1. Slow food
Eat slowly to fill up faster. The fact is that the brain receives a signal from the satiety hormone with a delay of about 20 minutes. If you swallow a portion quickly, he will not have time to understand that it is already enough, and he will demand that you order another coffee with a croissant. If you eat slowly until you feel that the stomach is 80% full, and not 100%, then you will save time and not overeat. And the rest of the day you will spend more cheerfully – without lethargy from a full stomach.
Choose food “slow”. That is, complete meals that include protein-rich meals, whole grains, greens and vegetables, seeds, and nuts. Three such meals per day are recommended. But snacking on “quick” snacks is best minimized. They take time and cause constant jumps in the hormone insulin, which lead to excess weight.
2. Anti-stress minutes
The stress hormone cortisol directly affects how much you get done during the day. If cortisol is constantly released, the body’s resources wear out. As a result, depression and fatigue become companions in all matters. Then you have to forget about productivity.
To keep cortisol under control, devote at least a few minutes to anti-stress practices, but every day. Meditation, warm baths, yoga complexes, breathing practices, walking, reading books and even playing with a cat help to cope with excess stress. Choose what suits you and start practicing.
Healthy anti-stress habits help keep your weight under control. When cortisol is normal, there is no desire to seize negative emotions with an extra piece of cake.
3. Early sleep
For your productivity, not only the quantity, but also the quality of sleep is important. It is recommended to sleep for about seven hours, but these seven hours can be completely different. Sleeping from 11 pm to 6 am is different from sleeping from 3 am to 10 am. Some systems of the body are restored only from 23:00 to 24:00, so it is so important to fall asleep early so that you can easily get up in the morning and be full of energy during the day.
And of course, it is better to do everything possible to improve the quality of your sleep. Turning off gadgets a couple of hours before lights out, a walk before going to bed, a quiet and dark room will help. If your house is located near the roadway and bright billboards, it is better to use earplugs and an eye mask. And don’t forget to ventilate the room. The optimal temperature for sleeping is 19°C.
4. Short workouts
The effect of training depends on whether your body can adapt to them or not. Studies show that if you train intensively for more than an hour, the body starts screaming “stop” and can not cope with the load. Too much stress for him, which means that there will be no benefit or energy for other things.
It is better to choose short but effective classes. “Effective” means varied, regular, where the exercises involve the whole body and develop its different qualities: endurance, strength, flexibility. When the stages of work and rest are calculated according to the timer, then 45 minutes are enough for a productive lesson.
If after training there is no strength to reach the locker room, this is too much. If you feel a surge of strength and a desire to move mountains – that’s what you need.
5. Measurement of body composition
How do you know if you are investing your time in training or if you are wasting it? Subjectively, your reflection in the mirror will answer the question, objectively – the measurement of body composition. The composition is checked during fitness testing on special analyzer scales that show the amount of muscle, fat, bone tissue, as well as water in your body.
If the fat is growing, and the amount of muscle is decreasing, your program needs to be changed. If excess fat is reduced, and muscle becomes a little more, you are on the right track. Although the right path will certainly affect your well-being. If you feel that you have more energy, and the 25th hour seems to have appeared in the day, then everything is fine with good habits!
