Maximum Efficiency vs. Burn-out - Part 2 | Building Blocks | Ginger Jenks

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Building Blocks

July, 2001
Volume 4, Issue 7

Maximum Efficiency vs. Burn-out - Part 2

To read “Part 1” of this article, please click here.

It’s important to be cognizant of the ebb and flow of life, time and your own productivity. If you’re feeling “on top” of everything, chances are you will then look for a new challenge or activity. Then the firm grip starts to slip. There’s no way to be at maximum efficiency all the time; the paradox is that in order to find your current maximum, you have to be willing to fail. But you still have to take some satisfaction in having achieved what you did before finding the point of failure. Who wants to feel that they just fail?

If you took a big rubber band and stretched it between your two hands, it would probably stretch further that you’d guess at first. And if you then released it and stretched it again, it would probably go further still. If you repeated this cycle over and over, the only way to truly find out how far the rubber band could expand would be to stretch it until it breaks. And then you’d have to find a new rubber band…..

So if you equate yourself to the rubber band, you have two choices:

Recognize when you feel you’re getting stretched too far, and take care of yourself before you reach the breaking point (trade-off – you don’t get to see what you might be capable of)
Accept that some failure is inevitable with stretching beyond your known limits; that in fact your “rubber band” is going to break periodically, which will mean some retrenching and costs.

You don’t have to choose one path or the other exclusively; just be sure you’re choosing consciously.

Here are the Top 10 signs that you’re either stretching too far or not enough:

Burn-out	Coasting
You say to your husband, “Hi, my name is…	You really can’t think of a thing that you could be doing better!
The dog barks ferociously at you when you finally come home.	You can’t name 5 goals in less than a minute.
You say, “I’ll slow done just as soon as I finish this….and that…and that….	Someone asks you what you’ve learned that’s new in the past month, and you have to ponder the question….
Nothing feels like much fun any more.	You find yourself doing lots of “personal stuff” at work.
When you get up in the morning, you think how great it will be to go to bed that evening.	You’re bored. Bored, bored, bored.
When someone asks to spend time with you, like for lunch, you book two months out.	When someone presents a new challenge, you think, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
You really think that not answering the cell phone while you’re at lunch will have earth-shattering consequences.	You’ve stopped looking for ways to innovate – at work and with yourself.
You refuse to find the time to take care of “the rubber band” – basic health care, exercise, etc.	You plan time to play Solitaire on your computer.
You have difficulty remembering what it is that you love about what you do.	Your “To Do” list is consistently a goose egg.
You take pride in the fact that you’re burnt out.	You can’t remember the last time you were exhausted….or you recall it by saying “I remember the time when….”

So where is the fine line between Burn-Out and Coasting? Right about here!

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