Do you wake up in the morning feeling well-rested and energized? Or is the feeling you have when the alarm clock goes off closer to the beginning stages of recovery from an all-night bender?
Sometimes you can wake up feeling groggy, light headed, and exhausted, even though you just got eight, nine, or even ten hours of sleep. It makes you wonder how you can get a good night’s sleep and feel horrible the next morning, yet sometimes you only get a few hours and wake up feeling great.
If this is happening to you, you need to make some changes to ensure a night of peaceful slumber that will leave you feeling revved up and ready to go. Try these things to give yourself a burst of morning energy and ensure you wake up feeling motivated and ready to go.
- Fix Your Diet: There are substances you consume every day in your diet that will have a direct reflection upon how you feel the next morning. Caffeine is the biggest offender, followed by sugar. In addition to causing highs and lows with your blood sugar, they affect your body’s hormone production, which directly affects how well you sleep. Combined together they make a cocktail that is surely guaranteed to kick your butt in the morning. If you must drink coffee – and many of us must – make sure you only have it in the morning, and try to limit it to one cup. Keep in mind that a Venti Starbucks is like having about three cups of home brewed.What you eat can affect your sleep as well. An old rule of thumb was to not eat after six o’clock in the evening. Eat a light meal at night loaded with fresh veggies. It not only fits in with healthy eating habits, but your body will sleep better if it is not burdened with digesting a heavy meal.
- Exercise: Some good aerobic exercise is not only great for your heart, lungs, and overall health, but getting a dose of daily exercise will do two other things for you as well. It will give you a burst of natural adrenalin during the day, helping to clear your head and boost your energy levels. Your motivation level rises significantly when you are getting regular exercise. It will also help you sleep more soundly at night. You do not have to get fancy with your exercise, either. Go for a run or a brisk walk, or jump on the stair stepper for half of an hour. Just try to get at least 30 to 60 minutes of exercise most days of the week. This single positive change can do more for helping your sleep than any other thing you can do.
- Establish a Morning Routine: Rather than throwing the dice to decide what time you are going to wake up each day, decide upon a set time that works well for you and stick to it. Set your alarm clock so your body learns that it needs to wake up every day at a certain time. You can actually train your body to wake up on its own after you have been doing this for a while – you might notice you start waking up on your own one minute before the alarm is supposed to sound. When this happens, your body has been programmed to wake at a certain time.
Have an enjoyable morning routine as well. Whether you prefer to get up and get your exercise in right away, or you enjoy reading the newspaper with a hot cup of herbal tea, find something pleasurable to do before you have to start getting ready for work.
It should not take too many changes for you to be able to wake up feeling great. Shake off your bad habits and kick that morning hangover out the window. If you do have days where you wake up feeling groggy and lacking any motivation to get out of bed, accept that you will survive, and get going. Keeping your morning schedule is another one of the biggest positive changes you can make to jump start your day.
