Are you burning out? Are you already burnt out? Do you know someone who suffers from burnout? Perhaps someone who’s exhausted? Are you interested in steps to prevent or avoid burnout? - Burnout is probably the number 1 wellbeing issue in 2021. In this episode I take a deep dive into the topic of burnout.
Having been burnt out several years ago, I have personal experiences to share and tips about the steps you can take to help yourself. The honest truth is that ‘self care’ (as most of us know it) is simply not enough and alone won’t give the outcomes you crave. The truth is that behaviours, choices and beliefs are where it’s at - a focus on these will bring more far-reaching results for you in the area of burnout.
CLICK HERE to access the free 24 page ebook that accompanies this episode on burnout with practical tips, exercises and templates you can use to put a plan in place to better prevent, reduce or more effectively beat burnout. If you know someone who would benefit from hearing this episode please share it with them - it could be just the thing they need to hear right now. If you want to take action to beat burnout or prevent burning out, listen in today!
Resources:
(If you’re listening on a platform where the above links don’t work simply visit www.nlptalks.com, find this episode and all the links are there too!)
Are you burning out? Are you already burnt out? Do you know someone who suffers from burnout? Perhaps someone who’s exhausted? Are you interested in steps to prevent or avoid burnout? - Burnout is probably the number 1 wellbeing issue in 2021. In this episode I take a deep dive into the topic of burnout.
Having been burnt out several years ago, I have personal experiences to share and tips about the steps you can take to help yourself. The honest truth is that ‘self care’ (as most of us know it) is simply not enough and alone won’t give the outcomes you crave. The truth is that behaviours, choices and beliefs are where it’s at - a focus on these will bring more far-reaching results for you in the area of burnout.
CLICK HERE to access the free 24 page ebook that accompanies this episode on burnout with practical tips, exercises and templates you can use to put a plan in place to better prevent, reduce or more effectively beat burnout. If you know someone who would benefit from hearing this episode please share it with them - it could be just the thing they need to hear right now. If you want to take action to beat burnout or prevent burning out, listen in today!
Resources:
(If you’re listening on a platform where the above links don’t work simply visit www.nlptalks.com, find this episode and all the links are there too!)
Welcome to the NLP talks podcast, bringing you inspirational stories along with a good dose of potentially life changing and LP strategies. I'm Laura Evans, multi award-winning NLP trainer, and I'm on a mission to help you unleash your potential in business and life. I'm so glad you're here. Pull up a chair, listen in and let's get started on revealing more about this transformational NLP toolkit. Hi that mine. My name
Speaker 2:Is Laura Evans and welcome to another episode of the NLP talks popped us. Now, today is a slightly different episode because you have got me all to yourself. I'm currently sat in my office at home, uh, with a Clementine and Cove candle, burning hot water with fresh lemon, my salt lamp going, and I'm surrounded by stats because today we are going to be talking about burnout. Now, whether you're interested in burnout, whether you are currently burning out or whether you are currently burnt out or you're looking to help someone, that is a thing you're going to find this episode really helpful. I'm going to be talking about burnout from a personal perspective, how I experienced it. And I'm going to share with you some mindset, hints, and tips in order to help you personally, or to help your friends and family. If that is what you want to do now, I must have you out this episode with, I am not medically trained and please don't take anything that I say in this episode as medical advice, because that's not what I'm about. I'm here to help you from a mindset point of view, share some personal experience, some hints and tips to help you on your journey with burnout and to help you help other people from a layman's point of view. Now, before we get into the main episode, you may already know, but if you don't, here's the news that there is a free ebook that goes with this episode, it's called the burnout field guide. It's about 20 pages. And in the ebook, I have created a whole host of exercises to help you do some self-analysis to make some decisions and then take some action. So wherever you're listening to this podcast episode, check the description below because there will be a link for you to go and download it. Now you don't have to have the field book in front of you to listen to the episode. We can crack home, but you can also go and download it and have it in front of you as we go. If you wish the choice is as always entirely down to you, you can listen to this episode as many times, as you like and said, you've got all the value out of it that you need. So without further ado, I'm going to have a sip of my hot water and lemon. It'll be clear where I've got this in a moment. Let's get started by looking at what is Knight. Burnout is set to be probably number one, being topic and issue in 2021, not just for organizations, but for all of us as individuals who are coming out of the pandemic and starting to get back to normal life. But my experience of burnout happened many years ago, and I hit what I called a brick wall. And that's because I inverted commerce fell asleep at the wheel. I was not paying attention to what was going on in my body and in my thinking and in my mindset. And I want to raise these facts with you in this episode today. Now, before we get into all of that, let's just stop to have a look at what exactly is burnout and why is it such a big deal? Well, with the stresses and strains of working through the global pandemic, a lot of us have been forced to juggle more than we ever have done in the past experiencing potentially mental and emotional overload. As we've worked from home, we've had to deal with business challenges. Some people dealing with parenting at home and having the kids home whilst working. I mean, the list goes on. You don't need me to tell you, right? And this has seen a rapid rise in people, struggling with their ability to bounce back and their energy levels. Now so much so that the world health organization has actually identified employee burnout as an issue. Now, of course, burnout doesn't just affect us as employees and business people, but the world health organization has recognized, um, burnout as an occupational phenomenon. Now in the 11th revision of the international classification of diseases. Easy for me to say, um, boop described burnout as a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress, but has not been successfully managed now for me, it's not just about work, actually. I think there's a lot of life factors that can play a role, but I'm not denying that work is for many people, a massive contributor. And it certainly was for me. Now, there are many definitions of burnout. If you go and Google it, one definition that I found here is that burnout is a state of emotional and physical exhaustion that is brought upon by long periods of constant unrelenting stress. And it renders you feeling depleted and dejected. Now that's certainly how I would have described it, um, when I had it. But burnout is not a new thing. I mean, if we go all the way back to her, but fried and burger pepper got his name, right. Um, a psychologist back in the 1970s, um, he was the first person I think on record to actually discuss work related burnout because of unresolved job stress. Now he was doing a lot of research at the time, but actually was using his researchers almost as an experiment in themselves. And, um, his research, um, that was published in a psychology related journal, talked about his observations of himself and his staff at while they were doing, um, some clinical drug trials. I believe if I'm right. Um, and he characterized burnout as a set of symptoms that include exhaustion resulting from work's excessive demands, as well as resulting physical symptoms. Now, you know, symptoms like headaches and sleeplessness. I mean, I can totally relate to headaches. Now. Sleep's an interesting one. We're going to come back to sleep because sleep is not something I personally ever struggled with, but many people do that suffer with burnout. They talked about the quickness to anger. I mean, I certainly found when I'm burnt out and I'm frazzled, my temper can rear its head, but I'm certainly not as calm as I normally would. And in this experiment here, you talked about the fact that people tended to be closed thinking as in they weren't open to new and different ways. They just seem to work harder and harder and harder. He noticed that burnt at workers, as he said, it looks, acts and seems depressed. But to me they're potentially different things. Um, and again, I'm not magically trained, so I'm not going to go into the medical definition, but I just want to make the point that this burnout is not new. And it's something that I think actually, if there's a past to come out of this pandemic, what it's done is made many of us way more aware of this thing called burnout. Now I want to take you through some stats that I found. Again, I'm surrounded by paper here in the office. Let me have a quick slick of swig of my hot water and fresh lemon, because I think it's fascinating