Last month, I was tired a lot and trying to juggle too much. I’ve since slowed down but it took me some time to really evaluate all areas of my life to recognize how to achieve a better balance.
When I took a look at what activities I needed to cut down on and how to increase my energy, I read all kinds of articles and decided to implement the following steps:
- Reduce HULU (aka TV) watching before bed
- Because I love to cook, I decided to plan my meals a week in advance
- Use travel time on the subway to read and get work done
- Take iron and B12 vitamins
- Burn lavender candles before bed to have a more restful sleep
- No listening to high energy dance music right before bed
I tried everything under the sun but was still feeling tired. Then I read the fab Michelle Loretta of Sage Wedding Pros Sleep challenge article on getting 8hrs of sleep a night. DUH!!!! The most obvious strategy and I hadn’t thought of it: revolutionary! The first week was hard because I usually like to crawl into bed and read one of the 3 books I have on rotation + the Bible + write 5 things I’m thankful for in my gratitide journal and I honestly hadn’t factored in that extra 30-60min. So I actually factored it in, cut down my reading in bed and scheduled 8hrs of sleep into my calendar. Yup, I scheduled 8hrs of sleep into my Google calendar. BEST idea. Even though, I’m not 100% Elmo and friends energetic, I feel much better.
Here are some photos of my friends who I caught catching some Zzzz’s… since on trips, I have a thing for photographing my friends fast asleep. It’s all in fun and we always laugh about it afterwards.
