This is what burnout looks like

Note: This is not how Burnout looks like. See it more as you having different files. And you have to clear them one by one with different stamps, some being more important than others. Arrives a moment where you get way too much files for you to Process and it continues and continue and continus and the flow of files doesn't stop. It makes you very tired, and your brain gets to a point where every files seems like it's the one single most important you should work on. But they are now to your brain/eyes all like that. And peeweew. You Softlock, too tired to make a choice, your body itself blocks and can't choose and need time to heal back

Note: this is not what it actually looks like.

"Burnout" is what habit extinction feels like from the inside, when applied to work tasks or the like.

"I keep doing the thing that used to be rewarding, but it's not rewarding anymore, so I don't want to do it so much."

"I used to believe that getting up early and going to work and closing a bunch of tickets actually made things better for the users. But, over time, it became obvious that the users' real problems were not getting solved this way. So doing it became less and less rewarding, and it became harder and harder to motivate myself to do it."

"I used to think that if I worked hard that I would get promoted and get a raise. But that did not happen. So now I am less interested in working hard, and I find it more and more difficult to actually do the thing."

That's just habit extinction, as described by classic behaviorism. Even though behaviorism is blatantly wrong as a total theory of human psychology, it's pretty reliable for things that rely on reinforcement to motivate you.

It's a neat piece of art, but as people have pointed out, and as someone who has experienced it, this isn't at all what burnout feels like.

Except the flame is going out on its own... it goes out because of something or someone else!