Episode #304: 5 Tips to Naturally BOOST Your Energy!

Intro:

Welcome to The Healthy Catholic Moms Podcast where we make moving and nourishing our bodies the priority, so that we not only fulfill our vocations, but excel in our callings. I’m Brittany Pearson, a Catholic wife, mom, personal trainer, and I’m here to help you build healthy habits that actually fit your life. I am here to teach you how to get the results that you want and maintain the results that you want. Without spending hours at the gym, or meal prepping all weekend long. I understand I am right here with you getting my workouts done in the nooks and crannies of time, looking up recipes, while nursing babies and trying to prioritize my own health amidst everything else going on. But I have really good news for you, you can get the results you want. In less time without doing hours of cardio and restrictive dieting, I’m going to teach you how to use strength training and eating in a macro balanced way to get you feeling so good and your skin full of energy, and strong to carry out your life. Okay, on this podcast, we’ll delve into how to lose fat in a simple, sustainable way. What your workouts and nutrition should look like during different seasons of life, like during pregnancy and postpartum times. We’ll also discuss healthy quick meals, and how to get them on the table, make foods that kids will actually want to eat, mom hacks for making your day run more smoothly, and so much more. All the while with continuous encouragement to stay the course and live with discipline. This is a place where we’re striving to steward our bodies. Well, in order to joyfully serve. I am so happy you’re here. Let’s dive in.

Main Episode:
Hello, beautiful people. How are you? I hope you’re having a wonderful day and a great week, whenever you’re listening to this. I’m so happy you’re here. And if you’re a newer listener, you can find out more about myself and all the ways that I can help you over at healthycatholicmoms.com.

So today, you clicked on it, you saw what’s going on, we’re talking about five ways to naturally boost your energy. Yes, I know it is possible. And it is not reaching for more and more and more caffeine, no judgments, if that’s been you today, if you’re on like your sixth or seventh cup of coffee, but we’re gonna chat about ways to enhance it naturally. So yes, caffeine is even a part of this. But we can work with our body’s natural rhythms and use nature and things going on, to help us to feel better overall. Now, of course, we’re all in different seasons, and some of us might be in seasons of very little sleep, you might have insomnia during pregnancy, totally get that totally been there. I can never sleep in my pregnancies. And especially at the end, I always joke that I get a sore getting a lot done. If you’ve been around the podcast long time you’re like, Yeah, Brittany, I was listening through a couple of pregnancies, and you talked about how much you’d get done, because I will just rearrange my spice cabinet in the middle of the night, all these things. But anyways, it’s not fun if you are in that boat, or if you have a newborn or just kids that don’t sleep through the night, you toddlers that are up in older kids that have nightmares and whatever, there’s a lot of reasons where we can be up during the night are getting very little sleep. That makes it really hard to function. So I will say this whole episode is not going to be me pontificating on the beauty of sleep, but it really is an important pillar of health. And studies show research shows that we really should be shooting for seven to nine hours of sleep each night and then getting under six hours of sleep. I think it’s even six hours or less. I think it starts at six, where if you’re routinely getting success actually shown as like, way too little sleep like sleep deprived starts at six hours of sleep or less regularly. So and most sleep experts agree that you if you have like one five hour night logged in there or something like that, it’s not going to do too much damage. But if that’s routinely your norm, and you’re always skimming from sleep for a long period of time, you know, again, I just said there are seasons of life, we just can’t help it and like we’re like, Yeah, I’d love to be an eight hours of sleep. But especially in those newborn phases, where you get your first like, five hour stretch and you feel like a new person you’re like come on five hours is great. But truly, in general for as much as we can control it, especially if we’re just not getting to bed because I know we all crave that mean time. But we want to stay up late and watch a bunch of shows and have her snacks and have her time again I get it because it’s kid free and you get to like decompress a little bit. But if that’s what you’re prioritizing oversleep, it’s just not great for your sustainability and longevity long term. So you heard it here first. I’m telling you now because a lot of you I know are younger listeners like young 20s and mid 20s. And if I was listening to To the podcasts then, like if I was you training places here and I’m just hearing longevity longevity, I’m thinking, okay, lady, I just want to get ripped and toned right now, I don’t really care about 45. I’m doing 65, 75 I want you to care. And I want to kind of like drop these breadcrumbs for you. And then those of you who are more around my age around 31, 32, 33, 34, 35 and beyond, we’re already thinking about it. I think that a lot of my friends who are around my age, like this is where our attention has turned is like, oh, longevity, yeah, joints. Yeah, my, you know, metabolism and things because it’s true. Suddenly, what you’re doing in your 30s didn’t like, what you did in your 20s doesn’t work in your 30 Sometimes. And beyond, like, I hear that from my clients in their 40s or 50s. Like what I did at 30 is not working anymore at 50. So a lot of focus for me lately has been on longevity, and sleep is a huge part of that game.

