February 2012
Book Review
The Joy of Burnout: How the End of the world can be a New Beginning
by Dr. Dina Glouberman
I found this book in the Toronto Public Library system and was impressed that Dina Glouberman spoke directly to the person experiencing burnout in a kind sensitive way that would provide opportunity for healing and moving forward. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is feeling like they may be experiencing symptoms of burnout.
For symptoms of burnout check out this website; http://www.helpguide.org/mental/burnout_signs_symptoms.htm
Glouberman quotes the following poem by T.S. Eliot
East Coker
I said to my soul, be still and wait without hope.
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing;
Wait without love
For love would be love for the wrong thing;
There is yet Faith, but the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not read for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
This was extremely poignant to me as I read this as it ties into a concept that is unthinkable in most aspects of our lives. When a person experiences burnout they have taken on too much and need to simply rest and wait. During the period of healing a person has no desire to plan or hope and the person will know they are on the road to recovery when they again desire to look forward and plan not out of a feeling that they “should” but one of pure desire from something that comes from inside.
Deborah Connerty
The difficult road...
I have been doing a lot of thinking about taking the difficult road and believe that this is a concept worth sharing.
One of the myths in life is that doing what is good for us will be easy and come naturally. Of course this myth is perpetuated when on occasion what we want does come to us easily and effortlessly as if it were written in the stars that we should have this experience, or shiny new item, we often feel that sense of something clicking into place. Our friends and family will say to you “it was meant to be” and you will often feel that way as well.
Of course we have forgotten about all the thoughts, dreams and of course hard work you have put into achieving your desire prior to that moment in which the ‘click’ occurred.
During a Cognitive Behavioural Therapy Course I took last year the instructor said something so profound, it has stuck with me ever since. Life is a series of challenges, it s not happily ever after, something good happens and then something challenging happens (I am not quoting verbatim) the general idea here is that life is a series of challenges that unfold and some of what we need to do in our life’s is face some extremely difficult challenges, and in so doing we find we are stronger, more capable then we thought we were.
Coming back from a setback can be the most life affirming experience you ever live through. Let’s face it the real myth is that life should be easy and that if we just do everything properly nothing bad will ever happen. Resilience is facing the reality of your life the way it is and moving forward from there and for many of us that is far from easy.