Discovering Photography After Digital Burnout
There's a quiet crisis happening in the lives of professionals that we don't talk about enough. It's what happens when your work stimulates your brain but starves your hands. When your days are filled with meetings and emails and digital documents that disappear into the cloud, never to be touched or held or seen in the physical world.
Burnout—a state of chronic exhaustion, cynicism, and reduced efficacy—has become endemic in our workforce. The constant notifications, back-to-back video calls, and endless stream of emails create a perfect storm of cognitive overload.
Our brains, evolved for a world of tangible interactions and natural rhythms, struggle to process the barrage of digital stimuli we subject them to daily.
Burnout and creative stagnation isn't just an individual problem—it's a collective condition, with the average knowledge worker spending approximately 28% of their day processing emails.
Our brains are starved of the opportunity to deeply focus or complete natural work cycles. Instead, we exist in a state of continuous partial attention, leaving us exhausted yet paradoxically feeling as though we've accomplished nothing tangible.
Research shows we're happier when we make things. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi calls it "flow"—that beautiful state where you're so absorbed in creating something that time seems to stop. Ken Robinson talks about finding your "element"—the place where passion and talent meet.
But how many of us actually experience these states in our daily digital work? And what to do about it?
My own story follows a familiar arc. On paper, I've checked all the boxes: stable career, good relationships, relative financial security. But something has been missing—a tangible connection to the world through creative work. My hands spend most of their time hovering over keyboards answering emails or designing documents for digital destinations. At the end of each workday, I found myself wondering: What did I actually create today?
The classic symptoms of burnout began to appear in my life: emotional exhaustion that left me depleted after work, a growing cynicism about my contributions, and a diminished sense of professional accomplishment despite external validation. Having studied burnout extensively during my PhD research, I recognized these warning signs.
What surprised me, however, was how specifically digital my burnout had become. I felt trapped in a two-dimensional world of screens, yearning for three-dimensional engagement with reality.
This yearning isn't about rejecting technology or digital work. It's about balance. It's about remembering that we're not just brains in vats—we're physical beings who evolved to interact with a material world. Our fingers want to touch things. Our eyes want to see the direct results of our efforts. Our souls want to leave marks on the world that won't disappear when the power goes out.
The antidote to digital burnout, I discovered, isn't necessarily less technology—it's more intentional engagement with the physical world. It's finding activities that engage different neural pathways and sensory systems than those overtaxed by our digital work.
My research on burnout had always pointed to the importance of future-oriented coping: deliberately putting resources in place today to help deal with potential stressors you might face tomorrow. This proactive approach creates psychological resilience reserves you can draw upon when needed. What became clear was that I needed more than just temporary relief; I needed a sustainable practice that would build my resilience while simultaneously satisfying that deep hunger for tangible creation. With this framework in mind, I began searching for a creative pursuit that could serve as both a protective factor against future burnout and a healing modality for my current state of digital depletion.
The Experimentation Phase
Most of us go through an "experimentation phase" when searching for creative fulfillment—that period of starting and stopping different hobbies, accumulating supplies, and feeling like a failure when none of them stick. But this isn't failure. It's research. It's your creative self conducting experiments to figure out what works for you.
My home contains evidence of these experiments. The linocutting tools and printing supplies now stored at the back of a high cupboard—creative but requiring too much setup and cleanup in my small apartment. The drawing pens that dried out after a brief period of enthusiasm—satisfying in their fluidity but lacking the technical depth I craved. The French language course that expired, largely unused—intellectually stimulating but not tactile enough. The life drawing class I attended exactly once—where the awkward dance between staring at a naked stranger and glancing down at my disfigured representation of his body left me feeling utterly defeated.
I used to see these abandoned pursuits as evidence of my inability to commit. Each unfinished project whispered accusations: You're flighty. You lack discipline. You waste money on things you never follow through with.
But one afternoon, while reorganizing my closet, I had a revelation. The cupboard housing art supplies in my home isn't a "graveyard of abandoned projects" as I initially thought. It's a laboratory. Each abandoned medium taught me something important about what I needed, which is:
Portability: Something creative I could do in small spaces and take with me on my travels
Affordability: Not so expensive that the investment itself creates pressure
Creative flexibility: Many ways to express myself within one medium
Intellectual engagement: Enough technical challenge to keep my analytical mind busy
Social potential: Opportunities to connect with others, not just create in isolation
When I looked at these failed experiments as data points rather than character flaws, a pattern emerged. I wasn't a dilettante jumping from hobby to hobby—I was systematically (if unconsciously) working my way toward the right fit. And while this reframing conveniently justifies the accumulated expenses and hours invested, it also revealed something genuine: all signs pointed to photography.
Why Creative Practice Matters
Why does creative practice matter so much? And why do we feel its absence so deeply? This isn't just about hobbies or pastimes—it speaks to something fundamental about being human.
Abraham Maslow, the psychologist behind the well-known hierarchy of needs—a theory with strong intuitive appeal but one that's often questioned in academic circles—placed creative expression at the pinnacle of his pyramid. Once our basic needs are met—food, shelter, safety, love—we naturally seek self-actualization. And for many, that includes creativity. That persistent sense that something's missing? If we go along with Maslow's view, it could be your psyche telling you it's time to make something.
