Ep. 183: The Real Reason Fundraising Burnout Keeps Coming Back
EPISODE 183
The Real Reason Fundraising Burnout Keeps Coming Back
About the Episode:
If you’ve found yourself feeling exhausted, overwhelmed, or wondering how you’re supposed to do another year of fundraising like this, this episode is for you.
In this episode, I’m breaking down what fundraising burnout actually is and why it keeps showing up for capable, committed nonprofit leaders. This isn’t about working harder, pushing through, or needing more discipline. Most burnout isn’t solved by rest alone. It comes from carrying too many open decisions, too many mental tabs, and too much responsibility without enough structure or support. I talk about how stress cycles stay open in fundraising, how avoidance and indecision quietly drain your energy, and why clarity and decisiveness often bring more relief than another day off. I also share practical ways to close loops, reduce overwhelm, and rebuild momentum without burning yourself out again. If fundraising has started to feel heavy or unsustainable, this episode will help you understand what’s happening beneath the surface and give you a clearer, more supportive path forward.
Here’s what you’ll learn:
What is fundraising burnout, and what it isn’t
Why burnout is often a stress cycle, not just exhaustion
Decision fatigue and its impact on fundraising momentum
How avoidance and “tinkering” worsen burnout
Why rest alone doesn’t close open mental loops
The power of decisiveness as a leadership tool
How to break big, overwhelming tasks into bite-sized actions
Using movement to complete the stress cycle
Identifying what’s urgent vs. what just feels urgent
Building systems that reduce burnout long-term
It’s not your stories—it’s how you’re telling them. If your amazing work isn’t getting the attention (and donations) it deserves, it’s time for a messaging shift. The Brave Fundraiser’s Guide guide gives you 10 done-for-you donor prompts to make your message impossible to ignore. Get it for free here! https://christinaedwards.krtra.com/t/xKuLs6tOiPZa
Christina’s Favorite Takeaways:
“Burnout is not just a state of being tired; it may be a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion.”
“Your body starts a stress cycle but never really gets a signal that the cycle is complete.”
“Movement is one of the fastest ways to get unstuck fromthe burnout cycle.”
“One of the biggest rocks in the way of getting out of the stress cycle is indecision.”
“Decisiveness is choosing one path and staying with it long enough to see results.”
“Eat the frog! Do the hard thing at the beginning of the day.”
“If there was one right way to fundraise for your nonprofit, to market, to manage your board, to manage your donors, there would be one book in the bookstore, and it would be called Nonprofits.”
“Creating micro routines where you start to get in the habit of being more decisive, will be building a new muscle, and you will see your overwhelm and burnout decrease when you feel that stress cycle start.”
“I believe everybody who's choosing to work in social impact in the nonprofit world feels a deep desire to make an impact on the communities and the people they serve.”
