Therapy for Burnout: Reclaiming Yourself After Chronic Overwork
There’s a particular kind of ache that comes with burnout. It’s not just exhaustion—it’s a bone-deep weariness paired with a quiet, persistent question: Is this really all there is?
You didn’t start your career expecting this. At one point, you were driven, creative, maybe even lit up by what you were building. But somewhere along the way, the hustle became survival. And now, after months (or years) of pushing, striving, and sacrificing sleep for output, you’ve hit a wall.
Maybe you’ve stepped away from the grind—taken a leave of absence, changed jobs, or just collapsed into a version of stillness you didn’t ask for. And now that the rush has stopped, what’s left feels... empty.
This is where therapy for burnout comes in—not just to patch you up and send you back into the same system, but to help you figure out who you are outside of it.
Burnout Isn’t a Time Management Problem
Let’s get this straight: burnout isn’t about poor boundaries or needing better self-care routines.
It’s about systems that reward over-functioning, companies that confuse overextension with commitment, and a culture that glamorizes productivity at the expense of presence.
If you're burned out, it's not because you're broken. It's because you've adapted to survive in environments that never made space for your full humanity.
So when clients come to therapy with burnout, I’m not offering productivity hacks—I’m helping them grieve.
Grieve the self they abandoned to meet unrealistic expectations. Grieve the relationships that suffered while they were drowning in deadlines. Grieve the version of success that was never sustainable to begin with.
What Therapy for Burnout Actually Looks Like
Therapy is where we slow down and ask the questions that capitalism rarely gives you space to consider:
Who are you when you’re not achieving?
What’s worth your energy—and what’s just performative urgency?
How do you know when you’ve done “enough”?
We work to reconnect with the parts of you that were silenced by stress—the creative part, the curious part, the part that once had joy. And we confront the inner critic that equates rest with laziness and says you need to earn your right to breathe.
In sessions, we might explore your values, your relational patterns, your somatic cues, and the unconscious beliefs that keep you chasing approval through accomplishment. We also look at the emotional residue left behind from chronic stress—anxiety, shame, disconnection—and begin to clear it.
It’s Not About Going Back—It’s About Going Forward Differently
Burnout recovery isn’t about bouncing back. It’s about redefining success on your terms and developing a nervous system that no longer confuses urgency with worthiness.
This process is uncomfortable. There’s grief in letting go of the overachiever identity. There’s fear in imagining a life with less doing. But there’s also a profound relief in realizing: you get to build something new.
Something that doesn’t ask you to disappear in order to be accepted. Something that makes room for rest, curiosity, and meaningful connection.
Ready to Begin Again?
At Rooted Therapy, we work with adults navigating burnout, overwork, and career transition. If you’re in Texas and feel like something in you has flatlined—like you’re living in black and white—we can help you find your way back to color.
Schedule a free 15-minute consultation to see if therapy feels like a fit. You don’t have to rebuild your life overnight—but you can start with one grounded step.