A client one of the few months ago came to me and said to me this thing that I hear, almost weekly: “I think, I'm just lazy”.
It was just a session ago that she explained one of her clients' presentations was running in her mind until the wee hours of the morning. Reading and responding to emails during lunch time. Collecting her children, preparing the meal, supporting with their homework and staying awake all night checking things out that her boss said offhand. But, after all that, her conclusion was that it was the problem of being lazy, she hadn't got around to starting the personal project she has been "meaning to get to" for three months.
I sat with that for a second, prior to saying anything because it is a common and such a cruel misdiagnosis. It wasn't laziness that she was talking about. It was a nervous system that was all done in. She didn't have words for that, however. Most of us don't. So, we choose the only word that our culture has given us - lazy.
This is one of the most crucial differences with clients, and I want to make it with you too as it doesn't just cost you a Tuesday. In the long run it deprives you of a relationship with yourself.
As you can see, there is something about the concept of laziness: it wasn't a clinical term. It's a moral one. This suggests a decision that you could do the thing, but you don't, maybe because of some lack of your discipline or your character. It's an indictment.
Emotional exhaustion is definitely not this. It's not a personal failing or sinful trait; it's a condition of the body. Your body, after weeks, months or years operating on a low level of fight or flight states, eventually does what overworked systems do: backs up. After weeks, months, or years of a low-level fight-or-flight mode, your body gives out, just like an overworked system does. It starts conserving. Clears out all unnecessary items that are not required for survival. Biologically speaking, creativity, motivation, an urge for new endeavors, even the ability to feel pleasure are luxuries. Once your system is depleted it is ready to sacrifice luxuries.
But you have to say no to that message or no to that project or no to that dinner you want to go to to begin that project that's not on YOU! You, your body, it has decided you don't have the resources to spare, that's your executive decision making on your behalf without asking, without permission.
The tragedy is that then we pass judgement on one we didn't make and did not consciously choose.
If somebody says, "Well, I'm just being lazy," I don't say, "Hey, come on, I'm not being lazy.I don't immediately say, “Hey, come on, I'm not lazy.” Rather, I'm curious to them. The case does open up a little with a few questions:
What happens in your body, when you imagine doing the thing? In the popular vernacular, laziness is sometimes accompanied with a sense of rote learning, of doing something because it seems like a chore, but that it isn't really that big of a deal: “meh, I'll get to it.” It typically goes hand in hand with something heavier, a sense of constriction in the chest, a feeling of fear, sometimes tears rolling down. If responding to this task as if it were a threat is not apathy, it's a very different thing. That's depletion.
“Is it all or is it just this?” If there's such thing as a genuine case of laziness, without any justification or reason, it's selective. You will not have to do the boring task and will do the fun one happily. Exhaustion doesn't discriminate. It squashes all things, even things that you love! When you have lost interest in your hobbies, your friends, your favourite TV show and your work altogether, it's not a productivity issue. That's a signal.
How did your week call you to action? This is the one that people miss out on. We almost never check our target metrics. We don't really audit our actual metrics normally. It just makes us feel out of the loop and that we aren't working as hard as we could be. The next time I ask my clients to list out what they did the previous week, from the emails they sent, the emotional discussions that occurred, the decisions made, the little things they did to take care of themselves it's amazing how many times they've been astonished. When the invisible labour comes into sight, it becomes much more understandable what the "laziness" is all about.
How long this has been your experience? If someone has a day that he is not motivated, it's only one day. Weeks, months or years of it is data. Exhaustion is no temporary condition that will go away after a weekend off – it's chronic and isn't going away because of one weekend of working too hard. It takes time to grow, and it requires time for recovery in order to relax; one lazy Sunday will not do the trick.
It's no coincidence. The mind goes for the more severe interpretation for a reason.
Paradoxically, the lazier one feels than to say he or she is tired, laziness is something you can do something about. So, if it's discipline the issue, it's easy to fix: Work harder, make a better schedule, install a productivity app. Maintains a level of control.
Feeling exhausted means that you are saying you have limits, and that's something more frightening. That it's not possible to run through. You are not working at your current speed and something in your life, whether it's your job, your relationship, the stress you have put yourself under, needs to be changed. That's a far larger and not nearly so convenient reality. So the mind goes with the easier "I'm lazy" option, as at least that one doesn't require anything from anybody else. It doesn't require you to do more on your own - just try harder alone again.
I'd like to soften that pattern and say that, in my opinion, it's one of the more self-destructive that people have in their lives, in a more subtle way. The more you say that you're feeling exhausted is a product of laziness, the more you are misunderstanding a true feeling. You are learning that you can't run out of gas, you can't give up, you have to push harder; that is the only answer when you run out of gas. It's the same lesson that gets repeated over and over, and that leads people to their burnout, resentment, and disconnection with themselves.
If you've read this far and identified yourself, then this is what I would actually say (not as a psychologist making a clinical recommendation, but as someone who's been sitting with hundreds of self-critical people who are tired) - what really works.
First, make sure that you have the correct name for it. Fill in the blank with I'm being so lazy with I think I'm actually really depleted right now (in either voice or journal). Compare the sense of that with the other. See how unlike that is. One invites shame. The other calls for tender loafing.
Focus on the process and not the moment! A day or two in which you are not very active doesn't require any intervention. However, if you've been on the verge of burning out for weeks, it isn't a more effective to-do list, it's more exercise. It's a straight answer of what's playing too much of a role in your life.
Don't rest until you "deserve to". The one thing I see time and time again is people waiting to feel motivated to slow down, but for the most part, it's the opposite: They slow down, and then they feel motivated again.
If this is not rectified, speak to someone. When you're feeling like you can't go on, you can't go on. On other occasions, it's the surface of something deeper - depression, grief that hasn't been dealt with, burnout that's become clinical. It's okay to figure it out with assistance and not on your own.
As most of us think of ‘laziness ', it is very uncommon. Real, ongoing fatigue, under the guise of ‘laziness' - the only language we had to speak is all around. Here's one thing to remember from this: If you're tired, YOU ARE NOT FAILING! It could simply be that you've been wearing more than you knew or even that you knew you were wearing.
Tenderly remind your not-so-perfect self that you can't get out of bed some mornings. She isn't lazy. She's only been holding out for a long time.
