Tired of Being Tired

Tired of Being Tired?

Every time I hear someone comment and say “I’m tired,” they tend to mean that in the physical sense. I nearly always comment immediately after, and say or ask, “Aren’t you tired of being tired?” People usually laugh it off and think I say it in jest, but I mean this in the most profound manner possible.

Being tired can apply to not only your physical being, but as well as your mental stamina. Now think about the people in your life. Most likely, many of them are tired in either, if not both of the ways I have mentioned.

Perhaps you are one of these people, which is why this title caught your attention. I will break down both of these categories and provide insight into how to break the cycle of being tired. If you are tired of being tired, it is time to make a change. Let’s stop being tired. It is important to conquer your mindset of tiredness and I am here to provide you with the tools to (re)gain control of your life.

Physically Tired

Almost everyone I know has this same problem of feeling tired every morning: always wanting to hit the snooze button on the alarm. Although there are other reasons why you may feel tired all of the time, it is usually the morning routines that set the course for the rest of your day, which is exactly why I’d like to focus on the mornings.

When people complain about this problem to me, I like to imagine the stereotypical, sitcom style mornings. You know the one where the character is covering his/her ears with a pillow, alarm obnoxiously ringing in the background while the parent is urging them to get out of bed. “Please… Just another five minutes, mom!”

It is amazing how many people have this problem, and their tiredness carries with them throughout the day. For as long as I can remember, I have always loved getting up in the morning. The idea of starting a brand new day excites me and it helps that I have things to look forward to every morning.

I used to be like the average person who hated every new day. Before, a new day meant more work. But I shifted my mindset and instead of seeing each day as work, I see it as a new opportunity to make it better than the previous day.

If you are a person who hates getting up in the morning, it should excite you to think that this can be you. It is a simple concept when it comes to better mornings. Try creating a daily routine and give yourself plenty of time to complete it to make for a less hectic and tired morning. Obviously, you will need to wake up earlier if you feel rushed every morning. It is up to you to decide how much time you need. Personally, I give myself an entire hour and a half every morning before school so I can take my time to get things done.

Once you start hopping out of bed every morning, you will feel a lot less physically tired throughout the day and hopefully all of your life.

Routines:

Here are some simple ways you can create a routine for yourself to practice in the morning. It gets your mind working the moment your eyes open and soon, you will be like me jumping out of bed the moment your alarm rings.

1) Checklist

I found it easier when I first started creating routines for myself to write it down somewhere. I use my iPhone, but you can use anything to help yourself remember exactly what you need to do.

2) Drink A Glass of Water the Moment You Wake Up

You might be going “huh” when you read that, maybe even saying “Eww, at least brush your teeth first!” But come on, let’s go over why this helps. You have been asleep for 7-8 hours now, so your body is dehydrated! Someone suggested I provide citation sources for this information. Come on, it’s fairly obvious that  lying dormant for a third of the day without drinking water is a lot if you really think about it for five seconds. Rehydrate yourself and let your body start the day fresh.

3) Stretch

After downing that glass of delicious water, stretch out your entire body. You can easily Google several morning stretches, but a basic one that I use everyday is called “Good Mornings”, which is an appropriate name. Doing them is quite simple. Put both hands behind your head, bend forward with back straight and try to be parallel to the floor. Hold this position for a couple seconds and repeat ten times. I have found that stretching every morning made the biggest difference in how I feel throughout the day.  Doesn’t that feel nice?

4) Start a Daily Morning Journal

It can be about anything you want. Write about anything that is on your mind to help get yourself going in the morning. Maybe about what you dreamt about, what’s bothering you, or just talk about what you want to do today. It helps you wake up and it is something that you can look forward to every morning. It can even become your personal diary! Don’t forget to title each entry with the day it is and maybe even number each entry.

5) Meditate

There are so many sites online that will tell you about all sorts of benefits of meditation. Good news, a lot of it is true. Not only does it provide benefits to your health, it’s an excellent way to simply enjoy the sounds of silence and clear your mind. There are a lot of in-depth guides you can find that will teach you how to meditate.

6) Bonus (Optional): Talk to New People Every Day

Now I’ll let you set your own rules for this one because this is a little fun “exercise” that will not only make you feel a little better about yourself, but whoever you spoke to as well! Here you have a lot of leeway. No, you don’t have to do this in the morning. Just make it a goal to talk to at least one stranger throughout each day. You can either have an actual conversation with someone you have never spoken to, or simply tell someone to have a good morning. Don’t forget to smile!

7) Be Excited!

