You may not love your job, but do you feel like it’s affecting your mental health? There may even be signs that your health is suffering because your job has severely affected your emotional and mental state. The signs of burnout at work can be difficult to spot and are so commonplace that you may believe they mean nothing more than that you need a holiday.
Is it time to take action, quit your job or even change your career? Here’s what you need to know.
What Is Job Burnout?
Job burnout is a form of stress related to your work, its environment and the people who form it. While it may happen in different ways, the results are always the same — feeling useless and disempowered.
Burnout affects your mental health, and it’s such a huge consideration that 81% of workers seek mental-health-aware employers who respect and support their mental well-being. With 77% of people in a work-stress survey indicating they experience work-related stress, it’s clear that stressful environments can cause significant mental distress. You may wonder, “What can I do if my job is affecting my mental health?”
7 Signs of Burnout at Work
Knowing you’re struggling to adjust and cope in a stressful workplace is the first step toward finding help and learning to manage better. Look out for these signs that you’re heading for burnout because of your nine-to-five.
1. Feeling Constantly Anxious
If you’re feeling burnt out, there’s a good chance you’re been worrying about something for a long time. However, constant anxiety harms your body and mental health. Excessive stress leads to many other issues like irritability, fatigue and physical symptoms that continue to bother you.
2. Overwhelming Workloads
You may face burnout when you feel like you’re always completely overwhelmed by the tasks your job demands. When the pressure becomes insurmountable, it can make you feel like you’re drowning.
A good employer knows how much stress is OK for their staff. Healthy workloads help you grow, but overwhelming ones oppress you and cause significant distress. You’ll notice work expands into your personal life, leaving little space to breathe or relax.
3. Feeling Demotivated About Going to Work
It’s Sunday evening, and you feel nauseous when you think about going to work the next day. Most workers may experience a little apprehension, but if the feeling of dread stays with you during the week, it’s a sign you feel pessimistic about your employment.
When you lack motivation, giving your best is challenging, and even the smallest thing becomes unbearable. If you feel demotivated, you’ll see everything about your job negatively.
4. Exhausting Days
Chronic fatigue may result from extreme situations and unrealistic workloads. Your body starts to suffer because nothing works as it should. The lack of rest and an inability to compartmentalize your tasks add up to ruin your motivation.
Working shifts or irregular hours can contribute to extreme fatigue and increased resentment toward the job and your colleagues. You’ll also feel a reduced concentration and inability to focus on essential tasks. Injuries can happen because of exhaustion-related mistakes.
5. Suffering Relationships
When you’re unhappy at work, feel like it’s too much and are tired all the time, it’s natural to become grumpy and harsh with your loved ones and colleagues. Your relationships suffer because you’re at your breaking point. Unable to handle the mental overload building, you snap at the nearest — and often innocent — person you find.
When you don’t like your job, but it consumes your life, you feel an increasing resentment that spills negativity to all areas of your life. You probably feel dreadful after being so short with people, but you have little control over your frustration and rage because your job doesn’t satisfy or appreciate you.
6. Unfulfilling Requirements
Having a job that doesn’t strain your mind may sound lovely, but the boredom and lack of fulfillment that comes with it can be as debilitating as having an overwhelming workload. Nobody likes feeling useless — if your job is monotonous, you’re likely to feel like a robot.
Your career doesn’t have to be your purpose in life, but it must bring you joy and a sense of accomplishment, or you’ll be deeply frustrated. A menial job below your skill level can also cause you to feel small, which damages your sense of self.
7. Feeling in Poor Health
Stress is a powerful contributor to poor health. For example, inflammation is a factor in both it and cancer, so the more you stress, the greater your risk of developing the latter could be.
Other signs of physical health challenges due to work stress include:
- Sleeplessness
- Headaches
- Increasing cases of illness
- Heartbeat irregularity
- Increased heart rate
- High blood pressure
3 Steps How to Overcome Burnout at Work
Admitting you may have work burnout is the first step toward reclaiming your power. Next, you should evaluate which of the above signs of burnout have already hit you hard. It’s time to plan how to overcome these and ensure you experience a whole and fulfilling life.
1. Talk to Someone
One of the best things you can do is to speak to someone about what you’re experiencing. An outside opinion is vital to help you steer back on course.
If your boss is amenable, discuss your feelings and consider asking for a transfer to remove yourself from the stressful setting. A work-from-home environment can help you refocus and find inner calm during your day.
Employers don’t always know they’ve overloaded their best employees, so when the breaking point comes, you must speak with them so they can take action to remedy the situation. You should also talk with a loved one to help you find emotional support and care. Despite feeling alone, you’re not alone — you need help, and it’s available.
2. Embrace Healthy Boundaries
Learning to set healthy boundaries — such as not taking work home to maintain a better work-life balance — is part of ensuring you don’t feel overwhelmed. This often applies if you’re a workaholic, so take lunches and use productivity timers like the Pomodoro one to help you remember to break regularly.
It’s OK to say “no” to coworkers and even managers when a request is unreasonable and you can’t fit it into your regular schedule. Despite an employer paying overtime, you have a choice. It’s all about finding balance to keep yourself able to do regular things and live a meaningful life.
3. Work on Life Outside Work
Your mind needs a wholesome life, which means working, socializing, and caring for other needs like food, exercise and sleep. Join a team that plays a sport you enjoy or take up a hobby that feeds your soul. These all help you define yourself outside of work.
With these outside activities comes support, socializing and entertainment, which all help unload your mind and body from cortisol. Likewise, when you’re physically active, your brain releases endorphins, which help restore your stress hormone balance so you can live in a more even state.
What Do You Do When It Doesn’t Improve?
When you’ve done your due diligence and you’re not feeling more integrated at your job, your relationships aren’t improving, and you still feel exhausted, you may need professional help. You may also want to consider that you could have a rigid mindset, which means your inflexible thinking patterns aren’t meshing with the environment in which you work, live and play.
An all-or-nothing mindset — or believing that you’re either the hero or the victim at work — can contribute to you not working on your problems. You might also cause challenges that trip you up because you are so rigid you leave no room for negotiations or learning.
Put Your Mental Health First
Managing work-related stress is part of successful adulthood, but your mental health should come first. If you’ve tried reasonable interventions, consider whether there’s something better you can do that’s more suited to your skills. Watch for the signs of job burnout and take steps to tighten boundaries and manage your work-life balance.
