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The mill of exhaustion

Do you remember Boxer, the horse from Animal Farm? That big, good-natured creature who turned the mill day and night, without ever asking why — or, at least, whether what he was building ultimately had any meaning for him. He believed that the solution to every problem was a little more work, a little more patience, a little more faith in the leaders.

While Orwell created him as a symbol of the working class, and with ever-increasing social inequalities, Generation Z cannot identify with him in this classic work. The lack of identification does not arise because this generation does not work, but because it realizes that the wheel can turn forever without producing anything substantial, It sees that silent faith does not save, that incessant productivity does not equal value, and that exhaustion is not a virtue. Orwell’s horse worked until it collapsed; the issue for today’s youth, these realizations, arise precisely because they are one step before, where the young burn out internally before they have to kneel.

Today, burnout takes the form of a young person faced with a set of responsibilities to fulfill, ultimately making burnout (a professional syndrome resulting from chronic work stress that has not been successfully addressed) the new norm. In a Cigna survey (2022), 91% of Gen Z employees report stress and 98% show symptoms of burnout. Although the WHO treats it as a crisis due to workload, this does not mean that the phenomenon is limited to the workplace, especially when technology blurs the boundaries between work and personal life, with every ping creating anxiety and constant posts “explosions” of creativity and achievements from others intensify the anxiety of comparison and the need for success. The relationship of young people with fatigue, stress, and social media as an influence on mental health is constantly being recorded. A study in the International Journal of Science and Research in 2025 shows that 75% of Gen Z report a negative impact of social media on their mental health, while 59% experience increased stress and anxiety due to digital pressure.

The phenomenon, beyond its collective dimensions, certainly characterizes the so-called West as a whole. According to APA Stress in America 2023, 58% of 18-34 year olds say that ” stress is completely overwhelming,” while 50% feel numb and 67% have difficulty concentrating. The main factors contributing to this picture are the post-effects of the pandemic, economic insecurity, isolation, and loneliness.

New times, old manners

Fatigue seems to be linked to a sense of disappointment, a disappointment in the idea that if you try hard enough, you will succeed, whereas now they see that mountains cannot be moved by willpower alone and that social mobility is practically non-existent. Furthermore, LinkedIn Workplace Insights data shows that Gen Z changes jobs 134% more often than before the pandemic, while 1 in 8 managers admit to firing them more often, citing “lack of preparation” and “resistance to feedback.” 

Their living conditions, meanwhile, no longer provide dignity. In major European cities, such as Spain, housing costs have risen by 70% since 2015, while wages remain stagnant. These conditions intensify collective demands for remote work or flexible hours, precisely to alleviate fatigue — not from work but from survival, for the sake of work, jobs that are not based on the productivity of workers but on the squandering of their personal capital, energy, financial and psychological. The consequence of this whole situation, existentially, in terms of young people’s goals, is now a house of cards that has collapsed, a generation living in constant tension, seeing their need for stability and survival constantly receding.

According to Forbes, most young employees seek “career advancement, challenge, and employer commitment to mental health and diversity,” but they find workplaces that continue to operate “with old models that favor productivity at the expense of well-being,” resulting in lower satisfaction and increased frustration, the first step toward burnout.

 

As per research from Youngstown State University, 43% of Gen Zers work full-time while also studying or attending a training program, trying to keep up with the changing job market. At the same time, nearly 50% say they feel “too exhausted to work,” while 76% consider the financial cost a major obstacle to their development, making the need for self-improvement more of a race for survival. Exhaustion is a symptom of a generation that is forced to be productive and balanced at the same time, to learn constantly but not have time to live, to be present everywhere and belong nowhere.

This feeling of fatigue is symptomatic of a generation that refuses to live chained to the rhythms of the mill. This generation, before it can even articulate it, demands the right to be lazy, become the norm, not laziness as idleness but the reclamation of life and time from the domination of work. When citizens have the freedom not to work constantly, they can also think, question, participate, that is, act democratically. The exhausted citizen of tomorrow cannot question the status quo, cannot be active and process information, cannot dream of “something else.” It is easier for them to follow easy solutions, simplistic recipes, populist offers that promise results (sic)without effort. Laziness, then, as an act of emancipation, acts as an antidote to alienation, opening up space for meaningful participation and political engagement. And this is perhaps the most radical demand of a generation that does not want to collapse in order to prove its worth.

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