Ahh, good old coffee. We’re all dependent on it. Nothing like waking up in the morning, not wanting to get out of bed, scrounging every last bit of energy that you have to hit the snooze button, then after your fifth time, you get out of bed. You now start to dread the cold walk from the bed to the bathroom, but you have to anyways. You’re yawning mid-walk on the way to the bathroom, as you start rubbing those eye crusts out. You look in the mirror – your hair is all messy, your eyes are all squinted and barely getting adjusted to the lighting, you fumble around for the tooth brush and tooth paste and you get started brushing your teeth.
You brush your teeth, use the restroom, moisturize, do your daily thing, then go on. Wait, it’s 2021, so you know what that means – you’re likely working from home. If you’re not working from home, well, you still have to work for a living. So you walk to the fridge and you need energy. You fumble around for that Keurig cup, or the French press you’ve made coffee the night before, or make some instant coffee.
You’ve made some nice coffee – smells great, and if you’ve made hot coffee, you see the steam just oozing from outside the cup. You take that first sip and you feel a literal buzz inside your head. Feel that? It’s literally dopamine surging throughout your brain as you start to intake caffeine. You’re now happy. You now feel content. You feel like in a good mood. Now you’re ready to be productive.
But is this really what you need to do every morning? No!
Why You Need To Limit Your Caffeine Usage:
Let’s all face it – we’re dependent on caffeine. Although it helps us concentrate and make us productive, it has its long term effects on us. When you drink coffee – you’re simply borrowing energy from the future. What caffeine does is when it is ingested into your blood stream, the caffeine blocks the adenosine receptors, basically not making you feel tired. This is as scientific as you need to understand it, but from a more “energy” type of perspective, you drink more caffeine, you get more tolerant, and that effect of drinking caffeine wears off. Because you get so much energy from caffeine during the day, it will seem like you don’t have energy in the night to do activities – weightlifting, cooking, cleaning will all seem like it will take much more energy relative to you not drinking caffeine.
Now it might make sense on why you feel tired all the time, especially after work.
I’ve been guilty of this myself. I work an engineering job during the day, and it gets grueling. I need caffeine to keep me on my toes and to be able to think in a straight and logical manner. Whenever someone calls on me in a meeting, I’m ready. When I don’t drink coffee I tend to lose this power. But what I’m starting to realize is that there are times I can get away with drinking coffee and still be productive and still have energy in the afternoon.
Limiting caffeine to 1-2x per week has done wonders for me.
Limiting caffeine makes me more sensitive to caffeine – therefore, I need to drink less to get the full hit as opposed to having to drink 3-5 cups in a day to barely float by.
Here’s what limiting caffeine has done for me:
- I get better sleep.
- I don’t wake up in the middle of the night
- I don’t feel as jittery and anxious.
- I spend less on coffee.
- My body wakes up naturally.
- My body doesn’t shut down at 3’o clock when I get off work
- I tend to be productive in the afternoon because my energy is constant
- My mood is generally elevated
- No crash in the afternoon
- Notice a glowing effect in the skin
If not caffeine, then what?
- Decaf Coffee
Switch to a decaf coffee if you love the taste so much! My favorite decaf coffee comes from Urth Cafe – it tastes just like coffee and doesn’t taste watery as all, as opposed to Starbuck’s Decaf.
2. Smoothies
You could even switch from coffee to smoothies in the morning. We love smoothies! Starting the day off with a fresh kale, celery, cucumber smoothie and your insides just feel amazing. The energy boost you get feels…natural. There’s no way to really explain this unless you do it. Invest in a juicer!
3. Lemon Water
Take a glass jug, slice up some lemons, fill it up with some refreshing ice cold water. Lemon infused water is great – starts off the morning with something acidic – good for your digestive system and its filled with electrolytes and keep you hydrated. I notice whenever I go work out, that when I drink lemon water – I stay hydrated and don’t feel the need to drink as much water in between sets.
Those are just three options, but there are plenty. A common theme? Find something healthier to replace caffeinated coffee with. You could even do tea, but I’m not a big fan of tea.
If you really want a natural boost in brain activity:
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