Beautiful Minds Wellness
The Brain People Podcast: 053 | Overcoming Burnout
Today Jonathan Edens is joined by Life & Health Coach, Mariola Porras. Mariola has a passion for helping people reach their true potential and live a balanced life. Through her own experience of burnout after 15 years of working in the corporate world Mariola shares insights on what causes burnout as well as how to overcome it in this episode you don't want to miss.
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[Music] welcome to the brainpeople podcast a show where four mental health experts team up to bring you practical tools for overcoming mental health challenges the brain people don't replace your doctor or therapist but we will give you some extra tools to help you on your journey so join us as we fight mental illness one episode at a time welcome to the brainpeople podcast my name is Jonathan Edens I am one of your co-hosts and today we are met with a very special guest Mariola porus she has been with us before some of you may recall some of those episodes in which she she has given us very valuable Insight today we'll be we will be discussing burnout specifically uh in a corporate context and the reason reason why we brought Mariola on to speak about this is because she she actually worked in a global marketing firm for over 15 years and during that time she kind of lost some of her health due to burnout and um and she was able to learn some crucial lifestyle interventions to help her deal with that so with that being said welcome to the podcast today Mariola thank you glad to be back yes it's excellent to have you back Muriel why don't you just give us a little bit about um you know why uh aside from what I just said um I know you've got you know uh kind of a specific role that you play here at Beautiful Minds uh you are a life and health coach and so why don't you tell us a little bit about that um and how your kind of your story of burnout sort of led to what you're doing today for us yeah sure well as you said I have I had a marketing career in global companies for over 15 years and as a result of not really taking care of my health and living a balanced work life um lifestyle it really led to breakdown at all levels physically mentally socially and morally to a point that I had no hope of a future and that led me to have to quit my career and really take care of my health but really addressing it at the roots which is now what brought me to there's no purpose of really sharing this hope with others dedicating myself to do this full-time as a life and health coach I work with stressed professionals that struggle with burnout by sharing that it is possible to to heal through natural and holistic methods so let's uh let's define our terms and then we'll jump into your story but can you give us kind of a brief explanation for what what burnout actually is yeah actually burnout has been known as a state of vital exhaustion but recently the World Health Organization has redefined the term given that it's growing more and more in terms of the concern medically and and um you know in the health field so now the new definition actually it became effective as this year 2022 they Define it as a syndrome conceptualized as resulting in chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed so when we talk about a syndrome it talks it really refers to a collection of signs and symptoms associated with a specific health related costs so that's what burnout really means I'm I'm kind of curious I'm I'm surprised that they they say work related specifically I mean do you think that there could be a little bit more of a comprehensive definition that includes non-work related burnout yeah actually what I've learned is that there's also academic burnout for you know college students and in schools for the younger population and it really started in 1970s related to people that work in the medical field like nurses and doctors but now they started to see that it's also present with entrepreneurs you know people that are starting up their own companies lawyers um and Beyond the just Medical but all along across the board with just places where we work and we're demanded with results and also in terms of belonging to a culture that has personal interactions so I'm I'm even thinking of uh like parents right so uh you know there's a lot of stress associated with being a mother or father and uh you know had many mothers that don't necessarily have a nine to five job per se but do seem to be experiencing that that burnout well as a result of of all the responsibilities that they have for that role so while it's not like traditional work right it is obviously work in and of itself and so um uh you know isn't a maybe an important kind of group to to recognize as well absolutely so let's uh how serious is burnout and why are we really discussing that today well Bernard has been always uh you know a state a state of mind and also um it's not only psychological but it's physiological what they found I believe that after covid the numbers have skyrocketed a lot more and before Kobe the last time I checked the numbers um surveys would report that people around 60 40 of the people in the workplace would identify with burnout symptoms but now it's gotten up to 70s up to 80s and this is what's really drawn attention to just the World Health Organization to redefine the term and really even DSM you know how they include different mental health diagnoses they're considering to add this because they're starting to see that burnout can also lead to premature death and other health conditions so it is really it's really um growing substantially especially after covet that we you know we were very isolated people had to