Over the last few months, I’ve neglected my sleep and allowed stress to creep in, so during the last couple of weeks I have been focusing on getting earlier nights to improve my sleep, and also managing my schedule to try lessen the workload and bring down my stress levels. Neither of these areas are way out but could do with improving. When you get your sleep right and bring down your stress levels, you’ll be amazed at how positively your body responds; you’ll have more energy, motivation, greater performance and better body composition.
I feel stress and sleep are both massively overlooked when it comes to changing our body composition. We always hear about the importance of nutrition and training but we don’t hear enough about the other factors that play just as much of a role. Why? Because it’s not sexy and doesn’t sell!
Our bodies are a true reflection of the state of our lifestyle, and sometimes eating well and training hard just aren’t enough to get the body we want. Sleep and stress are two areas that have made a huge difference to my body over the last couple of years. It’s still not perfect and from time to time I neglect these areas in my life, but its always something that’s got to be worked on. When I notice I’ve not given either enough attention, I always try and give them the focus they deserve by making a conscious effort to get into a better sleep routine, and to take time out to relax.
Our body only has so much capacity to deal with stress and lack of recovery until we start to see signs of fatigue, injuries, poor decision making and loss of strength and muscle due to the inability to repair and grow. Both these things can be improved if we just prioritise, in the same way we do with our training and nutrition.
If you want to learn more about the importance of rest and recovery then listen to mine and Steve’s podcast on Importance Of Rest, Recovery & Sleep
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