May 21, 2025

Hidden Factors that Cause Burnout: Are You Contributing?

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Today, we're diving into the ever-relevant topic of burnout, which has become a pervasive issue for many people. I want to unpack how personal traits such as perfectionism, people-pleasing tendencies, and unrealistic self-expectations, can inadvertently contribute to our own risk of burnout. Of course there are external pressures from our workplaces; but it’s important to look at how we interact with those pressures and the stories we're tell ourselves that are contributing to our chronic stress. We’ll discuss the signs of burnout, the different forms it can take, and how it can manifest not just in our jobs, but in roles like parenting and caregiving. Tune in to reflect on your own unhelpful patterns, and to consider how you might take proactive steps to help you manage stress better and nurture your well-being.Takeaways:

Burnout is a consequence of unresolved stress, resulting in feelings of exhaustion and detachment.
It's crucial to recognise the personal traits that may contribute to chronic stress and burnout.
Perfectionism, people-pleasing, imposter syndrome and undiagnosed neurodivergence can significantly increase your risk of burnout.
Understanding your own limits and setting realistic expectations can help prevent the downward spiral into burnout.

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Chapters

00:00 - Untitled

01:01 - Untitled

01:01 - Introduction to Crappy to Happy

03:22 - Understanding Burnout: The Individual's Role

16:22 - Understanding Perfectionism and Its Impact on Wellbeing

20:54 - Understanding Imposter Syndrome and ADHD

25:49 - Understanding Burnout and Neurodivergence

Transcript

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This is Crappy to Happy, and I am your host,

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Cas Done. I'm a clinical and coaching psychologist. I'm mindfulness

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meditation teacher and of course author of the Crappy to

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Happy books. In this show, I bring you conversations with interesting, inspiring,

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intelligent people who are experts in their field and who

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have something of value to share that will help you

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feel less crappy and more happy. Welcome, Welcome to another

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episode of Crappy to Happy. Two quick things note your self.

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I have to change that intro because it still says

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I bring new conversations with interesting inspiring guests. And that

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intro was recorded when all we were doing was guest interviews. Literally,

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the show was all interviews and there were no solo episodes.

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We started to add solo episodes and so there's probably

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more solo episodes than guest interviews. Don't worry, there are

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guest interviews coming. There are plenty. And the second thing

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I want to say, if you're a bloke and you

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love Crappy to Happy, I am so happy to have

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you here. It has been brought to my attention more

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than once that there are plenty of men who really

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get value from the podcast. And I am constantly talking

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about women and two women, and that is partly because

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it was kind of put to me that that's what

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I should do, that I should really try to speak

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to one particular demographic I guess, and the majority of

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listeners indeed are women, but not all. Then you're not

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all women. I know there are men listening. So I

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apologize if I have made you feel excluded, and I

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will certainly keep that in mind in future. I love

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having you here. Thank you. And then my Beyond Confident

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group coaching program, which focuses on overcoming imposter syndrome and

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cultivating self confidence. Again, all of the marketing messaging around

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that is really about women, and in the program we

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do talk about gender bias and stuff like that that

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impacts women in the workplace, so there is a female focus.

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But you know what, it's opening up again in July,

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and if you want to join and you're a bloke,

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I'd love to have you in the program. So that's that.

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Let's talk about burnout. I wanted to bring this topic

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up again because it's a topic that hasn't just gone away.

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It is still very prevalent, and I wanted to just

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share today a few ideas for you to think about

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in terms of what you can do or how you

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personally might be inadvertently contributing to your own risk of burnout. Now,

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let's just start with definitions. Burnout is a consequence of

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long term, unresolved stress. The World Health Organization a few

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years ago identified burnout as a workplace phenomenon. They don't

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call it a medical condition, but it's a workplace syndrome.

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It's a workplace phenomenon, and it particularly has three dimensions.

