Confessions of a Burnt Out Over-Achiever

I often only feel I have worked enough if, at the end of the day, I am bone-tired and wrung out. The team who designed the original Macintosh computer wore T-shirts boasting WORKING 90 HOURS A WEEK AND LOVING IT! This could be the insane slogan for our professional class. Many of us have built our identities around working to the point of exhaustio

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Meaning is not something that is bestowed upon us—it’s something we create. And as with any act of creation, it requires time and energy. One of the downsides of a life completely subsumed by work is that it leaves room for little else. In the words of psychologist Esther Perel, “Too many people bring the best of themselves to work and bring the le... See more

In my own life at least, burnout was not about trying to give too much, it was about trying to give things that I didn’t really have to give. It involved what I came to think of as a ‘high artificial ethic’ about what I ought to be doing in the world rather than an ethic that grew up from my natural giftedness and my place in the ecosystem of my ow... See more

Looking back, it's crazy how work used to consume everything... like a machine that never stops.

I remember those nights... coding hanggang madaling araw, as if time doesn't exist. Feels like I was proud of it before - wearing those long hours like a badge of honor.

Pero deep inside, I was slowly burning out...

It's weird how we glorify the hustle cu... See more