“Why don’t I feel like working out?” you ask yourself (as if you don’t already know).
“Hmmm, maybe it was the fact that I sat for four hours in agonizing traffic today going to and from work, narrowly avoiding rear-ending the car in front of me?”
“Or, maybe it was getting home from work and then immediately going back out to run errands, head to the supermarket, come back, cook dinner, wash the dishes, put the kids to bed . . .” (etc.)
Did I just describe your typical day?
Do you see how I don’t even know you, and yet, I can identify the daily minutiae that occupies your life?
It’s not because I’m a mind-reader. It’s because I deal with the same mundane tasks and routines you do.
I commute hours to work on the Jersey Turnpike five days a week. I’m married, visit the in-laws once or twice a month, struggle to find time to do the things I want to do, and deal with all the same life stresses as most people.
Working Out Is Easy For A Personal Trainer
But, it wasn’t aways like this.
Back when I was a personal trainer, I had plenty of time and opportunity to work out. I got bigger and more yoked than I had been in the thirty some odd prior years of my life.
Unfortunately for some of my clients, it was during this time that I used to give poor advice for how to fit workouts into a busy schedule, not realizing just how hectic their lives were.
I was younger and dumber and less experienced, frankly, to truly understand what they were going through.
I figured that if it was easy for me, it must be just as easy for them too.
But the reality is that it’s much easier for a trainer to stay in shape: they’re in the gym all day, for starters!
Usually, trainers workout on break between training clients (one of the perks of the job — that, and you get to wear shorts and sneakers to work every day).
Also, when you’re a trainer, the pace of your life, generally speaking, is slower, not as stressful, and you have the need to be in shape for a competition, or to continue to be able to get clients driving you.
But what happens when your life becomes so chaotic that you can barely make it to the gym without large sacrifices being made? Then what?
This is why your local personal trainer may not be the best person to help you with how to budget your time, or manage stress effectively.
When it comes to learning how to manage stress, we have to take an honest inventory of all the stressors in our lives and make conscious decisions for how to minimize, or completely eliminate each and every one of them systematically.
Stress And Its Relationship To Testosterone
But before we get into that, it’s important to understand the nature of stress and its relationship to testosterone.
Have you ever noticed how, during a stressful event, like a big argument with your wife, or blowing past a cop on the highway, knowing you’re about to get pulled over, you suddenly feel nervous, agitated, and distressed all at the same time?
That awful feeling is called stress.
Let me ask you this: could you perform sexually in that moment?
If you’re being honest with yourself, you probably couldn’t and the reason why is because having sex requires high levels of testosterone in the blood stream, something that’s severely lacking when cortisol levels are high. (1)
This is why it’s much easier to get an erection when we’re not stressed.
It’s because cortisol, the stress hormone, has an inverse relationship with testosterone. The more cortisol our bodies produce, the less testosterone we’re going to have available to be utilized by the body. (2) (3)
So, let’s think about this. If the body requires an anabolic (i.e. muscle building) environment with high testosterone levels in order to maximize muscle gains, then doesn’t it stand to reason that a perpetually stressed, high cortisol, catabolic (i.e. breaking muscle down) environment will hinder us from reaching our muscle-building goals?
That’s why managing stress levels is critical to ensuring we’re able to continue to have the will to work out, as well as the correct environment inside our bodies to capitalize on that workout so that we build the most muscle in the shortest amount of time possible.
Actually, when our bodies feel stressed and we don’t feel like lifting, it’s probably a good thing that we don’t lift because our body is probably trying to tell us something: “Don’t lift right now because the additional stress of weight-lifting, at this particular moment, would put the central nervous system into a state of overtraining!”
In the above situation, it may be wise to listen to our body, at least temporarily, so we can somewhat reduce our stress levels first and then have a productive lifting session later on.
The following stressors, whether work-related, forms of physical stress, or mental-emotional stress, are most likely kicking your ass in some way, which is in turn causing you to skip workouts, negatively impacting your training goals.
