Here’s where the rubber meets the road – what can we fuel ourselves with so that we can be the most productive?
First things first – be prepared! Sounds obvious, although when we ignore this one and think we’ll reach for the best brain-food possible when we need it most – you’re most likely like most of us and leave it till we’re famished when we make our worst food choices!¹
Preparing beforehand – ideally the day before, or even planning at the end of the weekend for the week ahead – which also means we benefit from a little variety on each day. This might mean pre-making a batch of soup (some of which can be frozen) – baring in mind this is an easy option to pop in a flask to take to the office, or a simple salad the night before and popping it in the fridge. Perhaps it’s a wad of rice crackers with an avocado and some nut butter and crudites – you get to design what works best for your body and your taste buds.
This helps us to avoid options that can tend to slow us down eg a high GI food. Classics include some of the processed grain-based foods like pastas, bread and muffins. Whilst these can give us that hit of energy, we can end up nodding off not long afterwards.
Or it might be a particularly tasty-looking burger that’s got a higher saturated or trans fat content plus it tends to take a lot more digestion to break it down.
For others, it might be ‘oh!I’ll just skip it and maybe have a coffee or something’, leaving us exhausted and needing multiple coffees to get us through the afternoon.
How about you? What have you found best fuels your productivity?
I look forward to seeing you on this week’s #ALivewithFi and til then, have a fabulous week 🙂
¹ Check out some interesting insights at the Harvard Business Review on optimal productivity-fuel -.
https://hbr.org/2014/10/what-you-eat-affects-your-productivity
What You Eat Affects Your Productivity
R. Friedman (2014)
Fi Jamieson-Folland D.O., I.N.H.C., is The LifeStyle Aligner. She’s an experienced practitioner since 1992 in Europe, Asia and New Zealand as a qualified Osteopath, Integrative Nutrition Health Coach, speaker, educator, writer, certified raw vegan gluten-free chef, and Health Brand Ambassador.
