CHAPTER 2 BURNOUT
WHAT TRIGGERS THE FLAMES?
Exhaustion is not a badge of honor.
– BRENÉ BROWN
How did we get to this place?
Our lives are not compartmentalized into neat boxes labeled “work,” “home,” “family,” “friends,” “community,” “school,” “health,” “religious institutions,” and “associations.” We dance among these entities, often weaving parts of one into another. Caring for an aging parent does not stop while working at one’s desk. Serving as the president of a local nonprofit does not disappear while meeting a work demand. Studying for final exams does not isolate one from the physical need to exercise and sleep.
To begin the journey from burnout to breakthrough, it’s necessary to stop and consciously examine all facets of our life. Now, I admit to being a jerk—a knee jerk. I respond instantly to what I think needs to be fixed. Alas, I am often off the mark. Some of you might be the opposite—procrastinators. You wait for things to simmer down before taking action. That can also prove to be an unhealthy response. Instead, let’s blend the two reactions and explore more deeply. This will lead us into breakout.
Five triggers might contribute to burnout:
1. Personal history and “voices”
2. Technology tyrants
3. Disconnected connections
4. Caretaker crisis
5. Lack of meaning and purpose
For now, just reflect on whether any of these “triggers” might be simmering in various parts of your life. Honestly owning the presence of any of these triggers can be one of your breakout steps toward breakthrough. Consider this a diagnostic chapter that lays out possible contributing factors.
TRIGGER #1
PERSONAL HISTORY AND “VOICES”
I had the wonderful opportunity to be on a program with Hamza Khan, a marvelous millennial and author of The Burnout Gamble.1 He calls himself a recovering overachiever, and his wonderful book is the result of burning out in a major fashion. The son of immigrants from India, Hamza needed to achieve results and prove his worth to his parents, which netted him names like “robot” and “machine.” A three-day stretch with less than an hour of combined sleep found him passed out on a bathroom floor, out cold for twelve hours in a pool of vomit!
He didn’t take the warning seriously. The voices in his head and his high ego need for wild success continued. You’ll have to read his book to get the entire story about his final wake-up call. However, his dramatic flameout was the product of stress brought on by trying to excel in anything he touched and trying to live up to the “superstar” image perceived by his family and the world.
Gen Xer Lin Jackson, today a senior manager in a major biotech company, recalls that her journey into burnout began like the proverbial frog in boiling water. At age seventeen, she went to high school in the morning, worked at a co-op on data processing in the afternoon, and then was sent out as a third-party consultant. Three jobs! Lin explained that she came from a lower-middle-class family. Her father instilled in her two things to get ahead: education and hard work! Lots of both. “He wanted me to have a different life and I was to be the first generation to earn that life. I listened to his voice … for decades.”
While your internal voice might not be as strident and demanding as Hamza’s or Lin’s, we all have voices that talk to us about who we are and who we can be.
These voices can also be powerful and positive. Tina Turner, born Anna Mae Bullock, was raised by her sharecropper grandparents in Nutbush, Tennessee. I can’t help but think that the voices telling her to never stop singing propelled her from poverty and an abusive marriage into her title as “The Queen of Rock and Roll.”
QUESTIONS
What do your voices say to you? Is it true?
Is it what you believe and want in your deepest soul?
What is the price you pay and is it worth it?
TRIGGER #2
TECHNOLOGY TYRANTS
How many of us jump when a text message dings? Or stop what we are doing to answer the latest email that flashes across our screen? Multitasking is a myth, having us believe we are being productive when actually we are not.
A Wall Street Journal video, “How Smart Phones Sabotage Your Brain’s Ability to Focus,” noted that some researchers suggest that heavy multitaskers are 40 percent less productive.2 This means that one must work longer and harder to regain focus. Talk about stress!
In another study, Stanford University researcher Clifford Nass found that people who were considered heavy multitaskers were actually worse at sorting out relevant information from irrelevant details.3 This finding is particularly surprising because it was assumed that heavy multitaskers would actually be better at this kind of sorting. But that wasn’t the only problem these heavy multitaskers faced. They also showed greater difficulty when it came to switching from one task to another and they were much less mentally organized. Smart phones can make us dumb and email can wreck our ability to focus.
QUESTIONS
Do you consider yourself a multitasking genius?
Are you addicted to your smart phone?
Do you have a hard time “shutting off” at the end of a day?
Can you limit your to-do list to what is actually feasible in a day?
Do you compete in the “my list-is-longer-than-your list” race?
