Healthy Lifestyle Tips by Aimee Carlson

One way to get more energy is to incorporate essential oils and color therapy into your life. Studies show that certain colors provide energy, while others provide calmness, and some even make you hungry. Fast food restaurants use color extensively to get you in and out fast, and movie theaters and malls often pump in the smell of popped corn or other food to get their customers to buy more food. 

If it’s good enough for retail, it’s good enough for you. After all, they’ve spent the money on the studies and if it didn’t work, they would have stopped doing it already.

Try to find ways to incorporate the right colors for the right mood you want to elicit in yourself and others into the rooms and environment that you want them to feel that way in. For example, red and violet are known as energy colors, but they may also cause problems with concentration. If you work in a high energy place, red and violet can work, but if you want to make people feel happy and also productive, choose green and yellows. 

Just because you want to be energetic doesn’t mean everything should be red, but it may mean that the wall in the exercise room should be red. It may also mean that any room you want to relax in should be a shade of blue. This is a great color for a waiting room, for example. A soft blue that is almost white can be very soothing.

Scents can also make a huge difference in your energy levels. However, be cautious because some people are allergic to fragrance. Using high-quality essential oils is key to keep away from so many toxic ingredients included in the room sprays, candles, plug-ins and warmers that we purchase in the stores. I highly recommend Young Living because of their Seed to Seal Promise.  No other company owns or partners with their farms.

Some scents that can provide energy are:

Orange

Eucalyptus

Lemon

Cedarwood

Grapefruit

Peppermint

Spearmint

Cinnamon

Basil

Rosemary

Ginger

Thyme

Juniper

Neroli

The best thing to do is to buy the best essential oils you can.  Here is my link to check out Young Living.  Give each new scent at least 21 days before you make a judgment.  Essential Oils begin to work within minutes, but it's important to establish habits.  Another tip is to place the oils where you will see them, reminding you to use them daily!  I personally have diffusers in every room of our home. Since there are so many essential oil scents that can be mood lifters and energy boosters, you have a lot to choose from. Remember, if you want to be energetic tomorrow, use something calming at night. Only use the ones above during the time that you want to feel more energetic. Check out my FREE eBook with a year of diffuser recipes!

During this report, hydration has been mentioned several times but that is because it's so important. By some estimates, about 75 percent of Americans are chronically dehydrated. So many people either drink too little water, or they drink other beverages for thirst instead of water. 

This is not good, because water affects every organ and function in your body. Whether you get headaches, suffer from sinus problems, dry skin, brittle nails, frizzy hair or something else, it may all be traced to not drinking enough water. No matter what you’ve heard, nothing is better for hydration than drinking regular unadulterated filtered water. 

But, since even mild dehydration can cause fatigue, here are some tips to ensure that you get enough water in every single day. If at any part of the day water tastes "funny" to you even though it’s fresh filtered water, try brushing your teeth because you’re likely just tasting your breath instead of your water. Yes, it’s true. 

Keep Water Handy – Instead of thinking that you must guzzle water, just have it handy. Keep a container of water with you always and sip it whenever you’re thirsty or hungry between meals. Due to the fact that most of us ignore our thirst signals, sometimes the body will signal hunger even when it’s not meal time to try to get moisture into your body. I highly recommend using a straw!  This will help you sip the water, rather than gulp.

Drink Water Before, During and After Working Out – When you work out, you need a little extra water to replace what you lose over your basic needs. Simply drink about four ounces of water before your workout and have some to sip occasionally during your workout, and then drink another four ounces after your workout.

Add Fruit to Your Water – If you want a change of pace, put a pitcher of water in your fridge with different types of fruit and even herbs. For example, sliced oranges and mint are good together. So are lemon and strawberry. Cucumber also makes water taste fresh and delicious and gives it a little extra something as a change of pace without adding unhealthy sugars.

Check out my Infused Water Recipe Book: Infused Water eBook.pdf

Avoid Other Beverages – Even if you enjoy coffee, coke, tea and so forth, none of these are hydrating, in fact they are dehydrating. Make it a rule that you can only enjoy something else once you drink your mandated amount of water depending on your weight. If you must have your morning coffee, add an extra few ounces of water to your day since it’s so dehydrating. I like to have an 8oz glass of water with lemon in it first thing when I wake up!  I encourage you to give this a try and see how you feel!  Tip:  fill the glass of water the night before and place on your bedside table!

