If You've Been Feeling Drained... Listen To This (9 Steps To Recover And Avoid Burnout)

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0:44This episode of On Purpose is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. I believe that travel is one of the greatest gifts that we've ever been given. And Chase Sapphire Reserve has been my gateway to the world's most captivating destinations. When I use my Chase Sapphire Reserve card, I get eight times the points on all the purchases I make through Chase Travel, and even access to one-of-a-kind experiences, experiences like music festivals and sporting events. And that's not even mentioning how the card gets me into the Sapphire Lounge by the club at select airports nationwide. Travel is more rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve.

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2:11I'm drained as a signal from your body to the mind. From your mind to your heart. Your body and mind are trying to tell you something. Pain makes you pay attention, but that attention needs to be followed by action. The number one health and wellness podcast. Jay Shetty. Jay Shetty. The one, the only Jay Shetty. Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world. Thanks to each and every one of you that come back every week to listen, learn, and grow. I want to take a moment to thank you all. or whether you joined the On Purpose community yesterday, or whether you joined us five years ago when we first started, I want to say a big thank you to you for your support.

2:57I love the fact that you're making Instagram Reels. I love seeing the TikToks you all share. I love seeing your stories. Thank you for making this such a highly recommended podcast to your friends, your family. It means the world to me, and I can't wait to keep bringing you incredible conversations and content. Now, this episode feels like a really, really important one because I can't believe that we're already this far into the year. And it's natural that a lot of people are starting to feel drained. Maybe you have some time off. Maybe you haven't had the chance to have some time off. But maybe you've been working really hard this year.

3:36Maybe you've been pursuing your goals, health and wellness related and also professional. How many of you honestly are feeling drained? How many of you are feeling exhausted? And how many of you are feeling like you need some practical tips and practical methods to actually find a way through this busy time? nearly half 48 % of 18 to 29 year olds said they feel drained compared with 40 % of their peers age 30 and up while women 46 % reported higher levels of burnout than men at 37%. So this is a problem that a lot of us are dealing with. We're not alone and we're highly challenged by it. and look the podcast is full of great advice from experts on how much water intake you need sleep and exercise you can find that here but what i wanted to share with you in this episode is what do you do when you can't do all of those things right now when you feel like you've tried but you're failing and now you're starting to do nothing what are these small incremental shifts what are the little steps that you can take right now to transform how you feel to stop feeling drained so if you've been feeling drained lately this episode is for you if you've been feeling exhausted this episode is for you and if you're on the verge of burnout please please please listen to this and if you have someone in your life that you know is headed down that road send them this so they can actually keep it together, keep the energy enough to get to their next break and their next pit stop.

5:20I want to start off with a really important principle. I've shared this statistic before. Studies show we have 60 to 80 ,000 thoughts per day and 80 % of those are negative and 80 % of those are repetitive. Let me give you an example. How many of you have ever started your day with the words, I'm feeling really drained? Now think about how many times you've said that in one day, in every conversation, every meeting, talking to a friend or a family member. Now think about how many times you've said that over a week. Now how many times have you said that over a month? And how many times have you said that over a year?

6:06We keep repeating the same thought, the same feeling over and over and over again. And it's so important that we learn to break repetitive thoughts, that we learn to disrupt that pattern, that we learn to intervene. We have to have our own intervention in our mind. I'm going to give you the AAA formula. Write this down, AAA. Accept and action. Usually, we don't accept how we feel. We're told to be toxically positive. Instead of saying, I'm tired, we say, I'm energized, I'm feeling good. Affirmations like that don't work. That isn't even an affirmation. That's just telling yourself a lie and hoping you'll believe it.

6:52Now, biology will reject that. You won't believe it. You won't just believe it because you keep saying it to yourself if you're not feeling any different. So accept and action. The acceptance has to be followed up by an action. So for example, I'm really drained and so I'll go to sleep early tonight. I'm really drained and so I will cancel my plans this weekend. The and so changes that thought. See, that thought is a signal. I'm drained is a signal from your body to the mind, from your mind to your heart. Your body and mind are trying to tell you something. Pain makes you pay attention, but that attention needs to be followed by action.

7:39And that's often what we don't find. We see the signal. It's almost like you're driving your car, you see one of the lights pop up and you keep ignoring or avoiding it. You go, I don't really know what it is. I'll figure it out. I'll take a look, right? How many times have you ever done that mentally? How many times have you ever done that physically? You're feeling a real niggling pain in your knee or in your back. You keep ignoring it. Stop ignoring your repetitive thoughts. Stop ignoring your repetitive feelings. Stop ignoring your repetitive emotions. They're repeating for a reason. They want you to pay attention.

