What I learnt overcoming my burnout during lockdown?

I recently overcame a bad case of burnout, and I learnt many things in the process.

I want to share my learnings, hoping they will be helpful to others who are suffering like I was. I have divided them into two sections of five points, each dealing with professional and personal learnings.

Professional Learnings -

Take note of the time spent in meetings

I recently noticed that I over-commit because I don't add up the time spent in daily meetings, ad hoc tasks, and other operational things. For example, when planning my week, I take tasks assuming a 40-hour workweek and not considering that in some weeks, meetings themselves take 15 hours. Then I stretch my work hours to meet the commitment, which becomes a major source of overwork.

Nowadays, I keep a buffer of 10 hours each week for meetings and other operational stuff, which has helped me significantly improved my work estimation and planning.

Don't keep open threads

I've been reading this book by David Allen called Getting Things Done, and it presents some interesting insights. For example, it says that we are overwhelmed by incomplete tasks floating around in our minds. If we don't properly store them somewhere secure, they start polluting our mental space and trigger anxiety until they are completed.

Having a daily planning session where I dump all the tasks swirling around in my mind into a notebook and setting reminders and due dates on my calendar had an incredible impact on my mental peace.

Talk with your Manager/Mentors

Your managers and mentors are there to help you. What's more, they have struggled with the same things you face and overcome them. As a result, they can give you excellent contextual guidance.

For example, recently, I was wearing multiple hats in my role, which is common in start-ups. Despite being an engineer, I worked more on setting the product roadmap and backlog, having numerous meetings with various stakeholders, team building work like defining the team structure and long-term vision, how many and what kinds of engineers to hire, writing job descriptions, sourcing strategy, etc.

Needless to say, it felt pretty overwhelming initially. I talked about it to my manager, and it turns out he went through something very similar. He shared his own experiences and how he navigated through them all. Having someone empathize with you is already great, but he also shared some pointed tips that helped improve the situation.

Keep work and personal life separate

Another big reason for burnout is when work bleeds into our personal lives. We keep thinking about work-related stuff even when we are with our family, eating food, even chilling on weekends. This is especially true in times of lockdown where the boundaries are blurred, and it is easier to overwork yourself. Compartmentalizing my time by setting up strict limits for work start and end times on my calendar did wonders for finding my balance.

Don't hesitate to take time off

There is this stigma associated with taking time off. Often, we are hesitant for fear of being seen as disinterested in working, not dedicated to the job and whatnot. But let me tell you a secret, good managers love people whose life is not all about work and who take care of themselves. As an added bonus, when you come back rejuvenated, you will have more energy to work and will complete work faster, making you appear someone who gets stuff done quick

Personal learnings

Talk with family

It's often easy to overlook talking to family. We often feel that they are near and will be there for us anyway. But, did you know that if you are above 20 and have started a job, most likely you have spent over 90% of all the time you will ever spend with your family and only 10% is remaining?

A video by my recent favorite YouTube channel explores this in more detail. Continuing on, we take our family for granted and prioritize work and friends over them. Yet, your relationship with your family is like roots to a tree. They help nourish you and provide you the strength to weather any storm, including burnout.

Cultivate a hobby

Everyone must have heard this at some point or the other in life but never really followed. After all, who's got the time to spend on hobbies when you are so busy all the time? Please make time for the important things. I recently took up writing, and it's pretty calming & peaceful, meditative even. It helps me destress and also reenergizes me.

Meditate

Like exercise boosts your physical health, meditation boosts your mental health. If you have never done meditation, I highly recommend you educate yourself about this and find a good meditation teacher near you. I have done vipassana courses. They are comprehensive and intense and provide a great head start to your meditation practice. Apart from helping deal with burnout and relieving stress, it enables you to become grounded and connected with yourself to better understand what really matters to you.

Invest in self-development & growth

What is not growing is dying- that is the law of nature. Feeling stagnant further exacerbates your feeling of burnout. You feel like all you are doing is work and nothing else. Because of this impression, you also spend more leisure time than you usually would, further reducing the time for growth and strengthening the feeling that all you are doing is work. This becomes a vicious cycle. To break out of this cycle, start replacing some of your leisure time with reading books, watching ted talks, listening to podcasts, etc. These can help you learn various life skills which will revitalize you and your career.

Treat yourself

We take ourselves too seriously and beat ourselves up over petty issues. But we never take the time to celebrate the little victories. With our skyrocketing expectations, nothing is ever good enough for us. This needs to change. We need to appreciate and pamper ourselves. So if you accomplish something, treat yourself with something nice like a bowl of mango kalakand or chocolate brownie with ice cream or Ferrero Rocher shake.