Okay, all that being said, as much sleep as you can get, hopefully between seven to nine hours most nights if you’re in a season of life where you can and you’re doing the very best you can to make that happen. Beyond that, we are going to look at how you can naturally boost your energy.

Number one is to expose yourself to sunlight as soon as possible and to start your day with movement. So I kind of threw two together for this one, because they both have to do with the start of your day. tenza Research shows that it is best for you to get out in the sunlight as soon as you wake up. Now, when I’ve heard this before, I’m like, but what if I’m up before the sunlight? And I don’t know the answer exactly that research had nothing to say about that. But that’s me a lot of the times is I am getting up before the sun not so much now as the days are starting a little bit earlier. But I would just then still start my day inside, like do my prayer, do whatever I’m doing first. And then as soon as the sun was kind of rising, I would get out there. Five minutes, 10 minutes, this is what I’ve been trying to do lately is just not expected to have to be like that. That used to be me. Like if I can’t walk around my backyard for 20 minutes or get a whole rosary in or whatever, I’m just not going to do it. But there was a study that I don’t have to cite for you that showed that even just five minutes went did so much in waking up your body naturally and getting your circadian rhythm going is very interesting, because it was I am sorry, I cannot say where it came from. But they were talking about how, like our eyes are designed to even when they’re open, you know, half of your eyes still covered by your eyelid. But the other half is getting that sunlight. And they actually said it’s best to go out in the sunlight without sunglasses so that it wakes up your body like your eyes actually adjust to that light and it signals the rest of your body like Kay her day has begun It is morning, cue the hormones that she needs. Cue all of this to make your body work really well, harmoniously together.

And then movement is so essential in the morning, even if it’s stretching for five minutes or walking like that. So you can get bang, like two birds with one stone here. Like walk around your driveway, walk around your backyard, you could obviously go for a walk. But I’m just saying like trying to get rid of excuses for those of us who maybe are solo parenting in the morning, and we have little ones sleeping or, you know, hopefully kids are still sleeping. And we get that time to ourselves to do this. But obviously, if you have a little baby who’s with you, too, I’ve done this, just when I like you know when baby would wake up and I would wake up if they’re in my room, I just wrapped them in a blanket, depending on what time of year it was and go outside with them and do the same thing, walk around for five minutes and come back in. And it just a world of difference in setting your day off on the right foot. So that’d be the two birds with one stone way of getting your movement in right with it just by walking outside. Otherwise, you could go sit on your deck or your patio or your front porch or whatever your front step your back step for five minutes in the sunlight. Maybe you’re doing your morning prayers or there or something and then you come in and you stretch for five minutes do some mobility work some bird dogs, some spine openers, that kind of stuff. And oh my goodness, the difference already in that setting the tone for a healthy active day versus you staying inside in the dark. being sedentary flipping through your phone first thing can you just see how much that like the two different trajectories your day could go on like active grateful, connected with nature versus like already sucked into whatever dramas going on with the world taking in content right away, staying in a stale environment like your house and with all the trapped air all that. I’m not saying I’m 100% perfect on this. There are some days where I set my alarm to wake up early before the kids and then I just can’t get out of bed and I do spend a half hour flipping through my phone because I’m like well, I’ll just get some things done while I’m here since I’m up but I just can’t get out of bed yet. And I’m gonna tell you what my mood is never.
Like the two moods are incomparable to when I’m up and Adam in the sunlight and moving and the difference in energy is wild.

