Are you resting enough between your sessions? The last thing
anybody wants to do when you are busting your butt to get in shape or shatter
your personal goals is to take a day or two off to rest. A big misconception is
if I take time off from exercising I am not improving, but this statement could
not be any further from the truth. It is extremely important to not only rest
your body physically but also mentally.
If you are increasing muscular strength and incorporating a
weight lifting regiment I would not suggest lifting more than 5 days a week or
working out a particular muscle group twice within a 48 hour time period.
Lifting weights puts stress on your muscles that create microscopic tears in
your muscle that need time to repair. It is important to understand that you do
not increase muscle strength when you are throwing the weights around in the
gym, but rather when you are in your deep sleep or chowing down on whole foods.
I find it best to incorporate a 2 to 3 day continuous rest period every week,
by taking these long breaks you are giving your body ample amount of time to
repair any deep tears in the muscle that are still in the process of being
repaired. I have also learned by trial and error that taking 6 or 7 days off
every couple of months will completely change your mental aptitude of exercising,
taking these long bouts reinforce how important fitness is to you and why you
work so hard to become better.
Not only is it important to rest but to rest with purpose.
If you are just taking days off from exercising and spend your entire day
eating junk food sitting on the couch and staying up late drinking and partying
you will not see any progress. It is important to get at least 8 hours of
sleep, if you are just getting 4 or even 6 hours of sleep your body does not
reach its Rem cycle also know as the deep cycle of sleep in which your body is
repaired at an accelerated rate.Your muscles are not the only part of your body
that needs rest after heavy lifting session or intense exercise regiments. Your
brain is taxed nearly just as much as the muscles you are punishing in the gym.
The brain needs just as much rest and sleep as your sore muscles, when you
reach the 8 hour sleep threshold you regain your alertness and drive that helps
push through the most intense of workouts.
Consuming whole foods with nutritional values in your diet
is just as important as the physical sleep you get. Eating fatty junk food on
your rest days will instantly turn to excess weight since there is no immediate
exercise taking place to burn the calories off. Make sure to eat a high protein
diet with healthy fats that are found in foods such as eggs and avocados. I
find it very helpful to find some sort of light exercise to occupy your fitness
craze on the rest days such as biking, hiking or going for a long walk around a
park or neighborhood.
If you make an effort to take the time off from the gym and
get some good quality rest in you will come back to your workouts with a tank
full of energy and the mental preparedness to set all sorts of personal records
whether you are lifting a new record weight or completing more reps than you
thought possible. Get all of those Z's in and you will be ready take on any
fitness summits you have out there looking down on you!
Taking care of your body and striving to be the healthiest
person you can be is one of the most important duties in all of our lives, I
have created "Fitness Summit Journey" to help all sorts of
individuals realize their fitness dreams and to supply the necessary tools to
achieve these goals and dreams.
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