How to Reduce Burnout
Prevent Burnout by Recognizing the Season You Are in:
We are all familiar with the feeling of burnout. Whether it’s feeling stuck, lost, or overwhelmed, we’ve all experienced moments when life feels like too much. There’s just too much to do, and we don’t know where to begin to get ahead of the challenges we face.
As a result, we end up adding more internal pressure to ourselves, in the form of negative self-talk:
What’s wrong with me?
Why can’t I manage this?
Why is this so hard?
It’s not that you aren’t a hard worker or that you’re lazy. You’ve had times when you feel like you are crushing it and could work seemingly nonstop. Why is this time different?
What if the problem isn’t the volume of work you must do, but the type of work you are taking on?
It took me way too long to learn this lesson. When I was trying to rebuild my life after losing my wife to cancer, I entered a harsh spiral of motivated work followed by burnout, and it continued for years. I was driven to make something of my experiences and dive into my work. I didn’t mind the effort because I was passionate about it and wanted to make a difference.
But for whatever reason, even though I was excited about the work, I would start to feel overwhelmed with everything going on. The stress and pressure always crept in. I would try to power through those feelings, but it never worked. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t outwork my burnout.
It was like I was trying to launch an airplane on a runway that was too short. As soon as I started building up momentum, the runway would end, and I would crash and burn.
It wasn’t a failure in me; it was a fault in my approach.
I was trying to apply the right strategies in the wrong seasons. I wasn’t recognizing when I needed extra rest and recuperation or identifying when it was time for me to push and grow. If I pushed when I needed rest, I would crash and burn. If I tried to rest when I was ready to push, I would feel unfulfilled. It was a confusing and overwhelming cycle.
If you are like me, you have likely experienced something similar. You do what you feel you are supposed to do, but it doesn’t work. Is it you? Is it the strategy?
What if it’s neither?
Recognizing The Season You Are In:
What finally changed everything for me was recognizing that not every season of life requires the same strategy. The problem isn’t knowing what to do, but knowing when to do it.
That’s why I created the “Seasons of Performance” framework: to help me recognize which season I’m in, so I can apply the strategy that fits the season rather than being misaligned with my needs.
The Seasons of Performance framework has three seasons, categorized by your needs in a particular situation. It applies to businesses and individuals alike, helping you quickly identify your priorities so you can take the needed actions. Following this guide will preserve your mental well-being and provide the most efficient path forward.
Endure: The Season of Survival
You’ll know you are in a season of Endure when you feel like you are just keeping your head above water. It’s all you can do to stay on top of your workload. You feel tired all the time and are constantly firefighting. You barely have time to react, let alone plan and respond strategically.
When you are in this season, the strategy is simple: do whatever it takes to endure while also maintaining your mental and physical health.
That means letting go of any tasks that don’t support you in making it through the season. Delay the tasks or delete them altogether. Do the minimum viable required and accept the temporarily diminished results. Put extra effort into your physical and mental health, even if it’s simply maintenance tasks like walks, adequate sleep, and other positive habits.
Remind yourself that this season is temporary, and your goal is to avoid burnout and make it out. Instead of trying to thrive, you are simply maintaining your commitments at a sustainable level. Give yourself permission to practice self-compassion when you're not at your best. It will pass.
Prevail: The Season of Restoration
You’ll know when you are in Prevail when you feel like you have a bit of breathing room. You are no longer surviving and firefighting; you actually have some time and space for once. Whether you just came out of Endure or are completing a season of Thrive, this is the time to focus on recovery and consolidation. This season exists to help you recover from Endure or replenish after a busy Thrive period.
The goal in Prevail is to efficiently tend to your needs, replenish your energy, and prepare for the next phase. It’s a time of consolidation, completing much-needed maintenance, and planning.
A successful Prevail season will see you emerge stronger, clear-headed, and energized to move into Thrive or ready for another Endure season.
Thrive: The Season of Expansion
Thrive is the season of growth, whether it’s personal, professional, or both. It’s a time of acceleration, when you chase your goals and achieve them. You feel on top of the world, and life is extremely fulfilling. You know you are crushing it and feel like there are no limits to what you can achieve.
Recognize that Thrive must come to an end at some point, so the goal is to optimize your performance to extend the season as long as possible. This means sustainability becomes the standard rather than aiming for “peak performance”, because peak performance implies expending energy faster than you can replenish it.
It’s not “All or Nothing”:
You can think of the seasons like buckets, where you allocate your limited energy into the bucket that matches the season. However, instead of putting all of your energy into one bucket, you will want to put ‘most’ of your energy into the appropriate one. For example, if you are in a season of Endure, it doesn’t mean we forget about Thrive. It means we place most of our effort into Endure actions, with a smaller percentage in Prevail and Thrive.
For example, if you are in Endure, you might allocate 70% of your effort toward survival, with the remaining split between restoration and expansion. During Prevail or Thrive, those percentages reverse.
Your Season Determines the Strategy:
We are conditioned to believe that growth is always the goal.
As a result, we try to optimize when we should be recovering and push harder when we should be enduring. We apply the right strategy for the wrong season. When we are unable to maintain Thrive habits because we are in the wrong season, we beat ourselves up and add even more pressure, making everything worse.
The right strategy in the wrong season will often feel like failure.
The solution is to take an honest look at where you are with this 3-question filter:
1. What do I actually need right now? Is it to survive, recover, or grow?
2. What do I actually need to accomplish? How much time and energy do I have to spare?
3. What should I stop doing immediately? What actions am I taking that don’t fit the season I’m in?
Remember that Endure requires letting go of the excess. Prevail requires leaning into decisive action. Thrive involves leaning into expansion and development. This allows you to spend your energy where it matters most.
Instead of beating yourself up for not thriving when you should be focused on surviving, make choices that preserve your well-being and set you up for success, whatever that looks like for the season you are in. Your mental health will thank you for it.
Before assuming something is wrong with you, ask yourself a simple question: What season am I in?