So even if you don’t start your day with a workout, just movement and then to exposure to sunlight, it’s really important number to start drinking water early and often. So I recommend between 80 to 100 ounces of water a day, it’s really hard to get that in if you don’t start right away. And then the weird thing with water and hydration and how our bodies work, is it the more we give it, the more it really craves. So in the beginning, when I start eating people’s ounces up, I don’t start right from if you’re drinking 40 ounces of water, I’m jumping you up to 80. But I’ll ask you to start trying to increase it each day. It is crazy that as you start drinking more, your body really does want more. So water has this like beautiful power of obviously, it’s hydrating us so it’s also energizing us. So much of our body is made up of water, it makes sense to keep everything running really well to keep us regular, all these things. Water plays a really big role. So start right away. That’s seriously like the second thing I do. I brush my teeth, I start drinking water and then I will head outside of the sun’s already up. Walk around for five minutes. Maybe I’m saying the rosary out there to maybe I’m not coming back in. And like wow, things are already cooking. All it takes I always tell my husband. Like I even said it this morning this morning, we did a live workout with the chasing greatness group. And it was 545 and I set my alarm for 430. And he came in at like 445 It’s like Brett, you snoozed it and like okay, and he came in at 450. And like, are you gonna, you’re gonna be good by yourself because he was leaving for work. I was like, Yep, I got this and like, I got out of bed before five. And as soon as my feet hit the floor, I was fine. And I said that Tim before he left is like see, I just always have to get out of bed. He’s like, yeah, that’s that would be step one. What is really true once you get going, you’re just setting the tone for that. All right, number three. So the first two, were really kind of like starting your day, getting energetic here.

This is kind of a little bit farther into day number three is actually to wait a bit to have caffeine. So waiting a little bit after waking. This is something you know, a lot of us when we talked about our morning routine episodes, I shared mine, I shared a lot of listeners, morning routines, coffee was a staple and a lot of hours. And I’ve mentioned this before, where I just really liked the act of having coffee, I like having the warm cup in my hand, while I’m saying my morning prayers or reading scripture or whatever. And it’s like the whole experience, right? It’s making it lovely. It’s we just talked last episode about food as comfort and enjoyment. Like it’s just a pleasurable part of the day to have that warm cup of coffee. And I know a lot of you guys have said that you like having that first coffee before your kids are up and it just peaceful. So I totally get this and I know that not everybody is going to jump on board with it, maybe just something to consider that maybe you actually do start with a decaf cup. And then a couple hours later you have a caffeinated cup. Because this goes back to our circadian rhythms, our body starts naturally picking up its own cues. If you’ve had that exposure to sunlight, and you’ve started moving around, your body starts sending those hormones to like, Okay, you’re awake, here’s what we’re gonna give you. The one we kind of interfere with that by pumping caffeine into our systems right away. If you roll out of bed and go, press Start or your husband brings you coffee or whatever it’s like in the first 1015 minutes of waking up, then our bodies do become dependent on it. And that is why, you know, you hear people say like, I can’t function without coffee, and you might hear them be like, You know what, birdie, if the worst thing about me is that I am dependent on coffee. I’m okay with that. Like I get it. I see you I understand that just No, that is a recommendation from research. And Cam Newton is a famous football player. And I don’t even know who he plays for right now was a Panthers for a long time. But there was he shared his training plan once and that was a big theme. And that was that he like wakes up does his training and everything. Maybe I’m getting that wrong, maybe he runs or something he did some kind of physical activity before having caffeine, but then he might have he wakes up at like four or 5am And then it was not until nine or 10 that he had caffeine because he said that he likes to wait a couple hours to let his circadian rhythm start doing its thing so Cam Newton doesn’t I’m just saying I’m just throwing it out there as an option. All right, two more. So we had exposed yourself to sunlight and move started drinking water early and often wait a bit to have caffeine and

