Why do ever more of us find it so hard to find a good balance between life and work? The dramatic rise of work-related suffering is clearly not the problem of just a handful of people who are bad at time management. When over 50% of us declare that we are always or often exhausted or stressed, something else is going on. Significant numbers report feeling overwhelmed (43%), irritable (34%), lonely (33%), depressed (32%), and even angry (27%) (Deloitte Wellbeing at Work Survey, 2023). Workforce well-being has also dramatically declined in academia in the last years.

Most personal development experts view this problem through the lens of individual psychology: They encourage us to strengthen our resilience, cultivate Stoicism, subscribe to various productivity enhancement regimes or time-management hacks, tame our perfectionism, and disempower our inner critics. All of this can and does help, but only to a certain degree. Given that over half of us struggle with the task of working (and living) well, this is not just a personal but also a systemic problem.

In this seminar, I explore some of the deeper cultural reasons for why we are all so burnt out. I also offer some practical, actionable advice on what we can do about our exhaustion and how we can re-learn how to thrive.

Key take-aways:

– Understanding not just individual-psychological but also some of the wider cultural and historical reasons for why so many of us are burnt-out.

– An enhanced awareness of which stressors are and which ones are not under our control.

– Some practical tips for how we can better manage our exhaustion and relearn how to thrive.