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Some years ago good friend of mine pointed out some signs of erosion
or warning signs on the pathway to burn out, pointed them out to me and a number
of leaders. It really resonated with me.
I actually taught them at a conference I was at recently. I shared with a group of
leaders those same warning signs and it resonated with them.
I think they will resonate with you
and I want to cover three of them
that are indicators that you may be drifting toward burnout.
The first one is words without action.
"Hey let's do lunch we will have to get together on that."
"Hey, I will call you next week."
"My team will have to get together and discuss that." "You know someone needs to
put a strategy retreat together or a planning session." "Yeah, we'll do that, I'll
get back to you on that."
All of this sort of activity in words and cliches
with no action behind and no follow-through is an indicator that maybe
your filling space with words and avoiding
true meaningful conversation where there's real dialogue and real engagement.
And I think you gotta pay attention to that.
Sometimes it's better not to say anything there's an old Jewish proverb
that says, "Even a fool, when he's silent, is thought to be wise."
So pay attention to how you're using words. Are you creating a lot of space that's
filled with words and cliches and da, da da da?
People are like. "Whoa,
you know she talks a good talk or he talks a good talk
but there's walk there. There's no follow through,
your integrity
will be compromised.
A second one is busyness without purpose.
Shuffling the papers on the desk again, reorganizing the files, doing yet another
search checking, did I get liked on Facebook, who's looking at my profile
on LinkedIn?
After all it has been
three minutes since I checked.
This sense of I need to constantly be active and busy in finding out
information.
Researchers at Purdue did a study of television watching in light of
the proliferation of tablets,
mobile devices, the internet, they expected to find a drop in television
watching as we spend more time looking at these other screens. Just the opposite
happened. Television watching increased during the proliferation of all these
devices.
And they made this comment, People are spending more time looking at screens
than they are into one another's faces.
Instead of doing meaningful relationships, instead of having purpose
to our activity, we're filling it with distractions.
And it's something to be aware of, the more and more you do that the more it says
there's something breaking down here, just busyness for the sake of busyness will lead
to burn out.
A third thing, there's relationships without reciprocity or relationships
without a return.
I give, I teach, I serve, I help, I care ...
I never get back.
So to have relationships where you're always on the giving side of the equation and
never on the receiving side
is going to lead you to emotional breakdown. You need to be filled up in
relationship you need mentors and friends and others to speak into your
life not just for you to serve and teach and help others.
So how you use your words,
how you spend your time,
just busyness for the sake of busyness
and how you connect in relationship are three factors to pay attention to
help avoid a drift
toward burnout.