5 Ways To Rest While In A Burnout
When I find myself in a state of burnout, I have trouble doing just about anything. When I get to the point where I am beyond sleepy and it’s really just a feeling of exhaustion of mind and body the only cure for me is rest and time.
With rest, sleep isn’t always enough. There are different areas of rest that you need in life that help to recover from feeling so exhausted. Just like anything, different ways of doing things serve different purposes and rest is no different. If I’m finding that sleep is not doing the work I need to recover; it’s essential to look at other areas of resting in my life
Emotional Rest
With emotional rest, it doesn’t necessarily mean avoiding or pushing down emotion. In fact, I think doing this can do the opposite of rest if you find yourself pushing your emotions down. To me, emotional rest is feeling without judgement and allowing a release.
I get more emotional when I’m tired and burnout, and I do find myself feeling more shame when I have more emotions come up. Being kind and okay with letting whatever comes up means rest because you’re letting it come and go instead of shaming and keeping it bottled up. Emotions are energy and bottled up energy is exhausting.
Mental Rest
Mental rest to me means distancing myself from over thinking. When I’m tired or burnout, I find it much easier to spiral or overthink myself or my life. With mental rest I work to let my thoughts come and go, and challenging mean or harmful thoughts about myself.
When I’m already feeling lower, I work to allow kind and uplifting thoughts and not accept everything I think when I know I’m tired. It’s not always easy to do alone, so asking for help when your thoughts get bad makes a difference.
Physical Rest
With physical rest, it’s similar to my perspective on emotional rest. Physical rest doesn’t always have to mean doing absolutely nothing, although sometimes it does. But physical rest is moving in a way that’s not rushing to do something, but doing physical activity with intention and enjoyment.
Sometimes we are in a position we have to physically rush around and do stuff for work or for family, but with physical rest putting an intention to only do one thing at a time and it’s for you only, is physical rest. For me, it’s my gym time with my music doing what I want to do for my body, its taking a walk with a podcast I want to listen to and no time limit, and it’s listening intuitively to my body and napping if I need to.
Sensory Rest
Sensory overload is one of the main ways I know I’m in a burnout or can put me in one. Days of constant stimulation from people, noises, things to do, thinking, and talking is enough for me. For the time I spend in a stimulating environment, I need the trade off of the exact opposite.
When I need sensory rest I love my “dark quiet room time”. In my dark quiet room time the room is quiet and dark and I’m all alone. If I need a little boost I love weighted blankets and headphones with white noise or frequency noise. It’s a time for not only my mind and body but my nervous system a rest.
Social Rest
With social rest, this means saying no and doing less with other people in place of resetting. Doing less for other people, with other people, and around other people. I’m introverted by nature and this is a vital part of me getting rest.
Like the other, social rest is not the same as isolating it’s just doing less for others and more to pour into you for a while. Instead of spending hours with friends or family, maybe drop it down to lunch or a movie or something relaxing.
Rest is about a recharge, and can mean many things when you’re feeling burnt out. Running through different areas of your life that you tend to on a day to day basis and making sure you’re not depleted in that area can be a big help in getting recharged and out of a burn out.
