The Link Between Physical and Mental Health: Finding the Right Balance

Written by Osteopath Felix Adamson-Walter

We all know that exercise is good for our mental health. It boosts mood, reduces stress, and helps us feel more confident in our bodies. But more exercise isn’t always better. The right kind of movement can help you feel calmer and more resilient. The wrong kind, or too much of it, can push your body and mind into overdrive.

The stress bucket

Think of your body like a bucket. Everything you do in a day adds something to it. Training, work, lack of sleep, emotional stress, tight deadlines, caffeine. They all pour water into the bucket.

Exercise is often one of the best ways to help empty it. Moving your body can reduce stress, lift your mood whilst helping you feel grounded and more present. But if the intensity is too high, or recovery is low, it can start to do the opposite. Instead of emptying the bucket, it can fill it up faster.

When the bucket begins to overflow, it doesn’t always show up as one thing. It might look like a flare-up of back pain, a niggle that won’t settle, or tension that keeps returning. It can also look like poor sleep, low mood, or feeling more anxious and reactive.

It’s your body’s way of saying the load has gone beyond what it can comfortably manage. The goal isn’t to remove stress completely, but to build awareness of what fills your bucket and what helps empty it. When you start to notice the signs early, you can adjust before things spill over.

The sweet spot of training

Not enough movement and your body feels sluggish, stiff, and low on energy. Too much high-intensity work and your system can feel wired and exhausted at the same time. The key is finding your middle ground.

That doesn’t always mean cutting back completely. It means being honest about what kind of stress your body actually needs today. Sometimes that might be a strength session or a run. Other days it might be a walk, mobility work, or an early night.

I would argue that for the most part, exercising gives you a larger bucket with more capacity. However, there is not a one-size-fits-all approach that works for everyone. Starting to intuitively ask your body what it needs can often be the first step. The best training routines adapt to your energy, not the other way around.

Listening to your body

Your body gives you signals all the time. Fatigue, tightness, disrupted sleep, or lack of motivation are small messages that the bucket might be filling up. When you learn to listen early, you can prevent things from tipping into injury, burnout or overwhelm.

This is where awareness beats discipline. You don’t need to push harder every week to make progress. Sometimes the best progress is pulling back when your system needs recovery.

Getting out of a rut

If you’ve fallen out of a routine, the hardest part is often getting started again. The key is to lower the barrier to entry. Don’t try to recreate your old training schedule straight away.

Start small. Go for a walk. Do 10 minutes of bodyweight movement. Get outside. Build consistency before intensity. The goal isn’t to chase fitness right away, but to reintroduce movement that feels good and gets your body moving again.

Momentum builds naturally from there.

A healthier balance

Exercise should support your life, not drain it. The best routine helps you feel calmer, more focused and more capable, both physically and mentally.

Your physical health and mental health are always connected. If one starts to struggle, the other often follows. By finding a balance between effort and recovery, and by tuning into how your body feels rather than just what your training plan says, you’ll start to build a foundation that supports both.

A last thought

Your mental and physical health are always connected. When you look after one, you support the other. If you’ve been feeling stuck, run down, or dealing with ongoing tension, it might be your body’s way of asking for a reset.

As Osteopaths, we help people understand these links every day. Understanding how stress, recovery, and movement all shape how your body feels. Sometimes, a small adjustment, the right type of exercise, or a shift in recovery can make all the difference.

References

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2. Symons, I. K., Bruce, L., & Main, L. C. (2023). Impact of overtraining on cognitive function in endurance athletes: A systematic review. Sports Medicine – Open, 9, 69. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40798-023-00614-3 PMC+1

   
   

3. Armstrong, L. E., Bergeron, M. F., Lee, E. C., Mershon, J. E., & Armstrong, E. M. (2022). Overtraining Syndrome as a Complex Systems Phenomenon. Frontiers in Network Physiology, 1, Article 794392. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnetp.2021.794392 Frontiers

4. Pollarolo, G., et al. (2023). Physiological and psychological effects of treadmill overtraining implementation. Biology, 10(6), 515. https://doi.org/10.3390/biology10060515 MDPI

   
   

5. Kazmierski, F., et al. (2022). Impact of exercise on brain neurochemicals: A comprehensive review. Sport Sciences for Health, 18, Article 10.1007/s11332-022-01030-y. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11332-022-01030-y link.springer.com