BANISH

BURNOUT

Escape hustle culture and love your life,

all without having to quit your job

Quit your job if you want to, you do you!

-Dr. Lauren Czaplicki, Founder

The BurnoutProof Protocol

"I’m Determined to Do Meaningful Work,

Change the World, and Find Experiences That Make Me Feel Alive”

Any of these describe your current ~situation~?*?

  1. You have your dream job and still aren’t happy, and now you’re pidgeonholed into this specific thing. Your day to day is not working for you anymore and you’re having a sort of mid-to-late-career crisis. Is this what you really want to do? You’re living your dream life, so why aren’t you happy? What’s up with this stress? Isn’t it supposed to be easier if you love what you do?

  2. You don’t love the job, but it pays well and you’ve got the golden handcuffs. You didn’t really know how you wound up at this job, but now your house, your kids, your dogs, your Real Adult Responsibilities are making it so that you’re trapped in this well-paying job that you mostly hate. You're constantly on the computer, trying to keep billable, doing the bare minimum necessary to not get fired. You wish you could be doing something more meaningful with your career

  3. You love the job but people and the systems they made are the absolute worst.

    When you were young, you wanted to be a vet and save animals! You went to school for international diplomacy and were going to win world peace! You had all this excitement and passion, got the appropriate education, but the status quo  stands unshakable between you and your calling. You’re a woman in STEM, fighting the old boys club. You’re a data analyst helping advance cleantech but you work with horrible techbros that want you to fudge the numbers . You’re a coder working on interesting projects but your teammates have given you so much technical debt to work through first, it’s laughable. You’re a nonprofit director fighting the good fight but the problems are systematic and there are people with vested interests to resist change.

You ever experience these fun joys?

You've been procrastinating working on the whole thing 👉👈because, while you really do want to feel like you’re happy and fulfilled at work, you'd ALSO rather eat worm corpses than:

  • Go back to school

  • Make slightly above minimum wage again

  • Interview for a new job

  • Start over in a different career

  • Move to a new place

Whether you're defeated, frustrated, or just no longer interested in continuing mustering up the energy to go to work, you're looking for a better way.

You get an extra special burnout trophy 🏆 if you:

  • Quit your corporate job to work for yourself on something you care about, only to find you have marketing, payroll, and 16 new jobs you don’t know how to do in addition to the one you care about.

  • Made a job change already and are experiencing the same problem at the new company and everything is horrible in your field.

  • Made a career change thinking that the problem was just in the one field and actually the problem is everywhere and everything is terrible. Burn it down.

You’ve been craving a fresh start.

You want to reinvent yourself & your work. You want more pleasure, more joy, more peace, and a meaningful career that also lets you enjoy your life...without fear of finding yourself burned out again (and secretly regretting your life choices). You’re upset by hustle culture, but it seems like it’s the only way and so you just want to buy a one way ticket to a beach and never come back. 

BurnoutProof is Pioneering an All-New Way to Gain Career Satisfaction and a Spacious, Ease-Filled Life.

This movement has been in progress for years—mental health and employee wellness are big concerns for companies and professionals alike. 

Self-Care 1.0 The early-prototype solution was self-care products, mostly focused on women. This solution took the approach of buying little goodies to take care of yourself: soaps, bath salts, yoga pants, face masks, and men’s self care centered around “convenient” at home fitness. All these consumables led to the 1.5 trillion dollar self-care products industry. This early-prototype demonstrated how much we value ourselves, increased access to relaxation products, and introduced the idea of prioritizing ourselves, acknowledging we aren’t robots.

However, it was a superficial solution and mostly ignored half the population. 

The problem was stickier than anticipated. It turned out, you could still think about all the things you’re not doing while taking your 10 min face mask/ 30 min bath/whatever, and people did. Employees were still quitting in droves.

Next, Corporate caught on and found that employee dissatisfaction was causing them A LOT. Attrition costs can be up to four times an employee’s salary. That’s $225,000-$300,000 for a single $75,000 salary employee. Not to mention the technical debt, impact on coworkers, and lost productivity. 