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The first of those is that it is characterized by

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feelings of energy depletion, exhaustion, like completely physically mentally broken,

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basically nothing left in the tank, not just a bit tired,

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completely burnt out. Second one is psychologically feeling distance from

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your job, feeling negative, cynical, detached, really not emotionally engaged

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in your work, and you know, detached and negative. I

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guess the third one is reduced professional efficacy. Now, efficacy

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means how good you are at what you do, how

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effective you are at what you do. I think it

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is more like it is a decrease in your feelings

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of accomplishment, your perception of your own efficacy. It may

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well be that your performance does slip when you're burnt out.

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I mean understandably if you're very unwell and really struggling,

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but it also I think it's really characteristic of burnout

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to believe that you're not doing a good job even

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when you are doing a good job, which is why

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you keep on pushing yourself and feeling down on yourself

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and feeling like it's your fault and you're not doing

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enough and what's wrong with you, etc. So they are

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the three kind of criteria for burnout according to the

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World Health Organization. Now, what I want to say is

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we will talk about workplace burnout today, but I do

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also want to make the point that burnout is not

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just It's not just a workplace issue. You can have

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maternal burnout or parental burnout from caring for children. You

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can have care burnout caring for anybody who is chronically

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unwell if you're in a caring role. Even when we

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talk about workplaces, the professions that are most susceptible to

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burnout tend to be caring professions. Medical professions and teachers

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are the most susceptible to burn out. Academics, UNI students,

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PhD students. There can be that kind of scenario where

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people burn out athletes, high performing athletes, overtraining, overscheduling, constantly

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pushing themselves unrelenting standards, not getting enough break. So there's

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lots of different areas that where individuals can be affected

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by burnout, can really suffer the consequences of burnout. I

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just want to make that really clear. But the consequences

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are really devastating, and it can creep up on you

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and you can end up in a really bad place

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before you've really twigged that something is wrong and can

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take a really long time to recover when you have

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completely burnt out. I mean the effect on literally every

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system and your body, your adrenals, all of your whole

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immune system, mendocrine system. You can experience high blood pressure,

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heart issues, panic attacks, anxiety, depression. Then it flows on

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an impact. So obviously your personal relationships with people around

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you impacts every area of your life and takes a really,

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really long time to recover. So I think it's important

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to just take a minute to come back and re

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examine what some of the things are that contribute to burnout.

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And I want to talk specifically about the stuff that

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is not to do with your work environment. So, first

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and foremost, burnout is largely a problem of the organization.

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It is a problem of management styles, poor leadership, poor management,

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lack of communication, not rewarding staff, expecting too much from people,

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under resourcing people, undervaluing people, not having appropriate grievance systems

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in place, or appropriate systems or reporting structures where people

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can go to somebody if they are really being put

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under too much pressure, if there is too much expectation

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put on them and they can't effectively do their job

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with the resources and in the time that they're expected to.

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So there's all of these workplace situations, poor relationships, just

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unchecked bullying and unfairness, favoritism. So these all of the

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things that happen in workplaces that will contribute to your

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chronic stress and that can ultimately lead to you experiencing burnout.

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I am not for one minute saying that if you're

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experiencing burnout, if you are struggling, if you're experiencing chronic

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stress in your workplace, that this is all a you problem.

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Not for one minute. Please don't interpret me the wrong way.

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What I am saying, what I do want to say

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is that I think it is important for all of

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us to be really cognizant of the kinds of personality

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traits and the kinds of patterns and behaviors that we

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as individuals might fall into, you know, to our own detriment.

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That's the kind of stuff that I want to talk

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about today. So, having just established that there are a

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lot of issues to do with the organization and the

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workplace that are going to be the major causes of

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burnout as an individual having unrealistic expectations. Now, the organization

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might have unrealistic expectations. Absolutely, that might be the case,

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But what about you and your expectations? Are you constantly

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trying to meet impossible standards that you set for yourself?

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So this is the kind of stuff that I want

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you really reflecting on. If you are feeling really overly stressed,

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you might not be at the point of burnout just yet,

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but if you're feeling really stressed at work, if you're

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feeling really stretched, really stretched too thin, these are the

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kinds of things I want you to start thinking about.

