Earlier quoted context omitted.
Stinky plant based substances can also help counteract getting stressed over things you don’t need to also!
And the things you do need to (...)
if you didn't do it, it didn't need to be done!
There Is No Cure for Burnout
91–100 of 101 posts
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a fair point and a flaw in my response. It's more based off the UK too where job security was higher and previously unemployment benefit was more generous and more widely available. There's still a difference here, from the UK the common mass redundancies of tech in the US seem bizzare and likely to increase work related stress. I still think the author is using "older white male" shorthand to point out that w…
>"older white male" shorthand to point out that we need to structure society and the economy in a way that protects all people from burnout and provides access to the tools and treatment to recover from it to all. That "shorthand" is going to inadvertently open the possibility of the reader to drawing broader and less exact conclusions than if the writer were more careful in their choice of words. Using "older white…
> next to nobody is going to have the resources to not only not work for six months
Why not? We're richer than we're ever been. What happened?
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
As are you - so what are you doing while waiting?
projects, things. Not maximizing the time spent doing nothing or just introspecting off the grid, in a country chosen just because it was cheap. There is a time and place for everything, but after a while it is best to interact and relate with other human beings.
The irony of you talking about relating to other human beings is staggering, given your unwarranted condescension.
I didn’t just chose here because it was cheap - I went for quality of life. Friendly locals, good food, sunshine, nature, and a generally laid back culture. I spent two years after quitting wandering the earth, weighing up options, seeing how other people live, broadening my horizons. Because I’m not spending money to make money and have no fixed calendar, I can go travel when everyone else is at school or work, meet up with friends, meet new people, experience new cultures. You can see a lot of planet for a little money, if you have time - I’ve driven the length of the Americas, from Ushuaia to Anchorage, the breadth of Eurasia, from London to Singapore, and down the west coast of Africa - and oh boy do I meander.
In these past few years I’ve written two novels, dozens of shorts, and I’m about to be (not self) published. In the last few months I’ve installed solar energy, built a dam, installed hydro energy, run plumbing, installed hot and cold running water, and inbetween I’ve found the time to go crayfish fishing and mushrooming with the locals. Sitting on the riverbank boiling up dinner you just caught and foraged with a bunch of other humans is the epitome of human interaction.
Being a cubicle jerk isn’t interaction, it’s a facsimile of interaction, divorced from human meaning, with a mechanistic ersatz set of values imposed by a group delusion.
I bought into it for too long - and only now am I beginning to realise my potential.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#94But my primary motivation—the one that finally overrode my aversion to risk and pushed me to give notice before I could line up another job I quit my job a month ago or so, citing burnout. They one thing the majority of my co-workers couldn't wrap their heads around was that I had nothing else waiting for me and made a point out of it. Some said they envied me, because they didn't have enough savings to pull somethin…
After some unpleasant life experiences, I've made a point of always having savings to be able to survive and keep a roof over my head for a year if the worst were to happen. (And lower my spending when I don't.) Sadly, it looks like the situation has gotten so bad that most people can't even do that ...
I don't have that. Even worse: almost three years ago I got to a point of having almost zero money, but found a job soon after.
I promised myself that this year it'll be different - we'll see.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
>"older white male" shorthand to point out that we need to structure society and the economy in a way that protects all people from burnout and provides access to the tools and treatment to recover from it to all. That "shorthand" is going to inadvertently open the possibility of the reader to drawing broader and less exact conclusions than if the writer were more careful in their choice of words. Using "older white…
> next to nobody is going to have the resources to not only not work for six months Why not? We're richer than we're ever been. What happened?
Rent, debt and inequality. There is much more wealth, but it's concentrated in places that are expensive and distant from traditional safety nets and social support networks.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#96I'm in consulting. And I can't count the times where I told people to say no to the client! (learn to say no) But they can't... Some just can't say no to save there life. Some just want to work looong hours. And some are just too nice and avoid conflict. Its frustrating, especially they could work on long term valuable stuff..
I think there's two kinds of situation this occurs in. There's the "not yet learnt" kind where people don't know what they can deliver, over-promise, and end up in an awkward situation.