Episode Resources:
FREE Resources from Splendid Consulting:
How to Work with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
Double Your Donations - Raise More From Your Laptop Without Chasing Grants or Galas
Easy Emails For Impact™ - Turn Your Inbox into an Income Stream
Donations on Demand: Build a $5K Email Campaign System in 30 min/week
The SPRINT Method™ - Fundraise Like a Pro, 5 Figures At a Time
Connect with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
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Christina Edwards 0:33If you found yourself saying I'm really edging on burnout, or I'm just so tired, or I don't know if I can do another year of this. This episode is for you. I'm recording this in January, releasing it in January, by design, because on the heels of what is for most organizations, a very, very busy last few months of the year leading into year end, it's really normal and common to take some break, some rest, a break for the holidays, and then get back to it in January, and also be like, I don't want to. I'm feeling so burnt out from last year. I'm just not even ready to get back fundraising. So that's why I wanted to have this episode on burnout and what's really underneath burnout, and the best news I have for you how you can deal in combat burnout when it comes up for you. So first, let's like, reset and reframe how we're defining burnout. So the type of burnout that I'm talking about is the type that you might be lamenting to a friend or a board member or a staffer or maybe even just yourself, you're just like, oh, I don't want to do this. It's sort of that dread. It's fatigue. It's more than just the usual. I have a lot to do. Burnout, though, is not just a state of being tired. It may be a state of emotional, physical and mental exhaustion. It's carrying a lot, and it's caused by the prolonged and excessive stress, maybe from job, your job, your role, your responsibilities. It may be that your nonprofit life is interwoven to your personal life, and it just feels like there's not enough time, right? And then the result of that is it drains your motivation. It drains your enjoyment of the work you do, both personally and professionally. It also creates this cycle, this stress cycle that makes you feel helpless. And worst of all, it crushes your productivity. And you might be like, Oh my gosh, this sounds terrible. Why are we talking about this? But we're talking about this because I want to crack more than a little window or a door open for you to show you that there is number one, this is normal. I see this with a lot of high impact, highly motivated leaders that this can come up. So I want to first normalize it for you. And two, I want to shed some light on some simple ways you can get out of this cycle when it comes up, because we're not talking about it enough. We're not talking about it more than you know, oh, I need a glass of wine after work. Or there's just a lot going on, right? We're just sort of saying it, and then we're going through the motions. But if you find yourself in this cycle, I Want to show you how to get unstuck today.
Christina Edwards 3:44
Years ago, I read the book the burnout, the secret to unlocking the stress cycle, by Emily and Amelia nagoski, and they really go into to what is burnout. They define some coping mechanisms, and they explain that burnout happens when your body starts a stress cycle but never gets a signal that the cycle is complete. Your body starts a stress cycle but never really gets a signal that the cycle is complete. So even though the stressor may fade, the stress sort of stays alive inside of you, because your body doesn't know it's okay. Your system does not know yet that you are safe, so it sort of keeps the alarms on, and that's why you feel that, like I can't really catch your breath, like I can't catch my breath feeling the other thing I would say is, as a coping mechanism I've seen is with the rise of social media. In particular, is in the rise of, listen, I love a Netflix, Netflix and chill. However, when our body is in this stress cycle and we just default to, like scrolling on social media, you know, just kind of zoning out, we are not actually. Telling our body it's okay, we've got this we're just zoning out. Okay. So the nagoski sisters go on to talk about completing the stress cycle through movement, and this is one of my favorite hacks. Now, if you're in one of my programs, maybe you've mentioned I have a mini trampoline in my office, and largely, this is one of the reasons it is not just for fitness. It's great, of course, to break a sweat, but I actually love to shake it off, bounce it out, get my body moving when I'm feeling nervous, anxious or in this stress, burnout cycle. So it's not necessarily about doing a 30 minute workout to get your body moving, but they actually go into in the book how the movement can be tiny. It can literally be like squeezing your hands, squeezing your fingers, walking down the hall. The movement can be imperfect, unclenching your jaw, squeezing your hands, rolling your shoulders, stepping outside, getting literally touching grass, right? And that movement tells your nervous system you're not trapped. You are safe. You can keep going, movement is one of the fastest ways to get unstuck from this cycle, because when your body moves, your mind flows, and it's like, okay, we're moving. And I find it actually like, releases something. So most commonly, if you're going to talk to your friend and you were saying, you know, listen, it's, it's the beginning of the year, I just, I'm already feeling just so overwhelmed and so stressed out. I think it would be super normal for your friend to say, you know, you should just rest more, take another day off self care. And I am all about rest. But what I want to give you, with this nuance, with this, with this episode, is what happens when you're not