The Real Cost of Carrying It All
Burnout doesn’t always look like giving up. Sometimes it looks like doing everything: the business, the house, the clients, the family, and still feeling behind. It’s the overflowing laundry basket, the dishes you get to once a week, the half-drunk coffee that’s been reheated four times. The emails keep coming, the dogs still need fed, and somehow you’re the one holding it all together.
People think burnout means you’re lazy or unmotivated. Nope. It usually means you’re the one who never stops. You’re the one who keeps showing up, who still cares about every client, every invoice, every detail, even when you’re running on fumes.
As an accountant who prepares taxes, I don’t just get one tax season. I get two. There is the spring rush when everyone suddenly remembers their bookkeeping exists, and the fall encore when the extension crowd crawls back after a summer of radio silence. By the time October hits, I have already lived the same chaos twice in one year.
But honestly, most business owners have their own version of that. Maybe your rush hits before the holidays, or when inventory explodes, or when clients expect miracles in the slowest month of your life. The details change, but the exhaustion doesn’t. The pattern is the same. You pour everything you have into the business, the home, the family, the inbox, and the dogs who still deserve your attention. No matter how much you do, it never feels like enough.
Burnout doesn’t mean you are bad at business. It means you have been running at full capacity for too long, carrying every responsibility because you think if you stop, everything stops.
From January to April, it is nonstop communication. Then silence. Crickets. By August, I start chasing the extension clients again, and they vanish until October 10. You love your work, but you start to resent the rhythm because you never truly stop working. You are tired, but you still care.
If this sounds familiar, you are not the problem. Your system is. You do not need another motivational quote about balance. You need structure that lets you breathe.
For some, the additional structure and accountability of the Life & Taxes – The Community membership may be just the thing. For others, it might be having the bookkeeping done for you. Either way, I am here to help you build a system that fits your real life, your business, and your budget.
So when you see those new requirements pop up about how I expect to receive your information for taxes, remember this is not me making things harder. I am building that structure for both of us.
I hear ya! Although I want to do it all I had to take a hard look at what I was doing and be realistic about what served me best. Cutting back on those areas was a good move for me and I’m much happier and have more energy.
I love that you recognized that and implemented boundaries.