Why Burnout Is Amplified By Overconsumption And How To Avoid It

Have you ever found that you’ll be doing good for weeks and then the next day it feels like you’ve fallen off a cliff? That’s overconsumption.

It happens so quickly that you think it shouldn’t be possible. And yet you find yourself looking over the edge into this bottomless pit that wants to swallow you up.

There may be many reasons for this, like life circumstances, stress, work, overeating etc. 

But in this article, I want to discuss how over consumption of people’s content can do this. 

Opinion overload

The amount of content that gets forced into our brains is huge. And that is an underestimate in itself. 

Every second of every day we see content of different types. Music, adverts, books, games, videos, movies, programs, posts like this!

It’s never ending, a stream jumbled together for your brain. I would go so far as most people’s feeds being like rivers of sewage. And just because a day of consuming makes you feel indifferent. Doesn’t mean it’s not affecting you.

For example, how much of your thoughts are truly yours? 

Think about it, if you have multiple streams of information, from different platforms and people, what is that doing to your own thoughts.

These people have unique lives and perspectives. With different upbringings and ways in which they interact with the world. All of this stuff, weighs on your mind. 

It’s as if you are collecting junk as you go. Your beautiful mind is being clogged up to the brim with unfiltered content.

Worst yet, you haven’t got a clue who these people are. And the river keeps flowing.

Burnout

I hope the above has outlined how tragic the world of content is.

And this is not to say it’s bad, far from it. We have so much information at our fingertips it would be impossible to ignore the benefits. A literal library of Alexandria. Yet, we don’t use it carefully.

Too much knowledge will make you go mad. It accumulates until the weight is so unbearable, it begins to pull you into madness. 

And this is a silent process. Ever wonder why it happens to some of the most intelligent people. It’s like a creeping death. The more you read, the more you understand and the closer to “truth” you get. 

Yet with the trick of enlightenment, is that once you see it. You cannot unsee it. You return to the All or God. 

Likewise with too much knowledge, at some point you make your own connections with so much information that you barely scratch into truth, and so, you dance with madness. 

I admit, the example above is far too extreme for simple advertisements and content. But you notice the difference from being near a radio all day, to going outside into nature where it’s tranquil.

It has an effect on the mind, a tangible one. 

Again, just because you can scroll memes on insta, then follow some silly trend on tik tok to then watch 4 videos on YouTube in a row doesn’t mean this is not happening to you. 

The Soul creep

It enters your inner sanctum like a creeping vine, and takes firm hold. 

Not just that, but the energy of each content creator gets slightly embedded with your own soul. Now I’ll come at this with experience.

Most recently, I’ve been dancing in terms of wellness and resonance. The way I feel is more aligned to the life I want to live.

Yet, as I started to watch more videos to gain helpful information, as you should…! I got addicted. It sunk its claws into me and started pulling me down.

In the space of a week, I went from a state of dancing to just living again. All because I watched too many videos and clouded my own light.

Because I’m aware of this feeling, and know what to do in order to dispel it. The smog gets released from my head and a burden taken off my heart. To get to this point, you’ll need to connect further through activities that refill you.

If you watch hyper productive and successful videos, which are very valuable, it begins to weigh on your mind. You’re not like this person, they’re better than you, they did it faster, they made this video in order to spite you. 

The thoughts that your mind will come up with in order to push back, only help to worsen the situation. 

Because now, your own mind feels bad and the quickest solution is more information, continuing the cycle farther down. 

You start to dull your clarity, just the same as spending time with the wrong people will. Because guess what!

You are spending too much time with a very small part of this person. In real life, they will be infinitely more complicated and will be able to explain what they mean with added clarity.

Yet in the context of one video, they share a snippet of themselves. Your subconscious brain doesn’t understand that and thus is happy to compare it to whatever you over thinking mind says.

A deadly combo.

Take a break

Okay, we’ve got this far. What now?

Realise that you must take a break. Stop the content, the feed of sewage and be with yourself.

Do what makes you happy and fills you up; with no external boundaries.

If you need to draw, cook, write, sing, dance, rock climb….! Do it!

Allow the time out to reset the brain. And once you feel that has happened, anywhere from a few hours to a day, then come back and assess your problem.

(The above time frame isn’t taking into account how long it’s been going on for, only short term overload).

With your mind clear and sharp, get back to the work you need to do. 

Make sure not to use this as a reason to stop working on your projects or work. This is a tactic to reset the mind and come back with all guns blazing.

Conclusion

Each of us are different in our needs and wants. Our rest time and recovery, it’s that simple. And part of getting closer to being whole is realising what it takes to get it out of the system.

This is the approach of the alchemist. 

He would have an idea, test it, recalibrate and test until the idea worked perfectly or didn’t. It’s this same approach of wanting to find a solution over and over again as turning lead into gold. 

Let him with the ears to hear, hear.

I hope that this piece was worth it and not part of the sewage I mentioned. It’s only because I want to stay productive that I found this out for myself.

Over cramming the mind with information makes it more dense.

So be intentional with the content you consume and make sure to spend time creating things.

Another post that may be of interest is about Clarity, check here.

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Good weather,

Elliott.