Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan - #145: What You Need To Know To Break FREE From Burnout with Davida Ginter

Episode Date: September 7, 2021

Burnout is absolutely terrifying! So many people struggle with it every day and don’t know how to break out of the stress cycle! So what can we do? Global burnout expert, author, and speaker, Davida Ginter is here to let us know. She is the Co-Founder & CEO of Enkindle Global, an organization created with the mission to end burnout and literally wrote the book on work life balance. Today, Davida shares all the secrets, strategies, and tips on eliminating burnout in your life. If you have ever felt chronically stressed then you HAVE to listen to this episode!  About The Guest: Davida Ginter is the Co-Founder & CEO of Enkindle Global, an organization that leads global efforts to eliminate burnout. She’s the author of the book “Burning Out Won’t Get You There” which features interviews and conversations with worldwide leaders and changemakers. She’s the founder of the sustainability center Be the Change, and has been recognized internationally for her work in the field of Values-Based Communication for Sustainability.   Davida is a Participatory Leadership facilitator and a Non-Violent Communication trainer, with a BA in sociology & journalism (Tel Aviv University) and a MSc in Strategic Leadership towards Sustainability (BTH, Karlskrona, Sweden). She is a writing contributor on several worldwide platforms, such as Thrive Global and The Startup Publication. While Davida currently resides in Israel, she works internationally to lead social change.   Finding Davida Ginter: Website: https://davidaginter.com/  Enkindle Global: https://www.enkindleglobal.com/  Read Burning Out Won't Get You There Facebook: Davida Ginter Review this podcast on Apple Podcast using this LINK and when you DM me the screen shot, I buy you my $299 video course as a thank you!    To pre-order Overcome Your Villains NOW and get the bonus bundle click here: https://overcomeyourvillains.com     See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

stress. When it happens every now and then, that's not a problem, though, but when it's constant on a regular basis, this is too much to carry. And the actual definition of burnout is chronic work-related stress that has not been successfully managed. So really, the problem is not stress. It's how we cope with it, how we not let it becomes a regular part of our routines that burden us and get us all paralyzed at times. I'm on this journey with me. Each week when you join me, we are going to chase down our goals.

We'll overcome adversity and set you up for a better tomorrow. I'm ready for my closer. Hi, and welcome back. I'm so excited for you to meet my guest today. I selfishly am having her on because I need to hear and learn from her. Davida Ginter is the co-founder and CEO of Enkindle Global, an organization that leads global efforts to eliminate burnout. She's the author of the book, Burning Out Won't Get You There,

which features interviews and conversations with worldwide leaders and change makers. She's the founder of the Sustainability Center, Be the Change and has been recognized internationally for her work in the field of values-based communication for sustainability. Davida, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you for inviting me. I'm delighted to be here. So tell me, I'm confused. When I hear burnout, you are speaking to me because I feel as though I'm burnt to a crisp right now. But as I thought more and more about it, I wondered, is burnout different than stressed out? Or is it the same thing? Definitely different. And that is always so interesting to explore that because there is a wide misconception about this. People assume that stress and burnout are the same.

when it's actually far from being true. The thing about stress, and this is really interesting that it's not a negative thing by itself. There's a vast research showing that stress by itself is not a problem. It could actually be a positive thing that push us forward to pursue our goal.

It creates adrenaline, right? It creates this drive. The problem, however, starts when we perceive stress as negative and then we get caught up in this loop and we get actually stressed out by thinking that this is a stressful situation rather than coping with it. And then the other problem starts or continues when stress is not happening occasionally, but constantly. So if I can give you an analogy, if you will now grab a glass of water or your cup of coffee and I would ask you to

hold it up in the air for five minutes. That's not too challenging, right? But if I'd ask you now to hold it up in the air for an hour, that is a bit more heavy on your muscle, but still something feasible for you to do. What if I'd ask you to hold up your glass of water up in the air for 12 hours a day, six days in a row? That's exactly. I can see your expression now. And you can imagine that is a real burden and the same goes for stress. When it happens every now and then, that's not a problem. But when it's constant on a regular basis, this is too much to carry. And the actual definition of burnout, as coined by the World Health Organization,

is chronic work-related stress that has not been successfully managed. So really the problem is not stress. It's how we cope with it, how we not. let it becomes a regular part of our routines that burden us and get us all paralyzed at times. I was reading an article that you were recently interviewed for in Forbes, and it was talking about some of the statistics around the percentage of employees that actually are burnt out overstressed right now, and I believe it was 83%. Yeah, well, that was a few months ago, shortly after, I believe the second wave of COVID.

