Burnout in the Age of Productivity: Work, Freedom and Philosophy Modern Life

Why are we so exhausted when we have more freedom, convenience, and productivity tools than ever before? Burnout in the Age of Productivity explores burnout not simply as a problem of overwork or poor time management, but as a philosophical problem shaped by modern ideas about work, freedom, ambition, success, and identity. We are encouraged to treat life as an endless project of improvement. Careers must advance. Talents must be developed. Hobbies should become skills. Rest should improve performance. Even sleep now comes with a score. Drawing on thinkers including Aristotle, Marx, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Weber, Freud, Sartre, Camus, Hannah Arendt, Michel Foucault, René Girard, Charles Taylor, and Byung-Chul Han, the book examines how work became tied to identity, why freedom can create anxiety, how self-improvement turns into self-surveillance, and why modern life so often produces the feeling of being permanently behind. Along the way, it looks at alienation, choice, status, attention, technology, leisure, meaning, and the curious belief that every unused hour represents a minor administrative failure. This is a book about what burnout reveals-not only about work, but about the kind of life modern society has taught us to pursue.