MY WAKE-UP CALL

Have you ever heard the philosophy of taking life one day at a time? I lived this philosophy from November 2016 to March 2018. During this time period at work, I was bombarded with one stressful time period after another. First it was preparing for 2016 year-end, then it was working on 2016 year-end, then it was wrap up 2016 and learn all the information that you can from the employee that is leaving after twenty some year’s of service, then it was a surprise IRS audit, then it was a surprise reclassification for yours truly that kicked off a huge budgeting process that would last until the end of 2017. Meanwhile, you’re trying to keep up to date on all your normal every day responsibilities which, quite frankly, have been growing in complexity and number of tasks by themselves. Every time that I would try to lift my head from the daily grind, I would start to feel hopeless at the never-ending stressful workload. When I expressed my despair to family and friends, they would sympathize and advise me to take each day at a time and not to look at the big picture since it was too overwhelming. I ducked my head and pushed forward one day at a time, I would put my nose to the grindstone and give my job and my family everything that I had.

For over a year, I had told myself not to focus on the big picture to just focus on getting through one day at a time. Things at work hadn’t changed at all during that time; it was still putting out one fire after another. My family life and myself; however, were a wreck. I had completely burned myself out. I suffered from severe anxiety and depression. At the end of January 2018, the day came where my inner voice was telling me that I was done. I was mentally spent and did not have another day in me. I remember the instant relief and rightness I felt when my doctor agreed that I needed a medical leave of absence from work.

That medical leave was the start of the huge transformation that I am still currently undergoing today. I had not lived authentically to my true self for so long and that was where I ended up. I spent the rest of 2018 healing from that costly mistake and re-connecting with who I truly was and what I wanted in life. I still call 2017 my hell year. My guess is that if you ask me about it 30 years from now, I will still refer to it as that. But you know what? I would not change a thing. I feel that a person grows the most in challenging difficult times and the lessons that I learned from this burnout were priceless. That being said, I would not wish this experience on my worst enemy. My hope is that by speaking out and sharing my story with others, they can avoid having to learn these lessons by going down that road. If I am too late and you are already there, please know that you are not alone and you WILL come out stronger on the other side.