Are you emotionally burnt out? Here is how to tell, and how to overcome it

Signs of Emotional Burnout

Hopeless Attitude: If you’re feeling more negative or even hopeless, that’s a sign that you’re deep into the emotional burnout spiral.

Lack of focus: When your mind is on too many different things, spinning in too many different directions.

Poor Sleep: Sleeping patterns can also play a part. You might have a hard time sleeping, waking up, or being motivated to do anything.

Numbing Out: It’s a common response to emotional burnout. It’s when you remove yourself from reality and relationships. You’re no longer present.

Avoidance and Detachment: Emotion comes from the Latin word, “emo vere,” which means to move. So, Matt said all emotions are to move you. If you’re leaning away and detaching from something, you’re trying to move away from the emotion. Let the emotion move you instead.

Five Ways to Overcome Emotional Burnout

Normalize It: “Normalize it. It is what it is,” Matt advised. Accepting that you’re experiencing burnout is the first step towards recovery.

Name It: “Once you just accept it’s happening, then you put a name on it. The rule is simply when we name it, we claim it. When we name it, we tame it,” Matt said. Naming your emotions helps you understand and manage them better.

Identify the Deeper Value: Matt encouraged us to look beyond the emotion and identify the deeper value that we’ve lost.

“Behind every pain, there’s a value. There’s something that we’ve lost that we miss.”

Prioritize Small Actions Over Exhaustive Thinking: Matt explained that many people think talking and thinking about the problem will fix the problem, but you must act instead.

“At some point, the only way to create your chemistry and momentum isn’t just thinking, it’s getting up and doing an act,”

Find Energizing Ways to Turn Our Arrows Out: Matt advised us to turn our arrows out and start being with people.

“People are social. We need to have people we turn to confide in,” he said.

“You should have emotional pain,” Matt believes, “Remember it’s teaching us something. We just don’t need to always stay in the pain. We can turn the pain into something glorious, something good.”

Find more advice from Matt at matttownsend.com, including an online program that will help you and your closest relationships “become one.” Find Matt’s “Becoming One” program on his home page for more information.