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How do you overcome burnout - Alan Berg CSP - Wedding Business Solutions PodcastHow do you overcome burnout?

This is a listener suggestion from Matt Campbell, who has been a guest here on the podcast. What is burnout, and when is it time to pack it in and move on to something else? I discuss my thoughts on this (and I’m not a psychologist and don’t play one on podcasts) to hopefully give you a different perspective on how to view your situation.

Listen to this new 8-minute episode for a different look at a serious topic.

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Below is a full transcript. If you have any questions about anything in this, or any of my podcasts, or have a suggestion for a topic or guest, please reach out directly to me at [email protected] or contact me via textuse the short form on this page, or call 732.422.6362

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– How do you overcome burnout? Listen to this episode for some ideas. What is burnout? Burnout is when you’re getting kinda tired of what you’re doing or you’re feeling, like you don’t have the passion anymore for what it is that you’re doing. And the question really comes down to why is that, is it internal or is it external? Are there things going on that are just sucking the passion away from you? I remember I had a client one time who reached out to me that was an officiant and he loved loved doing ceremonies, really loved doing ceremonies. And he said, “I’m thinking about packing it in.” And I said, “Why?” He said he had recently had a couple of couples and that really were just draining on him between not getting back to him on the paperwork that he needed, giving him the things he needed to create these personalized ceremonies. And when I dug down deeper with him, I said, “Well, how many people is this?” And it turned out it was two. It was two people, and all the other ones were fine, but these two were just really draining on him. And I said, “So do you like the people?” And he said, “Yeah, I like the people.” I said, “It’s just really the paperwork thing?” He said, “Yes.” I suggested, “Why don’t you just hire a virtual assistant who can chase them down for the paperwork, and then you’ll get what you need without having to feel that drain of, ‘Oh my gosh, I don’t have what I need. I don’t have what I need?'”

And he had never thought about that. And he said, “You know what, that’s a great idea.” And I recommended somebody to him, and he went and had somebody else do the things that he didn’t like. He loved doing the ceremonies. He loved creating the personalized ceremonies. He hated chasing people down for paperwork. And that totally changed his mindset from, “I don’t think I want to do this anymore,” to, “Oh, I get to love this again without having the drain of this.” We also raised his rates at the same time, and that ended up paying for the virtual assistant and then some, so that helped as well. And that perspective change is what he needed. The burnout really was focusing on the negative, not focusing on all of the people that gave him exactly what he needed when he needed it. It was focusing on the people that weren’t, and that’s a perspective change on your part. We get bogged down sometimes in the day to day. I remember a speaker friend, very popular famous speaker, former fighter pilot, Waldo Waldman. And we’re sitting at a speaker conference, a whole bunch of us. And he said, “I hate my job.” And we all looked at him like, “You hate your job? You’re really good at this. You seemed to love what you do.” He said, “Don’t get me wrong, I love speaking. I hate my job.” And the job is all of the admin. The job is the accounting. The job is the booking the gigs and all that kind of stuff that leads up to him being able to be on stage and do what he loves doing.

And I think we all kinda feel that way. At different times, you love doing whatever is you do, taking pictures, cooking the food, setting up the venues, planning the events, playing the music, capturing the images, making the invitations, baking the cakes, whatever it is. But then there’s the other parts of it that can be draining, the advertising, the marketing, the social media, all these pressures that are coming in. And that’s what can create the burnout. Sometimes, like my client, what you need is just to outsource some of those things that you don’t like so you get to do what you do like. Other times, you might just see a shiny object somewhere and go, “You know what, I should just give this up and go towards the shiny object.” Well, that’s, what do they say? The grass isn’t always greener on the other side. It’s kind of like being on vacation. You’re in a new place, and you’re walking around, going, “Man, I could live here.” Well, if you were retired maybe. Because if you’re not, you still have to work. And if you were working in that beautiful location, it would be different than from where you are, but it would still be the things that you have to do. It’d still be the work. And I remember I’ve had that thought many times, I’ve been someplace, I go, “Wow, I could live here.” And then I think, “Well, I could,” but it’s kind of far from the airport or I can’t get where I need to be or the timezone differences or whatever it is. The reality strikes that, yeah, this would just be a different place to work from. It would still be the work that I have to do.

So what is burnout, and how do you maybe recover yourself? Sometimes you need to take that vacation. You need to step outside and take a different look. It’s kind of like why do you get ideas when you’re in the shower? Well, you’re not trying to think about the things that you needed to think about, and it freed your mind up to be able to see things a little bit more clearly. It’s also how you could look at someone else that you know who’s having a similar situation as you and you can give them thoughts easier than yourself because you’re too much in it to see the other possibilities and you’re focusing on certain things. Have you ever had somebody you know say to you, “What about this?” And you go, “Oh, no, I never thought about that.” Right, sometimes you need that outside perspective. And whether that’s a mentor, whether that’s a psychologist, whether that’s a friend, a family member, a coworker, or somebody in your industry, somebody that you network with that can see it from the outside, sometimes you need that.

The burnout is usually caused from within, at least what I’ve seen with people is that you are causing that because you’re allowing the negative to be your focus instead of the positive, just like my client. He loved what he did. He hated a certain part. That was an easier fix. Now I’ve had people who’ve told me, “I hate doing weddings, I hate dealing with the couples, I hate that,” and yet you see their work, it’s beautiful. And when you ask them, “Hey, did you have fun doing that?” “Yeah, I did.” Maybe it was just the admin. Maybe it was the other parts. And maybe you can outsource some of that stuff. Or maybe you’re just not good at it. And if you got better at it, if you took some classes or something, maybe it wouldn’t feel like such a slog. So look at where the burnout’s coming from, and see if you can focus on the positive aspects of what you do, and see that if we were weighing this on a scale, is the negative that much bigger than the positive that it’s time to give it up and do something else? And if that is the case, can you think about that in terms of the long term where you can plan for that next step, plan for what you’re going to do next instead of just jumping off of a cliff? Sometimes we need to.

Some of us, including myself, have been downsized at one point or another where you got pushed off the cliff and you had to learn how to fly. That’s different because that was an external force as well. So before you go and leap, think about, “Do I really need to do that?” Or, “Do I need to just freshen up my approach, maybe do something new within what I’m doing, within my work that is going to give me that passion again so I’m focusing on that?” Even though the rest of the stuff didn’t change, you’re focusing on the positive, you’re getting excited about it again. So find that excitement. See if you can find that spark, and see if you can see where the negative is coming from so that you realize that that’s what you’re focusing on and not that it’s being done to you that you’re actually doing it to yourself. Now I am not a psychologist. I’m not giving psychological advice. This is my personal opinion, but I hope it helps.

I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is [email protected]. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.

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