It took me a really long time to get rid of these thoughts, not because I have trouble purging unwanted thoughts (this is something I have extensive practice in), but because they didn't seem unwanted. They seemed quite important! Burnout was the biggest problem in my life, so it seemed only natural that I should think about it all the time. I would think to myself, "I have to fix burnout! I must constantly try to optimize everything related to this! Maybe if I rearrange the desks in my office I won't be burnt out anymore." I thought, for a long time, that this was "optimization" and "problem solving". It took a depressingly long time for me to identify it for what it really was, which is just plain old stress and worry.

Bingo. When you have a seemingly intractable problem, always remember to ask yourself if what you're trying to do to solve the problem is making it worse. That's where intractable problems come from.