The first step in dealing with burnout is to acknowledge that you’re tired. Tired of the routine. Tired of dealing with the same old problems. Tired of putting out fires. Tired of too many masters and not enough help. Tired of excuses. Maybe tired of your own success. This exhaustion is a wedge that comes between ourselves and what we’ve worked so hard for. It may be the wedge that drives us from the people we love the most. So the first step is to take a break and re-evaluate.
Your world will not come crashing down if you take an afternoon, a weekend, or perhaps a week off. Your temporary absence may allow others to rise to the occasion and perhaps surprise you with their efforts. Remove yourself and let those around you help. Spreading the load is a great place to start.
If you don’t have people around you, then you need to address that issue. Are you trying to do too much with inadequate staff? Are you afraid of the expense? What’s the toll on you? Is it worth the expense?
This burden is self-imposed. When you start out, it’s just you. As your business grows, it becomes more than you, it becomes us. In the period between start up and maturation, you need to constantly evaluate the value of your time. What is your time worth? I suggest you consider the value of your time relative to your total sales. For example, if your business has $1,000,000 in annual revenue, and you work 3000 hours (six days a week, 10 hours a day, 50 weeks a year), your hourly rate is more than $300. So every time you take out the garbage, stock the shelves, vacuum the office, shuffle papers, etc. it’s costs $300 per hour. Surely you can hire staff for a lot less than $300 per hour. So why are you doing menial tasks, when your efforts should be directed to building your sales and hiring competent staff.
Building a business is building a team. The sooner you put proper support in place, the stronger the foundation on which to build your business. As your role in the business rises, so does your value to the business. Appreciate the value of your time and work accordingly. You’ll recover the most precious commodity in the world: time.
Type A personalities are the most prone to burnout. They place high demands and expectations on themselves but are almost always disappointed. I know successful individuals who feel like failures because they haven’t achieved the level of success they thought they should.
Success is often measured in dollars or material wealth but that’s only one measure. To me, being successful is being happy. For individuals driven by accumulating money, more money makes them happy. For most people, satisfaction from what they do fulfills their life and brings them happiness. It’s who you are and what you do that makes an impact on the world. When you take the time to make a difference, you achieve a level of satisfaction, of happiness, of success, that makes your efforts worthwhile.
Burnout pulls you down so it stands to reason that letting go of those things that are weighing you down will make you lighter. You rediscover that excitement and spark that was buried beneath a mound of tired, old routines and responsibilities. When you shed that old baggage, you realize the value of your time and apply your talents that truly add value.
There are other things you can do. Exercise. Evaluate old goals. Set new ones. Make a list of things you want to do. Write down your expectations and check it off as you make each aspiration a reality. Appreciate what you have and your accomplishments. It is you, your family, and the people you care about and the wisdom bought with hard experience that is important. No one can take that from you. It forms the foundation for the rest of your life.
