- [Presenter] Hey, Psych2Goers,
welcome back to another brand new video.
Why does it seem like you spend most of your time in bed,
lying down and not doing much lately?
Are you someone who easily gets tired
and doesn't feel like doing anything?
Do you label this kind of behavior
as mere laziness and nothing more?
There's actually a lot of overlap
between laziness and burnout
that can make it difficult to differentiate between the two.
Burnout is a negative state of emotional, physical,
and mental exhaustion caused by excessive stress
and inability to cope with it.
And as of 2010,
a survey reported that approximately 75% of adults
in the United States alone
have experienced symptoms of burnout,
with over 40% of cases being more severe.
Now more than ever, it's become imperative to educate
and better understand the nature of burnout.
So with that said, here are six telltale signs
that what you're experiencing right now
isn't actually laziness but burnout.
Number one, you feel disconnected from everything.
Are you going through the motions of every day
as if on autopilot?
Is there a persistent feeling
of being detached from your own self?
If you're suffering from burnout,
one of the things you might be experiencing
but don't quite realize or understand is depersonalization.
People experiencing depersonalization,
most commonly those struggling with trauma,
report feeling a strange sort of emotional numbness
or emptiness, as if they were watching life
from outside of themselves.
They don't feel like themselves anymore.
They don't feel engaged by anything,
and they constantly struggle
with the overwhelming sense of helplessness
and inability to take back control of their lives.
Number two, you used to be motivated.
Laziness is a character trait,
and character traits tend to remain stable over time.
A lazy person doesn't ever feel like exerting effort
or applying themselves to things.
But if you used to be self-motivated and high-achieving
often excelling in certain areas
and have only recently become exhausted,
apathetic, and unmotivated, then it's more likely
that you're suffering from burnout and not laziness,
like most people would think.
Number three, you used to be passionate.
A clear difference between someone who's burnt out
and someone who's lazy is that the former
used to have things they were passionate about,
but may now be struggling
to find interest or enjoyment in anymore.
Whether it's a talent, a sport,
or just your academic
or professional performance in general,
burnout can make it hard for you
to do the things you once loved or felt passionate about.
You might even come to hate or resent it
because of how much you overworked yourself
and pushed yourself to the brink because of it.
Ouch.
Number four, you've become moody and irritable.
Do you suddenly find yourself snappy and easily irritated?
Do you often feel emotionally out of control nowadays
and don't know why?
Moodiness and irritability are common,
but often overlooked signs of burnout.
So if you start to have trouble controlling your emotions,
especially when it never used to be a problem for you,
this might be the reason why.
Lazy people, on the other hand, are a stark contrast to this
because they're often very relaxed, laidback,
placid, and unaffected by things.
Number five, you've neglected your self-care.
One of the most distressing warning signs
that someone may be emotionally and physically burnt out
is if you start neglecting your self-care
and socially withdraw from others,
there are concerning changes in your eating
and/or sleeping patterns,
you stop making an effort to groom yourself or look good,
and you tend to spend most of your time by yourself
doing nothing because you're so easily exhausted
by even the simplest of tasks.
The difference between being burnt out and laziness
are starkly in the fact that you weren't always this way.
And number six, these changes happened gradually.
Finally, but perhaps most importantly,
something you should know about burnout
is that it develops in stages.
So all of the points mentioned before,
losing interest and motivation,
especially in things we used to love,
feeling detached from yourself
and disconnected from everything around you,
socially withdrawing and neglecting your self-care
won't just happen overnight.
Studies show that there are actually five major stages
of burnout, each with increasing degrees of severity:
the honeymoon phase, the onset of stress,
chronic stress, burnout, and habitual burnout.
Many people begin to experience symptoms
as early as the second phase,
when there is still a moderate amount of stress,
but optimism, interest, motivation,
and performance may already start declining.
And by the time you reach the fifth and final stage,
burnout has already become so embedded in your life
that the persistent mental and physical fatigue
become more intense and harder to treat,
making you more vulnerable
to developing depression and anxiety.
Spotting the signs of burnout early
makes it all the more easier for you to get help
and recover from it.
That's why it's so important
to raise awareness about burnout,
instead of simply dismissing it as laziness,
like most people tend to do.
So if you or anyone you know
may be suffering from mental or emotional burnout,
please don't hesitate to reach out
to a mental health care professional today
and talk to them about it.
If you find this video helpful,
be sure to hit the Like button.
Feel free to leave a comment down below
with your thoughts, experiences, and suggestions,
and share it with those out there
battling the haze of burnout.
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And as always, thanks for watching.