7 Stress-Related Reasons Why You “Don’t Feel Like Working Out” (And How To Reverse It So That You Do)
Let’s take a look at seven common stressors most men experience and how to either minimize or eliminate them in order to lay the groundwork for a solid training regimen where we’re consistently motivated to workout.
1. Lack of sleep
According to the National Sleep Foundation, the recommended amount of sleep varies between 7 and 10 hours, depending on your age. Getting less than the recommended amount has been proven to lower testosterone levels and we know that lowered testosterone levels are related to what? (4)
That’s right. High stress-levels! And not sleeping properly for three, four, or more consecutive nights could have a compounding (read: negative) effect on your testosterone levels.
Not good. It’s no wonder you don’t feel like working out and probably shouldn’t (with weights anyway) until you get this sorted out.
How to reverse it:
There’s no way around it. You have to get to bed earlier.
Resist the urge to sit on the couch watching Sling TV with your girlfriend or wife for longer than an hour after dinner.
Time has a sneaky way of creeping up on you.
Before you can say, “I’m wiped, babe,” it’s close to midnight and you still haven’t started your nightly getting-to-bed routine, which usually takes at least a half-hour, or so, just to brush your teeth, take a shower, and wind-down, right?
Instead, start your nightly routine earlier and wind-down sooner.
2. Work-related stress
Most people commute long distances in rush hour traffic to make it to work on time. This is a recipe for sky-high stress levels. I know because I live it almost every day.
If that wasn’t bad enough, what happens at work can often be even more stressful, depending on the type of job. Then, there’s the stress related to bringing home work, or things that need to be completed over the weekend. It never ends!
Trying to feel energetic or motivated to workout after you get home from work can be difficult when all you want to do is relax, or take a break.
How to reverse it:
Barring quitting your job, you’re going to have to learn to work with whatever schedule you have and try to maximize free time, so that you either work out in the early morning, or late evening and get used to that routine, that way it fits in with your current lifestyle long-term.
Maximizing free time is going to be key for the majority of people wanting to get in shape. The question is, how do we do that?
Not wasting time is critical. Time-wasters like watching YouTube and playing video games are killing your gains.
There’s a time and a place for vegging-out, relaxing, but tackling responsibilities first, then relaxing, is going to lead to less stress than perpetually putting off and postponing the things we need to get done.
When we procrastinate, we allow stress to slowly creep up on us until, bam, we’re totally stressed out and kicking ourselves because we didn’t attend to it sooner. Don’t let that happen to you.
3. Marriage-related stress
I think we can all relate to the wide spectrum of arguments and disagreements that tend to occur in marital situations, from the petty to the no-holds-barred intense.
So, when I say marriage-related stress, it encompasses all of that plus the stress of kids and making sure we’re carrying out our duties as fathers and husbands.
As positive, rewarding, and beneficial as marriage is and can be, we all know it’s also a form of stress that we have to learn how to manage.
How to reverse it:
I could probably give you some general advice, like be more empathetic, learn to compromise, prioritize spending quality time with your wife and learn to keep your word better, but to my knowledge, there’s no clear-cut advice that applies in every situation because every marriage relationship is different.
The saying, ‘Happy wife, happy life,’ the way it’s most commonly used, is way too simplistic and not even accurate, in my view. No, the best saying that applies to marriage is, ‘Communication is key,’ because, based on my personal experience, learning to communicate my needs clearly to my wife has led to far less stress.
In the past, I wouldn’t verbalize my needs as much and all those unspoken things would just fester and breed resentment over time (which would come out in negative ways and cause stressful arguments down the line).
Of course, we, as husbands, also have to return the favor and be receptive to the needs of our wives. If you do this, I can guarantee you will have a much more rewarding and less stressful marriage over the long-term.
4. Living a sedentary lifestyle
Think about how often you sit on your ass on a daily basis. Time commuting, sitting at your desk at work, sitting at your computer at home, and sitting on the couch watching t.v. probably add up to more than half your waking hours!
It’s no wonder so many of us are literal fat-asses who don’t feel like working out! Not only is it not a good look, but it could also take years off our lives because it’s a risk factor for obesity, stroke, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, osteoporosis, certain types of cancers, and the list goes on.