There's also a deeply social dimension to creative practice. The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu spoke of "cultural capital"—the knowledge, skills, and tastes that enable us to connect with others. Learning photography, for instance, isn't just about taking pictures; it's about joining a community, developing a shared language, and forging connections through collective appreciation.
At its most profound, creating something is an act of self-affirmation. The philosopher Martin Heidegger referred to this as Dasein—a concept roughly translated as "being there" or presence. When you make something tangible, you're saying: I was here. I noticed this. This mattered to me. Photography is especially powerful in this sense—it captures fleeting moments of existence that would otherwise be lost to time.
Finding a creative practice is about meeting a fundamental human need—one that our digital, knowledge-based jobs too often leave unmet.
The Decision Point
So there I was, drawn to photography but overwhelmed by where to start. The sheer volume of courses, genres, and styles made my head spin. Unlike choosing a phone plan or which dishwasher detergent works best, there's no Consumer Reports for creative fulfillment. I was stepping into what decision theorists call "decisions under uncertainty"—where outcomes are unknown and the path unpredictable.
Faced with this creative abundance, how does anyone choose?
I could have lost months in research paralysis, but that's not how human brains typically work. Herbert Simon, a psychologist who studied decision-making, observed that we "satisfice"—we don't hunt for the perfect option but settle for one that meets our basic criteria and feels right. For me, this meant finding a course with a solid curriculum that fit my schedule and wouldn't break the bank.
Discover the photography course I signed up for in my previous blog post: Want To Learn Photography? Choosing Between Formal Education & YouTube Tutorials
There was also something comforting about photography's familiarity. I'd always admired striking images in galleries, magazines, and online. Photography didn't feel as alien as, say, taking up glassblowing or blacksmithing.
I could see myself with a camera in hand, framing moments in the world around me. I could imagine the tactile satisfaction of adjusting settings, the intellectual challenge of mastering light and composition, and the joy of holding printed images—tangible evidence of my way of seeing.
The Power of Commitment
There's a world of difference between wanting to do something and actually doing it. I'd been thinking about photography for months, browsing camera courses online, following photographers on Instagram, and imagining myself capturing stunning images.
But thinking isn't doing.
Robert Cialdini, a psychologist who studies influence, has found that public commitments dramatically increase the likelihood that we'll follow through on our intentions. That's why I didn't just buy a camera—I signed up for a class. Enrolling wasn't just about learning skills; it was about creating a "commitment device"—a structure that helps overcome inertia.
The financial investment in a photography course creates a "sunk cost" that motivates participation. The scheduled class time eliminates the decision fatigue of figuring out when to practice. The presence of other students introduces gentle social pressure to show up and engage.
We're All Searching for Something Tangible
My creative crisis isn't happening in isolation. Look around at your friends and colleagues. Notice how many of them have taken up sourdough baking, woodworking, ceramics, gardening, or other hands-on hobbies in recent years. This isn't a coincidence.
The sociologist Zygmunt Bauman calls our era "liquid modernity"—a time when traditional structures have melted away, leaving us to construct our own identities and meaning. For most of human history, creative expression was built into daily work—crafting furniture, preparing food, building shelter, making clothes. People created tangible things as part of survival. Yet, today, many of us work in jobs completely disconnected from physical creation. We manipulate abstract information, send digital communications, and produce work that exists only as pixels on screens.
Is it any wonder we're collectively hungry to make things we can touch?
Photography occupies a fascinating middle ground in this landscape. It's both art and technology, subjective and objective, digital and physical. It requires both technical understanding and aesthetic sensibility. For someone like me—analytically minded but creatively hungry and digitally burned out—it offers the perfect blend of technical challenge and artistic expression.
What makes photography particularly effective as a remedy for digital burnout is its unique combination of engagement with technology on your own terms while simultaneously forcing presence in the physical world.
Unlike the reactive nature of responding to emails or notifications, photography puts me in control of the technology (well, at least as my current skill set extends to facilitating that goal). I decide when to capture an image, how to frame it, what settings to use. The camera becomes an extension of my creative vision rather than a demanding taskmaster.
Meanwhile, to take good photographs, I need to be present in my physical surroundings—noticing light, composition, moments, and details that a burnout-addled brain typically filters out in our rush from one digital task to another.
The Sweet Anticipation
In the days before Thursday's class, I find myself in a state of anticipation.
There's a name for this psychological space—the "anticipatory moment"—that magical time between making a decision and taking action, when all possibilities still exist perfectly in your mind. This moment has its own special pleasure, different from both the satisfaction of mastery and the joy of being in creative flow. It's the pleasure of pure potential, of standing at the threshold of a new experience. Interestingly, research shows that this anticipatory pleasure often exceeds the pleasure of the experience itself. This explains both the appeal of planning new ventures and the peril of becoming addicted to new beginnings without following through.
I recognize this pattern in myself—the thrill of starting something new often followed by the disappointment of abandonment. But this time feels different. Photography isn't just another experiment; it feels like the culmination of all my previous creative explorations. It feels like coming home to something I didn't know I was looking for.
Toward the First Class
The camera sits on my kitchen table—an object of both promise and intimidation–ready to be picked up and taken to class. Its weight feels significant.
I have a notebook and a pen.
I'm ready—nervous, but ready.
Tonight is the night that I attend my first photography lesson.
And maybe, just maybe, it's also the first step toward finding that missing piece of myself—the piece that needs to create, to see, to connect.
Wish me luck!
Thanks for being part of my journey,
Bron x