Out of all the things you can do to convince yourself to start the day, ultimately it comes down to your mentality. Learn to be excited each day. Visualize your upcoming day and even if you have nothing to look forward to, live it like it’s your last.

I know it is cliché to say carpe diem, seize the day, but that is what it all comes down to when you want to get out of bed effortlessly. If you do not believe me that starting with a good morning everyday will get rid of being tired all the time, then feel free to find your own path.

But remember that one day where you had something you just couldn’t wait for later on that afternoon? Do you remember how eager you were to hop out of bed? How energetic you felt and ready to tackle your morning? Because I do. That is exactly how I feel every day.

 What If These Don’t Work and I Still Feel Physically Tired!

There’s no way to tell if it’s not working until a few months in. Maybe you have other reasons why you’re physically tired all the time. Do you have health problems? Perhaps you’re doing physical activities that are taxing your body too much? Maybe I’m using rhetorical questions too much? The list goes on. But generally, your morning sets the mood for the rest of your day, so it is worth giving it a shot for a while.

Mental Stamina

Maybe you have got it all figured out. You wake up every morning feel fresh, you feel energetic and pumped, yet there is something holding you back. How often do you say something along the lines of “I’m tired of this happening” or “Why do things like ‘some unexplainable yet burdensome chain of events’ keep happening to me?” If you always feel like the victim of any given problem, maybe your reaction or the way you perceive things is affecting your mental stamina.

Low mental stamina can make you lose that feeling of being excited for every morning, for every day. It can make you always feel like the victim and it will become easy to blame it all on kismet for your misfortune. Of course, this strain, this cycle of poor reaction builds up until you have no more energy, until you are tired. Until you have lost the will to strive for excellence.

Wait, Are You Saying I Should Never Be Upset? Never Be Tired?

Of course, you can feel upset, angry, tired, or/and disappointed. These are all natural emotions after all. But when it becomes a cycle, something that always happens and you deal with these emotions poorly, it becomes a problem. You fall into a pattern and these patterns make you emotionally tired.

There are too many points to cover in a single article and too many unique circumstances that can apply to different people. So it is not my goal to have an end all solution that applies to everyone. It’s about realizing that you’re tired of being tired then taking the steps to minimize it.

There are many problems with being mentally tired all the time. You no longer feel excited for life, you lose your natural high that you had as a child, relationships with friends and family begin to strain until the distance is too great, the list goes on. You do not want to become a mental mess, so you should train your mental stamina. Here’s the remedy:

Step One: Analyze Your Thoughts and Reactions

It is a simple concept that provides disproportionate results.

What do I mean by analyzing thoughts? Quite simply, you put in little effort by analyzing your reactions and natural thought process. As a result, you know what to look for and what to fix, then you can figure out the proper remedy for your negativity.

Throughout your day, take note of the emotions you feel and the exact lines that run through your head. Are they mostly negative thoughts? Cut them out. When something bad happens, do you victimize yourself? Cut that out too and realize perhaps things are better than they seem.

Step Two: Be Honest With Yourself, Who Raises You Up vs. Who Brings You Down?

This part may be one of the hardest parts for many. You are really going to have to look beyond yourself here and analyze very carefully, your peers. Those you call your friends, your support system, they are all suspect to your happiness.

A good rule is to bring people who are happier, those who support you, closer to yourself. Surround yourself with these people. Chances are, they will be positive influences on you and their optimism and high for life will raise you up. Do not confuse the wrong form of optimism with those you should bring closer to you though. You still want these optimists to be realistic.

Now, the hardest part is to examine those people who are like gravity, always bringing you down. Do you have someone who is always criticizing others, never seeming to make you feel good? Simple solution, cut them out. If they are a close friend, you can do so gradually. Once you have these sort of people gone, feel your mental stamina growing.

Step Three: Realize That You Are Ultimately the Source of Your Own Happiness

This is something many people fail to realize and even on occasion, I forget this myself. You do not have to rely on external factors out of your control and other people to make you happy.  Focus on only things you can control, which is the way you perceive things. You can be a hedonist and indulge yourself on spending everyday of every month of every year, but after a while, you are only going to get used to it and be dissatisfied again, returning to your previous state of unhappiness and discontent.

Trust me when I say you do not want to be stuck in this cycle for the rest of your life. This never-ending cycle is called hedonic adaptation. How do you become happy? Well, break the cycle.

I hope that after reading this you’ll realize that you’re tired of being tired and you’ll take steps to change it. Hopefully, there are methods you use that don’t require a daily trip to Starbucks. Feel free to share in the comments and don’t forget to subscribe below, I thank you for reading.