are you a burnout? have you ever been a burnout?

Lily Dale, as a young person I vaguely thought I would become a writer. It was something my family taught me to value highly. I read a lot, had a good grasp of language, and a vocabulary in the 99th percentile. But in reality I was clueless about how to enter a career as a writer.

I didn't get serious until I'd dropped out of college, flailed around a while, and made a fresh start at college after another couple years. Even at The Evergreen State College I never found anyone qualified to teach me what I needed to learn, so I just read analytically and wrote non-stop for a couple of years. I got much better. Not in the MFA sense, but that wasn't my goal.

I still knew nothing about how to write a publishable book. I wrote one third of an historical novel. It was a decent start, possibly commercial, but I ran out of time. I finally shelved that ambition, tried my hand at advertising copywriting, hated it, then became a very proficient technical writer. Finally, I wrote a book that satisfied me. It isn't a book that would ever make a dime for me or any publisher, because it doesn't fit any pre-existing audience or market. But I am a writer and I have written one good book. That turns out to be enough.

Wow, Aimless, how cool! I didn't mean to derail the thread with Woe Is Me I Should Be A Writer, which is just something my brain yells at me from time to time, rather than something I really believe. But I suppose it is relevant to burnout - in the sense that when I burned out teaching, I also had a little voice in my brain saying "This is what you get for going into teaching; what made you think you could be good at this when you should be doing something else?"

I've been perfecting severe procrastination as a form of high-functioning burnout for 40 or so years, man.

it could be argued that I am but I think I just screwed everything up instead

^ same

i was so wasted, yes

That track is so killer

tomorrow is going to be long and i'm already feeling burned out by it, lol, but i've got weights in the morning and love at home, maybe that's all that matters.

my last job totally burned me out hard, it was really bad. I am a def a burnout/slacker in general but I consider that a different thing.

I think I was collosally frazzled by the end of the 90s. It's possible to push on as a teen but after 15 years of work (when I had jobs) and the main curriculum of caning it, in both areas with very little if any understanding of limits to do with neurotype, the breaks were going to go on hard one way or another. At the last minute I managed to duck out from under several piles of shit into an art college course with the expectation that it would at least allow me to get by for a few years, which it did. Two decades later I wouldn't say I've recovered completely but I'm healthier than ever in some ways and knowing one's limits is incredibly valuable it turns out.

know limits

Me and my partner are both hitting the wall I think

TS being "a burnout" vs being "burned out"

― I want to change my display name (dan m), Sunday, November 29, 2020 12:42 AM (six months ago) bookmarkflaglink

I'd not heard of being "a burn out" until this thread but have been pondering feeling "burned out" for a bit. What helps with the latter?

If I consider Graham Greene's dictum that burnout is the long despair of doing nothing well then aye, I can see that in the last 15 months.

That Graham Greene line certainly sums up the kind of burnout I experienced. Intellectually I knew I'd been set up to fail and there was no way I could reach the standards I expected of myself, but that doesn't make it any less soul-killing to keep failing.

I don't really know what helps, though, other than leaving your job if that is what you are burned out by. That was what I did, but I didn't have a choice; I got bumped from my job and it was crushing but also the best thing that could have happened to me. (I also developed a sudden, consuming obsession with Bruce Springsteen, which helped pretty much instantly, but I don't know that this would help/be possible for anyone else.)

I was in a bad state a few years ago (financial dire straits, suicide attempt by partner, section 47, my son with autism going through a very angry violent stage of adolescent development). What I learnt was I can actually be a surprisingly scary mofo when I'm on the edge. Now a few local thugs who I made to look like the soft wankers they are want to come back for me. Just when I'm back to my normal chilled self - I now have to rediscover my burnt out, on the edge persona - just to survive in this goddam jungle!

everybody I know is a burnout

i have been a burnout since i was about 13 probably. intrigued that there are people who say they were once burnouts but are no longer, or are less burnt out than they once were. what's the secret - therapy? no drugs? different drugs? yoga? change in occupation and/or location? luck?

I feel like I haven't burnt out hard enough. Yet. Which is tantamount to being a burnout.

change in occupation and/or location? luck?

― Left

Yep, yep, yep

planning to move & get a job, the rest is in god's hands

all my worst nightmares are about working, literally! I had one last night.

i don't want to work but not working hasn't done me much good either so idk

I get burned out about the third week of every month. But then the first two weeks of the new month all the money arrives and I feel better.

conditions are slowly improving for me being less of a burnout, at about the rate my aging seems to be eroding my energy stores.

kinda like my annual raise being cancelled out by annual rent / cost of living increases. which, come to think of it, is a big contributor to my burnout.

Let me tell ya, I am fucking *thrilled* to be done (in a few weeks) with this freelance gig I've been working on and off since February. I think I'm just going to take January off and take long winter hikes with the dogs, work on writing, and fuck around. I need it.