next up is to change up your environment and or add music. Okay? Environment is huge. And this is something that I recommended the book atomic habits a whole bunch on here. And atomic atomic habits talks a lot. The author James clear speaks a lot about environment and how big it is, and our habits and the things we do and how we are and it’s super true. It’s also very difficult to hear or read or no as maybe a stay at home mom who spends a lot of time in the home. Like Well, super Brittany if you’re telling me to change my environment. I have like four kids under Five. I’m nursing, like, I can’t just Alright, let’s change our environment. Let’s like Let’s go somewhere else. So I get that I relate. I’m not in four kids under five, but I have, you know, three under almost six. And it’s it is not easy to just be like, Alright guys, we’re going somewhere we’re doing something. Yes, sometimes it does totally work wonders and wakes everybody up and changes the mood and the spirit of the home, if it’s really a rough day, like, alright, we’re taking a car ride and go through the drive thru somewhere and everybody’s happy. But if you can’t like this could just be going outside going outside does that for us. And like, if everybody’s kind of chippy inside or I’m feeling really tired, this happens a lot. My kids love to read. And that’s great. And I love you know, reading to them. And obviously, literacy is great, all that stuff. However, the fact remains that when I’m sitting on the couch, reading aloud, book after book I want fall asleep. And I don’t think it matters how energized I am. If I have started my day with movement, if I’ve had caffeine or not, it’s that I get to that point where I’m like, I am going to fall asleep if I read one more book. So they know this and I will get to like book six or seven. And I’m like Mama needs to move and I will stand up and be like we’re going outside or we’re taking a dance break. Like we would do that in the winter, I would put on one of those go noodle things on YouTube. And we would do like a Grinch run or an elf run or whatever. And the floor is hot cocoa was one that we did, instead of the floor is lava. And it was like we needed to move and take a moment break and then maybe play some other stuff. And then we could go back to reading but we just couldn’t sit there sit still in that spot. And you know that sitting is such a big thing that zaps our energy. So that’s huge. If you’re you know, at work, maybe it’s taking a lap around I know a lot of you take walks on your lunch breaks instead of sitting on your lunch breaks. I think that’s awesome. I used to do that as well, when I worked in you know, taking advantage of moving and being active and not being sedentary. But if you can’t change your environment you’re like well Brittany I’m so my house I can’t really like yeah, we can kind of move around or dance around or whatever. But otherwise, how do I do this, I find just adding music and what music is and does is like such a great way to energize things. If I am making dinner or we’re just doing whatever and I have on like, one of my favorite Spotify stations is cello covers of pop songs. And it’s a great station but I’ll put it on when it’s quiet time or I’ll put it on when the boys are doing schoolwork. And it is it’s lovely but it also like could definitely loan me to sleep. I also you know I could fall asleep anywhere that you might just be getting there from this conversation. I am an energetic person, but if I sit I’m done I have literally fallen asleep at the dentist like with their hands in my mouth falling asleep. And it’s just if I if I said I’m done so there’s something to it’s not just all music but peppy music like there’s a lot of studies that show when you’re listening to music with whatever kind of beat or a fast enough beat that people start going harder and faster in their workouts and that’s a way to enhance your workout. So it also affects the mood and the energy of your day. There are times when I do have something slow around and I’m like okay we’re we’re really down in here are drawn out or I’m getting drowsy we’ve got to put on some 2000s pop some 90s country some whatever like change the mood and it does it changes the mood it changes the atmosphere and can absolutely get the energy up so don’t discount Music There’s a reason people have pump up songs and pregame playlists and all that kind of stuff.

Lastly, this might be a fun one for some of you some of you might not love this one but like crunchy ladies well using peppermint so I will take peppermint oil and just dab it like right on my temples or I will diffuse peppermint oil in the diffuser I’m no expert in essential oils I’m not telling you like this is not medical advice to rub it on yourself and be careful if you’re putting in your temples because you want to get in your eyes and all that stuff but peppermint does is supposed to wake you up and in my experience it definitely does and that might be even having a mint or chewing some gum or whatever but something about Mint is supposed to help you be alert wake you up and in my experience it definitely does so when I feel that midday drowsy I had one that I would keep in my car
I think I used to have one in the diaper bag right now I definitely just have one in the house because that is where I am a lot of the time and it absolutely works its magic every time I just it perhaps all of us up just just smelling it if you’re not going to I don’t put I don’t like ingest peppermint oil which you probably can too but I don’t I just again put it on my temples or in the diffuser and it’s a good little wake up. All right, I hope this is super helpful to you. I hope that you can glean a couple things from here. Maybe there’s something on here that you did not know that you can file away in the back of your mind. If you During this episode, I’d really appreciate if you would rate and review it. Or if you would share it with a friend. And we can get the word out to more tired moms. How to get energy naturally without hitting the monsters and the Red Bulls because that’s not great for you. You heard that here first too. Alright ladies, I hope you have a great rest of your day. Thank you so much for listening, and I’ll talk to you next time.

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