TL; DR
You can avoid mental burnout. Give yourself personal time; enjoy things outside of your job or project. The atomic option is to take vacation time and travel elsewhere.
For a myriad of reasons, we go an extra mile when it comes to our jobs, hobbies or side projects. This is what sets us apart from being just OK at what we’re doing. There is an unspoken social stigma that we are more productive when we work more. There are many opponents to this, such as Bertrand Russell. I’m not here to say that you should work less than 40 hours a week to be more productive. For that, I’d direct you to Tim Ferriss and The 40 Hour Work Week.
Most of us work a lot. Many people in competitive industries educate themselves outside of work. Others often do work outside of regular work hours. Doing things like this without a proper time-management system will lead you to burnout. So let’s talk a bit about time management.
An argument for time management
Since time is finite, the optimal use of time is doing what benefits us the most. Some people desire to make money, or to help out the community. Sometimes what benefits us most is counterintuitive. For example, it might be taking time off or exercising.
Notice that beneficial actions are subject to time constraints. This is why it’s vital to prioritize your time. Simple todo lists can not be done unless there’s some form of time management.
In the programming world, time management helps you focus. If you
know that you only have X amount of time to do something, that has
many cognitive effects. This is why in scrum it’s important to break up
your stories into smaller stories if possible. By breaking up priorities
into smaller portions, cognitive load is reduced.
Branching away
Doing too much of the same thing will make you better at it, but it also limits you. A friend of mine recently told me about a couple of people in grad school who made a poster that read: “I went to journalism school and all I got was illiteracy.” Doing too much of one thing can cause burnout. This is why it’s important to branch out.
To make muscles grow, they should be strenuously used and rested. Your mental muscles work like this. Learning different things improves working memory, verbal intelligence and language skills.
The best way to branch out is to pick what you’re interested in and practice it in small steps. Practice it to better learn.
Expect to fail a few times and learn from your mistakes. That’s where the growth is. It’s also important to socialize with other people. This is one of the most effective ways to get your mind off of work. It also gives you another person’s insight.
I have taken up weight lifting and writing music. Both of these things relieve stress, which clears my mind. As a result, I’m usually able to keep a fresh mind when tackling problems at work.
Getting back into the swing of things
When you have reduced your stress, it’s easy to fall victim to the stress again. Before any stress comes your way, try to pay attention to what is going on. Be mindful of what is asked and how reasonable the ask is. I find that being vocal about unreasonable asks/situations helps a lot to reduce stress.
As you return to your usual routine, try to incorporate the pervious methods mentioned. Spending your time on something that is not related to work. Make time for these things and stick to the schedule. While this won’t completely end stress, it will reduce it to a manageable level.
Nuclear Option: Break the loop
If none of this works, there are two options: take a long vacation or quit.
When a job consistently requires overtime, consider other options. At my old job, I was not salaried so I worked at 40 hours a week. This helped me build a list of things that I actually wanted to get done. Unfortunately the management there was demanding. I had to do a lot of work that required overtime, which was frowned upon. This created a lot of tension anytime I approached the 40 hour mark. I ultimately found a better job elsewhere.
My current job’s management is understanding. Yet, I still find myself underestimating how long something will take. On critical projects, I put in a lot more work than expected.
Thus, I get burned out at work every now and then. When this happens, I like to take a vacation. Taking one week off is what I find to be optimal. That is just enough time to enjoy a place and have leftover vacation days.
Final notes
There is no clear guide to cut out stress for everyone. There are some overlapping patterns and methods. Most of them involve getting your mind off of what’s burning you out.
Remember to stay healthy and take care of yourself. Your work will definitely reflect this state of well being.