Introducing Self-Care 2.0: employee wellness programs, the sport equipment refunds, the on-site gyms, unlimited PTO, the google playground offices. 2.0 did a valiant effort. It took 1.0 and, at least at the surface, lent it institutional approval. Self-Care 2.0 made these companies more attractive to work for, increased worker satisfaction and saved the companies a lot of money (ROI was at 2.7 for J&J!) on health care costs. 2.0 was more inclusive than 1.0 too!

Yet it still didn’t solve the problem, burnout remains on the rise 📈

It turns out, employee wellness programs must be complemented by leadership valuing it too. Otherwise, it’s just lip service and people don’t participate.

People with unlimited PTO actually take fewer days off than folks with traditional PTO and they still work from vacation. 

Today’s professionals seek a new, ease-filled version of business—and an all-new lifestyle too: one that values time, experiences, meaning, and a joyful, engaged career without compromising financial success.

The Burnoutproof Protocol does just that.

Escape hustle culture and love the life you live.

Introducing the BurnoutProof Protocol

  • You can't engage fully with work–any work–until you deal with the burnout you’re in. After working with burned out folks in practice and in theory (yes, there’s a lot of scientific research into burnout), we’ve determined that creating a burnout navigation strategy is key. Recovering from a career crisis took us 2 years, but the recovery time depends on how long burnout has been going on. One study found that people were still not recovered after 4 years! So my goal for you with the BurnoutProof Protocol is 3 months- 93% faster, but have some self compassion if you take longer.

    We can achieve this ambitious goal by focusing on six (6) high-impact, science backed, levers proven to maximize your recovery speed and get you feeling better, faster. You could sneak 10 minutes each morning and night or you could take advantage of your company’s unlimited PTO to go strategize from Bali. It doesn’t matter, you do what you can! When you complete your BurnoutProof Protocol, you’ll have learned how to apply those principles to create your custom-made BurnoutProof Protocol for your life, regardless of whether you choose to stay in your current job or if you choose a new one, so you can skip the learning curve and do what works...and get back to enjoying your life faster.

  • A 2022 Gallup survey found only 32% of workers are engaged with their work. That’s A LOT of workers suffering death from boredom. Integrating fun (at best) and fulfilment (at worst) into your day by transforming your assigned goals is a key tennant of the burnoutproof method. Not all tasks are going to be fun, we aren’t delusional, but all tasks can be fulfilling in some way if they align with what makes you tick, what you care about. Our special formula will change your soul sucking tasks into engaging (worst case) and fun tasks (at best). We’re setting a goal for you of being engaged in 80% of tasks. It’s possible for all 100% of your tasks to be engaging, but your boss always delegates new tasks and there’s bound to be some time where some portion of your tasks haven’t been upgraded yet by our systems.

  • A core tenant of our method is its emphasis on ease. According to a 2018 Korn Ferry study, work-stress caused sleep deprivation for 66% of American workers. Using that as our baseline, our third goal is to help our clients worry less about work, to engage in non-work activities without guilt, and sleep more soundly. It’s not about working harder. Giving more. It’s about finding ways to set and keep boundaries so that when you do choose to give your energy, you are effective. Deciding where you put your energy and then choosing to follow through on it. With this, you’ll worry less about work outside of work hours, and you’ll sleep better. Eventually, you’ll get to 100% fewer work-related sleep interruptions, but for the purposes of targets for this program, we aim to have 80% less work-related sleep interruptions. We weigh your easefulness heavily and consider it a fundamental measure of success: our goal for our clients is to escape the constant work-worry and instead, be as effective as possible at managing mental energy without sacrificing financial outcomes.

The BurnoutProof Protocol has three goals

The Secret?

The BurnoutProof Protocol.

The BurnoutProof Protocol™️ is our proprietary burnout navigation, resilience building framework.

