This one’s serious, my friends. We’re talking about OVER EXERCISING and how it might be affecting YOU.
First, the disclaimer: I’m not a doctor or a therapist! I can’t diagnose you or treat you, but I’m very happy to open up a conversation with you about how and why over exercising is bad for your mind and your body.
While we chat about this tough topic and I share personal stories about MY experience with over exercise, let’s WALK at a gentle pace.
How do you know if you’re over exercising? If you think you are, you probably are! And if you’re not sure, here are some red flags:
- Exercising through injury or chronic pain that would be relieved if you stopped
- A feeling of compulsion, or that you “have to” work out
- Lack of motivation before or feelings of apathy when you’re done
- A set of “rules” that you feel like you need to follow
- Trouble at work, school or in your social life
I WHOLE-HEARTEDLY encourage you to seek ongoing professional help for this issue, and I have some suggestions for how you might move forward from here.
Recovering from over exercising can be approached in two different ways, depending on your personality and how you prefer to make changes in your life.
Method 1 (the Running Coach way):
- Treat it like an injury and stop exercising.
- After several weeks of complete rest to heal your body and your mind, return very cautiously to activity
- Build very slowly, with the goal of enjoying your workouts
Method 2 (the Health Coach way):
- Take baby steps toward changing your habits, starting with one day of rest
- Gradually reduce your overall intensity and volume of exercise
- Continue reducing your workouts and taking rest days until you find the right balance of enjoyment
No matter how you approach healing, the outcome is always the same: LOVING your workouts and loving YOURSELF.
Take this 20-minute WALK with you by downloading the audio-only podcast from Stitcher, Spotify, Google Play, iTunes , TuneIn or SoundCloud.
Or follow along with me in real time with the full-length video below.
Can’t see the workout? Click here to watch it on YouTube: https://youtu.be/FWx2aFWRF74
Thank you for walking with me today, Killer Bs – be sure to LIKE, COMMENT and SHARE this video or podcast with your friends.
