Propel Fitness Journal, Issue 001
Rest Isn’t Laziness—It’s Your Superpower
If you’ve ever felt bad for skipping a training session vs. pushing through when your body begged for a break, it’s time to rethink your approach.
Rest days are an essential part of training AND injury rehab. It’s where the real magic happens.
When you train, you are breaking your body down. Every heavy lift, long run, or intense workout imposes physical stress on your body’s muscles, tendons, bones, and joints. This stress is good —it stimulates growth in your tissues, helping you become stronger and better adapted to handle more stress next time.
But, just like you need to refuel your car periodically during a roadtrip to keep travelling further, you need to take time to recover from this physical stress as it accumulates over time. This way your body has an opportunity to return back to baseline—and beyond.
Signs You’re Not Recovering Enough
If you’re experiencing any of these, it might be a sign your body is overdue for a break:
- A complete lack of desire participate in activities that normally bring you joy.
- An inability to fall asleep well past your usual bedtime.
- Feeling run-down or outright sick.
- Constant fatigue that no amount of caffeine can fix.
- Mood swings or irritability.
- Soreness that lingers for many, many days on end.
- Struggling to hit weights you typically handle with ease.
Ignoring these signals doesn’t make you tough—it sets you up for burnout, injury, and stalled progress.
What a Rest Day Should Look Like
A great rest day helps you recover, while keeping you mobile.
- Active Recovery: Go for a light walk, do some light yoga, or spend some time doing a bit of mobility work. Low-intensity movement keeps blood flowing and helps reduce stiffness. The key here is LIGHT — an “easy” 5-10km run at a slow pace, or an hour of technique work on deadlifts is still a high amount of physical activity for a recovering body and will likely dig a further hole to recover out of. Avoid this.
- Prioritize Recovery Habits: Focus on hydration, sleep, and quality nutrition. This is the perfect day to catch up on the basics.
- Mental Reset: Rest isn’t just physical. Take time to clear your mind, reflect on your goals, or dive into something non-fitness-related that brings you joy.
The key is to minimize physical AND cognitive stress—They both risk bringing recovery to a halt.
My Personal Take On Recovery:
In some ways, physical training is akin to digging a hole. The further you dig, the harder it’s going to be to climb out of.
Don’t get me wrong, you need to train—to reach your goals, to recover from injuries, and to perform at your best. But, over the long-run, training MUST be sustainable. Which means you need to balance the load and intensity with consistent periods of rest and recovery.
Don’t dig a hole so deep you get injured trying to crawl out of it.
– Dan
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