We’ve all been there.

Your alarm goes off, and an immediate sense of dread overtakes you. Or maybe even tears. The thought of getting out of bed sends an ache into your stomach. You are exhausted. You are fed up. You simply can’t do life today. You feel as if you have absolutely nothing left.

Psychologists have a word for this feeling. It’s called “burnout.”

And it’s infecting our world at at a rapid pace.

According to the National Library of Medicine:

“Burnout is a psychological syndrome emerging as a prolonged response to chronic interpersonal stressors on the job. The three key dimensions of this response are an overwhelming exhaustion, feelings of cynicism and detachment from the job, and a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment. The significance of this three‐dimensional model is that it clearly places the individual stress experience within a social context and involves the person’s conception of both self and others.”

And it doesn’t just have to be a “job” in the sense of working outside of the home. Stay-at-home caregivers, especially those for the very old or the very young, are just as susceptible to burnout as those who commute to outside jobs. And the statistics behind this burnout epidemic are sobering:

According to the American Psychological Association:

“As in 2020, American workers across the board saw heightened rates of burnout in 2021, and according to APA’s 2021 Work and Well-being Survey of 1,501 U.S. adult workers, 79% of employees had experienced work-related stress in the month before the survey. Nearly 3 in 5 employees reported negative impacts of work-related stress, including lack of interest, motivation, or energy (26%) and lack of effort at work (19%). Meanwhile, 36% reported cognitive weariness, 32% reported emotional exhaustion, and an astounding 44% reported physical fatigue—a 38% increase since 2019.”

That equates to a lot of stressed out, fed up, disinterested folks. Perhaps you’re one of them. If not, chances are, you know someone who is. Think about this for a moment: Based on these statistics, odds are pretty high that one of your neighbors is experiencing burnout. One of your friends. One of your coworkers.

Let’s take it a step further: One of your doctors. One of your child’s caregivers. One of the pastors on the staff of your church. One of those truckers you pass on the highway.

We all should seek to be healthy, happy, and whole, and we should want those things for others as well. But the situation becomes even more serious when we think of all the professions on which we depend on the workers to be at their best, not only for them, but for the safety and security of those around them.

Burnout is real. And it can have real, lasting, negative consequences.

“Adulting” carries with it a plethora of responsibilities and, with it, stressors we cannot ignore. Bills, deadlines, parenthood, medical issues, and economic uncertainty are unfortunate facts of life. And, over the last few years, the stress of the COVID-19 pandemic and its ensuing shut-downs and mandates added to the long-list of stressors already afflicting our world. But, even as the pandemic waned, burnout seemed to actually increase, at least according to studies.

So what gives?

Now, let me be 100% clear here: I am not a doctor. I’ve had no medical training, mental health or otherwise, whatsoever. But, I am a member of this “burnout generation,” and I have gone through my fair share of it. So, if I could be so bold as to propose as underlying cause no one wants to talk about?

Visit any therapist or mental health website for burnout-related issues, and they all tell you the same thing:

• “focus on maintaining balance, taking things off the plate when [you] add something new”
• take “increased time off”
• utilize “services as after-school tutoring and childcare.”
• offer “resiliency training”

Don’t get me wrong; all of these things are well and good. Work/life balance is imperative when it comes to mental health. But if you’re looking to cure burnout? These things won’t come close.

That’s because burnout goes much deeper than physical or even mental fatigue. Burnout is, I believe, is an exhaustion of our souls. Vacations don’t fix burnout. Spa days don’t either.

The only thing that can truly cure this burnout epidemic is Jesus.

Our society is becoming increasingly secular. That means, any role God may have played in our lives in the past is now replaced by ourselves. Looking for wisdom? It’s found within ourselves. Peace? Happiness? Joy? Contentment? You don’t need to look to the outside, and especially not to some non-exist God. Our “truest selves” are the source of all those things.

Not only is the problem inside me, but I’m supposed to find the solution there too.

Is it any wonder we’re all exhausted?

Friends, although we are living in a unique time with its own unique stresses, so has every generation that has come before us. Troubles, uncertainty, and difficulties are all a part of this fallen world. As John Mark Comer once put it: “There is a weight to life.” Believer or non-believer, I think we can all agree this is true. And that’s why the words of Jesus are so comforting:

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” —Matthew 11:28-30

The question is never about whether or not our lives will have a yoke; they inevitably will. The choice, instead, is about whether we will shoulder a heavy one or a light one.

Will we be tied to the yoke of selves, constantly forced to provide the answer for every problem, changing our stripes with every whim of culture? Or will we accept the yoke of Jesus, surrendering to His sovereignty and unchanging Word?

This requires making a radical shift from leading our lives to being led. To ceding control, power, and our own god-of-selves to the One who already IS those things (whether we want to admit it or not).

I believe our society will never find an answer to the problem of burnout until we readily receive the yoke of Jesus. Only He can offer us true rest for our bodies and our souls–rest that goes deeper and lasts longer than any vacation or massage ever can. The act of surrender in itself releases the weight of a thousand stressors…and it only gets better from there.

So whose yoke will you carry?