Anne Marie Miller

Category: Beating Burnout

Do You Feel Tired? Do You Need Some Joy? Maybe This Will Help.
I was shocked by her reply.

“I’m beyond burned out. I’m apathetic. I don’t even care if I can get healthy anymore.”

I’ve researched and studied about church health since 2007. I’m still requested to speak about staying healthy when you’re in the church. It should be easy: the church is the safest place in the world, right?

But when I step off a stage and talk to people, I’m learning that more and more people are going through the motions.

They’ve lost joy, they’re afraid, they’re tired, they’re sick. And it breaks my heart more than ever.

As much as I talk about staying healthy, I often find myself walking the fine line between being balanced, consistent and falling off a cliff into a hole of apathy myself.

When the holidays approached last year, my anxiety skyrocketed. I tripled my anxiety medicine. I went on a strict diet. I did all the right things just so I wouldn’t have a breakdown. Lots of time with God. Lots of time with others. And I survived.

In that season, I felt compelled to write a devotional. Something short but deep. Something based on scripture and the grace that we don’t need to DO anything for God. Practical application of what the Bible says about our health: spiritual, relational, emotional and physical.

What does the Word say about rest? About prayer? What is one teeny, tiny thing we can do each day to help us focus and return to a healthy path?

Beating Burnout: A 30-Day Guide to Hope and Health is what resulted. Mostly written in our car as we drove from Tennessee to Texas, Texas to Iowa, Iowa to Tennessee over Christmas and New Years.

It was written in real-time. The day I struggled with anger and apathy, I dug into Scripture and wrote what I felt God pressing into my heart about anger and apathy.

Today, this book officially releases. It’s my very first self-published attempt. (Side note: Self publishing is not for the faint of heart. Thank you to those who carried me through the last month when I wanted to give up seventeen times.)

But here’s what this book is:
- It’s 30 days of short reflections on all aspects of your health and a focused prayer time each week.
- It’s founded fully in scripture, and I believe that spending time in the Bible each day can only strengthen our relationship with God.
- It’s my heart to see those who have been hurt or who are hurting for and by the church healed and full of joy.
You can buy the book three ways:
- For $4.99, you get all the eBook formats: Kindle, Nook, PDF, iBook…PLUS you get the book FREE on audio. I read all the chapters so you can listen to each one for 30 days if you’d rather listen than read. This is an immediate download after you pay.
- For $7.99, you get a paperback copy (which will ship in a couple of weeks) and an immediate download of the free audio book.
- Or, for $9.99, you get all the above: the paperback in a few weeks, and instant access to the eBooks and the audio book.
All of the proceeds from the book directly go to support Tim’s and my ministry efforts of speaking, writing, and storytelling.

Thanks for letting me share this with you. If you don’t like it, I’ll give you your money back. If you love it, I hope you’ll share it with anyone you know who could maybe use a little joy and rest.

(A special thanks to Tim Miller, Lindsey Hartz, Justin Paschal, Rebecca Cooper and Alex Moore for the time you poured into this with me!)
February 4, 2014
Struggle with Shutting Other People Out?

“God blesses those who work for peace, for they will be called the children of God” (Matthew 5:9).

Stress and burnout can cause us to project our pain and exhaustion on others — usually those closest to us. Some people respond to burnout by lashing out in anger and storming around in a rage as their lives are falling apart.

Exhaustion can cause us to shut down and stop communicating with our spouse or our friends. And by “communicating,” I mean both talking and listening. We no longer feel connected to those around us, and we begin not to care about nurturing those relationships that God has placed in our lives.

After not communicating for a while, resentment can develop. Our spouses or friends may not feel comfortable opening up to us anymore, and bitterness can be formed and directed toward us, toward the church, and even toward God.

Reflect:

In Matthew 5:9, Jesus directs us to be “peacemakers.” It will take effort and intentionality on our part to bring balance back into our relationships. We are to make peace and strive for unity.

Have you cut off communication with people because you’re feeling burned out? Write down their names and a trait you admire about each one of them. Then write down a date you will contact them, making amends if necessary.

***

The above post is an excerpt (Day 9) of my book Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope and Health. It releases next Tuesday, and I’m crazy excited to share it with you!

