Anti-Anxiety Workout

Between work constraints, family responsibilities and social commitments, life can often get very stressful and you feel your anxiety levels rising up and up. When you then add training into the mix, things can often get worse.

Sometimes, getting to the gym can feel like a real chore, and if you’re tired after a hard day at work or have troubles on your mind, training’s probably the last thing you want to do. Add in potential traffic jams, busy changing rooms and queuing for equipment, and you’re just about ready to snap.

While you should certainly push yourself, train hard, try to set PBs and leave the gym shaking and sweating, satisfied with your performance, it should also be an opportunity to get away from the toils of everyday life. For that hour session two of three times a week, you shouldn’t have to think about anything else, as your mind is one hundred percent focused on your workout.

But when the stress starts adding up, it’s easy to forget this. If work’s busy, you might have to take your cell phone into the gym, or perhaps the kids need picking up from school, so you cut your workout time down to 30 minutes. Pretty soon you’re skipping the gym altogether, and on the odd occasion you do get in there, your thoughts wander and you don’t get much done at all.

Don’t let training take a back seat though. Working out is just as important, if not even more so in times when you’re stressed and anxious than when life is normal and you’re feeling pretty calm.

 It does this in a number of ways.

Firstly, your brain and muscles are linked via nerve cells. When you’re brain is working overtime and you’re feeling mentally fatigued, this has a knock on effect to the rest of your body, and you start feeling tired, run down and lethargic.

You’re probably also heard of endorphins. They’re the natural chemicals your body releases during exercise, and are nature’s painkillers. They elevate your mood, clear your head and leave you feeling far less anxious.

Training is also a fantastic way to get rid of your pent up aggression. There’s nothing better for releasing tension than hitting a new personal best on a squat, deadlift or bench press, or sprinting as fast as you can on the treadmill. Kickboxing can also give you the satisfaction of physically hitting something to release aggression, but has the added advantage of not seriously injuring a family member or your annoying work colleague!

Finally, when you train, your mind shouldn’t be thinking about anything other than your session. This is why having a set plan and defined, realistic goals is so important. Without these, you’ll amble around the gym, flitting from one piece of equipment to the next, and soon enough will start thinking about all your stresses and get anxious again. A hard session, where you’re determined to push the intensity and break some personal records should leave no room in your head for anything else.

Sample Workouts To Reduce Anxiety And Stress

There are varying levels of anxiety, and you need to adjust your training depending on how stressed you’re feeling. The following workouts are organized from what to do when you’re climbing the walls and feeling under more pressure than ever before, down to just being a little worried and nervous about something fairly minor.

Walk

Under normal circumstances, you want to forget about your troubles when training, but sometimes it can help to mull them over in your head. You don’t want to do this around other people though, and sitting and stewing in your office or at home often doesn’t get you anywhere. Take yourself off for a steady paced walk outside. You’ll get some fresh air, a little exercise, and hopefully a new perspective on your stresses.

Sports

Interacting with others definitely de-stresses you – you can’t be grumpy and uptight when there’s company present. A little more strenuous than walking, playing sport will certainly give you a great cardio workout, allow for some aggression relief and provide some well needed contact with acquaintances who aren’t family or work colleagues.

You may want to avoid high pressure competitive sports though, as these can heighten anxiety levels further. Stick with non-competitive games of pickup basketball, tag football or five a side soccer.

Combat

As mentioned earlier, hitting things is a great way to move stress along and burn a few calories. Instead of punching doors or kicking walls, try real combat workouts. You could do kickboxing with a trainer, join a boxercise class, take a karate lesson or learn some moves in the ring. Combat sports are also an excellent way of getting your cardio in.

Weights

Lifting huge lumps of iron off the floor not only makes you leaner, stronger and builds muscle, it clears away all your anxiety and worries. The high you get from hitting a new personal best is phenomenal and the perfect remedy for a stressful day.

If you’re feeling a little wound up, go to the gym with a plan to set new records and lift heavy weights.

- Pick a compound full body exercise such as a front squats, back squats, a deadlift variation, bench press, overhead press or clean and press.
- Warm up with three to four light sets of five to 10 repetitions.
- Load the bar with 65 percent of your one rep max – the heaviest amount of weight you can lift for one repetition.
- Perform one perfect rep.
- Rest for 10 to 15 seconds.
- Do a second perfect rep.
- Repeat this process until you reach 50 reps.

You have three goals with this workout.

The first is to get 50 reps in total. While the weight on the bar isn’t particularly heavy, 50 reps is a high volume of work that will give your muscles and cardiovascular system an awesome workout.

Secondly, you must use perfect technique. This is a great opportunity to perfect your form on some of the more complex exercises.

Thirdly, and most importantly of all, this workout is designed to help you relax. Between lifts, take a few deeps breaths and rest as long as you need to before doing the next one. You have to focus so hard on breathing and technique that you’ll feel all the anxiety drain from your body.

It doesn’t really matter what anti-anxiety workout techniques you decide to try, the main thing is that you get moving, and do something to release endorphins and take your mind off your worries.