Posts tagged ‘Burnout’

June 20th, 2012

How to Bring Meaning Back Into Your Life

{photo by The Inspiring Bee}

Have you lost that loving feeling for your current job? Has blogging become a monotonous activity? Do you find yourself daydreaming about the other life you didn’t take?

If you said, “Yes,” to the following, there are probably two reasons why you’re going through what you’re going through:

1) You’re ready for change.

2) You’ve lost the purpose of why you’re doing it all in the first place.

The good news is that what you’re going through is normal. It’s just our intuitive voice nudging us in a different direction. It’s saying, “Hey maybe it’s time you refocus your life.” Or, “When was the last time you did something meaningful in your life?”

If you keep going without adhering to that voice, you will seek deeper and deeper into a fit of unhappiness so great that you may even lose yourself.

Wake up now before it’s too late.

How to Bring Meaning Back

1. Revisit your goals. Remember that goal you had in 2011 to take a photography class, give back to your community or learn how to paint? Maybe it’s time you do that. There’s no time like now to begin fulfilling your purpose.

2. Discover what your purpose is. Is it to help others, be more creative, have more meaningful moments in your life? Perhaps along the way you gave up on your dreams. You let life derail you from getting what you want or believing it was possible. You create your life. Find out what you want out of it and just let yourself dream of its possibility. You’ll be amazed and how that tiny shift can ripple into big shifts into and what you think you can do in your life.

3. Surround yourself with people who are living their purpose. There’s nothing that will bring you down more than someone who has become jaded with time. But the same can be said of someone who’s lived their dreams. They’ll inspire you, remind you that with perseverance, determination and courage you can also achieve your goals. They may even give you the push you need to achieve greater meaning in your life.

4. Do less. It may seem crazy that doing less could bring more meaning into your life, but it can. Feeling burnt out and overwhelmed can suck out inspiration and meaning faster than anything else. It can make you forget that life is supposed to be magical and beautiful instead of tedious and predictable. Giving yourself time to explore life, to literally smell the roses, can help you to redefine what’s really important in life. And in doing so, you may begin to incorporate more meaningful activities and less busy ones.

June 14th, 2012

If You’re Feeling Overwhelmed…

What to do when you're overwhelmed

{flickr photo}

Yesterday all was well. But today? Hell broke lose and today’s an all together different story. Suddenly, your work load, your kids, your bank account, your health all need your attention and they need it now!

What seemed easy to put off yesterday, feels like an emergency today. How will you manage the seemingly unmanageable? And as your anxiety holds hands with fear, will you be able to survive whatever it is and make it out okay?

It’s a question that could likely leave most us wishing to be kids again, to want to hide from the responsibility that adulthood brings.

As someone who’s suffered from health issues and constant career fears (I am a writer), I understand the urgency. I know what it’s like to need answers now, to want to wake up from the nightmare that is your current life.

Fortunately there is always another way. I’ve discovered that even in the worst circumstances, light paves the way through the darkest of shadows. We only need to to know where to look to get to it.

Bite-Size Pieces

The majority of the time, we get overwhelmed because we think we need to do it all, and do it all right. It’s only in adulthood where we miraculously believe that because we’re older now, we should be able to tackle each mountain that comes our way. We forget that as children, it took patience, determination and hard work to learn how to roll, crawl and finally walk. Life is still like that. Sometimes we need to take bite-sized pieces and small steps to get what we want. We may not have it all right now. But we will eventually get there, if we give ourselves the time and space to achieve it.

Get Back to the Basics

One of my favorite bloggers is Sarah Wilson, a beautiful Australian media personality who blogs about life, health, travel and more. She wrote once that sometimes when she’s not feeling well, she simply lies down. As in, completely relinquishing to the earth or corpse pose for all you yogis out there. When life hits us hard, there is an automatic reaction in us that says, “Fight harder.” But in reality, the best thing we can do is ride the wave. When you’re feeling overwhelmed, go back to basics. Live simply. Breathe deeply. Work hard against being hard. Like the branches of a tree, be strong in your roots while allowing the wind to move you. You WILL get back on track.

{You can read the rest of this post on my Beliefnet column Happy Haven.}

April 9th, 2012

What to Do If You’re Feeling Burnt Out

I’ve been feeling burnt out lately. Actually, I didn’t even know that’s what it was until I read Fried: Why You Burn Out and How to Revive by Joan Borysenko. All I know was that it was getting hard and harder to blog lately. And I was also losing my creative drive. Hence, the lack of Creative Friday posts lately.

After digging into that book, I learned that being burnt out affects each of us in different ways. We become emotionally exhaustive, disengaged, cynical, feel diminished, isolate and lose sight of why we’re doing what we’re doing in the first place.

While I hadn’t experienced the full total experience of burning out, I definitely was creeping up to the edge. This Easter weekend, I vowed things had to change and fast!

In Julia Cameron’s infamous book, The Artist’s Way, Cameron says:

“Our artist child can best be enticed to work by treating work as play.”

Insert light bulb here. All work and no play was draining my creative fountain and I needed a break ASAP. Oh boy did I wish I had taken my own advice sooner. But better late than never right?

This weekend on an impulse, my husband and I took a much needed one day trip to Monterey.

Inspiring sunset

It was an important reminder that in order to meld meaning into our ordinary day-to-day lives we need to take a break, play and open our eyes to the possibility and magic taking place all around us each and every day.

Spring blossoms

{photos by The Inspiring Bee}

What’s inspiring you lately?

It’s hard not to feel grateful when you see a mommy seal with her new pup.

*The labels people give us can define who we are, if we’re not aware of it. Find out how what others tell you can have a negative impact on your life over on my new Beliefnet Health blog, Happy Haven.

February 28th, 2012

What’s Vital to the Success of Your Dreams

Every day a million dreams are dispersed around the world. I like to think of them as seeds awaiting their potential, having faith in nothing, but the wind to carry them far and love to embed them deep.

Think of a dandelion with all of its individual seeds. If it sits safe, it will never grow. Taking that risk and flying in the wind it could be eaten, it could disintegrate. But if it never left, it would perish anyway.

This weekend I went to a Buddhist Retreat where I remembered the price we pay when we forget to breathe.

In an attempt to make something of your life, you work against time, you fight your competition, you struggle with any obstacle that confronts your path. But at what cost?

How many times have I made that mistake? How many times have I forgotten and had to be reminded that the price I pay for overworking myself isn’t worth the sacrifice?

It’s one thing to work hard towards your goal. It is quite another to work hard regardless of your health, your relationships, your livelihood. I must continually remind myself that I am only responsible for myself, that the only goal in my life is to be happy, that my life will not be more meaningful based on the job I have, the house I don’t own, the book I didn’t finish yet. But how much I’ve given to others and most importantly myself.

Right now you may be throwing yourself in your latest endeavor. And you are proud of what you’ve accomplished and excited about the prospect of finishing it. And that’s good. We all need dreams. But remember that the risk of not doing, the risk of having faith that the wind will carry you through is also necessary.

It’s not just all that you do, but it’s giving yourself time to not do that is important.

You will never finish that book or complete that daunting task unless you put away that computer, turn off that phone and sit and be for awhile. So do it. Do it and be comforted in knowing that your life will be waiting for you when you return.