TRIGGER #3
DISCONNECTED CONNECTIONS
The third trigger is also catalyzed by technology. On a college campus, I watched students walking, their heads bent to look at text messages or email. Never once did they stop to interact. I sat by a reflecting pool outside a major hospital where medical personnel were taking a break. But no one was talking. Again, all eyes were focused on their phones. Standing in line at the grocery store, I found myself starting to pull out my phone to read email rather than smiling at the person behind me and saying good morning to the clerk. Shame on me!
The March 20, 2019, edition of Scientific American revealed that a recent study found that a staggering 47 percent of Americans often feel alone, left out and lacking meaningful connection with others.4 This is true for all ages, from teenagers to older adults. The number of people who perceive themselves to be alone, isolated, or distant from others has reached epidemic levels in both the United States and other parts of the world. From the UK to Japan and Australia, governments are taking notice. Loneliness has been estimated to shorten a person’s life by fifteen years, equivalent in impact to being obese or smoking fifteen cigarettes per day.5 A recent study revealed a surprising association between loneliness and cancer mortality risk, pointing to the role loneliness plays in cancer’s course, including responsiveness to treatments. Not surprisingly, loneliness causes stress—the catalyst for burnout.
While we can’t blame loneliness solely on technology, the reality is that the more we automate and turn to technology before people, the less human contact we end up with. People are stressed, and human connection is the remedy. As the director of nursing at an oncology hospital told me, “These young nurses have medical skills but zero idea how to talk to patients and their families. They are burning out because they don’t know how to talk to these patients. It’s now become a training issue for us!”
QUESTIONS
When was the last time you had a meaningful conversation—preferably face-to-face?
Who are your close friends?
If you don’t have any, what would it take to get one or two?
Whom do you know who needs a friend?
Are you willing to challenge yourself to smile at a stranger?
Can you put away all technology while having a meal with others? If not, why not??
TRIGGER #4
CARETAKER CRISIS
Life happens. With an aging population, many of us will experience the need to care for aging parents in various stages of physical and mental decline. We can be caught between parents and children. Or a loved one might suffer a debilitating illness and need your attention. Self-care gets pushed to the last item on your list.
QUESTIONS
Does this situation resonate with you?
Who are the people looking to you for assistance?
How often are you “on call”?
What resources, if any, do you have available?
Do you ask for help?
Managers, take a clue from former surgeon general Dr. Vivek Murthy, who wrote a fascinating cover story for the Harvard Business Review.6 Dr. Murthy will not only convince you that creating workplace connections is good for business but he also offers specific actions that allow groups to actually know and value each other. Forget mandatory fun and traditional “team building.” Murthy suggests that a connected workforce is more likely to enjoy greater fulfillment, productivity, and engagement while being protected from burnout.
Dr. Murthy created “Inside Scoop,” an exercise in which team members are asked to share something about themselves through pictures for five minutes during staff meetings. This is an eye-opener that generates greater insights and allows colleagues to learn about one another’s personal lives.
Strong social connections show that positive emotions improve performance and resilience. Make strengthening social connections a strategic priority (and this is not done through team games). Encourage coworkers to reach out and help others—and to accept that help.
TRIGGER #5
LACK OF MEANING AND PURPOSE
In a classic story, two bricklayers are working on a church in Europe. A passerby asks the men what they are doing. One bricklayer responds, “Can’t you see? I am laying bricks.” The other bricklayer, smiling widely, says, “I am building a cathedral!”
An old tale, to be sure, but today it is more powerful than ever. The first man shrugged off his work as just a task. The second man saw his work as a contribution to something greater than himself: a cathedral.
In her powerful, evidenced-based book, The Power of Meaning: Finding Fulfillment in a World Obsessed with Happiness, Emily Esfahani Smith outlines the connection between a lack of meaning and depression, burnout, and suicide.7 Happiness is equated not with having wealth but rather with being engaged in finding something worthwhile to do with one’s time—something that is meaningful. This doesn’t mean being able to cure cancer or achieve global peace, but rather working at something that has significance beyond a paycheck. If your work is stale, plodding, and without personal meaning, burnout might not be far off.
Consider this classic experiment conducted in the 1970s by researchers Ellen Langer and Judith Rodin. The elderly residents of a nursing home were each given a houseplant. One group was told that the staff would care for their plant. The other residents were given the job of caring for the plant themselves. At the end of eighteen months, the residents who cared for their own plant were remarkably better than the other group.8
I’m not suggesting you find a potted African violet. However, in subsequent chapters you’ll find people who brought an extra something special to their work that felt like a contribution. In chapter 9, you’ll meet a hospital housekeeper who uses her art to liven up the hospital floor and the patients.