Burnout & mental fatigue

Burnout is a term from occupational psychology, not from the herbal — it entered the herbal context through wellness writing. The tradition knows rather 'exhaustion': the state in which the body does not recharge even though it sleeps.

Herbal practice has no tool for it. What it has is the ritual of a pause: a cup a person brews instead of the next task. The catalogue takes that role seriously, but does not overrate it.

Burnout syndrome is tied to workload, the degree of control over one's own work and recognition — which is why interventions in those conditions work on it, not supplements. Herbal interventions have no data here to lean on.

Exhaustion, moreover, is often not psychological: anaemia, iron or vitamin D deficiency, an underactive thyroid, sleep apnoea, depressive disorder. All of them can be recognised from a blood test or a conversation, and all have their treatment.

When tiredness lasts weeks, a holiday does not improve it and the taste for things that used to be enjoyable fades too, that is a reason to see your GP or a psychologist — not to look for a stronger adaptogen.

Keep the herbal ritual as what it is: the boundary between work and the evening. That is its real value, and it need not be overstated.