Erin O'Hara: naturopath and wellness expert on how to avoid end of year burnout

The end of the year is almost upon us, and many of us will be feeling overwhelmed, burned out and exhausted.

This is not a new phenomenon, we see it every year around November and December ahead of the summer holidays.

Naturopath and wellness expert Erin O'Hara reveals how to work through the holiday exhaustion without getting too overwhelmed.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News Talks.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
A'b right, it's about this time of the year that
we're all just starting to feel a little bit weary,
aren't we. A little bit of fatigue is kicking in,
maybe a little bit of burnout. So joining us to
talk about how we can deal with this is Naturrobath.
Aaron O'Hara, Good.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
Morning, Good morning.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
I think I'm definitely surrounded at home by people who
are pretty exhausted after finishing exams or just you know,
a busy year, and the forgetfulness is kicking in, and
you just see it's a houseful of yeah, fatigued people,
shall we say?

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Yeah, it seems to be that time of the year.
And I think as we get to this time every year,
we many people are feeling very tired and worn out.
And it's nothing new, but we seem to kind of
it comes upon us and we think we're so tired,
and we start counting down the weeks and as we
roll into the end of November into just mbibround sort
of counting down for a summer holiday and a summer break.

(01:06):
And so it's really common that we will feel like this,
But there's a lot we can do that we don't
really need to keep sort of fueling the fatigue and
the exhaustion. But instead of waiting for the holiday to
come before you sort of do something about it. I
always think this is the time we bring in few
more tools to help you, so when you get to
the holiday, you don't kind of fall in a heap

(01:28):
and be really really exhausted and spend your whole summer
holidays sleeping.

Speaker 2 (01:32):
So what should we do?

Speaker 3 (01:34):
Yeah, So, if you're feeling really exhausted, I think always
the best place to look at is where is your
source of exhaustion and fatigue coming from? And maybe it
might be that you take a little evaluation of your
own lifestyle of looking at your habits and potential things
that are driving the tiredness and the fatigue, whether it's
you're doing too much, or you're not sleeping well or

(01:56):
not quite eating right. And that's a good place to
look at because then you know where to bring in
some healthy changes to actually get you out of feeling
exhausted and fatigue and burnt out. And when you've done that,
then you can start to bring in some new habits
that will really help support your energy and stress levels,
especially as it kind of feels like it's getting busier

(02:18):
and busier and busier with Christmas parties and family gatherings
and social events at work, as well as getting all
your work done before the end of the year.

Speaker 2 (02:28):
This is also really good advice just thinking about going
into summer. Yes, a lot of people are going to
stop and collapse. This is a real could be a
really busy time for a lot of other people. They
have to keep going. They might be working in businesses
where they're going to be really busy over the summer
as well.

Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah, and that's where it's bringing in those basic healthy
habits that quite often get forgotten when we get busy
and we sort of, you know, the exercise falls out
of the way because we think, oh, no, we're too
tired to exercise. But actually, if we bring in some exercise,
we actually have a bit more energy to manage better
and a little bit more motivation. Also eating healthy, we think, oh,

(03:05):
we'll start the healthy edding up Christmas, because then we
can enjoy all the Christmas food that we love, but
actually work on the balance of get the eighty percent
goodness of bringing in the real, healthy, whole foods and
then you can balance out any alcohol and extra treats
that you might be having at this time a year.
The other thing that I personally love to do is
bring in what I call little micro retreats. So when

(03:27):
you know you're kind of hitting that level where or
feeling really tired and exhausted, is go, Okay, I'm going
to do something for myself, whether it's in the weekend
or one evening, whether it's get a massage, go for
a beach walks it and read a book, and not
feel guilty about doing those things for yourself because if
you actually take time out, you then have that time
to fill up your bucket with energy and then you're

(03:49):
ready for the next week a head. So it might
be even using some of the holiday the weekend time
to instead of rush around doing a lot, put in
a little block in your calendar that's really just me
time that you do it, whatever it is that fills
up your bucket of energy so you can keep going.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
And look, you use that support system around you, use
your family and your friends. You know someone offers to
help say yes.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
Yeah, and I think quite often we're like no, no,
I can do it myself. But actually sometimes even letting
people know around you that you are feeling really exhausted
and needing that extra support with managing your stress, then
it actually helps take a bit of pressure off yourself
as well and not feeling as overwhelmed. And also there'll
be a bit more understanding when you say no, why
you're saying no, and actually be okay about that. I've

(04:36):
no your limits, be have realistic expectations and not overdoing
it when you're feeling really really fatigued.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
Thank you so much erin great tips there. Yes, I
don't know why we did. We work ourselves off in
a bit of a frenzy because we know Christmas is coming,
we know the holidays are coming, we know it's going
to be busy. Just need to pace ourselves, don't we.
I mean I have to pace myself till the end
of January so I don't get too caught up in it.
But yes, thinking about all those people who are also
getting ready to ramp up over the summer if your

(05:04):
business suddenly gets very busy.

Speaker 1 (05:07):
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