On Sunday we were at the Yoga and Wellness Festival.
It was great to connect with people like you who are interested in better health and a better quality of life.
One of the people I met, Dr. Thomson, is a Naturopath in Guelph focused on mindset, mental health, and stress.
We were talking about the benefits of exercise on stress and mental health and she shared something really, really interesting with me.
It’s well known that exercise is one of the best tools we have for managing stress and improving mental health.
- It lowers cortisol, your stress hormone
- It improves sleep, giving you more energy throughout the day
- It improves mood via endorphins and other bran chemicals
- And if increases energy and resilience to stress over time
As is always the case, the research is 5-10 years behind. It takes time to know why something happens.
According to the research Dr. Thomson shared, the benefits specifically relate to how you push yourself in the gym.
As it turns out, there is a direct link between pushing yourself in the gym – adding weight over time with progressive overload, getting 1 more rep than you did last time, and just giving that extra 1% effort – and your mental health.
It seems that physically pushing yourself in the gym develops mental resiliency and can contribute to curing burnout.
Here’s an example
- Person A does the same workout with the same weights and the same reps 3x per week. They don’t change anything for 3 months, they like their routine, and they are staying healthy and active.
- Person B does the same workout as Person A for 6 weeks, but every week they try to do a bit more weight or a few more reps. They pushed themselves every week. Not to the point of failure or injury, just to do a little bit more. After 6 weeks, they adjust their program (like our coaches do for you at LSFW) so it’s a “same, but different”, and try to progress on that program by adding weight and reps over time.
In both cases, the workout was appropriately challenging for the first few weeks.
But it gets easier to do the same reps and weight over time because their bodies adapt to the stimulus via getting stronger and building muscle, improving their endurance, and improving their cardiovascular system.
By the end of 3 months, Person A isn’t really working that hard anymore. It’s easy for them.
Conversely, Person B pushed themselves just a little bit on every workout, and adjusted the exercises over time. They never fully adapted to the program so it still felt challenging every week.
According to Dr. Thomson, Person A still gets a gold star for being active but they don’t get the same benefits for mental health and stress management.
Person B is developing mental resilience through physical fitness, and because they are pushing themselves, they have better stress management, a lower likelihood of burnout (or if they were feeling burnt out, it may be significantly improved), and greater physical benefits.
Simply “exercising” isn’t enough.
There needs to be progression over time so your body always feels challenged, which will help calm your mind.
For some of you who like to see the progress you can make in the gym, this may not feel like a massive revelation.
You’ve probably been feeling the benefits already and I’m preaching to the choir.
But if you are one of those people who does the same thing with the same effort day after day, a small amount more effort gives a disproportionate return on results.
And it’s more than just physical benefits.
The effort and resilience you show in the gym directly translates to the effort and resilience you have mentally, reduces stress, and gives life a greater sense of ease.
You can simply handle more with less stress.
And if you are feeling stressed or burnt out, it might be as simple as pushing yourself physically – even if that feels like that’s the last thing you want to do.
Your body – and more importantly, your mind – will thank you.
If you want some help with the exercise piece, click HERE to book a call with our team
