{"id":305,"date":"2015-05-14T18:30:32","date_gmt":"2015-05-15T00:30:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/?p=305"},"modified":"2015-05-14T16:56:47","modified_gmt":"2015-05-14T22:56:47","slug":"spotting-your-burnout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/2015\/05\/spotting-your-burnout\/","title":{"rendered":"Hug Your Kids and Smell Their Hair"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article on Burnout<\/a><\/strong> comes thanks to Grant Skousen (@gskousen<\/a>) who sent it to me in reply to the article I linked to on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

I’m pretty sure I was burning out some-time in 2013. \u00a0A lot of what the article says resonates with me. \u00a0The top two are<\/span><\/p>\n

1 – “Make time for numero uno”<\/span><\/h1>\n

It’s kinda silly so I don’t like to tell a lot of people, but I often listen to fiction on my commute. Especially Epic Fantasy like The Wheel of Time or Words of Radiance.<\/span><\/p>\n

I blush to add that I’m now branching into vampire novels. It’s not great writing, but that’s not the point: SOMETIMES MY BRAIN NEEDS A TWINKIE.<\/span><\/p>\n

When I was a developer I always listened to 2 to 4 technical and management podcasts on my commute every day. (Thank goodness for 3x playback.) It made me feel so productive. I loved what I was learning.<\/span><\/p>\n

The bloom started to wilt a few months after becoming a manager. I would get this rising level of anxiety that said, “These ideas are awesome! I have to do them all RIGHT NOW<\/strong>!<\/strong><\/em>“<\/span><\/p>\n

Since I’ve added\u00a0fiction to my rotation I’ve found I get to work energized and come home ready to adore my kids.<\/span><\/p>\n

I still listen to business and technical books and podcasts from time to time, but I keep a close watch on how they affect my state of mind. \u00a0Maybe it sounds silly, but it works for me.<\/span><\/p>\n

2 – “Have a process”<\/span><\/h1>\n

This was something I didn’t need as much as a developer, but is CRITICAL as a manager. <\/span><\/p>\n

I thought life was bad as a dev. In management it got worse.<\/span><\/p>\n

I have way more “bosses” now than I ever had as a dev. I have far more conflicting “number one priorities.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Having a process for ingesting, digesting, and executing on input has become more and more crucial for me.<\/span><\/p>\n

A Bow Always Strung Loses Its Spring<\/h1>\n

It’s great to be driven. But if you aren’t careful you’ll loose it all.<\/p>\n

Practice mindfulness. Smell those roses. If you have kids then smell their hair when you hug them (my favorite smell in the world).<\/p>\n

You’ve got to respect all those\u00a0clich\u00e9s or they will gang up and get you, eventually.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article on Burnout comes thanks to Grant Skousen (@gskousen) who sent it to me in reply to the article I linked to on Tuesday. I’m pretty sure I was burning out some-time in 2013. \u00a0A lot of what the article says resonates with me. \u00a0The top two are 1 – “Make time for numero… Continue reading Hug Your Kids and Smell Their Hair<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"link","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[36],"class_list":["post-305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-link","hentry","category-executive","tag-burnout","post_format-post-format-link","wow fadeInUp","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":307,"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305\/revisions\/307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.managerjs.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}