What happens is, the chronic inactivity weakens our bodies, leaving us more prone to stress-related illness and essentially lowering our threshold for being able to handle stress overall.
How to reverse it:
Unfortunately, there’s not much we can do about the need to sit to commute to work. I’ve heard about some people riding their bicycle to work, or stuff like that, but for the vast majority of us, that’s just not feasible, or realistic.
As far as having to sit behind our desks at work, for some people, using a standing desk might help, or an under-the-desk pedal exerciser, to help get the legs moving.
But the best advice I’ve heard is taking a long walk on your lunch break, or using a pedometer to track your steps throughout the day.
The second best advice I’ve heard is getting in the habit of taking the stairs instead of the elevator.
But let’s be honest, the absolute best thing you can do for yourself, hands down, is to get active and reduce the amount of t.v. watching/ couch-sitting you do, along with reducing your overall screen time in general because the more you’re being active (walks/hikes, working around the house, working out etc.), the less you’re sitting around like a lush.
5. Food-related stress
It’s a fact that the wrong food can put unnecessary stress on the body’s digestive system. Foods that are universally “bad for you,” or stressful on the body, are things that are too sugary, like soft drinks, or too greasy, like most fried foods (see Trans fat). Foods that are also universally bad for you are processed foods (i.e. white bread), as well as genetically modified foods and things with chemical additives and preservatives. (5)
There’s a lot to be said about the correct food intake, but the point I’m trying to make is, food can be a source of stress as well.
How to reverse it:
Books have been and can be written about this topic, so let’s stick to something very basic.
Let’s talk about sugar and leave it that. Sugary drinks, even juices, contain upwards of 60 grams of sugar per serving, in some cases. Let that sink in.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t need a scientific study to show me that ingesting that amount of sugar is bad and puts stress on the body.
My own personal experiences tell me that consuming a drink, feeling ‘up’ for a few minutes and then crashing, when your blood sugar goes back down, is terrible for your testosterone levels and general wellbeing.
But, if you still need the study to prove what I just said, here it is. (6)
6. Stress as a result of not boning enough
When you’re overweight, like I was, the excess of aromatase, which converts male hormone to estrogen in men results in lower testosterone levels.
With lower testosterone levels comes a feeling of not wanting to work out, as well as a decreased desire for sex and if you’re not careful, this decreased desire for sex can become a downward spiral, especially when you throw work and family responsibilities into the mix.
And, believe it or not, the age-old adage, ‘if you don’t use it, you lose it’ is pretty accurate, along with a correlation between less sex and a greater risk of cardiovascular disease, so for the sake of your own health, you need to make sure your boning consistently. (7)
How to reverse it:
You have to lose that belly fat and get leaner. That much is critical. Start going for long walks, lifting weights, and eating less/fasting. That’ll down-regulate your level of aromatase.
Along with that, having sex increases testosterone levels, so get in as much sex (with your wife) as possible. Note: I don’t condone cheating and if you do choose to cheat, just know you’re setting yourself up for a lot more stress down the road.
But getting back to boning, I can tell you from personal experience that neglecting to make time for sex by letting your job and family responsibilities take over, is going to lower your testosterone levels overall and increase cortisol levels, so just trust me on this one.
Marriage is way better when you have your wife whipped, so bone her brains out hard and frequently.
7. Worrying and chronic, underlying stress
One example of this would be worrying about bills. Money and bills are the source of a lot of stress, for sure.
Money problems can cause other kinds of problems. The imagination has a tendency of running wild with negative scenarios that can occur like getting evicted, maxing out credit cards, having to pawn things etc.
This type of stress, which many would consider, ‘chronic’ stress, as opposed to ‘acute’ stress, can wreak havoc on our health.
How to reverse it:
Regardless of whether it’s money problems, family problems, or some other type of problem that’s causing you to worry all the time, you just have to stop.
Worrying doesn’t accomplish anything. It’s better to a) take action (and by that, I mean, start doing things that will help you get out of your current, bad situation) and b) focus on good things that make you happy (i.e. spending time with family, working out, whatever it is).
