The Burnout Queens

UK’s leading coaches for woman and burnout

Divine Madness | Love Your Work!

February 13, 2016

The Burnout Queens love Love; big Love, small Love, puppy Love! Of course we are talking about Love today, check the date! (There are times we love to be predictable!) In past years we’ve ‘done’ Love (with a capital L), we’ve definitely talked about self-love and yes we have even explored the steamy kind, but love of work, loving what you do, is not necessarily the dot that gets connected to hearts and flowers.

Plato referred to love as ‘divine madness’ and Freud believed that two of the most important aspects of life were love and work. So is it madness to believe you need to love your work to be healthy and happy? The Burnout Queens don’t think so!

We have a very real need to love what we do… our work, the product, our art, our contribution and our success.
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If we connect love with work we should expect big moments of passion, true calling, momentous insights, or at least a big ‘kissy fest’ with our colleagues all the time…right? Not necessarily so.

It can be a challenge to notice signs, big or small, of the kind of love that means your work is engaging your soul. These signs often hide in the everyday, the mundane, the tedious and the commonplace. So what exactly are you looking for?

Well, when you work with mindfulness you begin to identify signs of loving what you do: a moment of pride for a well done job; a rush of warmth, understanding or caring toward a co-worker; the comfortable familiarity of an everyday task; the old books on the shelves in the boardroom; taking a moment to ‘see’ the painting you love on your office wall, the view outside your window; knowing you are doing ‘good’ work or providing for your life and family.

Here are some moments of love in my work:

	Typing this draft with my soul-dog on my lap (not great for my posture but fab for my heart),
	Receiving a ‘Hello here’s what I’m up to!’ from a long-ago (but never forgotten) client,
	Having an ‘ah hah moment’ when two seemingly diverse ideas collide and become something new...BIG LOVE!
	Writing that flows from the heart.
	A hot cup of tea and biscuit on the corner of my desk.
	Being ‘told’ to take a break by a ball dropped on my foot or thrown down the stairwell followed by barking!
	Receiving baby pictures, pet pictures, family pictures from clients new and old.
	Taking a brain-break by editing something already written (ah relax).
	Dropping a quick “Thinking of you” to a client for no reason other than to connect.
	Hearing the birds in the tree outside my window.
	Looking up to see the picture of Dad on my bookshelf.
	Stopping to read the Burnout Queens Desiderata (You mean you haven’t got one? Join the Realm Darlings!)

Let’s be honest we can all lose the love of our work from time to time!

There will be days you don’t feel like showing up, but don’t make the mistake of thinking this means you don’t love what you do!

Stress, pressures, deadlines, dreaded tasks, the evil boss or conniving colleague, or just the tedium of the everyday can trick even the most enlightened and sensitive amongst us into missing (or possibly avoiding or ignoring) many opportunities to connect with the love of what you do.

In the BIG picture we all want to be happy at work. We want our work to be engaging, pleasurable and fun at times. We truly want to feel like we are doing something that contributes to the wellbeing of others in the world. That sense of contributing is love personified.

Yes there are times when we drag ourselves ‘to the office’ moaning, but there are other times when maybe life is in turnoil that work becomes a place of refuge, a sanctuary. Just the other day a client whose world has been turned upside down said it so clearly, “Thank goodness for my work, it’s keeping me sane!” There was a time that my office became my retreat, my haven of peace, from family illness, crises and loss. It was physically a peaceful and serene place, I loved my clients, and when ‘in session’ I was unavailable to the outside world! What’s not to love.

Even if you aren’t currently in your ideal job or career, allow yourself to love aspects of what you are doing.

Finding love for what you do in the present doesn’t mean you can’t dream about the future and embrace change when it comes.
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Love for your work, in whatever nooks and crannies you can find it, opens up your imagination, your creativity and awakens your soul.

Being a highly sensitive woman means you were delightfully designed to find work you love but first you have to find love in your work.

From our hearts to yours…Happy Valentines Day!

PS. The BOQs would love to hear from you! Leave your wisdom and comments in the box below.

Time to take a break when…

February 9, 2016

It was definitely time to take a break…

The Burnout Queens took a week out to drop off the work scene. It was definitely time! If it’s one thing I have learnt over my long career it’s time to take a break when…

I want to stay in bed and pull the duvet up over my head
I want to do anything but sit at my desk
I want to do anything but speak with my dear clients
I want to retire and move to a quiet beach (oh wait I’ve done some of that!)
I find myself crankie at the dogs for everything (even when they are being cute)
I find myself dreading ‘calling home’ to speak to my 99 year old mother
I can’t catch a train to London because of weather or no petsitter (no cultural play makes me very grumpy)
I can’t stand being around people and noise (my Dietrich moments)
I can’t focus for more than a few seconds (unless it’s a puzzle and I’m obsessed)

I’m sure you get the idea. And I’m doubly sure you recognise many of these for yourself! Better to take a break and gather my steam again so that I can be creative, present and enjoyable to be around. Of course, breaks are always announced to clients after looking at the calendar, asking them to change their call dates (seldom do this, but…) and clearing the decks of responsibility.

