Self-Care Alone Is Not How To Recover From Chronic Stress And Burnout
- Oct 22, 2022
- 4 min read
Updated: Oct 23, 2022
Written by: Jen Barnes, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Only practicing self-care is not how to recover from chronic stress and burnout so you can feel better. In fact, only practicing self-care without addressing the underlying stressors or factors contributing to your chronic stress and burnout will leave you feeling more exhausted and eventually more burned out.
I can understand why you would think that self-care alone is the way to go. Tons of gurus and psychotherapists like me are telling you “do more self-care”. It’s true that self-care is an essential part of life and is very effective in helping us cope with day-to-day stress.
The problem is, when we are facing chronic stress and burnout, there is usually a much bigger underlying issue creating or contributing to that stress. If we never address this underlying stressor, our self-care may help us feel better while we are doing it or in the short term, but it will be harder and harder to do and long term we will completely burn out. It’s like plugging a hole in your boat with your finger. Sure, in the short term, you may keep the boat from sinking. But you have to keep your finger there or water will gush in and the boat will sink. It’s exhausting to hold your finger there and it isn’t addressing the underlying issue which is the hole in your boat. What you’re doing isn’t sustainable and won’t work long-term. And, if you continue only doing self-care without addressing the underlying problem, you could believe your self-care isn’t working and stop that too so then you feel even worse. You might even feel shame that you can’t help yourself out of this.
So what do resilient people do?
Resilient people do their self-care too. They exercise, eat nutritiously, get plenty of solid sleep and rest, engage in fun activities, connect with others, and engage in activities that promote emotional, mental, and spiritual wellness. AND, they also address the underlying issue. They consider the underlying issues they face and figure out a way to address them. There are several ways to address underlying stressors, some for those stressors that are outside of your control and some for those within your control. I’m about to share one way that resilient people address underlying stressors that are within their control, though there are three that I teach in my programs. One way resilient people approach stressors within their control is by communicating their wants, needs, and boundaries clearly and kindly. This may not be profound, yet it is something most people don’t do because it is hard. Most people complain to their coworkers and loved ones about the dysfunctional, even toxic, systems in which they work as though venting will help. But the problem is, while venting may feel good in the moment, it doesn’t solve the problem and can leave the venter feeling more stuck. The good news is, it doesn’t have to be this way. For stressors that are within your control, you can learn to communicate clear and compassionate boundaries around what you will and won’t do as well as communicate your needs and wants effectively.
There are ways to do this that honor both sides of the relationship (I.e., including yourself) and shift the situation into more of a negotiation, particularly in work settings in which negotiation may be useful.
To do this, you need to:
Be willing to have uncomfortable conversations
Communicate clearly, compassionately, and effectively about what is okay for you and what is not okay
Listen to the other person
Learn how to be accepting of nuance and uncertainty
Tolerate discomfort and teach your nervous system that discomfort is not the same as a lack of safety
Be willing to accept non-binary solutions
This work isn’t easy. In fact, it’s hard work. Work you have to be willing to commit to if you want things to change.
To me, it’s a matter of what kind of discomfort you want to deal with. Would you rather deal with the discomfort of things staying the same or the discomfort of the tough conversations?
The choice is yours.
If you feel ready to do this deeper work you’re invited to join the Priority Notification List for my upcoming launch of The Resilient Woman Program™ where you will learn all of the steps for recovering from chronic stress and building resilience, including how to address the underlying stressors you face as well as three other essential steps for recovering from chronic stress and burnout.
Previously, this program was open only to nurses. However, due to multiple requests from women in other high-pressure jobs and careers like teaching, physical therapy, social work, psychotherapy, finance, and other allied healthcare professions, I have opened this course up to all women in high-pressure jobs.
The Resilient Woman Program™ will now launch Winter 2023 to be able to include all of you professional women experiencing chronic stress who want to build resilience so you can feel better in your body, enjoy life again, and maybe enjoy your work again. I look forward to working together soon!
Click here to join the Priority Notification list.
Jen Barnes, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Jen Barnes is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker in private practice in Minneapolis, MN. She specializes in complex trauma, PTSD, stress, and grief. The daughter and sister of nurses, she has a passion for empowering nurses to build resilience. She has worked with nurses 1:1 hoping to expand her reaching to a broader audience. In 2021 she completed the Dare to Lead certificate program in order to more effectively address organizational challenges in healthcare. Most recently, she spoke at the American Association of Critical Care Nurses’s 2022 NTI conference on Building Resilience in Nursing.