8:22Pain makes you focus and pay attention so that then you can take action. Break your repetitive thought cycle, break that spiral so that you can actually shift into taking action. Principle number two. One of the things I find that has really helped me, and I practice this often, is recognizing that I don't always have to be at 100 % energy. how many times have you ever gone to an event you've gone to work you're with your family and you constantly think that you have to be at a hundred percent all the time i'll give an example i was at a dinner recently and i had to give a speech the next day i just got off a flight so i just got off a flight i'd been traveling for around 20 hours i had gone to the opening night dinner.

9:16And the next morning, I had to wake up and give a keynote presentation. I wouldn't say I was drained, but I was exhausted. The interesting thing to me was at dinner, everyone was chatting, it was opening night, everyone was, you know, being their best self. And I very quickly realized that if I wanted to give a great presentation the next day, which is why I'd been brought in, that I wouldn't be able to be 100 % energy the whole night. So I was probably at about 50 % energy. And I could tell that people could sense that even if they didn't know me. And I shared with them. I said, hey, I'm really tired.

9:52I got off a plane today after 20 hours of travel. I have a presentation tomorrow. I really wanted to show up and meet everyone. But I'm going to be a bit more reserved tonight. Now, being able to vocalize that, being able to communicate that helped me feel better about it. I want to be at 100%. I want to be able to give my best. But often my travel schedule, the demands don't allow me to be that way. and I'm guessing it's the same for you as well. And I realized that being able to say to myself and communicate to others, why I'm at a 75%, why I'm at a 50%, people are going to be able to sense it.

10:28Often we wanna act our way through these things. We want to hope that no one realizes. People recognize, people feel it. But actually when we can communicate our limits, when we can communicate our challenges, when we can communicate why we're feeling the way we are, why we're acting the way we are, what is happening behind the scenes, right? No one there had a badge that said the travel time it took them to get in. Some people had come from 30 minutes away and like me, some from 20 hours away. And so the idea that we should just assume that everyone should be 100 % all the time doesn't actually make sense.

11:07And I'm hoping that this actually gives you the capacity to also be compassionate to others. I think often we're so quick to judge others. Well, like, oh, they didn't show up with their best energy. Oh, they seemed off tonight. And we don't recognize what people are carrying, what people are dealing with. So I want you to take that on board. When can you be at 50 % energy? And what does that look like in communicating that? Now, there are times when I have to be at 100 % energy. and I know I've got to show up as my best self. I don't have the excuse to say, okay, I'll show up as 50%. I don't feel comfortable to communicate that.

11:48I find that might be difficult. So one of the things I've realized in this is to cap the time. In order to preserve my energy at 100%, the time I can be 100 % is different. I may show up to a dinner for 30 minutes. I may make the meeting 10 minutes. I may make the presentation 15 minutes. What can I do to do what I want to do, to do what I need to do, but how do I time box it in a way that I can give my best self? Often what we try and do is say, okay, if the meeting's an hour, I'm going to be there and show up for an hour. Actually, can I solve that in 30 minutes with my best energy? Is that actually more plausible and possible?

12:31step number three this one is important if you are on the verge of exhaustion we have to learn to say no it's okay to cancel social events and ideally what a lot of us do is we try and cancel it last minute it's actually so much better if you cancel it in advance if you give someone notice if you let someone know hey i'm feeling really rough this week i'm kind of under the weather I'm worried that I'm going to get sick and I don't want to come ruin the party. I don't want to come ruin the event. What we often do is we wait till the last minute. We're going to force ourselves to go and then we realize we really can't go or we force ourselves to go and then we're bitter about it or we're upset about it.

13:13It's so important to just get that RSVP out the way. Let the person know. Let the event know it's okay. Things will go on. Yes, you'll experience FOMO. Yes, you might miss out on something cool. But guess what? Burnout is not worth it. Exhaustion is not worth it. Feeling drained is not worth it. Let me say that again. Feeling drained is not worth anything. Feeling exhausted is not worth anything. and experiencing burnout is not worth it. Now, again, there have been times when I have to turn up, I have to be there. And what I've found is that usually in social settings, it's overwhelming thinking you've got to talk to 20, 30, 40, 50 people.

14:05I did this again the other night and I love it when you find someone who's trying to do the same thing. So I ended up talking to someone who was also feeling the same way as me. They were tired. they were feeling slightly drained and they said I just want to find one person to connect to meaningfully so instead of trying to feel like you've got to work the room you've got to introduce yourself to everyone you're going to miss out literally find the other person have a beautiful meaning interaction or exchange and just feel connected and experience what it feels like to actually just allow yourself to be I think that a lot of this draining feeling actually comes from stress and the stress is where we're demanding too much of our body and mind.

