Top 10 energy wasting things you must avoid

 

Energy efficiency:

How to be more energized throughout the day? 

How to be more energy efficient?

How to be more mindful about spending energy?

Top 10 energy wasting things you must avoid:

The physical aspect:

1. Lack of mindful sleep timing:

Lack of set sleeping and waking time:

Our brain creates automated sets of actions, it includes timing the "wake up" command and the "sleep" command. We can work either with or against our brain. If we work against it, we inefficiently waste energy. But if we decide to work with it and use its power we can accumulate more energy for other, more important tasks in our day.

To work with the brain we should understand the importance of automation. Give the brain consistency and a fixed pattern and it will do the work for you. You actually can teach your brain to automatically send certain hormones through your body at a certain time.

Actions to take:

1. Set a fixed and realistic "fall asleep" and "wake up" time, not less than 7 hours of sleep.
2. Be consistent at least 30 days in a row at following these set times.
3. After a month you will notice you waste a lot less energy to wake up from bed each day.

Uncertain waking/sleeping state, aka the "snooze":

The snooze option is a terrible brain-confuser. As much as it is nice to snuggle 10 more minutes before getting up, that much it is bad for your brain to drouze between sleeping and waking states during the morning. This state confuses the brain and it takes 10 times more energy to get up than if done right away.

Actions to take:

1. Set a fixed time to wake up with enough hours of sleep.
2. Put your phone far from your bed so you have to get up to turn the alarm off.
3. Go straight to the kitchen and drink a lot of water to start your digestion and all your body systems in action.

2. Dehydration and wrong drinking habit:

Dehydration after sleep:

After 7 hours' sleep, our body is dehydrated. The first thing we insert into our system in the morning is entering a sleeping factory, it is the first worker who pushes all the buttons "on", setting your digestion in motion. You would like your factory to run smoothly and cleanly, so you would like this first worker to start with the cleaning of all pipes and vessels first.

The second false drinking habit is when combined with food - your body will waste a lot more energy on digesting when you wash your digesting system right before or alongside the food consumption.

Actions to take:

1. When you wake up, drink at least half a liter of water. If you want to take it to the next level - drink the water in your body temperature to decrease the amount of energy your body would use for adjusting temperatures inside.
2. When eating - stop drinking at least 15 minutes before staring your meal, and wait at least 30 minutes after finishing it. With time, try building that habit to 30 minuted before food and 1 hour after.

Interrupting digestion with water:

The second false drinking habit is when combined with food - your body will waste a lot more energy on digesting when you wash your digesting system right before or alongside the food consumption.

Actions to take:

1. When eating - stop drinking at least 15 minutes before starting your meal, and wait at least 30 minutes after finishing it. With time, try building that habit to 30 minutes before food and 1 hour after.

3. Sugar crashes:

Sugar crash in the morning:

When you fast (haven't eaten for 5 hours or more) your digesting system is getting reset.

So the first thing you will put there will have a bigger impact than if you eat it after a full meal.

The body reacts to sugar in a very drastic way. To make it simple and easy to understand -  if you eat an omelet, it breaks down slowly into protein and transforms into energy and building blocks, giving you a steady stream of energy for several hours. On the other hand, sugars, break down a lot faster and the energy they provide comes in high but short boosts.

What is the catch? When the sugar gets in your blood the body releases insulin to steady the rush, the sugars break down faster than most of the insulin, leaving it to break more sugar from the blood than needed, leaving you in a state of low energy with a pounding need for compensation, which results in more sugar consumption.

When you put your body on such a sugar/insulin rollercoaster don't be surprised to have low-energy days more often. The body likes a stable and consistent stream of energy.

Actions to take:

1. Never break a fast with sugary meals. When breaking a fast start with a high protein meal, and only then you can treat yourself to a sugary snack.
2. When eating sugar snacks try to combine them with fruits (natural sugars) to help your body get a more stable stream of energy.
3. Avoid sugary drinks, it is like ingesting sugar in your veins and setting out of balance your whole system.

4. Caffeine withdrawal:

Too much caffeine:

It is not such common knowledge that you can have caffeine withdrawals.

When you insert caffeine into your body it is like a drug, it affects your systems in a way that makes you feel more alert. But when your body is not accustomed to the amount you've inserted, you start to feel fatigued, dizzied, nauseated, dehydrated, it even can get to a panic attack, vomiting, and fainting. It often can be mistaken for a sugar crash, only in this case there is fastened heartbeat and there's more tendency for panic attacks.

When you insert your body with drugs you should be mindful of your body's limits.

Actions to take:

1. Be more mindful of the amount of caffeine your body is used to intake. Mind that after a month of caffeine-free diet, your intake tolerance is much lower than before.
2. When intaking caffeine, drink a lot of water to stay hydrated. Caffeine is known to have a dehydrating effect on the body.

