Burnout

uh chloe's talk is gonna be another good one actually it's about burnout uh she's gonna talk about the balance between hacking and personal life and i'm really interested to see um you know now what 2020 has uh you know how that comes into play in her talk um so we'll get over to chloe in just a second um hi there how's it going good good welcome it's great to be here i was like i was like oh when is he gonna put me on and i was like should i let him know i'm here but yeah all right all right thanks all right time to take it away all right you guys we're gonna talk about burnout today so

i'm gonna just share my window one second okay okay you see my entire page that says burnout and there's two images i will take that as a yes silence means yes right now all right welcome you guys we're to talk about burnout today and if you do not know i'm one of those people that have dealt with burnout but i also know how some techniques that can prevent you from having burnout so let's first dive into this so before we start i just want to let you guys know that 2020 has been a very hard year and some of us have never dealt with mental health issues before we didn't know we had mental health issues before

so it's really important to understand that you know to tread lightly in a sense that don't automatically assume what people say or write is exactly what they're trying to state um always take it with a grain of salt in a sense because you don't know the emotion behind it and also when it comes to random communication miscommunications can happen all the time so it's really important is to just be there for one another try your best to understand from their perspective but also know that when people take decisions or do decisions of their own there's a reason behind it it's not something that we would agree on but it is something to acknowledge that there is always a reason for an

action and so it's important to note that you don't know what it's like to be in their shoes so please be kind to one another in other words um we should definitely be kind to one another on twitter all right for those that do not know who i am my name is chloe mistaki i am an infosec advocate but i'm also an activist who's trying to change the way things are at this time by taking actions that help our community um also vp of strategy over at 0.3 security and i'm also co-founder of hacking is not a crime which is an organization that is a grassrooted movement to change the public perception of the hacker

community but by working with media organizations but also with legislators our whole goal is to change the current legislation that's very much out of date i'm also the president co-founder of wosec and the founder of we are hackers formerly known as women hackers um also run a hacker book club with angela and when i'm not doing that i'm also on a podcast with alyssa miller and phil wiley and that is my url if there's anything you want to know about me is most likely on there and also that is my twitter and instagram feel free to follow and also feel free to dm and anytime my dms are always open for you guys now as you can see from this list this

is a pretty long list of different things that i do but i do a good job at uh prioritizing and knowing what i need to do first versus another thing and balancing everything out as much as possible because the whole burnout thing is balancing it's a balancing act in a sense that you want to make sure you have a balance of your personal life and your work life and so i'm going to try to teach you guys the skills that i've learned um to try to prevent burnout but also what to do if you're dealing with burnout at this moment but i want to go through some scenarios with you because sometimes people don't know they're

burned out until they start realizing this and so i want to talk through these quick examples with you so you have a good idea and understanding of what burnout is like so i want you imagine you're driving in your car and you need to merge into your left lane now when you're merged into the left lane you suddenly think what happens if i don't look at my mirrors if i don't look at my mirrors and i get an accent then i don't need to do that project or i don't need to go to that place i don't need to have that assignment i don't have to have that task on me anymore or sometimes it comes like this where it

used to take you a few minutes to respond to a quick email now it takes 10 minutes now 20 30 minutes hour hours maybe a day or so and then your zero inbox suddenly looks like there's so many that it's overwhelming every time you check it because your anxiety is high that your soulfall are behind and sometimes it shows up when our friends and family tries to contact us and we dismiss it we don't dismiss it because we're busy it's because it's just too much like it feels like it would be another task on top of another task that we're already swimming in and you don't mean to ignore people or to not respond to their messages the

reality is is that you are struggling yourself and it's hard to be there for another person when you're not 100 who you are at the moment and sometimes burnout can come in different ways where we suddenly could be very sad he's suddenly very angry where little things can just throw off our emotions but most emotions that come from burnout is the feeling of being trapped like you can't see an exit here you can't see how to reduce it and you just feel very trapped like as if you're drowning in a sea and you don't know what to do and it can also come off as feeling empty that you feel robotic and less human as

