Eat, Sleep, Work
Eating, sleeping, and working are three of the biggest factors that can affect your mental and physical health for better or worse. Although simple at first glance, it can prove to be quite difficult to manage these three life tasks. Let’s take a look at why they are so important and what we can do to maintain them well.
Eating should be the most obvious. We all know that we should eat more vegetables, fruits, be moderate in meats and cheese, and so on. We would benefit to shape up our diets to better resemble the almost impossible-looking food chart and the requirements they recommend for each day – but that’s not all there is to healthy eating.
We have to be mindful to eat our meals at least three times each day, sometimes more often, if possible, but definitely no less. Jamming three meals worth of food into two meals a day is an overload for your stomach, and you stomach usually has to wait too long before the next meal arrives.
When your stomach waits too long, it goes into a mild “starvation mode” in which it holds onto the fat as backup. Your stomach is trying to keep you alive because it doesn’t know when you’ll eat again. Eating consistently throughout the day provides sufficient energy, while providing a routine for your body to grow accustomed to.
I love sleep. Sleep is crucial to getting your mental health balanced. When we are sleep deprived, things bother us more, sounds seem louder, it messes with our appetite, and our overall body chemistry. Lack of sleep causes our physical bodies some trouble, as well. When we’re exhausted, we can’t exercise effectively, or at all.
Everyone needs a different amount of sleep. If possible, try to wake up without an alarm clock at around the time the sun rises. Your body should naturally wake itself up after it has had sufficient sleep. If you find yourself needing to sleep in consistently, then it’s time to go to bed early – which can prove very difficult to do if you can’t seem to fall asleep.
The “trick” here is to just allow your body to rest. If you mind won’t shut off, then choose to focus or think about something simple. For me, I find that if I focus on how comfortable my bed feels, rather than thinking about my schedule the next days, my body and mind will start to settle themselves down, and I’ll drift into sleep without knowing it.
Even if your mind doesn’t shut off, at least you’re resting your body. Changing sleeping habits is not easy and will take some adaption. However, it’s worth taking the relatively short period of time to adjust to new sleeping habits in order to enjoy a lifetime of being well rested for a new day.
In some form or another, we all have to work. Work can become very busy, especially for the entrepreneur or self-employed. For some people, it’s hard to know when to shut off the switch that is always telling you to keep moving forward. Multi-tasking is usually not your friend. It often diminishes efficiency more than we realize. It’s good to give sole attention to whatever the task is at hand.
Personally, in addition to my daily work agenda, I have a list of thing I want to do each day and the amount of time that I want to spend on it. It allows me the freedom to choose my next project, without the pressure of doing something that I’m not in the mood for. “Not being in the mood” sounds slightly childish, but sometimes, especially for the dominantly right-brained types, it’s better to do what we feel like doing, as long as it’s something productive and we eventually get around to doing what we need to do.
At the end of the day, learn to finish! Each day has enough worries and trouble of its own. We can’t solve the problems of tomorrow before they arrive. If you can’t let that go, then simply pray that you will find the power to let that go. Life is too short to work constantly. Life is a gift and sleep is necessary. Nobody is going to praise you as superhuman if you sacrifice your life for your work. It’s silly to invest that much of yourself into work to the point of being unavailable to others, and your own needs. And most importantly, do what you love to do. Rest well, eat well, and work well.
For further related reading, please check out: When Diligence Pays Off.
