Note to listeners: This is an unofficial workbook and summary of Burnout by Emily Nagoski designed to enrich your reading/listening experience of the original book. Life Lessons is wholly responsible for this content and is not associated with the original author in any way.

Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle begins with the statement that the book is written for women. Women who feel overwhelmed at the sheer amount of responsibility they hold, but who still don’t feel as though they are doing enough. The authors explain that the inherent issue isn’t that women don’t try hard enough, but that in the current state of the world “wellness” has become a goal, and it’s a goal that only people with certain means can achieve. The aim of the book is to teach what “wellness” should really look like and how to get around the barriers that prevent most people from achieving it - via science. 

Emily Nagoski holds a PhD and is not only a health educator, but also a New York Times best-selling author. Her identical twin, Amelia, is a choral conductor. Together, they decided to write a book that would teach women how to properly deal with stress and emotional processing. They explain that the definition of “burnout” was first used in a technical sense by Herbert Freudenberger in the year 1975. He split it down into three components, which were emotional exhaustion, deper-sonalization (or a reduction in feelings of empathy, compassion, and caring), and a decreased sense of accomplishment. 

As it stands today, most scientific research done on burnout has focused on the professional aspect of it, rather than putting emphasis on the widely prevalent “parental burnout”. The authors begin with breaking down the meaning of emotion by first offering the scientific definition: the brain releasing neurochemicals, which in turn cause your body to react with various physiological changes. 

Generally speaking, most emotions will come to an end. Something happens at work that upsets you, but then you get home and you start thinking about what you’re going to make for dinner, and eventually, those reactions fade away. Emotional exhaustion is what occurs when a person is consistently exposed to situations that invoke an emotional response. Here, the authors explain that another factor in emotional exhaustion relates to a syndrome called the “Human Giver Syndrome”.

The term comes from a book written by the philosopher Kate Manne, where she presents a hypothetical class system. In this system, there are two classes of people - the beings and the givers. The givers are required to give their time, attention, bodies, and affection to the other class. Human givers are described with adjectives such as “pretty, happy, and generous” and are expected to neither need nor want anything back in return. If they don’t follow this set of social rules, the giver has to face consequences in the form of punishment, shame, or destruction.