And to be honest, there isn't an accurate number data on stress and burnout because it keeps changing. The last 18 months since COVID hit took a serious toll on people's emotional well-being for different reasons, dissolving boundaries, a lot of balls to juggle in the air. uncertainty. Uncertainty. Uncertainty, exactly, dealing with the unknown, working remotely when we really wanted to socialize with people and or co-workers. And that means that every time you ask a person, how do you feel their answers keep changing.

And this is something really understand. This is so, it makes so much sense on the human level. And now it's up to us. and we had this brief chat just before we started recording, it's up to us to decide how we need to cope with this ever-changing situation, because this is our reality. Regardless of COVID,

we are living in an over-busy, ever-demanding environment. Now, what do we want to do with that? One of the things that you mentioned before we started recording was just the idea of acceptance and accepting the situation to help. us lower the stress. Can you explain that? Yeah, absolutely. Again, I can start with an analogy, which is, let's say I'm an athlete training for the Olympic Games in a marathon, right? I want to run the marathon. I've never done it, maybe one day. So it's not that I'll show up to the Olympic Games

to a real marathon running for the first time the 42 kilometers. I will run before. that many different hills and terrains and within different weather conditions because I want to prepare myself for whatever will come my way. That way when I will fly to a different country, different times on, different weather conditions, different soil even to run on, I'll be prepared. And that's basically how resilience is being built, right? You prepare before the challenge because sometimes you cannot predict the challenge. You don't know the territory until you walk on it. And going back to our discussion about learning to accept and live with the reality

is not really about feeling like a victim or this is our reality and that's just the way it is and we need to live with it. It's more about this is our new reality. Now, how do we turn that into an opportunity for growth? How do we prepare ourselves not just professionally, but also mentally, emotionally, to deal with the unknown, to deal with uncertainty. And from there, it really opens or paves a path of creativity, of innovation. You know, innovation is not just about building machines. This is about also innovate our routines, our lifestyle. This is why I'm calling it an opportunity to really

reinvent how do we want to live our lives and our work routine, our social lives, our parenting maybe, you know, there are different aspects coming in together in this new reality. DeVito, with so many people, myself included, knee deep in the anxiety, knee deep in the uncertainty. And I have past clients reaching out to me saying, Heather, my employer's mandating I get a vaccine to come back into the office. I don't want to go back to the office. I don't want to get a vaccine. I don't know what to do. And then conversely, there's people like me that want live speaking events happening again because we make more income when that happens. And every time one gets canceled, it's so frustrating and it feels so stressful. Depending on which side you're on, I feel like no matter

where you are, there's this high level of continued stress. Like you said, holding the glass up for days and days at a time. It's not possible. What are some of the tactical tips that you give people to implement in their life to overcome this kind of burnout? I'll start by saying, and really, that's always the first, because this is the foundation, that there is no one size that fits on. To be honest, when we try to blindly follow others' advice when it comes to our emotion, well-being, that could actually be more harmful. If we try to, say, employ a practice that another person seem to be doing and it's working well for them, but it's not a good fit for me, I could suffer from that if I would compare myself to another person, keep asking, why can't I meditate? I don't know,

why can't I start jogging, whatever it is. So you really want to choose for yourself the practices that suits your preferences and values and personality and routine. And with that said, so we have this foundation that we want to test and try for ourselves. Really, there are many practice we could share, but I can offer three main themes that I usually start with. And under those umbrellas, there's a lot of freedom for creativity. And the first one is setting boundaries. I think that many times people fall into this trap that we need to achieve it all.

And we need to be nice and kind to people, which is wonderful, but then we say yes to everything. And we want to accomplish so much at once that we simply forget to set our own boundaries. and how about instead of just keep saying yes and feel bad from the inside, how instead of that developing some sort of compass that helps you navigate between all those decisions and set your boundaries? So for example, ask yourself, what increases my level of energy and what drains it? And that's a fair question, you know, and I can say yes to something which is really challenging. but really lifts up my energy, but then again say no to something that might give me some

income, but I feel that it's totally, you know, taking the wind out of my sales or something like that. So you really want to navigate there according to what you believe is important for you and what you want to stand up for, for example. If your anxiety, depression, or ADHD are more than a rough patch, you don't need just another meditation app. Takayatry makes it easy to see a psychiatrist online using your insurance in days. Takayatry is 100% online psychiatry practice that provides comprehensive evaluations, diagnoses, and ongoing medication management for conditions like ADHD, anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, OCD, PTSD, insomnia, and more.

