Here's how you can bounce back from burnout and reignite your love for teaching.

I think times teachers feel a certain way about admitting burnout. Maybe that they are weak or not good enough. That couldn’t be further from the truth. It doesn’t mean you are weak. It means you need to lessen your load.

Find others who have been there and done that, and learn the best practices for dealing with burnout. No one person is as smart as all of us, so utilize each other for finding new ideas and new ways to love yourself first before pouring into your students. You can't pour from an empty cup, so recharging yourself from other places is necessary.

Setting personal and professional boundaries is so important to live a more balanced life. Teaching is a calling and who you are, not just a job. This makes our profession a labor of love that we pour into, often to the detriment of our own selves. Clearly define for yourself where, when, and how much time you are willing to contribute to your workload, and then promise yourself that you will maintain that boundary. It may actually feel selfish at the time, but you will thank yourself later when you still have the energy and drive to get through those long weeks of school between breaks.

In my first year teaching, the best piece of insight I received was this: Sometimes you need to do less. Sometimes that benefits both the students and you. Sometimes it only benefits you. What matters is that you preserve yourself and make it through so that you can regain your enthusiasm for teaching. The art of inspiring learning is delicate. You cannot win hearts and minds and make an impact without that.

There are several ways I’ve changed my routine to imbed self-care into my day to help with burnout: 1. Prioritize yourself during your morning routine. Even if this means waking up a few minutes earlier, start your morning doing something to fill your cup before thinking about lesson planning, taking care of your own kids, or checking email. Some things that have worked for me are: Journaling, Yoga, Affirmations, and spending a couple of minutes in nature. 2. Carve out time during your work day to recharge. Instead of using lunch to catch up on grading or email, but what if you stepped away from your desk and did something to recharge? Some things that have worked for me are: taking a walk outside, meditation, or breathing exercises.

Going back to your why you got into teaching in the first time helps you to clarify your goals and mission in the education field. Find and develop a technique or a subject that you haven't learned much about and cultivate it in order to broaden your experience. This may spark an interest in a different section of teaching that you hadn't considered before that may keep the fire burning.

I feed off change, so it helped me changing schools and positions. I was a teacher, graduation coach, and AP. The biggest question I had was if the burnout was due to the environment, or was it the profession. Eventually, I stepped away for 10 years and now, I can’t get past an interview. Looking back though, I needed to step away to get a new perspective.