resting, because the truth is, many of us can't just rest like we can't just rest our way out of this overwhelm kind of stress cycle. The day off can be really, really therapeutic, but it doesn't actually solve for and fix the open loops of your to do list the open loops of that bath backlog in your email inbox, right? So what can you do instead first acknowledging that you're holding a lot of responsibilities in the air, maybe too many decisions, too much emotional labor, without that support or structure. So that's where we see this burnout kind of bubble to the surface, and that's one of the reasons why I love coaching so much, because we can coach on this. Just today, I was coaching a leader on this where, you know, she basically came to the call and said, You know, I've got so much happening, and honestly, I don't have the bandwidth for it. I don't have the bandwidth for it. And again, on the heels of last year, it's just been so much, and so burnout can look like that. It can look like circling the same decisions. And you're looking at your to do list, and you're like, oh my gosh, I've got to, you know, do, like, a deep dive on our data. I've got to do our board, you know, our board packet. I've got to do this. I've got to do that. It's very I've got to do frantic energy. It's thinking about thinking. It's rewriting the same content, refreshing the same content four or five, six times. It's opening your CRM but then closing it because you feel overwhelmed, and your thought is, I'll do that later. It's avoiding donor meetings. It's very avoiding. It's very tinkering with tasks that don't matter. That's that burnout loop, because you're sort of like, I know I need to do this, but I also don't want to do this, so I'm not doing this while also kind of looking at the stuff I want to do with me. So here's the solution. One of the biggest boulders, rocks in the way to getting out of that stress stress cycle is indecision. So the solution the number one thing you can do to stop this cycle is decisiveness. Now here's
Christina Edwards 8:47
the piece that I want you to understand. Decisiveness isn't necessarily being impulsive. It's not being haphazard. Decisiveness is choosing one path and staying with it long enough to see results. So somebody came to me recently, a friend of mine, and they were really struggling with a decision they needed to make that had kind of a deadline attached to it. They were like, you know, I really need to figure this out. It was kind of some family stuff, and they were in a type of way about it, right? They were just really heavy and really in their head about it, and really holding that decision, and I don't know what to do, and I don't want to make this, and it was just very like, I don't want to make the decision, okay? Because the decision, no matter which way they went, they knew that people would be upset. Okay? So what do they do? They think about making the decision. Instead of making the decision, they are prolonging the negative emotion in that process. So instead of making that decision on a Tuesday, they waited another week to think about thinking about making the decision. And that meant, what do you do? You play out scenarios in your head. You think about avoiding it. You Doom scroll some more, then you play out some other scenarios, then you maybe run it by chatgpt, and you're spending all of this time avoiding the thing while also thinking about the thing. And now we are in that stress cycle. You with me? So what I said to them was, okay, do you really have to make this decision by next week, and what we what we arrived at was no it was just an internal deadline that actually didn't exist, except by their own creation.
Christina Edwards 10:45
and so the first step was realizing I don't have to make this decision right now. And what I told them was, if you know you don't have to make it right now, let's decide when you're going you're going to make a decision. For making the decision, literally, this is what we did. And so I said, Okay, so 10 days from now, you're going to make the decision. So between now and 10 days, you don't have to think about it. You've just said to me, it is not like urgent, time sensitive. So get through the holidays. No worries there. Enjoy your time off, rest, recuperate. Have fun. Don't Don't spin out about the decision, and that gave them some peace, right? Because they were like, Oh yeah, I really don't have to make the decision. I just think I need to make the decision right now. And so then my next kind of hack for you is when it is time to make the decision, you want to actually look at choosing a time frame to make the decision. So many of my clients right now are making tech changes, internal staff changes, let's see, like even contract freelance work, kind of anything like that, like staff, team, tech, CRM, things like that. And I love q1 for this, because this is generally not your business, busiest fundraising season. So you have more time in your schedule to do things like this. However, it can spin out really quickly to burn out and overwhelm. Ah, I can't do any of this if you're not decisive. So just even a decision like, I need a new email service provider, and I don't know which one to go with, and Christina, there's like 50 providers, and I feel overwhelmed, and I just don't want to do it. Okay, you're going to spend one hour looking at email service providers on Tuesday. You're going to spend one hour narrowing it down on Wednesday, and by Thursday, you will have signed up for that. That is how you're decisive, versus stretching that out into 10 different things that feel overwhelming. I had another client that was kind of going through this burnout kind of stress loop, and we listed out what was in there, and it was like some, you know, I've got to do this report and that, and I've got to figure this out, and I've got to figure that out. And then we drilled in on when it actually needs to be done, whether or not it was urgent or just seemed like it was urgent, because those are two very different things,
