Let’s face it, it happens to everyone. And it happens to us in the creative industry, no matter how much we love our work.
When burnout happens it doesn’t just impact our professional life but our personal life too. So much of our “self” is woven into what we do and how we do it, that when we burn out our confidence, self worth and identity can take a really nasty hit.
It’s important to learn to recognise the first signs that something is not right, to have coping strategies to deal with it before it spirals out of control and tools to regain motivation and creative flow.
The creative industry is one of the most exciting, fun and rewarding to work in. It offers a chance to innovate, experiment, express yourself, be independent and create things you’re truly proud of. But this near-constant need for inspiration to generate ideas and creative energy to manifest them can lead to major fatigue and burnout.
This can produce feelings of exhaustion (physical and mental), inadequacy, overwhelm and low self esteem and as creative creatures, let’s be honest, we are often a bit dramatic, feeling things quite deeply, so before too long you start feeling like you’ll never get a good idea or create anything worthy never ever again.
So what causes burnout?
- Constant overstimulation
- Long hours
- Deadlines and unrealistic expectations are all common problems for people working in the creative field.
Burnout is not just a creative block, something we’ve all experienced once in a while, it is an actual physical condition, far more severe than a block, it is an exhaustion that impacts your health and emotional well-being.
While it’s normal to have “up and down” phases in life, sometimes brimming with ideas and excitement, other times being unable to catch the flow so easily, though occasionally frustrating, it’s completely normal. The problem lies when creativity is at the heart of your day-to-day job and you’re expected to have moments of inspiration during a normal working day, every day. Burnout is a serious problem for many people in the creative professions.
We feel immense fear of failure in our jobs, how can we produce work when there is zero creative energy left and create is what we do?! With burnout we become less resilient, less able to bounce back from setbacks and criticism, and more fragile in general. We are more likely to give up on projects or relationships that are important to us, either because we just don’t care anymore or because we don’t see any way out of the situation we’re in.
First signs of burnout?
- lack of motivation
- severe fatigue
- loss of interest in things we once enjoyed in work and life in general
- dread of taking on new work and crippling self doubt
But don’t despair, there are things that can help and if you enjoyed reading about this, come back for part two where we tell you how we cope and recover!
