I know this title is probably somewhat peculiar. You may be thinking “how could burnout ever be a gift?”, but don’t stop reading yet. Just trust me. You’ll see.
During my life I have had a strong history with living off of academic validation, doing every single extracurricular activity available to me and trying to keep up with my “gifted kid” title that I was granted in my 2010 kindergarten class.
Obviously, this eventually caught up to me, since I found myself thrown into a pandemic where none of those things mattered whatsoever and there was actually no physical outlet for me to keep maintaining this image. I then realized I absolutely had zero sense of self outside of the things I once furiously clung to. I burnt out. Bad.
Burnout is not fun whatsoever, that I can strongly attest to, but it was then I adopted a new life outlook, one that centered around finding the positive out of every negative, even if it was hard. My sanity depended on it.
With this, I realized my burnout actually summed up to be a blessing. A gift.
Not a gift like my ability to read chapter books at age five or my ability to have absolutely 0 free seconds in my schedule. Not a gift that deemed me “gifted”.
A genuine gift, one that actually had positives for ME and my own self. A gift that only I could control, only I had the ability to declare. Mine.
Now you may still be wondering how this difficult thing was actually a gift, and here’s how.
It saved me! I realized how much more I was than an impressive report card, a leadership position, a performance in a sporting event… you get the point.
For the first time, I was able to do things because I ENJOYED them, not because other people would perceive me better because of them.
I became considerably more happy. I no longer had to look at a 98 and think about the other 2 points “I should have earned”, didn’t nitpick every single action of my day to day life, didn’t need to be some 14 year old “Future resume builder”. Obviously I still value my hard work, accolades and well-roundedness while also still adding to them and maintaining the same qualities. The difference is that this time it isn’t killing me.
It taught me so many new things about myself. That I enjoyed things like breaking the occasional rules, that I loved being able to sit in my teenage angst and journal or pick apart songs, that I definitely loved taking care of my body rather than pushing it to its breaking point, and many more.
It made me value myself so much more, independent from the opinions of others.
It also taught me more of what I needed to be doing, like eating normally, laughing more, affirming myself and a plethora of other things.
Writing this now as a college student, I couldn’t be more proud of me and everything I endured, but also my tremendous amount of growth and healing. Of course in the moment, the word “gift” would have never crossed my mind, but now it’s what I confidently define the whole experience as.
Screw you burnout. But, also, thank you burnout! You know?
Never be afraid to think of gifts in a way that is greater than a little wrapped box, a talent or some happy-go-lucky thing that the word typically denotes. Sometimes life’s greatest gifts to you, are the things that you think you’ll never overcome, the things that in the moment feel like opening up a box with a rock in it instead of a diamond.