Burnout - Causes and prevention

  Introduction  

  Introduction:  4

1.  Definition  4

2.  Manifestation  5

2.1.  Mental:  5

2.2.  Physical:  5

2.3.  Spiritual:  6

2.4.  Biblical examples of burnout:  7

2.5.  What does Burnout look like practically  7

3.  What Causes Burnout  8

3.1.  General  8

3.1.1.  Feeling overwhelmed:  8

3.1.2.  Loss of hope:  8

3.1.3  The role of stress:  9

3.1.3.1.  How stress works:  10

3.2.  Society  11

3.3.  Job  12

3.3.1.  Specific professionals:  12

3.3.1.1.  Caregiver burnout:  13

3.3.1.2.  MINISTER BURNOUT  13

3.3.1.2.2.  Ministry burnout:  14

3.3.2.  What causes job-burnouts  16

3.3.2.1.  Lack of Recognition:  16

3.3.2.2.  Big Consequences for Failure:  16

3.3.2.3.  High-Stress Times with No Down-times :  16

3.3.2.4.  Impossible Requirements:  17

3.3.2.5.  Unclear Requirements:  17

3.3.2.6.  Poor Fit for the Job:  17

3.3.2.7.  Lack of Belief in What You Do:  17

3.3.2.8.  Shift work:  17

3.3.2.9.  Bad Leadership:  17

3.4.  Lifestyle  18

3.4.1.  Too Much Work With Little Balance:  18

3.4.2.  No Help or Supportive Resources:  19

3.4.3.  Too Little Social Support:  19

3.4.4.  Too Little Sleep:  19

3.4.5.  Too Little Time Off:  20

3.4.6.  No time for hobbies:  20

3.5.  Personality  20

3.5.1.  Obsessive compulsive personality (OCPD):  20

3.5.1.1  Type-A personality (TAP):  23

3.5.1.1.1  Type-A personality its effects:  23

3.5.1.2.  The workaholic most likely candidate  24

3.5.1.2.1  Symptoms of Workaholism:  25

3.5.1.2.2.  The reasons for workaholism:  25

3.5.1.2.3.  Solution:  26

3.5.1.3  Workaholism combined with Type-A personality  27

3.5.2.  Pessimism:  29

3.5.3.  Idealism Perfectionism:  29

3.5.4.  Playing God-syndrome:  30

3.5.5.  People Pleaser:  30

3.5.6.  Others  30

3.5.6.1.  Unfulfilled expectations:  30

3.5.6.2.  Bitterness:  31

3.5.6.3.  Burnout as a virtue  32

3.5.6.4.  Other reasons  32

4.  Who has a burnout  33

5.  How to get back on track:  34

5.1.  Restoring Hope:  34

5.2.  After recovering burnout  37

6.  Prevention  37

6.1.  Get proper exercise have a healthy diet and enough sleep  37

6.2.  Carrying God s yoke not my own:  38

6.3.  Forgive:  38

6.4.  Carry each other s burden:  38

6.5.  Know who you are in Christ get your thinking right:  39

6.6.  Look at the true meaning of life:  39

6.7.  Having the right perspective:  39

6.8.  Join a small support prayer group  40

6.9.  Prioritize:  40

6.10.  Watch perfectionist tendencies:  40

6.11.  Take regular time off:  40

6.12.  Relax  40

6.13.  Have fun  41

6.14.  Change  41

6.15.  Know the warning signs:  41

  Conclusion  42

  Bibliography  43

  Books:  43

  Internet:  43

4

Introduction:

Burnout, a term heard with increasing frequency these days, is becoming a prominent fact of life in the fast-paced and stress-filled 21 st century. People in all walks of life are experiencing burnout, and many end up losing their jobs, their health, and sometimes their families because of it. Some even commit suicide as a way of escape. Since almost everybody will experience burnout to a certain degree in some stage of life, one may ask what exactly burnout is, what the warning signs are, how to deal with it and what can be done in order to prevent it. The aim of this paper is to answer those questions with a special emphasis on workaholic and ‘Type A’ personality burnout, since those people are most prone to the experience it.

1. Definition

Dr. Wendell Friest says that “the word ‘burnout’ is borrowed from rocketry science and refers to the point at which the fuel of a missile is completely expended.” 1 Frank Minirth suggest that “burnout is, when one’s attitude becomes ‘a job is a job is a job;’ a depletion of energy and a feeling of being overwhelmed by others’ problems; a syndrome of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment that can occur among individuals who do ‘people work’ of some kind.” 2 It is often described as a loss of enthusiasm, energy, idealism, perspective, and purpose. It can be viewed as a state of mental, physical, and spiritual exhaustion brought on by excessive and prolonged stress. 3 Burnout is actually a vicious cycle, because the desire to

1 Esther Schubert, What Missionaries Need to Know About Burnout and Depression, (New Castle: Olive

Branch Publications, 1993), 3

2 Frank Minirth, Don Hawkins, Paul Meier, Richard Flournoy. How to beat Burnout. (Chicago: Moody

Press, 1986), 14

3 Ibid.. 15

5

minimize any interpersonal contact is coupled with a feeling of emotional exhaustion and results in a reduction in personal accomplishment. A feeling of diminishing accomplishment leads to stronger feelings of personal inadequacy, which further reduces accomplishment. 4 This is the cycle of burnout, a cycle many people experience.

