Time, the Silent Hunter: How I broke my Burnout Cycle

When I was in high school, everyone said just work hard now and you will be free later, you will have time then to do what you want. When I went to university, everyone said just work hard now and you will be free later. They said the same in grad school, and at my first job. But soon I realized it was all a lie.

Do you ever feel like time is slipping through your fingers — wasted on endless scrolling, exhausting workdays, and sleepless nights — while your dreams remain untouched? I did too. Burnout wasn’t just a phase; it was a cycle I couldn’t escape. Until one day, I stumbled upon wisdom in an ancient text that transformed how I saw time, control, and purpose.

One night I dozed off, consumed by the question: When will I ever find time to do what I truly want? When I woke up, I instinctively scrambled to charge my devices, as most of us do. My eyes fell on the long, coiled cable lying on the floor, and for a split second, I thought it was a snake. Once I plugged in, I knew what awaited me — eight hours of being drained, followed by another round of fumbling back for a few hours of mindless entertainment. Tired, sleep-deprived, and frustrated with the relentless cycle, it hit me: this is where my time was slipping away — my precious life, wasted.

For months, I found myself on a rollercoaster of emotions: cheering myself on one moment — ‘Yes, you can do it!’ — only to feel crushed by exhaustion or disheartened by my inability to make time for what I truly wanted. The cycle felt endless, like sprinting toward the same wall, hoping it would somehow turn into a springboard for success. It didn’t. I was drained, disillusioned, and beginning to suspect that I was caught in what they call a downward spiral. This wasn’t sustainable — it was burnout & traumatic.

“You just make time” — great mantra but unless you have a time machine or lots of money to hire someone to do your stuff — it can push you further down the pit of feeling inadequate.

Suffering, I questioned — who has ever seen this work? Part of trauma is you want to run away, but tired of running away and the utter foolishness of basing my life on a principle I have never seen work in anyone’s life…I decided I will face the trauma.

I could hear the lyrics of one of my childhood favorite songs by Bangles ring in my head

It’s just another manic MondayI wish it was Sunday’Cause that’s my fun day

That’s it, I didn’t want to live my life Sunday to Sunday anymore — I wanted more. Frustrated by modern-day axioms like ‘you just make time’ and the havoc they cause, I turned to ancient wisdom. I began exploring time-tested solutions — secrets found in the yoga knowledge of the East that have stood the test of millennia.

I had made up my mind — I am going to dare, dare to be not like everyone else, so I can be me.

So, I started on a new journey into Yoga knowledge of the east, especially Shrimad Bhagavatam. Among the 18,000 mantras in the Shrimad Bhagavatam, I found the story of Prahlad, a five-year-old prince and transcendentalist. While I was starting my journey at 22, he was daring to be different at just 5 years old. His friends, puzzled by his choices, asked him why he was different. In three mantras, he explained the mathematics of time that shaped his perspective:

puṁso varṣa-śataṁ hy āyus, tad-ardhaṁ cājitātmanaḥ

At best we live for a 100 years puṁso varṣa-śataṁ hy āyus and half of it is wasted for one who has not mastered their senses. How so? He goes on to explain how their nights are completely wasted in deep darkness…in other words śete ’ndhaṁ prāpitas tamaḥ completely absorbed in ignorance forgetting your identity, body, mind everything. I could relate to that; he was onto something. According to surveys, humans spend about a third of their lives sleeping and Americans spend more than 2 hours per day on social media.

So, I read on as little Prahlad goes on to explain how we spend almost the first twenty years of our life completely bewildered — mugdhasya. Why? Because we are lost enjoying youth childhood just playing. And then the last twenty years he explains we have a body that gripped by old age — jarayā grasta-dehasya. What is the special feature of this time — Akalpasya — without determination, inability to perform even basic tasks. This is something I had observed before but I had also read that according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), nearly 43% of adults aged 80 and over experience physical limitations, with about 27% having three or more such limitations. I could tell the young boy was onto something that I wanted to know.

I scribbled some numbers to do my own math — I asked myself, how long do I think I will be around. I chose the age of 90 — and then started to do the math. Minus the first and the last 20, I am left with 50 years. I subtracted half for sleeping and scrolling, and that leaves me with 25. And then you throw into the mix statistics like “The average person spends 90,000 hours of their life working (roughly a third of their lifetime).” And the best people can offer while judging you is — you just make time! How? I was determined to find the answer.

Walking down the cold empty, snow-covered streets, I could see only a few people who were out to walk their dogs. As I saw them pull on the leash trying to drag their pets in different directions — I wondered if while people are busy exerting control on other living and non-living things/people/animals — do they ever stop to think about the deadly control time is exerting over us?

For this we first have to understand the two-fold illusion of time.

There is time

We live our lives like we would live forever, we make plans into the future, confident that we will live to realize them.

I have some control to exert

If I make the right moves, put in the right effort, I will get what I want.

And this two-fold illusion of time, keep us going non-stop, with deep faith — more, more, more….and then I will be happy

As the yoga texts describe, apramatta idaḿ paśyed. You can only see when your material fever has come down a bit, when the madness starts to settle then you can see “idam pasyed”. See what — the whole world is in the grip of time — grastaḿ kālāhinā jagat. What happens when you see that — nirvidyeta yadākhilāt — you develop some detachment from this manifested world and its ups and downs along with your fervent attempt to “grab a piece of the pie”. You become sober.

The question then is how to bring down the material fever, how to become sober and make sober choices?

The key lies in the wisdom of Bhagavad Gita — the most ancient and globally accepted Yoga classic.

Nirbandha Krishna Sambandha

Learn how to do everything, so that it brings you closer to the Supreme.

Time is the silent hunter, and most of us unknowingly become its prey, chasing goals that leave us feeling empty. But the wisdom of ancient yoga texts taught me something life-changing: freedom doesn’t come from creating more time but from transforming how we live each moment.

Start small: swap mindless scrolling for a mindful mantra, or turn a routine meal into a conscious, spiritual act. Instead of losing yourself in Netflix, grab the ancient yoga classic, Bhagavad Gita, and start exploring its time-tested wisdom. It’s not about adding more to your day; it’s about transforming how you approach what’s already there. The path to freedom begins when you dare to step off the beaten track and reclaim your life. Will you take the first step today?