The Connection Between Burnout And Passions
If you’ve been following me for a while, you’ll have noticed that I used to talk about prioritising your passions all the time. More recently, I seem to place an emphasis on burnout prevention and recovery. Why have I chanced my focus, then?
The short answer is: I haven’t changed it at all. I’m still doing the exact same work I did before, the exact same program. I simply noticed that all my clients, different as they and their passions were, had certain things in common.
They all struggled with setting healthy boundaries (which can manifest in being too harsh in some cases, and letting others walk all over you in others) and were underappreciated and/or underpaid at work. They often had trouble saying No to certain people in their lives and were fed up with overdelivering and still being overlooked.
In other words, they were struggling with the exact same things that cause burnout. In fact, some of them were fairly burnt out already, others recovering from a previous burnout. The rest were headed towards one and wanted to pull the emergency brake before it was too late.
When experts talk about burnout, they often focus on building resilience and getting well again. Therefore, the connection I make between burnout and passion(s) is not immediately obvious, but it’s needed if you want to not only recover, but also burnout-proof your life for the future.
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How’s a passion different from a hobby or an interest?
Before I continue, I’d like to clarify some terms I use frequently. To answer the question in the title: There’s not really a difference. Okay, so I’ve said in the past that a passion is something that truly lights you up – but honestly, so does a hobby in many cases.
The thing is, these aren’t trademarked names for very specific things. The reason why I and many others often prefer “passion” over “hobby” is that we’ve been brought up to find hobbies a little silly. “Oh look at him and his little hobby,” people say condescendingly. This is a symptom of our times: There’s little value placed on things that simply bring us joy, rather than money or practical use. I’ve often mentioned just how damaging this society brainwashing is for our capacity for happiness.
Really, though, it doesn’t matter whether it’s a passion, hobby or interest. If it fascinates you, brings you joy, lights up your soul, then it’s worth prioritising. To counteract the above tendency to only value that which brings us monetary value, I often say that a passion is something that
either doesn’t make you money (because you never intended it to, or you’re not very good at it, or any other reason),
or, if you do earn your living from it, you’d continue prioritising it even if you never earned a cent.
Why you might be burnt out
I’ve mentioned before that burnout might concern you even if you’re not at the point where it makes you actually sick or incapable of working. There are several stages to burnout.
Let’s look at the symptoms (not all of these must mean you have burnout, but they could). You might be on your way to burnout if you:
feel tired a lot,
don’t feel like doing much outside of work,
have trouble sleeping,
don’t feel like meeting friends or communicating much,
mindlessly binge TV/Netflix/social media,
are more irritable or snappy then usual,
often feel like your life lacks direction,
wonder what the point of it all is,
fantasise about living a quiet life where nobody bothers you.
I often think burnout is depression’s little brother. Like depression, it shrinks your life and focuses you on just a few parts of it – usually not the most pleasant ones. It just isn’t quite as severe and disabling.
When I work with clients on creating both time and headspace to do more of what they love, some elements are fairly consistent. Among those is that everyone thinks they’re not doing too much, and they invariably do.
I often quote Emily and Amelia Nagoski’s book Burnout, which says that 42% of our time need to be spend in rest. It also says that this isn’t a recommendation, but a requirement, and not sticking to it will in the long run have serious consequences for our health and well-being (and life expectancy).
Guess what these consequences are? Yup: Burnout!
The connection between burnout and passion(s)
I’ve spoken before about our idealisation of “working hard” which is based on an inherited trauma from the times of the Industrial Revolution. In our day, it all comes to a head because we no longer live in a formal class society – which is great, of course, but also means that we now naturally assume we need to work full time, do the whole household, look after ourselves and our families, as well as keep healthy and exercise and eat well and have a social life and…
All at the same time.
This is considered normal, which is why my clients often need to re-learn how to check in with themselves and listen to their own needs first, before they see how burnt out they truly are. And then we go to the remedy: passions. Of course, passions alone can’t cure burnout, but in combination with some other steps that I describe below, they are absolutely the anti-poison.
Why passions? Because in order to pursue something you love, simply because you love it (and not because it’s “good for you”, you “should” do it or it makes you money), you need to get into a headspace that’s practically the antithesis of the tight, shrunk, joyless burnout space.
How to make it work
It takes time and persistence, and it’s practically impossible to do this on your own without support. I tried and failed for years. Basically, what you need to do is radically downsize your life – kick out anything non-essential. This might include things you enjoy, like clubs and sports activities. You’ll also outsource things. You need to focus on very few priorities, and that goes against everything we are brought up to believe.
After downsizing, prepare to rest. And rest some more. And keep resting, a lot and regularly. Also develop a self-care habit. And then suddenly, in your free time outside of resting and self-care, you’ll feel like doing the thing you love. You won’t need motivation. You won’t be “lazy” any longer. You’ll simply feel like it.
This is the reason why I don’t focus on “resilience” against burnout. It’s part of my program, too, but it’s not a focus, because I don’t want to enable you to continue doing something that’s against human nature and not conducive to joy.
Instead, you’ll learn how to create and maintain balance. You’ll spend the necessary part of your life in the mindset of work and chores, things that need to be done. The other part will be dedicated to the mindset that allows for joy and passion. It’s the mindset that makes creativity thrive. It’s where you find your purpose, that you can then align the rest of your life with.
It’s an amazing journey. If you’d like to avoid burnout and achieve lasting happiness, it’s the fastest and most reliable way.