I’m pleased to say that I didn’t decide to pack a million and one things into 7 days, but I did some very pleasant sightseeing and tea sipping at my leisure. You could say a curative rest. It was a good plan and the feedback from my community says Dr T and I are great role models for taking care of ourselves and not burning out. Well that’s the idea anyway!

Next time you find yourself feeling the same way, take yourself away and rest up. Take it from these 2 docs, “You could just prevent yourself from burning out!”

Love, Dr B (The Burnout Queens) xx

Giving Is Simply Fun

January 26, 2016

This last Christmas, The Burnout Queens decided to add a little sparkle to girls’ and womens’ lives. We decided it’s time to put our Christmas Chaos Campaign into action.

Ladies who read us…and get our philosophy…were asked to purchase our It’s Beginning to Look A Lot Like Chaos video and learn how to create delight in the holidays, instead of dread! As an incentive we decided to send all the proceeds…yes 100% +…to WaterAid to help young girls get an education rather than walking all day to gather water for their village. The purchase + our donation match + UK governments match.

Well…proud to say that we got some lovely hearted women on board and we raised £50.00 for WaterAid. So like all good women after Christmas….we shopped! Here’s what we got with your help, our help and the government’s help: a bag or 2 of cement, enough to build the foundations of a village loo!!

And because a woman can’t just stop at bags, we thought a little red toolkit was the perfect accessory. This red toolkit will fix the water supplies in not 1, but 10 villages.

Now that’s what I call a shopping spree. It was fantastically fun to know that your £2 expanded to give young girls the chance to open a book or two and help her village for the future in a different and important way.

And we hope that those of you who helped in this global way, found some fun and merriment in the suggestions we gave on our latest edition of It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Chaos.

Till next year’s campaign kicks off with another offering. Thanks from us to all our Burnout Queen friends. Your generosity is uplifting.

With love, The Burnout Queens xx

Big Hair, High Heels! The Power of Confidence

January 23, 2016

Hello! Happy January & Happy New Year to all you fabulous Burnout Queens! We hope your year has gotten off to a great start. You probably expected us to kick-off (that would be a high kick!) 2016 with a ‘rah- rah, you can change your life tomorrow’ article! Far too ordinary, just not BOQ style. We are going for the gusto; dig in and dig deep! Let’s start the year with confidence, we say! No, really, this article is all about confidence…the power of confidence.

So…what is the power of confidence? Are you ready? Ta Dah…

You own your confidence!
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Yes, it’s truly that simple! Confidence comes from the inside; it is determined by you. Confidence is about your beliefs, attitudes and experience. It really isn’t about outside stuff like tasks, situations or relationships.

You, and only you, decide if you are a confident woman.
Now that’s powerful!

There are plenty of myths and misunderstandings about confidence out there. Like this idea that confidence is a singular state of being; constant and steady, with no ebb and flow. No wonder so many of us trip-up over confidence when we think of it as an either/or thing. Confidence, you have it or you don’t. Now that’s a myth for sure!

As long as you believe there is only one way to be confident you may make proclamations (cause that’s what Queens do!) like ‘I’m not confident’, ‘I don’t know how to be confident!’ or (we love this one) ‘I’ve lost my confidence’!!! All of these statements are likely untrue and if we are to be completely frank with you darling a little ‘passe’!

Be assured, confidence doesn’t have to be complicated, not even when you are a Highly Sensitive and creative HSP (and as you well know us HSPs can complicate most anything we put our minds to!) It’s just that confidence is multi-faceted like a brilliant diamond. The experience of confidence is as varied and unique as you.

There is no one-size-fits-all feeling of confidence.

Confidence is situational. You may be perfectly confident in one area of your life but quake in your ever-so-fashionable boots at the mere thought of another. That’s perfectly normal! (Yes, we use that term advisedly!)

Confidence has an ebb and flow. Lots of things can affect your confidence, your mood, the company you are in, your physical state, even if you have slept poorly the night before. Just ‘cause confidence can fluctuate doesn’t mean you don’t have it!

Confidence comes with doing. This is vitally important to remember because confidence diminishes with avoiding.

Confidence can be ‘borrowed’ from one area of your life to enhance another. Think about it…if you are good at xyz over there, you can borrow skills or strengths or attitudes to hold you in good confidence in situation abc!

Confidence can be (how shall we put this?) improvised! Even if you are feeling particularly shaky you can pull it out of a hat. Remember when you were young and played pretend or dress-up? Uh huh, who cares if you are all grown up, you can ‘play pretend’ with confidence. I remember this Board Meeting that had me a nervous wreck, so I just dressed up (in my imagination) as Tina Turner and made my entrance. Voila, instant over-the-top confidence (not to mention BIG hair)! Here’s the hidden treasure in this one, shhhh, if you can pull it off with your imagination…you can actually do it. So own it. Strut your stuff!

