This might be one of the clearest and most important lessons I’ve ever found about work/life balance, stress and burnout at work:

(a tragic story in many ways)

On August 5^th 1949, a wildfire swept through a gulch in Helena National Forest in the U.S. state of Montana. 

15 smokejumpers were sent to fight the fire and bring it under control. 

As the smokejumpers got closer, the wind suddenly picked up. The men fled uphill, cut off from their escape route.

The wind grew so strong that the fire turned into a firestorm – a fire so huge that it created its own wind system.

The men raced for their lives as they were chased by a fire now moving at eleven feet per second.

Wagner Dodge, the smokejumpers’ leader, yelled at his men:

“DROP YOUR TOOLS!”

As ordered, two of the men dropped their tools and raced over the edge of a ridge to safety.

The other twelve men clung to their tools and were caught by the flames.

This disaster is known as the Mann Gulch Fire. It’s not an isolated incident. Over four separate fires in the 1990’s, 23 firefighters chose not to drop their tools as they were chased by flames and perished as a result.

Karl Weick, a psychologist, has investigated this phenomenon.

In his own words:

***

Firefighting tools define the firefighter’s group membership.

Given the central role of tools in defining the essence of a firefighter, it is not surprising that dropping one’s tools creates an existential crisis.

***

In simple terms:

Asking a firefighter to drop his tools is like asking a firefighter to drop what defines him. Not just as a firefighter, but as a person.

So what does this have to do with work/life balance, stress and burnout?

Everything!

Take my stress, exhaustion and burnout from the first iteration of my banking career as an example.

Each year when I went for my annual health check, my weight was always a few pounds heavier, my blood pressure a little bit higher, my BMI slightly worse.

I didn’t need a bunch of medical instruments to tell me all this though.

I could feel it.

Some days I was so exhausted that it felt like I was walking round the office in a trance. I also had excruciating headaches which came from nowhere and sometimes I could feel my heart pounding in my chest while all I was doing was sitting at my desk, flicking through emails.

So there were plenty of warning signs that breaking point was creeping up on me.

These weren’t the only signs though.

There was also a voice inside me which kept saying “Tom, you’re not listening to yourself”.

But I buried that voice. I thought I needed to force my way through, toughen up, push forward and be MORE of a banker. 

In many ways, my job became the equivalent of the Mann Gulch fire.

Sure, the fire didn’t race up behind me at eleven feet per second.

Instead, it crept up slowly.

But the fire was absolutely raging and after 13 years it was a whisker away from engulfing me.

Towards the end of those 13 years, I ended up on Harley Street getting checked out for heart irregularities. Even though the doctors found nothing, the very fact I was referred to get a check-up was a wakeup call in itself. I knew if I kept pushing like I had been, I’d do myself irreparable damage.

But even then, that wasn’t enough to make a change.

I couldn’t. I didn’t know how.

Looking back, I can see my job was too closely enmeshed with the idea of who I was. And I couldn’t abandon who I was.

Eventually my body took matters into its own hands. 

I was sitting on Lauren’s sofa (this was back in the early days of our blossoming relationship), mug of Earl Grey tea in hand, when I broke down. The tears flowed down my cheeks and once they started, they didn’t stop.

Luckily Lauren was on hand to sit next to me, give me a big hug and just be with me (she knew exactly what to do) while years of bottled-up pain broke through like a dam bursting it’s defences. 

Finally, I paid attention. 

I took a six month sabbatical from work. Halfway through the sabbatical, I quit my job.

You might think the point I’m about to make is that I should’ve quit my job sooner. That I should’ve dropped my banking tools like the smokejumpers who dropped theirs.

But actually, that’s not what I’m getting at.

If you’re stressed, exhausted and on the road to burnout, you can press pause before you get caught by the flames.

You don’t need to drop your skills, your knowledge or your expertise.

You certainly don’t need to drop your job.

All you need to drop is the idea that your job is who you are.

Which means all you need to drop is an idea. All you need to drop is a thought.

When I saw who I was beneath my job, my job title, my tasks, my boss’s feedback, the targets I hit (or didn’t hit) and my thoughts & feelings about my job, it changed everything. 

I'm now back in my old job. And seeing that my job is something I do, not something I am, is why the stress & exhaustion have lost their grip. It's why my headaches have fallen away. It's why space has opened up to step into a life that feels like mine.

Now, perhaps this prompts the question:

If we’re not our jobs, who are we?

I’ve been exploring this fascinating question ever since. It’s also a question I’m inviting a small group to explore with me inside my new coaching program.

In the program, we’ll look at how to separate who you are from what you do, how to listen to yourself and how to tap into what makes you feel most alive. All with the aim of helping you step away from pressure, stress & “shoulds” to reconnect with who you really are.

If this sounds like something you’d like to be part of, please hit reply and let me know why.

Hitting reply doesn’t lock you into anything.

But it does let me know that you might be interested in the coaching program.