burnout in careers
Life is now so be present
Time To Pack-Up And Move On?
You are brilliant, Darling! We know it and you know it. You sparkle in your own unique way. But sadly, the brilliance of your brilliance isn’t always appreciated! In fact, it is often misunderstood and sometimes, well sometimes, it just goes unnoticed! Now that’s a royal pain!
Now you could just recline on a chaise lounge, despairing about why the world doesn’t understand you, or you could read our three simple answers to why you may need to pack-up your brilliance and move on! Are you ready?
#1 – Creative, quirky, sensitive types can’t thrive in environments that don’t get us.
Sometimes the environments you choose to work or live in are unsupportive, plain and simple. When you try to survive in environments that don’t appreciate your HSP nature you eventually begin to feel diminished or less than. Seriously, if this is the case, you need to have a good honest conversation with yourself. Have you ended up in an environment (office, group of friends, relationship) where your brilliance isn’t appreciated, goes unnoticed, gets ignored, is made fun of, or put down? Your surroundings can make you feel like you need to hide the best of you. You know, an environment like this can actually get to the point of feeling hostile. No, my loves, you are not imagining it.
So if you are in an environment where it feels like your intelligence, senses, and emotions are becoming dulled, then it’s time to take your brilliance where it can be freely expressed. You deserve to find places in the world that nourish your sensitivity and creativity.
Seek places that are open to your strengths, talents, gifts, humour, love of beauty, and unique world view.
You need environments where you can be true to who you are. You definitely want to spend your life in places that reflect your values and beliefs. If you are to feel respected and honoured you need to know that others benefit from, enjoy, and value your uniqueness.
#2 – Hey, if they don’t get you, they don’t get you.
Sometimes people don’t appreciate your brilliance. Actually, some people are unnerved by it or threatened by it! Oh we know you may not believe that, but it’s true, you are often perceived as powerful whether you know it or not!
We know you are naturally inclined to keep trying to get your <insert here> (boss, mother, father, partner, colleague, sister, teacher…) to ‘see’ your brilliance, to see things from your perspective, to accept your novel approach to things. But seriously, what a waste of time and energy! Constantly trying to explain yourself only tarnishes your brilliance. “If they just understood me everything would be fine.” They won’t. So (excuse our bluntness darling) but time to…
Stop selling your soul. Stop trying to get ‘them’ to see the errors of their ways.
When you continue to attempt to scale this wall you only increase your own stress. You are never going to persuade them, prove to them, get them on-side, or ‘help’ them to see things from your point of view. Sorry, but they don’t want to, they aren’t able to, they are simply not there with you! And, you know what, that’s ok.
You have a choice to make, you can stay in that ‘old’ place of proving your genius or you can pack-up. We just want you to know that as long as you stay stuck in that struggle you are a single pirouette away from creating your own burnout.
#3 – Admit it! You hide your brilliance.
Indeed, you sometimes go to royal lengths to hide your brilliance. Well, my dears, it’s time to show-off your strengths, successes and achievements. Now relax we’re not saying you need to get all diva-ish or braggy, not at all, we know that would make you uncomfortable. You see, somewhere along the way you became more comfortable letting others see your less than powerful points. But seriously, where does that get you? Only to the place you fear the most; boredom, tedium, and dullness. That is no place for a Burnout Queen!
Darling it’s high time you get your crown out and start polishing because you are ready to show the world just how much you can sparkle! If you keep hiding who you are, you will eventually begin to feel diminished and you may even start believing that you are dull! AND, this could simply never be the case!
You know, it’s perfectly alright to appreciate the times you are afraid to let your brilliance show. You may temporarily feel afraid of what will be asked of you, afraid you are not ‘up to the job’, maybe afraid you have been kidding yourself about your brilliance all these years, that you are, well…oh let’s just say it, a fraud!
You know, it’s o.k. to be afraid as long as you don’t let that stop you.
What are you waiting for? If you aren’t going to show the world how much you have to offer, who is?