The framework focuses on building two different forms of burnout resilience:

  1. preventing burnout from happening from things inside your control (I) and

  2. body-focused stress management prevents burnout from happening from things outside your control (O). 

It’s this bi-directional framework that makes our methodology revolutionary.

✅ Our method introduces a formula for how to manage mental energy and break habits that bring burnout back. This provides hard assurance that you won’t get burnt out again, and it builds in checkpoints that give you the opportunity to check your compass and course correct.

✅ But, what makes it one-of-a-kind is that it’s also built strategically to help you deal with past burnout without years in therapy, 1:1 coaching, or taking time off work. (Though we think everyone would benefit from therapy ALWAYS)

The I portion earns you the independence and internally sourced validation you crave–no more bad days because your boss is in a bad mood or you got yet another passive-agressive email from Karen! 

The O portion gives you the confident spaciousness in your life you crave—without the hassle of finding 1:1 coaches or therapist who can only help you on their timeframe. You don’t even need to go back through your formative childhood experiences, first, or ever. Here you have everything you need, instantly and you set your own timeline!

THE BURNOUTPROOF PROTOCOL is set up uniquely to optimize time efficacy, incorporate actionable science backed findings into your life, and take advantage of modern technology to build gentle accountability systems, allowing for a completely new model of work: one in which you truly work for yourself, regardless of who signs your paychecks.

It’s time to be free.

The BurnoutProof Protocol does not require:

  1. ❌ You to simply work harder

  2. ❌ Any type of 1:1 client work or group coaching

  3. ❌ Participating in a community, membership, or Facebook group

  4. ❌ Being on the working hamster wheel of doom, where you have to do more faster for the rest of eternity

  5. ❌ Making it to live webinars (HELLO, WE’RE TRYING TO HAVE FEWER SOUL SUCKING TASKS HERE)

  6. ❌ External accountability structures 

  7. ❌ Required time off from work 

  8. ❌ Reading 16 self-help books on productivity

If you’re too overwhelmed 🤦‍♀️to even think that your work could be better, or if you feel like burnout is weakness, or burnout recovery takes too long, requires time off work, and where does one even find a business coach? Or a therapist, don’t those take a long time to kick in and lots of uncomfortable conversations? 

Well, guess what: NONE of these are requirements of The BurnoutProof Protocol. That’s right. None of ‘em. We went through two crises, turned our considerable research power onto this topic (Lauren’s doctorate is in environmental engineering, after all), read so many science-backed self help books, and researched all of this for you.

We found that none of these are necessary (but therapy is super helpful for everyone, regardless of burnout status).

Do you know why ???? Because they further the hamster wheel of doom that perpetuates burnout in our hustle culture. These external accountability structures keep you answering to other people, needing time off keeps you trapped in waiting until you have more time, and other inflexible requirements add to your already too long to-do list. While control is an illusion (a conversation for another day), you definitely don’t want to buy into the idea that you need someone else to tell you you’re a good noodle who is worthy.  That ensures that you will forever play by their rules, essentially, imitating a universally pleasing robot if you want to be successful.

But, we’re about to step off that hamster wheel of doom and show you a better way. Because we 👏 don’t 👏 have 👏 time 👏 for 👏 that 👏 . And it’s scientifically proven that hustle culture puts people in a mental state where they cannot make clear decisions. Hustle culture is bad for everyone, big or small business, corporate cogs and freelancers alike. There is no occupation that’s exempt– not even if you work for yourself. It’s time for hustle culture to change. 

The Burnoutproof Protocol encourages you to make unconventional decisions about what you do and don’t do, because if you want to beat burnout for good, you need to do a full revamp on both your work life and your non-work life. But beyond all of that, you need a strategy that doesn’t have unrealistic expectations of your time or energy resources. You need something that you can start now, with the bare minimum time and energy. 

And that’s what the Burnoutproof Protocol is.

Inside the BurnoutProof Protocol’s Curriculum

The Burnoutproof Protocol includes six (6) comprehensive masterclasses designed to be done in order so you can build and test your very own BurnoutProof Protocol all the way from start to finish: from ideation to execution to testing to improvement.