well also when you're dealing with burnout you might find ways to push out due dates once again it's not because it could be because you're busy but the other thing is that you're so overwhelmed that you can't even get your head straight and all you're thinking about this is dude that's due and everything else is due and there's just so much clutter in your head that it's hard to uh be on time and so procrastination is definitely one of those things of course but this is different because the reality is with procrastination very last minute you can push yourself to get um it through and deliver on time but this is not procrastination this is

burnout where you'll find ways how to push out a date or you will miss your deadline because you just don't have the ability because once again you feel overwhelmed some other signs of burnout can be drinking a little bit more caffeine than usual you used to drink one cup of coffee now you drink three cup of coffees um this is the same with tea as well and also if you're reaching for energy drinks you're drinking more than you usually do sometimes when we're really stressed out usually we go as to you know salty sweet foods might be smoking some cigarettes or using some recreational drugs or you might just be needing a glass of wine or another glass of whiskey

um but the reality is is that when you start noticing that you are consuming all these things a little bit more than usual this could be a sign of stress but the thing you need to note is that burnout happens because it's prolonged stress stress that hasn't been basically conquered in a sense and so you might be reaching more for alcohol more for cigarettes more the junk food because it's the same thing as stress but the thing is that you might be developing a pattern because you're not able to focus and figure out how to get through burnout but overall burnout can always feel like you just feel so tired no matter how many hours of sleep you get

it'd be like eight nine hours a night but you still wake up so i'm so exhausted like you're so tired no matter how much you sleep so what is burnout in a sense imagine it being on a ten percent battery you haven't charged her for a long time and you're barely functioning and that's the thing you need to understand when people are burned out it's not them a hundred percent it's just a very small part of them that means being there for others it's very hard and challenging because you don't have the energy to do that because you can't even take care of yourself and that's why it's important to understand about burnout is this feeling

of being trapped low battery and you don't know what to do and that's the hardest part of burnout now i just want to say i am not a therapist but i've been through burnout a few times in my life and i definitely have learned um but i've also worked with some experts in this field to try to learn how to get even better because i do so many projects all the time but i want to make sure that by six o'clock i'm not working anymore majority of my days and so that's why i went out to research talk to real professionals in this field and these are the strategies that came about but i want to first let you know that

sometimes it could come off as you are burned out if your vitals are low for example if you're low in iron vitamin d or vitamin b's you might have low energy fatigue emotions might be all over the place a little bit you can have higher anxiety even depression and whatnot and it's important to understand to get your blood checked just to make sure that that is what's you know it's not a blood vital thing it's an emotional situation um i've had this happen to me last year where i felt very low in energy and i wanted to just make sure that it wasn't something emotionally so i did get checked out turned out my iron level is a little bit low and so i

started taking iron and then i felt much better within a couple weeks so it's important to understand is to see a doctor get your blood checked um so you can know that that's the situation that's going on so what is burnout the textbook definition is burn as a state of emotional physical mental exhaustion caused by excessive prolonged stress it occurs when you feel overwhelmed emotionally drained and unable to meet constant demands so the difference between stress and burnout is that stress is like if i have a glass of wine or take a bubble bath i'm going to feel a little bit better when you're burned out you could drink all the wine take all the bubble baths

but it doesn't do anything that's the difference it's uh stress is something that you can process things you can still be productive um versus burnout is that you wake up and you literally just can't do it like you are pushing every single inch of your body to do something it's a very there's a huge difference one puts you in a situation where you know a little bit of stress is normal but burnout is one that stress has become more than that um and the thing to note is that why you need to take care of burnout immediately if you have the symptoms is because it can lead to having depression and anxiety so it's really important for you

to take care of yourself and right now because of covet 19 and 2020 our elections and everything it's been so emotional right our emotions are all over the place and at the very beginning of covet 19 some of us were scared to go outside some of us still are too to be honest the thing is like not only do we have to worry about um our health but our loved ones people that we can't control to wear masks sometimes it hurts a lot um constantly worried about other people also financial situations some of us have lost their jobs because of this and some people don't even know how they're gonna pay rent so of course there's gonna be burnout

