Revitalize Your Workout Routine: The Importance of Lightening Up

We often want to push beyond what we did yesterday. Lift more weight, perform more reps, or jack up the intensity. If we’re not moving forward, we’re either standing still or moving backwards.

It’s the pursue-your-goals-at-any-cost mentality.

I don’t blame us humans. It’s in our DNA to strive for better; better food, better shelter, better circumstances. But this breakneck mindset can’t go on indefinitely. We will eventually run into a wall. A big honkin’ concrete wall. The rough type of concrete our childhood driveways were made out of that would make our feet feel like they had a thick leather belt strapped to their bottoms.

Once we get ourselves back on our feet, we scratch our heads and wonder what the heck happened.

You may need to back off, my friend. But not only for the reasons you’re thinking of, like overtraining.

Here’s what I like to do when I’m feeling burned out. Take a few days off–not a week, just a few days, so I don’t go into full-on I’m-not-training-for-a-while-so-I’ll-just-eat-whatever-and-get-back-at-it-later mode. I take off just enough time to mentally miss training.

Next, and here’s the whole top secret master plan I only want you to know, I reduce all my weight loads by 5 to 15 pounds. I then proceed to start over with my form on all lifts. I go into full-on textbook mode with form and technique.

The lighter loads enable me to slow the rep cadence, reestablish a full range of motion, and extensively feel every inch of the movement.

For example, on the basic barbell biceps curl. I’ll hold the bar a bit in front of me so I can get a full stretch of the biceps. I then curl up while mentally flexing my biceps, the entire range of motion. In other words, I don’t just let the weight contract the muscle–I consciously contract the whole way up. I squeeze at the top and then lower the weight much the same way–slowly and purposely tensing on the way down.

I do this for every movement to help reestablish that mental connection and to prevent future injuries.

The results? I get an incredible pump and thorough stimulation of the muscle without any strain on my joints. Every workout afterwards will follow suit as I steadily and gradually increase weight, reps, or both. It’s a process, but well worth it.

Think of it like a tune-up. Every now and then you need to give your lifts an audit, so swallow your pride, lighten the load, and clean up your form and technique. Your joints will thank you.

Do you have any tactics you’d like to share? Meet me in the comments below.

Happy lifting!