when you start to look hat, do you know the data? Like what does the data tell us about this phenomenon? So here's a survey that was done@fifteenhundredusworkersbythejobsiteatindeed.com in January, 2020. So pre the pandemic and they were talking, even at that point, that burnout was on the rise with over half of the respondents, 52% saying that they'd experienced burnout in 2021. Now that was up from 43%, who said the same in the survey pre COVID. So pre COVID 43%, um, during, and just after the pandemic, 52%. So it's on the app. I mean, I don't think we need to start to tell a stat, right. You know, 67% of the responders, the majority of the respondents said that burnout was worsening during the pandemic. You know? So that was one survey, um, from indeed, let me just check my notes here. Indeed studies showed that those who work from home are more likely to say burnout has worsened. And I think that's interesting, isn't it? Because I think the lines between work and home life blurred while we were all working so much from home. And I think, you know, one of the things that strikes me about burnout is the word boundaries. Um, and I think when I got burned out, I didn't have good boundaries. You know, I didn't make for myself, you know, there's that old saying, isn't it, if you don't make time for your wellness, you will ultimately make time for your illness. You know? And I think that's exactly what happened to me. I, I didn't take care of myself at all. I just worked and worked and worked, um, and there was no balance. So I think boundaries is a key word. We're going to come back to later in the episode. Um, but they also talked in their survey about people's inability to disconnect from the office because those boundaries have become so blurred. Um, now another survey that I've got here, uh, was a survey by Robert half, um, and in December, um, I think it was last year, 2020, I believe. Um, they did another survey again in the us 1,136 employed people. And they found a staff in 76% of employees were experiencing work burnout with researchers saying, um, that, uh, symptoms included things like exhaustion, feeling negative, cynical, or detached from work and reduced performance. Now another survey by a company called lie, mate don't know who they are. So, but it was their survey. Again, found that before the pandemic, 42% of workers were saying they were burnt out. And actually a few months later into the pandemics, a few months into the pandemic, this was shot up to 72%. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. I mean, I could coach that at you all day. Now what's interesting is, you know, what people have done about it. You know, organizations are really grappling with how do they help people with this phenomenon because it's not going to go away. And I see lots of stuff on LinkedIn recently where, you know, people are saying, organizations need to take responsibility. Organizations need to look at that workplace culture. And yes, in part, I think that's the answer, but I also think there is an element of personal responsibility. Now I'm very much looking at myself in the mirror metaphorically, of course, as I say that, because, you know, when I think about the excessive hours, I used to work the lack of boundaries that I had, the lack of self-care as some might call it, I have, I had to take some personal responsibility for what was going on in my life at that time. I mean, my boss even said to me, I remember distinctly at the time, just before I, I did find any burnt out and had my, my mental health breakdown. But, and by the way, I see them as very different. I know a lot of people merged those two together. I do see them as different. I think you can be burnt out without having a breakdown and you can have a break down without being burned out. You know, just, just to be clear on my view on that. But she said to me, you know, Laura, you know, you need to back off like, you know, you need to look at how you can better organize yourself. You need to look hat. Um, for example, don't drive everywhere and spend four, four hours a day driving from one place to another for your meetings. Like, could you do some of them online? Could you do conference calls? Could you, um, you know, do more from home on the phone and, and I didn't want to, and this is, I think part of the problem that we have as individuals is that, you know, it's, it's all very well placing the blame at the door of companies. And I'm not saying they're not blameless. You know, there are organizations with, with huge cultural and workplace cultures that, that encourage overwork, but actually it's down to each individual to make their own, you know, life choices. I mean, let's look at a couple of companies and what they have done to help the situation. I'm going to come back to personal responsibility. You know, there's records here of LinkedIn that gave all of its nearly 16,000 full-time employees are paid. We coffin eight pro last year to help them combat burnout, encourage them to unplug and recharge. Now there's a key word, encourage them to unplug and recharge LinkedIn. Can't make their employees do that. That's down to the individuals. I mean, I don't know about you, but you know, there is this piece about, you know, when I was off work, I'm a lot better now than I used to be. Um, I should say, um, I'm not saying I'm perfect with this burnout thing, by the way, I'm just sharing my experiences and my knowledge. And, you know, I used to check my emails all the time and I used to really struggle to unplug now from a mindset point of view, what I'm really interested in is what drove that behavior as you're going to come to find out later in the episode, I think behavior choices and beliefs have a massive part to play in mine and potentially a lot of other people's burnout because my behavior was, I need to check my emails now with anybody ever told me, I should check my emails when I was off. No, did I feel a sense that I needed to? Yes. That's about me. That's about the choices that I make and I'm going to come back to that a bit later. Uh, SAP here, there's a record here of, uh, SAP doing some stuff, Cisco doing stuff, Google Thomas Reuters. I mean, many of them have done stuff, you know, I mean, let's take at Thomson Reuters, for example, as an institution, they've got company wide mental health days, you know, I mean, I remember watching a video by Simon Sinek, you know, and he was saying in his organization, you're rather than people making up a stomach bug type illness when their mental health is not good, actually it's okay. In his organization for you to take her mental health day. Um, I need to step back and I think company cultures have come a long, long way. And like I said, I'm not saying that that blameless, but you know, could my employer have stopped me working? I mean, sure, just standing next to me and shutting my laptop and confiscating it and taking my phone away. You know, what else could they do now? That comments is rather ironic because if my ex-husband over here is this, um, there was many times in the lead up to my burnout, um, that he actually did that. Um, and I remember being so angry and frustrated at the time, like, Hey dad, Hey, take my laptop. And my mobile phone out. I felt like my right left hand had been cut off. I was desperate. Like, give it back to me. I need to know what's going on. So there were people in my life trying to warm me. I didn't listen. I didn't see it. And I'd got myself into a brief behavioral pattern that, you know, th th that really, um, you know, wasn't helpful for me or my mental health. Now I know this podcast is probably not going to be the kind of podcast that you were expecting to hear about burnout, but really, I, I really come from this as a place of personal responsibility. No one else. Um, you know, I can point the finger at, you know, we have this thing in NLP about the cause effect equation, and it, and if you've heard many of my podcast episodes should have heard me talk about it all before, you know, it's all very well for me to sit here and point the finger at my employer and say it was their fault. You know, I'm not saying they were blameless. In fact, I don't think they were blameless. And I do think work pay stress was a conscious, significant contributing factor. I mean, it's, it's, it, it does make me raise an eyebrow. That one point there was three of us covering the whole of the UK in this organization. And 12 months later there was them five of them, you know, so we were being asked to deliver a huge amount. And so on one hand they were like, you need to deliver all this work and on the other hand, oh yeah. But we care about you, you know, and you know, and I think they did the best they could at the time. And other NLP, presuppositions people do the best with the resources they have available. And I think I bought absolutely. He did that. I wouldn't have said that at the time though. I'll be honest because I was very angry about what had happened to me, but actually I was responsible. So coming back to the cause effect equation, we have people, the effects side of life, blaming everything, can everyone else for what goes on in their life and people at cause people that want to take responsibility. Now, I can't control the environment necessarily that I was working in, like the expectations were the expectations, but I have to stop to think about what can I do? What could I do? What are the options? And do you know what that environment wasn't right for me? And I ended up leaving it, you know, like they say, isn't it, the, you know, the old saying that, you know, the environment that made you sick is not an