Question about moderation?!


Question:

Question about moderation?

I have a problem, and I need to know some steps to help control it. I seem to always overexert myself whenever I need to do something, and then 'burn out' examples seem the only way to explain.

At my last job I was working 70 hours a week and busting my ***, but I quickly fettered out and quit. School is another thing, I got straight A's the first month, then pass by the skin of my teeth the rest of the year. A third example being working out. One or two days of intense work out followed by a week or two of inactivity.

My question being, how do I moderate myself to avoid burning out, this is pretty deeply rooted, so I need some really good advice.

Thank you.


Answers:

You probably need to examine your beliefs... you're probably a perfectionist. Ask yourself why you believe you need to give yourself 100%, tell yourself that a lesser effort is good enough. Establish some rules, such as when you get a job, make an agreement with yourself that you will not work more than say 40-50 hours a week max, no exceptions. You need to convince yourself that that 40-50 hours will be good enough, which may be hard, as there are plenty of people who will tell you that you should work as hard as you can. You just need to learn that that means "as hard as you sustainably can", not "as hard as you temporarily can", get what I mean?

As this is a habit you've had for a long time, odds are you're not going to change it overnight, but with time you can make improvements. Whenever you're tempted to overdo something, remind yourself that that hasn't paid off in the past. Buddhism and meditation classes are good (you don't have to be a buddhist to benefit, I'm not but some ideas are rather useful), and also cognitive behavioral therapy. I wouldn't necessarily recommend counseling at this point, unless it's really bothering you a lot, but Feeling Good by David Burns for example has a list of cognitive distortions in it that you could read and that you could learn something from. It basically helps you unravel why you believe you have to work so hard (and other erroneous beliefs you might have).




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