Real exhaustion or just a rough patch?

Answering emails at midnight and wearing dark circles like a badge of honour? Most of us have been there. But assuming a Sunday lie-in will fix this kind of tiredness? Not quite. There's an invisible line you crossed without noticing, and your body has started cashing the bill.

Real burnout shows up in three brutal dimensions

If all three of these feature in your day-to-day, you're in the danger zone:

Rest doesn't touch the sides

You wake up as flattened as you went to bed. Your biological reserves are at zero.

Cynic mode: on

You look at your team, partners or clients and feel mostly irritation. Your brain has switched off empathy to save the little energy it has left.

A direct hit to the ego

You feel you're working twice as hard and getting nowhere, losing control of your own performance.

This isn't mental weakness or a bad attitude. It's a chemical short-circuit in your brain.

So the real question isn't whether you'll stop — it's whether you'll choose to, or whether biology will choose for you.