environment that will help you get wild or worst. I fact, I probably ruin someone's quote, but certainly not mine. Um, but I think it's true. You know, I think you have choices. Um, you know, coming back to my point earlier, I think a lot of this comes down to behavior choice and belief. And you're going to hear me talk a lot about that today. But I had choices. I didn't feel like at the time and had I had a coach, had I had someone to help me. I think I would have seen those choices a lot earlier. Now you're going to love this episode because I've got another stop for you. And then I'm going to talk more, but there's a fascinating survey that I found. Just looking at my notes again, because I want to get this right for you. Um, a survey that Deloitte stead and a thousand people in the us now, it's interesting because there Deloitte are advocating. Employees should consider workplace culture, not just wellbeing programs. And again, you're going to hear me talk about this because you know, everybody's, oh, you know, you should, you should be in yoga. You should be exercising. You should do all of those things and don't get me wrong. They are all good for your health and you absolutely should do them. If that is what, something that works for you. But it's not just about sticky plasters. It's not just about all of that. Again, I keep coming back. It comes back to behavior choices and beliefs. Um, and yes, companies have to do more, but it's not all just about their wellbeing programs. Anyway, if you're not a company that doesn't have a wellbeing program, you really should think about it. I used to run multiple wellbeing programs at different companies. I worked at back in my HR days and they really do make a difference, but it's not going to fix it for every individual. Now, this survey coming back to Deloitte, this survey, I hope we keep pace with me. And I hope you're enjoying this episode. Now, this survey was this fascinating, right? So it says here that passion may not prevent work place stress. So if you've read up much about burnout, you'll find a lot of people talking about how finding your purpose and being on purpose and doing meaningful work. And all of those things, you know, has a contributing factor to whether people burn out or not. You know, if you do something that you love, if you feel like you're making a contribution, you're probably gonna have more energy to do more and achieve more, or because you're on purpose. And I get that to a point. There's not a whole story. Now it says here 87% of professional surveyed say they have passion for their current job. Great, brilliant. Cause if you're not doing something that you love, then change it, you know, but anyway, it's Simpson love it. Brilliant. But 64% say they're frequently stressed. Dispelling the myth that passionate employees are immune to stress and burn it. Oh, yesterday. Right? Raise a glass to that when I saw that. So I think it's interesting. Now let me talk to you a little bit more about my journey and why I'm so passionate about helping people get their head around burnout. Now you see the thing is I was in HR for 14 years and I was hugely passionate about what I did. Right. I fell out of love with it in the end, but for 14, nearly 15 years, I loved it. I loved making a difference. I was hugely passionate about the difference that we would make as a team that we could do, you know, drive profit into businesses. We could improve employee wellbeing, engagement. Um, look, after people develop people, help them develop their career. Like there was so much I loved about that profession, but I think that was part of my undoing. You see, the problem is I woke up one day and I just couldn't do it anymore. Now I have burned out. I'd absolutely burned out. Now. I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression. And if you've not heard my story about anxiety and depression, then go back and find the podcast episode all about my story because I, I share it, but I worked hard. Like I worked harder than anybody else I know. And I was relentless in my pursuit of perfectionism. And again, if you know much about me, you'll know my story of perfectionism, you know, I have a belief and it's just my belief that perfectionism is the flip side of people that have a massive fear of failure. And I used to have that, like, you know, I was almost, I wasn't diagnosed with dyslexia, but I've always struggled with spelling and language. I've always had foggy head. I forget things, you know, and we all know these, that we're quacks about ourselves. Right? And, and we have to compensate for them. Well, that's what it feels like we have to do. And so I'd work harder and I do longer. I knew it would take me four or five times longer for me to read a board report than any other director that had to read. It. I'd have to get my highlight is that, you know, I developed strategies, um, to really help me mitigate this fear of failure. And that was part of burnout. That was the third part of my jigsaw puzzle, which is the beliefs I believed I would fail if I didn't work hard. Now, Simon Sinek, I was watching a YouTube video again, as part of my research for this episode, I really enjoyed research in this episode actually. Um, I'm sure you're probably getting that nice Simon Sinek. And one of the videos I found about him, a massive Simon Sinek fan, if you don't know about him, go, go find him. Now he gave a story of a lumberjack and I'm probably not going to get this exactly right. But that kind of bear with the essence of the story. And essentially what happened was there was a story of two lumberjacks, both started at the same time, every single day and both finished at the same time every day and both were cutting wood. Now one of the number jacks disappeared for an hour in the middle of the day. And the other lumberjack never knew where he went. And the other number Jack said to him, one day, we start at the same time we finished at the same time. You disappear for an hour during the middle of the day, but yet you always cut more work than me. And he said, well, yes, you said, where do you think I go, I go home to sharpen my soul. Now that's a re that's like when I was in Burnett, that would have made no sense to me whatsoever. Right? Cause I'm just like, no, I need to work on which went hard. But actually sometimes there's better ways. There's more efficient ways of doing things. And we need to take time out in order to see the bigger picture. Sometimes when we're at risk of burnout, we've got our head buried so deep in what we're doing, that we don't look up to see other options, smarter options, more efficient ways of doing things. We just find a way of doing it and go, well, I might as well do that. Some of you like me remember the old office humor books that we used to have. Um, but when I started my working career and there was always remember one that had a sign on it, um, there was good stress reduction tool. It said at the top with a big circle on it. And it said, bang, head here. And we have it on the office wall now clearly, right? If you're banging your head against the wall on that piece of paper, right? Because it says you're supposed to do it to reduce your stress levels and it doesn't work. Do you keep banging your head? No you don't because you go, oh my God, that hurts. Or, oh my head's bleeding. I need to stop. I need to do something different. But when you're in burnout, you don't think like that. You just think I've just got to work harder and harder and harder and harder. You know, as, as I go, it's really interesting. And I'm really have started to form the view that yes, there are environmental factors. Yes, there are workplace cultural and all of those things need to be addressed. But becoming burned out is equally about personal responsibility. For me, it is about each individual's behaviors, choices, and beliefs. You know, talented people are way more, I think at risk now we all have a talent at something. And Einstein, I think it was the Einstein quote. You know, if you try and get a fish to climb a tree, it's not going to work, take a monkey in it or wet, something like that. Anyway, you probably know the quote, but people that are talented and have a real passion and skill doing things I think are more at risk. I mean, here's the thing, right? When you start doing a job, take a senior manager in an organization. You know, there comes a point where they have to master the skills to be able to do the job and get the level of competency they need. But for many managers in organizations, this goes beyond simple competency to do a job. It almost transcends to a higher level that potentially of identity. Now some of you will be familiar with Robert Dilts his work in NLP, around the levels. Um, and you know, identity. When people start to have problems that link in with that, then that's a bigger challenge for us. You know, we're not, you know, someone say, you know, I'm a high performer. I am a manager, I'm a leader, I'm an accountant. Like you ladies, well, yourself with your job, your job, and you are two separate things. But in burnout, I never saw it like that. It was all, it was all to say. Now we lead ourselves in life in NLP and what we call the first position. Now, if you have ever done any NLP training, you might have come across the technical perceptual positions, sometimes known as the three chair technique for the students that I've trained. Um, and position one is, is you. And position two is, is usually someone else in position three is usually an objective observer, but essentially let's not get caught up in attacking that technique. But the positions that we go through