Coping with Burnout: Understanding Its Impact on Training

When you feel flat, over-trained, and unmotivated.

I have a standing appointment with the phenomenon known as burnout. I’ll be gliding along, minding my own business, getting great workouts, pumps, and progress numbers, and then it’ll creep up on me without warning, trigger, or logic. Burnout greets me with a visit.

Here is what it delivers to my door:

• A general flat feeling at rest. Normally, I feel pretty solid during the day. My tone is tight, I have the feeling of effortless mobility, and my energy is rather steady. When I get my burnout package delivered, it strips these things away, and I’m left scratching my head thinking, “When did I order this?”
• My training suffers. My workouts tend to become tougher to get going. I usually end up getting in a decent workout, but it’s just more daunting. The weights feel heavier, my rest between sets becomes longer, and I get the feeling as if I’m dragging myself through my training, which I often do.* (Click here for more on that story)
• All of those wonderful things above inevitably lead to a state of being unmotivated. Again, motivated or not, I will still gut through my training. Is it a character flaw? Maybe, maybe not.

In two words, it sucks. One week I’ll be cruising along, and the next I’ll suffer that flat tire and wobble over to the shoulder and turn on my hazard lights.

Now, this only happens every few months, which makes complete sense. Despite the Terminator movies documentaries, we are not machines. We will eventually break down and need maintenance.

Pausing for maintenance isn’t in my skill set. It’s either all or nothing, so I tend to take off a few days instead of downshifting. If you’ve read my blog for any amount of time, you know my process on how I take days off and then eventually return to training.

Here’s a summary:

• Once burnout rears its head and motivation takes a vacation, I will intentionally take off a few days. Normally, this only lasts three to five days.
• The requirement to return to the gym is rather simple: I must regain my mental motivation to return. I must gain the feeling of wanting to go back. I have to crave it.
• When the motivation returns, the body is usually ready as well.

Is it effective? Yes and no.

I definitely benefit from the rest. I feel as though my nervous system and endocrine system get a little R&R, but I usually still feel a few nicks and scrapes in my joints.

This all leads me to something new (for me).

In the future, I might experiment with active rest. So, instead of taking off completely from the gym for an extended period of time, I’ll take two days off and then come back to a, for example, Monday, Wednesday, Friday schedule for one or two weeks and train all body parts just once per week with half the volume and around half the weight. Additionally, I will stop each set well before hitting failure.

This will have the potential of doing a few things better than taking off for a week.

• It’ll allow me to still get to the gym and stay active.
• I’ll actively flush my muscle groups with blood and help rid them of any waste products.
• I’ll keep my joints in motion and help heal up their wicked disposition.

After that, I’ll adopt a new routine and write about it right here. Stay tuned.

Happy lifting!

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* This might be a glaring flaw of mine, but no matter the day I’ve had, the meals I’ve missed, or the stress I’m under, I will always make it to the gym, complete my entire workout with intensity and focus, and hit all my numbers. Is that smart? I don’t know. It may drive me into burnout quicker, but it’s the only way I know.