Do you ever wake up on a Monday morning feeling groggy, tired, uninspired, or under-energized? Does this have a knock on effect on the rest of your week, where you never really catch up until the weekend when it all starts again? Well, the good news is you’re not alone. Many, many people wake up on a Monday morning feeling under-energized, and that’s something I’m going to try and help you with. The good news is there are many things that you can do about this. Here are my seven ways to feel more energised on a Monday morning.
- Eat dinner three to four hours before going to bed. This actually starts Sunday night, and would apply for any evening of your week, as well. The renowned nutritionist, Alessandro Ferretti, in the podcast that I recorded with him last year, said that studies have shown that the best length of time is between three and four hours between eating and getting to bed for optimal sleep, so it doesn’t interrupt your circadian rhythm.
- Make sure you’re getting enough sleep. It might sound obvious, but we’ve come to accept that the new normal might be getting six to seven hours sleep, and the majority of us need longer than that. This will depend on your genetic predisposition, and there is a very tiny minority of us that can do with maybe four or five hours sleep. A few famous politicians, like Margaret Thatcher, for example, was potentially one of those people. However, most of us need a good seven or eight hours or sometimes even more, so understand what amount of sleep really works for you. If you’re an eight-hour person, then you need to adjust your bedtime to take that into account.
- Start moving as soon as you wake up. In order to kickstart our circadian rhythms and get our bodies geared up for the day, we need to move. Optimal movement would be a gentle walk, maybe some yoga, and this need only be a few minutes; it could also be walking the dog or just bouncing or walking around the house, but get moving and get some energy flowing.
- Heartfulness. This involves saying something nice to your partner or your kids or your animals or looking in the mirror and saying something nice and warm and loving to yourself. Start the day with a positive tone. Change your physiology by doing something that comes from the heart, and you’ll be amazed at what a difference it can make to how you feel, even about the day ahead.
- Get natural light into the eyes as soon as possible. Curtains go up, blinds lifted. Get natural light, even if it’s not sunny, onto the eyes and onto your skin as early as you possibly can. Once you’re up, get in front of the sun or in front of natural light.
- Introducing more heartfulness into the week. What I mean by this is, quite often, we have a week that’s controlled by somebody else. It’s controlled by our employer, by our clients, by our team, and we can feel quite claustrophobic in that environment. Put something in your week that’s for you. It might just be five or ten minutes. Maybe it’s meditation. Maybe it’s reading. Maybe it’s walking the dog, reading a magazine. Whatever it might be, do something, an exercise class, get something in the diary that is for you, and that will help change your perspective on the week ahead and help you feel more energised about it.
- Governing your circadian rhythm and making sure you don’t have what’s called a sleep hangover on Monday, also called a social hangover. This refers to the fact that many of us get up to an alarm clock Monday through to Friday, but at the weekends, we sleep in, and the consequence on Sunday nights, we can’t sleep at our usual time because we’ve had a lie-in that morning. So have a consistent wake time throughout the week to avoid that sleep hangover on a Monday morning.
Bodyshot Energy Package
We have brought together everything you need to optimise your energy levels, in one package. The Energy Package includes the DNA test for diet and fitness, combined with a non-invasive blood test panel for 11 key markers including vitamin D3 and B12, calcium, iron, testosterone and HbA1c (diabetes).
Once we’ve received the results of your DNA and blood test, we arrange a suitable time for the consultation which takes place online and lasts approximately 60 minutes. In the consultation, we analyse your results, explain what everything means and draw up a personalised action plan.
Our Energy Package includes an eBook that talks you through the Energy Signal and gives you loads of tips, information and a resource you can keep coming back to. The eBook is a concise summary of everything we’ve learned from the hundreds of clients we’ve helped to optimise their energy.
What you get:
- DNA test for diet and fitness
- Custom Blood Panel
- eBook
- Consultation with a Health Expert
If you would like to find out more about this package click here.
What’s your Health IQ?
If you’re reading this, you’re are probably in a reasonably senior position, running your own business or have a busy life running the home and juggling other responsibilities. Either way, you’re busy. The convergent pressures of work and family life have probably meant that the time you did have to spend on health and fitness has disappeared. Why not talk to us and see how we can help.
Leanne Spencer is an entrepreneur, coach, TEDx Speaker, author of Remove the Guesswork, and founder of Bodyshot Performance Limited. Bodyshot is a health and fitness consultancy that helps busy professionals get more energy by removing the guesswork around their health, fitness and nutrition. Visit www.bodyshotperformance.com or email info@bodyshotperformance.com to register your interest in our services and connect with us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
