How to Listen to Your Body During a Workout - When to Stop When to Keep Pushing

When exercising, it is very important to listen to the signals that your body sends about what is happening. These signals will tell you if you are pushing yourself hard enough or if you are holding back.  Unfortunately, interpreting these signals can be difficult, especially if you are new to exercise.

The second level of signals your body can give you spans a large range, which most of you have experienced. Though the majority of exercisers will have had experience with the full gamut of this level, some newcomers to exercise may have experienced only part of it. This level includes minor fatigue during a workout - all the way up to that colossal muscle burn while pushing through a particularly hard workout. The middle of this range is where most newcomers tend to hover during exercise because they don't yet know how hard they can push themselves, while veterans typically get to the top of that range when they are challenging themselves.

Getting stuck in the middle of this level is where most people (especially beginners) get off track by thinking that the burning of lactic acid they feel in their muscles is bad or dangerous and that they need to limit it or avoid it all together. Even the most basic starting exercise should give you a decent amount off muscle burn while doing it. It doesn't matter if you are doing strength training, toning, cardio, or HIIT - you should always challenge yourself to "feel the burn" when you can.

Level three, the top and most intense level, is an area where few exercisers have even been let alone get to during their regular training routine.  This level is where your body actually stops functioning the way you want it to. Instead of touching on your anaerobic threshold (using up more oxygen then you can take in), this level puts you past your limits and staying at this level for longer than a few seconds at a time will cause your body to shut down and potentially can lead to injury.  Though this is not a level that is functional for prolonged activity, it can be used in certain training styles for very small amounts of time to effectively improve your maximum functioning levels.

Getting into level three is typically reserved for elite-level athletes and is not a particularly safe place to be unless you are under the supervision of an educated trainer or coach. However, it is an experience that is valuable for even the average exerciser to increase their scope of what their own body is capable of doing.  When exercising for any goal, whether it is strength, endurance, weight loss, etc., having a complete grasp on what your body is capable of and what it takes to get to your maximums is incredibly important to getting the most efficient workout. Not knowing your own maximums will invariably hold you back from pushing as hard as you can and need to, to really see the results you really want.

So, use this guide in order to learn to listen to your body so that you safely push yourself during your workouts. It's a bit of an art form and it takes some trial and error, but it's very useful once you learn to understand and respect your body's signals.



Via : https://boutder.blogspot.com

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How Often Should You Work Out Your Abs?

If you really want washboard abs, you've got to put the work in every day. Right? Actually, crushing your ab routine everyday might do more harm than good.  “People have the idea that if they do an hour of ab exercises that that’s going to chisel their abs and burn fat from that area—the old spot-reduction approach,” says Wayne Westcott, Ph.D., a professor of exercise science at Quincy College in Quincy, MA. But realistically, Westcott says you should train your core no more than three days a week. While by now you know that spot-reduction is a myth, when you overtrain your abs at lower intensities, core work becomes an endurance-type activity rather than a strength- and muscle-building activity, Westcott explains. Related: Don’t Miss These Nine Exercises That Will Fast-Track Your Six-Pack On top of not providing the intensity or recovery time needed to increase strength, too much training can also increase your risk of overuse and imbala...
Read more

How to Gain Weight the Healthy Way - Building Muscle, Curve Shape

An important part of fitness that’s covered much less than weight loss, is weight gain. Gaining weight takes strategy, consistency, and work. It might seem foreign to some people who have differing goals, but saying “just eat more!” to someone who is trying to gain weight is not unlike saying “just eat less!” to someone who needs to lose weight. Relationships with food can be complicated. How to eat to gain weight and muscle the healthy way Eat often - Try to eat 6 times a day; 3 meals and 3 snacks. Try to not let more than 2-3 hours pass in between eating. Related:  What should you eat before your workout? Best pre-work out snacks  Eat more - Adding an additional 500-1000 extra calories to daily intake would make for an increase of 1-2 lbs a week, though these variables will be impacted by the individual’s level of activity. It may seem a little intimidating to someone who is trying to eat more to gain weight but you can break the add...
Read more

140-Pound Woman Joins The 1,000 Club

From nothingness, the universe was created. From a simple caterpillar, a butterfly emerges. A dorky teen grows up to be a fashion model, or a bodybuilder. The one constant in life is change, and in our  Transformation of the Week  series, AskMen is celebrating men and women who have turned their lives around through dedication, commitment and hard work. Is that you? Email us your story and pictures at askus@askmen.com and you could be featured next week! Reaching the 1,000-pound club is an impressive feat for any lifter man or woman. It is essentially a standard by which many lifters measure themselves to be “strong.” To join the club, add the total weight you can lift in a squat, bench press and deadlift. If the total is more than 1,000, you’re in. And if you’re not in, it does not mean you’re weak. In fairness, that’s a damn lot of weight. Which made it all the more impressive when Gabrielle Tucker announced on a Reddit thread that she had...
Read more