How To Make 2023 Your Year of No Burnout

The high you get from recovering from your last burnout cycle is intoxicating. Finally, you can do things again! The energy, focus, and interest are all back. So you waste no time jumping back in. Saying yes to every ask that comes your way, going here and there, and grandly living life with no boundaries.

And before you know it, you’ve burnt yourself out all over again. Who knows when you’ll be back in the recovery stage. Months? Years? You’re now stuck in another frustrating waiting game. But what if you stopped this cycle? Let’s make 2023 your year of no burnout.

Everything has a cost. And I’m not talking about money. I’m talking about energy. But because energy isn’t visible, people end up spending it like a naïve teenager with a credit card — racking up endless debt (that they don’t have the means to pay) until they max it out.

To get ahead of this, you have to make the costs more tangible. Try to envision an energy bank account. Everything you spend time on, from thoughts to actions, is either an energy deposit or a withdrawal. It’s up to you to ensure your deposits meet or exceed your withdrawals so you can stay out of the red. Here are three tips on how to do this:

1. Be Aware of Your Balances

Do you know what your deposits and withdrawals are? Do you know exactly what you’re paying for your actions? Do you know what your current energy balance is off the top of your head?

Don’t wait until the statement is due to check. You can’t get ahead of the burnout cycle without a little awareness.

Action:

List your responsibilities, events, and daily practices. Then, assign them a dollar value for how much energy they cost you. $10, $100, $1000?

Now, list the deposits in your life and assign a dollar value for the worth they’re giving you (ex. sleep, spending time with people you love, doing your hobbies, etc).

By laying this out, you force yourself to question how you could be doing things in a more energy-giving way, or at least in a way that depletes less energy. This is where the real insights happen.