Thoughts on Burnout and Recovery

Healing

All along, I just learned how to fight back.
To be resistant and to be brave.

I just learned how to be tough as stone
So that I could not easily swayed by whatever is happening around me.

I just learned how to be numb
So that I won’t have to feel the pain.

Oh boy, I was wrong.

I was wrong not to think that
Accepting the fact and the things that we cannot control is also a strength.

I was wrong not to think that
Being soft and flexible as water is powerful
– It can change its form naturally by being adaptive to any external factors.

I was wrong not to think that
Feeling everything and releasing them is
How you overcome all the fear, sadness and suffering
That Ihave been experiencing my entire life.

Fighting against the odds is a superpower,
But healing yourself from all these wounds also has a magical power too.

I am now wishing myself a healing after so many years of fighting.

by: me

I took this free training course How to Transform Emotional Sensitivity & Be Free From Anxiety. by Youhem Son. She is a content creator that I deeply admire and adore because she has been true to herself and her content covers healing, minimalistic and sustainable living which is very entertaining to watch. Unfortunately, she may seem to have deleted her YouTube videos and only her Instagram and Facebook is active for now. I won’t explain in detail about this course, hence kindly check her site instead if you are interested in learning more. By taking this course, it made me think about this fact:

Every person’s healing journey is different

After experiencing burnout twice from work a year ago, I still feel like I am not totally recovering from it. I used to have more enthusiasm for what I do, I used to have more energy to be productive and bring value to the table. Now, I just feel less motivated.

But instead, I am now giving my time and focusing on the creative pursuits I have set for myself. I do not care if I cannot turn this into a business or bring any form of incentives because that is not the whole point of why I intend to create something in the first place. I value authenticity, connection, and freedom and that is what I want to deliver as a message from my art.

In that sense, I am entering a new phase of my life again where I gained strength again to be inspired and to create more — not to work more. I have made the conclusion to myself that I have a profession as a tool to do whatever I want to do in life. I won’t let my work be my life. Rather, I make a living through work. Work is just a tool for me to be compensated for whatever value I provided to the company. After constantly living with the fear of being financially unstable, I was scared of not proving my worth to the team and to my job. The main motivator why I was working so hard was insecurity. But, I came to the realization that being successful at work is not everything.

I came to the point that I do not have to prove my worth to everyone else anymore

Burnout was just a part of my experience as a human being. Burnout just served as a cue that I need to slow down and reorganize my priorities. In my article, This Is What Burnout Taught Me, I mentioned

“I remind myself that this is just how my body responds when I’m not able to pay attention to my physical, emotional, and mental needs”.

What happened to me is just a normal and natural reaction from my body — the issue was coming from external factors (employment, team structure, working hours) and internal factors (thought patterns, coping mechanisms, etc).

At some point, recovery from burnout became my whole identity, but now, I am ready to stand up again and be wiser as an individual — I am over with calling myself a survivor of this mental health crisis. This made me see my life in a different way by seeing it from different lenses. I overcome the feeling of guilt, and released myself from the victim mentality — I finally became my own creator of my life and all of my actions are coming from gratitude, appreciation, and compassion.

Recovery from burnout does not mean you will be working with a productivity rate of 120–200% again. Recovery from burnout does not mean you will be happy all the time. Recovery from burnout does not mean becoming stronger and tougher to all challenges life will be throwing at you.

My definition of recovery now is how much I can be patient with myself

My definition of recovery is not to expect anything from the outcome of my healing journey. My definition of recovery is not defined by time but by the tiny progress, I am making each day. My definition of recovery is the devotion, determination, and dedication I am putting myself into — by filling the empty cup through the act of self-care, self-expression, and self-love.

Just knowing the fact I am more aware of my feelings, emotions, and triggers; being able to uncover and unravel them by self-reflections, and being able to separate myself from the emotions and thoughts and treat them as visitors of my life who comes and goes; and being able to realign with my values — made such a huge difference on how I react to certain things in life. I won’t have developed these skills without my experience of burnout. So I am still grateful that this happened to me.

As always, be compassionate, be patient with yourself xoxo

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Originally published at https://erinne0217.wordpress.com on July 10, 2022.