[coffeefirst]

Two things surprised me about burnout:

1. It has physical symptoms.

2. It doesn't go away when you stop.

Vacation is good. But two weeks after my vacation I had a rough couple of days, nothing that I couldn't handle before, and I was right back where I started.

I've come to think of it like a mental equivalent of a torn muscle. Recovery takes time—probably far more time than I expect, and if you overexert it, even a little, you'll do a lot more damage a lot faster than you did the first time around.

[singron]

Sometimes vacation makes it worse because it makes you realize just how much your job makes you unhappy.

[rzzzt]

I'd like to try and take GP's analogy a bit further:

- thermal paste dries out and becomes brittle due to sustained overheat

- resulting in bad contact between heatsink and CPU

- CPU (returns from vacation and) finds that even small efforts makes core temperature rise quickly, thermal throttles constantly

[rewgs]

That analogy is spot on. Absolutely the perfect way to look at burnout in my experience.