Each masterclass shows you a component of your BurnoutProof Protocol complete with multiple examples, science-based techniques to choose from, templates to start from, and tailor made printables to help you stick to it! 

I have thoughtfully packaged each masterclass into a straightforward, downloadable PDF booklet with embedded links and multitudes of examples making it fast and fun for you to learn on the fly, whether you’re at the airport, squeezing in a quick lunch between zoom meetings, or just having a cozy cup of coffee at home. 

At the end, you’ll metaphorically staple together these components (hit -c if you’re a programmer -sorry not sorry, that’s a coding pun), and your systems will make you burnoutproof so you can drop hustle culture and start living your life.

    • How The BurnoutProof Protocol is different from traditional work models, and why it deliberately doesn't involve any type of external motivation, no carrots, no stick!

    • How you’re possibly going to keep going to work at your soul crushing job through this—including a step-by-step guide

    • The perils of performative productivity—including the false but common assumptions of "if I put more time in, I’ll be rewarded", “I just need to put my nose to the grindstone, hunker down and focus”, and that you need to constantly work in order to earn fun (all of which are rejected under The Burnoutproof Protocol)

    • Why when your mental wellbeing and work are inextricably linked as your main identity and source of validation, you significantly limit your capacity to make good business decisions and good life decisions

    • How we develop a lean, mean, easy work life instead: we take your tasks, pop them into a Magic Burnoutproof formula—and the end result is a satisfying, fulfilling day of work. And maximum fun!

    • The BurnoutProof Alignment Axis, and why finding your sweet spot here is the key to low exhaustion, high satisfaction, and maximum fulfillment.

    • The #1 thing you need to get RIGHT in order for your burnoutproof protocol to work (and what you should never, ever do)

    • How the three (3) types of stress management you’ll learn — Bob, I & O —combine to make our Burnoutproof Protocol tick

    • How to build habits that stick (the science based way)

    • Introducing: THE Burnoutproof Protocol Emergency Kit (What to do if you’ve been burnt out so long you don’t even remember joy )

    • How to take advantage of technology to set up accountability systems

    • End goal: a clear path to feeling good ASAP

    • The Burnoutproof Protocol has been designed to get you feeling good where you are, without excuses, no waiting until you can quit your job, take time off, read those 5 self help books–, I’m giving you the easiest way to start, without getting in your own way.

    • We’ll start by tackling BoB (aka chronic stress. We’ll call it BoB because 1) it’s a fun way to personify chronic stress as an energy vampire named Bob, 2) naming is one of the effective tools we use to step off the hustle hamsterwheel, 3) it’s short for Backlog of BS)

    • Here we hone in on the six CRITICAL things to do to take BoB down: this is how we deal with BoB and keep you working your crushing job, maximizing income while minimizing it’s impact

    • Here we have our BurnoutProof Starter Kit– contains our six most accessible ways to start to break down backlogs of BS (BoB) with minimal time availability

    • Ask yourself these THREE questions to identify your current center

    • Carve out time in your burned out schedule in five steps and make time for recovery activities you’ll actually want to do

    • We’ll talk about strategies for building habits and managing time so you can get through the work day as painlessly as possible

    • Plot your own customized activities to reclaim your soul within minutes, hours, and days

    • Step-by-step instructions behind BurnoutProof Accountability Systems to make it easier to thwart BoB for good

    • A KILLER formula you can use for your burnout proofing start, designed to make you feel better now, without waiting for more time to pass (no childhood delving required)

    • By the end, you’ll reclaim your soul from your BoB and feel more energized and optimistic

    • Burnoutproof Expansion Kit– a menu of detailed alternative options of the six critical techniques to thwart BoB

    • Meet your Burnoutproof Numbers, a 5 minute mini check in– it’s less scary than it sounds, don’t overthink it

    • Why your BoB portion of the BurnoutProof Protocol will make or break the entire system—and why testing it is FINALLY helping folks get past this common block

    • A template for your first portion of your Burnoutproof Protocol to set yourself up for success using ONLY the time and energy you have! No time off required!

