Thoughts on Stress, Burn Out......

Recently I’ve heard (and had) many conversations about burn out. Burn out physically, mentally, emotionally.

And the strange thing is that we all seem surprised… like this shouldn’t be a thing. But let’s stop for a minute— We as a collective human race have been through almost 3 years of a pandemic, tumultuous political circumstances in our country, and very extreme weather situations this summer. So why do we act like we are super heroes who can just charge through and come out unscathed?

It’s time we cut ourselves some slack!

I’ve come to accept something recently that I’ve known for a long time but have been resisting for many years. The level of productivity that I expect of myself is not reasonable or most importantly sustainable.

This realization began back in spring of 2018. A few things happened: the honeymoon period of farming wore off. The honeymoon period is where you make the excuse of “I love this work so it’s okay that I put in 14 hour days.”

My extended family (mine and my husbands) began incurring some life altering health issues. There were multiple times that spring that I seriously considered going back to my old life of being a graphic design freelancer.

I began searching for the elusive “balance.” It took me a little while to figure out that it doesn’t exist. Balance would mean that we are able to place equal attention on multiple things at once. Ask anyone who has ever tried to multi-task how well that works.

Priority is a much better word. At a specific moment in time, where do you place your priority? What activities do you value enough to give them your precious time and attention?

It’s a continuous lesson I think. Especially if you are an optimistic type like me- we always over-estimate what we can accomplish. I remember working a 14 hour day many years ago- I was building raised beds and hauling compost for a new field on the farm. I didn’t quite finish the project but started right up again the next day. I didn’t last 5 hours!

And after I recovered, it occurred to me that I’d be much more productive if I worked the same number of hours but split it between 2 days— I spent as much time recovering as I did working because of the one day of overwork. This led me to begin examining my work habits, hours, and how I was spending my time on the farm.

I set a goal to work no more than 9 hours a day during the busy season and only 6-8 during the winter. And let me tell you—- it’s taken a long time to get there! It’s downright hard to convince yourself that you can run a farm on a 40 hour week.

Can you do it by yourself? No, not unless it’s a very small farm. But setting goals like this caused me to evaluate every single task on the farm. I had to prioritize the things that would contribute to the bottom line of the farm. I also realized I would need to hire help (which has been so amazing!).

I also set a goal to take a day and a half off on the farm. This was hard— I had to physically leave my farm at first to take the time off. I knew if I stayed on the farm, I would end up working. But overtime, I began to look forward to that day off- to the fun I was going to have. I began to see how much more productive I was when I rested my body and my mind.

Now it’s become a habit to not work on the weekends. I can sit on my back porch and read a book and stare at my field and not feel guilty or like I should be working. I allow plants and seedlings to be watered but that’s it. I do have an employee who does the weekend harvest for me. There are some flowers that have to be harvested daily/every other day. Having an entire weekend has allowed me time to rest, have fun and feel excited when Monday morning rolls around.

If you work a 9-5/M-F type of job, you may think this sounds crazy but this is the life of a farmer and a lot of self-employed people. We have an insane drive and this causes us to overwork. But it’s not sustainable. And at some point you burn out.

Any you know what? Even when you are taking regular breaks and days off- you can still burn out or get stressed out. Because our bodies aren’t machines. There is no magic formula that we can honor to run at peak efficiency all the time.

Realizing that my body is going to ebb and flow in it’s energy levels has been a game changer. And it’s not always related to the amount of sleep or time off. Being aware of your stress triggers and the symptoms that your body manifests is sooo important.

This awareness is how we can catch ourselves before we reach burn out. But in all honesty, trying to make sure we take care of ourselves can cause stress too. Eating right, exercising enough, sleeping well, getting enough social interaction— it could be a full time job just to manage that in your life.

Because having the awareness of what I need to avoid burnout is a bit of a double edged sword, I’ve begun focusing on one thing at a time until it become habit. It comes back to those priorities again. We want our lives to feel balanced but we have to realize that we do constantly make choices based on our priorities.

Hopefully you aren’t feeling more overwhelmed at this point. If so, try starting a list of what makes you happy— what things in your life make it worth getting up everyday. What activities, forms of exercise, or groups of people do you want to give more time to?

Choose One.

Just one- and work on it until it become a habit. Something that is so ingrained in your life that you would feel the gaping hole if it ceased to be. Then you move on to the next thing and overtime, you take your life back from the unrealistic expectation of productivity that is etched into our minds.

So what one thing are you going to choose?