When a Healer Burns Out

I empathize for those who suffer problems with co-workers, who feeling trapped in a work environment where they experience anger from co-workers, clients or patients.  Built up minor stress causes annoyance but long-term problems affect health, well being and can end careers if we can't change the way we interact with others. 
For those in the helping professions, healer burnout isn't easy to identify and resolve. Many valuable and fine people have already burned out and given up trying to find a cure. You might even be someone that is experiencing early signs of burnout yourself, or see it happening to a friend or a dear one.
What is the average career of a healer? I heard it was 3 years. This isn't very long by comparison to the amount of preparation and study that goes into that career.  
Many nurses are disappointed in their expectations of how their career as a caregiver was going to be. I gave a teaching called Utilizing Compassion in the Face of Anger discussing special issues facing nurses, such as passive aggressive behavior, and how hurtful these are in clinical settings.
What are signs of burnout?
· Irritability happens slowly, more and more things bug you, and you snap more. You start creating problems where there are not problems.
· Disoriented or just going through the motions
· Judgmental
· Physical system out of balance,
· Stomach problems
· Headaches
· Outright anger at anyone making demands. Part of being judgmental is an inability to tolerate anyone telling you to do anything, without feeling irritation or anger. I believe that someone has already turned the corner into burnout when it arrives at that point.
What would an early warning be?
Perhaps surprise. The first time you experience something that does not resonate regarding your work environment and feel surprised that something shifted just then. This would be an early warning sign accompanied perhaps by a feeling that something inside hurts and you don't know what or why. In the familiar environment of your work environment, suddenly you feel like it does not energetically support you.
Successful people who have not burned out are able to perceive early warning signs and work with them before they become confused and disappointed with healing others. Wherever you are in that progression, there is a potential for adding to that unhappy surprised feeling.
Many of you are healers. think about that and just simply hold your hands like this. Close your eyes think about your work. Feel whether your environment is energetically supporting you. If it is, it will feel like a cushion of density supporting you. Look at how high your hands are. Do you feel very good about your work?
We have a sense of where we do have energetic support, if we feel the hands drop down. In a way, your energetic system is saying something to you that you have programmed it to do.
Some other signs of burnout are
· Cynicism,
· Negativity and irritability,
· A sense of being overwhelmed or besieged.
· Frequent headaches or intestinal disturbances.
Meditators acknowledge that the navel center is a strong practice location. In the more yogic processes, of the various centers of meditation, the heart, and the navel centers are the most important. Recently, science research has identified that there seems to be a second brain or certain cells, which have a brain-cell-type configuration in the intestines. There seems to be a kind of intelligence associated with the intestines. Practice energies around the navel accumulate. When problems come up, intestinal distress manifest, as though you are thinking in a different way.
Other signs of burnout could be
· Weight loss or weight gain
· Sleepiness or inability to sleep
· Depression Part of burnout is anger, which is an energy arising. The other part is depression, which is the up and down between angry and depression where the person’s energy rises up as though there was no monitor on emotional cycles.
· Shortness of breath
· Suspiciousness. It is hard when burnout comes and the healer is unable to see that. No matter what you say to them, it does not make sense to them. They become suspicious and unhappy.
· Feelings of helplessness and self-criticism, blaming oneself for putting up with the demands of others. So, in addition to being angry with others, that person blames themselves for allowing that other person to put demands on them. What is wrong with them…? It is a difficult dilemma because whichever side you are on, it does not work!
· Exploding easily at seemingly inconsequential events
· Increased degree of risk-taking … pushing too ha when the system can't tolerate it can cause a plummet into depression. In order to continue working, some will take chances that they normally would not. 
 One certainly doesn't need all these symptoms to recognize a downward spiral. It is definitely time to seek change. And whatever they are doing is not working. There is something else that has to happen.
· Chronic fatigue syndrome is a very real possibility at a very serious level. People who have experienced serious burnout exhausted themselves and tried to pull themselves into a position where they can accomplish what they promised to do. Something happens inside where they literally faint inside. This happens in a deeper level of their being, which is the area I call the actual being. When the actual being faints, very often that person cannot get up out of bed. They fall into extreme exhaustion, feel physically run-down and unable to be diagnosed with any perceivable disorder.
Some businesses and hospitals encourage hyperactive work, which over stimulates the energy system and makes you susceptible to drops in your own energy due to stress.
What are some of the good reasons that people want to become healers?
Some say it is because they want to affirm the interconnectedness of beings so that not only are you supporting others, but also your good karma comes back at you and you yourself will be cared for.
Other healers want to help end suffering. With a powerful idealistic urge, which arises and due to your education and abilities, this emerges as a wish to be a healer. Some healers feel that there is something was wrong the way health services are done.
I have one student raised in an environment that not just encouraged but demanded that she follow in the footsteps of other family members who are healers and the expectations of that family tradition.
The one reason I would like to present, one of the best reasons for becoming a healer is that you have no other choice. You have no other choice. The commitment to heal is not dependent upon whether you can afford to be a healer, whether you have all of the educational modules in place, or support of your family. Your commitment to being a healer is because there is nothing else you feel like you are. In some ways, the best reason for being a healer is that you already are a healer.