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- 38. The four main ways to treat burnout—with creativity
38. The four main ways to treat burnout—with creativity
On the intersection between creativity and burnout
It is hard not to be a hypochondriac for work stress.
Whenever I’m confronted with content about burnout, I can resonate, hard. I’m quickly brought back—movie-montage-style—to memories and feelings I’ve had throughout my career. For instance, every burnout quiz be like: Have you picked up more impulsive habits? Certainly I have (points at Wordle). Are you exhausted but your body can’t seem to relax? Always. I can nap anytime, anywhere. Do you think that your job is secretly trying to kill you? Absolutely, let’s get NCIS on the case.
There is something visceral and universal about the stress we feel at work. The stress is everywhere. Two-thirds of employees experienced burnout last year. Three-fourths of us have experienced burnout at any point in time; 98 percent of Gen Z is experiencing burnout right now.
At Bonfire, we tend to think that creativity can solve a lot of things: business growth, managing up, even procrastination.
Can creativity save us from burnout?
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First things first, what even is burnout?
A high school football coach of mine was fond of asking, “Are you hurt or are you injured?” Well, I was in pain either way, so I didn’t see how the question was all that relevant, but from his perspective, the answer determined whether I was capable of toughing it out or I needed to seek medical attention. Ah, masculinity.
We approach our burnout from a more gracious perspective, thank goodness, although no less curious. As you can see from the below Google screengrab, there is a lot of interest in knowing whether this thing we feel is actually burnout or if it is some other thing—no less arduous, of course.
Let me share a bit of what I found to clarify the differences and intersections between these terms.
Burnout is a result of severe stress that leads to complete emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion. It is often correlated with the workplace, though you can experience burnout in other ways (parenting, relationships, etc.). Along with emotional exhaustion, those who suffer from burnout may also feel depersonalization, which is a feeling of being on the “outside looking in” at yourself.
Burnout is a set of symptoms in response to an acute event or situation. When you take away the event or situation, you feel better. This is one of the main differences between burnout and depression, which often get conflated.
Depression is a diagnosable mental health condition that needs to be treated with therapy or medication. Though a lot of the symptoms of depression and burnout overlap, depression is marked by a hopelessness and an indifference to previous interests and hobbies.
Stress is a state of worry or tension brought about by a challenging situation. Burnout is a response to severe and sustained stress.
Fatigue is a feeling of constant tiredness. It’s a symptom of all of the above!
How to recover from and prevent burnout, science edition
Phew! As you can see, there are a lot of different ways for us to feel left out to dry, at work and in life.
Specifically when it comes to burnout, there tend to be a handful of common go-to moves that either prevent burnout from happening in the first place or help us recover once burnout sets in. The specific tactics differ from website to website, but generally things fall into four main buckets:
Take a break
Practice self-care
Set good boundaries
Connect with others
1 - Take a break. Literally, leave your laptop and stop working for a bit. Sometimes it can be an afternoon off, sometimes a long weekend, sometimes a sabbatical.
2 - Practice self-care. Everyone’s self-care rituals will be unique, so you’re encouraged to do whatever it is that gets your serotonin flowing. For instance, there is scientific evidence that exercise can do the trick, whether that’s hitting the gym or going for walks.
3 - Set good boundaries. Even something as simple as turning off your Slack notifications at certain hours can be enough to restore a semblance of balance. Other times it may require clear, compassionate conversations with coworkers and bosses about what you’re able to do and what you’re not.
4 - Connect with others. Having more of your favorite people in your life can make a big difference. One reason burnout happens is that we are so stressed by work that we spend too much time with the job and not enough time with our people.
The role that creativity plays in recovering from and preventing burnout
If we were to take the four main buckets of burnout recovery and prevention and apply a creativity lens to each, it’s easy to see how creativity can make a positive difference in a more balanced work-life. Let’s go one-by-one.
1 - Take a (creative) break.
While the prevailing advice for taking a break often skews toward vacation, you can “get away” without actually needing to book PTO and still find a bunch of the same benefits. The “perfect” break, according to researchers, is between 15 and 20 minutes. And while these breaks may be seen as a way to boost productivity when you return to the computer, they can just as easily be your way of fighting back against the hamster wheel of work-work-work.
We’ve written before about some ideas for how to spend these 15-20 minutes.
I’ve fought back with creative breaks at various points of my career, too. Typically this would mean:
Blocking an hour on my calendar every morning for Deep Work, which I would spend chasing whatever creative rabbit trails I wanted.
Signing up for business webinars, then not showing up to them and using the “free” hour for some creative project.
Scheduling calls with co-workers and having strict rules to not talk about work stuff. It then becomes a creative break for you and for someone else (which is a convenient way to also do #4 on this list: Connect with others).
2 - Practice (creative) self-care.
If you’ve been following our Kumbaya newsletter for awhile, you may have seen Shannon’s complete overview of how to set up a creative practice for yourself at work or at play. Here are all five parts
Self-care can take many forms. One of the most fulfilling ways I’ve found to care for myself is to make things: writing, designing, coloring, crafting. As you’ll see in the five-part series, there is no shortage of ways to come up with a creative practice of your own, and given the importance of self-care in staving off burnout, this optionality is good news for anyone longing for a break from the stress of work.
3 - Set good boundaries (for your creativity).
Funny enough, I’ve often struggled to set boundaries for myself but have been more than okay accepting boundaries from others. Because of this, I’ve needed to hack my way into better boundary-setting by starting small, taking baby steps, and working my way up to setting the clear and respectful work rules that protect me from too much stress.
Creativity is a perfect place to practice boundary-setting. I like to use creative rituals as my proving ground for even bigger boundary-setting scenarios. If I can’t be respectful of the time and space and routine of my creative work, then I often struggle with doing the same around my business work.
4 - Connect with others (on creative projects).
The great thing about so much of this advice on creativity v. burnout is that it all overlaps. You can come up with a creative practice that allows you to set boundaries and carve out breaks in your day to re-invest in you. You can even do so with your friends, which helps you stay connected to others.
But beyond your creative practice and the creative things you make outside of work, it’s also possible to grab onto creative opportunities within your job to work more closely with your fellow creatives. If you’re able, sign up for a project that involves people you love to work with; suggest new ideas for creative campaigns so that you can do some creative work alongside your colleagues. Stress creates burnouts, but so too do silos. The more you can work together on creative projects, the better off everyone will feel.
Over to you
How are you feeling these days? What has burnout looked like for you in current or past jobs? What creative activities have you found to be effective at staving off burnout? Feel free to reply to get in touch. We’d love to hear from you!
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