in life are quite important. So position one is me, right? This is me looking through my own eyes, experiencing life as me. Um, and most of you will be familiar with that cause that's how we, we live our lives, right. But we often will lose the objectivity. We'll often news that ability to take a step back and actually look at what's going on for us, you know, massive, really stepping back and seeing myself start here in this room, in the office, recording this episode for you. It's a very different, slightly more detached view of me and my life at this moment in time. Now the absence of our ability to step back is part of, I think the unconscious problem that might lead to burn out, it's almost like we're wandering through life. Like in some kind of trance, if you like, just going from one thing to the next, just going through the motions, lots of parents talked about that during the pandemic, a homeschool children. And it was just get up, set them up, try and get to work, to try and get things like it was just day. It was really land, but what is more of us during that pandemic? And I include myself as many of you and I don't have kids, but if I consider myself during that kind of crisis phase of the pandemic, right back at the beginning, if I take a step back, actually I would have gained more perspective. I would have been able to think more clearly. I would have been able to think, uh, perhaps a little bit more objective about my situation and you know, rather than metaphorically banging my head against that wall, as I was just talking about to step back and go, hang on, this is not working. What am I going to do differently? Like the lumberjack that Simon Sinek talks about, you know, is there a different way of actually achieving more with less effort and less time? Now we therefore I think become need to become more conscious, more aware, more self aware about what's going on in our lives. And, and I'll be honest with you. This, it was a light bulb moment for me. And if I compare how I run my life now to how I ran my life back before I got burned out, I am much more self-aware. Now, if you're someone that knows me personally, you've been trained by me or you're follow me on social media. You know, I'm a busy woman, you know, like my life is very busy, but what people don't see because it's social media and it's, you know, you don't tell your customers everything, do you? You know, but what people don't see is actually how I manage my energy levels behind the scenes. You know, people always say to me, Laura, how do you do it? You know, people will see me train for 11 days straight, sometimes 14 days stray because I'm running courses back to backs with different groups of students. And if I had a pound for every time someone had said to me, Laura, how do you do it? I'd be rich woman. And I, part of it is the passion is the drive is the sense of joy, the sense of achievement, the sense of fulfillment that I get at doing a job I love, but there has to be boundaries around it. You know, I'll be honest with you. The prep for this podcast episode I did yesterday. I started work on it mid afternoon and I got so engrossed. I was what some people would call him flow. I was so engrossed and so fascinated by finding out about all of these stats I found for you to tell you about, oh, and then started to think about my own personal journey. And what did I want to tell you about that too? Before I knew it was eight o'clock and I hadn't had my dinner, that was time to stop. Now old Laura would have gone. No, let's do it. Let's stay up. Let's like record the episode. Let's get it done. Cause I'm passionate and I'm excited and I'm on the track man. And I love what I do, but now I check in with myself, I sit there and I think to myself now, am I going to do my best work tonight? Or should I break it? Should I get up in the morning and doing it? And I'm now recording this episode for you the following morning. So I ended by all my notes from yesterday. I want have done that before. You know, I will often, um, you know, if I get stressed at a particular part of the day, when I'm working from home, I know the strategies that work for me. I'll go to bed for an hour in the mid afternoon. My old housemate used to take the mat out, me and my Nana naps, but that's a strategy that works for me because it powers down my mind. And I'm going to explain the science behind how that works, um, in just a few moments. But I think it's fascinating to start to think about what personal responsibility, what behavior do we need to change? What choices are we making and what beliefs are playing a role and in terms of how we are the way we are and how we expose ourselves, predispose ourselves, even to burning out or becoming burned out. Um, I think it's fascinating now. I'd like you to do a little exercise. Now only do this, if it is safe to do so, this is the exercise that's on the second page in the ebook. If you've downloaded it. And if not, you can come back later. I've pretty much written out a rough exercise. So you can do this exercise. I'm about to get you to do that any time you like now, the exercise is going to require to close your eyes and to do essentially what we call a body scan. Now, it's really interesting in NLP when we start to look at, um, kinesthetic feelings and where they are in our body and what that might mean for us becoming this more self aware person that I keep talking about. Now, this is a technique you can do at any time of day. Um, as regularly as you'd like, in fact, I'd encourage you to get into the habit of doing it maybe once a week or more or less, whatever works for you and track yourself over time. I've actually put a tracker here in the ebook for you. So you can record your scores. Now, if you're not safe to do this, please skip forward to the podcast and carry on listing if you're driving or doing something else. But if it's right for you to follow along right now, then, then please do that only as long as it's safe to do so first you drive in operate machinery and stuff. Don't do this now, but yeah. So first of all, you need to go and find yourself somewhere quiet to sit or lie down, which might mean you need to pause this episode just for a second while you sort yourself out. I liked doing it sat in my great big armchair in my lounge with my feet up on my recliner chair. And, uh, you know, but you can do it lying on your bed wherever you like. So just take a moment to organize that, pause the episode, and then, uh, you can comeback when you're ready. I hope you found somewhere that is safe. Um, and, uh, where you won't be disturbed. This is only going to take a few minutes. It's not going to take long at all. And I'd like you, if you would, as long as it's safe to just close your eyes and just take a few deep breaths. I like to do it in, through my nose and out through the mouth. Just as you breathe out, just let any tension, nobody start to disappear and let those shoulders start to drop and just take a few slow, deep breaths. Some people like count in for four and try and count out for somewhere between eight and 12, whatever works for you. But I'm telling you from my experience that a longer out-breath will really start to help you just reconnect with your body and just start yourself feeling as if you're drifting off a little bit to that pace of peace and rest you're safe and you're at ease as you just breathe deeply. Now, when you feel that you're ready, we're going to start to scan the body, just breathing easily and effortlessly with your eyes closed body, fully supported. Now let's start at the top of your head and just notice any sensations around your scalp and your head. As you start to bring your attention down, maybe to your forehead, notice your eyebrows and that space between your eyebrows for some of us at sometimes hold our stress, maybe the temples of your face and down into your cheeks and your jaw. Like, how is your drawer? Is it 10? Are you relaxing it? And I wonder if you focused on just relaxing it as you breathe out, um, whether that would just help you just rest a little more. How's your neck, any tension there. Can you feel anything as you continue now, breathing easily and effortlessly carry on down and put your attention on to your left and your right shoulder. What do you have notice as you start to maybe think about that space on your back, between your shoulder blades and down your back, how's that all doing? Perhaps you've noticed a sensation somewhere in your body, maybe. I don't know, but when you were doing your mouth, it could be anywhere. And as you're doing this body scan, just start to ask yourself, how about your energy levels, your vitality? How are they? Like if you were raped them not to tat, where would you put them? What about that feeling of fatigue? You're tired. Could you do with taking some action to reduce that level of fatigue, just pay attention to your body. As you scan through the body, asking yourself how you do it and how would those levels, those energy levels, those stress levels are these appearing anywhere in your body as you're going. And I sometimes feel it in the back of my neck and then my shoulders. And I'm moving them as I'm talking to you now, like that's somewhere where it goes. I often feel it in my jaw. I never expected that, but that's sometimes where I feel it. So where do you feel it let's continue with our body scan, thinking about our shoulders down into our upper arm, elbows for, um, wrists, hands, fingers, and thumbs. And just as you put your attention on them, continue to breathe easily and effortlessly by now. You probably should be feeling your breathing, starting to slow as