Why you can’t bubble bath your way out of burnout.

Here’s what I see far too often. Nonprofits have unrealistic goals and expectations (for all the best reasons, but still…). That means they haven’t thought about realistic timelines on which to achieve their goals. They push their employees and volunteers to their limits, to the point they take over all their time.

Nonprofit professionals are working 60 or 80 hours per week, paid tiny salaries—often with no benefits—so supporting their personal goals (like buying a home or travelling) becomes a challenge.

Under enormous pressure at work and at home, nonprofit professionals simply can’t manage the enormous stress loads. Leadership is as stressed out as the junior staff; nobody gets enough support, and rather than see the problem as the unrealistic expectations, we blame individuals for not caring enough about the mission. 

It’s rugged individualism at its finest, in an industry where we’re supposed to be advancing the common good. It shouldn’t go together, but it does.

According to Nonprofit HR, 45% of nonprofit employees they surveyed in January 2020 said that they planned to leave their current employer, and of those, 23% said they intended to leave the field entirely. And that was BEFORE a pandemic and a new Administration that’s making life very difficult for nonprofits.

The number one reason I hear from nonprofit professionals that they plan to leave their jobs is BURNOUT. The numbers are even starker for fundraisers…with nearly half of professionals saying they plan to leave in the next two years (according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy).

But all too often, I see the nonprofit professional being blamed for this failure, not the culture and environment that pushed them to that extreme.

But first, what is burnout? 

According to Psychology Today, “Burnout is a state of emotional, mental, and often physical exhaustion brought on by prolonged or repeated stress.” Burnout is defined by its symptoms: “Physical and mental exhaustion, a sense of dread about work, and frequent feelings of cynicism, anger, or irritability are key signs of burnout. Those in helping professions...may notice dwindling compassion toward those in their care. Feeling like you can no longer do your job effectively may also signal burnout.”

Here’s another way to think about it. When we experience a stressor, our body goes into fight or flight mode (you’ve heard that info before, right?). While helpful when running from predators in the wild, it’s not a helpful response when your boss comes in with a ridiculous request or unmeetable deadline. You can’t fight your boss. You can’t get up out of your desk and run away. So our body keeps the adrenaline, cortisol and all the other stress hormones in our body. It builds up and builds up...and when your body tries fight and flight repeatedly and it doesn’t work, your body tries another response:

FREEZE.

In wild animals, that manifests as playing dead.

In humans, we call it burnout. 

Let that sink in for a moment. Burnout is a point of stress buildup in your system that you just lie down and hope you don’t die.

We can do better…but we’ve got to stop talking about burnout like it’s a personal failing and more about the systemic reasons we can’t get away from it.

Here are five reasons we can’t just bubble bath our way out of burnout.

1. Bubble baths are Band-aids. Burnout is a hemorrhage.

A lot of what is passed off as burnout prevention—bubble baths, massages, long walks on the beach—they are great stress management tools.

But stress management is like a Band-aid. When you’re level 1-2 out of 5 on the stress scale, they are great. They close the wound and let you heal.

But burnout is 5 out of 5 on the stress scale…and it’s like hemorrhaging. When you’ve nicked a major artery and you’re losing blood at a terrifying speed, Band-aids don’t do a darn thing.

Burnout means things have gone badly wrong, and they will continue to go wrong unless we do some deep fixing at a fundamental level. Just like that major artery, you’re just going to keep bleeding through Band-aid after Band-aid, and you’re not going to feel any better unless you get some real help in fixing the wound.

2. It’s not YOU, it’s the system.

We like to place responsibility for stress management squarely on individuals. It’s BS, especially for women, people of color, people with disabilities, and many other groups. It’s double BS when you represent more than one of those categories, which so many of us do. When we face microaggressions on a daily basis, have our experiences denied by colleagues, get talked over, get asked to conform...the stress builds up. It’s death by one thousand cuts; and, again, band-aids won’t stop the bleeding after a certain point. 

At some point, you have to look at your environment and realize that—without radical changes to your environment—things simply won’t get better. At that point, you have to assess. Is it worth staying and fighting for change? Or do I need to get out and find a new situation? I’ve done both for different reasons in different situations. But the main point here is that you need to stop looking inward and blaming yourself. Instead, you need to start assessing your environment to know if recovery is even an option.

