Tip 22 - Recognise the symptoms of burn out

Burn out is something that can happen if you overwork yourself and is sadly most common during exam time. However, it can happen at any point if you are doing too much work and stressing yourself out. Some of the common symptoms of burn out include: tiredness, insomnia, frustration, anxiety, loss of confidence, depression/constant sadness, stress, anger, muscle aches, headaches and lack of motivation. You may confuse some of these symptoms with laziness but it is in fact nothing to do with laziness. The best way to treat burnout is to take a break or scale down your studying A LOT. Find a way to distract yourself and don’t feel guilty about stepping away from studying. Learn self discipline and teach yourself how to recognise when you need to take a break by monitoring your emotional and mental health during studying. Burn out can actually cause you to score lower in exams because you won’t be able to remember as much or work as hard if you are doing too much. It’s ok to step away and it’s good to take breaks. You can literally get sick if you overwork yourself, so please, please remember the signs. Studying constantly isn’t healthy or useful.

Here is a website that gives advice that may be helpful if you think you’re suffering from burnout

https://www.uopeople.edu/blog/what-is-academic-burnout/