Speaker 1: 0:43

Hello and welcome back to the Fit Soul podcast and the YouTube channel, and I am your host, amy Ramsey. I'm so excited you're here, and today I'm actually recording all of this on brand new equipment, so I'm feeling a little bit. It's interesting. I'm feeling a little overwhelmed. I had just had a crash course on how to use this big fancy microphone and a mixer and all of this stuff, so I hope the volume and the quality of this is amazing. So I am so grateful that you are here again.

Speaker 1: 1:19

My name is Amy Ramsey and the goal of my podcast today is I want to help you understand how to fix this big problem. This big problem I see over and over again, I hear it from so many women is man. I want my energy back. I want to feel energetic again, and I don't. It's one of the number one things that people come to me and say you've got so much energy. How do you have so much energy? I want that, and so I'm going to share with you today how to fix this. I'm going to give you three simple tips.

Speaker 1: 1:52

So, if we haven't met before, or maybe you're new to the podcast or to this YouTube channel, again, I'm Amy Ramsey and I am a midlife wellness expert and at the time of this recording, I'm 51 years old. I've been in the health and wellness and fitness space for a long, long time. I have to sit and do the math right now Many, many years, 25 plus years and your health is your greatest wealth. And it just kills me because so many women think they think that it's normal to no longer feel energetic and to not have that thriving life, and what I want to share with you is that no, no, no, it's not normal, but it's complex, because the reality is is that what used to work for you no longer works, and so what we want to do, I want to just share with you a couple of things that, um, a couple of things to help you get your energy back, and so three reasons.

Speaker 1: 2:56

I want to give you three reasons why your energy levels are out of whack. Number one. Number one is your sleep, your sleep, and can we just talk about the hormonal shifts and the struggles of getting a good night's sleep and some people struggle with this for a long time, but I know I've talked to a lot of women, and myself included is that the hormonal shifts are the things that started to keep me up at night, even with a good, healthy night routine and morning routines. So this is a really big deal to address your sleep. And just when you think that it's like I don't know about, I don't know about you, but man, it's. It's the hormonal, it's, it's the my like my body temperature at night, it's just those hot flashes, and even with hot flashes, mostly under control, I struggle to keep my body temperature regulated and this is so common.

Speaker 1: 4:00

So if you're feeling like, oh wait, no, you're not alone, this is just, you know, the part of our, our age, and it is not fun, right? And also, can we just talk about? We're talking about sleep right now, but stress, stress is a big deal. Stress. I don't know about you, it's sometimes those, those really stressful situations that wake me up in the middle of the night. The reality is, is that our age? With our age, we have very complicated stressors in our life. Maybe it's aging parents, maybe it's our children work, whatever. We have a unique set of complex stressors in our life and, man, it is a big deal for our sleep. So did you know that your science studies show that hormonal changes in midlife can mess with your circadian rhythm, making it harder to get that quality sleep and leaving you feeling like a zombie in the morning.

Speaker 1: 5:00

So here's another thing that's super important to know that your sleep is the number one thing that you need good sleep for fat loss. So fat loss is a goal of yours. I want you to absolutely consider about your sleep. I'm going to give you some fixes here in just a minute. I want to give you the number two thing that's really taking away from your energy are nutritional deficiencies, and how these deficiencies impact our energy is. As we age, we have different nutrients, different things that we need for our body, and what used to work no longer works. So, of course, you know like sometimes no, oftentimes common knowledge is not common practice, but we really do want to focus on that whole food diet. We really want to focus on getting our vitamin and elemental levels of our body balanced out. It's like with all of the things that you have to do, and you want to go and do them and do them well and do them with excellence, and your brain is all engaged, but, man, your body's just low on gas, and that's what happens when you don't give your body the energy that it needs through food. And if you missed the episode before this, I think it's episode 109. I did a whole podcast with my friend, deborah Leiter, and we talked about how to have effortless energy and how to really focus on your circadian rhythm and vitamins and elements and balancing all of that Fabulous podcast. I do recommend that. In fact I'll link that up in the show notes here.

