The Psychology Behind Why We Get Easily Tired and Fatigued

We’re all accustomed to being tired and fatigued owing to our hectic lives in today’s ever-so-modern society. Each of us has our own tried and tested bag of tricks to cope with our exhaustion. Be it a cup of strong black coffee or a long relaxing bath with essential oils while sipping a glass of fine wine, we unwind in varied ways to treat our fatigued bodies and minds.

Have you ever wondered why, in the first place, most of us, despite working a comfortable white-collar job, succumb to disproportionate magnitudes of tiredness and fatigue almost daily? Read on. There’s also a simple relaxation technique included with additional suggestions to learn to really relax.

First of all, What’s the difference between tiredness and fatigue?

Tiredness is an expected feeling after certain activities or at the end of the day. Usually, you know why you’re tired, and a good night’s sleep solves the problem.

Fatigue is a daily lack of energy; unusual or excessive whole-body tiredness not relieved by sleep.

An astounding and significant fact is that mental work alone can’t make us tired! To demonstrate this, scientists conducted a study to determine how long the human brain could function without attaining a decreased capacity for work — the scientific definition of fatigue.

To their amazement, they discovered that blood traveling through an active brain showed an absence of fatigue markers, whereas blood passing through the veins of a physical laborer while he was working was filled with fatigue toxins(by-products of muscular fatigue).

So far as the brain is concerned, it can work as well and as swiftly as at the end of eight or even twelve hours of effort as at the beginning. The physical brain is tireless and robust.

So, what causes us to be tired?

According to psychiatrists, the majority of our fatigue stems from our mental and emotional attitudes. Also, the majority of the fatigue we experience is mental in nature, with pure physical depletion being extremely unusual.

Humans are strength machines with more than 600 sophisticated muscles that have evolved over thousands of years. Even so, we use less than 10% of our physical strength when compared to our distant ancestors who were hunters and gatherers. Looking at the ongoing obesity epidemic that is afflicting both children and adults, this is an irrefutable fact.

100% of the fatigue experienced by the sedentary worker in good health is due to psychological factors, which are the same as emotional factors.

What emotional factors could possibly tire the sedentary(office) worker?

Could it perhaps be joy? or Could it be contentment? No! Never! It’s always BOREDOM, RESENTMENT, a sense of UNAPPRECIATEDNESS, FUTILITY, HURRY, ANXIETY, and WORRY. Now, these are the emotional factors that tire the sitting worker.

These emotional elements produce nerve tensions in the body, which causes fatigue, decreased productivity, and nervous headaches. Because a tense muscle is a working muscle, we must learn to relax and conserve energy for more vital tasks.

Hard work by itself seldom causes exhaustion that cannot be remedied by a nice long restful sleep.

The chief causes of fatigue are anxiety, tenseness, and emotional stress

Let’s do a quick test

Are you frowning at the screen as you read these lines?

Do you have a strain in your eyes?

Are you sitting comfortably or hunching your shoulders?

Are your facial muscles tense?

If you answered yes to any or all of the above, you are experiencing nervous fatigue or nervous tension.

Why do we create these unwanted tensions while doing such simple mental effort as reading?

It’s because we almost always believe that any hard work requires a feeling of effort or else it’s not done properly. As a result, when we focus or concentrate, we scowl. We hunch our shoulders as well. We urge our muscles to make the motion of effort, which in no way assists our brain in its work.

So, how can we overcome our nervous exhaustion? The solution is to learn to relax while working!

It’s not going to be easy. I agree. It usually demands the reversal of lifelong habits. Tension is a habit, as is relaxation. Bad habits can be broken and new habits cultivated.

When we relax, do we start with our minds or with our nerves? We do not begin with either. We begin to relax with our muscles! Yes, you heard that right! MUSCLES!!

How do you relax with your muscles?

Lean back and close your eyes.

Say to your eyes silently and slowly, “Let go. Let go. Stop straining, stop frowning. Let go. Let go.

Repeat that over and over slowly for a minute.

How was it? It takes some practice. No, loads of it. Nonetheless, I’m sure you felt your eye muscles obey your orders, relax, and your tensions disappear. You can now do the same thing with your jaw muscles, face muscles, neck and shoulder muscles, and so on.

The art of mind-muscle connection!

When it comes to such muscle relaxation techniques, the eye is the most important organ. The eyes are vital in reducing nervous tension since they absorb one-fourth of all nervous energies consumed by the body.

I try to do this every day and whenever I am feeling down or running low on my batteries. Another thing to remember is to feel the energy moving from your eyes to your jaw, neck, and shoulders, and finally to the rest of your body. Finish it off with your toe muscles. Full body relaxation may take up to 15 minutes, but it is well worth the time.

You could do a part of it, like only the eyes and face, just before a big event, a public speech, or a performance.

More suggestions to help you learn to relax

When you do the muscle relaxation technique, you could let your body go limp and floppy like an old sock. Think of yourself as an old crumpled sock. Then you’ve learned to relax.

Work in a comfortable position as much as possible. Have a break every 45 minutes to stretch your body and destress your eyes.

Check- in with yourself four or five times a day and ask yourself, “Am I making my work harder than it is?” Is it possible that I’m using muscles that have nothing to do with the work I’m doing?”

At the end of the day, put yourself to the test once more by asking yourself, “How tired am I? If I’m tired, it’s not because of the mental work I did, but because of the way I did it.”

“I measure my accomplishments not by how tired I am at the end of the day, but by how tired I am not.” — Daniel W. Josselyn

“ Sometimes people let the same problem make them miserable for years when they could just say, So What. That’s one of my favorite things to say. So what.” -Andy Warhol

Reference

How to stop worrying and start living — Dale Carnegie

Thank You for reading.

Love, Peace, and Bliss.