burnout isn’t the price of impact...
For founders, funders, builders pretending they’re fine.
Read time: 5 min
Can we talk about burnout?
I know.
Summer’s here.
Some of you are finally booking that long-overdue vacation, taking that first deep breath in months.
Good.
Do it.
But that’s not what I’m here for.
We talk about sustainability every day.
Climate. Energy. Food. Water.
But when it comes to our own lives?
Completely
fucking
unsustainable.
I’m not talking about plastic. Or red meat.
I’m talking about founders and investors and activists who are chronically burnt, quietly depressed, and still sprinting like the next win will fix it all.
It won’t.
Let’s be real:
Who planted the idea that pushing ourselves to the edge of collapse was heroic?
Don’t get me wrong, I love the push.
Sprints. Deep focus. Shipping something truly epic.
That high is addictive.
But here’s what no one tells you:
Those wins come with scars.
Tiny at first.
Then deeper.
And after a decade of working like this? You don’t just feel tired.
You feel... disconnected.
Like you can’t even recognize who you’ve become.
You stop feeling proud. You stop feeling much of anything at all.
And the worst part?
You won’t even realize you’re burnt out.
Not until it becomes depression.
You’ll just keep “delivering.”
Keep optimizing.
Keep pretending you love what you do.
Until you hate it.
And yourself.
That’s where I’ve been.
And no, this isn’t the prelude to shutting down Climate Insiders. I love what I do.
But how I’ve done it?
It’s hurt.
Not once. Not twice. But over years.
Because I ignored the warning signs until they became warning systems.
Let’s get clear:
Burnout isn’t a phase.
It’s a slow leak of purpose.
A quiet suffocation.
And this is the part no one wants to admit:
We chase titles like “Founder of X” or “Investor in Y” hoping they’ll heal us.
They won’t.
Because most of that pursuit is just performance.
Trying to prove to the world (and to yourself) that you matter.
But the “arrival fallacy” is real.
There’s no mountaintop.
No final win that makes it all make sense.
You blink and realize the peak passed you years ago, and you didn’t even stop to feel it.
So what do we do?
We stop trying to outrun the emptiness.
We stop glamorizing burnout.
We stop treating humans like servers to scale.
And we start building a new model of leadership.
Not the “go big or go home” Silicon Valley cult.
Not the speed-obsessed “scale or die” grind.
But leaders who last.
Who enjoy the craft.
Who can still look in the mirror and like the person staring back.
We need founders who stay in the game because they love it.
Not because they’re trying to outrun something broken inside.
We need investors who don’t just optimize for 20x, but for 20 years.
The kind who know that how you build is as important as what you build.
We need a new archetype.
Sustainable humans. Building a sustainable world.
That’s the only way any of this is worth it.
Be that founder. Be that investor.
Love your craft, and most of all, love yourself. You’re too precious.
If you're feeling this in your bones, if you're ready to build without breaking, check this out:
Build & Thrive by Accelerate Health.
It’s a 4-month founder experience for impact-driven people who want to lead without losing themselves.
No fluff. No productivity hacks.
Just deep, somatic leadership work. Mental clarity. Science-backed performance.
For founders with ties to Germany. 20 spots only.
Deadline: June 30th.
→ Apply here.
(Not sponsored. Just something I believe in.)
P.S. Fabian from Overstory is still offering free 15-min consults to founders looking to refresh their brand.
He’s a rare one: a designer who walked away from AI and SaaS clients to focus entirely on impact projects. Climate. Water. Energy. The stuff that matters.
He’s not here to sell you trends. He’s here to help you build a brand that actually closes rounds.
If you're raising and want to look like you belong in the room with serious capital.
👉 Free 15-min consult with Fabian. No pitch. Just clarity.
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