January 31, 2014
What Questions do You Have about Church Burnout or Staying Healthy?
As many of you know, the next month or two promises to be exciting!

I’m releasing a thirty-day devotional called Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope and Health (which will be an eBook, a paperback, and a free audio book) in addition to releasing an expanded edition of my first book, Mad Church Disease: Healing from Church Burnout (as an eBook and a paperback).

It’s been so great (and yet, so heartbreaking) to write the new material.

I continue seeing how burnout is affecting sons and daughters of God.

In no way are either of these books focused on church bashing, negativity, or cynicism.

It’s my hope that they’re full of light, practical steps, and overflowing with how much God loves you and you don’t need to earn His love.

The expanded material includes:
- new chapters
- an expanded study guide
- a more in-depth burnout assessment
- plans you can print to help you get healthy
- …lots of fun things!
If you’d like to find out when Beating Burnout and Mad Church Disease are available to buy, just sign up here! (use the link if you don’t see the form below).

Healing from Burnout

*(I won’t use your email address for anything else!)

As part of the resources I’m providing, we’re shooting video interviews with pastors and leaders (and not just the ones who speak at conferences!) but local pastors here in Nashville and the surrounding area. If you are a pastor or have served in a church and have a story about burnout and health, we’d love to chat and potentially interview you, if you’d like to share your story. I married a professional videographer (lucky!) so we can come to you or you can come here, whatever works best! Just contact us.

We have a couple of interviews this week, including one with Dr. Thom Rainer, who’s the president of LifeWay Resources and has often shared about staying healthy in ministry in his own communication.

If you have a question about church burnout you’d like to have answered, or have questions about getting or staying healthy (spiritually, relationally, emotionally, or physically), it would be great if you’d leave your thoughts in the comments here.

I realize it is not easy to talk about burnout, but here’s the thing. If you’re close to it or in it, you need to talk to someone. If you know someone who’s close, you need to talk to them, support them, offer help. It’s amazing to me how, when I go somewhere to talk about burnout, people come up to me before or after my session and say, “I can’t come to your session. I’m here with my team and I don’t want them to know how close I am to losing it.”

As Christians, we feel like we have to have everything together in order to be effective for the Kingdom. This is not the case.

If we had everything together, we wouldn’t need the Cross. We wouldn’t need Jesus. When we say, “I need help,” we’re inviting in more of His love, and we’re reaching out in faith for others to help carry us.

I need you to help set this example.

May you have an amazing day and just know how much our Lord loves you!

***
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January 29, 2014
Is Burnout Beating You?
I’ve been in the process of adding some helpful stuff to the 5th Anniversary Expanded Edition of my first book, Mad Church Disease which launches next month (woot!)

In that journey, I realized people were needing something NOW. Something to help NOW.

The emails I get daily show me that burnout is still epidemic in ministry and in the church world and if anything has become more taboo in the last five years, which breaks my heart.

Over Christmas, I sat down and wrote Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope and Health that covers
- rest
- spiritual health
- emotional health
- relational health
- physical health
- and prayer.
Rinse and repeat for five weeks and you’ve got yourself a 70-something page book.

Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope and Health releases as an eBook this week! (The print will follow shortly!)

Each day has
- scripture
- a short and meaningful reflection
- and a section for practical application and a page for notes.
It reads fast because I know you don’t have much time, but I pray it takes you directly to the heart of our Father with no fluff, only grace, and gives you enough action when, after thirty days are over, you find yourself in a healthier and more intentional place than you are now.

Can you do me a favor?

If this book sounds like something you need, can you give me your email address so I can ping you when it comes out? I won’t bother you for anything else. And, if you’d like to spread the word ahead of time, I’ve made some tweets to help you do that!

You can sign up for the email notification here!

Share about it below!

[Tweet “Burned out? THIS > @girlnamedanne’s “Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope & Health” #BeatingBurnout”]

[Tweet “Had enough? > @girlnamedanne’s”Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope & Health” #BeatingBurnout”]

[Tweet “2014 = HEALTH! @girlnamedanne’s “Beating Burnout: A 30 Day Guide to Hope & Health” #BeatingBurnout”]

I am SO GRATEFUL for your support and I truly pray this devotional can help you find hope and health!
January 14, 2014