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posted by martyb on Wednesday September 06 2017, @10:31PM   Printer-friendly
from the find-a-bigger-candle-to-burn-at-both-ends dept.

In today's era of workplace burnout, achieving a simpatico work-life relationship seems practically out of reach. Being tired, ambivalent, stressed, cynical and overextended has become a normal part of a working professional life. The General Social Survey of 2016, a nationwide survey that since 1972 has tracked the attitudes and behaviors of American society, found that 50 percent of respondents are consistently exhausted because of work, compared with 18 percent two decades ago. ... common signs of burnout include:

  • Feeling emotionally drained and mentally unwell. Nausea. Being unable to sleep or constantly fighting sicknesses like head colds.
  • Feeling alienated by your colleagues and bosses, feeling constantly underappreciated, or feeling ostracized by them.
  • Feeling you are not personally achieving your best, or regularly "phoning it in."

"There are a lot of things that can happen when people begin to have this problem at work," Dr. Maslach said. "There are things like absenteeism, turnover, but also things in terms of errors, not being careful about the work they're doing. We see a lot of difficulty with people getting along with each other — angry, aggressive." ... If you're suffering from burnout at work, or if any of those symptoms sound familiar to you, there are a few things you can do now, before you get some time off to recover. (Although you should definitely consider some time off to recover, if you can.)

  • Focused breathing, which can tap into your parasympathetic nervous system to help you reduce or manage stress.
  • Frequent breaks, preferably five-minute breaks for every 20 minutes spent on a single task, or sitting at your desk.
  • Ergonomic chairs and desks, like a sit-stand arrangement, or even a small plant in your office space.
  • A trusted mentor at work with whom you can discuss and strategize other ways to deal with work-related issues.
  • A hobby outside of work through which you can decompress, de-stress and dissociate from work. It doesn't have to be anything specific, but regular exercise or another fitness activity works wonders here, and has benefits beyond stress relief.

AI and robots don't need yoga, meatbag.


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  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 07 2017, @07:28AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 07 2017, @07:28AM (#564456)

    I remember well the feelings in myself when I burned out. It was when a corporation bought us out and I was made subordinate to some young kid who had "leadership" training, and my skills were in engineering.

    I guess I am not all that far from being a monkey, as I felt just like the cucumber-getter in this experiment. [youtube.com]

    It was so degrading to know my engineering and design skills were of much lower value than the leadership skills of the manager. I knew good and well the guy placed over me had no idea what I did. His skill was in the "leadership" of designing ways to compel and rank me, not in designing things. He was empowered to push me just to see how much bullshit I would take before I finally lost all drive to do anything. The organizational skill of the executive to put me in this kind of predicament was valued even more. We had plenty of money with quite lucrative government contracts, however it was made quite clear to me, as an engineer, that I was the most easily replaceable part of the organization. Anyone could do analog design or assembly coding. It got to where I really resented going to work, as I felt I was whoring my life away only to make someone else filthy rich, while I was getting laughed at for obediently taking it.

    Don't like it? There's an H1-B just waiting for your seat.

    Inside, I just got madder and madder, but I did not want to be "written up" by a "superior" for having a "bad attitude". So I spent way too much time stewing over it instead of throwing stuff like an angry monkey. Besides when a corporate entity is so well-off, of what importance are employees or customers anyway? They are not nearly as important to an organization as the ability to see us getting pissed and report us.

    I believe this whole mess is fomented by laws pushed by the elite granting them enforced monopoly, so if anyone threatens their business model, they have legal recourse to have their competition shut down, by force if necessary. At taxpayer expense. So they can do what they wish. We "little guys" don't have much recourse.

    When I finally saw Dr. Frans de Waal's animal research, I knew *exactly* what happened to me. I had the exact same response the monkey had.

    So, another monkey hits the unemployment line, with a bad write-up from a superior. I wonder how much technical talent has been squandered by the use of this kind of leadership and organizational skillsets? I think I have it bad? Geez, look at skilled machinists! I know three homeless people with quite impressive skillsets with a CNC mill. Homeless! Such a waste.

    I have gotten so pissed off just thinking about this again, that I am probably no longer rational, so I will avoid responsibility for saying exactly how I felt about it by signing off as anonymous.

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