3. We’ve got to cure Human Giver Syndrome.

My hands-down favorite resource on burnout is the book “Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle” by Emily and Amelia Nagoski. In the book, they identify “human giver syndrome” as the root cause of burnout. In their assessment, “human givers” are people (read: women, people of color, etc.) who are expected to sacrifice their wellbeing for “human beings” (the people who have historically expected to be taken care of). We can be human givers and human beings at different points in time in different situations, but the balance is heavily weighted toward human givers in certain populations (again, women, people of color, etc.). In fact, “human givers” are punished for trying to assert themselves as “human beings.” We are punished by others. And it’s so pervasive, we internalize it and criticize ourselves for doing things to care for ourselves. 

An example I love from the book is to think of the last time you got a great night’s sleep and shared that information with someone. Was their response “Wonderful! I’m so happy you’re taking care of yourself.” Or was it “oh, lucky you, I wish I could get a good night sleep…”? The authors’ guess (and mine) is that it was the latter. That’s human giver syndrome. When human givers do anything good for themselves (even sleeping), they get punished for it.

I’m doing my part to cure human giver syndrome by having my clients tell me about what they’re doing to take care of themselves, and then I celebrate it. And when they share things that are not taking care of themselves, I ask them why, what can they do to care for themselves more? If it’s a tight deadline, fine, go ahead and hustle, but then I hold them accountable to taking an afternoon off or doing something restorative over the weekend. I do my best to spot human giver syndrome in my clients and root it out.

But you can start by ruthlessly defending your right to care for yourself…and celebrating those around you who take care of themselves. That’s step one.

4. Self-care is non-negotiable...and (again for the people in the back) self-care isn’t a bubble bath.

The book “Burnout” is chock-full of amazing recommendations for how to manage stress. First and foremost, the book helps you spot what in your environment is keeping you burned out and how to deal with that. But then it walks you through daily stress management and self-care because even in best case scenarios stress is inevitable.

I refer you to the book (or the awesome accompanying podcast, if you’re a more auditory learner) for ideas that work for you. But you need to find what works for you, and then you need to figure out how to make it non-negotiable.

My husband and I have worked together to identify those for ourselves, and we fiercely protect each other’s restorative time. My thing is running, and he makes sure that I have the time to get in my daily run, no matter what. (He even pushes me out the door sometimes when I don’t want to.) For him, it’s his art practice, so I make sure that he has the time he needs in his studio. 

Things that counter Burnout are the things that tell your body that you are safe. Running (the “flight” part of fight or flight) helps your body process stress hormones. Creativity is something you can’t engage in when you are unsafe, so it automatically tells your brain you are safe.

What makes you feel safe?

5. Boundaries are the best! 

Setting boundaries, especially at work, can be game-changing. Establishing your work hours, and then pushing back when you’re asked to work outside of them is critical. Holding to the boundaries of your job description (because along with mission creep, nonprofits are really good at asking employees to work outside their areas of responsibility) is an important practice. We care, so we fudge our boundaries at work. But that’s part of how we burnout.

And while your colleagues may initially balk at your boundaries, I’ve seen people make important changes to their nonprofit culture by holding their boundaries. For nonprofit leaders, this is doubly important. If YOU don’t hold your boundaries, you’re setting your employees up for failure because they emulate you. YOU set the culture, so don’t be that boss… 

Furthermore, holding your boundaries in your social life is good too. Don’t see that family member that makes you feel bad. You don’t have to go to every socially-mandated baby or wedding shower just because you were invited and don’t have a conflict. If your friend’s destination wedding is going to drain your bank account, tell them you love them but you have other financial priorities.

You can just say no to protect your time, energy, and money. I give you that permission right now.

So what next?

On May 16, I’m hosting a workshop to help you–you wonderful nonprofit pro–learn more about burnout and workshop a plan to beat the burnout. It’s going to be a tough conversation, but I think you might need it. Register now to make sure you get a spot.

If you’re struggling with burnout, I highly encourage you to read the book and listen to the podcast. If you’re really in need of support, I recommend looking into mental health and therapy services. I’m a big, big fan of therapy!

If you learn nothing else from this blog post, let it be this: YOU are not a failure for getting burned out, nonprofit culture is. You deserve care and support. You have the right to take care of yourself above others when you need to. You can’t serve others when you have nothing left to give.

You are a treasure. Please treat yourself accordingly.