May the body you burnout light the way – MAN CAVE MAN
Zul Andra reveals how he shines on through burnout, and how you can offer support to others
Text: Zul Andra
I used to burnout every half a year. Recently, I’ve been burning out nearly every quarter. Who knows, next year, when I turn 40, I might burnout every month. High-five! No? Okay.
I anticipate that I’ll face a burnout every 32nd of October; three-ty, two-ty. When you do, numbers are just squiggly lines some Arabian in the desert made up. Just as work, life, and your physical and mental health are — some kind of squiggly mirage.
What does burnout symptoms feel like? That’s like asking me what water tastes like, so here goes.
It places you in an existential dread of wanting nothing, while desperately attempting to hold on to something, in the chaos of everything. Perhaps the best way to describe it is driving at top gear with an empty gas tank while being blinded by smog made up of a smorgasbord of denial, lethargy, and a poor midnight diet.
Build a burnout strategy
In June 2019, the World Health Organisation classified burnout as an “occupational phenomenon” — not a medical condition, but an experience. In its 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases, WHO defines burnout as “a syndrome resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed.”
According to the organisation, it is categorised by “feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion; increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one's job; and reduced professional efficacy.”
In an article published by the Harvard Business Review, the writer argues that “the responsibility for managing it has shifted away from the individual (forget about more yoga, better breathing techniques, practicing resilience) and towards the organisation. Leaders take note: it’s now on you to help our mental health and build a burnout strategy.”
But what if you are the leader facing burnout symptoms? I run my own solo practice with a small team of roving consultants and specialists. I love it and it’s absolutely passion- and purpose-driven. But according to a study published in the Journal of Personality, this type of labour can breed obsessive — versus harmonious — passion.
Help me. Please?
The walls seem to have come crumbling down. You’ve been in bed for three days doing jackshit; Netflix is asking “Are you still watching Friends?” and your Gmail is so full that Google recommends an upgrade. How’d you feel? I’d be pissed.
Pissed that my body is unable to maintain the delusion of its statuesque prowess bestowed upon me by the Indonesian deities of my ancestry (and also, National Service). Pissed that I’m letting people around me, and myself, down. Being pissed — a negative mental attitude caused by burning out in the first place.
Are you looking for a solution? Look, I’m not writing this to tell you how to fix your burnout. I’m not a medical practitioner. I’m not a therapist. I’m not your mum.
I am, however, a practising communication strategist, coach and trainer. Here lies my attempt to eloquently pen a rather disastrous experience. Maybe you have an answer. A fix. A balm to soothe the tiger of its backache.
And that’s where my conflict lies. My life’s work has been to enable people to communicate with creativity, clarity, and conviction; to empower each other through their stories; but I find myself unable to say:
“Help me. Please? I don’t feel too good right now.”
I’m a business owner, a husband, a man. I was part of a United Nations peacekeeping mission in East Timor. I dragged two people out of a burning car — one of them died in my hands. I’ve been in bar fights. And… there’s a reason why you don’t see Batman and I in the same room together.
How then, do I articulate this pain? Who do I express it to? Why should this burden be on them?
The balm for burnout
I realised that I don’t talk about my burnout — not because I don’t know what to say but — because I can’t deal with what would be said back.
In communication, it’s very easy to say things. But a lot of communication is being able to manage the response. It’s two-way. You putt something into someone's space and that someone putts it back into yours. This is also why no one has ever regretted replying in a calm and collected manner.
What I found to be the most delightful is (ellipsis for maximum impact ...) empathy. A space where I can convey my burnout symptoms without judgment, or worse, ridicule. But everyone is different.
This reminds me of an exercise I enjoy facilitating in communication workshops. I call it ‘the all-seeing blind’. Two participants will buddy up. One will be blindfolded and the other will guide the blind through a maze of chairs and tables.
Most will do the same thing. Nearly none will do the one thing that’s pivotal in successful communication.
In this exercise, we’ll always have that one guide who’d direct with military precision —straight, 12 o’clock; back, 6 o’clock. We’ll always have a shepherd; we’ll always have the motivator; and occasionally we’ll always have someone who just want to mess you up like David Bowie’s goblin king character in the Labyrinth.
Rarely do we have a guide asking the blindfolded how they’d like to be led; what works for them; how to make them feel better, safe.
This, my friends, is my balm for burnout.
To identify that you are, to accept that you are, and to remedy as you are. One of these, or all of them, might not be easy for you. Dude, that’s alright. We are all in a constant process of self-discovery and rediscovery.
It’s like visiting Bali for the hundredth time and realising that you’ve only been eating but not praying or loving. Identifying and accepting what is will open a gateway to what could be.
Self-actualisation sometimes takes the sun setting perfectly over the apex of a temple. A trigger for the uninitiated. It’s not about finding it. Most of the time, it’s about keeping your eyes, mind and soul open and letting the light seep in through the cracks.
What has helped me is the light of a small support network of family, friends and professionals. People I can talk to: a sounding board. People who have the clarity of distance to acknowledge that my mental health and my symptoms of burnout are not theirs to own; that I’m not looking for a solution but, rather, compassion; and that if humanity is broken, may a collection of all our pieces make us whole.
Be there, or be square
Is this emasculation? What’s the benchmark for manliness? Hunter-gatherers? Can you build a mud hut? Do you derive pleasure shooting from a blow dart or shooting from a blowjob? Do you hunt for food through a food app? Do you paint your face because you are heading to a war or because you are going to an Irish pub at Clarke Quay for the Rugby Sevens?
What’s a man if the concept is man-made? And if being able to express your battle scars makes you feel better, who is anyone to judge?
I’ve never subscribed to the paywall of manliness. Gender roles and rules are meant to be broken simply because man made it up. A mud hut made of bullshit. What I do identify with, as a personal benchmark, is the last best and worst version of myself.
Sometimes I don’t get it. Sometimes I do. But the more I’m allowed the space to talk about it — especially with people I care about and who care for me, and maybe with you — it not only fills up the gas tank of my beingness, but it also fills them up for being there.
Be there for someone who’s experiencing burnout if you can, or be square. Because if you are not there, you are not ‘around’. Geddit? No? Okay.
Read more on spotting a burnout by a top psychologist here.