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Are you holding yourself to impossible standards that might look

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like not asking for help knowing that you're going to

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struggle to meet a deadline, but feeling uncomfortable or not

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registering that maybe this is too much for you to

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do in this amount of time, or perhaps you want

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to bring in some extra recruits to help you to

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get this over the line. And there are just some people,

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people particularly, who have more of that avoidant attachment style.

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If you're a person who grew up in a family

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where you were emotionally very self reliant, if there wasn't

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much available nurturing for you, if you were kind of

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expected to just pull your socks up and get on

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with it and look after yourself as a little one,

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then you may naturally have grown up with that kind

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of more of avoidant attachment style, which is often characterized

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by this very fierce independence, very strong sense of self reliance.

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Just doesn't even occur to you to ask for help.

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You just do it all yourself. And it's good to

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know that about yourself, right, It's really good to know

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that about yourself, because it could be to your own

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detriment and maybe you need to ask for help. You know.

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It could be that you're really fully believe that you

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can get these three projects over the line in whatever

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ridiculous timeframe, and actually maybe that's you know, probably not

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going to work unless it's at significant costs to you

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in terms of your work life balance, your sleep, your

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self care routines, and things that you need to do

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for yourself to look after yourself and your well being.

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Perfectionism if you're a perfectionist, Now, perfectionism, don't get me wrong.

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If you hold yourself to a high standard and you're

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really got meticulous attention to detail, you're a dot. The

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eyes cross the t's like, I love that. I love

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that for you, I love that about you. We've got

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to be considering the impact of overthinking, constantly double checking,

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constantly rereading, regoing, over making tweaks, making little changes, constantly

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feeling like something is not quite up to scratch, never

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resting because there's always more to do. That kind of

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maladaptive perfectionism is going to take you straight to chronic

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stress and burnout. Maladaptive, unhealthy perfectionism is exactly what it

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what it says. It is unhealthy and unhelpful to you. Now,

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there is a big difference between a perfectionism that is

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a striving for excellence. I want to really do a

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good job, but also not having my sense of self

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worth attached to the outcome that I achieve, not being

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completely shattered by not producing something that's perfect, because you

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know that you gave it your all and you did

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your best, and there is no such thing as perfect.

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The unhealthy kind of perfectionism is more driven by a

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fear of being judged or criticized or rejected, or an

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internal belief that you are not good enough, that nothing

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that you do is good enough, and that therefore you

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feel it in your gut right you will feel it

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as an anxiety. This needing to overthink, double check, reread, redo, tweak, edit,

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think about things long past when you should be, you know,

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going home and still thinking about things. That kind of

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overthinking perfectionism. It's time wasting, it's energy wasting, it's emotiontionally taxing,

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and it's unnecessary. So that might be something to think

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about if you recognize that in yourself being a people pleaser,

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having poor boundaries, having difficulty saying no. It's one thing

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to say that the organization shouldn't be asking you to

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do this extra stuff, but when somebody does, if somebody

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does ask you what your workloads like, can you take

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this on? Do you have the capacity? If your instinct

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is to say yes, even though maybe that's going to

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cause you to be really really stretched, but you're not

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comfortable to say no, and you just want to do

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a good job and you just want to make people happy,

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or you're thinking about, oh, well, who else is going

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to do it? Because they're all overstretched, So I'll take

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it on, sacrificing your own physical health, mental health, work

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life balance in order to take something on and say yes,

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because you're so concerned about everybody else's workload that they're

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also busy, they can't handle it. I've got to do it,

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and genuinely taking that responsibility on yourself when it may

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not necessary be expected of you. Again, this all comes

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back to, like, on the inside, how much do you

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believe your needs matter, your work life balance matters you

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having a manageable workload because your needs are as important

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as everybody else's. And I'm not suggesting that you prioritize

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your needs over everybody else's, but that you give your

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own needs as much consideration as other people's if you

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are taking on things and saying yes to things because

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you're concerned about what other people are dealing with. Another

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bit contributed which has been identified is a misalignment with values.