your body start to rest just for a few minutes. And as you continue to take your attention to your chest, your ribs, your abdomen, your torso, like how has all of this energy tension, fatigue? How is it about your hips? Give out your back upper lower, mid back. Like how has all of that? I'll have a therapist that I've just started working with and we've identified that I carry a lot of tension in my lower back and in my, so I have a very stiff left hip. How do I make that better? These are the types of things. I want you to start to think about noticing any emotional stuff as it displays in the body, wherever, just noticing it, notice the sensation and just let it go. Following down your legs through your thighs knees, shins, CAFS, don't your ankles. Just feel the feet as they're on the floor or as you're on the bed. If you're on the bed, just notice that feeling of your body fully supported by what you're lying on. And if you're sat and notice the ground underneath your feet, give you a little toes, a little wiggle and ask yourself. Now you've scanned your body. Think about it in relation to burn out overwhelm and tiredness. Some even call it the spinning of just far too many plates. If you were to give yourself one score on a scale of zero to 10, where zero is awful drained burnout, and 10 is great. Amazing on, on form. What number would you give yourself today right now, having done this exercise, what number would you give yourself and just pick a number perhaps while you're nicely relaxed. Just take the opportunity to take a few more deep breaths. I love a breathing technique called box breathing. So how about we breathe in for a count of four hold for a count of four, breathe out for a count of four and hold for a count of four. Why don't we do that together now? So breathing in 1, 2, 3, 4, and hold 2, 3, 4, and out 2, 3, 4, and hold 2, 3, 4. And you can just continue to do that for a few moments. Just pacing your awareness on your breath as you breathe in and how this is a moment just for you. And I really hope you've enjoyed this body scan exercise today, and you can come back and listen to this anytime you like. And of course this exercise is written in the eBooks that once you learn the process, you can do it yourself. And when you're ready, I invite you to bring your awareness back into the room and open your eyes. And if you have the work book to hand, I like that number, whatever number came into your head, don't analyze it, judge it or anything. Just write that number in that great big green box. I've put for you on this second page of your workbook. Now, I really hope you enjoyed that exercise. And this is an exercise you can do any time to check in with your body to check in how are you doing and you know, how are things going for you? It and track it as you go. Now, rest is a really important thing. And I'm going to pick the pace up a little bit because I'm conscious that I could be do hours and hours on this podcast. I've just come back from a holiday. Another reason why I have more balance in my life now than I ever used to. And I went away and I didn't take my laptop. And I mean, that would never have happened with the old Laura, but I started reading a book called daring to rest by Cameron broody. Now I'm not going to confess I haven't finished reading it. I'm about just over, almost halfway through. And I have to say I'm really enjoying it. So, um, you know, it's, uh, I became your power, uh, with yoga nidra, rest meditation designed for women, but no reason why men can't do it too. And it's fascinating. I want to read you some bits out of her book, because I think she talks a lot of sense when it comes to the things that lead up to burn out. Now, she quotes in her book, Karen Page three, Rubin Naiman, um, who was asleep specialist. Um, and he talks actually about a Buddhist philosophy, which teaches at the depression. It says, Hey, results from excessive activation that is not properly balanced by rest. Now I think we have to reevaluate our Western world's understanding of what rest is because when we think about self care activities and rest, they're not really rest. I mean, you know, you going for a bike ride, you reading a book, taking a trip like that, active your body needs balance of rest. According to this sleep exper and you know, active stuff is, is really not going to do, you know, play in a game on your iPhone. You know, that might help you distract yourself from life and from work, but it's still active. It's not rest at rest. Is, is she describes current described to you in this book is this nothingness, and we're not very good with nothing. You know, she talks in a book about the fact that rest is to surrender from activity and being active and, you know, surrendering from this need and this well achieve something, uh, which I think is, is quite interesting as she goes on in the book to talk about the sympathetic nervous system and the PA, uh, Paris, the sympathetic nervous system. Easy for me to say, I find this all fascinating, and I'll be honest. I'm at the very early stages of my knowledge and learning about all of this. I'm very much relying on what she's written here in the book, but it fits with what I read elsewhere. And she talks about the fact that actually doing active things like exercise and taking trips with friends, going to dinner, these activities being stimulated actually stimulates the sympathetic nervous system. Now this part of your system does all sorts of things, including your fight or flight response. So it's a very active part of you. And if you are stimulated for long periods of time with whatever activity, um, then your body is not going to rest. Uh, she talks about actually what's useful is stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system to have more balance. And this is something I never used to do you see? Because back when I had burnout, I'd either be working busy, I'd be out walking, exercising with the dog, or I'd be out socializing with people. I never actually truly rested aside from when I slept and actually I'm getting much better at it. Now. Um, this is a book all about, um, something called yoga nidra. Um, again, I'm at the very early stages of my learning was that recently done, um, what we call an eye rest course with, uh, Louise Hertz Oak, one of our students, and I ran our peak community. Don't check her out if you're interested in this stuff. And I find it hugely fascinating, um, that actual rash as well as sleep is important. And we need to, we need to activate this parasympathetic sympathetic nervous system for balance there's non-active time. And it's this non-active time allows the body and the mind to rejuvenate. So true rest is not self care as we would perhaps know it. And I'm not saying that those things are not good for your mental health. Of course they are being with people that are positive being with people that lift you up, doing activity, you know, all of those things. Of course, they're all really, really good. They're not rest, you know, rashy talks about is this space of wonder, um, you know, I mean, I love just watching the sunset, right? I'll sometimes I live about 12 minutes from the beach. Um, and sometimes I'll just dry that out around sunset and I'll just sit in the car and I'll just watch that sign as it slowly starts to go down and look at the wonderful colors. You know, that's almost like a state of nothingness that space of wonder that is, is really important. And this idea then that yoga nidra this at rest process from yoga is quite interesting. I mean, she talks also in this book about, you know, our natural cycle. Now, this is written about in many, many places. They reckon that our pattern of our body operates 90 minutes cycles. And you know, it's interesting because if your body is naturally programmed for 90 minute cycles, um, Nathaniel, Katelyn, I think was the guy that first came up with this idea, although it could have been someone else, like I say, I'm a beginner, right, this, but he observed this 90 minutes cycle when we were both asleep and awake. And actually what a lot of us try and do is Uber ride this 90 minutes cycle, which I think is hugely fascinating. Um, and, um, you know, it, this is a book all about women, but like I say, I mean, this stuff applies to men too, but it's interesting because when we try to override the natural 90 minutes cycle that we go through, actually, that's when we reach for things like caffeine and sugar to fuel ourselves to sustain that alert stimulated state for longer. Now it later on in the book, again, I've so enjoyed reading this, um, th th this book, like I said, I'm only, only, only, almost halfway through it. It's, it's a great book. Now, she talks about the benefits to the brain of, of yoga nidra and essentially also rest and sleep. Now you may or may not know we talk about this on our NLP courses about the different brainwaves that we have. So you will have, uh, typically speaking, uh, you'll go from beta brainwaves then through to alpha theatre, then Delta, they're the kind of four stages as your body starts to slow down. And it's really interesting because here in the book, page 15, if you've got it, she talks about that when your body starts to slow. So B2 would be new normal, uh, and awake alpha is, is when you're slightly more relaxed shifting into this downshift. She describes it, the powering down, if you'd like into rest states. And when you come into the, this alpha, that starts to slow and in fetus is just the third category down. If you like your thoughts slow to fall to eight thoughts per second, according to this book and theater is not sleep as such. Now, when we do hypnosis