The world can be exhausting at the best of times and it is safe to say the last two years have not exactly been easy going for many people.
For many people, particularly key workers and those navigating the new challenges caused by working from home, burnout has become an increasingly common concern, as has anxiety and depression caused by both personal and wider concerns.
Burnout is a state of both physical and emotional exhaustion, typically caused by long-term stress or working in a position that is physically and/or emotionally draining for a considerable time.
While these are not the only signs of burnout, and they can commonly overlap with other conditions, telltale symptoms of burnout include:
- A constant feeling of being overwhelmed,
- Self-doubt, particularly about skills you know you have,
- Procrastination,
- A negative outlook for the future,
- A feeling of detachment or loneliness,
- Feeling helpless about your ability to change or improve your situation,
- Fatigue or feeling drained the majority of the time.
There are ways to help with these feelings of burnout, however, and one of them may be the use of CBD products.
According to a clinical trial published in JAMA Network Open, a randomised trial measuring the emotional exhaustion among frontline doctors and nurses showed that CBD therapy helped to reduce the symptoms of burnout, although future trials are needed to confirm these findings.
Here are three of the ways CBD can help people suffering from burnout and stress.
- Encourages Better Sleep
Burnout and stress can cause restlessness, frequent pain and a change in our eating and sleeping habits. CBD can help to relax and relieve pain, allowing for better sleep and improved productivity afterwards.
CBD can do this by calming the nervous system, and several studies have found that it can not only help improve sleep but promote wakefulness, reducing the groggy feeling many of us get when we wake up.
- Helps People Feel At Ease
The emotional aspects of burnout are particularly strong and can lead to more physical symptoms as well, but CBD can help improve people’s moods.
The reason for this is that CBD can act on serotonin receptors in the brain. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter chemical produced by our nerve cells that affect the entire body in different ways but is perhaps best known as a mood stabiliser.
However, serotonin also affects our digestion, our appetite and our sleeping patterns, which is part of why CBD can affect these parts of the body as well.
- Improves Focus
CBD can help improve our productivity and focus when undertaking tasks, although how it does so is the result of several different factors working in tandem.
The primary way in which it helps to improve our focus is by reducing the distractions around us, although more research is being undertaken as to the exact reasons it can do this.
Whilst the best way to reduce burnout is to reduce exposure to its causes, such as by working fewer hours or in a less intense environment, there is hope that in the short term there may be ways to at least help reduce that emotional burden.