Unlike therapy-only apps, tachyotry is psychiatry. That means you're seeing a medical provider, who can diagnose mental health conditions and prescribe medication when it's appropriate. All their 600 plus clinicians are in network with major insurers so you can use your existing insurance instead of paying monthly subscriptions or out of network fees. You'll meet with an experienced licensed psychiatrist who takes the time to understand what's going on, build a personalized treatment plan, and can prescribe medication when it's right for you. Your care stays consistent and evidence-based.

Head to tachiatry.com slash confidence and complete the short assessment to get matched with an in-network psychiatrist in just a few minutes. That's tachiatry.com slash confidence to get matched in minutes. When you want more, start your business with Northwest registered agent and get access to thousands of free guides, tools, and legal forms to help you launch and protect your business. All in one place.

Build your complete business identity with Northwest Registered Agents has been helping small business owners and entrepreneurs launch and grow businesses for nearly 30 years. They are the largest registered agent and LLC service in the U.S. With over 1,500 corporate guides, real people who know your local laws and can help you in your business every step of the way. Build your business identity fast with Northwest Registered Agent and get access to thousands of free resources, forms, and step-by-step guides,

without even creating an account. Sign up for a free account to begin managing your business hub with lawyer drafted operating agreements, bylaws, resolutions, membership certificates, bills of sale, and more, all at no cost. Northwest is your one-stop business resource. Learn how to build a professional website, what annual filings your business needs to stay in good standing, and simple explanations of complicated business laws.

With Northwest privacy is automatic. They never sell your data, and all services are handled in-house. Because privacy by default is their pledge to all customers. Don't wait, protect your privacy, build your brand, and get your complete business identity in just 10 clicks and 10 minutes. Visit northwestregisteredagent.com slash confidencefree and start building something amazing. Get more with Northwest Registered Agent at www. northwestredgisteredagent.com slash confidence free.

Starting the year with a wardrobe refresh, Quince has you covered with lux essentials that feel effortless and look polished. They're perfect for layering, mixing, and building a wardrobe that lasts. Their versatile styles make it easy to reach for them day after day. Quince has all the staples covered, from soft Mongolian cashmere sweaters that feel like designer pieces without the markup to 100% silk tops and skirts for easy dressing up to perfectly cut denim for everyday wear. Their wardrobe essentials are crafted to last season after season.

Their Italian wool coats are real standouts. They're beautifully tailored, soft to the touch, and built to carry you through years of wear. Not just one season. The quality shows in every detail. The stitching, the fit, the fabrics. Every piece is thoughtfully designed to be your new wardrobe essential. And like everything from quince, each piece is made from premium materials in ethical-trusted factories that are priced far below what other luxury brands charge.

I can't tell you how much I am loving my new cashmere sweater. It's a staple for sure, and I can't wait to give one to my best friend for her birthday this year. It is timeless, gorgeous, and the softest thing I've ever touched. Which quince pieces are you interested in it? I mean, from the bags to the denim, to the sweaters, to the jackets, they're all incredible luxury high-end products without the high-end price. Refresh your wardrobe with quince. Don't wait. Go to quince. com slash confidence for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns now available in Canada, too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash confidence to get free shipping and 365-day returns.

Quince.com slash confidence. Well, you bring up a good point. So one of the companies I did a keynote for, it's a large company, they're mandating their employees, come back to work and have the vaccine. And I'm getting messages from the employees saying they don't want. to. So for that person, what is the boundary that person sets because they're afraid to lose a job? How do they handle that? Well, to begin with is to have a dialogue, an open one, an open conversation with their boss and openly say, I feel that my privacy has been invaded, that I'm entitled

to make my own choice, and from there to take it on. But you see, that's the interesting part, which is very challenging also, if it's the company's policy and if there is no other choice, and oftentimes there is, there is a creative choice to keep working remotely, to get tested before you walk into the office if you don't want to get back. There's always a creative outlet, but if there isn't, then it really boils down to your own boundaries. So just ask yourself this tough but much needed question, what am I more afraid to lose my current job, but you can probably find a new one. Maybe, I don't know, it really depends on the case. Maybe you need to provide for a family right here right now. But again, why are you more afraid

to lose your current job or your core value that you're not waiting for someone else to force you to get vaccinated? And there's always when you, And there's always a choice and we always have a choice even if it's a tough one. And this is what we really need to understand. This is doing the deep work. Preventing burnout is really not about pursuing the easy choice. It's about listening to ourselves. Easier said than done, but this is life, right?

