Burnout is at an all-time high, with some surveys showing that two-thirds of employees now cite job burnout as a major challenge.
Not only does overwork and chronic stress drain your energy, it can impair your health and cause a wide range of psychological and physical problems, including depression, anxiety, cardiovascular disease, and even increased risk of stroke.
Shaina Shiver offers a solution rooted in science in her new book. Using ACT and CFT to recover from burnout: A blueprint beyond burnoutcontains strategies to help people in high-pressure situations break the cycle of fatigue.
what is burnout
The term “burnout” was coined by psychologist Herbert Freudenberger in the 1970s to describe a state of physical and mental exhaustion in workers. Decades later, the World Health Organization officially recognized burnout as an “occupational phenomenon” characterized by fatigue, cynicism, detachment, and decreased efficiency.
“Burnout not only makes us miserable, it also makes us sick. Half a century after we named the problem, we are still collectively racking our brains about how to solve it.
“If you’re experiencing burnout, you’re probably already trying to ‘fix’ it.” Perhaps you lean toward conventional wisdom like more exercise, more sleep, more meditation, more sunlight, and more kale. Perhaps you’ve accepted the idea that a vacation or spa day will reset your system.
“Here’s the truth: You can’t rely on ‘good vibes’ alone to find your way out of burnout. There aren’t enough green juices, yoga classes, and massages in the world to self-care burnout into submission. Even the most restorative vacation glow often evaporates before you’re finished unpacking,” Seaver explains.
Cyber says that while we can’t ignore the organizational realities that cause burnout, such as unsafe staffing, impossible workloads, workplace discrimination, and other pervasive and harmful issues, we can recognize these challenges and find ways to deal with them that don’t cause physical or mental harm.
“I don’t tell people to deny these issues, downplay them, or pretend they don’t matter. But burnout is not something that can be easily removed when external circumstances change. Pain and challenges are inevitable in work and in life,” she says.
Burnout Syndrome: Neurological and Psychological Perspectives
Burnout is more than just a feeling of exhaustion, it’s a state of chronic stress that rewires your brain. Science shows that long-term stress activates the amygdala, the brain’s fear center, while suppressing activity in the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for decision-making and emotional regulation.
This imbalance keeps people stuck in survival mode and unable to gain the psychological flexibility necessary for recovery.
Mr. Cyber explains: “When we experience burnout, we are often drawn into mental time travel: repeating the past, catastrophizing the future, or checking out completely. Burnout is more than just exhaustion; it’s a loss of meaning, connection, and agency in life..”
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Compassion-Focused Therapy (CFT) offer ways to realign.
ACT promotes a concept called “radical acceptance” to promote psychological flexibility, the ability to maintain the status quo, accept difficult experiences, and take action in alignment with broader goals. Dealing with difficult situations with acceptance reduces the overactivity of the brain’s default mode network (DMN) associated with rumination and self-centered thinking, improves connections between higher-order thinking parts and emotional processing centers for more deliberate responses, and changes the brain’s neural responses to difficult thoughts and emotions.
CFT complements this by using compassion to reduce the control of the brain’s fear centers, activate the brain’s affinity pathways that modulate the nervous system, and promote safety and connection. Combining these approaches can help individuals move from survival mode to thriving mode.
A science-based blueprint for recovering from burnout
Cybele’s Blueprint beyond burnout We integrate ACT and CFT into a framework designed to address burnout at its root, rather than softening its effects through lifestyle adjustments.
Unlike traditional health improvement methods, which often focus on short-term nervous system conditioning techniques such as exercise or meditation, this approach goes further into the psychological and systemic physical reactions that cause burnout.
This framework begins by creating a vision. This includes clarifying deeply held values that will serve as a guide throughout the process.
“Imagine not just the challenge you’re trying to escape from, but the life you’re building towards,” Seaver explains.
Then, that process involves welcoming the uncomfortable. This involves learning how to sit with discomfort rather than suppressing it, thereby developing resilience and emotional openness.
Being mindful of your words is also an important step, focusing on minimizing unhelpful self-talk that fuels self-criticism and replacing it with more compassionate and flexible self-talk. Far from being a “nice-to-have,” compassion can help regulate your nervous system.
“Practicing intense compassion is essential for cultivating self-compassion that lessens the effects of burnout and promotes emotional healing,” Seaver explains.
“Compassion makes the flexibility that ACT fosters more accessible and sustainable.
“Compassion, especially compassion for oneself, is not a finish line that you cross once and you’re done. It’s a relationship that lasts a lifetime, one choice, one breath, one moment at a time.”
She suggests that people also need to identify their strengths and what’s important to them so they can rediscover what energizes and fulfills them.
Siber describes exercises designed to help you apply these principles to your daily life. For example, the “spot your inflexibility” exercise can help you identify patterns of psychological rigidity that promote burnout. By noticing these patterns without judgment, readers can begin to change their responses.
Burnout in high-pressure occupations
Burnout does not discriminate, but it disproportionately affects people in high-stakes fields such as health care, education, law, finance, and technology.
Siber highlights the unique challenges these professions face, from the moral injury of medicine to the relentless demands of a competitive corporate culture.
She emphasizes the importance of systemic change for leaders and teams, including fair workloads, flexible arrangements, and psychologically safe environments.
“True prevention requires redesigning the work itself,” Seaver says. “Equitable workloads, trained managers, and accessible mental health resources are essential.”
Cyber explains why developing resilience is a more sustainable tactic than lifestyle changes for people in high-pressure roles. “Developing burnout resilience allows you to adjust, focus, and bounce back when burnout hits. It’s not about working harder to cure yourself. It’s about learning how to work through discomfort without losing sight of what’s most important.”
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Reference magazines:
Cybert, S. (2026). Using ACT and CFT for burnout recovery. DOI: 10.4324/9781003640592. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781003640592/using-act-cft-burnout-recovery-shaina-siber