Start and End Your Day with Fruit-Infused Water – You can even heat it up as a pick-me-up or relaxing beverage in the evening. Just choose your fruit wisely. Try mint and orange in the morning, and berries and chamomile in the evening. Check out the Recipe book above!

Drink Water with All Your Meals – Water needs to be the beverage of choice with meals. Some experts on digestion believe you should drink your water before and after your meal and not with it, so that your digestive juices are strong enough to digest your food. Test it out to see if it makes a difference for you.

Like most things, enough is the best, but too much is not good. Be aware of people trying to tell you to drink too much water. To calculate your needs, simply take your weight in pounds, divide by two, and then drink that many ounces of water all throughout the day. Do not guzzle water or drink water too fast, as drinking too much too fast can be very dangerous and unhealthy. Instead, make water drinking part of your daily life to enjoy all throughout the day.

Recharging your body and overcoming fatigue so that you can get your life back is one of the most important ways you can improve the quality of your life. There is no reason you need to be exhausted and tired all the time. If it’s not a medical condition (and even if it is), you have a lot more control over how you feel each day than you think. It might be as simple as getting enough sleep and drinking enough water. You are the one with the power to figure it out. Don’t delay, so that you can get your life back and do wonderful things. 

For many people, the main reason they are mentally and/or physically exhausted can all come down to issues with sleep. If you are an insomniac, there are steps that you can take to get rest and hopefully reverse your situation. 

The very first thing anyone with insomnia should do is make a doctor’s appointment to talk about the issues. It might help to track the situation using a device like an Oura Ring so that you can show your doctor your records. But you can also just write things down, so you don’t forget what to talk about with your doctor. 

Your doctor should take you seriously and not just automatically prescribe drugs to help you sleep. Even though that might be a short-term answer, it is not a long-term solution. Your doctor will do a complete blood work-up to ensure that you are doing well nutritionally. If you have low iron, B12, or D, these can cause anxiety and insomnia in some people. 

The times you wake up can also indicate what may be going on in your body.  The below graphic is from Chinese Medicine and gives us insight to our bodies.  Look to see where you may need more support.  Notice that most of the issues in the middle of the night have to do with Detox?  

Another area to address are the emotions.  In staying with the Chinese Clock, a couple to point out are liver and lung.  Liver is most associated with anger and lungs are grief.  

This is a great excuse to redo your bedroom. Your bedroom should be a sanctuary made for sleeping. Your bed should be the most comfortable and organic that you can afford to buy, along with the sheets and blankets that you use on it. Remember, we are spending 1/3 of our life on top of this!

You may need to test out a few mattresses, but you usually want something that is firmer than you might have thought.  

You can buy good organic sheets less expensively than you might think if you know what type of sheets you like. Check on Overstock.com and Amazon to find good prices on well-made sheets and look for the certified GOTS seal.   For blankets, choose layers of blankets instead of one heavy comforter. That way you can adjust as needed for the time of year.

Invest in blackout shades for your windows. You can get them made for your windows at places like Home Depot or Lowe's. They are well worth it. Even if you have a rule with your HOA that they should be white on the back, you can still get blackout shades that will enable you to sleep better at night. Our bodies need the darkness to trigger natural melatonin release.  

Keep your thermostat set properly. Studies have shown that we get our best sleep somewhere between 64-68 degrees F. Having a fan to circulate the air is also helpful, especially if you are in menopause.  I found this to be extremely beneficial for good sleep when I was at my worst symptoms. If it’s nice outside, try opening your window about an hour before you go to bed, but close it if you can when you go to bed so outside noises don’t interfere (unless you’re lucky enough to live where it’s super-quiet or you have the sound of the ocean to lull you to sleep). 

Additionally, invest in very comfortable, natural sleeping attire or sleep naked to avoid anything getting in the way of your comfort and help your body breathe at night. If you or your partner snore, consider using comfortable earplugs to help further block the sound. (Hint: parents of young children can take turns so every other night at least one parent gets a full night of sleep.)