here these are extreme things that are happening this year as humans we like to feel like we're in control but in reality is we've never been in control the entire time and that's something that's hard to digest at this moment because the reality of it is that we used to be able to plan out a vacation a few months ahead of time maybe a year ahead and it didn't cross our mind that things would be disrupted but the reality is is that things can change instantly so remember that so if you feel overwhelmed and you feel like you have no control in your life just remember that it's always kind of been that way the only difference is that we're trying

to also deal with other pains along with it because coven 19 is something very scary to have i know for myself after rsa i was very sick for two months i couldn't get tested or anything like that and it definitely was the after effects that affected me the most so it's important to understand cover 19 is not a joke it's actually something very serious so please wear a mask be there have hand sanitizer stay six feet away um and just do the best that you can but also note that it's gonna bring emotional burnout too now how to prevent burnout let's just quickly go through this usually we recommend exercise eat a balanced diet practice

good sleep habits ask for help but this is of course really hard during this time some gyms are closed um ourselves so we have to try to figure out how to get exercise in daily so it might be buying a treadmill going for a speed walk with your loved one that lives in your home of course um otherwise six feet apart with mass just walking together um it's also hard to get a balanced diet when you might not feel comfortable going to grocery stores as often so you're going to grocery store every two weeks instead so it's hard to get that balanced diet plus when we're stressed we want that salty sweet food so that's also a hard thing

to do too practicing good sleep habits i don't know about you guys but the election those days i struggled to sleep because always think about it's like what's gonna end up happening here i'm worried about our country and where it is being split apart and that's something that i think many of us were also dealing with too and even throughout this whole year we may have had some insomnia because of everything that's going on because this is not our norm we've never been through something like this there's no guide so we're trying to figure it out at the same time stay afloat asking for help is something that you can always still do no matter where you are what day of it

is what hour it is you can always ask for help but how do you prevent burnout let's just go into this the first thing you need to know is have self-awareness remember the very beginning those examples that i shared with you be aware of those and you might have to be that person that tells a loved one hey is everything okay um so just be aware that self-awareness is the number one key to preventing burnout but also when you're getting into the burnout phase that you know exactly what to do next but of course getting self-awareness can be very hard because we're distracted with our phones social media watching movies tv shows reading books whatever

you know playing with your puppies or cats i don't know but the thing is is that the reality of it is you need to journal so i recommend basically journaling if you can daily if not if that's hard do once a week but don't be harsh on yourself if you cannot do it but the thing that's really important is that when you're journaling is to look over it and also to see what other sections of your journal is repeating the same pattern we're good at catching patterns that's why we're in security but the reality is you need to catch your own patterns and so when we're writing it's kind of free flow and things that

we weren't thinking about was going on internally actually it's now on a paper so it gives you a better idea what's going on with you but it's really important to catch words so if you see words of such a feeling trapped or empty um sad depressed anxious these are things you want to keep note of because you might need to get help now the other thing is to take a break uh many people know i tend to be pretty much off of social media unless someone tags me in something or dm's me i'll get on but i try my best to stay away from it because i want to have more of that work and

life balance but also the emotional burnout of looking at twitter dumpster fires can be a lot um but i do recommend that once a week that you stay away from everything infosec and you're like why chloe i don't understand because the thing about our industry is 24 7. 24 7 around the clock we're expected to deliver if ever it's needed and the thing to understand is that that is a lot of stress and not a lot of other industries are like that so it's important for us to take a break and do all the things that are non infosec for that day that means getting off of social media that gets off of your devices

for a day that means learning to paint or i don't know learning to dance you want to learn some ballet techniques youtube videos are there you want to learn how to give yourself a haircut the youtube video videos there the thing is once a week give yourself a little break and that could be if you have kids and everything i know that's really hard to do but at least take a device break for like the day and you can do it with your kids too it's really important to do that right now because it really helps balance your emotions but also reminds you that there's a life outside of infosec write it down so the thing is besides

journaling everything another self-awareness thing that you can do is to have a to-do list it could be just a page in your notebook or whatnot um or you could do is break it down so i have a to-do list for my personal 0.3 and then all the little projects that i'm part of and basically it's just notes in here um and it reminds me of what are things i need to do the reason you want to do that is because it declutters your mind so it gives you a better idea of what you need to do it also feels like you have a lot more room in your mind to think about other things which is great because that's where you

