Physical energy is derived from the interaction between oxygen and glucose. This means the size of our energy supply depends on the patterns of our breathing, the foods that we eat and when we eat them, the quantity and quality of our sleep, the amount of recovery we get during the day, the levels of our fitness, and how you deal with stress.
So, lets see what we can do to increase your energy levels…
Exercise 3 Times A Week – as you stress your muscles and your body with exercise you force it to get better. Stronger and faster than you were before, a more efficient system. As long as you exercise and recover you’ll only continue to keep increasing your energy vs. being lazy and not exercising.
Do Yoga Once A Week – Doing yoga increases circulation throughout your body, helps aid in digestion, increases endurance, increases energy and more…
Yoga is one of the best things you can do for your body, even if your a guy, its not only for women!
Breathing Exercises Before You Go to Bed (QiGong) or Tai Chi – increases the oxygen uptake and utilization which helps you with more efficient breathing, reduces stress levels, improves immune function and gives you a heightened mood state. For breathing exercises, inhale for 3-6 seconds and exhale for 6 seconds. Do a couple of these to increase oxygen in your body and relax yourself.
Don’t Skip Breakfast – You should eat your biggest meal the first part of your day. If you screw this up your already setting yourself up to have lower energy levels because your compensating for missing this meal with bigger meals through out the day or drinking coffee and energy drinks to get through the day.
Eat 5-6 Meals A Day – eating every 3 hours insures a steady resupply of energy. Just make sure the food you eat is nutritious and good for you. The worst thing you can do is allow too much time to elapse between meals or miss a meal, then your energy gets lower and lower and then when you get that next meal you try to eat too much and then your too full which slows you down, don’t do this.
There was a study done from kids ages 7-12 and they were classified into five weight categories, from thin to obese. On average, they all consumed the same number of calories per day. The one variable, was that the children in the two heaviest categories ate less breakfast and more dinner than the other groups.
Don’t Stay On A Fad DIET - DIET stands for Depression Insecurity Emotional Trauma. I don’t remember where I heard this but its hilarious isn’t it. All these companies try to come up with another way for people to lose weight when the obvious is right in front of them. Eat specific nutritious foods for your blood type every three hours and exercise.
Don’t Overeat – leads to too much recovery, slows down performance and hinders digestion, and overtime obesity. As this slowly happens like a slow cooked frog, it goes unnoticed and you may slowly start to feel bad about the way you look, which just starts piling everything on, bad emotions, negative energy, and onto a downward trend. Don’t do this.
Get All the Nutritional Value Out of Your Food By Digesting It – you do this by chewing your food and eating enzyme rich foods to help you digest. Enzyme rich foods are all green vegetables. Add some spinach to your plate when you eat or have an enzyme pill that helps break down all your food. Digestive Enzymes
Another important thing in digestion of food is to not drink when your eating. You should drink 15-30 minutes before you eat with a glass of water and then 30 minutes or so after. Drinking while your eating dilutes your stomach acid which doesn’t digest your food fully. If you don’t digest your food fully, you won’t get as much energy value.
Have A Strategic Nutrition Plan and Eat Foods That Provide Energy – eat foods that are low on the glycemic index which measures the speed with which sugar from specific foods is released into the blood stream. A slower release provides a steadier source of energy. Low glycemic foods provide the highest octane and the longer lasting energy source. High glycemic foods or drinks give you a short spike of energy for short periods but can prompt a crash in 30 minutes or less.
Stay Well Hydrated – if you dehydrate a muscle by as little as 3%, your muscles will lose nearly 10% of its strength and 8% of its speed. Inadequate hydration compromises concentration, coordination and leaves less oxygen in your body than their would be if you were drinking enough water.
Listen To Music – music gets us pumped. It makes us happier (some more than most), and invigorates our emotional, mental and spiritual energy. It may not be a sustained energy but it might get you through a boring day or give you a quick pick me up.
Do A Ten, Twenty or Thirty Minute Nap in Afternoon – based on the ultradian and circadian rhythms, we reach the lowest phase around 2 pm – 4pm in the afternoon. This is period of day when most of us feel the highest level of fatigue. Therefore to get more energy we should nap.
Go To Bed On Time & Get Enough Sleep – if you don’t get 7-8 hours of sleep you deprive your body from the recovery it needs from what you did during the day. Lack of enough sleep impacts our strength levels, cardiovascular capacity, mood, and overall energy levels.
If you don’t go to bed on time and go to bed too late you may never reach the deepest levels of sleeping stages of REM sleep which is the best kind of sleep.
Improve Your Sleep – everything from the type of bed your sleep on to the pillows you use to who sleeps by you determine how well you sleep. You also may have trouble with your body like back problems, then go see a chiropractor or do acupuncture.
Do Meditation – meditation has many benefits for increasing our energy. It is proven to lower our stress levels including harmful brain chemicals related to stress, stimulates new neural pathways between the right and left hemispheres of the brain which leads to whole brain functioning, improves your ability to focus concentrate and think more clearly, increase your mental and emotional health, and many other benefits. If your interested in doing meditation the easier and more productive way look at Holosnyc.
Improve Your Blood – depending on what you eat, it could be making your blood lumpy and sticky, like a bunch of pennies stacked on each other if looked at under a dark light microscope. If this is the case you probably feel lethargic and have lower energy levels. I recently went to a Naturopathic doctor and looked at my blood for a normal check up. What you want to see is a lot of white blood cells apparent and blood freely moving. Eating foods with enzymes and good digestion helps with this.
By seeing a Naturopath he could let you know what kinds of foods to stop eating and what else you can do to get your blood looking more normal.
Change Your Environment – if your inside go outside, around negative people or people that drain your energy, do whatever you can to get out of that environment.
Go On A Walk or Light Bike Ride Upon First Waking Up - get up and get some athletic wear on, splash water on your face, and head out the door. If you traditionally wake up late and spend the majority of your day inside, this will do wonders for you. When your outside really take a moment to let everything sink in, the nature, the sounds and just be observant.
Get Out of Negative State of Anger or Anxiety – changes your breathing patterns to a faster and shallower breathing. To change this state to increase your energy, do some breathing exercises or ask yourself some questions.
Why am I being so negative today… Is there any reason why I can’t turn this into a positive here…? Or why am I so mad… Is being mad gonna help anything…? Get over it and realize whatever you focus on expands. If your focusing on what is making your Angry your just gonna get more angry…
Don’t Work for More than 90-120 Minutes - if you work any longer than this you start to lose focus. Take a 10 minute break and do something to recover before working anymore. This can help you dramatically.
Take A Liquid Multi-Vitamin – if your not getting enough nutrition from good foods you may need a liquid multi-vitamin. Not having all the nutrients your body requires could be making you feel sluggish. Multi Vitamin
Don’t use any of these products during the day to temporarily increase your energy:
- Coffee
- Caffeinated Sodas
- Energy Drinks
They only provide temporary spikes of energy. Since caffeine is a diuretic, it prompts dehydration and fatigue in the long run.
What other ways are their to increase our energy levels naturally…? Let us know what you do.
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