with people, we always intend to get people into this theater brainwave, which makes total sense now in terms of why people find hypnosis so beneficial, not just because of the hypnosis itself and the positive suggestions that we would put in, but actually the person is happening 30, 60, 90 minutes of rest. If you like, which also is hugely, hugely helpful. I mean, she talks in this book about how theater is great for learning state and, oh my goodness, isn't it. You know, don't, I agree, you know, serotonin is released, um, this is our, our mood regulating hormones when you're in theater. And then obviously then when you go into Del, so your thoughts will slow down even further to one to 3.9, thoughts per second, according to this book. So when you really start to think about what rest really is, I think as a we're pretty poor at rest and actually things like meditation, yoga ninja, I rest hypnosis mindfulness. Like all of these things have probably even more health benefit than we might even realize when it comes to burn. It just absolutely eye opening. Um, as I was really starting to consider this yesterday, now what I'd also like to do, I'm conscious, this is going to be a long episode. I really hope you're enjoying this and getting tons from it alongside this, the book that I've created to help you. Um, now in terms of burnout, we therefore need to start to think about balance then, right? Because if actually work is causing a lot of problems for a lot of us, a lack of boundaries and therefore a lack of re-ask, um, and a lack of perhaps of the things in our life. This is how I think we can better. I kind of almost vaccinate ourselves, not really against burnout. Like I was at the L word than facts. You know what I mean? Like inoculate ourselves, like prevent this from happening now in the ebook. And on the next page, I've put a wheel of life for, you know, some of you will be familiar with the wheel of life. And this is essentially when you rate each area of your life on a scale of one to 10, one to 10 or one to five. Now I've done a one to five in the ebook, but you can have one to 10. It doesn't matter. And you don't have to do a circle either. Like you could do it on a piece of paper if you wanted to, but really starting to think about, and honestly, think about where are you in relation to these categories in your life now on the wheel of life here, I've, I've chosen, um, you know, health, friends, hobbies, recreational spirituality, careers, finances, but of course you could pick any label that you like, perhaps for you. Mental health and physical health are both important. I need their own quadrants. Perhaps personal development is important to you. Maybe time off is important to you. Maybe find you need a category for fun on this wheel. Cause that's important to you. Maybe you want to split significant others and friends and family separately. I mean, there's no limit to how many coordinates. You can have a cushion, you to have hundreds, don't have hundreds rather. Um, but like what are the areas of your life that are important to you and how would you rate yourself, honestly, in relation to those areas, you know, like, you know, significant other. Now you may have a relationship with a significant other, or you might be single on your own and, and how content are you with? Uh, there is no judgment here around any of these priorities for your life, but you should at least stop and rate them. How do you see yourself in each of these areas? You know, I'll be honest and I'm not perfect at managing burnout. You know, sometimes I slip up, you know, and I've had a very busy three months prior to August when I'm recording this. Um, you know, and, and I was very, very close to burn out. There was a lot of stress in my life. I had a lot of issues with the venue we were using for thankfully that's gone now and, you know, and, and trying to trade the business in a pandemic and all that kind of stuff, like very stressful. I needed time off. And so I had 10 days off and I went away and, and those 10 days away from my normal life enabled me to just stop and reflect. I mean, I've read a book. I don't ever read a book or read or read a book about rest. Um, you know, I reconnected with my family. I did things I loved. I mean, I went bodyboarding, I haven't been bodyboarding in the sea for probably four or five years. I went with my family. We had a date at the beach and it was amazing. And I reconnected with them and, and I started to think about actually, do you know what, apart from my wonderful dog, Rosie, who's fast asleep by the side of me. I didn't really have any other hobbies in my life right now. And actually that's not good for balance and boundaries. Now I'm a super busy woman and we could all say we're too busy to do anything. Right. Totally. We can all find a plausible reason to kid ourselves. We've got no time. We all have the same 24 hours in every single day, but this comes back to choices and behavior. Again, how are you choosing to spend your time? You know, I could work 14, 16 hours a day. If I wanted to, I will never get to the bottom of my, to do list for this business and for my work. But I have to stop. I have to make time. I'll make time for my customers. I'll make time for my business. I'll make time for the team that works for me because it's important. I spent four hours the other afternoon with one of my team looking at Google ad words, and I'll do that. So why don't I prioritize myself? Why don't I make time and protect time in my diary for me. Um, and I put off the press as of two days ago, I bought myself a sewing machine and I've signed up for some sewing machine. It's because I love creating things. I love to be able to have made my own clothes and taken up my own curtains and, and all of those things. And actually I could easily say, I haven't got time for that, but do you know what I've paid them? The, he put the workshops in my diary. I bought the machine is coming tomorrow and I'm going to make the time to do it because actually I think it's good for my balance in my life and that's not rest, but that's doing other things. So when we talk about how important behavior and choices are in relation to better managing burnout for me, we need to become more consciously aware of where we're saying no. Now a lot of people have a problem with saying no to other people saying no to things saying no to work. I mean, I know I used to be like, but the problem is we all have the same 24 hours, as I said. So if you want to free up time to have more balance in your life, to free up more time to do other things free up time to actually rest that by default means that you have to say no to other things. People could all know under a point and say no to other people or whatever. And I couldn't say no to it, but the truth is you're already saying no at the moment, if you prioritize work over your mental health, you're saying no to your mental health. Now we would never consciously do that. Would we? That would be crazy, but that is what we're doing. Um, and so actually for me, parcel of the solution for me, when I was starting to recover from my burnout was actually becoming more consciously aware about where it was better for me to say, no. Now you all only know for yourself where, and when you can do that. But I think, again, going back to this whole thing about, you know, not falling asleep behind the wheel of the car in your own life is actually, if you can get better at saying no, in order to free up your time to spend on your plan, to come out of burnout, your plan, to better manage your mental health, your plan, to bring a variety back into your life and all of those things, like that's only going to be a good thing, right? Just as a side note, before we move on, if you're someone that struggles to say no to other people and other things, then check the description below this podcast. And I will put a link to the YouTube video and the free ebook that I created called saying no, without feeling guilty, because if that's going to help you, I want you to access it, talking about hobbies, because I think this is a pipe part of, of how we perhaps have more balance in our life. A post on LinkedIn. I did a poll and at the recording of this episode, it's had almost 15,000 views, 300 votes, um, and, uh, you know, loads and hundreds of comments. And I just said to people, do you have a hobby? Yes, no thinking about it. Absolutely. And 63% of people said, yes, they have a hobby. And 17% of people said, absolutely I have several 15% of people said no. And 5% said thinking about it now, hobbies every great way. And now if I read through some of these comments that people have left me, I was in, or at the variety of hobbies that all these people have from making, um, slate case for tropical fish, paying recreational hobby, uh, hockey, roller skating, painting, riding, knitting, silver smithing. Um, I mean, there's so many patchwork embroidery walking the dog, doing agility with the dog, wonderful picture of a lady called Sharon. Who's put a picture up of her and her horse, which I think is just amazing cake, decorating portraits, kickboxing Helens, the kickboxing, Roger talks about learning Spanish, yoga, gardening, weightlifting. I mean, listen, the list goes on and on and on. And I sat there and thought, you know what? I need a hobby. I needs a hobby. And I'm so glad. I've just signed up to bring some more bonnets into my life. And I have to make the time to do the app in your ebook. So once you've done your wheel of life, and it's just a template in here for you, there's enough space on the following page for each of the areas of the, of your life. Again, change