We really need to make a choice. But then we live peacefully with ourselves that we did not let anyone else make the call for us. because I've seen people burnt out, not because the workload, not because they were underpaid, because someone else decided for them. And those were the severe cases of burnout. Not people who worked, I don't know, more than 10 hours a day. That's not very nice, but that's manageable. When they felt that they can't voice their opinion and their own values, that's when they got burnt out, severely. Wow, that is so true, and I've lived that firsthand. Okay, so boundaries are the first B. What are the other two? Boundaries is the first B, and they identified it correctly. The second B would be

balance. And I know that people love talking about work-life balance. I wrote an entire paragraph about that in my book, but life has changed, reality has changed. Who knows what work-life balance is now anyway. How about instead of calling it that way, we'll find a more realistic model sounds more like work-life blend or work-life harmony or work-life synergy or whatever allows us to stay the person that we are at work and the professional that we are also at home in our personal life. And that is to say that every time that we try to draw an artificial line, a separation between the two spheres, there is this bothering dissonance because that means that we cannot be ourselves in the workplace. And that means that we cannot bring our concerns

from work back home. And we need to keep putting this mask of toughness on, you know, being the rock. And that is a very, very stressful and demanding. place to be. So this is not really what we want to create. I have nothing against work life balance, but it doesn't work that well anymore. I want to suggest a different kind of balance. And actually, the balance that I would like to suggest, regardless to the harmony and blend I was talking to, is a more self-personalized, created balance. It's basically to look at your own needs. what are you currently lacking in your routines and balance that complement those routines with different activities that nourish you, that's providing for those needs?

Let's say I'm working all day long in front of my computer screen. Right. This is wonderful, but it's my work. So after work, I really want to socialize people. I want to complement this routine and balance that in the way that suits me. But what if I work in a hectic, noisy, environment. I need some me time. I want to walk outside, hiking nature, you know, being with myself or read quietly or write quietly in my case. So the way I see a far more accurate balance

that actually meets your own needs. I love what you said there because for me, I love being around people. I love being outside. I love being active and the past year and a half has meant me being inside my house working from my computer day in and day out and for very long hours. And one thing that's a non-negotiable for me is to leave to work out outside and go for a walk at least once a day. I don't care what time it is. But when I don't have that, I feel so much worse. Yeah, exactly. Because you just found a way that uplift you and your energy. We are going back to that. A practice that rejuvenates you and recharges you, we never forget to recharge our own cell phone, right? What about ourselves? What about our own battery? We are not a machine, but we definitely need to recharge ourselves every now and then

to just, you know, feel good, keep being ourselves, keep leading, keep serving, keep parenting, keep doing what we do. This is not egoistic to maintain self-care. This is truly essential to just keep pursuing our goals and keep living our lives in the best possible way. I really don't see it as egoistic to find those nourishing activities that creates this such needed balance. Okay, so we've got boundaries. We've got balance. What's our final?

The final and my personal favorite one is building support systems. It's tightly connected to resilience that we have mentioned. before. And the idea is that you build your support systems before you need it. Support system could be a group of people that you can go and either social with or seek for their help or advice or maybe even just one person, but you know that this person will have your back whenever you need it. And it's a lot about or around empathy, which is again, not necessarily about sharing advice. Most of the time, we just need to be heard and seen by someone else.

And so building those support systems, it's about creating those places that we now will share our journey, successes and failures, achievements and mistakes, right? So for better words, they are there for us. And I always encourage people to actively go and build and maintain those support systems. Because when you don't do it proactively, then when you really need it, it's not there. It's like you will never approach someone for professional health for the first time just met the person, right? You want to build a relationship with them. And it's basically the same with those support systems.

We are social creatures. We want and need to be surrounded and belong to groups that wants to support us. And this mutual feeling is deeply ingrained in who we are as humans. That's really very, very powerful. And I couldn't agree more. When you interviewed the people for the book, were there any that stood out that you thought weren't able to come back from the burnout? where it just destroyed them entirely?

Up until now, and as I've said, I've interviewed people who went through severe burnout, being hospitalized. I've never met a person who never fully recovered. However, I met a few who were burned out so badly that it took them a couple of years to gain full recovery. For example, one woman who I'm still in close relationship even with. She's a wonderful person, very sharp. But sometimes she just, and her burnout happened, as I said, three years ago.

