Overtraining symptoms

A paper published in 2009 called "Mental fatigue impairs physical performance in humans" showed that if the people do something that causes mental fatigue (computer games in this case) and then exercises, the perception of effort during physical exercise seems much higher than if there was less or no mental fatigue. Those who suffer from mental fatigue are likely to quit 15 percent earlier during training.

Professional athletes do not suffer to the same extend amateurs do.

Elite athletes require a bigger dose of mental fatigue before their performance suffers, perhaps because they build up a functional immunity to mental fatigue. But when it happens, a possible solution could be to taper of mentally before competitions or perhaps special brain endurance training. 

• Takotsubo cardiomyopathy is characterized by a sudden physical or psychological stressor that could release a surge of hormones that stuns specific heart muscles, preventing them from properly pumping blood. The left ventricle balloons out, and people experience chest pain, difficulty breathing, and even heart failure.
• Doctors may mistake this condition for a heart attack or inflammation of the lungs. When people show these symptoms, doctors must eliminate other conditions first. Real confirmation of Takotsubo will likely come from an angiogram.
• 90% of people survive an episode of stress-induced cardiomyopathy, but consequences may remain. While most patients' hearts may return to their normal shape in a few days, others can take three or more months to heal. Some people may require defibrillators.

While Takotsubo patients' hearts appear to function normally again, the heart may have some segments that are not contracting well. That may explain why some people report chest pain, breathing difficulty, and other challenges long after their heart appear to have returned to normal.

Medications like beta-blockers and blood thinners can be necessary for recovery, but it is also important to see a psychologist. Meditation and regular exercise may also help.

Since late 1960, the energy status of muscles is deemed to be important in exercise performance.

Since carbohydrate is the preferred energy source for muscle contraction during intense exercise, sports nutrition guidelines recommend eating carbohydrate-rich food to maximise performance. The guidelines suggest eating one gram of carbohydrate for every kilogram of your body mass, each hour for four hours.

• Recovery describes the processes inside the muscles that are stimulated by the stress of exercise sessions. These processes build up and result in increased endurance and muscle growth.
• Exercise performance describes the ability to perform exercise at a specific intensity and duration.

The current nutritional recommendations for performance may not be ideal for promoting recovery.

“A person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have.” 

Momentum is created or destroyed every day with the first few decisions you make.

If you learn to master your day, you’ll learn how to master your weeks, months, years, and life.

Contributing factors to mental fatigue are poor nutrition, lack of sleep, hormonal imbalances, or cognitive overload. Cognitive overload can take the following forms:

• When you focus on a single task for an extended period of time.
• When you spread your attention across too many things.
• Worrying about tasks. It is as mentally taxing as doing the task.

Your brain is fuelled with the same food as your muscles. What you eat has an enormous impact on your cognitive functioning.

• Cut down on refined sugars as it decreases alertness. Aim for sustained energy levels throughout the day.
• Plan your meals in advance. If you wait until you're hungry, you're already low on energy and willpower and will reach for a quick energy boost in the form of sugar.
• Don't skip breakfast. Without it, you may likely crash in the middle of the morning. Eat more eggs, yogurt, and oatmeal to sustain your energy levels until lunch.
• Snack mid-morning and mid-afternoon to give your body consistent fuel.
• Stay hydrated with water. Mild hydration can negatively impact cognitive performance.
• Listen to your body to figure out what makes you feel best. The same nutrition advice won't work for everyone.

With stress, the mind and the body are intrinsically linked. You can view stress as something that is wreaking havoc on your body (and it can) or as something that is giving you the strength and energy to overcome adversity.

Regular exposure to stress in small quantities can prepare us to handle a big stressful event in our lives. Prepare yourself for stress by self-education about the stressful event, by doing some physically stressful activities like completing a marathon, or something you dread, like giving a speech.

Repeated exposure to mildly stressful conditions can alter your body’s biological response to stress, making you manage stress in a better way.

The first purpose of sleep is restoration.

Every day, your brain accumulates metabolic waste as it goes about its normal neural activities. Sleeping restores the brains healthy condition by removing these waste products. Accumulation of these waste products has been linked to many brain-related disorders.

The second purpose of sleep is memory consolidation.

Sleep is crucial for memory consolidation, which is responsible for your long term memories. Insufficient or fragmented sleep can hamper your ability to remember facts and feelings/emotions.

• Stabilize your blood sugar, by eating hearty food (protein and fat) more often.
• Reduce refined carbs and increase fats and proteins.
• B-complex vitamin supplements can give you an immediate boost in alertness and mental clarity.
• Soak in an Epsom salt bath - might even help you get enough energy to exercise the next day.
• Drink more water than you usually do to help compensate.
• Exercise is the single best way to “take out the trash” in your body, and after staying up more hours than you should.

• Individual variation. Not everyone benefits from the second-person self-talk. People with more narcissistic tendencies use first-person pronouns more frequently, making them more or less sensitive to the effect.
• Customized self-talk for athletes. Framing self-statements in a positive light tend to be encouraging and actionable. For example, changing "keep grinding" to "I (You) can keep going."