get great ideas is when we kind of declutter our brain it's also important to carry this wherever you go so then if it comes and pops in your mind that you're able to write it down because once you write it down you forget it in a sense it helps so much be able to have a better idea what's going on with you but also when you look at your list you know what to prioritize what is thing that you need to get done now the first time you do it it might be five pages long and that's okay i know it's gonna be it's gonna be hard to look at but that also lets you know you have a

problem you have committed too much or you need to learn how to delegate and that's important to know is that there's people in your life that you can work with to get tasks accomplished don't do it all by yourself that's why team and friends and family are there they're there to help and support you too just like you are doing for them the other thing i want to point out is do not have a to-do list on any devices and the reason for that is that right when you're going to sleep usually something pops your hand like oh my god i have to send that email oh my god that's a great idea i need to

do that and then you start thinking about it over and over and you don't go to sleep so sometimes what we do is we go to our phone to you know give ourselves a message to remind us the thing is that once you get on your device then what happens is you go to your other apps and then you you know an hour has gone by and you're like oh crap i forgot i need to get sleep but the problem is is that it's really hard to get sleep if you right when you get off a device the trick is you want to get off of all devices at least one hour before bed this actually helps with your body um to

get more tired so i do recommend having a to-do list on paper because it's easier for you but also in the middle of night if you have it something you need to write down you could do so and then go right back to sleep that helps a lot also volunteering there's the one thing i would say is that when we're overwhelmed and stressed and burned out we feel empty we feel like disconnected from the world and the thing is by volunteering it reminds us that we are connected in some sort of way it gives us hope it gives us um it makes us feel more optimistic uh but it's also something you need to remind yourself that you're not alone

and i think that's really important is because a lot of times when we're burnt out we feel very isolated and alone when reality we shouldn't feel that way at all the community's been there we have friends and family and if you need some support just dm me and i will put you in touch with other people and i'll even get on the phone call with you but i'm not a therapist i'm just a friend the other thing that you could do is be a good manager i know that sounds like really weird and kind of cliche but the reality of it is be a good manager if someone comes up to you and says i

need to take time off let them don't be like okay what about in two weeks no don't do that the reality is by being a good manager at this time means understanding that maybe they will not tell you why they need to take time off so it's important not to ask questions instead ask how many days do you need and then try to find out who can fill certain roles while that person's away but also set up one-on-ones with your team members because it could be only 50 minutes long it's fine but it's good because if you have your employee do a to-do list and you go over that in your 101s you can see what things

if you're on the same page in a sense uh on what to prioritize so this helps reduce miscommunication so i really do recommend having those one-on-ones even if it's only 15 minutes it definitely helps but also be transparent too if you're going through a hard time they're going through a hard time talk about it it's okay that's the thing that we need to understand is that people don't open up unless you open up first and as a manager it's kind of your job to open up a bit too because the job of a manager is to see their employees thrive and that's the most important thing and the best way how to see your your employees thrive is by being there

being present by listening not talking but listening to them and being there and asking them how can i be better just as your employees ask how can i be better in my role also ask them how can i be better how can i support you and don't just like fake it actually mean it now if you are dealing with bernie already at this time i hate to break it to you but there's only one thing that you can do you have to take time off there is no no magical pill out there there is nothing out there that can uh reduce your burnout in a sense if you're in burnout burnout you have to actually take time off to

heal and i know that sucks because you're probably like oh yeah i'm going to go to this burnout talk i'm going to find all the secrets so then i don't have to take time up i hate to break it to you but that is not the reality my friend the reality is you have to take time off and at least three business days at a bare minimum and it has to be in a row so i recommend a monday tuesday wednesday because if you do that then you have your saturday and sunday too so that gives you five days to unplug now it's important to understand is that when you take time off that means

getting off of social media that means kind staying away from your devices don't check into work emails or anything that's related to security take that time off for you to heal because the reality is that's all distraction and you need to face reality because that's where you are right now is that you keep pushing reality away and i hate to tell you this but it's gonna be bitter at first but it's important that you do that so i recommend three at least three business days if you can't do one week if it's severe case then take up to two weeks if you can um the other thing to know is like i know that it's really stressful to take

