Setting Healthy Limits

Setting Healthy Limits

Setting limits/boundaries, re-prioritizing one's schedule, and stress management techniques are all ways to decrease the chance of experiencing burn-out.

You can avoid mental burn out by ensuring that what you do remains fun: There is a limit to your mental energy and you should respect that. As you get better at what you do, people may want increasing amounts of your time, and will rely on you more and more. It is easy for commitments to get bigger: people tend to be quite happy to consume other peoples mental resources without worrying about the consequences. You must learn to say 'No' to commitments that you do not want to take on - otherwise you will be in severe danger of burning out as you become unhappy with your situation.

Signs of Burn-Out:

If you feel that you are in danger of burning out, or are not enjoying what you do, the following points can help you correct the situation:

* Re-evaluate your goals and prioritize them

* Evaluate the demands placed on you and see how they fit in with your goals

* Identify your ability to comfortably meet these demands.

* If you are over-involved, reduce the commitments that are in excess.

* If people demand too much emotional energy, become more unapproachable and less sympathetic. Involve other people in a supportive role. You owe it to yourself to avoid being bled dry emotionally.

* Learn stress management skills

* Examine other areas in your life that are generating stress, such as work or family, and try to solve problems and reduce the stress

* Get the support of your friends and family in reducing stress

* Ensure that you are following a healthy lifestyle:

o Get adequate sleep and rest to maintain your energy levels

o Ensure that you are eating a healthy, balanced diet - bad diet can make you ill or feel bad.

o Get adequate regular aerobic exercise

o Limit your caffeine and alcohol intake

* Perhaps develop alternative activities such as a relaxing hobby to take your mind off problems

* Acknowledge your own humanity: Remember that you have a right to pleasure and a right to relaxation

·  Burnout is often caused by not knowing what we want, yet killing ourselves to get it.

·  Management uses ABM to determine if resource consumption is balanced. They will personally classify activities as required or discretionary to determine if time is being wasted on unnecessary activities. You can do the same. A time management expert said that most people spend one hour per day "Looking for Misplaced Things". If true, this equates to six weeks per year of discretionary time. Get organized and use the time for more important required activities.

·  Take a blank sheet of paper. Draw a line down the middle. On the left side, list all the activities you enjoy. On the right, list all the activities you detest. These are your own non-value added activities. Target one for elimination. Define actions that you take this week to re-deploy that wasted time to your value-added activities listed on the left.

·  Excessive secondary or administrative activities are not fun and cause burnout. Secondary activities are those tasks that you feel should not be a part of your job. It is very difficult to do a good job on an activity that you do not enjoy performing. Primary activities support your company, departmental or personal mission statement. Secondary, as the name implies, are not your primary purpose in life. Therefore, take steps to eliminate, reassign or right size them.

·  Activities form business processes. Yet we often forget to link ourselves to other people doing ABM. Find one or more ABM "friends". Don't become an island. You don't have to deal with burnout by yourself. ABM is now almost fifteen years old. As a result, there are many people worldwide who have years and years of experience and wisdom to share with you.

·  Activity and business process information helps senior management allocate the limited resources of the organization to its mission and strategic plan. Resource allocation is one of the four primary reasons why Peter Drucker recommends ABM in his books and teaching. We need to re-evaluate our personal time allocation periodically. If there is not a balance between physical, mental, spiritual and rest activities, burnout can occur. Are you taking care of your physical body? Are you feeding your mind with new ideas from books or seminars? Have you made worship, prayer and Bible reading a part of your weekly schedule? Are you taking time out to prevent burnout?

Making Changes:

The first step to being happier in your job is realizing you are burning out. The next step is making changes that allow you to climb up and out of the burn out cycle you are in the midst of.

Change Your Focus

~Set Limits/Boundaries

Avoid bringing your work home. If you have an home office, then decide on a certain time each day to shut the door to your office (lock the door if you have to). Never mind that the office phone is ringing or your computer is bleating You've Got Mail. You're no longer at work! Ignore it. The answering machine will record your calls, and your e-mail will be waiting for you the next day.

~Spend Your Lunch Break Differently

If you usually have lunch alone, ask a co-worker to join you or have a friend or spouse meet you out somewhere for lunch. If you generally eat with your co-workers it is likely you are spending your break in the midst of office discussions or politics. These types of lunch chatter aren't normally conducive to good digestion, and is certainly not a real break from your job. Instead of eating with your co-workers.... go off by yourself. Brown bag it at least once a week and find a place outside to enjoy your peanut butter sandwich and fruit cup.

~Re-organize/Re-prioritize Your Schedule

If you are disorganized in your work schedule it is time to take the bull by the horns and build some kind of structure that will make your work routine flow better, thus reducing your stress level. On the other hand, if you are the type of individual who keeps to a strict schedule consider juggling things around a bit. Most jobs involve a variety of tasks. As long as you perform the tasks required it likely is okay to change the order they are accomplished.

Examples:

* Office Worker: Make your phone calls to your clients in the afternoon instead of first thing in the morning allowing you to get caught up on back logged paper work while your mind is fresh and uncluttered.

* Food Service: Prepare those lunchtime dinner salads at the end of your shift (storing them in the refrigerator overnight) instead of arriving an hour before your shift. This allows you to sleep in an extra hour the next day.

* Manager: If you are in a position to delegate some of your work on to others... do it, don't assume you have to do everything yourself.

~Plan a Vacation

Everyone needs a break, whether you are a stay-at-home mom, the president of a company, self-employed, or an employee. If you have vacation coming to you time, even if it is only a 2-3 day, weekend, get out of town! Staying at home during vacation breaks is fine for some people who understand how to relax, but often times workaholic-type individuals tend to slave away when at home doing yard work or household repairs.

~Don't Forget To Play

Try not to take life so seriously. Keep your heart light. Fear of not meeting deadlines and burying yourself in work, becoming a slave to your tasks is not in your best interest. Surprisingly, taking time out each day to play, exercise, and/or meditate will magically alter your psyche and will awaken your body, mind and spirit. Afterwards, you will miraculously begin to feel more refreshed when you tackle the tasks required on the job.