breathing, locking myself away from people or not being
able to sleep at night. Ymmv.

------
lr
> Don’t talk to me about burnout without addressing universal healthcare and
> worker’s rights. I just don’t want to hear it (or read it, or listen to it,
> or buy it, or watch it).

That is the real issue: people can't give up their jobs because there is
absolutely no way they can afford the health care. The healthcare system in
the US is completely broken. This absolutely must be addressed, which is a
major point in her post.

------
mdszy
>I didn’t do my laundry for four months and I ordered Wendy’s delivery twice a
week for most of winter because I was psychologically unable to pick up
groceries.

Sounds like more of a serious case of actual clinical depression.

~~~
AstralStorm
Exhaustion caused by chronic stress - general adaptation syndrome (formerly
neurasthenia, now "other neurotic disorder") and depression share many
features, but the treatment is different. (Likewise PTSD.) Dysautonomia is
related, maybe a feature that would be tractable pharmacologically.

And probably harder as it's less understood. Nobody really knows how
adaptation to stress works, much less how to fix the terminal exhaustion.

------
sailfast
This isn’t a cure but it helped me and the author mentions their job having to
be on Twitter a lot.

The constant churn of social media (esp Twitter) is not a place for sanity or
calm and is absolutely a recipe for late nights wasting away when your brain
can only handle repetitive tasks with quick endorphin hits (railroad tycoon
was cited) or random mobile games.

When success is how quick you respond to the latest with something witty or
anything at all, rather than considered substantive discussion you will not be
able to quiet your mind.

Get off Twitter if you can. Logout of Facebook. Have a friend change your
passwords. Avoid the “news”. Some good can come from it, but this is step one.
It is an addiction, and must be treated as such.

------
IndrekR
Your mileage may vary, but regarding effective life management, I found the
Mark Manson's book _The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A F: Counterintuitive
Approach to Living a Good Life_ to have more truth in than the title may say.

~~~
loulou24
Seconded. A funny yet surprisingly instructive book. His concept of "VCR
questions" (about the importance of processing emotions) was really eye
opening for me.

------
intarga
Spot on, the best cure for burnout isn't a cure at all, it's prevention.

~~~
HNLurker2
But preventative means limit my potential

~~~
madaxe_again
Your potential to do what? Trade happiness for money? Because that’s how this
works.

We’re totally sold on the idea that more money means a better life. More.
More. Always more. Always wanting. Always lacking.

Happiness isn’t in more. It’s in everything. You just have to have the time to
find it - and time is the crux.

You only live once; time is your most precious and finite commodity. Each day
that passes is irrevocably gone - and as morbid as it may be, you don’t know
which will be your last. I have had friends drop dead in their 20s and 30s
both out of the blue, and after agonising illnesses.

If your work makes you happy, great. If your work is gently or not so gently
killing you, and you are persevering for some abstract goal of “more”, you are
taking a dangerous wager - your precious time against the chance of making it
into the 0.0001% - the idea being that if you win, then you won’t have to
work. That’s fundamentally the bet we take when we venture into a career.

There’s a shortcut. Don’t work any more than you absolutely have to to keep
the lights on.

I left my business a few years ago after a decade, withered and broken,
mentally and physically damaged. I do as little contracting as I can get away
with to cover my living expenses, which I’ve dramatically cut by moving off
grid in a cheap country. I have so much time to read, to work on projects and
hobbies, to just stand and stare at the river running by.

I used to stand in the shower, weeping, and think about how I would kill
myself.

Now I weep only with happiness.

Life doesn’t have to be a slog.

~~~
1996
No prospect, no future.

You seem to be waiting for death.

~~~
madaxe_again
No, I’m living life. If you measure your entire worth through your position in
a corporate hierarchy, sure, no future.

Life isn’t about how much stuff you have, but that’s for you to find out -
most only discover this just before they die, if ever.

~~~
1996
I have little care for such things.

Human interaction is different - as is doing things with other human beings.
Hobby, work, paid, volunteer - doesn't matter.

You seem to be living a recluse life. I find that concerning

------
dangerface
Pacing, life is a marathon not a race.

------
Tade0
_But my primary motivation—the one that finally overrode my aversion to risk
and pushed me to give notice before I could line up another job_

I quit my job a month ago or so, citing burnout.

They one thing the majority of my co-workers couldn't wrap their heads around
was that I had nothing else waiting for me and made a point out of it. Some
said they envied me, because they didn't have enough savings to pull something
like that.

And this made me think, because not having anything lined up beforehand was my
rule which I broke for the first time by applying to this company, and in
hindsight it was a bad move.

Are we all "running on fumes" to such an extent, that no-one can afford a few
weeks without a job?