2. Manifestation

Minirith suggest three burnout areas:

2.1. Mental: Burnout shows up mentally in the form of a feeling of

disillusionment or failure as a person or worker. Signs of anger, cynicism, negativism, or increased irritability spring up. Burnout victims may feel frustrated by a sense of helplessness, hopelessness, or self-doubt, which then may lead to depression. Another common sign is guilt –false guilt over trying to be overly responsible or committed, a feeling of not doing something perfectly or well enough. Other symptoms of mental/r emotional burnout include apathy, difficulty concentrating or paying attention, decreased self-esteem, feelings of disenchantment, disillusionment, disorientation, or confusion. 5

2.2. Physical: Continued stress and burnout may bring on backaches, neck

aches, headaches, migraines, insomnia, loss of appetite (or a never-satisfied appetite), ulcers, high blood pressure, constant colds, digestive problems, allergies, or in the most severe forms of continuing stress and burnout, heart attacks and strokes. In many people, unrelieved, unresolved tension and stress result in their turning to alcohol or drugs for temporary relief. The decreased energy and fatigue symptomatic of drugs tend to worsen

4 Ibid., 15

5 Ibid., 19-20

6 an already burnout-out feeling. 6 Brooks R. Faulkner adds to this list exhaustion and sexual dysfunction. 7

2.3. Spiritual: Some people experience spiritual exhaustion with burnout. Such

individuals seem to have lost perspective and have failed to recognize their own limits. They usually experience a gradually increasing feeling that God is powerless and that they themselves are the only ones with the power to help in their current situation. Without realizing what they are doing, they refuse –consciously or unconsciously- to rely on God’s power and try to play God themselves. Then as time passes, they realize that their own power, or energies, are not enough either. They feel like giving up, believing that others, including God, have given up on them. 8 One spiritual warning sign for burn out is the increasing sense of self-effort rather than trusting God or even others’ God given abilities in particular circumstances. Those Christians may start giving more lip service to their trust in God in order to cover up their decreased dependence on him 9 However, the signs of burnout tend to be more mental rather than physical. They can include feelings of: 10

6 Ibid.. 20

7 Brooks R. Faulkner, Burnout in Ministry, (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1981), 60. 8 Frank Minirth, Don Hawkins, Paul Meier, Richard Flournoy. How to beat Burnout, 20. 9 Ibid.. 34 10 Help guide: Understand, Revolve & Prevent life’s challenges. Article ‘Prevent Burnout’ was written by Melinda Smith, M.A., Ellen Jaffe-Gill, M.A., Jeanne Segal, Ph.D., and Robert Segal, M.A. The article was last modified on 26 th October 2007. Accessed on 14.04.2008.

7

2.4. Biblical examples of burnout: King Solomon in Ecclesiastes 2:17-23, Moses in

Numbers 20:10, and Elijah in 1 Kings.

2.5. What does Burnout look like practically?

N A missionary who uses a relatively minor health problem as an excuse for

escaping the burdens and frustrations of living in a foreign culture

N A pastor, who is idealistic and overcommitted, trying to please everyone in his

congregation and feeling guilty when he doesn’t.

N A nurse in a large hospital who takes her time even ignores a patient’s buzzer

request for attention.

N A mental health worker who just doesn’t seem to care any more

N A doctor who finds himself avoiding certain patients

N An alcohol rehabilitation counsellor drinking more and more, while complaining

about his clients who drink.

N A business executive who finds himself unable to function at his previous level

N A salesman who has become so depressed that he is considering suicide 11

11 Frank Minirth, Don Hawkins, Paul Meier, Richard Flournoy. How to beat Burnout, 17-18.

8

3. What Causes Burnout?

3.1. General

3.1.1. Feeling overwhelmed: Burnout can occur when you feel overwhelmed

and unable to meet constant demands. As the stress continues, you begin to lose the interest or motivation that led you to take on a certain role in the first place. Burnout reduces your productivity and saps your energy, leaving you feeling increasingly hopeless, powerless, cynical, and resentful. The unhappiness burnout causes can eventually threaten your job, your relationships, and your health. 12 As this paper will investigate in a later part, feeling overwhelmed is usually caused by stress, which in turn is boosted by lifestyle, job and personality. Workaholics and ‘Type A’ personalities are most prone to burnout due to their constant intensity of stress which leads to being overwhelmed resulting into the loss of hope and strength, which ends in burnout.

3.1.2. Loss of hope: One of the most common characteristics of advanced

burnout is the loss of hope. “I don’t feel there’s any hope of changing the situation” Hope is an essential ingredient to withstanding the difficulties and pressures of life. The author of Hebrews refers to hope as ‘an anchor of the soul’ (Hebrews 6:19) 13 When someone undergoes burnout, it involves the loss of two important elements from that person’s life: strength and hope. 14 When Christians neglect appropriate spiritual priorities, compromise biblical convictions, and allow their personal commitment to Jesus Christ to be weakened by such factors as personal pleasures, desire for material possessions, and effort to achieve power and influence, the results will by a loss of

12 http://www.helpguide.org/mental/burnout_signs_symptoms.htm

13 Frank Minirth, Don Hawkins, Paul Meier, Richard Flournoy. How to beat Burnout, 135.

14 Ibid.. 143