the titles if they don't work for you and just make some notes about your observations, about the scores that you've got, and then start to think about where do you want to make change in your life, wherever you're going to bring that balance back. What different choices are you going to make? Um, what different behaviors do you need to have in your life to do the app? I just think it's fascinating when we, you know, we really start to look at where are we, you know, this step back that I talked about earlier, like consider looking at yourself like a scientist word, right? So imagine there's a scientist in the room where you are right now, looking at you and analyzing your life and doing this self analysis that I'm encouraging you to do. Um, and what would they say? You know, objectively, no, I can't make you change. I can't make you do things differently. I mean, no one could for me, I had to discover it and learn it for myself. But the fact you're listening to this podcast episode Townes me that you either want to help yourself or you want to help someone else. You wouldn't still be here listening to me, talk about this. If it wasn't something that was important to you, you know, for sure. Um, you know, and it's really interesting, you know, Carl Young, I switched psychiatrists many years ago, talked about what you resist persists. And the more that you resist bringing this balance back into your life, the more you resist saying, I don't have time. The more that you don't take the action, the more you're going to continue to make yourself susceptible to burnout. You know? And like I say, I keep saying, I'm not perfect. I'm not saying I've got this now for myself. You know? I mean, I'm sat here drinking hot water and lemon. I've got my soul candle going and the dog's asleep, but you know, like there's a lot of, if you can argue self care going on right now, I'm resting. I'm not bringing balance to my life. I'm just doing little things. And, and all of those things have a role to play and I'm not dissing them at all. Um, all of those hobbies, the things that people I've read out that are doing absolutely brilliant, but none of it will work unless you start to look at your behaviors, your choices and your beliefs, none of it. Um, I think it's quite interesting now in your ebook care, I've, I've done a little quadrant about where are you now in relation to burnout. And, and this is the last kind of reflective piece before we start taking some action. Um, and I've asked you four questions and I'd like you to get the ebook. And I'd like you to really think about these four questions. What won't happen. If I change things, what will happen if I change things, what will happen if I don't change things and what won't happen, if a don't change that because these four questions and really reflecting on these questions, this is just a two-second fill Phillip box in, right? This is a real reflection piece. Um, you know, you've got to decide like how valuable is this change to you? Like, do you want to carry on the way that you are, or actually you prepare to take the action? Are you prepared to do what needs to be done to get the change that you want to have in your life? I mean, only you can make that change. You know, there's all sorts of, um, you know, we're talking in our peer about submodalities and I'm not gonna talk usually about that because I'm really conscious that I'm already like massively running. Um, you know, but when you think about how your life is right now, like, is that images for you that are big and bright in your mind, large, you know, or are they far away? Are they small? You know, how do you feel about them? Are, are they things that are diminishing, you know, when you look at that wheel of life and you think, oh yeah, Korea. Yeah. Brilliant. That to me, that's big. That's bright in my head. Like that's amazing. Yeah. Friends, no, actually I don't have time. Like I need to make time, you know? And, and it's, um, yeah, it's hugely, hugely fascinating when you start to really reflect and step back, um, from where you are. You see, as I said, at the very beginning of this episode, too many people using the metaphor of a car, too many people fall asleep at the wheel. Like these signs are usually there. If you check in with yourself, if you actually stop and step back and signs are normally there, but we live our life in first position, as I said earlier. And that means that we don't stop to reflect. We don't stop to analyze. We don't stop to take stock. We don't stop to think about, could I do things in a better way? Um, that takes this time more efficient using assignments, cynic example. And I think the more we can become self aware the better, but it's down to you to take personal responsibility. If you're going to make any changes in your life, um, to prevent yourself being susceptible to burnout. But what different choices do you need to make in your life? What different behaviors do you see to start to demonstrate? What different beliefs do you have? I mean, I'm just very honest and told you about my, my fear of failure that I used to have. I don't anymore, because of all the NLP training I've done in the change work, you I've told you, having a coach back then would have helped me. I think, discover what was going on for me, I probably could have prevented my burnout. I can't say for sure. Cause you can't rewind the clock. The truth is that there are so many things that you could do to either prevent or improve your situation in relation to burning out. And the challenge is what are you going to do? If you're someone that repeatedly gets burned out time after time, then you're going to have to change something. Maybe it's the environment that you're in, that needs changing. Maybe your relationships are not supporting you. Maybe you need to spend more time with positive people. Maybe boundaries are what you need to work on. Maybe you've got that balance in your life. And you need to think about your, uh, your hobbies and how you spend your time. Maybe rest is something for you that you've actively need to go and investigate and find out more about, you know, your burnout is not going to disappear overnight. You know, it's probably taken you quite some time to get to the point you're at now. I know it took me a long time cause I miss all the sides cause I'm on the road because I'm fell asleep at the wheel as they say, but you know, you absolutely, um, you know, need to, to think about where are you at? Like honestly, and honestly prepared to do, you know? I mean, if you're not going to take the action, then my question to you is so what are you gaining by keeping yourself burnt out? That's a tough love question. I'm fully aware of that. But if you're keeping yourself burnt out, then what are you gaining? Cause you must be gaining something. Cause otherwise you change. You know, some people might continue to keep burning out because it means other people do stuff for them because people feel sorry for them because people run around after them. That's still healthy. You need to take personal responsibility. That's where I'm at with it. Like take some responsibility, decide what you are going to do to change the course of your life. Now, if you're really serious about getting underneath the skin of your burnout, that what's caused it. Um, and uh, you know, how are you going to prevent yourself from going through these cycles in the future? Then you've got to dig deeper into your thoughts and behaviors. Now listen to the NLP podcast series. You'll know that your unconscious mind, mind controls your behavior. And it runs 10 to 20,000 patents or programs every single day. And unless we start doing a little bit of what I call a software update and your unconscious mind, and have you run some healthier patterns and programs, have you get rid of some of these unconscious limiting beliefs that you have, some of these internal conflicts, you know, and very common, uh, conflict that will lead to a lot of women burning out is part of me wants to be an amazing professional partner, wants to be an amazing mum. I'm a goodness. Like, can you be perfect at both? I mean, perfection is an illusion I think, but I didn't used to think that, you know, so, so there are some beliefs and thinking patterns and things you'll be doing, um, that are not helping, that the stuff I'm sharing in this podcast today are all what I call conscious mind techniques. And we're not changing anything at the unconscious mind. We're not changing the patterns or programs. And if you're really serious about really getting under the skin, you either need to come on an NLP practitioner course or find yourself an experienced coach to work with. Because if they're working with you with NLP, they will be able to help you really make those changes that you need to make to the unconscious patterns and programs that you're running. Now, we can't do that on a podcast. So what can we do Laura? Well, let's have a look first things first, next page in the ebook, my goals. So you need to decide for yourself what your priority areas are going to be like, what areas of your life is going to give you the biggest impact right now, or with preventing you from being exposed to the potential risk of burnout. Now here in your ebook, you've given you an opportunity to write out three goals around burnout to help you move forward. Now I've only put three deliberately because those of us that are prone to burnout are people that like to overcome it. We like to say we're going to do too much. So three's all I'm going to let you have. I mean, that's up to you. I'm not going to be there to stop you, but I really