Tough Love for an Overwhelmed Student: You Have To Do Less!

00:00:00.000 | All right, we have a question here from Lira.

00:00:05.000 | Lira says, "How do you deal with unexpected overload

00:00:09.880 | and burnout that you can't really ease?

00:00:13.780 | I'm a 26 year old Spanish ESL teacher

00:00:15.920 | and nutrition student from Spain.

00:00:17.480 | I've been working at an academy teaching English part-time

00:00:19.680 | for the last year and a half.

00:00:21.840 | I'm also finishing my degree project

00:00:23.960 | for university from home and working at a bookstore

00:00:25.920 | owned by family members.

00:00:27.480 | Due to the owner having an unexpected illness,

00:00:29.520 | my hours at the store have doubled

00:00:31.160 | and I have to work for another three months,

00:00:34.200 | blah, blah, blah.

00:00:35.280 | Now I get up very early to work on my project

00:00:38.200 | before working at the store all morning.

00:00:40.280 | I'm feeling burnt out, I'm not well rested,

00:00:42.540 | and I'm feeling stressed most of the time.

00:00:44.000 | I time block and keep to-do lists

00:00:45.400 | and I assign specific days and times,

00:00:46.900 | plan my days so I can fit everything

00:00:48.240 | and have started quarterly planning since September,

00:00:50.960 | which does help keep my eye on my goals

00:00:53.160 | and figure out the next steps,

00:00:54.220 | but this does not help with burnout.

00:00:55.800 | Could it be I'm simply adjusting to the increased workload

00:00:58.280 | and what would you recommend?

00:00:59.720 | Well, Lyra, first of all, I understand the state you're in.

00:01:06.600 | I get there often myself,

00:01:08.480 | where I have a lot of things on my plate.

00:01:12.420 | Because I'm very organized, I can make it fit.

00:01:15.580 | So it's not like things are being left behind

00:01:17.760 | or I'm scrambling to stay up all night long

00:01:20.160 | to try to get deadlines on.

00:01:21.280 | It's not that type of stress

00:01:22.800 | of I don't have enough time to get things done,

00:01:24.840 | but it's exhausting.

00:01:26.600 | Every minute is scheduled right up to a shutdown.

00:01:28.720 | You feel like there's no gaps in that time block schedule,

00:01:32.140 | your full intensity all day long.

00:01:34.800 | I find that exhausting

00:01:35.800 | and that's exactly the situation you're in.

00:01:37.800 | And you're exhausting, A, because of just constant labor.

00:01:40.520 | That's just physically draining

00:01:42.000 | day after day after day to do that.

00:01:43.480 | It's just draining.

00:01:44.440 | It also, at least this is my theory,

00:01:47.640 | short circuits the planning centers of our brain,

00:01:51.160 | which aren't used to having so many things on our plate.

00:01:53.120 | Yes, with artificial help and tools

00:01:54.960 | like multi-scale planning, we can make it work,

00:01:56.960 | but our brain doesn't really know about that.

00:01:58.840 | And so it can't wrap its mind

00:02:00.440 | about all the different stuff on your plate.

00:02:02.220 | And so it's freaked out about it.

00:02:04.240 | How are we gonna get this all done?

00:02:06.240 | It's used to a slower pace of execution.

00:02:08.900 | So you're straight up exhausted

00:02:12.040 | and you have the negative effect

00:02:13.240 | of this planning center short circuiting.

00:02:15.960 | That's why you feel burnout.

00:02:17.360 | So here's the cure.

00:02:20.000 | Do fewer things, take more breaks.

00:02:24.740 | That means one of these things going on in your life,

00:02:26.940 | you're gonna have to pause or stop.

00:02:28.700 | Now, I think you know that this is the answer.

00:02:35.060 | And the reason why I think you know this is the answer

00:02:37.220 | is that in the full version of your question,

00:02:39.020 | I condensed this, but in the full version of your question,

00:02:41.700 | you were very careful around each of the things

00:02:44.500 | you introduced that was drawn from your time

00:02:46.220 | to put these disclaimers that explained why

00:02:49.240 | there wasn't more blood to squeeze from that turn up.

