FLAME with Brad Hook
What Is Burnout? I Investigated and Was Surprised by What I Found
Is burnout real — or just imprecise language for being tired and fed up? A solo investigation through the science, the philosophy, and Brad's own three burnout experiences.
Burnout has critics: it's vague, it's self-diagnosed, it medicalises ordinary struggle. In this solo episode Brad takes the case against burnout seriously and works through it — the research, the definitions, and what his own three encounters with burnout actually felt like from the inside.
The surprise is where the evidence lands. The research base behind burnout turns out to be stronger than the evidence behind celebrated constructs like flow state and growth mindset — ideas we accept without blinking. A short, sharp episode for anyone who's wondered whether the word means anything, or suspects they might be living it.
In this episode
- The honest case against burnout — and why it doesn't hold up
- What the research actually shows
- Burnout's evidence base vs flow state and growth mindset
- Three first-hand burnout experiences, examined
- How to tell tiredness from something more structural
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