Christina Edwards 13:28
and also how much time it would actually take to do some of those very big looming tasks. And what was really fascinating is the big looming tasks actually weren't time heavy. They didn't take, you know, three weeks of work. It was a half day of work. It was the way that they were thinking about it that felt overwhelming. It was like, imagine you put every, every grocery you have in your refrigerator into one pot. You're gonna be like, What is this overwhelming stew of sweet and savory and salty and gross, right? It's like overwhelming versus being like, Okay, I have breakfast items over here, I have dinner items over here, I have snacks over here, which is like, way different, even if you thought about, like meal prepping in that way to think about, there's seven days a week, three meals a day. That's 21 meals. Might be like, I can't do that. That's overwhelming. I can't cook 21 meals, right? Okay, what if you could cook five days a week, Monday through Friday, and you're just doing breakfast? Okay? That's five meals. It's like, how do we parse this out so that it's a little bit more like bite sized. So that decisiveness to make it bite size looks like choosing top priorities, choosing your next action, choosing what you're not doing, is the thing that's overwhelming you, the thing that is making this burnout really pitch up a well meaning, intentioned suggestion from a. Board member of an idea that they're not going to support you to run. That was just something they said off the cuff, and now you feel like it was plunked on your lap, and you can just tell them, thank you so much. We're going to keep that on the future projects list, and we're going to stay over here within our strategic plan, you're allowed to say that choosing which open loops you will close, choosing before you feel ready. Now let's use the email marketing tool. So say you need a new email marketing tool for whatever reason. There is no perfect tool. So let's go ahead and level set that. Let's go ahead and level set that. There is no one right tool, whether it's your CRM, your email provider, your anything, right? So you're going to choose the one that's most compatible with your tech, that beats your budget. And we go, and you go, I remember when my kids were starting school, one of the things that gave me a lot of peace as they were going to like big kids school was this is the decision we're going to make for now, and if we need to, we'll change course. Okay, we'll change course. It just gave me peace, because I was like, should we apply for the charter school? Should we go private school? Should we go public school? Are they too young? Right? All of those questions. This is the decision that we're going to go to for now, and if we need to, we'll change course. That's what you can say. If I need to, I'll change course for now. I'm going to decide that decision will make you feel I can't even put a number to it 100 times better. It will restore your energy, your confidence. There is nothing like for me writing the line across my to do list like it is done. It is done because when you get decisive, everything feels lighter. You actually show your your to your higher brain, you show to your lower brain, that kind of lizard brain, like I we got this under control. It's okay. We're gonna be okay. That stress cycle reduces. Remember that stress cycle is looking Are we okay? Do we need to keep spinning out about this? And when you tell it, Nah, we're good. You shake your body, you do some movement, and you make some decisions. Another hack I have for you is, please eat the frog. If you've ever heard that saying, Do the hard thing at the beginning of the day. So anytime I have this, this was just yesterday, I had to do some like, bookkeeping, accounting stuff. And that's my frog. That's one of my frogs. I don't want to do it. I'm spinning out. It's going to take so long. I'm not in the mood, like all of my reasons. And I was like, Oh, I caught it really, really quickly. I caught it probably within 90 seconds. And I was like, we're going to eat the frog. And on top of it, I gave myself a little challenge. And I was like, I wonder if I can get this done in less than 10 minutes. Because in my mind, I was like, take an hour and a half, just like it did last time. I mean, I was like a teenager in my head about it. And sure enough, it was like, this is not going to be perfect. I'm going to get this done. And I got it done in about eight minutes. And what did I show my brain? I showed my brain, like, a little win, and we could close the loop on just Feeling like, you know, sad and stressed and overwhelmed you,
Christina Edwards 18:36
so some patterns that might be in your organization and you might not be seeing and realizing until now, might look like leaders sitting on 10 possible projects or ideas and actually choosing none. It's very kick the can energy. Let's just table this and figure it out later. You guys, that is costing you brain space, that is creating overwhelm, that is creating that burnout cycle. It looks like teams spending weeks brainstorming but never really committing. No one holding anyone accountable. Hey, Fred, remember you said you would call A, B and C. You haven't called Have you like holding people accountable? Very freeing organizations, rewriting the case for support instead of talking to three more donors, tweaking campaign pages, tweaking this, tweaking that, instead of just launching Ed, is avoiding one hard conversation for an entire quarter. That is what is creating the burnout. It's like, eat the frog, do the hard thing. It will create more safety, it will create more positivity. It will create more satisfaction in the work you do.
