Burnout – Are You Flirting With It?

Get Accomplished with Heather

You don’t have to experience burnout in order to live a relaxed, spacious, abundant life. You deserve a lovely life without first flogging yourself half to death.

Have you ever experienced burnout? “Words don’t teach, only experience does.” Abraham-Hicks.

I was blown away when I heard these words of wisdom and I realised the truth of it. We can be told about things or warned about things, but until we experience it for ourselves we can’t really KNOW what it (whatever that is) is like. Childbirth, drunkenness, running your own business. You can tell someone until you’re blue in the face what it’s like. They won’t understand until they’ve been there. And even then, their experience may be TOTALLY different to yours.

So is there really any point in learning from mentors? People who have walked the path ahead of us? Hell yes. We don’t need to experience something to decide that it’s something we want or don’t want. We can hear others experiences and make a choice that we want something similar or different for ourselves. How we achieve that something is up to us to discover. We may take a different path to get to the same outcome, and the same outcome will be different anyhow, because we arrive with a different perspective, our own perspective. And that is the fun of the journey.

Hell Yes!!!

I live a really spacious and chilled out life. I help my clients to do the same. Part of the reason I live such a spacious and chilled out life is not because I decided that was what I wanted and went for it, but because I was experiencing all the symptoms of burnout and as a result, got a scary (to me) diagnosis. (Graves disease – an overactive thyroid condition.)

I suffered with low energy way before my Graves diagnosis. Probably for the past 30 years. When your energy levels feel limited, you really learn how to manage the reserves you do have, more and more efficiently, which in turn leads to having more and more energy – woohooo!!! It also took me on a wild holistic adventure of discovery to try and find out what was ‘wrong’ with me, and how to become more efficient and effective in the world.

So many, myself included, can be so down on ourselves when our energy is low. We think we are lazy and inefficient, that we haven’t achieved anything, that we’ve wasted time, that we should be further along than we are. That couldn’t be further from the truth!

5 helpful tips for when your energy is low

1. Your energy runs in cycles.

If you’ve lost your mojo, and your energy is low, know that this will pass. Sometimes we have more energy and sometimes we have less energy. This is totally normal. Our energy levels can be affected by internal workings such as hormones, immune system, health conditions, and external factors which may, or may not be in our control. Work, social, family and study, commitments, happenings in our community and wider world. In any moment we’re moving towards having more or less energy, think of it as a natural, circular cycle. Even when we feel stuck, there is movement happening. Attune yourself to the movement. Practise working out where on the cycle you are and act accordingly.

An illustration showing the movement from more energy to less energy and back again in a circular cycle

2. Know that when you have more energy, you get more done with more efficiency.

If you push on through when your energy is low, you waste time, and you could potentially be moving yourself a little bit closer to burnout. Leave the things you can until your energy has increased and you’ll whip through them with so much more ease and efficiency.

3. There are tools you can use to increase your energy in every moment.

Using your tools in each moment may not immediately increase your energy, but they will move you towards having higher energy rather than towards even lower energy. Using these tools before you hit a low energy state, will prevent your low being so low before you begin to move back towards high!

4. Keep a list of holistic tools to refer to and use when you’re in a low energy state.

Take a nap, do some journalling, hydrate, eat foods which nourish you, delegate, ask for support, exercise/move, get out in nature, watch Netflix, paint, meditate, read, draw or do something else creative. Write a list of all the things you HAVE accomplished. Ask yourself which of these tools would benefit me most right now – and do it. Again, using these tools before you get to really low energy will help you to move through the cycle more quickly, and your low can be less low.

5. Know your minimum viable tasks in your business and life.

Get clear about and be honest which tasks really need to happen in your business and life. When your energy is low, just do the most important things. Use the rest of your time and energy to use your tools. You’ll get more quickly to a better feeling, higher energy place where you’ll get the thing done with more efficiency anyway. The minimum viable is going to depend on what’s going on in your business and life, and just how low your energy levels are. Are you mid-launch? Or is your priority back end stuff? Are you a bit low on energy? Or are you close to burnout? You’re smart, you know what you can let go, and delegate what you can.


Much of my work is around showing people that managing their energy does in fact mean they get WAY more done. Yes we need systems in place to help us see clearly, and manage our workload. To see our business and life from a high-level birds-eye view. I help with that. We also need granular systems which help the day-to-day run smoothly. That’s all super important, but when we learn to become masters of our own energy, we get to live a more steady, sustainable, and pleasurable life in every way.

It takes courage to do less in order to gain more. It goes against so many of the stories we’ve grown up with. We can feel lazy, indulgent, like a slacker, not worthy, to name but a few. It’s my desire that more people have the courage to choose ease, without having to go through a scary diagnosis or burnout in order to give it a go.

I predominantly work with coaches and healers who run group programmes. If you’d like to chat about how I can help you to live a more easeful life, book in a free call here. There’ll be no hard sales tactics, just a chat to see if we’d be a good fit, no-obligation at all. I look forward to hearing from you.

An illustration showing the movement from more energy to less energy and back again in a circular cycle