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If what you're doing feels really out of sync with

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what matters to you, your personal values, the things that

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are just important to you in life. If your work,

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whether it's just the organization, whether it's what you're being

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asked to do, the whole career potentially might just be

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not a good fit for you. And maybe you've gone

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down this path and it's not the thing for you,

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Like it is not what makes you happy, It doesn't

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tap into your skills, it doesn't feel good for you,

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it doesn't give you any opportunity for growth. It just

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doesn't feel right for you, and it might be worth

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taking a step back to reconsider what you might do instead.

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Now that's a tricky one, okay, because that can feel

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really hard. To just up and go in a different direction,

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can feel really challenging. If there are financial considerations, you know,

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just the whole, if it involves retraining or making a

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big change, if you've been doing something for a long time,

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it can feel difficult. Sometimes it can feel impossible. But

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I think having the willingness giving yourself permission to open

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your mind to the possibilities, to give some consideration to

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what it might be If you were to do something different.

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You don't know what's around the corner. Anything happen around

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the corner. I've met so many people, even in my

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own life, where you might think that something is an impossibility,

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that it could never happen, and long and behold, things

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change in an instant. So it's worth giving some consideration

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to what else you might do that might be more

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a good fit for you if you're experiencing chronic stress,

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because what you're doing is really not a good fit

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for you. Now, getting back to that perfectionism and people

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pleasing broadly imposter syndrome. Now we all know that I

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run a course, I've written an audiobook talked a lot

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about imposter syndrome over the last few years. And imposter

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syndrome is a pervasive belief, persistent and pervasive belief that

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you are not as smart and capable intelligent as other

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people believe you are, despite all evidence to the contrary,

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And when you internally don't believe that you're as smart

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as other people think you are, when you feel like

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you are a fraud and other people are saying that

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you're good at this, but you don't actually think that

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you're that good at this that leads to overworking, overfunctioning,

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trying to prove yourself because you feel like all these

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people think you're so good, so you've got to work

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like twice as hard, do twice as much, but that

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much more effort in order for them to continue believing

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that you're that good. You haven't registered that actually what

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you're doing already or what you just showing up and

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doing what you do is enough. Now, this is especially

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a trap if you have been overworking and overfunctioning, being

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a perfectionist, overthinking, and people as a result think that

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you are like really good at what you do and

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they give you feedback, and in your mind it's like, well,

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that's only because I have to work ten times as

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hard as everybody else, and because I do all this

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overthinking and perfecting and working late and stressing and not

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sleeping like it because I put all of this extra

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effort in, that's the reason that I get those results,

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and therefore that's what I have to keep doing. And

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you don't give yourself the opportunity to have a different experience,

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to do something different and to get some different feedback.

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Imposter syndrome will cause burnout one hundred percent and you

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may have already experienced that yourself. You may have experience burnout,

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and you know that it's the imposter syndrome. It's this

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drive to have to do more, be more, a constant

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stress of feeling like you're not enough, never feeling satisfied,

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and never really internalizing positive feedback results, achievements, success. You

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can have all the degrees in the world and get

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all the promotions in the world, you can get all

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the awards and the accolades in the world, But on

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the inside, if you don't believe that you're deserving of that,

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if you've constantly got an excuse that you just got lucky,

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that you just were at the right place at the

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right time, or that you had to just work ten

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times as hard as everybody else, all of the stories

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that you tell yourself about why people think that or

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why you've got those achievements means that you can't rely

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on that, like you don't actually ever cultivate that really solid, grounded,

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stable belief in your own inherent intelligence, capability, knowledge, expertise.

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So when you've got imposter syndrome, remember also that apart

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from a lot of the early childhood stuff, a lot

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of the feelings of unworthiness blah blahn. We talk about

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that in my program it's opening in July. Apart from

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all of that, there is these stories. There are these

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stories that you create in your mind about what you

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need to do or be in order to be confidence,

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really faulty rules that you are running in your own head.

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It's like, to be considered an expert on this topic,

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I have to know everything that's ever been written or

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published on this topic. Otherwise I'm a fraud. Otherwise who

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am I to be talking about this topic? It could

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be that I have to do everything perfectly all the time.