Christina Edwards 19:49
if you're thinking, I'm too overwhelmed, I've got too much going on to make decisions. I don't want to choose the wrong path. I need more time before I act. I need to figure. This out more I need to ask another person before I decide the problem with those thoughts is that they're rooted in a misbelief. Right? They're rooted that you need more time, that time is going to going to create more more clarity, or time is going to create more perfection, or time is going to make it right when, in fact, it's think about that example with my friend. Time was actually creating more stress, more stress because they were like, oh my god, it's a holiday. I have to admit, this hard conversation I don't know what to do. The time was stretching it out and making it worse. It was making their entire regardless of that one hard conversation they needed to have. It was making their entire just daily life worse because they were thinking about thinking about it, right? So number one, giving yourself the peace, a peace of mind that there is no exact one right thing. I promise you, there's not. If there was one right way to fundraise for your nonprofit, to market, not your nonprofit, to manage your board, to manage your donors, all of the things. There would be one book in the bookstore, and it would be called nonprofits. There is no one right way. Your organization is led by you. Your organization has a very different mission than another's. And so part of this is giving yourself the freedom and flexibility to iterate and the confidence that you will, you will, you will right side things. You will change course if you need to that decision, every single decision, when you have the to do list, you're like, I don't have time for any of this, ask yourself, What's one thing I can do? What is one thing I can do right now? That little micro decision, one micro action, will give your brain relief. It will close an open loop. I love that. That is, like, one of my favorite things, closing the open loop, it is like it's done, it's done, and every decision helps return more energy, satisfaction, confidence into your system. That's how you break that burnout cycle.
Christina Edwards 22:03
and that's what we do in my programs. Inside the sprint method, we give you clarity, systems, the confidence, the exact tools. So we're reducing decision fatigue for new and solo run nonprofits. So there is a step by step. Plan to fundraise online, inside the purpose and profit club coaching program, we give teams that clarity, right? They get that weekly coaching, they get that feedback, they get that guide, guidance and support, so you're not piling these open loops, and you can clearly see, what do I need to do, what's actually on task to help meet my goals, and what are just things I that are stuck in the shoulds? What are things I think I should be doing but I actually don't need to do? What are things that I'm kind of spinning out about? Right? You get that community and that visibility so you see you're not doing it alone. So ask yourself this, what's one loop that I can close today? And if you don't know, like, take a minute, take a minute, take a deep breath, and like, think about like, your mental To Do List your projects, what's, what are the top five things? Here are some questions you can ask that are really stressing me out or overwhelming me with work, or that I feel just like when I when I said to my friend Christina, I feel really burnt out. Ask yourself, why did I tell her that? What did I mean? And I want you to really drill into what feels like. What does it feel like? What is most stressful? And how can we start to close some of those loops, like take bites out of some of those burnout pieces, so you can actually help your brain see, oh, we don't need the stress cycle. Oh, this stress cycle has been been dealt with. Or maybe you'll find this isn't even a real stress cycle. We don't even have to deal with this right now. This isn't even a fire we have to extinguish. One way you can establish what is a priority and what isn't is you can look at this month, the next four to six weeks. What are your top three revenue drivers? What are the top three strategic initiatives you need to take and ignore the rest, everything else can go to future projects. You can also write down your decisions so that your brain doesn't have to hold them if you are really like, I don't