Fitness burnout: You want to workout, but your body says “count me out”

Fitness burnout is so real. It can happen to anyone, and it’s not a cool experience to be in. If you’ve been feeling drained, tired, disinterested, or just not motivated to work out, you’re most likely dealing with fitness burnout. 

But it’s not because you’re lazy or indisciplined; it’s simply due to you not paying enough attention to what your body is telling you. You’re still “trying” but not “listening”. 

Working out is great, but taking care of yourself is not debatable. 

Fitness burnout signs

• Feeling a persistent tiredness, whereby you feel tired all the time, and it’s more than feeling tired physically.

• You get easily irritated or annoyed. Things easily annoy you, and you become short-tempered. 

• When someone brings up something related to fitness, it annoys you, and you just don’t want to hear it. No uh. 

• There is zero motivation to work out. You open your wardrobe, and you can see your gym clothes. But you don’t care. Your workout shoes? Yeah,h they can sit there all they want. You simply have no energy to exercise at all. 

• You’re not bothered about eating healthy. You aren’t making efforts to have healthy meals anymore. Whatever comes your way, you eat. 

OH, is it depression?

It could be. However, signs of depression are much deeper. You’re probably just burnt out from working out and trying to be fit. Depression is a mental health issue, and it usually affects a person’s life in general. Fitness burnout is simply no energy to exercise, but you’re doing just fine in other areas of your life. And it is usually temporary. 

Why Fitness Burnout Happens 

1 . You pushed yourself too hard and too fast, without getting enough rest to recover. Overexertion is not good for you, and this is what you did: you simply did too much.

2. “ I’m going to do 1 thousand jump ropes every day.” Ah, but you’re new to skipping rope? Or I’m going to weight train 45 minutes every day for the next 4 months.” 

This is cool and all, but it’s unrealistic. If you set goals like this, that aren’t realistic or unattainable, you’ll eventually get burned out. It’s nice to be ambitious, but being too ambitious won’t do you any good. This is likely why you’re burnt out from working out. 

3 . You’re not caring for yourself enough by neglecting your mental and emotional well-being. Lack of self-care may also be the reason you’re burnt out from exercising. 

But you can prevent yourself from experiencing fitness burnout.

How To Prevent Fitness Burnout

1 . This one is obvious, but always get some rest. And not just any rest, but a guilt-free rest. If you’re already noticing the signs, you should take some time off to chill and see how things go. 

2 . Rest when your body tells you to. Don’t push through the pain or exhaustion you may be feeling. Even if it is telling you to take a few days off, take a few days off.

3 . Stop thinking about the calories you could’ve burned today. Missing a few days when you needed to is not going to ruin your efforts. You have all the time to resume exercising, so don’t worry about all that. 

4 . Take care of yourself by making time for things you like, and things that help your mind and body relax. It could be meditation, writing down your thoughts, or even writing a story, reading novels, or going outside, that can help you feel a lot better. 

5 . Be fair about your goals; Set reachable targets, it doesn’t mean that they can’t be challenging. They still can, but healthily, so you don’t burn out. 

6 . Have other things in mind aside from working out, like your hobbies, school, work, home, and so on. It’s not healthy to become too absorbed in exercising, where nothing else matters to you. Your life is more than the gym. 

At the end of the day, prevention is key, so make sure you put these things in mind. That said, you’ve got this; you just need to pay attention to your physical and mental well-being.