The darker you can make your room, the better. But, once the sun goes down outside, it’s important to make the house dimmer too. You want to turn off all electronics at least an hour or two before you go to bed, so that your body gets used to the idea that it's bedtime. That includes your TV, your computer, and your mobile device. This is probably the hardest one for insomniacs to deal with, but it’s very important for your health to disconnect.

If you’re nervous that something is going to happen to anyone if you’re not there immediately, understand that long before there were cell phones there were parents. Of course, you’re going to want to be available to your kids if they’re teenagers, but that’s what curfews are about and that’s why people have two parents. Ask for help and take turns. If you do not have children living at home, you really don’t need to be available 24/7 to anyone most of the time. Anyone who has something to say to you, even if something bad happens, can be dealt with in the morning. If you must have a cell phone in the bedroom for whatever reason, keep it at least 15 feet away from where you are sleeping and turn off all notifications.

Try it for at least 30 days. You’ll see after that time that you’re not in charge of the world, and no one needs to bother you about anything when you’re sleeping. If you have elderly parents, share the job with your siblings with each of you having assigned "on call" times or something like that so that everyone can get sleep. Remember, you cannot take care of others if you don’t take care of yourself first.

A great way to ensure that you get more sleep is to create a bedtime ritual. Since you already need to turn electronics off and turn down the lights, think of something you can do that doesn’t require either. For example, soft slow stretches, meditation, a hot bath, taking care of your hygiene such as by brushing and flossing your teeth, doing a facial, applying lotion, and other activities. 

Think about how babies go to sleep. Mom and Dad create a ritual around bedtime. They get a bath, a quiet story, cuddles, comfy clothing, and clean bed, and soft blankets. All of this starts well before bedtime and helps the child calm down, so that when you sit down in bed to read they usually fall asleep fast if not with the first book, then by the third. You should do the same thing for yourself. 

Do the same things nightly to help you sleep such as stretching, bathing, applying lotion, dressing for bed, and reading something positive. Bedtime is not the time to read anything upsetting, scary, or even exciting. Use that time to read uplifting or thoughtful poetry, history, or something that keeps your heart rate low. 

I have found essential oils to be extremely beneficial in my sleep and nighttime routines.  When combined with a nightly ritual, essential oils can give you the warm, fuzzy feelings you need for a restful night of sweet slumbers. Let's break down how essential oils work in very basics.  

1.  Each oil has a unique combination of constituents, and every combination lends itself to a different use. 

2.  Receptors are proteins that specifically bind with different types of molecules to facilitate chemical communication within our bodies. You have millions of receptors on your body, but we want to focus on your sensory and thermoreceptors, because they’re the ones involved in touch, taste, and smell. When compounds in essential oils bind to receptors, they trigger specific effects in our bodies depending on the oil’s constituents and how you’ve applied it—topically or aromatically.

3.  Of all the senses, essential oils affect your sense of smell the most.  According to a study published by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, the sense of smell is one of the first senses humans developed. From the beginning, humans have used their olfactory sense—science’s fancy way of saying sense of smell—to identify food, potential mating partners, dangers, enemies, and more. For most living creatures, smell is a key way we interact with our environment.

So how many receptors are dedicated to the olfactory sense? You’ll find a whopping 100 million or more receptors packed into an area about 2.5 square centimeters! No wonder essential oils are crazy good at stirring certain emotions or specific memories—you have all those olfactory receptors just waiting to send signals to your brain!

So which ones can you use for sleep?  Here is a list of some of my favorites:

Have you tried using essential oils?

Finally, you really need to make time for sleep. Set a daily schedule for your life and stick to it. Sleep is one of the most important factors in your schedule. You should be able to get everything you need to do done daily and still sleep at least seven to eight hours a night. But, it may require you to learn to say no, because it’s that important to your health and your daily energy levels.

Make sure you are doing your best to go to sleep and wake up at the same time every day. This is crucial for your body to get into a rhythm.  Studies have shown that for every hour you sleep prior to midnight, it's the equivalent to getting two hours sleep!  

Stay tuned next week as we wrap up this series in our blog with how to add more pep to your step!

One of the best ways to treat any type of exhaustion, beside hydration, is by eating the right type of food so that you can keep your energy balanced all day long. One thing to understand about food is that it’s all just different nutrients.