It may take a little getting used to, but the next time someone says to you ‘How do you do it all?’ You simply answer, “Extremely well!” When someone asks, ‘How are you today? Your answer…
“Brilliant!”
It’s time to take your brilliance where you can let it shine!
Until Next Time…Grab Life by the Crown!
P.S. The BOQs would love to hear from you! Leave your wisdom and comments in the box below.
Never Let Me Loose in the Dictionary!
I was nose deep in the Oxford dictionary (a childhood habit I still secretly indulge in) looking up a word that I and many other HSPs frequently use, and that word is DRUDGERY. Most often it is used in association with work. However, I was thinking how sometimes that same feeling of drudgery goes beyond work, way beyond a job. There have been times in my life when I felt like I was drowning in drudgery! So what is going on when LIFE starts feeling like drudgery? Here’s the dictionary scoop on drudgery…
Drudgery refers to dull and hard work. Yes, that simple. I admit I was expecting more. Now, I’m confused. You see I don’t mind hard work and occasionally I even relish dull work (it gives my overactive brain a rest, like folding socks). No, drudgery doesn’t quite capture the experience of feeling like someone has turned the lights out on your life. Back to my old friend Oxford!
Now here’s a word, TRUDGE: to walk with slow and heavy steps. Yes, that definitely describes what some days feel like when you are not enjoying life, but simply going through the motions. Life definitely feels like this when you are in the process of burning out. (I used to describe this feeling as walking through wet cement). Then it hit me!
It’s TRUDGERY!
Trudging is existential. When I am trudging I am lost. I am caught in the minutia of life. One day blurs into the next. I’m exhausted and totally unsatisfied. I am just doing and don’t know why. (Hmmm, sounds a lot like burnout!) I don’t know where I’m going, I have no idea why I’m going, but I’m going. The thing about trudgery, you can be fully in motion and still feel meaningless.
“Sorry don’t have time to sit down and think about where I am going, you see I’m trudging.” Trudge trudge trudge… Next stop, burnout.
Right, now I’m going to confuse you even more! (Never let me loose in a dictionary!) Seriously I can’t even remember why this word jumped out at me, but it did and behold it made perfect sense. REDEEM. Now there were a few variations on this theme, but one made total sense: to regain possession of something in exchange for payment. BINGO!
We have been “trudging towards redemption!” Walking with slow and heavy steps through the dull and the mundane (don’t forget tedious!) in order to regain possession of something which you have come to believe you are paying for day in and day out with monotony, boredom, lack of enthusiasm, loss of energy and ultimately with what feels like selling your soul! And in this moment of enlightenment we have our solution. Right here right now we are writing off your debt!
You don’t have to ‘make payment’ for who you are, how you live your life, the work you want to do, your creative soul, or just being YOU!
Say it out loud, “ I will not trudge through my life. My days of trudging are over. (We can’t hear you! Louder!) My days of trudging are history!
We know that sometimes it’s ‘easier’ to trudge than to be all paid-up and ready to move on. “Oh no, move on where?” You don’t need to know where right now, or even how. You just need to know that deciding not to trudge is a one time decision that is yours to make.
Swearing off trudging is one of those big life U-turns! In an instant everything is different.
(tweet this)
Oh, we know it’s not always that simple and it doesn’t automatically mean your relationship will get an instant make-over or your job won’t be drudgery come Monday, but it really isn’t as complex as you think. Here’s what you need to do…
Each and every morning when your feet hit the floor, recommit to your present and your future. Remind yourself that you will no longer ‘trudge towards redemption’.
- You are free NOW to walk your own path, or dance it if you dare!
- You are free NOW to do the work you love to do.
- You are free NOW to pursue your dreams and desires.
- You are free NOW to live as boldly and as bravely as the very unique, sensitive, creative YOU chooses to!
- You are free NOW to live life, your life, as YOU.
Don your crown, are you ready? The Burnout Queens declare! You are redeemed. No more trudging.
You are free NOW to defy ordinary!
Until Next Time…Grab Life by the Crown!
P.S. The BOQs would love to hear from you! Leave your wisdom and comments in the box below.
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