I now know what true burnout feels like and it's worse than people say it is.

Hello Reader,

I officially burned out right around the time of the last e-mail, which was about a month ago and it sucks. To sum it up, it's basically a combination of feeling completely exhausted and also having a weird mental barrier that prevents you from doing... well, anything.

The things you previously found fun and fulfilling don't feel that way anymore and you just want to sleep or just stare at the wall.

The worst part about it is that the symptoms aren't obvious until everything hits you at once, which is to say that it can sneak up on you and strike without you realising.

And experiencing true burnout has been a good thing for me.

I'm the kind of guy who wants to know about something so I can act upon it. The reason I don't mind failing is because if I fail then I'll have a better idea of what doesn't work so I can figure out what does. And experiencing burnout has made me realise what is not working in my life and I have spent the last month figuring out what does.

And I come to you with some answers.

Yesterday's video tackles this, but I want to expand on a few things in this e-mail.

In the last e-mail I mentioned that there was a part of me that just wanted to disappear for a year or two and then come back to this "creatorpreneur" journey I've been on for what feels like 200 years. I've felt that way before but the reason I didn't act on it was through fear that it would be a huge mistake.

I now know what the route cause for this feeling, as well as the feeling of burnout comes from. It actually comes from two places.

The first is not respecting your schedule

I covered this a little bit in the video, but I want to talk more about it here because I really feel strongly that this is the most impactful change you can do for yourself.

We live in a world of hustle culture, which in and of itself isn't bad. But hustling is a skill and it can be a net positive in your life if you treat it as one. Conversely, it can screw you over if you don't. It can cause you to ignore more important things in your life for the sake of arbitrary goals and it can cause us to overestimate what we're capable of doing.

So how do you fix and maintain a schedule?

I used to think that the schedule came first and the work came second when actually it's the other way around. Instead of spending energy on your schedule, spend energy on your work.

Let's say you have 2 hours in the evening to complete tasks A, B and C. Well, normally you might look at the week ahead and plot task A for Monday and Tuesday, B for Wednesday and Thursday and C for Friday and Saturday and maybe you'll give yourself Sunday off.

That's not a bad way of doing it. However, you must approach this with the following mantra:

"The work is more important than the schedule"

So if by Tuesday you're nowhere near completing task A and you have to continue that task into Wednesday, then that's okay!

I used to fill out a schedule months in advance, assuming that I knew how long a comic page would take. I've been at it for a few years now so I have a pretty good understanding of my speed. But I never account for the following two things:

1. How tired I'm going to be
2. How unpredictable life is

And so whenever I felt especially tired or if my daughter becomes ill then my entire schedule would be destroyed which would cause huge amounts of anxiety and stress. I HAVE ALL OF THIS WORK TO DO AND NOW I DON'T HAVE TIME TO DO IT SO THAT MEANS IT'LL NEVER GET DONE. That was what would go through my head at the slightest inconvenience to my strict schedule.

Not a great way to live.

So now, I've slowed down. I know that if I take on too much then nothing will get done. Which brings me onto the second point I want to talk about this week which is all about Overestimation.

You will find ways to screw your future-self over

Your future-self is a God damn super hero with the perfect life. It must be, considering how much pressure and work you're putting on them, right?

WRONG!

Your future-self is just as exhausted and anxious as you are. They're probably more exhausted and anxious, actually. So you need to take special care of them.

And to do that, you need to keep them in mind when you're making decisions. Decisions like taking on extra projects and having an unrealistic schedule are going to make things worse for your future-self.

The way that I'm taking care of my future self is to base my schedule on the work by doing everything I've mentioned in this e-mail so far, but by also not being worried about consistency as much. Take YouTube and this newsletter as the two examples.

I'm not going to write anything, be it an e-mail or a video script, unless I have something to share or something to say. If I've completed a cool project and I want to shout about it, I will. If I've discovered an answer to a problem or I am passionate about a particular topic then I'll write about that and create stuff around it.

It's pretty simple. I only need to fulfil one of those two criteria. Something to share or something to say. And if there's a month between them? So be it. If there's 3 months between posts? That's fine, too.

I came at this e-mail newsletter the same way that I came at my YouTube channel. I must provide value once a week, every week. Which, for me, is not sustainable. I don't feel I'm at a place in my life or career where I can do that, and that's totally fine. As I mentioned earlier, I'm really grateful that this happened because I feel like I'm in control for the first time in a very long time.

I think blaming social media is a bit cliché. Everyone blames social media for everything.

But, also, it's social media's fault.

I think the way that people talk about social media, specifically when it comes to "making it" on social media is what I have a problem with. The idea that you must post on a schedule and you must post with a level of consistency is what screws us over. And there are people out there who legitimately try to help with that by giving valuable tips and tricks, which is great.

But by detaching myself from that mindset and simplifying it down to my criteria of two, it has helped me not only come up with better ideas (in my humble opinion), but I'm actually doing more of the important stuff and less of the distracting stuff. Plus, I'm not as tired anymore. Which is nice.

When I'm creating my comic, I'm making choices that I feel would improve it instead of making choices that would get me to the finish line faster. When creating videos, I'm actively trying to learn new editing or writing skills, instead of hoping that I'll learn them by doing the same thing over and over again.

And, again, none of this is based on a schedule or a level of consistency. I am creating first and worrying about the schedule second.

That's not to say that you should ignore your audience if you're lucky enough to have one. I'm always on the look out to see what my audience thinks and ultimately things like my channel and this newsletter are services to you. So if there's anything you dislike or want to see more of then do reach out.

I don't have that attitude when it comes to my comic. I'm expecting criticism and I'm happy to learn from it, but I won't change or adapt things based on what the audience wants or expects. I see the comic as mine and the YouTube channel and e-mail newsletter as everyone's. Hopefully that makes sense.

Anyway, let me know if this e-mail was too long, not clear or anything else.

I'll sign off with this.

Please respect your own limitations today and your future-self's ability to cope with the workload you're giving it.

And just make cool stuff that you like at your own pace. In a world of hares, be the tortoise.

Thanks for reading and I'll see you soon.

-John