00:02:53.760 | There wasn't, you didn't have options to make it easier.

00:02:56.800 | You didn't have options to make it more flexible,

00:02:58.840 | to spread it out more like this is this demands,

00:03:01.920 | I can't change it.

00:03:03.560 | You said that for each of the things.

00:03:05.560 | So you were preemptively trying to sidestep an answer

00:03:10.000 | that was like with a little bit more organization,

00:03:13.160 | with a little bit more savvy in how you lay things out,

00:03:16.280 | maybe things will feel better.

00:03:17.360 | Because I think you knew the answer was,

00:03:19.320 | that's not gonna solve it.

00:03:20.280 | There's too much raw stuff on my plate,

00:03:22.560 | and it's exhausting me.

00:03:23.840 | And you were looking for permission for me

00:03:26.400 | to take things off your plate.

00:03:27.900 | And I'm giving you that permission right now.

00:03:30.160 | We have a hard time with this,

00:03:33.340 | taking things off our plate.

00:03:36.280 | Especially those of us like you, Lira,

00:03:38.240 | who are driven and ambitious and interesting

00:03:40.600 | and doing interesting stuff.

00:03:41.640 | All these things you're doing

00:03:42.480 | are either interesting or admirable.

00:03:44.840 | You're helping your family, you're getting a degree,

00:03:46.680 | you're working on a big project.

00:03:48.560 | And we feel bad about taking stuff away.

00:03:52.120 | But let me tell you, when you zoom out

00:03:53.600 | and look at these pictures,

00:03:54.440 | in the big scale, it's not a big deal.

00:03:56.960 | You're going through a period of,

00:03:58.280 | you said three more months where you have to take extra

00:04:00.520 | shifts at a bookstore to help your family.

00:04:02.080 | Okay, that's nice.

00:04:03.160 | So maybe you need to delay the nutrition degree

00:04:07.420 | by a semester.

00:04:08.760 | Or not do your project yet.

00:04:11.960 | And say, look, we have this family thing going on,

00:04:13.800 | I have to help out.

00:04:15.000 | In the big picture, what's gonna,

00:04:16.280 | it's not gonna matter.

00:04:17.120 | You're gonna get your degree,

00:04:17.940 | you're gonna finish your project,

00:04:18.780 | you helped your family,

00:04:19.620 | you spread this out by another six months,

00:04:21.080 | it's not a big deal.

00:04:22.280 | But in the moment, it feels like failure.

00:04:24.200 | Because stepping back, adding things makes us feel good.

00:04:27.440 | Hey, look how admirable and ambitious I am.

00:04:30.440 | I'm doing all these interesting things.

00:04:31.760 | Stepping back from things makes us feel bad,

00:04:34.160 | or like something bad is happening.

00:04:35.480 | Or like there was a failure.

00:04:37.220 | And we amplify in our mind how much other people

00:04:40.000 | are gonna care when we do that.

00:04:41.440 | Reality check, they don't,

00:04:42.620 | they're thinking about themselves,

00:04:43.660 | they're barely gonna notice.

00:04:45.600 | I used to encounter this in a dramatic way

00:04:48.760 | when I was a grad student at MIT.

00:04:50.440 | And I was writing student books,

00:04:51.960 | and I was advising, informally advising undergraduates

00:04:54.840 | to help them apply my advice to their lives.

00:04:56.960 | And the trade-off was,

00:04:58.880 | I would then write about them on my blog,

00:05:01.520 | anonymously, or shoot anonymously.

00:05:03.280 | But I would like, let me help you get your life in order

00:05:06.520 | as a student, and then let me write about it.

00:05:08.600 | I had a series on my blog called College Chronicles

00:05:11.400 | back then, where I'd write about it.

00:05:14.200 | And I remember I would come across students,

00:05:16.200 | and there was one in particular,

00:05:17.280 | I remember this one student, and I called her Lena.

