In part one of a blog series on burnout, we looked at the top 8 signs that you might be burning out and not realising. These included a rise in anxiety, lack of motivation, social isolation, issues with concentration or memory, and feeling run down and catching lots of bugs easily.
If this rings any bells with you, please have a look at that blog, as well as this one. Together they will help you get back on the right track. It can be tricky to notice burn out creeping up on you. However, once you do, it’s really important to act and stop it in its tracks before it impacts your life even further.
Burnout can happen to anyone, so how do you know what to do for the best? What can you easily do to support yourself back to strong physical, mental and emotional health again?
Implementing just a few of our tips can have a really life changing effect. Have a go and see what you think.
Mindfulness and meditation
Meditation fast becoming a revolution and even big businesses are running meditation and mindfulness sessions for their teams. Yoga can really help with learning meditative breathing skills, and YouTube is a vast resource for guided meditations, tailored to your needs (sleep, stress, relaxation etc).
We recommend an app called Insight Timer that is free and has some easy introductory guided meditations. Just put your headphones in and listen – it is super straight-forward and even 5 short minutes per day will help!
Some of its top benefits include reducing stress and anxiety and improving cognitive function and relaxation.
Mindful awareness is also a practice that you can learn to perform at anywhere, anytime. It takes you out of negative, toxic thought patterns. Instead of focusing on turning your thinking towards optimism, mindfulness helps you stay in the moment, and reduce or eliminate the time and energy you expend on anticipatory dread and procrastination.
Be kind to yourself in all things and all ways. Try not to judge yourself harshly, and if you don’t succeed, or don’t do the best job imaginable, remember that’s ok, and you can always try again another time. Life is rarely perfect.
Nutrient Rich Foods
A diet filled with nutrient rich foods will help to counter act fatigue and low energy levels. Gram for gram, some foods have far more benefits than others. Some of the top 11 nutrient rich foods are as follows: Salmon, Kale, Kelp (seaweed – you can take a supplement if preferred!), Garlic, Shellfish, Potatoes, Liver, Sardines (and other oily fish), Blueberries, Egg Yolks and Dark Chocolate (yes, chocolate – yum!).
If in doubt, or if you eat a restricted diet, just aim to make sure you have between 4-6 portions of fresh fruit and veggies each day as a starting point. It can also really encourage you to start experimenting with some new recipes.
Professional burnout support
We can’t say enough good things about considering seeking counselling or psychotherapy. Having a person to talk to who can be an objective but interested observer, is a blessing. No two people experience burnout in exactly the same way. For example, some people feel an overabundance of negative feelings, while others become detached from their emotions and feel very little but helpless.
Therapists are trained to help with all the emotions of burnout, as well as the techniques to help break through it. Even a few short sessions can kick-start you and help you to gain the clarity you need to get your life back on track.
Consider supplements
It is well evidenced that Omega-3 fatty acids, Vitamin C, and Vitamin B Complex (especially vitamin B12) can all help to support you while you manage symptoms of burnout. Herbal supplements can help relieve anxiety.
Ashwagandha is a herbal supplement from India, famed for boosting resilience to stress. As an adaptogen, Ashwagandha helps to moderate your body’s response to stress and reduce the production of the stress chemical cortisol. It can also help to support the reduction of tissue inflammation at the same time. That’s a big relief for aching joints and over-tensed muscles.
Valerian root is well documented for its ability to boost restful sleep by gently increasing the amount of the “relaxation” neurochemical known as GABA.
Gingko Biloba also supports the reduction of inflammation in the body. It can also promote good memory function and concentration and is useful for reducing anxiety.
Although not a herb, Marine Collagen is great for reducing joint aches and inflammation. Collagen is the protein that is responsible for providing structure and strength to your skin, hair, bones, joints and nails. Beyond the age of about 25 years, your body’s own production of collagen starts to decline. Taking this can really help to boost your structural protein levels and subsequently reduce on-going aches and pains.
Schedule in some fun to ditch the burnout
If you’re so busy (and it’s likely you are) that the easiest items to sacrifice in your life are your own self-care activities, you need to reclaim those fun times. Fun is not frivolous, it is very much a necessity, and one that you deserve. Everything else can (and will) wait, especially work!
Enjoyment and pleasure are proven to reduce the production of cortisol, helping to lower blood pressure, and distract the mind and brain from repetitious negative thinking. Put fun and self-care back on your calendar and block it off.
Brain training for positive thought patterns
The symptoms of burnout can lead to you thinking that you are trapped in a situation when you are not. This doesn’t need to be a never-ending free-fall. With the right care this will not last for ever. You will always have choices, even if sometimes it doesn’t feel that way.
Your choices only evaporate when you tell yourself you have no options. A good exercise to counteract this is to write down every single imaginable negative thought or idea related to the situation or circumstances causing the most stress (no matter how they are perceived in terms of un/realistic or im/possible). Then, no matter how hard or how unrealistic it feels, write something positive next to each and every one. Somewhere in among the list, there will be some gems that you can really start to work on, one step at a time.
Negative thought patterns can become ingrained and extreme during burnout. Sometimes cancelling out negative thoughts is no more complex than countering with some positive self-talk. Your mind will believe whatever you tell it the most.
For each negative thought that comes into your mind, try countering it will the exact positive opposite (even if you don’t wholly believe it at the time).
If your mind says “I am so tired, this is so hard to learn, I will never do it” counter it with “I can learn anything I want, and learning gives me energy”. This repeated action will gradually ‘re-programme’ your neural pathways and you will become more positive overall.
Time with trusted friends, family or loved ones
Burnout can create a towering sense of isolation. Getting out with friends (away from the workplace) builds and strengthens personal relationships. Adding in a few actives with friends really helps re-establish connections.
Although you may feel you are in a position where you are ‘not yourself’ and you might not want people to see you differently, it can really help to talk to people you like and trust. Being honest with friends about what is happening can significantly increase the strength of your support network and your connection to people overall. The results can be amazing.
Making a defined and conscious effort to create time with those you love and trust will have great benefits. Turn off your mobile devices, leave the house is necessary, just ensure you reconnect… It’s worth it!
Things to remember on your burnout recovery…
Finally, remember to treat yourself with kindness. It is 100% ok to slow down and put yourself first. It is only by doing this that you will really be able to give your best anyway. As the saying goes… ‘you cannot drink from an empty cup’.
By practising love and kindness towards yourself, and focusing on what you truly value, you’ll not only be the best version of you, but you’ll feel at your best and most energised. Taking on just a few of the tips above will really help you to support yourself.
Guest Blogger Tara Barton, founder of Birch & Wilde the most dedicated company to helping people live happy, confident, healthy lives, our range of premium vitamins and wellbeing supplements are designed to offer the very best results. So, of course here at the burnout slayer we were more than happy to collaborate to share these important tips.
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