Burnout and the Hero’s Journey: Rethinking success for overachievers

Burnout doesn’t always look like failure. Sometimes, it looks like doing everything “right” — and still feeling exhausted, lost, or behind.

In this episode, former PumaPodcast producer Jyn Garcia revisits her own experience with early-career burnout through the lens of the Hero’s Journey, a storytelling framework popularized by Joseph Campbell. Drawing from her background in screenwriting and film studies, Jyn reflects on what happens when the mindset that once drove success — constant achievement, perfectionism, and measurable milestones — starts to fall apart.

By weaving together personal storytelling and narrative theory, this episode explores burnout not as an ending, but as a turning point: the “abyss” that forces a shift in how we define progress, purpose, and self-worth.

If you’ve ever felt pressured to keep pushing, worried about being “behind,” or struggled to let go of overachiever habits, this episode offers a different way to understand where you are, and where you might be headed next.

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