Worrying is a really bad habit. At a certain point, we just have to have faith that things are going to turn out alright and that there are certain things that are outside our control.
If you choose to believe in God, or a higher power, that might help you to mentally switch off the worry, but make no mistake. You need to switch off that worry button in your brain. It’s a killer.
Eliminate Stress And Start Living Again
Remember what life was like before work, bills, marriage, and responsibilities?
Two words: pure bliss! You’d spring out of bed to the chirping of birds and sunshine on your window sill, with only one thing on your mind: “How am I going to satisfy my every desire today?”
You had all the time in the world to focus on number one. It’s no wonder that when we were younger, we were a picture of health, had great physiques and super high sex drives!
But that doesn’t mean that we can’t experience that same bliss today. We absolutely can!
As a matter of fact, it’s a better form of bliss because it comes as a result of hard won success, which makes everything more meaningful, since it comes at a cost.
Once we figure out how to eliminate, or at least reduce stress from our life, we can once again have that motivation and desire to work out, just like we did back in high school.
Still Don’t Feel Like Working Out?
Getting rid of stress is an important piece of the puzzle when it comes to getting yoked, but it’s not everything.
If you’ve followed the steps above and taken action to start eliminating stress, but still don’t have the motivation to work out, then you need to join a like-minded group of guys who all have the same goal of getting yoked and improving their lives.
Your humble trainer,
Read next: How To Lose Weight Without Exercise
Sources:
- Relationship Between Circulating Cortisol and Testosterone: Influence of Physical Exercise Kaye K. Brownlee, Alex W. Moore, Anthony C. HackneyJ Sports Sci Med. 2005 Mar; 4(1): 76–83. Published online 2005 Mar 1.PMCID: PMC3880087
- Testosterone Suppression of CRH-stimulated Cortisol in Men David R. Rubinow, Catherine A. Roca, Peter J. Schmidt, Merry A. Danaceau, Karen Putnam, Giovanni Cizza, George Chrousos, Lynnette NiemanNeuropsychopharmacology. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2006 May 25.Published in final edited form as: Neuropsychopharmacology. 2005 Oct; 30(10): 1906–1912. doi: 10.1038/sj.npp.1300742PMCID: PMC1470424
- Circadian Rhythms in Exercise Performance: Implications for Hormonal and Muscular AdaptationWeipeng Teo, Michael J. Newton, Michael R. McGuiganJ Sports Sci Med. 2011 Dec; 10(4): 600–606. Published online 2011 Dec 1.PMCID: PMC3761508
- Effect of 1 Week of Sleep Restriction on Testosterone Levels in Young Healthy MenFREERachel Leproult, Eve Van CauterJAMA. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2015 May 27.Published in final edited form as: JAMA. 2011 Jun 1; 305(21): 2173–2174. doi: 10.1001/jama.2011.710PMCID: PMC4445839
- Trans fats—sources, health risks and alternative approach – A reviewVandana Dhaka, Neelam Gulia, Kulveer Singh Ahlawat, Bhupender Singh KhatkarJ Food Sci Technol. 2011 Oct; 48(5): 534–541. Published online 2011 Jan 28. doi: 10.1007/s13197-010-0225-8PMCID: PMC3551118
- Sugar-sweetened beverage intake and serum testosterone levels in adult males 20–39 years old in the United StatesLiang Chen, Yu-Mei Xie, Jian-Hao Pei, Jian Kuang, Hong-Mei Chen, Zhong Chen, Zhong-Wen Li, Xiao-Ying Fu, Long Wang, Shui-Qing Lai, Shu-Ting Zhang, Zhi-Jiang Chen, Jin-xin LinReprod Biol Endocrinol. 2018; 16: 61. Published online 2018 Jun 23. doi: 10.1186/s12958-018-0378-2PMCID: PMC6015465
- Sexual activity, erectile dysfunction, and incident cardiovascular events. Hall SA, Shackelton R, Rosen RC, Araujo AB.Am J Cardiol. 2010 Jan 15;105(2):192-7. doi: 10.1016/j.amjcard.2009.08.671.PMID: 20102917