My 12 June 2015 blog still makes me proud: The road to recovery from a burn-out or depression. It offers solutions and dealt with the How question. The increasing number of people suffering from – and talking about – a burn-out has left me wondering about the Why and What question.
Recently, I had an epiphany. I connected several of my concepts like Body Mind & Soul, Change, Faith Beliefs & Willpower, and Needs Wants & Beliefs. Then I tweaked the diagram in my 27 February 2017 blog on “The process of Change”. The updated diagram at the end of this blog may help understanding the Why and What behind a burn-out.
Most Change is external and comes to us through our bodily senses (eg, hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting). Our mind needs and wants to understand (eg, listening, recognizing) this input before it is willing and able to accept and believe that input. It takes willpower for executing internal Change. Without faith, any internal Change will be short-lived.
I had never realised that external Change may also affect one’s faith, without going through the entire Change Management process (from left to right in the diagram below). Once your faith “breaks” then willpower and beliefs will immediately break down too (domino effect).
The resulting burn-out will require a long recovery period because it involves your faith and Soul. A burn-out is not a sickness of the Body as the Body works just fine. I still recall visitors at my home who wanted to see how a burn-out looks like. Well, you can’t see anything.
Neither is a burn-out a mental sickness as the Mind still works fine, apart from an immense confusion. My doctor didn’t prescribe me any medicine as she concluded that I perfectly understood my own situation. She offered talking to some professionals which should help sorting out my confusion. I spoke to 3 of them but none earned my professional respect.
Hence, I decided to “talk to myself” and doing my own “soul searching”. I am convinced that this immense confusion relates to our (broken) faith and (hurt) Soul (eg, NY Mag, 2007). Our emotional and rational distance to the concepts of faith and Soul, may explain the long duration of our recovery. Restoring the balance between Body, Mind & Soul takes time. My writing allowed for and/or coincided with some important breakthroughs. It’s like diagnosing yourself.
During my 18 month recovery, I minimised external bodily / sensory input like people, music, radio, and TV. Sounds disturbed the thinking inside my mind: a new understanding, accepting and believing. Actually, I am still limiting artificial sounds because I have grown accustomed and fond of Nature’s quietness.
“The quieter you become, the more you are able to hear.” A quote by Jalaluddin Rumi quote and Ram Dass.
I am happy sharing this diagram with you:
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