Member-only story

Are You a Workaholic?

Here’s why burnout is a greater risk today

Sarah Kat
4 min readJul 11, 2023
Tired woman drinking tea
Photo by Keenan Constance

For many of us, the pandemic set our worst money-fears into motion.

We suddenly lost work, in all forms and shapes, and with it, our sense of financial security.

For those of us who identify as workaholics, this was a huge trigger to want to work even more.

The fear of not meeting the bills, and the guilt of ‘resting’ — if you could call anxiety-fuelled fidgeting a kind of rest… Personally, it all drove me a bit mad.

But since the world came back on line, I found new work and absolutely drowned myself in it. I must be honest and say this hasn’t been good for my health, and my levels of burnout have been rising like dirty flood water — opaque and all-consuming.

In the post-traumatic state of recovering from a global recession, I want us all to think carefully about why risking burning ourselves out is more dangerous now than ever.

Why we do it

Being a workaholic is often perceived as a virtue. Many individuals wear their workaholism as a badge of honour, equating it with dedication and success.

We do it to ourselves out of guilt — and often with a heavy side-order of childhood conditioning.

The author made this story available to Medium members only.
If you’re new to Medium, create a new account to read this story on us.

Or, continue in mobile web

Already have an account? Sign in

Sarah Kat
Sarah Kat

Written by Sarah Kat

Self help, neuropsychology, small business and marketing. An Elective Orphan and abuse survivor. https://bit.ly/highlights-email

No responses yet

Write a response