Why Burnout Happens

Today I’m going to talk about why burnout happens.

I didn’t know much about burnout before I experienced burnout for myself. It took me a really long time to admit that I was experiencing burnout because I knew so little about it. I also honestly thought I just wasn’t handling my project at work well. I knew my co-workers were having the same struggles I was so I thought it was a collective work issue. Which was partially true.

Hind-sight is so informative. So is learning about burnout and why burnout happens. Yes I was part of a big work project, but that was only one little piece.

The cause of burnout is chronic stress. Chronic stress is the build up of stress over time. Burnout happens when you experience chronic stress and you aren’t able to manage the stress well. Unfortunately, stress is unavoidable and something that we all experience. If you’re curious about what causes chronic stress, check out this post on 9 Things that Cause Chronic Stress. 

There are 6 main reasons why burnout happens.

Reason #1

• Burnout happens because you have an excessive amount of work
• There’s an imbalance between the workload and the resources

Reason #2

• Burnout happens because you lack control over your work
• There’s an imbalance with control of the resources or authority

Reason #3

• Burnout happens because you lack reward for the work you do
• There’s an imbalance with reward either financially, verbally or intrinsically

Reason #4

• Burnout happens because you lack community at work
• There’s a lack of positive connection with others

Reason #5

• Burnout happens because you lack fairness at work
• There’s a perceive sense that things as not fair (pay, workload, cheating)

Reason #6

• Burnout happens because you have a conflict with your values at work
• There’s a mismatch between your own personal values and your work values

Unfortunately these 6 reasons aren’t specific to one job or workplace. Anyone can experience burnout. No one is immune to it.

How we each define our job or workplace is going to be unique to each of us. It might involve a place of work and having management, it may be self-employment where you are management or it may be that your home is your workplace. A stay at home parent, an office worker, a front line worker are all examples of work you can burnout from. You get to define what your work is.

The reason for your burnout might be caused by more than one of these reasons. I know that was the case for me. There’s also personality and approaches to life (think perfectionism, high standards, givers) that can factor into each of these reasons as well. 

You become burnt out when you use one part of your brain too much and for too long without rest. You need time between uses to rest and regenerate. If your stress has become too much for too long, my eBook "A Way Out of Burnout" offers simple and practical steps so you can start your burnout recovery today.
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