Why You Should Stop Working Out Too Hard

Are you working out too hard?

If you are, then you should stop.

Yup, your ears do not deceive you!

You heard that right.

Mr. You-Need-To-Work-Out-Harder is indeed telling you to stop working out hard every time you step inside the gym because, contrary to popular belief, your training sessions DON’T have to be gladiatorial life or death contests.

Sure, your workout shouldn’t exactly be a cakewalk.

But it shouldn’t be a vomit spewing affair with you bawling your eyes out in pain, at least not all the fucking time.

Why?

Because the object is to “stimulate, not annihilate, the muscle,” as 8x Mr. Olympia winner Lee Haney used to say.

You see, resistance training involves the tearing of the muscle fibers, with the body then making them bigger and stronger to better withstand stress the next time it’s exposed to it. Pushing it to the limit each and every workout interferes with this recovery process, as the body isn’t given the requisite time to fully repair itself thanks to you continuously driving yourself into the ground.

But keep working out hard in the gym and having every workout look like a deleted scene from G.I. Jane all you want. All that does is increase your chance of injury and impede progress because the body not only has difficulty rebuilding muscle but also repairing the joints and connective tissue to provide support.

So how hard should you work out?

Well, if you’re into being able to maintain an active lifestyle free of aches and pains for years and years, then the exercise intensity of most workouts should teeter somewhere between moderation and all-out exertion rather than full throttle each and every workout.

That’s enough to allow the necessary recovery to produce results, as well as for you to keep at it consistently without burning yourself out.

Glossary: active lifestyle, exercise, gym, intensity, muscle, results, work out, workout

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Monster Longe

Monster Longe is a personal trainer in San Diego. He has been lifting weights for +25 years and training clients in the gym and online for about half of that time. When not working with clients or making content that's easy to read, understand, and apply to everyday life, he enjoys long walks and leaving buildings crushed and entire city blocks decimated in his wake.

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