I am going to guess that you are very much like myself and very committed to your training. You have your training plan and want to stick to that training plan. You want to perform well every single day you are training. When things don’t go your way with your training, you get frustrated.
And then it leaves you asking “Why.” Why am I fatigued? What is wrong with my body? What is wrong with me? Why don’t things feel right? And that can easily lead into the deeper frustration questions. Is the training I’m doing too much for me? Am I going to be able to train properly for the races I want to do? Am I cut out for this?
Luckily, there is often a good answer for the fatigue we feel and the answer is not that you are not cut out for it. There are a lot of things that play into how our bodies feel when we train.
Today, I want to dive into a specific one…Life Stress!!!
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First, I want to share a story with you…
I love my routines. I have my morning routine for personal development followed by my gym time. I like to say my routines are how I function best, which is mostly true. I am finding, though, that sometimes I need to break that routine based on what life throws at me occasionally.
Recently, I had a day that life threw me a huge curveball. I have learned that when I let the stress build up, it does not go well for me mentally or physically. My training suffers. My relationships suffer. My business suffers.
Because of that, I broke my routine. I stayed home from the gym and spent some time writing out my thoughts to clear my head. After that, I went for a nice meditative walk in the cool, dark morning. It was exactly what I needed to heal my body, mind, and spirit.
It may not have been on the plan for my training, but my training and competing will be so much better because I took the time to clear the stress.
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We all have stress in our lives, both good stress and bad stress. As stress adds up, especially the bad stress, both our mental selves and physical selves are negatively impacted.
When talking about performance…
- You notice strength deficits, not being able to hit weights you previously could.
- You find yourself moving slower during workouts or needing to take more breaks.
- You realize your pace has slowed down when running, even though you feel like you are going the same speed and using the same energy.
- You just don’t have the energy or mindset to push through your workout.
Personally, I have noticed all of those at one point in time when I have situations that are causing high stress in my life. Most clients I work with experience that same things when dealing with stressful situations in life.
In full disclosure, I can honestly say when I didn’t understand all this, I got very frustrated with my sudden declines in performance, as do my clients until we talk about the situation and dive into what is going on in their lives.
When this happens, it is important to listen to the body rather than get frustrated with what is going on. Depending on what you are feeling, what you do on a given day in response to how you are feeling may change. It could simply mean using lighter weights or allowing yourself to slow down and not push as hard. It may mean ditching the plan written down and instead going for an easy run or walk. Or maybe you take a day to just do some mobility work or take a full rest day. Whatever your body is telling you to do that day, do that! You will come out better in the end, I promise!
Are more questions coming up about your training as you read this? Let’s chat to help you sort through it all. Feel free to schedule a call with me!
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