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Boost Energy Levels With These 10 Easy Ways
With hectic lives, we often forget to take good care of our energy levels and end up feeling drained and tired. What’s harder to realize is a low-grade energy drain. In this, you don’t feel the usual signs of exhaustion like muscle ache or tiring feeling. You may recognize a lack of concentration in tasks, less patience, and more frustration. Minimal tasks that you would do effortlessly before seems to be a big deal now. Are you experiencing anything like this? The good news is there are many ways to boost your energy.
Boosting up energy builds a thought of energy drinks, herbs, supplements, and vitamins. But do you know there’s little or no scientific evidence that proves energy boosters like guarana, ginseng, and chromium work? If the tiredness you feel is linked to your lifestyle, there are many ways to naturally boost your energy levels.
1. More Sleep is the Key
Sleep is often sacrificed when we have loads of work to complete. Lack of sleep may make you feel lazy and grumpy, or irritated for no reason. According to some studies, around 50 to 70 million Americans suffer from sleep disorders or lack of sleep. Most of us just need to develop new healthy habits to get a good night of sleep. If you have a television in your bedroom, take it out to the living room. Also, go to bed only when you want to sleep. Laying on the bed unnecessarily may affect the actual sleep you need.
If you are still having trouble while sleeping, try meditation or mindfulness practices to relax your mind.
2. Work on Reducing Stress
It’s very common for people with hectic lives to feel anxious and stressed. Stress can make you mentally and physically tired. However, we know it’s not practically possible to remove all the stress from your life, but you can try reducing unnecessary or lifestyle-related stress. Also, not bringing work problems home is an excellent practice to start.
Take out some time for yourself and do what makes you happy such as walking, reading, playing any sport, writing, etc.
Suppose you still feel very stressed or have extreme anxiety. In that case, you may want to meet a counselor or any professional who can listen to your problems.
3. Get to Move
Working out regularly has more than one advantage. Exercise reduces the risk of heart diseases and also encourages sound sleep. However, it sounds a little odd to work out when you feel tired, but studies show that people who participated in low-intensity workouts have experienced less fatigue. Exercise also helps in increasing the higher brain dopamine level, which elevates a good mood.
To incorporate exercise into your lifestyle, you could start by walking or cycling.
4. Say No to Smoking
Smoking is terrible for energy levels and overall health. The smoke from cigarettes may lead to many harmful diseases like lung cancer, heart disease, and stroke. The tar in the smoke also reduces the efficiency of the lungs. When the efficiency of your lungs decreases, you end up feeling tired. The best thing you can do is to quit smoking. If you feel trouble quitting, you can take a nicotine replacement like gum.
5. Watch Alcohol Intake
If you feel dizzy in the afternoon, this probably because of the wine you had with your lunch. The best thing, in this case, would be avoiding alcohol in the afternoons. In fact, do not drink at any point in time where you need the energy to work. If you want to take alcohol, do it when you don’t mind if your energy levels are lowered.
Alcohol may act as a sedative and can make you feel tired. If you’re having trouble sleeping at night, try not to take a drink near your bedtime.
6. Clean Out your Gut
Experts say energy levels are greatly affected by your gastrointestinal tract. To improve and clean out your gut, you can start by avoiding alcohol for 3 to 4 weeks and drinking about 8 glasses of water during the day. Avoid any diet soda or such hard drinks as the aspartame in them act as inflammatory in your gut, and you may end up putting on weight.
7. Give a Thought to the Food You Eat
We recommend eating food low on the glycemic index as the sugar in these foods is absorbed slowly. Due to this, you don’t feel a quick drop in energy as you would with foods high on the glycemic index. Also, eating more protein helps to fight fatigue, specifically in the morning, where your cortisol levels are high.
Another thing you can do is eat at regular intervals to avoid overeating at a time. For this, you can have mid-time snacks like fruits, nuts, or digestive cookies.
8. It’s Time to Check Your Thyroid and Blood Cell Count
If you feel tired even after having a good night’s sleep, and this happens constantly, you may want to consult your physician for a thyroid and anemia test. If you’re a mother or recently had a baby, thyroid chances are more as it develops during childbirth.
If you have anemia, your body will not receive the required amount of oxygen to sustain energy, which will make you more tired. This can also occur in women having a heavy menstrual cycle.
9. Increase Your Magnesium Intake
Make sure your vitamin and mineral needs are met. Magnesium is needed for more than 300 biochemical reactions in the body. The daily intake of magnesium for men should be 350 mg and for women, 300 mg. For this, you can add hazelnuts, almonds, and cashews to your diet. It’s good to increase whole grains and fish in your diet.
10. Lighten your Load
We all know the biggest reason for fatigue is overwork. By overwork, we don’t mean office work only; it could be professional, social, or family work. You can make a to-do list to lessen your burden and perform essential tasks.
The Bottom Line
Excessive tiredness is the most common problem in people with hectic lives. We often ignore our health due to work. If your body is showing some signs, it’s high time you should pay attention. You don’t have to rely on supplements or energy drinks to boost your energy level; you can do this by natural means also. From simple lifestyle changes to medical help, we have discussed 10 simple methods to help improve your energy levels; we hope this will prove beneficial to you.
