Although there is no final agreement among scholars and researchers as to what burn out actually is, many of us have somehow felt totally burned out. And even if there is no conclusive definition, there are some widely accepted signs of a burn out which mirror those of a chronic stress response. It’s like our guest speaker Viviane Gisler cleverly illustrated; acute street is a short term immediate response to a life threatening situation, such as a bear attacking us around a camp fire. The other type of stress, the chronic kind, is like hundreds of ‘little bears’ pursuing us around all day, never really immediately life threatening, but as Viviane pointed out, definitely cause for concern in the long run. There is no easy cure for burn out, other than being able to find that delicate balance. There are apparently four areas that we should each try to balance: Work, Social Interaction, Private (Hobbies and things we like to do) and Downtime (which does include sleep, but not only!) It became immediately clear to me that I am seriously missing out on Downtime, since I never considered it a vital area of my life in need of balancing. Thanks to Viviane I spend a very relaxing weekend, with plenty of downtime and for the first time guilt free!