Folks, it’s July. It’s three weeks away from August which means it’s almost time for Fall/Autumn and I’m not ready.
Things have started to go downhill after May for me and from what I’ve heard from others, I feel like many people are riding this downhill trend with me. May and June have been such chaotic months. It’s now July and I’m awake at an ungodly hour feeling out of breath and just so off balance with what I envisioned for myself this year.
I don’t know what planet has been in retrograde but every day the past few weeks has felt like Groundhog Day, and the day that keeps repeating is a very physically and mentally exhausting day.
I don’t understand the concept of time and how we’re supposed to simply live beside it as it rushes ahead without our consent. It’s like I’m in a moving car that’s going a 100 miles per hour and my body feels like it’s going at that speed but my body’s physically not in the moving car. It’s disorienting and it’s confusing. I feel like I’ve been jet lagged for the past two or three months.
I keep saying that I’m going to pull myself out of this funk and that I’m going to analyze how to right the wrongs but I haven’t. Every time something more pressing or important pops up, I push myself and my well being to the side and push forward in damage control mode.
But why?
Why am I so burnt out? I mean I know why, but how can I better handle it?
How can I implement a routine to mitigate the burnout and still be productive?
I know the term “productive” is controversial because people believe that promoting the concept of productivity is toxic but I disagree. I think everyone has their own definition of productivity. For me personally, what I perceive productivity as is to accomplish my long term and short term goals that ensure that I’ll feel financially, emotionally, and physically secure. The way I go about achieving the status of being productive varies each day. One day, being productive may mean that I read a book that soothes my soul (emotional security) and another day, it may mean that I made a home made meal (physical and financial security). It’s truly subjective.
When I’m burnt out, I ignore these three pillars in my life that offer me some form of security in a very not so secure world and I start to feel out of control and out of balance. Ignoring my core values is what results in me feeling out of control with life which then is what makes me hyperaware of time passing in a fast and unmanageable way.
It’s a pretty nasty cycle.
Writing it out and breaking this down is the first step in me trying to pull myself out of this burnout life slump and finding the motivation to drive forward. But there’s still a lot more to be done and a lot more to be analyzed.
These are some of the questions I know I will be journaling about or thinking about as I work my way through the rest of the month. I think that understanding your personal definition of a good and bad day can help you narrow down what you’ve been ignoring while being burnt out. Finding out what’s missing can be a bit tricky but sometimes, the thing that’s missing is what we need to stop the cycle.
Also recognizing that we’re not the same person that we were six months ago is vital. So much has happened globally in the past six months and let’s be real, it hasn’t been pretty. It’s been hard, gruesome, and often times harrowing. You as a human being weathered those happenings. You as a human being also have been weathered by the happenings in your personal life. There’s been a ton of internal and external changes and happenings in the past six months and it’s important to address that.
Forget about those January 2022 goals and write out all of your hopes, dreams, and wishes as of now, as of July 2022. Afterwards, go back and look at those January 2022 goals. How much has changed? What stayed the same? Again, analyzing the differences will show your real priorities in life.
Thinking of goals as rules and permanent milestones is dangerous and can lead to you unnecessarily beating yourself up and calling yourself a failure. I for sure do this all the time. I think that it’s important to realize that goals are not permanent but instead suggestions and flexible things. Just as you are affected by the passing of time, so are your goals. Don’t be afraid to revisit them, change them, or trash them.
In conclusion, time’s flying by and it sucks. But it’s okay because we make July our Second January. And if you’re reading this in October or March, then that’s okay, because you can make those months your second January.
Redefining time and your beginnings is something that we can do and something that we should do. Burnout isn’t something that we should push aside but it’s something we should address and question. It’s something we should breakdown and ask why, how, and where it happened.
Is anyone else feeling burnt out?