Let's just say once upon a time, me and being burnt out were too close for comfort. This week's post is about what signs to look for to figure out if you are burnt out or not!
1. You wanted to read this article.
Am I right with this one? But seriously, let's start with just gauging where you're at. I often ask my clients to tell me where they are at on the burnout scale. I ask them, "On a scale of 1-10, 1 being you love EVERYTHING about your job to 10 being you want to quit most minutes of your work day, where do you land?"
What's your number? How do you feel about that?
2. Sunday scaries are coming on earlier and stronger.
I think it's normal to be a little bit sad on Sunday nights. You're coming off of a few days without work which gave you the opportunity to control your time, relax and have fun. However, one of the first signs that your current job or career might not be best for you is when this starts to turn from "dang, the weekend is over" to "Don't think about work. Don't think about work. Don’t think about work!".
If the feeling keeps growing, such as you start feeling it earlier in the day or the feeling gets even worse (all you can think about, effects you physically, etc), you are definitely burnt out and need an action plan like yesterday to reset course.
Full disclosure: my worst Sunday scaries started on Friday afternoons before I even left work. At one point, I had the thought that if I never stopped working, it would maybe go away. Can ya tell I was burnt out?! Check out this previous post on beating the Sunday scaries.
3. Mondays make you sick.
Whether the thought of going back to work on Monday makes you sick or you are starting to actually feel a little under the weather on Monday mornings, it's not a good sign. Mondays were always the hardest day for me to face when I was burnt out. It was when I would need to call in sick to avoid work all together or I'd opt to work from home just to get a breather from the office. Life is too short to spend any of our energy disliking a DAY. Whatever we are doing in our lives and careers should allow us to face each day with energy and excitement!
4. You spend most of the time feeling like you don't like your job but by the time you leave at the end of the day you feel grateful for the thing that's driving you crazy.
Wait, what did I just say? Here's what I've seen in myself and in my clients: They will wake up not liking what they are about to do, spend most of their day not liking what they are doing and then once they are finally set free from the work life, they start to feel a little bit guilty about being so hard on their job. "Well, it's a good job" or "I'm thankful to even have a job!" or "That one meeting wasn't that bad". I know you're not a complete jackass that's ungrateful for their job. It's ok to not like a situation you're in and it's OK to admit that!
Here's why this means you're burnt out: because you're not honoring your gut feel about what's going on. You're actually using gratitude as a way to disguise the discomfort. You can learn more about this here.
5. You've stopped caring at work.
There was a time you used to put all of your blood, sweat and tears into your work. Now, your company is lucky if they get any of that because you are so checked out. You have to stop giving so much effort because otherwise you'll crack. But, it doesn't feel good. You don't feel like yourself. You used to try, you used to care, and it doesn't feel good to not do those things. You have a lot to offer an employer and you're so ready to get into a role where you can rock it again.
6. You daydream about quitting.
You're not a quitter BUT the thought of marching into your bosses office and saying "PTFO!" sounds amazing. I'd expand on this one but if you get it, you get it. Life in the fantasy world of quitting is amazing.
7. You have been on LinkedIn while at work every day for the last few weeks.. Months?!
I used to troll LinkedIn when I was burnt out. What jobs were available? What job boards could I get lost on? What were my peers doing? What were older people doing that I'd like to emulate? Some days it felt like I spent more time trying to get out of my job then I did actually putting in work.
8. Other people's successes are starting to bother you.
Everyone's reading this one like "shoot, did she just read my mind?". Look, we're not naturally envious people but when you're burnt out, it feels like everything is just clicking in everyone else's life. So-and-so got ANOTHER promotion?! So-and-so is already a Manager?! The funny thing about this is that I bet if you take a step back and ask yourself "Would I really want that job or promotion?" usually the burnt out answer is "yes" and the whole-hearted answer is "no". Hint: Focusing all of your energy on other people during this time of burn out will NOT help your cause. Bring it back in home girl, you've got some work to do!