~~~
BlueTemplar
After some unpleasant life experiences, I've made a point of __always __having
savings to be able to survive and keep a roof over my head for a year if the
worst were to happen. (And lower my spending when I don 't.) Sadly, it looks
like the situation has gotten so bad that most people can't even do _that_...

~~~
Tade0
_I_ don't have that. Even worse: almost three years ago I got to a point of
having almost zero money, but found a job soon after.

I promised myself that this year it'll be different - we'll see.

------
ThrowMeAwayOkay
"I’m afraid that there is no cure for burnout. After all, you can’t untoast
toast."

Well said.

------
rpmisms
Reads like an extremely discriminatory hitpiece. Gross.

------
rb808
One thing I've seen is people get used to working 60-80 hour weeks at
university. But you can't keep doing that your whole life, you have to learn
to work a regular weeks as well.

Also and people assuming promotions is always a good thing. You don't have to
always want to be the boss.

------
tempodox
> If there is a cure for burnout, it’s voting, and unionizing, and
> redistributing wealth.

I couldn't agree more.

------
growlist
So many words, yet so little said.

------
eigenvalue
The author seems to me to be blaming society and her former employer for her
own failings. Perhaps if she were smarter about how she performed her job
duties she wouldn't be so overwhelmed, unable to do even basic chores like
buying groceries or going to the gym. And if it really was the fault of her
unreasonable employer/boss, she could have applied to other jobs. Or maybe she
should find a different industry, or develop useful skills that are in enough
demand in the economy for her to dictate a better work environment. By blaming
everything and everyone but herself, she has set herself up to fail. It's not
the patriarchy or capitalism that is the cause of her issues-- it's her own
bad choices and even worse ways of grappling with the fallout of her bad
decisions.

~~~
AstralStorm
Nice example of prevalent victim blaming. The mentally ill person expected to
cure themselves? Really? If you consider her to be setting herself for
failure, why did nobody help her before it was too late?

There are very strong social pressures on staying working. Be the hero to buck
them, see what your spouse thinks if you have one. Or friends - suddenly
you're considered a loser.

And the key thing is that switching jobs requires patience and actual work to
not land in the same or worse hole. Even then, when truly exhausted, you might
be unable to hold on in the new place.

Develop useful skills? Taking say up to six years with what money and energy?
Then getting hired while being older this many years, quite a challenge.

What's your solution? "Stiff upper lip?" Boundless forced optimism? Job
hopping? Just being rich? Having actual friends? (but not everyone is so
lucky)

Even psychologists have problems dealing with this thing.

~~~
eigenvalue
Calling it "victim blaming" presupposes the existence of a victim in this
scenario. But there is no victim-- her own actions are the cause of her
problems. This is not an example of someone getting assaulted on the street
corner by a stranger and saying "well, they shouldn't have been by themselves
in a dangerous area late at night, it's their own fault." No one put a gun to
her head-- she isn't an indentured servant, or in a prison work gang. She
lives in one of the freest places in the world (and in human history), with
the best economy in decades and the lowest unemployment rate in recorded
history. At some point you need to take ownership of your own destiny.

------
foobarbecue
Why is the link to Helen Peterson's article a mailto?

------
DATACOMMANDER
I’ve noticed a trend recently. Someone will write a very long article about
some problem, without mentioning politics once. Then, at the end, they’ll
assert that the answer is to remake society from the ground up. This is the
template:

 _5000 words of bitching about some problem that’s always existed_

...

Ahem. And that is why we must dismantle the White Supremacist Capitalist
Patriarchy.

~~~
forgottenpass
I see it too. It's like the correlation vs. causation error, but less
rigorous. More like coexistence vs. causation.

Now that you've caught this trend, you'll start seeing the more generic form
of it everywhere.

------
hellofunk
What great writing this was.

------
corodra
Hold up, there's some really bad perspective on this. While I would say
there's no immediate cure for burnout, it is absolutely curable.

When I first learned to program, I dived into freelancing. I lucked out and in
about 3 weeks, I teamed up with two design firms that needed a webdev. I was
working ~18 almost everyday. No exaggeration. I was single and this was right
after I lost my job, apartment and my life collapsed. So, I was on the kick of
getting it all back. It was work, coffee, sleep. I literally drank 2-3 pots of
coffee everyday and had to chug beer to fall asleep. Wake up, all over again.

BTW, not a healthy lifestyle, in case you didn't realize.

After a year, I was done. I would literally stare at my emails piling up and
just not move. Just blank stare for hours. I had zero focus. Not, oh I'm going
to watch a video or check reddit kind of "zero focus". I could barely
function. Any task I needed to do, like brush my teeth, I couldn't think about
long or hard enough to get up and do it. That, I learned is zero damn focus.

