I'm pretty sure most -- if not all -- experience burnout at work at some point. When this happens, that's a signal for you to get away from the stress and take a breather... Time to regroup, relax, recollect your thoughts, whatever it is you do to cope with work-related stress.
There are, however, times in which there is just too much stress, your mind and body literally -- and I mean LITERALLY -- cannot take it anymore: lose sleep, lose weight, cannot focus, miss appointments, etc. I guess that's a big billboard saying "CHANGE WORK", "LEAVE COMPANY", etc.
From my experience, the signs that you must look for a new job include, but is not limited to, the following. (Well, you know, work-related stress may have caused me to miss a few points! LOL)
You excessively dislike people at work. In particular, whenever you hear the name or the voice of someone -- your colleague, a boss, or a subordinate -- you have an involuntary response that equates to irritation; your ears twitching, your mouth making that funny shape, one of your eyebrows rising, your eyes roll up, your face frowning, your hands clenching, your feet stomping, etc. Little things like that betray your negative feelings toward that other person.
It is normal to dislike some people at work; there are an infinite number of personalities, some of them -- or some aspects of them -- would likely not be compatible to yours. Hence, you will come across these people at some point.
What's bad is the degree / level of annoyance to that people. How many people do you dislike? How often do you deal with these people daily? Do they consume your thoughts? Are you thinking of many dark and different ways of flaying their flesh and rending their bones? Hehehe.. Okay, I may have gone a little bit overboard, but you get the point right?
Another thing is that your hostility for these people have changed you; could be as simple and subtle as turning away your head slughtly whenever you hear something you don't like , or as apparent and obvious as swearing obscenities when normally you wouldn't.
You compromise your friends/family. How many times have we seen a scene in which the working parent would miss his/her kid's recital, first game, graduation, whatever, all because of work? I remember this ad on the papers the other day: a working mom promised her kid a picnic the next day; then he got called by her boss who wanted her to do extra work on that same picnic day. What do you do?
Sometimes, there really is a need to do some extra work, hence requiring you to sacrifice some time that you would rather spend enjoying with your family and/or friends. The question is, how many times have you sacrificed your time for them for the sake of your job? Between work and family, where do you draw the proverbial line??
You have nightmares about work. If you dream about it, that means your job is ingrained in your subconscious so deeply, that it has become a part of you. Now that's not necessarily bad; that is, if you dream about the "good" stuff of your work or if you dream something that would make you suddenly wake and shout "EUREKA! I've found it!" or something, that's all fine and dandy. This is bad, however, if all you dream about are the stress and the other "nightmarish" part of work. You'll be more restless and susceptible to stress, which gets absorbed into your subconscious, then you dream more about it and it goes on and on and on in a vicious, seemingly never-ending cycle.
Personally, good or bad, I just want to leave work in the office altogether. When the clock strikes 5:30PM, by 5:31PM I should be already be on my way home. I won't let the work consume me beyond that time, unless there is really a need to extend.
You unintentionally miss your lunch and breaktimes. You are rooted in your seat so much that you lose track of time. By the time you remember you have to eat, you have already lost your appetite. Since you haven't eaten, you have even less energy and patience to resist stress and you will burnout that much sooner.
BTW, others see that missing eating times as a good way of saving money... Oh, come on!!!! Whatever you save on food will be spent on your hospitalization/treatments for your ulcer... or worse! So please... Unless you are a creature that doesn't have to eat anything, buy some food, okay?
You cannot focus on your work. You are at your desk, facing your monitor, your tasks for the day is lined up, and you know what to do. And yet, for some reason, you just sit there, stare at the monitor while there are a dozen ideas going on in your 'noggin, but still you have not done or accomplished any of those tasks.
Your brain is probably overloaded with a lot of information. Think of a PC reaching 100% CPU utilization; the PC appears to hang for a while. You are this PC! And your CPU is working overtime such that you appear to be hung, not able to do anything until some time has passed.
So what have you been thinking of, that has got 100% of your brain worked up?
You get a severe/critical health condition. This seems far-fetched, an exaggeration to emphasize effects of too much work; I just wish that this was indeed the case. :( Unfortunately, there really are STRESS-triggered ailments; I know of at least two people who have been affected so severely, they developed irreversible health problems.
This is perhaps the ultimate culmination of the effect of stress and burnout in your body. Don't wait for this to happen to you, okay?
If you are in this situation, either get rid of your condition (if possible), or change your work (change the working conditions, or leave the company outright).
These are all I can think of right now. I know I have missed a few points, but I think this post is long enough. :)
