Everybody knows cardio workouts can give you physical benefits. But do you know what kind of mental benefits you can get, too?
You hear all the time about all the physical benefits of a good cardio workout plan.
By now,
it’s probably all old-hat – fat loss, a stonger heart, better lung capacity, decreased risk of certain kinds of disease, etc. Blah, blah, blah. We’ve all heard it a zillion times.
But what about the psychological benefits of cardio training? How come nobody really talks about that?
Well, it’s likely because psychological benefits are much more subjective and harder to express with same sort of facts and figures. The kinds of numbers that can be calculated when it comes to cardio workout plans causing weight loss or reduced risk of heart disease are much more convincing.
Besdides, cardio workouts are physical, right? Right. So where does all this psycho-babble fit in?
Well, let’s take a look at this psycho-babble for a minute.
First of all, we’ve already established that a prperly performed cardio workout plan can help you lose weight, right? Well, would you feel better about yourself overall if you lost a few pounds and a few more inches? Nobody likes spending money, but spending money on new pants because the old ones are too big always feels good.
Then, there is temporary stress relief. Ever have a day where everything just went wrong, and you felt completely stressed out? And on any of these days, did you ever get a good workout (cardio or otherwise) in, only to find that you felt better afterward, because you worked some of that stress off? Bet you did. Well, now keep that going on a more regular basis.
Now, this is a physical thing, but nobody feels good when they’re tired. When your heart and lungs are in shape because you spend time on your cardio workout plan, your body has to work a lot less in a resting state to simply perform involuntary actions such as breathing, pumping blood through your body, and even digestion (which improved blood flow can help improve). Well, if you’re working less, that means you’re using less energy. Which means you’re less tired. Which translates into better chances of being less grumpy.
Looks like there might be something to this whole “cardio workouts put you in a better mental state” thing after all…
Train Hard, Rest Hard, Play Hard.
