Not an Intellectual Exercise: We Need to Experience an Internal Shift
I hope you found the descriptions of the types of burnout, and my advice for changing your relationship to work and to yourself, helpful. But even if you have put your heart and soul into the worksheets and exercises in this book, until a major internal shift occurs at a deep level, your enthusiasm will fade, this book and its worksheets will gather dust, and you'll slowly go back to orbiting the strong gravitational forces of your ego, its desires, and your daily chores and activities. You'll feel the pull of your soul or true self, too, but without the purposeful emphasis on that higher part of you, it's natural to give in to gravity and sink down to the lower parts.
When an addict or codependent decides to try a twelve-step program (like Alcoholics Anonymous), they're told to go to ninety meetings in ninety days. That's because what AA has to offer is not an intellectual exercise. Yes, you do have to learn the content. But it's more important to practice reacting differently to stressors until you start to expand your consciousness. Then you'll have other, better options than the reflexive ones that come naturally, but that cause pain and keep you stuck.
The most rewarding part of my work as both a coach and as a psychotherapist might be when I see a client go from reacting to a hurtful situation, to trying out a new response. It's a magical moment.
Janice, a thirty-two-year-old client, recently had one of those moments. She came in to my office and started explaining what had happened as soon as she sat down. She had occasionally complained that her husband, Joe, would leave his laundry on the floor instead of putting it in the hamper. On a good day, she didn't care too much. But when she was having a tough day, this really got on her nerves and made her feel taken for granted. "I was having one of those days," Janice said, anxious to tell me about her experience. "I was feeling unloved, unhappy and hormonal. I walked by the bedroom and saw Joe's shorts, t-shirt and underwear lying on the floor. He must have just dumped his gym bag onto the bedroom floor. I lost it. First I felt angry. But pretty soon I sat down on the bed and started to cry." Janice took a Kleenex out of the box on the side table at the end of the couch and held onto it while her eyes filled with tears, remembering how flooded with emotion she'd felt a few days earlier.
"I cried for a few minutes. It surprised me. I've been irritated at Joe's laundry on the floor, but I never felt sad about it. It didn't make sense. I guess my surprise at all that crying made me wonder where it came from. I tried to let my mind go blank to see what would come up. The thought popped into my head that Joe loves me and he doesn't throw his laundry on the floor because he thinks of me as his maid. He does it when he's just gotten back from working out and the kids are following him, wanting to play. If I leave his stuff there a day or two, he picks it up and puts it in the hamper.
"As soon as I realized this, I felt a huge relief-this whole anger about his dirty laundry that irritated me once or twice a week was gone. Yesterday, Joe left his towel on the floor. When I went over to put it in the hamper I realized that I'd be lying to myself if I got all upset and told myself that he didn't respect me or treated me like a maid. It was like that part of me was an immature teenager and the calmer and more detached part was me the adult."
When we shift from reacting emotionally and feeling out of control of our emotions and behavior, to taking a step back into the "witness" position, we're not just using our minds to think differently or learning a new tool to use when we're stressed. We're growing and developing a new part of ourselves. A part that is connected to something higher that isn't controlled by our thoughts or feelings. But once we open ourselves up to a higher energy, our thoughts can help us to stay on that higher plane when lower impulses try to get us to react.
There's No Finish Line for This Work
I've been encouraged along the way, both in my personal development and in writing this book, by others who have also found their unique path by nurturing their true self or soul and looking inward for meaning and truth about life and work.
Some of the encouragement came from books I read along the way. Some of these were spiritual and religious books. I'll include just a couple of them in the resources at the end of this chapter, because choosing which spiritual or religious books to read is very personal. I found that reading "how-to" books strictly for information wasn't nearly as meaningful as reading books that touched my soul and made me feel uplifted and as though I understood something deeper than if I'd just used my intellect. The best ones put me in a higher frame of mind, for lack of a better term. A frame of mind that was conducive to inner reflection and contemplation of something higher. They helped me to leave behind what now seem like petty preferences and lower impulses and fears.
I also spoke to quite a few people, both men and women, who had struggled with burnout, caring about what others thought of their career and family life, and battling their inner critic. These people were now living their lives according to what they cared about most, and looking inward and upward for answers. I'll include some of my interviews with them in the next section, Interviews with the Inwardly Mobile.
There's no finish line for this work. You just keep doing the best you can, and some days you can tune in to your intuition and calling more easily than other days. But if you have faith in the process and if you build up some momentum by making this inner work a practice, as opposed to hoping for some kind of sudden change that will make everything right from then on, you'll have more calm, grounded days than frantic, hectic, self-doubting days.
¬2004. All rights reserved. Reprinted from from burned out to fired up: A Woman's Guide to Rekindling the Passion and Meaning in Work and Life Leslie Godwin, MFCC. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the written permission of the publisher. Publisher: Health Communications, Inc., 3201 SW 15th Street, Deerfield Beach, FL 33442.