So when we first talk, it was a year or so. Until this day, she sometimes just paused and tried to come up with the right word and try to remember something. And then she apologized for that and asked her, what are you apologizing for? And she tells me, David, you should really met me before my burnout. I was the sharpest person who could articulate myself so well. And now I just can come up with the right words when I really need them. I don't understand something.

Was it like she literally had a breakdown and ended up in a hospital? Breakdown in a hospital with a disease. But it was right after she suffered the burnout and deep stress and had another really, who went through other health issues. So it was everything all together, you know, everything at once. And those are basically what I'm describing the after effect, the physical symptoms that just followed an emotional breakdown. Yeah.

And then again, people who just after a very intense year that included burnout of different reasons, they someone told me, I went back to my parents, place and the person was 28 already living in another country managing a full team told me I went back to my parents place I could not stand the thought of leading people now I went back to a place that will just take her babysit me and I went crawled into bed and just stayed there for two months to sleep again 14 hours a day to recover so you said people recover from burnout but it such a long recovery when it's not managed well, when it has been prevented. When they actually hit the wall, it's a long recovery. This is exactly what we want to prevent. What are the signs that

you see before you hit that wall? So the main three signs, and this is really important, that's a really important question. First one is exhaustion. As we said, tiredness. And people don't mean, we couldn't understand that. We slept quite well, eight hours at night. And we still walk. up tired every day. That was emotional exhaustion being translated into physical tiredness. So the first one is exhaustion. The second sign is cynicism and you feel really negative and disconnected from your work, your mission, your colleagues or your boss. Now we all get sometimes negative and cynical. That's okay. Frustration. When it happens every day, when you really can't stand the phases of the people you are working, that's a red flag. Something is wrong.

you need to pause and ask yourself, am I on the verge of burnout? The third sign is reduced self-efficacy. So it's about our sense of self-worth. We are no longer just less productive. We feel less productive, less creative. Our sense worth is being negatively affected there. Wow. I had never heard that breakdown before and I didn't realize that burnout could affect

and impact your self-worth. That is pretty scary. But I'm glad that you've articulated so clearly. So we know these three things. And if you're seeing them and so often I've been in a situation, we're going to work every day. It was negative every day. And you hate going.

And there is nothing worth sacrificing your health for. And continuing to go back to a place and an environment where you hate being there, you've got to make a change and put yourself first. Definitely. I love that you say that because you bring up two really significant issues. One is, again, our intentional choice. We always have a choice, even if it is to speak up about what's wrong. Now, the second aspect is about our roles as leaders.

Now, it could be that we are leading our family. We could be leading a team of 10 people. We could be leading an organization of 1,000 employees. If we notice those signs that we just counted, If we notice them another person, this could be really helpful that we as leaders or colleagues will do something rather than ignoring that. And that also means that changing something within the system is really important because, you know, we kept talking now in the last few minutes about what could individuals do and individual practices. But that's just half of the story. The other half belongs to systems, organizations, institutions, communities.

I can do all the work on myself, which is really important. But tomorrow morning, if I'm going back to the very same system that contributed to my burnout, then I'm still, you know, subjected to this toxic work environment or whatever it is. This is why, for example, when I speak to CEOs or HR and I ask them about their well-being strategy and they told me, oh, you know, we gave our workers vouchers for yoga classes or we brought in the massage chair. I know they don't get it because if you have problems of broken communication or lack of trust within the company, no massage chair in the world will fix that. It's so true and sadly that's the majority of major companies.

Yeah. I know this is exactly a work to change to create a deep culture change, organizational culture, social culture, whatever it is, deep profound change. Rather than those superficial and random solutions, the scratches, you know, the surface and don't address the root causes. Oh, well, keep doing your work to Vita because the world, needs it and employees in this world need it. How can people find you and how can people find the book? Thank you so much. So the book Burning Out Won't Get You There is available on Amazon or you can find it

on my website, davidagintir.com. And we have our organization that is dedicated for burnout prevention. We support leaders, organizations, as I said, strategies, whatever is needed for this profound change. We are called Inkindle Global. We work globally. I love my team and their commitment to this mission. So you can also find us at inkindleglobal.com. And we are always happy to support with this endeavor. Well, your passion comes through loud and clear.

We can feel it. Thank you so much, DeVita. Keep up the amazing work and we will be implementing your strategies. Thank you so much.