would caution you having to make yourself too many more commitments. So based on everything that you've done so far on this episode with me today, what are you going to do? What action are you going to take? What are your goals? Why are those things important? And how are you going to measure whether or not you achieve them? Now this doesn't have to be perfect. You know, this is work in progress and you could have Maine amend, refine it grade, revise, remove, replace any of these at any time because it's all of yours. Um, but I really want you to start to think about what action are you going to take? And if you turn over the page, then in your ebook, you've then got the no reflect. So what won't happen if I take this action, what will happen if I take the action? What won't happen if I don't take the action and what will happen if I don't take the action, those of you trained in NLP will know this is easy on logic. Um, if you're not, don't worry about it. Just use the book as it is. And then just like, what steps are you going to take right now in relation to these three goals? So this ebook is there to support you to do that. Now again, without you coming in and seeing me one-to-one or coming on a course, I can't help you change the unconscious patterns or programs, but consciously we can do a little bit of work to make progress and make steps in this area. The next thing we've got here in the ebook is talking about positive habits. So questions for you to answer, and I'm not going to go through all of these. You need to go and download the ebook and complete these yourself, but your habits, the habitual things that you do are going to play a role in whether or not this is actually going to change for you. So, you know, what do you want? How are you going to do it? What habits do you need? How are you going to pick up new habits that you might need now? And the next page in the ebook I've then per page, all about role models. Now sometimes the easiest way to solve a problem or achieve a goal is to find someone that's already done it. Now in NLP, we call this modeling and again, on a podcast, I can't teach you all about modeling, but what I've done here is put some questions in here for you to think about who do you know that's been in a similar situation to yourself. There's overcome these obstacles and can you find out how they did it? So hopefully you've been taking notes throughout this episode because I could be your role model in terms of some of the ideas I've given you, but there's a whole host of questions here in the book for you to use this. Then in the book again, another actual orientator task for you to do a page called shoulds into musts. There's no point in having shirts far, too many people as I call it should all over themselves. It is not the way to motivate yourself. You need to get those shirts to the muster I am going to, I will do. And on here, um, you've got a little exercise that you can use for that. It comes from some of the work of Tony Robbins, who many of you will have heard of, um, in the sense of creating some urgency around how you're going to do things. He says here, the difference between mustard shirts in your life, um, you want, and the life that you have. Um, so that's really useful. And then in addition to that, all these resources for you in the ebook, I've then put in some stuff around mindful choices. Now I'm not trained in mindfulness, but I have a huge amount of empathy and sympathy, not sympathy. That's the wrong word. What am I talking about? I believe in it. That's probably what I'm trying to say. And actually, if we can get you more mindful, more aware self-aware of your choices, which is what I've been talking about and less on this autopilot falling asleep behind the wheel of the car, then we can be making much more sensible choices. So I put some stuff in here about choices, cause I've been talking about a lot today. I put a section in here about new habits. So what do you need to change in order to help support you? And then there's a section on limiting beliefs. Now I shared one of mine with you already. Um, and on a podcast, I can't help you change your limiting beliefs unconsciously. I could, if you came on the practitioner course, no problems at all. So there's a page here about that. And then a couple of pages about the belief results cycle. So a little introduction for you about how your beliefs turn into thoughts, which turn into your behaviors, which turn into actions with turn into results. So your beliefs are something that really are playing apart, um, in the situation you're in, in relation to burnout. So make sure you go through those pages thoroughly and read everything that I've written in there. So fat then merely that we then got a paycheck for the wheel of life, vision, as in, what do you want to do in terms of improving the areas of the wheel of life? You did add it. So page for that. And then I just, I included a few extra bits and pieces to help you. So there's a success planner, which I think you'll find quite useful for helping you to monitor weekly, the success you're making in terms of your burnout plan. There's a journal page. So some of you will really like journaling. A lot of people do that morning and evening every single day. It's a way to become much more self aware and present. And in the moment in relation to this, if you really are serious about making a change in your life in this area, so there's a journal template there for you as well. And then at the back, I've put in a habit tracker. So if you've decided that some of the habits, some of the things that you want to do are things like doing, um, you know, learning about, um, yoga nidra or ivest or journaling or mindfulness or family time or hobbies or whatever. You can then as a little monthly tracker on the back here, which you can download and use just to tick yourself off. Do you remember when we were all kids, we used to have charts on the fridge, what we did in our house. It will reward charts. And then you can give yourself a reward for actually making the progress that you want to make in your life, in this area. So if you haven't already downloaded the ebook, go and get it because this ebook is what's going to help you implement everything we've been talking about in this podcast. Burnout is absolutely preventable in my view, and you absolutely can recover from it. If you are willing to take the action to change your behaviors or choices and your beliefs, if what you've currently been doing has not been working, then I genuinely hope from me to you that I've given you some ideas and some tools today that you can use to help you on your journey to beating burnout. I would hate for anybody in my community are on here on the podcast or social media or in our students to be suffering with something like this and not have some ideas about the actions which they could take. If you are absolutely serious about making some unconscious changes in your life to help you beat burnout, then you really do need to seriously consider coming on our NLP practitioner course, where I can help you discover the unhelpful thinking to change it, to look at your limiting beliefs, um, to absolutely start to change the way that those unconscious patterns and programs are running in your life that are leading you to where you are. If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got coming. Who's quote, that was, but it's so, so true below this episode, wherever you're listening to this, you will also find a link to our NLP practitioner course page, go and check it out. You're also on our website. Find a guide to helping you picking the right NLP course for you. So I'm conscious that a lot of our listeners are overseas. Um, so some of you are in America and all the way around the whirlwind, oh God, goodness knows how many countries now. So traveling to the UK to train with me might not be an option at which point I want you to use that guy to pick the right provider for you. I want you to get good quality, decent NLP training. There's too much rubbish out there. Um, and I don't say that word lightly. Um, and that's quite polite for me. Um, and I want you to get good quality NLP training because I want you to change your life. I want you to beat these things that are holding you back, and I want you to unleash your potential, the name of my NLP business. Please let me know what you think about this episode. It's a really good long in-depth episode. Look at practical ways to help you with burnout. And I sincerely hope that you have benefited and will benefit. As I said again, go get that ebook if you haven't already got it, because I really know that if you do the work, I know you can start to change the way that you feel and you can get yourself back to that place of feeling more energized, loving, enjoying life, and feeling fulfilled and all of those wonderful things. So stay well. I wish you every success. Um, if you want to talk to us about our NLP courses and just drop us an email@infoatunleashyourpotential.co no, I can't even remember my own email address. Laura, start again. Sorry. It gives you a chance to get a pen, right info@unleashyourpotential.org.uk. And if you've enjoyed the episode today, drop me an email. Let me know. I always love hearing from people when they've had benefit from our staff. Stay tuned for the next episode in this series, which is the wonderful Yvonne pre-charge where she is going to be sharing with you. The difference NLP has made in her life and in her business and your head, just how passionate she is about helping people at small business owners in that business. And until then take care and I'll see you.