Fast forward about 2 months. Lost all those contracts and contacts for obvious
reasons and got into really bad depression. Now, I was "trying" to cure my
burnout and was getting no where. Meditation, soothing music, motivational
videos, whatever. None of it was enough to get me "work" functioning again for
more than 15 minutes without me wanting to just go jump into front of a fast
moving truck. Oh, but I can't do that because I lack the motivation to even go
out there to kill myself. That's how bad it was.

Until, one Friday, Steam sent an email about Borderlands 2 was free for the
weekend. I didn't play a video game in like 2 or 3 years at that point. I
thought, "Fuck it, my weekend isn't going to be productive anyways since I'm
burnt out and probably going to die in this apartment only to be found because
they want to collect past due rent."

I didn't think of "working" at all. Just played, non-damn-stop that entire
weekend. Didn't drink coffee or alcohol, mostly by accident because I was
focused on the game.

I fell asleep at a decent time Sunday. Monday I woke up, did all my morning
hygiene properly, like an adult. I then sat down and made phone calls to
contacts that didn't suffer from my burnout phase. Got working again. I tried
getting 7 hours of sleep every night and went from 18 hours working to only 10
max for the first few months (had to pick back up on finances). Eventually I
forced 8 hours of sleep on myself over time. One of my best decisions.

You need to have fun people! I don't play video games much anymore. I like
reading, woodworking, nature photography, writing, watercolor painting (I suck
at it, but it's fun) and literally walking on the beach. Bars and generic
social meetups are fun too. I only work more than 8 hours a day if it's a
real, super emergency. I restrict my coffee intake to 3 mugs max per day. No
caffeine the moment it's 5pm, no exceptions. Even if there's a crunch. My
sleep is important. I only allow 2 all nighters in a 30 day timespan. No
exceptions.

While I feel for Ella in the article, but you can't blame the economy or
capitalism for the fact you don't take care of yourself. It's not a political
issue. It's a "be an adult" issue. One that many have to learn the hard way,
like myself. But blaming others is... well... stupid. Yes, there are drawbacks
to standing your ground about this. Again, it's about being an adult. Nothing
about gender or race. Be an adult. Yea, I didn't get certain contracts,
especially one from a FAANG (Fuck them all by the way, they're the cause of
this overwork bullshit plaguing society), because I have very strong
stipulations how I work. If I'm requested to work after MY 5pm, I charge
double, instantly. Don't call me. I don't check my work email. If you call, I
charge you a full hour, at double rate, even if it's a 5 minute phone call.
Email me and I'll get to it 9am the next day. Unless you take me out to dinner
to chat work. But I'm an expensive work date.

If you're in a burnout phase. Here's what I recommend.

A. Do something drastically fun or relaxing. Pure pleasure and don't even
think or worry about working. For at least a day. I think a weekend is best
(obviously) but at minimum do 24 hours. This is the first "small fix" to get
you started.

B. You need a hobby. A relaxing and/or fun hobby. No, you don't instagram or
facebook what you're doing. It's FOR YOU and you only. I recommend something
constructive. But whatever it is that you find enjoyable and somewhat
challenges you(not crazy important). Do it.

C. Work/Life balance is about doing responsibilities and still having fun.
Life isn't all about "constant" improvement and work. Relax, have fun. Get
your work done sooner so you can have fun sooner. Don't get your work done
sooner just so you can give yourself more work to do.

Hustling is good in spurts, especially when you're young and can handle it.
Cutting your teeth is good. But you still need to realize that life is more
than that. If you're hustling so you can "hustle more", you're doing it wrong.
You hustle so you can enjoy life more. People bitch about the boomers. Yea,
but you know, they did protest against the stiff all work corporate culture of
their time and brought in the sexual revolution. Millennials are a generation
that focus on all work/career along with public image for their social media
feed and are really under-sexed.

Go get laid, have some fun and remember you work so you can enjoy life more.
You don't life so you can work more.

------
chrshawkes
This is coming from a lady pitching for redistribution of wealth and universal
healthcare. She also takes her time to attack men as the only ones who can
receive a cure from something most everybody faces at one time or another. I'm
sorry, I've been burned out for years but this sounds more like a mental
illness than occupational burnout.

My thoughts while reading this are... can you imagine if she had a family to
support?

I think the cure for burnout is time off and thinking about all the things you
do have and not about how unfair the world is. It's always been that way and
always will be. Millennials are burned out at a much higher rate due to the
fact that they are the most entitled generation entering the workforce.

If it's truly occupational, I think one should find a new job. To quit with
nothing else lined up except a dream, that's just irrational behavior. The
world owes us nothing and our ancestors had it much much worse.

Also, she hasn't even had 3 months off. The general rule is at least half the
time you've been burned out to truly recover. At least that's what I hear from
people who we're actually able to recover, the ones without children to feed.
For this guy, it's not a reality. I have to grind and it's just the way it is.

~~~
neuronic
> This is coming from a lady pitching for redistribution of wealth and
> universal healthcare.

So someone sensible then?