14:47That's how I look at stress. Stress is when I'm demanding too much of my body and mind. My body and mind is trying to tell me its limit and I'm pushing it further. Sometimes that can be brilliant. Kelly McGonigal in her book called The Upside of Stress talks about how we can deal with more stress when we experience purpose. We can deal with more stress when we have a clear intention. So that's one thing to think about. When you are experiencing stress, ask yourself if you need to push through, what's my intention? What am I really trying to achieve? Let me focus on why it's so important for me to experience this.

15:24And actually, we become better at dealing with it. We deal with it more gracefully. It doesn't have that negative impact that stress often does on our lives. So find a way to think about that. Take a moment to say, what is my intention here? Why is it necessary for me to tackle this stress and take it on right now. Going back to the social event point, I have a friend who's amazing at this. She'll always message me and she'll say to me, Jay, are you going to this? And I'll say, yes. And she'll be like, can I just let you know that I'm really tired today? And I'd love for it if we could just hang out and talk, but I don't think I can do big groups.

15:59I go, I'm all in, right? That kind of strategy and approach when you know someone coming, it's a safe space. They trust you, you trust them. You can give them a heads up. They can do the same. And now you're supporting each other in that environment. Parking shouldn't slow you down. ParkWiz gives every driver a shortcut. Book ahead, save up to 50 % and skip the hassle of circling the block. Park smarter, park faster. ParkWiz. Download the ParkWiz app today and save every time you park. Have you ever brought your magic to Walt Disney World like, hey, we came to play? Did you tip your tiara to a Creole princess or get goofy officially?

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17:23More choices, less compromise. Visit buyatoyota.com for a great deal on an efficient Toyota today. Toyota, let's go places. Sometimes I actually think that stress or feeling drained makes us more strategic. Yep, I said that right. Stress can actually make you more strategic. Feeling drained can make you more dynamic. Here's a really interesting thing to think about. Which one of your meetings could actually be emails? Think about that right now. Look through your schedule and ask yourself which of those can be solved with an email? Which of those could actually be solved in an email exchange? We don't need to do a call.

18:06The call will actually tell into an hour. It will be far more draining. I'll exert way more energy. And actually, I can solve it in far less time. I can actually get to where I need to get to. So sometimes what you'll find is stress releases your strategy. And I want you to think about that. When else have you been stressed recently? And how could you have used that stress to become more strategic? How could that stress create a better idea, a better option, a better solution? Because now you're actually thinking, well, how do I do that with less energy and less time? And if we looked at life like that, we may be able to solve some of those things that create more stress, create more pressure in our lives.

18:51And I'd really consider where and when in your life, being more strategic will save you from that added stress. Definitely something to look at, something to consider and something to think about. Now, that also applies to phone calls over Zooms. I find that when we're listening, sometimes I find that when I'm on a phone call, I'm actually more present than when I'm on a Zoom meeting. On a Zoom meeting, you're on your screen, which means most people have email up, emails popping up. You're now looking at yourself. And I think you have to turn yourself off. I mean, I'd actually argue that the amount of time and energy and presence that's drained in looking at your own appearance on a meeting is so high.

19:35And most of us have been doing it since the pandemic. Turn your screen off. Just look at the other person. Even pin the person that's speaking, because when you're looking at nine boxes, when in a meeting room, would you be looking at nine people at the same time, all at the same time. It would never happen. You look at the person who's talking, maybe you flip over to one or two, but generally you're not looking at nine people all at the same time. And sometimes you're on a Zoom call with 20 people and you're now looking at everyone. Someone's scratching their head, someone's looking at their phone, someone's taking notes, someone's talking.

20:09It can be overwhelming and it can be draining. Which Zoom calls can turn into phone calls. Really important question to ask. Important to think about all the meetings you have, the events you have, the things that you're going to, the things you're traveling to. How can you streamline? How can you make it simpler? One of my favorite ones, which requires a bit more planning, but has been a huge asset in my life, is called a reset day, a reset half day, or a reset hour. Based on how busy my schedule is, I'll make sure that during the weekend, I get to have a reset hour, a reset half day, or a reset day.

20:53What this is, is that it's almost a rehearsal of my most perfect day. It's a day where I get to live how I wish I could live every day, how I want to live every day, how I aspire to live every day. But the realist in me that I've worked on being when I used to be a perfectionist is saying, let me at least have one hour. Let me have half a day of that. Let me have a day of that. Let me invest in that. And how incredible would that be? How powerful would that be in my life if I allowed myself to do that? I'll have the perfect amount of meditation, the perfect workout. I'll eat really well, even if it's for an hour.

21:32That reset hour or reset day is like what we do when our phone's starting to jam up and we just switch it off and we reset it. We can't do it with an on and off button with ourselves, but we can if we take some time out to reset. And I think we often think, okay, no, tomorrow morning's my reset. It's going to be a perfect day. Tomorrow morning's my reset. And it's almost like we have to carve out time that's fully under our control in order to do that effectively. Think about that. One thing that we really need to start learning to ask ourselves when we are failing drained is how can I be kinder to myself?