know. I don't know what I should do here. I'm not sure. Write it down, old fashioned pros, cons. What am I thinking? I find too. Even just writing it down helps my brain go. We are addressing it noted right, noted brain. And so if you can write it out, pen to paper, that's really helpful, or voice memo it out, I love a voice memo for that. So if I can say it out loud and just give a brain dump of just everything that's like, feels like it's on my plate, but actually isn't on my plate, it's really or feels like it's on my plate. And everything feels like a priority, but it may, maybe isn't a priority. That's really helpful. A couple of other things before we close out that I find are quick hacks to reduce that burnout are. Planning blocks. Remember I said eat the frog calendar in time to eat the frog. So decide Wednesday mornings is my frog eating time from nine to a 10. Nine to 10am that's when I'm doing my hard thing. You put your phone on, do not disturb, really reduce any distractions, creating micro routines where you start to get in the habit of being more decisive, will be building a new muscle, and you will see your overwhelm and burnout decrease when you feel that stress cycle start. And it might be a call you got, or disgruntled email you got, or some sort of, you know, internal staff memo, whatever it is, I want you to first take a deep breath, drop your shoulders, drop, release your jaw, release that tension, and you can use what the nagoski Sister suggests, some movement. Or you can even sit in your chair, or you can lay down and just squeeze and release. I sometimes will shake it out with my hands. That's really, really helpful. Go for a walk up and down the street. These things can take a minute. It can take a minute listening to music can be really, really helpful, just literally to exhale that tension. These are not like wellness hacks. These are literally leadership practices. This is how you stay in the game, because my goal for you is that you're not leaving this industry burnt out. You're not staying in this industry burnt out that you're loving this industry. You're loving this sector. This sector is so special to me, because I believe everybody who's choosing to work in social impact in the nonprofit world feels called to do it like feels a deep, deep desire to make their impact, to make an impact on the communities, the people they serve. And in layman's it sucks to make an impact on the people you serve. If you feel like crap the whole time, right? If you feel white knuckled, if you feel stressed out, if you everything feels hair on fire, I would much rather you make the impact. You know, while taking the hard because it's not always going to be perfect, right? I would rather you make that impact, feeling joy, feeling positivity, feeling less stress, less overwhelm, and ultimately, it's beneficial to the people inside and around and supporting you, because that's much more magnetic, right? We've all seen the stressed out fundraiser, right? We've all seen her before. She's stressed out. She's not necessarily magnetically drawing in more donors, right? Or the the leader or CEO who's just like, super strict and you know, like, that's not magnetic either. So finding the joy is for you. Finding the joy is for The people you serve, right?
Christina Edwards 28:22
so that decisiveness that you're now going to filter into your work day helps you become unstoppable. That decisiveness is not pressure, it's relief, it's leadership, it's courage. It's sprinting when you need to sprint. It's resting when you need to rest. Your next decision is the first step out of that burnout and stress cycle. I'm here to support you. So if you have questions, if you're not sure how we can work together, what programs right for your organization, you're always welcome to reach out and send me an email. I am here cheering you on for an amazing year, not only financially, not only as an impact, but again, I want you to be the best you this year. Not I mean, that can sound kind of cheesy, but like the best you, the best version of you, the version of you that logs off and is done with work and into your personal life where it's not bleeding together, the version of you that doesn't have to, you know, scroll endlessly and doesn't feel like this constant stress cycle, the version of you that is living into their purpose and impacting so so many I'll see you in the next one.