00:05:20.440 | It's not a real name, but I called her Lena.

00:05:22.280 | She was at MIT, and she was an undergraduate.

00:05:24.080 | And she had all this stuff on her plate,

00:05:25.400 | because she was so ambitious.

00:05:27.360 | Her family and her school back home were so proud.

00:05:30.080 | She got to MIT, and she didn't wanna let 'em down,

00:05:32.040 | so she had three majors in all these clubs.

00:05:34.360 | And she was the person everyone was always impressed by.

00:05:36.880 | And the only lever she knew how to pull

00:05:39.000 | to increase impressiveness was quantity.

00:05:43.320 | Quantity of activities, but she was having trouble.

00:05:46.760 | And so I worked with her.

00:05:49.200 | I said, "Let's look at all of your obligations

00:05:50.760 | "and figure out how much time they need each week,

00:05:52.160 | "and let's try to figure out a schedule,

00:05:54.840 | "a student autopilot schedule.

00:05:56.120 | "We can make time for each of these things,

00:05:57.560 | "so it's automatic.

00:05:58.400 | "Tuesday at this time, I work on my problem set.

00:06:00.620 | "Wednesday after dinner, I'm at this club meeting."

00:06:03.520 | We did this exercise, and we ran out of time.

00:06:06.120 | Even if she worked every hour of the day,

00:06:09.200 | from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.,

00:06:11.760 | she still couldn't get all the work done,

00:06:13.720 | even in a normal week where there wasn't

00:06:15.520 | extra exams or projects due.

00:06:17.100 | I said, "This is black and white, Lena.

00:06:19.620 | "You have to quit things.

00:06:20.680 | "You have to stop doing three majors.

00:06:21.860 | "You can't do all these clubs.

00:06:22.900 | "You literally don't have time."

00:06:25.240 | Black and white.

00:06:26.800 | She couldn't do it.

00:06:27.760 | She couldn't do it, because to quit something

00:06:31.480 | or walk away from something would be her

00:06:33.560 | stepping away from accomplishment,

00:06:35.360 | stepping away from ambition, it'd be letting people down.

00:06:37.680 | And I've told this story before,

00:06:38.880 | but what happened to Lena was she burnt out

00:06:41.640 | and had to take a leave of absence,

00:06:43.120 | a medical leave of absence for mental health issues.

00:06:46.560 | Prider Brain.

00:06:47.400 | So I understand the difficulty here,

00:06:51.880 | but this is me telling you and giving you the permission

00:06:54.040 | I think that you want from me.

00:06:55.540 | Do less.

00:06:58.520 | Spread it out.

00:06:59.600 | Give yourself a break.

00:07:00.840 | Give yourself breathing room.

00:07:02.520 | You're young.

00:07:03.840 | None of this is incredibly time-sensitive.

00:07:05.920 | When you look back 10 years from now,

00:07:08.300 | you're not even gonna know the difference

00:07:10.200 | between getting all this done in the next three months

00:07:12.040 | and spending eight months instead.

00:07:13.520 | But in the moment, it's gonna be night and day.

00:07:15.440 | There's gonna be the difference between

00:07:17.640 | physical breakdown and exhaustion

00:07:20.040 | and all of the things that can lead to

00:07:22.560 | depression, deep procrastination, health issues.

00:07:27.560 | It's gonna be the difference between that

00:07:29.880 | and actually having some autonomy, control,

00:07:33.000 | gratitude, and depth in life.

00:07:34.600 | So that's what I'm gonna say, Lyra.

00:07:36.880 | Do less.

00:07:37.720 | I give you permission.

00:07:38.860 | Quit the way.

00:07:40.500 | It's not retreating from your ambition.

00:07:43.940 | It's tackling it in a way that's gonna be sustainable

00:07:47.380 | in the long term.

00:07:48.580 | (upbeat music)

00:07:51.160 | (upbeat music)

Tough Love for an Overwhelmed Student: You Have To Do Less! | Deep Questions with Cal Newport

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