Posts Tagged ‘Energy Levels’

How to stay active and boost your energy levels in today’s fast paced times?

Energy is essential in this sleep-deprived, overstretched, high-speed world. Everybody is leading a hectic life has become a natural part of life. The challenge, therefore, is to maintain health and vitality, which can only be done by preserving the energy.

- Get a good sleep in night
Having eight hours of sleep is very necessary. It is very important to sleep at proper time. Sleeping from 1 am to 9 am is not though to be as restorative as sleeping from 10 pm to 6 am because hormone secretion, body temperature, digestion, and other important restorative processes follow a 24-hour cycle linked to natural light exposure.

- Increase your magnesium intake
This mineral is needed for more than 300 biochemical reactions in the body, including breaking down glucose into energy. So when levels are even a little low, energy can drop. Add a handful of almonds, hazelnuts or cashews to your daily diet. Increase your intake of whole grains, particularly bran cereal. Eat more fish, especially halibut.

- Eat wholesome cereals
Wholesome cereals such as corn flakes, museli, oatmeal without adding sugar provide quick energy. These meals are digested slowly which means that sugar levels stay stable.

- Drink enough water
Drink at least 8 to 10 glasses of water in a day especially if you are working out or in warm weather. Drinking nimbu paani will replenish nutrients that are lost.

- When you take time to rest, relax, meditate and eat well, you are preserving energy you already have and are also taking an opportunity to cultivate more. Meditate for 20-25 minutes daily. Try to take a quick 15 to 20 minutes of power nap during the day to help you fight fatigue and low energy and try to stretch for 10minutes twice a day.

- Don’t Skip Breakfast — or Any Other Meal.
- Reduce Stress and Deal With Anger.
- Eat More Whole Grains and Less Sugar.
- Check Your Thyroid Function and Complete Blood Cell Count.
- Although coffee initially raises stress hormones and gives a rush of energy, consuming several cups or more of coffee per day can promote burnout.

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What should be the time gap between eating and exercise ?

No definite answers, but it depends on the amount of food, and type of meal. It is an error to say that you should always have a gap of around 1-2 hours between when you eat, and when you exercise. After all, it is recommended to eat a banana or similar kind of fruit before you are going in for an exercise, and that does not seem to cause any harm.
What is however recommended is that if you are having a meal, whether it be light or heavy, a minimum gap of around 30 minutes should be there before you start exercising. You can start exercise as quickly as 30 minutes after a meal, but this should be a light meal. If you have had a heavy meal such as lunch or dinner, increase this gap to as much as 1 hour and 30 minutes. And of course, if during your exercise, you feel some discomfort, you should stop your exercise.
On the converse side, if you have done some intensive exercise, you should wait at least 30 minutes before going in for a meal.
However, there are some constraints to this advice. The blood and food chemistry of every individual is different, so this time requirement also varies between people. And of course, for diabetics, they should check with their doctors before going in for such exercise routines.

Chew gum to reduce weight

Sounds a bit strange, right ? After all, chewing gum would supposedly mean that you are consuming a substance that has plenty of sugar, and inbetween meals, somewhat similar to the practice of snacking in between meals. But surprisingly, research has indicated that chewing gum can actually result in lower calorie intake, and after all, this would result in lowering of body weight and size. And we are not even talking about the sugar-free chewing gum, but about the normal sugared chewing gum that is available for most people. This was done through a randomized test of volunteers, and the science dealing with this deals with a higher amount of energy expenditure that is caused through the chewing of gum; further, the portion of the brain that deals with hunger might be satiated by the chewing of the gum (link to article):

When study subjects chewed gum for a total of one hour in the morning (three 20-minute gum-chewing sessions), they consumed 67 fewer calories at lunch and did not compensate by eating more later in the day. Male participants also reported feeling significantly less hungry after chewing gum. Melanson also found that when her subjects chewed gum before and after eating, they expended about 5 percent more energy than when they did not chew gum. In addition, her subjects reported feeling more energetic after chewing gum.
According to the URI researcher, nerves in the muscles of the jaw are stimulated by the motion of chewing and send signals to the appetite section of the brain that is linked to satiety, which may explain why the act of chewing might help to reduce hunger.