A quick Google search would reveal that the internet is filled with lists of meditation and yoga apps to calm you down and cure burnout. But these don't help you deal with an overwhelming number of tasks and overwork, which are the primary causes of burnout.
So we're not going to recommend just meditation apps. In this post, we bring you 4 tools that can help you work more sustainably and thoughtfully. And hence prevent, and cure burnout. The apps listed below are helpful whether you do creative or analytical work.
If you first want to identify the early emotional and physical warning signs of burnout, check out this post here.
4 Apps to Help You Prevent Burnout (Not all meditation apps!)
Sunsama: Manage Your Day
Feeling overwhelmed and overworked is the leading cause of burnout. You can prevent that from happening if you can see the volume of work you have or the meetings you are required to be in. Be honest with yourself if it's practically possible to do all that.
Sunsama is an app that can help you visualize your tasks and meetings in your calendar. You can add tasks from project management tools (like Trello or Asana), Notion, Slacks, or emails.
When you put a time estimate to each task, it will calculate the total workload for the day. If it's beyond your threshold, you can defer it for later by putting a future date. Dragging tasks into your calendar blocks your time according to your estimate. This makes it easy to practice timeblocking — a time management strategy to get deep work done.
The goal is to help you go from all the things you could or want to do to a list of things you can reasonably do that day.
Sunsama costs $192/user/year when paid annually. You can get a 14-day free trial without giving you any credit card. Get your free trial here.
Headspace: Manage Your Mind
Including mindfulness and meditation in your daily life can help you become self-aware. You will be able to observe subtle changes in your mood, thoughts, and reactions when you feel burnout. It will help you take action before you hit a point of emotional or psychological breakdown.
We tend to overwork when we feel inadequate or like an imposter, which leads to burnout. Mindfulness will also help you compassionately notice where you can improve rather than self-criticizing or over-analyzing. And as a result, you will be able to perform better at your job as well.
Headspace has an entire library of 500+ meditations to help you stay mindful and build resilience.
It costs $69.99/year, and you can try it for 14 days for free here. Most meditations are beginner friendly and short enough to squeeze in a busy day. It may be worth checking with your company to see if they offer the app as a company benefit.
StandUp: Manage Your Breaks
If we work continuously through the day, without many breaks, it takes long hours of recovery at the end of the day just to recharge. And on most days, we simply don't have those long hours. When this continues for weeks or months, it leads to exhaustion and ultimately burnout.
You can avoid that by including micro-breaks in your day. Stand up from your desk and stretch your body rather than scrolling through your phone or browsing social media.
Small physical movements are enough to reduce stress hormones (cortisol) and activate the production of endorphins. Eventually, micro-breaks improve alertness, keep you engaged, and make work more enjoyable.
To be intentional about getting some physical movement during work, you can use an app called Stand Up. It's a simple reminder app that tells you to stand up from your desk, stretch and take regular breaks.
You can set up the start and stop times and set the interval time and days of the week. To gamify, it even shows you at the top of the screen how many of the goals break you were able to hit.
It's a free app available for iOS users. Check it out here. If you are an Android user, you can try
a similar app called Break Reminder.
If you don't want to use multiple apps to manage work & breaks, try Sunsama. It will remind you to take a break after you've been working for a while.
Pomofocus: Manage Your Distractions
When we can't focus at work because of distractions, it can make us feel stressed about not getting things done. This can cause overwhelm, which is a major cause of burnout.
We recommend trying the Pomodoro technique. It involves breaking down your work into 25-min sprints & focusing on one task at a time.
It has a three-step loop:
- Step 1: Set a timer and work for 25 minutes (these are called Pomodoros)
- Step 2: Take a 5-minute break
- Step 3: Repeat
After every 4 Pomodoros, take a 15-20 minutes break.
Pomofocus is a web app we've found intuitive to implement the Pomodoro technique. It's pretty affordable at $12/year and $36 for lifetime access. However, the free version is excellent to get started.
It also includes features such as customizing the duration of Pomodoro, adding your to-do list, and generating a report to analyze your focus hours.
In Sunsama, you can swap between the default timer view (which counts up, showing how much time in total you've worked on a task) and the Pomodoro timer view pretty easily.
Final Thoughts
The biggest factor for burnout is your relationship with work. Ask yourself if your work brings you fulfillment and satisfaction apart from just delivering on the basic practical necessities. If not, burnout will continue until you become intentional about your time, and work. The apps we've suggested should help you work more sustainably if you are happy/comfortable with your work.
Using apps is not to make your work easy but to create a system that prevents & cures burnout. And we understand that just like the burnout situation develops over time, the system you create will also take time to show benefits in your life and work. That's why you can get a 14-day free trial to Sunsama to see if it works for you.