    • A hot, secret, HUGELY game-changing trick to getting your habits to stick (you can beat the fate of every one of your new year's resolutions that didn't last past february)

    • How to design your accountability system for optimal efficacy….no hostage negotiation experience necessary (promise)

    • Kick back and relax, you’ve got a checklist of things you want to do, time to do them, and your Burnoutproof Protocol Template

    • I guide you through free tools to make your BurnoutProof Accountability System: put your burnoutproof action plan into action, holding yourself accountable with compassion!

    • Result: Rest assured you’ll never have to fight a BoB this big ever again

    • The I Protocol Kit– a collection of templates and guides for dealing with stressors INSIDE your control

    • Here you take inventory with my proprietary Fuck It assessment–you identify predictable non-work related stressors that contribute to BoB but with the intention of nipping them in the bud, before they amass into a backlog!

    • You’ll get a Fuck It Assessment, where we minimize external stressors and maximize your usable energy

    • You’ll use my Fuck It Decision Matrix, so when people ask you about your new life choices you can say it isn’t rash or desperate, it’s been well thought out and analyzed

    • You’ll go public with your effort to reclaim your soul using an easy, beautiful script—for email, for phone calls, and for in person conflict navigation, without anyone getting riled up

    • After you’ve practiced with people who don’t sign your paychecks, let’s tackle the equation for for the people that DO, with this one formula that’ll make your soulcrushing tasks more manageable

    • End goal: maximize your energy and minimize your energy drains

    • Now it’s time for the real fun to get started: we learn how to manage outside stressors so you build confidence and calm

    • You’ll start by learning the first question to ask yourself when you have a new, apparently soulcrushing work task

    • Then, I’ll teach you my unique 5 point BurnoutProof Protocol Outside Stress Management System, designed to overlay your own agenda on your tasks, and exactly how to tell if your system is working. Yup, there’s a rubric and everything!

    • You’ll also get access to pages and pages of before and after goal transformations.

    • You’ll go on to learn proven habit building strategies

    • This is where you get a bunch of customizable printables to remind you what to do, and that yes, you can do this

    • And, finally, I’ll show you the BurnoutProof Daily Protocol: the five minute check in to make life easier

    • There’s only one tiny little thing that remains: actually living your BurnoutProof Protocol. That’s the actual sustainability part of this whole thing. The BurnoutProof Protocol does NOT require you to put a lot of work into maintaining this system. Instead, we teach you how to build systems along the way. Translation: no more waiting until you have everything perfect before you can start!

    • As with anything, it requires updates. Stuff in your life changes, growth happens, chaos is always out there. The burnoutproof protocol works because it’s flexible. It’s not a set it and forget it system, but the maintenance comes in small mini system reflections periodically.

    • Here we review all the systems we’ve set up along the way and set a schedule of checking in with them

    • We’ll talk about strategies for iteratively improving the practices in your protocol.

    • And, of course, you’ll also learn how to slay the beast that is YOUR BRAIN: what happens when you get tripped up, something doesn’t go as smoothly as you’d hoped, or you fall behind on schedule

    • And here we have lots of options for you to choose from, now that you have more energy! Ever been curious about meditation? How about yoga? A variety of starter kits live here for all the different hobbies you can use to support your BurnoutProof life.

How It Works

All materials are taught via asynchronous learning🪄: each week you’ll log in to your class portal and learn on your own schedule, making it convenient for you wherever you are in the world.

If you have any questions for your instructor, Dr. Lauren Czaplicki, or would like to participate in the class with other learners, you may email her at lauren@burnoutproofnewsletter.com. Lauren responds to questions several times per week—you’re in good hands! Every few weeks, you’ll also be able to review other questions past learners have had, and their responses, helping you cement each concept and know exactly how to move forward.