There's also a trickier, structural situation that I think is more common. If managers don't have real ownership of their client relationships, they learn they become effectively unable to say "no". If they try, someone else will say "yes" instead.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#97I left my job as a physician 5 years ago. Of course it was a hectic life, but the hours and pressure wasn't as bad as my lack of control over my life. Everyone thought I was crazy to leave without something else lined up already, but I knew if I stayed I would die. Just as she says in this article; not suicidality, but rather some odd sense of existential doom. I'm still angry. Angry at every imposition anyone dares…
"funny" I do feel similarly cheated about my studies (computing) and the missing information about adult life that totally change my view about job/career.
I'm also a bit schizophrenic about computing. At my current min-wage job, I started thinking and writing some code (some topic I never done, on a new platform mind you). I'm both happy and unhappy about it.
Back to burnout, this brainless job I have allows me to wander as I see fit without stress. It's a freedom of creative thinking without pressure to be compared to the forced burden of juggling with things I wouldn't enjoy in a mainstream programming job. Even for a big check I'm not sure I'd be as peaceful as I'm now at times (it's not stable yet).
I also keep intellectual and creative pursuits on the side. Somehow I decoupled financial duties and intellectual growth. I can read about mathematics and electrical engineering on my own pace, and it's often a joy. The lack of pressure and the choice of topics I find interesting is a much better and much more natural energy source.
Do you think about keeping medical pursuits on the side ? maybe not as a physician. I don't know, joining a lab, going to conferences.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#98I went through a 4-5 year period in my late 20s working 60 hour weeks while also doing grad school and independent research for 60 hours a week, not getting enough sleep or taking enough time for physical and mental health. It was ultimately very damaging; it left most of my personal relationships and social life in dysfunction. While I made it to the field and work I wanted to be in, I burned out quickly. When obsta…
Your analysis is very well worded. Do you think you could not readjust your internal compass to value partially limited efforts (efforts that you said you considered were under your maximum capabilities) so that you take a long time averaging view on them. Sure you could go 99% and destroy yourself but no human should destroy himself[0] so it's totally acceptable to chunk your work into "good enough for now" and keep going at a smaller pace.
I used to suffer from social anxiety due to the need to outperform everything. After personal grief I realized I owe nothing to nobody and it made my brain infinitely more focused about my internal pleasure and sanity rather than external constraints. I'd rather be nobody and smiling than suffering. It made me balance things and put limits on things. I still value being active and working good and hard but only to an extent.
[0] I'm not talking about absolute freedom to destroy yourself if you ultimate think it's your desire.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
projects, things. Not maximizing the time spent doing nothing or just introspecting off the grid, in a country chosen just because it was cheap. There is a time and place for everything, but after a while it is best to interact and relate with other human beings.
The irony of you talking about relating to other human beings is staggering, given your unwarranted condescension. I didn’t just chose here because it was cheap - I went for quality of life. Friendly locals, good food, sunshine, nature, and a generally laid back culture. I spent two years after quitting wandering the earth, weighing up options, seeing how other people live, broadening my horizons. Because I’m not spe…
I don't see contact info in your profile, but I'd love a link to your novel (or email address if you care to converse). I haven't wandered, but living somewhere really cheap where my modest house is paid off in cash and monthly expenses are tiny, is life changing.
If I'd done it younger, I might've done more of what you describe, but as it is it's liberating if you've got a family too.
It's amazing the decisions you can make when "I want to take this risk or do that thing" has a worst-case outcome of "oh well, I still have a secure home for me and my family" and not "oh crap we're living out of a van". Mortgages are death to life - actual life - perhaps why that have "Mort" right there in the name.
Re: There Is No Cure for Burnout
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did we read the same article? As far as I can tell, the only mention of white men is as part of a bigger picture of someone who hit the jackpot with respect to "burnout recovery" options, and so whose advice isn't worth much to the average person suffering burnout. The fact that they're white men isn't presented as a problem per se .
> " white men is as part of a bigger picture of someone who hit the jackpot with respect to "burnout recovery" options " Wow. Somehow you wrote this statement but you don't see it as dismissive sexist and racist stereotyping just because it's in the reverse direction sexism and racism usually goes? Being reversed doesn't make it okay, at least if you claim to believe in equality.
> you don't see it as dismissive sexist and racist stereotyping just because it's in the reverse direction sexism and racism usually goes?
No, I don't see it as sexist and racist because the context makes it very plain to me that it's not a stereotype of white men. The people complaining seem to think that "most X are white men" and "most white men are X" are the same statement.