go back to their homes and work from their homes for a lot of the load started multiplying and that has led into mental and physical breakdown well I don't know if you know this but while burnout is not technically in the DSM it is actually in the ICD-10 so you know I can I can use the medical coding and I can include burnout in a patient's chart so it is being recognized to some extent as having you know medical Roots but you know as far as the the DSM goes they have not included it yet um so one one more question for you and then we'll we'll jump to kind of your story but uh you kind of touched briefly touched on this but what are some of the main causes of burnout yeah well there's recognized there's six causes um high workload low value low decision making no support or limited support lack of rewards and lack of control now the way I've seen this in my own experience and I would just summarize it in four main things that really lead to uh this regulation of our system which is one perceived stress the way we look at stress right just by looking at stress negatively it has an impact on our health a lot more than those that have a lot of stress and don't perceive it as negative the second one would be inflammation everything that inflames our body and mind also has an effect in our nervous system that leads to this flight or flight chronic state leads really to to freeze mode and that is synonym of burnout the third one is blood sugar imbalance is really not being able to to have our nutrients balanced in our body because since we're um running and you know being burnt out you demand a lot more of fuel so not having a balanced diet is also a big cause and the last and not less important is this balanced um sleep wake Cycles so not being able to sleep or rest all those are the four main causes that I've experienced to be very prominent when we talk about burnout so let's um we'll come up come back to some of the things that we can do uh to to help with burnout but first I would love to hear you know some of your story because I know you you mentioned right you you did the 15 years in Global Marketing and I'm guessing you well let me ask you during that time frame um you know when do when do you recall uh or I should say now at this point now that you have sort of this hindsight when do you when did you think that you started dealing with burnout uh in that corporate space you know this is the the part where you know I'm really happy that we're talking about this because many times we struggle with or Not Without Really knowing we have it sure it just doesn't happen over time gradually we start deteriorating there's actually six different stages of burnout right it starts at the honeymoon phase when we're very effective and driven right but that leads to um Balancing Act chronic symptoms crisis stage to a point point of enmeshment actually those are five different stages and enmeshment is when we're not even aware that we have it in my case you know it got to the point where physically I was um really tired and I would recur to things like caffeine and sugar to get those boosts of energy right and it started affecting my my sleep cycles I couldn't sleep I would struggle with insomnia um and it's like adding layers right to the point where I couldn't even speak right I had a lot of fatigue couldn't even keep track of my thoughts my line of thoughts um even articulating a thought was hard for me um and that's when I started really seeing the breakdown to a point that I couldn't continue work because I was not efficient at all I was really forgetting things I was not concentrating so it started manifesting in many different ways another thing I was very negative about work things that I would really like doing I started really running away from that and avoiding that I was very pessimistic I lost my sense of humor so a lot of these things started happening to the point where my whole body just crashed and I just couldn't get out of bed sure so for for many people they're uh that are listening to this they're probably going to recognize um you know I know we went through those stages fairly quickly right but but many of them if they could have a certain degree of self-awareness they might recognize that they're falling into one of those stages could you kind of walk us through those stages again but using your own experience and just maybe give like a kind of a brief a brief sort of story if you will a brief narrative about you know what you recall and when you think you were going through those stages and what what you were experiencing yeah I think I started experiencing burnout in the last five years I was working for 15 but the last five years is what I can recall more um so you know at the very beginning when you're in the initial States you're very driven you're actually achieving your your goals so those those pieces seem to be like something that even companies reward right because you're very effective you're driven you're over achieving so who doesn't want to have a worker like that um but at what cost right so it really started with the chronic symptoms you know how we are in fight or flight that gives us adrenaline like that cortisol which is stress hormones is driving us to be more effective what happens when we're in that stage where it's we're more effective in all levels right we have this extra boost of energy the problem is when we stay there and that leads to exhaustion and how did it start manifesting I had difficulty learning and retaining what I was learning and applying it I had um I started procrastinating you know a lot of the the things that I would be efficient I started eating them on this side I remember that being a factor um any little thing that I