The End (of Burnout) is near
A look back at 2021 and an invitation to a virtual book launch in the early days of 2022
I hope things are well with you in this period that’s usually the one widely-observed break in the American culture of work, striving, and profit. I hope you’re able to find some time for rest and reflection even as pandemic-related fear and anxiety once again sweep across the world.
I feel like I only have a brief moment to reflect on the past year, as big things are happening right at the start of 2022. The End of Burnout’s official release date is January 4. (Amazon is currently discounting the Kindle edition but not the hardcover; Bookshop is offering a couple dollars off the list price; and the publisher, University of California Press, will give you 30% off with discount code 21W2240.)
I want to invite you to a virtual book launch on Thursday, January 6, at 7:00 pm Central Time, hosted by multi-genre author Danielle Metcalfe-Chenail, who is one of my best friends in the writing world.
I hope you’ll join Danielle, me, and other readers to celebrate The End of Burnout the week of its official publication. Danielle and I will discuss how we bonded over burnout more than five years ago and how our writing group helped take the book from an academic idea to an engaging work of creative nonfiction. I will do a short reading from The End of Burnout and take your questions about the book. Sign up here.
Many of you have been with me since I started this newsletter in 2016, and I’m greatly appreciative that you’ve stuck with me as I worked on this book. I hope to see you there!
Here’s a rundown of what I wrote in 2021:
You Don’t Have to Love Your Job (review of “Work Won’t Love You Back” by Sarah Jaffe), The New Republic, January 21, 2021
Sorry for Your Loss (review of “Regret: A Theology” by Paul J. Griffiths), Commonweal, February 2021
Experiments in Self-Reliance, Commonweal, February 24, 2021
What Coronavirus Taught Us about the American Workforce, America, March 2021
Unfaithful Reproductions, The Point, March 22, 2021
The Exaggeration of “Burnout” in America, The New Republic, March 25, 2021
Space Invaders, Notre Dame Magazine, Spring 2021
A Stacked Deck, The Hedgehog Review, June 17, 2021
The Future of Work Should Mean Working Less, New York Times, September 23, 2021
What Are We Doing? Notre Dame Magazine, Fall 2021
Are We All Really Burning Out? Chronicle Review, December 15, 2021
The Gift of Burnout, America, December 16, 2021
Because this newsletter’s subscriber list grew quite a bit toward the end of the year, many of you know me only as a guy who writes about work and burnout. But as the longer-term subscribers know, I write about other things, too, like death and regret. So I invite you to take a look at “Unfaithful Reproductions,” which is about my attempt to get inside my father’s final thoughts, based on a cellphone photo he took of himself on his deathbed; “Space Invaders,” which is a short essay on the inseparability of life and death, told via an account of successive infestations of my home; and “Sorry for Your Loss,” which is a review essay of a book on regret. I am very proud of these pieces.
An essay from last year, “Drinking Alone,” was named a Notable Essay of 2020 in The Best American Essays. This is the third year in a row one of my Commonweal essays has made that list. It’s a great honor. One day, though, I’m going to make the table of contents in that volume, which I have been reading for two decades.
I say this every year: Though there was certainly much to mourn and worry over this past year, there were almost certainly wonderful events in your life, perhaps even things you won’t realize were wonderful for several more years.
I am proud of the work I did this year. The essays listed above are some of my best. I taught dozens of students. I got to visit family for the first time in over a year. I made it through a harrowing few days without power or heat during a frigid week with the help of good friends.
In June, I bought a new bicycle and I told myself I would ride at least 60 miles a week. And then I actually did it, through the unrelenting heat of the Texas summer and into the stiff winds of fall. On the days when I commuted home 15 miles from a suburban university campus, I saw Dallas from a new, rarely-viewed perspective — from underneath the mega-highway interchanges rather than through them. My mental and physical health benefited in numerous ways. I started finally to lose the pounds I gained while I was burning out out as a college professor.
I hope you’re able to find what was good in the past year, and I wish you all the best for 2022.
You’ll hear from me again next week.