Burnout Recovery

Ep#179 For the Burned-Out Helper Gratitude as Medicine

• Dex Randall • Season 4 • Episode 179

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In this episode, we explore a surprising yet research-backed path to recovery from burnout: gratitude. If you’re working in health care—or in any high-stress, high-stakes profession—you might feel like there’s no room for gratitude when your world is collapsing. But what if it could be one of the most powerful tools to reverse the helplessness and disconnection of burnout?

Dex shares stories, science, and practical exercises to help you reconnect with what’s still working—even when everything else feels broken. We cover:

  • Why gratitude doesn’t mean minimizing your suffering
  • How it restores energy, mood, and resilience—without toxic positivity
  • How healthcare professionals can begin to recover their sense of agency
  • The neuroscience behind gratitude and its physiological benefits
  • Real-world examples, including insights from “Compassionomics”
  • How to use gratitude as an act of self-respect and resistance

This episode is especially for caregivers, clinicians, and professionals who feel like they’ve given too much—and have nothing left. But it’s for anyone who wants to heal.

Resources Mentioned:

Show Notes:

 ;
https://hsph.harvard.edu/news/experiencing-gratitude-associated-with-greater-longevity-among-older-adults;


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[00:00:00] Hi everyone. My name's Dex Randall, and this is the Burnout to Leadership Podcast where I teach professionals to recover from burnout and get back to passion and reward at work.

[00:00:22] Hello my friends. This is Dex and welcome to this week's episode on a topic that may seem almost outrageous in the depths of burnout. We're going to talk about gratitude, and before we start, if you find value in today's episode, I'd be grateful if you share it with a friend. Paying it forward is, after all, an act of gratitude.

[00:00:42] Now let's be real. If you are in the midst of burnout, even hearing the word gratitude might make you bristle. You might be thinking, Dex, you have no idea how bad things are right now. Well, maybe I do get it. I've lived burnout, a long, slow implosion, the helplessness, the injustice, and the crushing loss of purpose.

[00:01:06] And I've walked that path with many others, professionals, leaders, doctors, carers who are staggering under the weight of burnout, often while still holding up the world for others.

[00:01:20] What I want to say gently, but clearly is that no matter how lost or stuck you feel, burnout is not a life sentence. There is a pathway out, and it's not mystical or mysterious.

[00:01:35] It's a predictable process based on human wiring. What supports us to thrive, connect and bound. So why talk about gratitude now? ' cause while burnout shrinks your world into helplessness, gratitude begins to open it back up. And let's be clear, this isn't about ignoring reality. Gratitude doesn't erase hardship. What it does is return control to you. It reconnects you with what's still working, what's still meaningful, what's still yours. And even if you don't feel grateful right now, just being curious about gratitude is a powerful start.

[00:02:24] Today I had a warm shower and quietly ate my breakfast and gratitude moved through me like a wave.

[00:02:33] Life is not fair, but I can see for a moment just how precious my ordinary life is. And in the face of that, why bother with gratitude? Well, because it works. Gratitude isn't fluffy. It's biological. It improves mood, boosts contentment, enhances sleep and digestion, lowers stress hormones, and builds resilience. It strengthens empathy, relationships, even heart health.

[00:03:06] One study of over 49,000 older nurses showed that those who scored higher on gratitude lived significantly longer. They had 9% lower mortality, not because their lives were easier, but because they chose a different internal posture.

[00:03:24] Gratitude restores perspective, it reminds your nervous system that all is not lost. It calms reactivity, and it creates space to breathe again. Let's not sugarcoat it, healthcare professionals are under siege. As far back as 2018, over half of US physicians reported burnout. And then came COVID, crushing performance metrics, shorter patient windows, more admin, tighter insurance controls, and shrinking pay.

[00:03:58] In the UK right now, doctors are asking for 20 pounds an hour and some start at 14, barely above minimum wage. The system is cracked, no question, but letting the system define you, your worth, your limits, your energy, that's what finishes the job, that burnout starts. That's what steals your power.

[00:04:23] And here's a hard truth: identifying as a victim might feel accurate, but it's dangerous. It disempowers you, it traps you in threat protection. It tells your nervous system, I'm not safe, I'm not capable, I'm not enough. And when that goes on long enough, we stop trying. That becomes our lens on the world. If that's happening for you, you might have stopped seeing solutions, or stopped trusting your own strength. It's not your fault, but it is your responsibility to reclaim the wheel.

[00:05:02] So, how do we keep giving without depleting ourselves? The book Compassionomics offers a clue. Even 40 seconds of compassionate words improves outcomes for both patients and doctors. It turns out compassion doesn't drain us, when it's authentic, it uplifts us. When we have the energy to, and the resources to offer it from our hearts, it reconnects us to meaning. So that's the middle path, not burnout, not self neglect, but shared humanity.

[00:05:39] And gratitude doesn't have to be grand. Send someone a kind message, acknowledge their efforts, or celebrate their wins. Even listening without interrupting, letting someone know you're thinking of them.

[00:05:53] You don't have to volunteer. You don't need hours. Every small act of giving uplifts you. Research shows that giving elevates wellbeing even more than receiving. It creates belonging. It says, I matter, you matter.

[00:06:10] So let's talk belief. Bruce Lipton calls it the Biology of Belief, and Joe Dispenza teaches how our thoughts and feelings sculpt our biology, moment by moment.

[00:06:24] When you believe you're healing, you are, and when you believe you're stuck, you are. So, what if you chose to believe in the you that exists underneath the burnout? Not the perfect you, the real you.

[00:06:43] The one who holds everything you need to thrive. Could you take one small step today to nourish that self?

[00:06:51] And here are some powerful tools to begin that right now. And I'm going to put links in the show notes to support your action on each of these.

[00:07:00] First one visit, there's a website called Gratitude for Nurses,

[00:07:06] and in there they have a link called thnx4.org, THNX number four.org. So if you visit that, it's a group or individual gratitude journal, where you can write your own gratitude journal and or invite a friend or join in with other people.

[00:07:23] Number two, write down 10 things you appreciate about yourself every day for 30 days, but a different 10 each day. So that's self gratitude, right? Build your own library of gratitude prompts for yourself. Show yourself how worthy you in fact are.

[00:07:44] Number three, practice Joy on Demand. This is a technique from Chad Meg Tan, who was Google's Jolly Good Fellow. Look out for one tiny moment of joy each day and name it. Just recognize it.

[00:07:59] Number four, imagine today from your future self's perspective. What would you wish you had appreciated more?

[00:08:08] Number five, document this. Track your ability to shift your mood, have experiments, see what works. Notice all the tiny things that help you and those practices might seem small, but small is good.

[00:08:22] They speak directly to your nervous system. They gently rebuild, trust, connection, and hope. This is your plus 9% longevity.

[00:08:33] So that's what I have for you today. I will just close with a quote from Melody Beattie.

[00:08:38] " Gratitude turns what we have into enough and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos, to order confusion to clarity. It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow."

[00:08:57] If you yourself are in burnout, please don't try and fix this alone. Come and talk to me for free. Let's make a plan together for you to recover quickly, powerfully, and sustainably, and return to your peak performance, leadership, and most of all enjoyment, inside work and out. You can book a time at dexrandall.com

[00:09:21] if this episode resonated, I'd love for you to share it and leave a review, and that's how we reach more people who are suffering in silence. And I'll catch you next time with more burnout-healing ideas. 


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Dex Randall

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