would add on my plate it would feel you know bigger than what it really was um a lot of my sleep hygiene started being affected as I mentioned self-doubt I remember I was very disorganized I'm very structured but there I was just doubting myself very disorganized so I started feeling like I was not being able to keep up with what I was asked for um and I remember that when I started seeing this affecting my relationships and also my deliverables you know how in companies they they measure your goals when I started seeing that I was not being able to deliver that's when it hit me and I said well my goodness I am struggling with burnout but actually that came after physically I was no longer able to show up that's when I was like wow there's something wrong and you know in my case it started being manifested gastrically I had a lot of digestive problems and I think it was because I was coping with you know food and caffeine and all these things but I also um was not absorbing so there's an intimate connection between the brain and the and the gut and I started seeing it physically there and then I started learning how that connects to their brain and the more educated I got about the topic I really identified okay I qualify as a burnout you know professional okay um any any other things you would like to add you know as you were kind of um recognizing and experiencing burnout and then we'll shift gears into you know once you sort of recognize it for what it was what you started doing after that for now I think those are the ones I can recall yeah okay whether well let me ask you this were there any uh aspects and I'm not asking you to um you know give us specifics about your company or whatnot but any aspects of the dynamic of work things that you recall um contributing to the burnout yeah I think that um definitely not having clear communication of the expectations was a big one you know many times we we feel hesitant to say this is a lot I'm not going to be able to to do this yeah for my capacity because that would impact Us in terms of being promoted so I think there was not a safe space for us to really assess the workload versus what we can do or I could personally achieve um so the lack of communication was a big one um not having enough breaks I think that you know companies now that they're starting to see the the importance of this we should create more mental health days um PTO which is a personal time off really Embrace this because when we take rests companies sometimes see it as a hit on time like oh my goodness we're going to work Less hours yeah we're going to lose money out of that but actually that's an investment for employees to feel a lot more committed to their work and also to perform better so I think those would be the things that I was lacking that I would you know for those listeners that do have that position in leadership to really promote that because it is it does make a difference so um I know we we talked about the stages we talked about some of the most common common symptoms um you know and and you also mentioned you know some of the ways leaders can help reduce burnout so specifically um just making it it sounds like making it a priority recognizing that you know your uh you know your expectations from a financial perspective or productivity perspective maybe push pushing some of your workers um into a state state in which they cannot maintain for extended periods of time right there are definitely you know certain industries um most Industries are going to have like an ebb and flow right where there's this sort of seasonality um to like a much more intense workout uh much more intense expectations that are that are required of and and many people are able to endure that but usually there is you know there's a there's a season in which things do calm down and people can kind of recuperate but a lot of these industries have turned into this go go Non-Stop right and uh and so that high level of stress for long periods of time it's not just I mean it we're not saying that it's all the companies the court you know the corporation's fault right you know big part of this is going to be the the things that you tell yourself right and so we'll get into that in a second um but can you tell us a little bit how you kind of came back from burnout like what were the sort of incremental um steps that you started taking uh to help you during that recovery phase yeah definitely well first is acknowledgment that I had that I had this need right like really acknowledging okay I have burned out what can I do about it then second recognizing my symptoms and the signs that would indicate that I needed help in different areas of my life this is why I was talking about the four different causes you know the World Health Organization they list three main causes which are increased exhaustion that's extreme fatigue right the second one is increased distance between our like deep personalization between my perspective and reality so being disconnected is a second main cause and the third one is decrease in productivity so I think that understanding those three main categories and see how they flesh shout in our own life through our lifestyle like if it's manifested in sleep hygiene or if it's manifested in the way I'm perceiving or communicating with others you know interpersonal relationships have a lot to do with how we come back from this right so definitely acknowledging the symptoms or acknowledging that I needed help to understanding my symptoms and three understanding my capacity so I would definitely and I and this is something that I strongly recommend is to seek help talk to a counselor talk to a coach or someone that can help you navigate through strategies