time off we i know in security i felt really guilty it took me two and a half years you guys to take a break two and a half years i never took a holiday off nothing um but the thing is at the reality of it is that that's why teams are there they're to help you catch you when you fall just like you would do so too and i know it's stressful because you're also worried what happens when i get back i'm gonna be flooded with emails and all this so here's my quick tips for you have an out of office message that basically say for example you're coming back you're actually coming back on the 14th

put your out of office message for the 15th um and the reason for that is it gives you a one day of catching up on all emails now also on the day when you get back you want to have a no meetings day um this also helps you in many ways catching up but also let all your team members um to communicate and see you while you're away by emails so only have one communication channel for any projects and the reason for that is that then you don't miss any projects you can catch up on all communication that you missed having multiple places like slack and then like trello email text message that's a lot keep it

in one place it helps a lot um do note that if you are a manager another important thing to state is to have a once a week no meetings day for your team this actually helps them catch up or do whatever they need to do at the moment so back to you those that are burned out you now you know you need to take three days off it's easy to do and i know you're gonna feel guilty about it but in reality is that you have to it's for your own good i don't want you to have depression i don't want you have anxiety i want you to feel better so it's important take your time off

now the other thing is you need to learn to say no and the reason i say that is because a lot of times we don't know how to say no so anytime someone gives you a project that's not about your job ask why you and then see if anyone else can do it um i know sometimes we have to pick up other hats um especially if we're overachievers or someone who's underrepresented chances are we're gonna have multiple jobs on top of us but the reality is that you just need to learn to say no and put your foot down and if you work for an employer that doesn't care about that and you're worried of how

they're going to respond that might not be a good place for you to work because the reality is that you will never be perfect and you'll never and you're going to have to accept that you cannot do everything i've had jobs where they suddenly assume that i'm also a secretary and i'm also you know doing sales and then also doing operations and then doing all these things and the reality of it is that there's only one of you there's no close of you so it's important for you to put your foot down when you need to and just know you're not perfect and if you have an employer that doesn't understand that or doesn't want to be there for you

like i said it's time to think about yourself because you need to invest in yourself the reason you are burned out at this very moment isn't because everything around you is because of you and i know it's really hard to digest but in reality is that you're not investing in yourself you need to you should be happy i know sometimes life is not always about being happy but reality is it's your life you only live at once so do the things that make you happy and if you're working for an employer who treats you terribly it's time to revisit that idea so takeaways from this is when you feel well do device detox remember at least four hours if you can

if you have kids but otherwise um if you can't do a whole day i do it once a week and i love it it helps so much when you feel around invest in yourself feel wrong ask for help always ask for help don't ever do it alone and i know sometimes we feel guilty for asking for help because we don't want to stress other people out around us but you need to because they can tell when you don't or sometimes we're really good at hiding and it gets worse so ask for help um when you feel overwhelmed write down have a to-do list journal and when you feel wrong take a break it's important that you take at least

three business days when you feel around put yourself first the reality is that you cannot help another person if you're on 10 battery life yourself so put yourself first then you could be there for others that's the one thing that we don't really talk about is that we're always sacrificing ourselves for the greater good or for our community but in reality is that you also need to be able to put yourself first because who's going to take care of you when you feel wrong know that you're not alone but most importantly if you're always wondering am i balancing my work and personal life and if you're not you are already entering burnout or you already are burned out so it's really

important but now you know the steps to fixing it preventing it but also what to do if you're in that situation but most importantly i just want to let you guys you got this i've had burnout before and i got through it i took a whole week off in that two and a half years of no break remember i took one week off i got off of social media i got away from devices i didn't check any email i got back to like thousands of emails but the thing is is that i felt so much better like i could tackle the world i felt recharged and it felt amazing so just remember you got this

burnout starts with you but also note that you should take care of yourself because it's so important that you exist and i wanted to say thank you so much for having me and giving this talk and thank you guys so much for existing and just know if you ever need anything i'm here my dms are open on instagram or twitter feel free to reach out at any time i'm going to stop sharing and yeah if anyone has any questions i know i went a little bit over but if you have any questions i'm here to answer in the chat and yes john apply mass sell first on child that's what is really important we learn this in the

airline industry we should do it also here