Confidence grows when you are honest with yourself and others about your strengths, talents and capabilities. This can be a little tricky for HSPs since we tend to under-estimate our abilities and our gifts, but the benefits are so fab it is well worth the discomfort of trying on this attitude. It’s a perfect fit!

Self-honesty lets you be a learner, not-so-good at something or own being absolutely brilliant!!

So what are some other key misunderstandings about confidence…hmmm, thinking…got it!

Confidence is not something that you lose or carelessly misplace. You lose contact lenses, you lose your keys, you lose your phone…you do not lose your confidence. (So Darling please, no more ‘I’ve lost my confidence’!)

Confidence is not something someone else can take away from you! The Power of Confidence is that YOU own it, it never belonged to anyone else…ever. (So no more hiding behind that one!)

AND…get ready for it…for the record, you did not miss out on confidence by being in the wrong line when you were born. (Nice try!)

Oh, and this is important, as a confident woman you do not have to be able to do anything and everything confidently the first time. Do not fall into that trap!

Confidence comes from experiencing, succeeding and even failing.
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Here are a few more tid bits to think about when considering the power of confidence…

If you have never done something before it stands to reason that you would have less confidence, but that doesn’t mean you have no confidence. Increase your confidence by relating what you are about to do or enter into to similar situations or tasks you have been successful at in the past. Then say to yourself…

I am confident! I’ve had experiences like this before.

If you have done something and been a little less than perfect at it (what can we say, it happens) you might be a little ‘iffy’ about climbing on that learning curve again. Relax, that’s why they call it a learning curve, you are allowed to be a learner!

Confidence increases with doing. Try again!
Give it a chance.

What if you have been doing the same thing over and over again and not succeeding or not even enjoying it? You tell yourself you have failed and so has your confidence! Stop right there. Get honest and ask yourself why you continue to do something you either aren’t any good at or you don’t like. If something (or someone) is a bad fit, it’s simply a bad fit! Darling, your confidence isn’t gone but you have to stop wearing the same old trainers and find some high heels you can proudly walk in!

When you don’t believe in your confidence you spend time and energy fighting mental, emotional and even physical blocks. You will feel heavy with anxiety, worry and trepidation because you are fighting shadows that aren’t real.

Stop hiding from the power of your confidence. When you tell yourself that you don’t have confidence you end up avoiding and not experiencing something that you could be very very good at, brilliant at in fact! That’s just not ‘ok’ with us! So…

Get ready Burnout Queens…

Are you ready to own the Power of Confidence?

Are you ready to wear your confidence crown with pizzazz?

YOU ARE A CONFIDENT WOMAN!

We declare that with the utmost confidence!

PS. The BOQs would love to hear from you! Leave your wisdom and comments in the box below.

Not My Responsibility!

January 22, 2016

Twice this week clients, professional HSP working women, have wanted my opinion about situations that had come up at work and the common denominator…is this my responsibility?

Responsibility is tricky for us highly sensitive (dare I say, oh sure why not since I’m one too!) perfectionistic, over-achieving, and highly ethical and responsible women! You see we have been raised and trained to take responsibility for everything and anything whether it actually is our responsibility or not! And we step up and then we stew about it. Two scenarios:

First one: Client is aware that a colleague is partaking in some pretty unethical behaviour. My client had alerted the owners of the company about this possibility when they hired this other worker – it wasn’t a suggestion to not hire them just to keep an eye on them. Over and over again my client tried to raise the red flag, which was part of her original consultancy responsibility but wasn’t really listened to by the powers that be. This time my client directly addressed the situation with the person who was carrying out this questionable behaviour to be met with a complete ‘who cares!’ attitude. So now she was wondering do I go to ‘the bosses’ with it? Lots of you are probably saying, ‘of course!’ (probably because you are also HSPs full of integrity).

My response…not your responsibility any longer, let it go. They didn’t listen to you before, they are not going to listen now. Take yourself off the hook and don’t enter a contentious situation.

Second situation: Budget! My client, a financial exec, brings forward an invoice of varying tech costs with a whole list of reasons why some should be excluded from these tech consultants. Bosses attitude is “just pay it!” But, but, but…

My response…not your company, his company, you did your job, you raised the issue, you showed him the evidence…pay it, it’s his money!

I’ll probably have lots of people disagreeing with me, even I disagree with me sometimes! However, I also know that our proclivity to take 150% responsibility for things that aren’t ultimately our responsibility gets us into trouble.

Take the steps you need to feel like you can look at yourself in the mirror, know you have done your best, then let it go. You can’t be right, or listened to, all the time. Darn!

Love, Dr Toby (The Burnout Queens)) xx

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