How I Survived End of Year Burnout

I can’t believe it's December 23rd.

Looking back on almost every year since I’ve entered the industry, until now, I’ve been severely burnt out at the end of the year. Q4 is often met with an increase in demand for creative work due to budget leftover reallocation, tight deadlines, and metric reports.

While I’m all for putting the pedal to the metal in this annual crunch time, there is a difference between rising to the occasion and stretching yourself too thin. For example, there were times I was going to sleep at 3AM because I was up all night editing or cried in my car on the way to a Christmas party because I thought I couldn’t balance time with my loved ones while meeting work deadlines before the close of the quarter. I opened up about these seasonal struggles with my colleagues and friends and learned how alarmingly common this is across all industries. Not cool. I actually think the American culture has an unhealthy relationship with the reality of burnout by mislabelling it as a strong work ethic, but that is a different blog topic for another day.

This year I have learned how to support myself and build resources to provide freedom from the dreaded end of year burnout. I now equate success not with a number or income, but with what my schedule, lifestyle, and mental health look like. Here are two lessons I learned the hard way, but made all the difference, and I believe are important to share with my fellow creative professionals:

1. Hiring people. This one was scary. At first I hated the idea of spending more money and trusting important business responsibilities to other people, but it drives performance. I actually had the capacity to take on more work (without going into a tizzy) because of the extra support. Your work will actually be better in this regard because, in my opinion, we’re always better when working on a team.

2. Setting goals for how many projects you want to complete per week. Let's say you decide to do 3 video shoots or design projects per week. That's great, because it motivates you to fill slots, but also provides a boundary. When you get a fourth inquiry for that week, you can safely turn it down because you’re already booked. Before I developed this strategy, I always said: “Sure, lets see how much I can possibly do in a week!”

Now, when you genuinely love what you do and are doing it for the right reasons, you are more than entitled to spend all of your final hours of the year plugging away. But for others, more work can lead to more stress. Stress can cause mental and physical health problems – i.e. a lower quality of life. Burnout is almost inevitable without time to unwind, take care of your home, exercise, spend time with loved ones, enjoy hobbies, connect with friends, and generally live a more balanced life, especially when it takes away from all of the other things that life has to offer.

And you, your creativity, and the start of a new year have a whole lot to offer.