Speaker 1: 6:41

The third thing that is coming in and zapping your energy is the ultimate energy drainer, which is your stress, your stress levels. You cannot underestimate the struggle that that will put to zap your energy and I know a lot of times we can think that, oh well, it's my sleep, because that makes sense, right, I'm exhausted. Or oh, it's my diet, my diet's been off, I'm eating terribly, I'm not drinking enough water and, yes, those things are important. We underestimate how much stress impacts every part of our body, our cortisol levels, and just keeps our mind going. So chronic stress on your body is doing more harm than you can possibly imagine, is doing more harm than you can possibly imagine. It's like carrying around a backpack full of bricks constantly, except those bricks are worry, anxiety, your to-do list that never seems to be done and the constant pressure oftentimes that we are under, but oftentimes it's weird, we're honest, we're just really hard on ourselves and the reality is that you're probably under more stress than you realize. So just know that this is a big, big, big, big issue, and science shows us that chronic stress keeps your body in fight or flight mode, which can exhaust you emotionally and physically and just leave you feeling absolutely drained, leave you feeling completely sluggish. So I want to just give you three quick, simple hacks to get your energy back, okay. Number one reset your sleep routine. Okay, so you can make a few simple adjustments. Just that will make the world of difference. Number one power down your screens at least an hour before you go to bed, maybe enjoy a calming tea. I've got this one. It's called Sleep Beauty, beauty, sleep. I can't remember. I can't remember exactly what it's called, but it really does kind of help me to calm down. Add some magnesium to your routine at night. I do magnesium every single night right before I go to bed, and I'll tell you what.

Speaker 1: 9:10

I used to scroll on social media too much and I really wanted to quit. I really wanted to stop that. I really wanted to kind of break that habit, but I wasn't making gains on it, and just this year, I feel like I have finally broken through and I'm doing so much better. And it was so simple and I want to encourage you to do this too is that I finally went and set time limits screen limits on my phone. It's so simple to do and actually they're very simple to adjust and you can take certain apps out. So here's the thing you can put time limits on your social media. That was game changer for me, and I run a social media based business. So I'm on social media, but it's designed to draw you in and before you know it, you're scrolling, commenting about how cute somebody's baby is and all of the things right. So just really for me, doing that one thing um, setting time limits on my phone on social media was huge.

Speaker 1: 10:14

It's like it's given me part of my life back, and I know this is an addiction that so many of us struggle with. So I want to encourage you to like. It's given me part of my life back, and I know this is an addiction that so many of us struggle with. So I want to encourage you to like, literally like today, don't, don't, don't go to tomorrow. Like, do it today, Do it today. Do it today and it takes a little bit to get used to. In fact, it took me about a week to sync up all that. I needed to, because some of my apps I needed to have access to like to talk with the children and different things like that. Also, I set downtime on my app, so all of my apps, except for the ones I select, they black out and I can't access them from 9 pm at night till 7 am in the morning. That has been so helpful for me to again reclaim more of my energy.

Speaker 1: 11:00

This is about your energy management, right, so I want to encourage you absolutely to do this. So we're talking about sleep. Number one reset your sleep routine. I want to give you a challenge that's really worked for a lot of my clients and I think it will for you too. So it's called the 3-2-1 sleep challenge and on this and I want you to try it for 10 days three hours before bed, no food. Two hours before bed, no work. One hour before bed, no screens Watch what happens to your energy when you practice this for 10 days.

Speaker 1: 11:32

And a few other tips on this your sleep routine make sure your room is nice and cool. There's several reports out that say between 66 degrees and 68 degrees is the ideal temperature. Now, this is the ideal temperature for um. I don't know for everybody, but I know for sure women in midlife. My husband struggles with it being that cold. I'm like you know, here's a sweatshirt, honey, go put a sweatshirt on, right, you know um, because they can. You can bundle up, but you can't unbundle to get to get comfortable, to keep that, that steady sleep, okay.

