Real-world thinking on mental health, work and the juggle of life

80% of Australian employees are reporting symptoms of burnout. As a psychiatrist, I want to tell you what that number means. And what it doesn’t. When I quote…

Burnout is not a personal failing. The World Health Organization agrees with me, which is always nice! In the diagnostic manual ICD-11, burnout is classified as an occupational…

Have you ever said, “I’m fine” while clearly not being “fine”? There’s solid research on what saying “I’m fine” while feeling otherwise actually does to us. In mental…

Ask a manager who on their team they’re worried about in terms of burnout, and they’ll often name the person who’s visibly struggling: missing deadlines, calling in sick,…

We’ve spent decades telling employees to be more resilient, and burnout rates continue to climb. Maybe the problem isn’t the amount of resilience. Maybe it’s the definition. The…

After thirty years of clinical work, I’ve heard about a lot of workplaces from the inside. The healthiest ones are not the ones with the best wellbeing app…

These two get confused constantly, in both directions. People with depression may tell themselves it’s just burnout and push on. People with burnout may fear they have depression…

Our bodies stress response was built for a different world. We’re biologically designed to escape from sabre-toothed cats: cortisol spikes, adrenaline spikes, we run to safety, and then…

Have you ever driven a boat fast across the water, focused on getting somewhere, not thinking at all about what you’re leaving behind you? Then you look back…

Last week I wrote about the stress wake we leave behind us, and how our nervous systems sync up with the people around us. There’s a flip side…