Ask HN: Seemingly unable to recover from burnout. Please advise

For me, the single most depressing thing in my life was working for someone else. I now set my own schedule (and have set) for years, working on my own products, and live a relaxed life.

Six months is nothing. Everything compounds. Working in a toxic environment compounds and takes a long time to cleanse. Good things also compound. You need to find something to work on that makes you happy, suited for your personality.

I went for a 2 hour walk today. It put my mind at ease.

What helped me un-burn myself was focusing on creating as many serendipitously boring moments as possible.

I canceled all pre-made plans, stopped pursuing any goal outside of existing, and did things because I was bored and felt like doing them.

Our culture is 110% fail-forward, goal-oriented, growth-mindset madness that doesn't give us time to relax and chill out.

I'm not talking about pursuing a hedonistic lifestyle nor walking into the woods and being a hermit.

Get a dumb job, go to work, go home, do whatever. Meet with friends if you want too, go out if you want too, but stop all forms of external pressure and just exist.

I remember eventually I was sitting around with nothing to do and spent an hour dreaming about dragons and then went for a walk around the block because I got tired of sitting.

Avoid anti-stagnation gamification bs that only exists to make money like meditation apps or fitness trackers. Just be.

As you said, people are going to tell you to sign up for a "prescription" like traveling more or exercising but that is just more of a burden to an already burned out person.

Travel or exercise if you want but do it because you want too not because it's on some path to a better you.

As far as working, I think you might be happier doing your own thing. If you have some runway I would look at starting your own company.

It sounds like you might be happy with a lifestyle business.

Inspiration: @DHH Startup School Talk (2008) it's still relevant and a great talk. Lots of great quotes in this one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CDXJ6bMkMY

StartUpsForTheRestOfUs.com is a great podcast, start in the archives. You can follow Rob along from starting out with job board sites, he even mentions drop shipping beach towels, to an invoicing app to an SEO SaaS app, to founding Drip all the way through to a nice exit. Inspirational and sound advice along the way.

Check those out, that might be your path to a job you can be happy with.

I enjoy work and you have to make a living but there is more to life. Family, friends, pets, volunteering, mentoring, helping others. These might bring a new perspective of work time vs personal time and give you things to look forward to outside of work.

Reach out and find a mentor/group/mastermind to help guide you through this time.

Take care and good luck.

Something else missing in my life? Possibly. Well, in university, it definitely was. I hated (and I still do to some extent) the whole high school/university/9-5 career pipeline. I wanted nothing to do with FANG etc. I saw X as my "way out." My light at the end of the tunnel. My escape from the rat race that I so vehemently opposed.

I've considered that. I might be clinically depressed now, but since it's not nearly as bad as I used to be, I write it off as "I'm fine. I've been much worse."

I really hate the idea of taking mind-altering medication regularly. I was diagnosed with ADHD as a child (erroneously, I believe) and took medication everyday for years. A few years ago, I deemed it no way to live and weened myself off of it.

As a transitionary step, though, I guess I'd be open to it.

Ah, yes. I didn't touch on sleep. It has wavered over the months. It's better now, but not perfect. Often I sleep more than 8 hours, even though I have alarms set for 0800 and 0900. I do use melatonin when I have difficulty falling asleep. I think a lack of a "need" to wake up at a certain time (for work) induces laziness in me.