to come back from that state of burnout now the strategy will depend on the person but that's where um we as as Beautiful Minds we promote lifestyle it's a lot rooted in the way we live right um what we do and what we don't do what we put in our bodies um and how we process whatever it is that we're carrying along so you've mentioned uh you mentioned lifestyle interventions as being a big part of this also working with a counselor which you know generally is going to incorporate more of a sort of a cognitive psychotherapeutic aspect to overcoming the burnout can you give us um maybe some specific things that you recall having incorporated into your life from these different categories that uh helped you on that road to recovery absolutely um well connection was important because we tend to isolate when we're burnt out and we don't want to be seen as less effective right so definitely seeking to talk about it with people that we trust that really helped me and it also helped me gain awareness that there is actually a condition called burnout right and there are different strategies um for me what it really helped was um combining the psychological piece like really understanding myself knowing my limits learning how to say no right so that really helped me and the way I was perceiving things so you can change your life just by the way you changed how you see things right so cognitive behavioral therapy really made it for me in that sense um and also in terms of lifestyle change as I started by you know how they tell you that for you to be healthier you need to do exercise and all that but when you're burnt out exercise is very delicate we shouldn't be running you know because we're already very low on energy so exercise for me was walks out in nature deep breathing stretching right going for a massage was part of my self-care but the number one was really giving myself permission to rest because when we rest we can see things more clearly and then we start defining oh okay this is what I need to do to increase my my supply of how I'm eating right or how I'm sleeping but definitely connecting with people as number one into resting and really find that type of exercise that type of diet that will help you get back on track so what qualifies is good rest because you know a lot a lot of people when they think of resting or relaxing activity they're thinking you know lounging around John lounging around on the couch watching Netflix scrolling their phone right doing doing these types of activities so you know can you can you kind of specify for us what what might be um like a good restful activity that actually is going to help you recover versus one that's not yeah definitely well rest there's different kinds and it depends on the person what I find restful you may find it different but definitely things that will um reach our Jewels so things like going out in nature right like active rest but also restorative and we are built with different internal clocks right so we are made to sleep in the night and to be active in the day so really following nature like a little bit early to rise those are are good ways to start we we sleep you know our melatonin which you are very well familiarized with this this is the hormone that really helps us sleep well so that is produced in the dark right when the Sun goes down and cortisol which is the hormone that gives us the energy that should be at its higher peak in the morning so what we want to do is really imitate nature so not being exposed to light for example in the evenings will help us like screen screen time things like that um very close to bed that will help us to produce the Melatonin for example so following these internal Cycles we actually have a sleep hygiene sheet on our website and you can always reach out for us and I can I can share it to you with with whoever is listening but um there are some tips there definitely following nature going outside um taking one day a week off has been proven that really helps us I remember that I would work 24 7 but really taking that one day off made me a a lot more effective so sleep time and taking breaks every couple hours during work and do things that really recreate you things that you enjoy that that would be rest as well taking your mind off of the to-do's and choosing to do things that add value in your life so Mariola could you uh give us what your definition of um activities that would actually be restful would be yeah well rest can mean many different things for many people but I would just say that rest is important at the different levels of our health so physical rest really taking a day off the week really made it for me um taking breaks also in my work space every couple hours I would do something that would help me boost my energy again there's also Menthol rest right like what can we do to step away from all those mental demands that we have even from our thoughts um social rest really recreating ourselves with others people that we love that increase that joy in our life spiritual rest is also a form of rest like trusting and hoping and not wanting to control everything right that's a way of resting but there's also creative rest things that um just the appreciation of beauty around us like going out in nature on Hikes for example that was very important then now it's a topic of study right this concept of forest bathing where we go out and and there's a lot of healing when we spend time on nature so those were the big ones for me as I looked into balancing my my health as I started learning to recover and again you recover from burnout it can take up to years so it is important to gradually take one thing at a time so taking uh you know taking breaks you know as she as