Fix Your Energy Levels - Start Here
“Okay, so this week has been the worst in a long time!”
This was the opening line from a client I have been working with, Michelle*. She went on to explain how motivated she had felt following a chat we’d had the week prior but how that motivation fell to pieces early the following week. She had defaulted to fast-food meals five days a row and started eating lollies again.
“I’ve not been in a good way mentally from being super busy at work and just gave into my cravings instead of being organised. I had all the food in the cupboards and could easily have made it. I was just lazy.”
And there it was. The supposed self-defeating character flaw. “I was just lazy.” Except she wasn’t.
Like so many people I work with, Michelle wasn’t lazy. In fact, the opposite was true. Michelle’s problem wasn’t laziness, it was overwhelm. A sense of overwhelm saw her undereat across the day as she struggled to keep up with a demanding work schedule. Then, at the end of the day, fatigued and frazzled, there was no energy left to prepare, cook, and eat a good meal, even with everything that she needed sitting in the cupboard.
It was a similar story with Terry*. He came to me seeking help for his low energy, low mood, and low motivation. He knew that physical activity (lifting and biking) made him feel good, especially mentally but the motivation to initiate anything had escaped him. As he felt his fitness fall away, his motivation fell even further. Sensing that there must be something wrong with him, and thinking that he must be broken somehow, he went to his doctor and left with a prescription for antidepressants.
Defeated or Depleted?
Terry, trying to reduce his body fat, had long fasting periods - up to 14 hours at a time. He had combined this with a low protein diet (low animal source foods, in particular). He wasn’t broken. He was depleted of energy, and, given his dietary practices, quite probably depleted in many nutrients (amino acids, vitamins, and minerals). I can say this with confidence, because within 2-3 weeks of eating more - increasing his protein energy intake via nutrient-dense animal source foods in particular - he was feeling far more energetic, getting to the gym and out of his bike more than he had done in months.
The pattern is a common one, probably the most common one that I see currently. Individuals who are undereating for one reason or another, be it intentional dietary restriction (fasting, variations of low carb, and variations of low protein), or unintentional, with the busyness of life taking over, and other things being prioritised over fuelling themselves. Coffee is seen as a meal. A bar on the run will get them through. All you have to do is hold out until dinnertime, except, as in Michelle’s case above, by dinnertime decision fatigue is so great that hitting the drive-through or getting Uber Eats seems like the best and only option.
We don’t intend for it to be this way, of course. We have good intentions and high expectations. When our actions don’t meet our expectations – which is often when we operate in such a low-energy state - we despair. We internalise the low energy we are experiencing as being “unmotivated,” “lazy”, procrastinating, and “just making excuses”. The emotional regulation required to pull us out of such a tailspin itself requires significant energy.
All elements of our daily living, health, and well-being are interconnected, and all require energy. Indeed, energy is the currency of deep health. When we get dragged down into the busyness of life, fragmenting our week further and further to fit everything in, we can lose sight of how important our energy is and what it takes to recharge it until it is largely drained from us. Yes, there is the physical energy required for us to engage with any form of intentional physical activity, exercise or training. But we also need energy for all of the non-intentional physical activity too.
Ever found yourself taking the lift because you were too “lazy” to take the stairs? Ever found yourself driving around the same block or car park over and again to find the closest parking space to where you need to be because you “can’t be bothered” to walk too far? The common stories we tell ourselves about our behaviours in these instances can often give us insight into our internal energy state.
Physical energy is also required for other parts of our bodies too, not just for our muscles to move us around in time and space, intentional or otherwise. Your gut and its digestive and absorptive processes require energy. Deprive your digestive system of energy to do its job properly, and you will experience problems. Everything from the ability to break down and digest the food you eat, to the capacity to absorb the nutrients, to the muscular components of your digestive tract (which can become “slow” and “lazy” when we are in a chronic low energy state), require sufficient energy to function optimally.
Your brain also requires energy. A lot of energy. Despite its size, it hoovers up a disproportionately large amount of the fuel you take in. Deprive your brain of sufficient fuel (yes, you need carbs; no, coffee and fasting are not fuel for your brain) and you can experience changes in cognition and behaviour. Decision fatigue and brain fog are common, as can be increased anxiety. As already stated, our ability to regulate our emotions well requires that our brains are well-fed (and well-rested).
So, whether you want to avoid arriving at the end of the day feeling defeated and wanting to fall asleep on the couch, or you want to become a better, faster, stronger version of yourself, you need energy, which, nutritionally, requires you to eat much more than you probably think. More energy and better recovery allow you to stay consistent and keep your training intensity high. This allows you to build muscle and strength, and it is this muscle that allows you to burn fat. As the renowned OG of sports nutrition, Dr. Susan Kleiner1, puts it succinctly, in order: eat more, gain energy, train harder, build muscle, burn fat.
*Client names have been changed.
References
1. Kleiner, S.M. 2018. The New Power Eating. Human Kinetics, Inc.
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