Dealing with Burnout
Hi guys. I hope you all are doing well. I am doing pretty good. I’m enjoying the slower pace of life. The physical copy of my degree came in the mail this week which was fantastic. My undergrad journey has officially closed.
This week, I want to share something super important that performers of all mediums need to be aware of. And that is burnout. It's something that should be talked about more, and I wish I had known about it sooner. My examples will be related to dance because I've had more dance-related burnout than I have with theatre. I will provide theatre examples if I find any that work with my topic.
Before I begin sharing the signs of burnout, I wanted to note that Type A personalities (high achievers who tend to overcommit themselves) are at especially high risk for burnout.
Early signs include:
Not enjoying performing.
Tension, depression, frustration at not improving.
Anger, fatigue, and feeling out-of-whack.
An inability to bounce back from rejection.
The solution:
Take a few days off from performing entirely. Don't attend class or rehearsals. Fake the stomach flu if you have to. Rest your body, do yoga, eat and drink right, and most importantly, get enough sleep.
Full-blown burnout signs include:
Pushing yourself through exhaustion.
Physical pain and feeling emotionally shot.
Feelings of negativity, being catty towards others, and depression.
The Solution:
Take more than a few days off from performing. Take the summer off if you can - go on vacation. Do other things you enjoy. Don't do anything related to performing, as hard as that may be.
According to an old Dance Spirt magazine I have, here are some things you can do to beat burnout:
During days of rest, nurture yourself.
For me, nurturing myself looks like eating all my favourite foods (which all happen to be healthy), listening to my favourite musicals, watching YouTube videos, reading good books, and getting a lot (and I mean a lot) of sleep.
Maintain a workout regimen.
Since leaving dance, working out in any shape or form has been hard for me, so if anything at all, I'll do a bit of light stretching.
Don't be so hard on yourself; try to be less goal-oriented.
When I need to be less hard on myself, I don't write out a daily to-do list; I just do whatever I feel like doing that day.
Switch studios
If you're a dancer, and worst comes to worst, try switching to a new studio. You may be burned out because your studio is not meeting your needs anymore. That's how it was for me at one studio, so instead of leaving, I took classes with a different teacher at a level lower than I was taking before. Not only was I the best dancer in the class, but it also helped me focus on my technique, and all the praise I got really helped me feel better about my dancing.
Evaluate your commitment to performing
If you're burning out, you might need a new venue for performing. Try joining a dance team at your school or doing a school play instead of a community/regional one. That will allow you to continue performing at a lesser intensity than wherever you were before.And that concludes my post on dealing with burnout as a performer. I hope you all enjoyed this post. If you did, don’t forget to give it a like, share it with any of your fellow performers and leave me a comment sharing any tips you have for burnout. As always, sending you all the light and love in this world. See you next week!