Speaker 1: 12:10

Number two protein. Ramp up your protein. Almost any woman I have ever worked with, ever, ever, is usually I mean almost always they're not consuming enough protein. Protein is your best friend. You need more protein, especially in midlife. We're losing muscle, so there's all sorts of things that are going on, but it's also a very satiating macronutrient. So I want to encourage you to get that protein in and just try to get shoot for 100 grams a day.

Speaker 1: 12:50

I've got a protein cheat sheet that I give my clients and then I help them understand what this looks like, because it's a little bit. When you're not sure what things are, it takes a little bit. It's really a skill. I mean, that's all it is, and it takes a hot minute to start to understand. Okay. Well, if I eat four grams of chicken breast, then that means I've got this many, like 28 grams of protein.

Speaker 1: 13:14

And there's a lot of people think, well, I'll just eat, you know, a couple of eggs or a couple of boiled eggs. Listen, boiled eggs have about six to seven grams of protein per one egg. It's not enough. So I want to encourage you to keep up and to track how much protein you're actually getting, and remember me saying I want you to get around 100 grams a day, and your body needs that protein to rebuild your muscle. This is going to help keep your energy up. It's going to help you sleep better. It's going to help just a whole better loop of energy in your body.

Speaker 1: 13:46

Okay, that third tip that I want to give you. So we've gone over. Reset that sleep routine. Get you some protein. Come on now.

Speaker 1: 13:55

And then the third thing that I want to share with you is to stress less and really take this to heart. Like I said before, stress is a huge component of say compared if I were to do a comparison, is pretty good. It is absolutely not perfect, but I've been practicing solid, whole food nutrition for many, many, many years. It's just part of my lifestyle now, my exercise and what I'm doing for that. On point, I've learned to really master those things in my life and I want to encourage you to get to a mastery level of it as well. It doesn't mean perfection, but it means you have really honed in and you have absolutely established those habits in your life. But it was the stress part that I was really struggling with and again, what used to work for us no longer works in midlife, and so here's the thing.

Speaker 1: 15:09

Here's the thing you have to address the emotional components. It's a deeper. It's like peeling an onion, layer by layer by layer by layer, and learning how to manage your body. And manage it helps to like lower your cortisol levels. It helps the hormonal level of your body, and so many of us have cortisol levels that are out of control and we just push through and we're really hard on ourselves and we're not even like taking care of us at an emotional level, or maybe we don't even know how to. Maybe we don't even know how to address it and instead of addressing the emotional issues, we have defaulted to some really bad habits like eating, like scrolling, numbing out, instead of addressing with the issues of our heart and I want you to be healthy, emotionally, mentally, physically, spiritually the whole package really matters for you to get your energy back All right. So here's a few ways that you can just start to like immediately take this and and apply it to your life and you're going to feel a little bit better.

Speaker 1: 16:20

Listen, pray, pray, pray, read some scripture. When I'm feeling particularly stressed or like anxious about a circumstance that I can't control, I find that the Psalms give me so much encouragement Pray, surrender. It give things back to God. It's like in our human nature, in this human experience, we take the stress of it ourselves and it takes that spiritual practice of that surrender. And when we're walking through hard things and I know you're walking through some hard things right now it sometimes means a constant place of surrender, surrender, surrender, surrender. I'm right there with you and if you need this reminder, as I'm sharing this with you, I need this reminder as well.

Speaker 1: 17:04

Journaling Journal Get a paper, get a pen and just start. Sometimes you'll be surprised what comes out. It's like, oh, I didn't even know that that was going on in my heart and my soul. Just start journaling. Grounding Get grounded honestly, like legit, legit. Throw your shoes off, stick your feet in the earth. Did you know that that can lower your cortisol response? Get out in nature. We're inside and under fluorescent lights way too much. Get yourself unplugged, disconnect from your phone, disconnect from technology and just get out in nature. It is powerful what it does to your body.

