Camino with burnout

Burnout is neither a trend nor a psychological technical term nor a “manager’s disease.” Burnout is a very serious situation in which people push beyond their limits for so long that they eventually collapse.

Can the Camino de Santiago be an emergency brake here? Yes.

It actually can.

People who feel exhausted and burned out, who feel stuck in a hamster wheel, unable to switch off and constantly running at more than one hundred percent, often struggle to create distance from their lives. When burnout approaches, a sauna visit or a Netflix evening is no longer enough to relax.

What can help is stepping out of everyday life and having only one job for weeks: walking through nature. From morning until evening. Washing clothes, eating, sleeping. Then starting again.

Life on the Camino is so different from what you experience every day in normal life. There is simply nothing to get done. You are in another country, with different people every day, and your only task is to put one foot in front of the other.

This can give you the distance from your life that you need in order to find new solutions. Because things cannot continue the way they are.

There is no guarantee, of course. But there is incredible potential.

People who are close to burnout often struggle to let go of control.

Be careful that your Camino does not turn into a project that you plan down to the smallest detail. On the other hand, a Camino that is too loosely planned can also become a stress factor for people with a strong need for control.

The solution is this: let someone you trust plan the Camino for you, while making sure the plan includes what is personally important to you so your Camino can become a success.

Think in advance about which factors matter to you — and which ones create stress.

Does it stress you to know you must complete a certain distance every day because a room is already reserved?

Then it may be better not to book anything and decide spontaneously each day how far you want to walk.

When you reach the point where you’ve hit your daily limit, you write to me and I find accommodation that still has availability.

But the opposite might also be right for you — maybe you feel good knowing:
“Today I will walk 20 km / 12.5 miles, and at the end of the day a room in Hotel So-and-so is waiting for me. All I need to do today is walk 20 km.”

Burnout is not a mental illness; it is a syndrome resulting from exhaustion that includes various symptoms — but every burnout involves profound exhaustion.

The ICD-11 classifies burnout explicitly as work-related, but I would personally disagree. Permanent overload, missing boundaries, and chronically high stress levels do not necessarily have to be connected to paid work.

But that is not the focus here — the question is whether the Camino is a good idea if you have already collapsed under the pressure.

In general, I consider the Camino a good idea for people experiencing burnout. However, as with people dealing with depression, anxiety disorders, panic disorder, or PTSD, stabilization in a professional environment should come first.

If you feel so unwell that you wake up crying in the morning and it takes hours to find the energy to get out of bed, then even the Camino is probably too much.

But if you are already feeling a little better and leaving your familiar environment feels right, the Camino has clear advantages compared to a beach vacation on a spanish island.

Nothing against beach vacations like this – in some cases that is exactly what’s needed, ideally in an all-inclusive resort where everything is taken care of and you can simply exist.

But in most cases, the Camino is more healing. You spend the entire day outside, and your field of vision is no longer the television and the same wall you’ve been staring at for years – but the ocean or a eucalyptus forest.

The following two weeks were a constant up and down. On one side, I could watch myself grow and blossom. By day four, I stopped booking accommodation in advance and trusted that the Camino would give me what I needed. I had deep conversations with people I had known for only a few minutes. I experienced moments when I felt completely free and happy and didn’t know what to do with my emotions.

I was happy. For the first time in a long time, I felt strong, stable, free, and calm.

But there was also the other side – again and again, the small challenges of the Camino knocked me down. When suddenly no room was available. When I reached the end of my energy. When it became too much to be alone with my thoughts for so long. When I ran out of water and had a panic attack in the middle of the forest. Sometimes it was simply too much – too much unknown, too much adventure. And no one I could turn to.

I am by your side — digitally or even in person. I understand very well what burnout means and what the Camino means. Since 2019, I have been helping people turn their Camino into a successful experience rather than an overwhelming one.

It remains your very personal Camino. But you place the planning in the hands of a professional and have someone who is always there for you before and during the journey – whether for organizational or emotional crises.

I have personally walked more than 4,000 km (2500 miles), I am a trained psychological counselor and mental health first aider – and together we make your Camino possible, even with burnout.

Get in touch for a free initial consultation, or send me an email or WhatsApp!