When you think of food as nutrients, you realize very fast that some things we put into our mouths aren’t really food. It’s more like a toy, a distraction, or a leisure activity – an unhealthy one at that. For example, coffee and donuts are not nutrients. Therefore, they are a horrible choice for anyone who is suffering from or trying to prevent mental and physical exhaustion. 

So, understanding that, let’s look at some revitalizing foods that you can easily incorporate into your life to help you boost your energy all day. Remember that if you are on a special diet, you can just substitute the ideas so that they fit your way of eating. The important factor is to consider nutrients that give energy.

Brown Rice – If you normally eat white rice, switch out all your rice to brown rice, or even different colors of wild rice. Rice that has a color and is not processed will be richer in manganese, which is a mineral that helps your body process energy from both carbs and fats better. A good way to cook brown rice is to boil it in salted water just like you do noodles for 20 minutes, drain, then set aside with a lid on for at least 10 more minutes until ready to serve. 

Sweet Potatoes – This is an excellent lunch idea because sweet potatoes are packed with vitamins and minerals. Loaded with vitamin A and C, if you eat a sweet potato for lunch you’ll be much less likely to suffer from the midday slump. They are super-easy to cook in the microwave or bake ahead. You can eat them hot or cold too. 

Bananas – A banana is almost the perfect food. It has plenty of sugar and fiber to slow the digestion of the sugar. You can eat them alone, or you can spread with seed butter like hemp or sunflower seeds to add a protein kick to make it last even longer. 

Apples – This is another naturally fast food. If you buy organic apples you can just wash them off and start eating them as they are. Due to the high fiber in apples, the sugar processes slowly - making them a perfect snack to help you study harder or get over the midday slump at work. If you normally start falling asleep around 3 pm, try grabbing a small apple around 2:30 and you may find that you don’t get tired at all. 

Oranges – You know that an orange is high in vitamin C, and of course the hit of sugar will help perk you up too. But the smell of the citrus as you take out the time to peel the fruit will also wake you up and give you both a mental and physical boost of energy that can’t be beaten. Always eat your oranges rather than juice them for best results. 

Spinach – Everyone knows that spinach is a superfood, but due to its high iron content that is easily digestible by the human body, adding just one cup of spinach to other dishes or smoothies that you eat throughout the day can make a huge difference in your energy levels. Popeye had the right idea, after all. Tip: Adding citrus and a small amount of fruit-based fat like coconut oil or olive oil to your spinach can help your body process the vitamins. 

Eggs – For some people who need more iron and B vitamins but don’t want to eat anything that is sugary even if it’s a fruit, a boiled egg is the answer. The worries about too much cholesterol isn’t a problem for most people and falling asleep or getting overwhelmed due to studying or work can be avoided by adding a boiled egg to your snack options.

Water – While water isn’t a food, it needs to be mentioned. If you’re not drinking eight to ten 8-ounce glasses of water each day, look to that as your first reason for exhaustion. Most people are walking around dehydrated and don’t even know it. Remember that water is life and the first choice for beverages should always be water. 

Adding these foods to your day can make all the difference in the world to your energy levels. When you feel better, you will automatically feel more energetic. In addition to adding these foods to your daily diet, eliminate all processed food. Some people also see good results from eliminating dairy from their diets as it can be a cause of congestion, skin issues, and stomach issues for many adults. 

There are many activities that you can do to help raise your energy level, whether you need more mental energy or physical energy. Your mental and physical energy are so intertwined that when you do something to help one you’re automatically helping the other. Here are some effective activities to try.

Develop a Daily Meditation Practice – Meditation is an important way to help reduce mental stress so that you can focus better. Not only that; you’ll also learn to be more mindful of everything you do, which will help you avoid exhaustion in the first place, most of the time. One of my favorite meditation practices is BrainTap.  It's really not meditation, as it is retraining your brain, but I find it just as relaxing as meditation.  You can check it out here!  Some of my favorite essential oils to use for relaxing are frankincense, lavender, stress away, peace and calming, cedarwood and any of the citrus oils!

