I have an open secret to confess: I often work out simply because I’m bored. But first, story time. T’was the summer of 2011 and I had just turned 20 years old. I worked a part-time job that was near my old college campus on most weekday nights. Given the nature of the job, this left my days relatively empty; no classes, no work, and no friends available until the weekend. Thinking that I was ever-so-clever, I stayed up most nights until 4am, with the plan of sleeping until at least noon each day. Thus, I’d only have to entertain myself for about three hours before I had to work my night shift job. However, this reality rarely went according to my plan (shout out to Mike Tyson).
Instead, what usually happened is that I would hit the sack around 4am (so far, so good), and then only sleep until 8am, thus leaving me with a nearly 7-hour void of time to fill before shift started. Therefore, on most days I would go to the gym for a heavy weightlifting session. My gym sessions would usually last for about 2 hours. Don’t get me wrong, the primary motive of the workouts was to get stronger; after all, putting in the work is mandatory. Though, a secondary objective was simply to pass the time. Working out was the most constructive activity I had available to me at the time, and I would work out about 5-6 days per week.
Here’s the sneakily deceptive thing about working out as a pass time; it works. Not only did it kill my short-term boredom, I also grabbed those precious and ever elusive gainz. My lanky friend would even introduce me as his steroid homie and some of my high school football teammates asked me what position I was playing in college; I wasn’t even playing college football.
On a rare off-day I had in the middle of the week, I had a brief four hours of sleep, followed by a grueling chest workout at my gym. I was on the bench press when I tried to power through the last rep of my final set. I felt winded and needed to give the bar every ounce of effort I had. The bar was shaking as I was starting to lose stability. After a few heart racing moments (and I’m being literal when I say that), I nudged the bar just high enough to safely re-rack the weight. My face was flushed, my heart racing as sweat poured down my face. I was feeling pretty damn proud of myself in the moment, though I noticed a slight pain in my chest, brief as it was.
Later that day I was laying on my bed, reading a library book when the pain returned, a crushing sensation in my chest. After a less-than-voluntary ride to the emergency room, the doctors were able to rule out anything cardiac-related. However, the orthopedic doctor was able to diagnose the real issue; I had strained my inner chest wall. I received a few grating finger wags from the doctor about over-training and the importance of rest. Of course, I knew the importance of such things, however I lacked a similar constructive hobby to pass time with that summer. I couldn’t lift for the next few weeks and my treasured gainz left as quickly as they came. The rest of the summer felt like a goddamn purgatory with no worthwhile pass-times.
I’ve taken some steps to cut down on the boredom workouts. Realizing the upper limit of how much I could, and reasonably should, workout in a given day or a given week has helped as well (though pushing boundaries is still mandatory). Since then, I’ve gotten a lot more into reading. I’ve also picked up a love of writing over the last few years as well, which fills in dead time with something constructive. I always keep a yellow legal pad handy in case the Next Big Idea hits me (shout out to James Altucher).
I wish I could sit here and say that I learned my lesson, though that is not the case. Sure, I’ve learned to embrace boredom, and that being bored is not a bad thing. However, old habits are hard to break, doubly so when the activity feels so damn good! Granted, there are worse things to do when boredom strikes, such as hard drugs or excessive video games, though overtraining is still a needlessly high injury risk. In my twenties (when I worked at the shittiest job ever) I would often plan vacations around de-load weeks just so I could avoid the temptation to workout due to boredom; I’ve broken many promises regarding de-load weeks in the past. While I haven’t had any more weight-lifting injuries since 2011, The Chinese Liberal Mass Micro-Chip Sterilizing Plandemic came along and shut down my gym, thus I purchased resistance bands so I could conveniently workout at home. Given that these bands are pretty easily accessible, I still find myself working out simply to pass the time, especially during my recent unemployment. Seriously, I even put my stationary bike in front of the TV so I could get more miles in during football season. I often finish these workouts barely able to move on account of feeling so drained. Sometimes I feel like Dom Mazetti was onto something…
Surprisingly, there isn’t a lot of talk on the internet regarding boredom-fueled workouts. Boredom is typically linked to over-eating. Excessive amounts of working out is often linked to male body dysmorphia. Searching for boredom in regards to working out results in links about how to switch up your routine rather than how to stop using your routine as a pastime. Much like I mentioned in my boredom article, society has demonized boredom far too much and hence discussing boredom is somewhat of a taboo. Even in my own upbringing, openly talking about boredom was a taboo; broaching the topic usually resulted in a sudden and unpleasant To-Do list! Having too much time on your hands can also be seen as a luxury or a privilege. Statistically, there is almost no way that I am the only one who has this habit of working out due to boredom, so it’s about time we start acknowledging the phenomena. Once the taboo is broken, we can then start a public discussion and maybe even allocate some research dollars towards the topic of boredom-induced workouts (shout-out to Brett McKay).
I skipped watching the paint dry day…
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