22:11A lot of what's draining us is happening within our mind. You're not good enough. You're not fast enough. Did you see what they did? Look how behind you are. The way we talk to ourselves when we look in the mirror. You're looking overweight. You don't look great today. You look tired. You look drained. Can't you do better than that? The voice in our head constantly pushing us to be better, do better, but not in an encouraging way, not as a cheerleader, but as a critic. And what's really interesting about that is, if we're encouraging and empowering ourselves, we can achieve great things. But if we're stressing ourselves, we're draining ourselves from within.

22:51How can you be kinder to yourself when you know you need to push yourself more? You didn't get to do everything today on your to-do list? That's okay. You got seven out of 10 things done. You didn't perform exceptionally well this week at work? it's okay we start again on Monday. Maybe you didn't feel like you were the best around your kids this week or the best around your partner. It's okay you can improve and take accountability and let them know what's going on. How can you be kinder to yourself? If you were kinder to yourself what do you believe you would achieve? This next one's slightly harder.

23:29When something's stressing us out, there's two things we can do. One is we can either talk about the stress of the whole time. And if you talk about it with the right people, it actually gets lighter. When you talk about your stress with the right people, it becomes more light. People who help you carry it. People who help you make sense of it. People who help you think about it. People who just agree with you and let you vent are useful too. There's a need for you to let that stress out. Being able to talk about it to a friend, a therapist, a colleague, a person who understands you can be huge.

24:10Now, the opposite also works. Distance from the stressor. So you may not have distance from the stressor verbally, but you want to have distance from the stressor physically if you can. Don't be around them. Don't be around people who are around them. Don't be around people who know them. It solves your issue when you can distance yourself from having to deal with that stressor up close and personal, face to face. You don't have to put yourself in that position. So ask yourself, can you do that? And if you can't do that, then allow yourself to vent. Allow yourself to have space and time to let it out.

24:51Now I'm bringing this up because I found in my life I was sleeping right. I was drinking the right water. I was eating right. And I still felt drained. And I realized a lot of it was because of a lack of vitamins and supplements. I wasn't getting enough vitamin D. I had others that were low. And as soon as I got checked out, it changed my life. I highly recommend that you go and get checked out because so often we're trying to solve something in our mind when actually we need to solve it in our body, right? I always say to people, like, if you're struggling with your mind, figure out what you could change about your body.

25:23And if you're struggling with your body, figure out what you could change in your mind. So many of us are only looking at one aspect when we need to focus on both. This also applies, as I said earlier, to the quality of your sleep. Obviously, feeling drained, a big part of his sleep, diet, exercise. Are you drinking over three liters of water a day? Are you eating healthy proteins, healthy fats in good proportions, getting your carbohydrates right? We've got some brilliant episodes on that. Make sure you check out our gut help episodes. And of course, are you getting good deep sleep? We've had sleep experts on the show before and studies show you need seven to nine hours of sleep, ideally starting before midnight.

26:07So if you're sleeping seven hours from midnight to 7am, it's different from sleeping from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. Those hours before midnight are where the human growth hormone HGH is most activated. Our ability to have deeper, more quality sleep is better when we're doing it before midnight. Now, I want to leave you with one last thing. And I want to leave you with this idea of if you wake up in the morning and the dishes aren't done, how does it feel waking up to dirty dishes? that's what it feels like waking up when you didn't clean your mind before ask yourself at the end of every night when you're drained what do I want to leave behind today what am I going to consciously intentionally leave behind today what am I going to wash away today what am I going to allow to just be today wash your mind the night before and leave the draining behind thank you so much for listening today.

27:06I truly hope this helps you. And remember, I'm always rooting for you, and I'm forever in your corner. If you loved this episode, you will also love my interview with Charles Duhigg on how to hack your brain, change any habit effortlessly, and the secret to making better decisions. Look, am I hesitating on this because I'm scared of making the choice because I'm scared of doing the work? Or am I sitting with this because it just doesn't feel right yet? This episode of On Purpose is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. I believe that travel is one of the greatest gifts that we've ever been given.

27:43And Chase Sapphire Reserve has been my gateway to the world's most captivating destinations. When I use my Chase Sapphire Reserve card, I get eight times the points on all the purchases I make through Chase Travel. And even access to one-of-a-kind experiences. Experiences like music festivals and sporting events. And that's not even mentioning how the card gets me into the Sapphire Lounge by the club at select airports nationwide. Travel is more rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve. Trust me. Discover more at chase.com forward slash sapphire reserve. Cards issued by JPMorgan Chase Bank, NA. Member FDIC.