Speaker 1: 17:49

In fact, I was talking to a friend who's really going through some incredible grief and just a hard time. Hard time no way easy way around where she is right now. It's going to be a season. You know, the scripture says that there's seasons in our lives and so she's definitely in a season of lament and she was telling me that walking has been everything to her. I can clear my mind and she'd been sick and hadn't been able to walk and she had noticed that over the last three days, because she wasn't able to walk, that she was feeling angst and stress and worry and all of the negative emotions again, where she was learning how to just, and she goes. I think it's the walking, but I think it's also just being outside of nature. I'm like, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, science backs you up in all of those things. But listen, I hope this brings you a little bit of clarity to know that, even those tiny little things that we're talking about, practice them.

Speaker 1: 18:51

Common knowledge is not common practice. Just because you know to do something doesn't mean you're doing it. The first piece that you need for change is to know. Number one awareness Just bringing a fresh awareness. You, listening to you pushing play on this podcast today, you go, girl, super proud of you because that you're, you're looking for that personal development, that spiritual growth in your life. Now I want you to implement. If you're just listening but not implementing, we got a problem and I want you to take. So just take one of these ideas, it doesn't matter which one, just take one of them and implement that.

Speaker 1: 19:29

So the next time you're struggling, the next time you're frazzled and maybe you find yourself in your pantry or you're scrolling through on social media and you're trying to reduce that time, or you're numbing out with whatever fill in the blank, I want you just to bring some awareness to it and say, okay, wait a minute, how do I want to deal? To bring some awareness to it and say, okay, wait a minute, how do I want to deal? Why am I doing this? You know, and then what do I want to do about that? And I'm telling you you're going to start to reclaim more energy in your body. So, as we're wrapping up today, I want you to know that there is, when we start to implement some of these as lifestyle changes, as lifestyle shifts, that part can be difficult to like.

Speaker 1: 20:14

Take what you're hearing now and building a habit around it, and that's what I love, love, love to do, and I would love to help you as well. I have a whole bunch of different ways that I work with my clients. I offer programs certain times of the year and I do have one coming up and would love for you to. You can go to midlife metabolismcom and go ahead and get set up. What's really cool, what I'm doing I'm doing something very, very different this year is that, um, I've listened to the feedback of what was struck, what was the struggle and how do we take that and like create new habit loops around this to where it's lifestyle. That's the big.

Speaker 1: 20:54

My biggest goal for us is that we make lifestyle changes, not just do a program, and maybe we even were successful in the program, but we don't actually keep it going consistently. I want you making choices in your life that are in congruency with all the best that God has for you. Sometimes we don't have the energy that we want because of our own choices and our own habits and our own behaviors and the way that we've been dealing with life, the way that we've been dealing with the stress in our life and our habits, and so I really want you to just bring that fresh awareness to that so you can live that vibrant life that God's calling you to. You're not too old, it is not too late. I promise you it's not. So I really want you to step into 2025 with clarity, with energy and confidence to thrive in your mid life. And so let's get started now, don't wait till 2025.

Speaker 1: 21:47

In fact, I was reading in my devotional it was Susie Larson's Prepare Him Room, advent, and she was talking. I can't remember the exact statement, I don't have that devotional up here with me right now but she talked about the regret that we have on January 1st when we overindulge, overspend and overcommit, the regret that we have in January 2025. So think about that and it just really made me think where am I overindulging, where am I overspending and where am I overcommitted? And ouch right, I did that.

Speaker 1: 22:30

That will step it on my toes, but I don't want to step into 2025, january 1st 2025 with regret, because I blew it and I ate too much and I you know I just like derailed my healthy lifestyle plan. I don't want to do that. These little bitty tips help, so I want to know which one will you try first? I would love for you to message me, dm me and let me know, and I want to cheer you on as you reset and you reclaim your energy so you can go do everything that God has called you to do, and I want you to know that I am cheering you on. All right, until next time, bye-bye.