Last week, I wrote about how The Smothering Grind of Life drives us into burnout – a state of emotional, mental, and physical exhaustion.

But here’s the sobering truth: The Grind is not content with simply exhausting us. While it loves to render you useless with burnout, it wants to destroy everything you’ve built and the things which matter to you the most.

The Grind wants you to flame out.

Pushing you toward self-sabotage, moral compromise, and total collapse, The Grind reels you into flameout so it can ruin your relationships, your career, and your integrity.

We all know what flameout looks like. You become unfaithful within your marriage. You embezzle money (even in subtle ways). You abuse the power with which you’ve been entrusted. You fully succumb to addiction. Any and all of these ends are possible as you make choices that sacrifice your relationships, your meaning, and your purpose.

The emotional signs the Grind has you heading towards flameout may include:

• Entitled Resentment: You feel unappreciated, like you’re not receiving what you deserve. This bitterness may lead you to think the rules don’t apply to you or that you are justified in breaking them.
• Unhealthy Deconstruction: You lose faith in your beliefs, values, calling, or other things you once believed in.
• Recklessness: You have a growing sense of indifference. You start creating and believing a narrative that there is no point in trying, which leads to poor decision making.
• Despair: You’re plagued by a deep sense of inadequacy or imposter syndrome. Failure seems inevitable. You can’t escape toxic shame and feelings of worthlessness.
• Internal Conflict: You’re embroiled in an ongoing conflict between two competing desperations – the call to stay faithful and responsible vs. the desire to chase relief, pleasure, or escape.

These Grind flameout symptoms show up, they also begin to manifest physically: adrenaline dependency (running on stress, and constantly chasing highs such as success, excitement, or even risk), neglect of your body (skipping meals, sleep, or exercise), or compulsive indulgence (overeating, drinking, or seeking physical pleasure in ways that snowball).

But that’s not all. Subsequent symptoms of suppressed guilt from these behaviors may follow: stomach pain, migraines, excessive work, over-exercising, etc.

Physical recklessness may also emerge as a sign—driving too fast, extreme risk-taking, or neglecting safety in small but telling ways.

To cope, we begin to betray our truest self by turning a deaf ear to the Holy Spirit and our inner man, effectively silencing that secret tide of tenderness. Soon the ability to hear the gentle loving voice within fades, opening the way to justify small compromises. It starts by cutting small ethical corners, keeping secrets, and rationalizing small indulgences.

Continuing the downward slide towards flameout, the next phase involves pulling away from people who know us deeply in avoidance of accountability.

Finally, a shroud covering our truest self is created, effectively masking our new self-betraying secret habits, including but not limited to online behaviors, private financial decisions, or hidden relationships.

When you’re being reeled into flameout, a trickle becomes a torrent before you even notice the storm, washing away everything you love.

But hear this: flameout is not inevitable. The Grind would like you to think so, because it wants to keep you snowballing down that path to destruction. He whispers in your ear that it’s too late, that you’ve passed the point of no return.

He’s lying.

Here’s the truth:

You are loved. (Yes, even when you can’t hear the gentle voice.)

I’m for you.

You’ve got this. And if any of those symptoms feel true to you, reach out to us. We’re here to help you stand up to The Grind and protect the things that matter the most to you.