My 90 Day Anti-Burnout Plan

Using the knowledge I have to change my own life.

Hey there, reader. This isn't going to be my typical blog post. I am not necessarily trying to give you any tools or teach you anything, but rather, this is going to contain excerpts from my personal journal.

I've been really burnt out lately. Like, seriously considering quitting my job and metaphorically burning everything to the ground and moving to a new country type of burnout.

And at some point in the midst of this - it hit me. This is what I do for a living. This is what I'm passionate about. Helping people manage their stress and get out of burnout. You know, as much as we can as individuals living within an entire system that is set up to burn us out.

So I decided to make myself a guinea pig and use all my knowledge on myself. Here is the formal training that I have that sets me up for this:

• Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, with a speciality in trauma.

• Trained in EMDR - again, a trauma healing modality.

• Certified Restorative Yoga Teacher - nervous system regulation at its finest. The ultimate rest practice

• Certified Sleep, Stress and Recovery Coach, through precision nutrition.

• Certified Hypnotherapist

I also have a lot of informal training and knowledge that can apply here. I've read several books about stress, trauma, and the importance of rest. None of this is to brag, but to show that my entire existence revolves around this topic.

So like, I know what I'm doing here. What's to stop me from doing it myself?

I took my baseline assessments, and the plan is to focus for 90 days. There are 6 domains that I will be focusing on, you can read a little more about each one here.

1. Mental

2. Emotional

3. Physical

4. Existential

5. Environment

6. Relational / Social

Yikes - 96 on the Deep Health Questionnaire

My plan is to spend a couple of weeks focusing on each one, making small changes within my life as it exists now (you know, without burning everything down yet), and implementing them for about 90 days. I started on 9/15/26, so the whole experiment will take me to 12/15/26.

I'm tracking everything daily in an app and will post some updates intermittently here. And I'll just see how it all goes, and hopefully I'll have something that I can put together at the end to help you if you're in a similar space.

9/22/26

I’m about a week in, and I have been feeling decent. I know there is something about knowing I’m focused on working through this burnout; I have a plan, and that hope influences how I feel in its own way. But I’m tracking my mood, and what's really interesting is that I actually have more good days than I thought. Like, 5/9 days so far I marked as good. That’s cool. 

I want to start gratitude journaling, just 3 things per day, because I know a huge aspect of this burnout is my negative mindset. It’s a cyclical mindset keeping me stuck. 

I know I don’t have to make too many changes to how I take care of myself physically, and I know I need to hone it in. High-protein, high-fiber meals. The right supplements. Recovery. Rest. Rest Rest. 

10/03/26

I keep track daily in my app, Daylio, but I haven’t been free-writing entries as much. But what I am noticing is that work has been much slower, and I have been feeling better. I’ve been taking care of my physical health in a more structured way, which may have an influence on all these other things as well - especially experiencing mostly good sleep. That has a huge influence on my mood and stress, duh, Kaylin. I know that. I preach that. But seeing it in the data makes it even more obvious. It takes me back to my why - why I do everything that I do. Why I’ve always done what I do, even from a young age. Sleep and naps have always been of interest to me. 

It’s still early, but the data is showing my mood is heavily influenced by sleep. 

What else do I know?  know that since work is slower and I don’t have back-to-back meetings all day every day, I feel better. I do better with a spacious schedule. So that is helping as well. 

So I think Physical Health is off to a good start. This week will change our meal planning and prepping methods because schedules have changed. My plan is to have some proteins, greens, and carbs prepped so that we can just throw them together quickly and easily - add a yummy sauce and enjoy the evening. I want dense bean salads for lunch. But I do prefer a hot meal, so maybe like a warm, dense bean salad. I just don’t want to get sick of my food. 

And then, after physical health, I want to turn the focus to the emotional health I mentioned before, adding gratitude journaling, which I haven’t started. Emotional regulation and expression. Anyone paying attention to the world right now is experiencing a lot of rage. I’m no different. How do I channel that so that it doesn’t just sit inside of me? 

---

I'll continue to give you some updates here if you want to follow along. And then... who knows?

Kaylin Zabienski, LMFT, is a licensed therapist with over 15 years of experience supporting clients in California. She works with driven women who look fine on the outside but are exhausted from managing it all - people-pleasers, perfectionists, and the quietly anxious - using EMDR, mindfulness, and ACT to help them stop performing and start actually living. At KZ Counseling, she is committed to providing compassionate, expert care online for clients across California.