Breaking fast with caffeine:

When you fast (haven't eaten for 5 hours or more) your digesting system is getting reset.

So the first thing you will put there will have a bigger impact than if you eat it after a full meal - It is the same with caffeine as it is with sugar.

Actions to take:

1. Never break a fast with strong caffeine drinks. Don't give this shock to your body.
2. When intaking caffeine, always combine it with food (not a sugary snack - that will only worsen the effect of caffeine).

5. Lack of exercise:

Your body stays asleep:

When you get up from bed and start your day, your body has not woke up yet. In order for it to fully start operating you need to shake it up. Let all your factory machined run for several minutes to warm up for the day.

It is harder to make your brain work when you fight your body from falling asleep again.

Actions to take:

1. Take as little as 10 minutes each morning before breakfast or right after getting out of bed, to do a full-body exercise. Be mindful to activate all parts, and include at least 20 jumps to really shake your body out of the sleeping mode.
2. When feeling tired during the day, get up and do some stretches, stand and reach for your feet, making thus getting more bloodstream to your brain.

The emotional aspect:

6. Ignoring your intuition:

You concentrate on the wrong things:

Your inner self always knows what you really want and what you don't want. When you are concentrating on the things you do not want, you create resistance inside, which created a bad feeling as a reminder that you are not in alignment with yourself.

First, when you try acting from a place of resistance it will take a lot more energy from you.

Second, when you follow your intuition you follow the path of least resistance, thus spending less energy in achieving your goals.

Third, it is much easier and less stressful to just be who you are, the amount of energy it takes to keep a certain mask on during the whole day is unbelievable.

Actions to take:

1. Be mindful of your inner feeling before taking any action, does it feel good? Does it go along with my vision and desires?
2. Practice meditation to achieve a higher state of awareness of your feelings and actions, gain more control over the choices you make throughout your day, so you can be more true to who you are.
3. Get to know yourself better by practicing daily journaling, and gain more confidence in your own worldview.

7. Toxic self-talk:

When you have a constant critic in your head:

The most important and long relationship you will ever have is with yourself. Choose now to make it a good one. When you talk to yourself in a critical and abusive way, you won't last long. Give yourself an unconditional boost of compliments, motivation, praise, and positive talk. No one else needs to know you actually feel good about yourself even if you did something wrong or made a mistake. When you are being positive with yourself it doubles your power and motivates you like no other can. But when you hinder yourself with negative talk - any action would take much more energy to complete.

Actions to take:

1. Cultivate self-compassion like your life depends on it.
2. Be mindful of your thoughts during the day, how do you refer to yourself? Be nicer!
3. When feeling off and unenergized, make a list of things you are proud of yourself for (even washing the dishes count, for example: "look how awesome you are! You did not argue with your partner today! You prepared yourself a healthy breakfast! You are fantastic!")

8. Worries about things and people you cannot control:

Focusing on the things you cannot control instead of focusing on the things you can:

When watching the news and worrying about crises and other people's troubles that you have no control of, you deprive this energy of focus from something else you are in control of and wasting it in vain.

Your inner self always knows what you really want and what you don't want. When you are concentrating on the things you do not want, you create resistance inside, which created a bad feeling as a reminder that you are not in alignment with yourself.

First, when you try acting from a place of resistance it will take a lot more energy from you.

Second, when you follow your intuition you follow the path of least resistance, thus spending less energy in achieving your goals.

Third, it is much easier and less stressful to just be who you are, the amount of energy it takes to keep a certain mask on during the whole day is unbelievable.

Worrying about someone else's faults and behavior is also a waste of precious energy. You do not control other people, so save this energy for the things you can control.

Actions to take:

1. Remember you have limited power and limited time, so you must choose what to use it for.
2. Focus deliberately on the positive things you can do.
3. Remember you only have the power to change yourself and it is enough.

9. Information overload:

When your brain gets too much information in its stream that it stops operation and cannot digest more.

Actions to take:

1. Be mindful of the stream of information you are surrounded by.
2. Help your brain digest information by journaling every day.
3. Limit your access to sources of unhelpful information.
4. Limit communication with people you don't want their stream of information.

A more general aspect:

10. No set routine:

We understand already that the brain love automating processes. It then can focus more energy on the important tasks and decision-making.

When having a set routine in every task in your life that you do frequently you are reserving more energy for the more important things.

Your brain has a limited amount of decisions it can make in a day.

You will still have your freedom, only it will now have a lot more energy reserve to tap into than before.

Actions to take:

1. Set a morning routine - work with a checklist.
2. Set a bedtime routine.
3. Set a schedule for the week that feels most comfortable to you (don't set unrealistic goals, you're not a robot).
4. Respect your brain and give it the consistency that it wants, leaving freedom inside brackets.
5. Schedule your freedom time.