Move Your Body Every Single Day – Moving is something that is so important that even if you have a physical job, you should still find a way to get in more moving in an intentional way. Even if it’s just a few brisk ten-minute walks, it’s a way to clear your mind and get your blood flowing. Anytime you feel a slump coming on, take a fast walk. I find short walks in the morning and afternoon just really help clear my mind!

Keep a Gratitude Journal – Another way to stay energetic, both mentally and physically, is to be a positive person. Not everyone is positive naturally, but you can start to trick your mind into being that way by keeping a gratitude journal. Each night before bed, write down three things you’re grateful for. That will make it the last thing you think of each night. You can make this even more effective if you use a journal that is also a coloring book. Coloring will soothe your mind and relax you. I found this journal at Target and love the prompts in it!!  Simply Grateful Journal

Find Your Energy Music – Everyone has positive, uplifting music that they really enjoy and that makes them feel upbeat. However, some of it can also make you unproductive, so it’s important to try out different types of music for different activities. If you think a song you sing to might not be the right one for work, it may very well be just the ticket for your ride home in the car. I personally love to listen to praise music.  Lots of great uplifting messages!

Play a Game – Games and puzzles are great ways to have some downtime but are also good for your mind. Do at least one type of puzzle each day (such as a crossword puzzle) to help keep your brain thinking and to get your mind off other things that are pressuring you and sucking your energy. Sometimes it’s fun to play a game with another person too, such as a silly fast card game like Uno just to break the pace. I encourage you to do these old style, get off your devices!

Start a Yoga Practice – One of the best exercises for both mind and body is yoga. There are all types of yoga that you can get involved in. If you’re a member of Amazon Prime, you can get free videos for beginners to get started. Alternatively, you can join a class, which is a great way to feel more connected to the world at the same time. 

Drink Water and Eat Chocolate – Sometimes, it’s impossible to take time out to do anything mentioned. If that’s the case, a fast way to improve your energy is to drink water so that you’re hydrated and eat a small 1 oz serving of dark chocolate. If you cannot eat chocolate, another alternative is a crunchy apple. 

It might seem like these activities will take away from the time you need to spend on things you need to do. But the truth is, the more productive you are, the easier everything will be. Productivity doesn’t mean that you need to take more time doing something. It means that you need to focus closely on what’s at hand, and not what’s to come. By taking breaks with these activities, you can help yourself become far more productive and reduce mental and physical exhaustion exponentially.

Which will you incorporate into your routines?

Everyone thinks it’s normal for someone to be tired if they work out in a field all day or stand on their feet all day. But, people who have a desk job or spend a lot of your time on mental tasks are often surprised and shocked that they are still exhausted. I have found this to be so true, how about you?

Mental exhaustion can affect your entire body in negative ways. Not only are people with mental exhaustion tired, they also often suffer from body aches as if they have worked out all day long. Overusing your mind is just as bad for you as overusing yourself physically. 

For example, many people who suffer from mental exhaustion, in addition to being tired most of the time, may start to get sick more often, have a lot of headaches, experience back pain, muscle aches and more. Plus, mental exhaustion can affect your ability to get a good night’s sleep which can just make all the above worse. Hello, this was me to a tee!

Take note of the symptoms that are caused by mental exhaustion. If you have more than a few of these and have been burning the wick at both ends, consider mental exhaustion a potential culprit.

When people are mentally exhausted, their body tries to get them to take a break and rest in every way it can. That’s why it’s so important to pay attention to the signs of mental exhaustion. Thankfully, there are ways to combat and overcome mental exhaustion, which we will discuss next.  

Question?  Are you paying attention to the signals and messages your body is sending you?  I know for me, I had no idea what these were.  That list up above???  SIGNALS!!  

Suffering from mental exhaustion is not a fun experience. It can sneak up on you. You may think you’re doing wonderfully well and then one day you realize you’re not. Therefore, let’s go through some steps to overcome mental exhaustion but also learn how to prevent it in the first place. After all, prevention is the best medicine of all.

If you are currently mentally exhausted due to a project of some kind, and if it’s possible, take a sick day on a Friday or Monday, or take two vacation days - one on a Friday and one on a Monday. Spend that time resting, doing nothing, eating right, drinking water, and just getting yourself back. Then start fresh when you go back to work or school.

Next week we'll be looking at activities that raise your physical and mental energy levels!