she defined is incredibly important and the things that you do during those breaks are going to sort of make or break how resting and recovering and rejuvenating an activity actually is going to be um I know you you've mentioned circadian rhythms um I'm guessing you probably heard of ultradian rhythms um maybe not it's not as commonly discussed um but there's you know our various biological clocks and The ultradian rhythms are on this um roughly 90 minute interval and so that's kind of another another way to sort of think about the you know work on versus work off mode there's something called the Pomodoro Technique maybe you've heard of that before essentially where you use like a timer and you take a certain amount of time or you're working and you're focused and then you take a certain amount of time off and so for in my own personal life I find that that roughly 90 minutes of work is typically what's a good amount for me and then taking you know 10 15 20 minutes off to recover from that 90 minutes and intense Focus before I come back and one thing that I actually one one person that I was listening to that defined it I think in a in a way that's been applicable and um sort of easily defined is when you take rest you want to broaden or when you're taking a break you want to broaden your focus uh and so you know the the Temptation for many people is say they're working on their computer and they're doing a particular task they might then in order to rest pull out their phone and and you know scroll social media right you're narrowing your focus in that particular point in time and so it's not a restful activity but when you go outside and you go out in nature right you're Broad and you're broadening your focus I mean you're not specifically narrowing it down to something else right and so when you do that it's very restful to the brain and then it's going to allow it to recover a little bit better yeah I thought I thought it was in a very interesting way of kind of defining like these things in a simplistic way and so if um you know pretty much everything that you've described is going to fall into that category of broadening right your your focus um and so so when whether it's engaging like with people in sort of a social setting or if it's uh maybe praying or if it's going outside and just looking at nature right all of these things are are going to broaden your focus um you know relative to maybe what you were doing previously um so what are some uh any other well any other tips and tools that you would suggest to help you uh combat burnout I know you did mention diet you haven't really discussed that in in detail but anything that you would add to that well so dieting particularly is you know many times when we're overworked we forget to eat and this is where our body starts um this you know it's trying to compensate the lack of nutrients so definitely having speaking of rest right eating our bodies or reading or how do you say responding back to the clocks that we have making sure we're eating and also having nutrient dense food so try to stay away from process because usually What We crave when we're on stress it's the salty and the processed and the sugar products right so really make sure that you supplement your body well with a balanced diet and low inflammation as well so that would be the colors of the rainbow but what would I say in just in closing is that burnout is reversible but action is very important before it becomes chronic and I would just invite you know when we talk about action and you're burnt out you're like that's extra work I don't want to do that because we're very fatigued but I would really encourage the audience to start now and start small just one thing we can do and commit to every day as we deposit it's like making deposits like watering the plant what be positive can we commit to in to our health that will help us get back into recovery yeah one thing I will just add is that burnout and depression can look very similar and have lot lots of um you know lots of similarities between them and so as a result you know a lot of the treatment for both of those is going to be somewhat similar and so you know many people you might be like not necessarily know right know how to distinguish between whether or not this is a major depressive episode of whether this is the result of burnout or whether this is major depression as a result of burnout um and and many of you listening may need that professional help and you know I would implore you you know do not be hesitant to to seek that out uh if if this is negatively affecting your life and it's something that you can't do on your own and that's okay it's a It's Perfectly reasonable and perfectly okay if you cannot do it on your own um you know that's why you know we exist right many people um they end up you know because of their ego or you know some other reason right they're not necessarily willing to seek out that help and they just sort of keep digging themselves into a deeper and deeper and deeper whole and I'm sure you would agree with this Mariola like the the sooner you catch this and the sooner you try to address it the easier it's going to be for you to be able to make that recovery back to the life that you want to live absolutely and as we do that we're also helping others to do the same because it's amazing but mainly more people than what we think are struggling with this and as we are advocating for that change in our own lives we can also help the lives of many more so thank you absolutely [Applause] thanks for listening to hear more episodes find us on social media or support us financially visit the brainpeoplepodcast.com [Music]
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