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My experience with burnout doesn't really gel with this. I find map lookup style tasks as you describe them pretty draining and the reasoning tasks relatively more energising.

But generally what actually causes burnout for me is a sense of pointlessness, that the work is nothing but the pay because it's, for example, just some B2B finance adjacent system or something.

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Great comments from both of you. I will also add the (unsupportive) environment and uncertainty for the future as major factors IMHO.

One should also consider the "outside" environment. We jumped from covid right into war without a break in between and now we are being told that we will be replaced by AI, while expecting the stock market to crash and increase unemployment. Ah and also the inflation (wage reduction) that has been going on for the last five years and doesn't show a sign of stopping.

I don't think thats burnout, its more like apathy. I am the same way. When I worked for Amazon, I spend half sundays writing scripts that almost automated my map look up tasks (like stuff for oncall)

Burnout is when you are overworked with regular activities that you see no other way to accomplish.

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