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It could be that I have to do everything on

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my own. And so you may not even be consciously aware,

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but you're running this story in your mind. You're following

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this rule about what you think you need to do,

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or who you need to be, or what need to achieve, well,

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how much you need to know, what training or qualification

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you need to get, what results you need to be

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getting in order for you to feel worthy, in order

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for you to feel good enough. And so it's this

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what Brene Brown calls hustling for your worthiness. All right,

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this hustling even if you're not physically doing it's in

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your mind. The low grade stress and anxiety that is

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always there, This agitation, restlessness, this feeling that I'm not

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doing enough, I need to be doing more. That is

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going to cause you to burn out. All of that stuff.

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You can work on that, because that's got nothing to

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do with the organization and the job requirements. That's all

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to do with your internal programming, your inner world thoughts, feelings, sensations,

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reactive patterns, behaviors, or that old programming conditioning. So that's

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something that you can look at yourself that can make

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an enormous difference. And the other thing I want to

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add on here, as somebody who is really diagnosed with ADHD,

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is that I now recognize, and I know many people

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now recognized undiagnosed neurodiversions, whether it's autism or ADHD. Many

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people are realizing that the symptoms of that. I mean,

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whether you have a diagnosis or not doesn't matter, but

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some of the traits of those conditions just make you

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an absolute prime candidate for burnout. So with ADHD, for example,

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there is a difficulty following through on a project in

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any kind of logical sequential order with consideration of the

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time frame required to get the thing done like that

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doesn't work in the head of somebody with ADHD. In

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the ADHD brain, there are only two times. There is

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now and there's not Now. Am either doing it now

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or it's later and later is not fixed. Later is

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just I'm kicking it down the road, like I'm just

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kicking the can down And all I know is that

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the deadline is not for another six weeks. So I

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know it sounds like it's just it's the organizational problem,

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but I promise you it's not. It is a fundamental

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inability to be able to take action on a task

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or a project if it doesn't need to be done

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right now. This is why there's all of this procrastination.

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It looks like procrastination and doing all of these other

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things instead of the actual thing that needs to be

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done until it gets to urgent, like actual panic stations

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urgent adrenaline fueled. We use adrenaline to get moving because

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we lack dopamine. Most people use dopamine to feel good

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for making progress taking action. Dopamine, No, we don't get

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that gogno dopamine, so we rely on the adrenaline to

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pull the al nider to get the thing done now

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that's highly stressful, highly stressful, and every single time we

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say we won't do that again. And also you feel

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shit because you know how much better a job you

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could have done had you put more time in, had

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you planned ahead, used your time well. So there's loads

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of self criticism about that, there's loads of shame about that,

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and there is just the stress of that kind of

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adrenaline fueled activity that is flooding your body with cortisol

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and stress hormones. So the thing about the time blindness,

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when I say now and not now, it's that now.

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If it's now, it's not that I have no attention.

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It's that I have loads of attention, but I've got

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sixteen things in front of me, and there is no

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ability to prioritize those into what is important and what

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is urgent and what can wait. If it's in front

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of me, gets my attention. So therefore something's in front

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of me gets my attention. But as soon as something

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else is in front of me, then that gets my attention.

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Soon as something else is in front of me, that

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gets my attention. So it's this scattered mess of attention

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on everything all at once. It's not an attention deficit.

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That is the biggest misconception. There is no deficit of

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attention in ADHD. There is disorganized attention. There is disregulated attention.

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It's too much attention on too many things all at once,

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and not necessarily the important things, and no capacity to

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put aside the other things and not give them your attention.

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And when everything needs to be done. Now, that can

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also lead to crushing paralysis. Don't know what to start

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on first, and so therefore I'm just spinning my wheels.

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And again, all of that comes with the self talk,

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self criticism, self judgment, just feeling incompetent, unproductive, ineffective. And

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it's nothing to do with intelligence. It's nothing to do

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with competence. It's nothing to do with capability. It is

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all about an executive dysfunction, inability to prioritize and organize

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