As this is Beta Round 1, we’re still working on getting pretty videos and things for you to download to reference ready—but it’s the perfect time to join The BurnoutProof Protocol, because the early adopter price is still 60% off during beta. You will receive any and all updates to The BurnoutProof Protocol as they roll out! In exchange, we’d love your feedback & would appreciate hearing how BurnoutProof Protocol is helping you accomplish your dream of living a life of meaning and presence while working!

Beat Burnout with the BurnoutProof Protocol Now!

By this time next year, you could:

  • Be one of those people that don’t need coffee and gleefully jump out of bed

  • Spend your mornings excitedly collaborating with your coworkers on a problem—before breaking for lunch... and life

  • luxuriate after work in the art of doing nothing- the French call it being a Flâneur

  • be that fun parent that learns hula hoop tricks with her kids

  • Hunt down the best cheeses on a tasting tour across Europe, knowing your work is handled and not thinking about it every moment you’re away

  • Give yourself a new project. Immerse yourself in meaningful things. Insist on your own joy. Breathe, breathe, breathe. Do things your way. See beauty in everything.

The BurnoutProof Protocol will get you there.

Join us now.

About the Creator of the BurnoutProof Protocol

Dr. Lauren Czaplicki is the founder of Becoming BurnoutProof, a newsletter about how to beat burnout without quitting your job and the BurnoutProof Protocol, a wellness program for professionals who want to beat burnout without sacrificing financial stability or the meaning that comes with continuing on their current career. She’s also the innovator behind Fungal Solutions, a company that solves big environmental problems using fungi. She earned her doctorate from Duke University for coaxing local fungi to clean up really stubborn soil pollution. She’s recovered from burnout twice after researching the methods that went into the BurnoutProof Protocol. She’s over hustle culture and her programs have been hits at the West Slope Startup Week for the past few years!

Decades of drawing on her anger for her persistence took a toll, and between that and the pay discrimination at her first job post-grad school, she finally flipped all the tables and left the field to find a different purpose.

She literally ran away to a cabin in the mountains on 99 acres. She dyed her hair and pierced her nose. She became a certified yoga teacher. She traveled to exotic locations. She learned how to spin fleece into yarn. She started brewing kombucha. She started riding horses. She did all the things one would think would make her happy. They all helped a little.

She remained called to try to save the world using fungi, and would not be fulfilled with anything else. She was determined to make it easier this time around.

She researched a lot. She read Harvard Business Review and articles from Duke’s own Dr. Dan Ariele. She read about the scientifically sound therapy modality Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, that’s essentially secular Buddhism. She got a lot of therapy herself. She read a lot of productivity, mindset, and trauma books. She works out of generosity and curiosity now, not out of obligation to solve the problems before it’s too late. She has fun with work. She poured all of this research into BurnoutProof so that burned out professionals can keep on solving problems that matter to them too.

In business for herself since 2018, she teaches about mycoremediation, helps companies scale fungi-centered technologies, and speaks about resilience at multiple scales. When she’s not engaged in her work solving problems or helping people beat burnout, she rides her horse, forages for mushrooms, and hugs her chickens at her ranch in Durango, CO.

FAQs

  • If you wait until you have enough energy and time, you’ll be waiting forever. This program is self-paced with a special week at the start to focus on getting you in a spot where you can start thinking strategically about your work life. You can do this with what energy and time you have now!

  • Totally. This isn’t an intensive that requires you to change anything about your big life structure; your job, your location, your critical responsibilities can all remain. This is a mindset shift and a flexible living framework.

  • Yes! The protocol is preventative too!

  • Yes! You can email us at lauren@burnoutproofnewsletter.com within 30 days of purchase and we’ll refund you if you don’t like the program!

  • Yes! I’m offering- for a limited time- a company tailored BurnoutProof Protocol for management and groups.

Join The BurnoutProof Protocol Now

Start reclaiming your soul from the grasp of your soulcrushing job, be more present in your day to day, the compassionate, straight up fun way 🎉. We'll help you escape the rat race, while you keep your financial stability, beat burnout and love the life you live.