What's burnout and how to know if it's happening to you

It seems like all we hear these days is burnout. Everybody has had a burnout, is having a burnout, is afraid of burning out…

Apparently, in 2025 more than half the active force in the US is struggling with burnout, that number is around 40% in Canada and was around 35% in 2024 in France. We are currently experiencing an all-time high in burnout numbers, all over the globe.

And (of course), women, LGBTQ+ communities and people from minority ethnic backgrounds experience it even more.

But what is burnout really?

And how do we know the difference between burning out and just being tired?

Well, medically, burnout is defined as a state of physical, emotional, and mental exhaustion caused by chronic stress at work. It’s not “being tired.” It’s a deeper form of depletion, when your body and mind have been giving for too long.

To me, burnout is the sign of an imbalance between what we take on and the resources we have.

It’s not just about physical energy, but emotional, mental, and spiritual capacity.

It happens when we keep giving, producing, and achieving… without replenishing. When our nervous system stays in “go mode” for too long, even if our body is begging us to slow down.

It’s your body’s final way of saying “you can’t keep building a life that doesn’t support the way you’re meant to live.”

And it doesn’t just happens at work. There is professional burnout, parental burnout, emotional burnout…

Our ancestors did not burn out… Or at least not as much. So how have we come to this?

I believe it’s a symptom of the way our modern way of life leaves less and less space for humanity. In this era of artificial intelligence and extreme automation, some of us seem to have forgotten what being human is.

We don’t just need to have energy to operate. We have emotions, we go through cycles, we are affected by our experiences. We need to feel replenished, fulfilled, motivated, moved, useful, loved, needed, cared for…

And in a world that constantly pushes us to do more, earn more, achieve more, create more, there’s not enough room left to just be, listen, breathe… Essentially, there’s no more space to replenish not only our physical energy but also emotional, mental, spiritual tanks.

The problem with burnout is it rarely shows up as one big crash.

It builds quietly, creeps in slowly, almost invisibly…

It’s like that old story of the frog in warm water: if you drop it into boiling water, it jumps out immediately, but if you place it in cool water and slowly raise the temperature, it stays in, until it’s too late. That’s exactly how burnout feels.

You adapt. You push. You normalize.

Until your body, your creativity, or your joy can’t follow anymore. Until one day, you wake up exhausted, depleted, unmotivated, or feeling detached from what used to make you feel alive.

Because of that we often notice it only when it’s too loud to ignore.

Women are generally more exposed to burnout than men.

Again, because of our society. We are brought up to be caring, responsible, empathetic, and productive. Those are presented as such good qualities. For generations, we have been raised to juggle all those invisible roles, put ourselves last, and never complain about it.

Working mothers are even more so affected because of the inequalities that persist in family responsibilities and mental load. Female entrepreneurs even more so because the boundaries of their work can be a bit more vague.

Between being the business woman, the caregiver, the friend, the daughter, the partner… we are trying to “do it all.” It ends up feeling like we are just trying not to fall off a treadmill going faster and faster.

Until we realize something is wrong, or something forces us to stop.

So how do we recognize burnout when it’s there?

Burnout doesn’t always look like lying in bed unable to move. Here are several different ways it can manifest.

It can show up physically, with fatigue, insomnia, sleeping but never feeling rested, experiencing frequent headaches, palpitations, tension in the shoulders and jaw, frequent digestive issues, sudden drops in energy you don’t quite understand.

Mentally, it can manifest as low productivity, losing focus, brain fog, overthinking even the smallest decisions, procrastinating more than usual.

Emotionally, it can show up as unusual irritability, feeling detached or even numb to certain things, not being able to enjoy rest without guilt, ordinary challenges triggering disproportionate reactions or a freeze.

Spiritually it could be feeling disconnected from yourself, from the people around you, or from what used to light you up, feeling like you’ve lost your spark inside, losing creativity, constantly ignoring your intuition and inner signals.

Sometimes, it looks like functioning “just fine” because things still get done, but experiencing some of those symptoms at the same time.

It can affect work, relationships, physical appearance and emotional state. It can even go as far as to provoke depression.

And what’s the right way to deal with burnout?

First, let’s take a breath. The most important thing to remember is that burnout is not a weakness, and it’s not a dead end.

It’s an invitation.

It’s a call to rebuild your life (and business) around your real needs and rhythm, not the expectations you’ve been trying to meet.

Here is how you can approach it and make your way back from burnout to peace.

🪷 Start by creating the conditions to rest (physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually).

🪷 Then let yourself pause and reconnect to yourself, with your values, your boundaries, and your vision.

🪷 Only when that’s done, start acting to build back up around the life you want for yourself, not at the cost of it.

I’ll be writing another article soon about how to start this process gently. If you want to make sure you know when it's out, subscribe here and get your free Clarity Workbook to give yourself 30 minutes to reconnect with your vision and values, find clarity on your journey, and identify your next aligned step towards a more peaceful life.