What Burnout Taught Me By Hayley Hughes

“I was a people-pleasing, high-achieving perfectionist” – what burnout taught me

It’s possible the message in the wind, sky or the trees isn’t about fighting for a fairy tale. Maybe it’s about being receptive to finding the fairy tale in the most unexpected places. These days, I believe this. So much so that it’s the pull quote from my debut memoir, Thank You, Burnout. 

Sometimes the most transformative journeys are unplanned. Like penning a book by hand before you know you are writing a book. Like journalling your way from depletion to peace. Like thanking burnout. 

Similar to many women navigating the blurred overwhelm that is twenty-first-century motherhood and work, I was a people-pleasing, high-achieving perfectionist so good at getting on with the task, until one day I became the task.

I pushed beyond reasonable limits towards a one-dimensional definition of success for years. Too busy for boundaries and self-care, I said yes a lot while delivering for everyone else. My accepted and tolerated state: overload masked with professionalism and grace. What I normalised was worlds away from right, and that’s the madness in it all; that’s burnout. 

Thankfully, diverse approaches exist in every situation, and hindsight imparts that breakdown wasn’t all terrible. Rather, a chance, an invitation suggesting that a stroll along a quieter path is wise and advised. No one was coming to fix how I operated. Only I had that power, and I used it. Somehow, I managed a becoming that trumped my burnout, full credit to life changes, special places and writing. 

Sure, writing was a simplistic solution for a far-from simple situation. Journalling never appealed to me. As in, I wasn’t interested, but writing was my last-ditch attempt to save myself. Ironically, my first-ever entry that morning in May 2024 is where my book begins. 

For once, I had no agenda. Instead, I wrote because I was without-a-hope lost. I wrote to document real and aspirational growth, to mark progress and missteps, to process and stay accountable to myself. My journal wasn’t a fix; rather, an element of change, a way to become open to something new and uncertain, an entry point to another way.

On paper, I bolstered a bravery I’d not known while locating sense in my world, there in black and white. Hence, journalling was no longer lame. 

Thank You, Burnout evolved pen to page at the dining room table, the library, the farm, in the garden, in the car waiting at school pickup, by the creek, on the couch and the lounge room floor. Out of nowhere, I had piles of handwritten journals that told a heartfelt story of recovery, change and hope.

My journal through burnout offered a lived example of finding genuine happiness on the other side of change. Call it a manifestation, a redirection, a pivot, self-help in action or an honest and relatable tale of burnout becoming an opportunity for courage, growth, gratitude and newfound life. A metamorphosis. Yes, all of that. 

If I’m honest, writing rescued my life. It made healing tangible, compelling me to face the decisions I had to make. Breakthroughs surfaced one entry at a time, and each day built on the last as I shut parts of myself down to unlock others. For me, writing is tactile thinking therapy that underlines the joys of simplicity.

It helped me twirl personal disarray into a state of wonder and catharsis, which is part of the reverence. The words scribed went from sad and strained to one day beautiful, the journey much the same. 

Somewhere along the way, my thoughts drifted to how my experience might offer encouragement to someone else. And so, I turned my words into something meaningful for others. I spent many an afternoon in the garden transferring my notebooks between throwing the ball for the dogs. My writing process is time-consuming in all the right ways, and the one thing that I don’t optimise for efficiency. Maybe that’s why it works. 

For months, I didn’t tell anyone about how writing pulled me from burnout’s pit. There was fear in admitting that I recorded it all. It’s raw and regards intimidating aspects of the human condition, exploring my flaws in vulnerable detail, but there’s a shared humility in that. Regardless, I circled back to nerves and self-doubt as I prepared to publish. Writing to heal is one thing, but exposing everything felt both brave and a bit nuts. 

However, authentic stories gift valuable reminders that we are not alone. We seek examples of hope when lost in the wilderness of life. I did. Therefore, there’s merit in hope, in stories inspiring us to have a go. Too, there’s power in coming to our own rescue and discovering that fulfilled lives exist if we’re brave or fed up enough to curate them. 

In my happily ever after, this memoir is my thank you note to the Universe, my version of presence and prayer, my way of expressing gratitude for being aware (of what’s important). It’s also sincere proof that nothing’s out of reach, not the sublime dreams or maverick ideas. If I’m a nobody who found peace and place on my own terms because of burnout, anything’s possible. Even healing and the refreshed little life that I share in the book, even Thank You, Burnout helping others as much as writing it helped me. 

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Hayley Hughes is an Australian author and working mother who writes to heal. In 2024, burnout compelled Hayley to leave her successful senior management career to pursue a more fulfilling life. These experiences led to Thank You, Burnout, a powerful memoir about self-discovery and transformation.

THANK YOU, BURNOUT

It’s possible the message in the wind, sky or the trees isn’t about fighting for a fairy tale. Maybe it’s about being receptive to finding the fairy tale in the most unexpected places.

This book is about burnout—with a beautiful twist.

Hayley Hughes pushed herself to depletion in the name of accomplishment and success. Her burnout felt eternal, deep, consuming. A full stop.

But amid profound collapse, burnout also became a chance, an unexpected catalyst for becoming.

Thank You, Burnout is an intimate walk through someone else’s woods. It winds the valleys and peaks of human emotion, through courage, self-determination and healing to reveal there’s much to gain from change.

A collection of heartfelt journal entries, Hayley’s powerful memoir is honest and personal, detailing an ordinary life that transformed into one of remarkable vibrancy and happiness.

Thank You, Burnout explores darkness and light, offering a portrait of hope that ventures into the aches and joys of helping ourselves.

With grace, Hayley’s story speaks to anyone who has felt the effects of burnout or the strange relief of finally having nothing left to give. An ode to presence and subtraction, Thank You, Burnout is a tale of coming to our own rescue and being the heroes of our own self-care stories. It inspires trust in intuition all the way to peace.

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