Minds Turned to Ash: Burnout is more than working too hard
<i>To anyone suffering from ACTUAL long-term burnout</i>, in the sense that a &quot;Mind turned to ash&quot; doesn&#x27;t sound like hyperbole <i>at all</i>, and trying to recover:<p>Do NOT bother with this article. Save yourself the emotional drain (maybe go outside for a bit ;) ) It contains NO actionable advice, just a few anonymised stories, some academic and pop-psych ideas. Also conspicuously absent is any mention of these patients&#x27; recovery or future.<p>Maybe this article does serve as a nice warning for those heading towards burnout. I wrote the above, to help others already suffering. As a warning it&#x27;s way too long for the crowd that is too busy working too many hours. Now trust me you can get it from working as little as 16h&#x2F;wk! If that sounds like you--best of luck.<p>Yes the stories are so recognizable. Especially when he contrasted the first story with the second because the first one hit most of the main factors and then got convoluted with a whole bunch of other psychodevelopmental factors that the second story demonstrated have nothing to do with burnout.<p>The article could have been about 1&#x2F;3rd it&#x27;s length and I&#x27;m a bit bummed about this. Normally I wouldn&#x27;t complain about that but this guy is a psychiatrist and I truly wonder what he was trying to achieve with this article, if it is anything besides self-promotion he would have written a disclaimer like above as a summary to help sufferers.<p>Myself, burnt out in 2007. Never got better. I don&#x27;t actually want to read anonymized burnout-stories. It&#x27;s an emotional drain with no reward (I&#x27;ll page through a few in this thread, because this burnt-out husk of my former self is compassionate). I read it on the off-chance that maybe it&#x27;d contain some info or idea that I haven&#x27;t tried in the past 9 years. So, that was my mental energy for the day.<p>I don&#x27;t have answers either, but maybe some ehrm, burnout pro-tips. The web is full of stories to serve as warnings before burnout, but hardly anything for after, especially for sufferers where a few months rest just does not cut it. So here&#x27;s a few things, maybe it&#x27;ll help someone:<p>- Meditation is <i>really</i> nice. Maybe even more important was finding a group to do it with[0], it adds a dimension, mine are the kindest people I know in the world, and it helps motivate to do it daily . For mindfulness meditation, I found I need at least 2-3 sessions&#x2F;week, for the exercise to carry on outside the actual moments of practising it. Apart from sitting, occasionally try a walking meditation (look it up) just like with physical exercise, changing up the practice helps if&#x2F;when you get stuck. And don&#x27;t forget there&#x27;s more kinds besides mindfulness. One that is quite orthogonal to mindfulness is compassion meditation or &quot;metta&quot; meditation[1].<p>- Physical exercise is also really nice. I like running. I only found out I&#x27;m actually good at sports during the first half year of acute symptoms when I literally couldn&#x27;t use a computer for more than 10 minutes. I used to do strength exercises too (various pullups mainly), liked the results but the exercises carried that scary burning feel in it. Maybe you&#x27;re different, try it because I hear that stuff is really healthy :) Figure out what&#x27;s nice for you.<p>- Something creative that gets you (even just sometimes) into flow. I like drawing and singing. If you play a live instrument that&#x27;s probably good too. Unfortunately for me, computer programming doesn&#x27;t quite fit this category any more. Not even democoding :&#x27;-( I still do it anyway because I really really want to and my creativity wants to get out and some things you can only express in code.<p>- Keeping a positive attitude is probably the hardest but it&#x27;s also nice. I&#x27;m not sure if the start of this post is a good example but that came from the heart and I hope the tips make up for it :)<p>These are nice things to do when you can&#x27;t do anything else.<p>I also do volunteer work and teaching kids my otherwise-wasted years of studying computer science, but I don&#x27;t know if that is for everyone. Other people I know really enjoy working with elderly people, providing company and hearing their stories etc. they love it but don&#x27;t understand why I like working with kids and vice versa. To each their own :)<p>[0] try <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;wkup.org" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;wkup.org</a> or <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;meditation" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;meditation</a> (the sidebar) to find a meditation group in your area (sometimes called &quot;sangha&quot;)<p>[1] if you always practiced both you might think &quot;what, no, they&#x27;re two sides of the same coin&quot; and you&#x27;d be right--for <i>you</i>. because if you&#x27;ve only ever practiced mindfulness, you&#x27;re in for a treat! you&#x27;re one of today&#x27;s lucky 10,000 ;-) (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;xkcd.com&#x2F;1053&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;xkcd.com&#x2F;1053&#x2F;</a>)<p>[2] I like to end on a positive note so I&#x27;m hiding this bit in the unreferenced footnote. <i>Ahem</i>. Seriously, <i>fuck</i> this author. The link below the linked article from the same author, &quot;The way out of burnout&quot; would hopefully get flagged for misleading title on HN. I had to page through it because I can&#x27;t read more of this drivel in detail, but <i>again</i> no actionable advice; &quot;less severe cases of burnout&quot; are advised to take action to avoid actual burnout (great) and actual cases of burnout are advised that this no longer works for them (whoa, my mind is blown, like the ashes in the Lebowski movie)