Life doesn’t always go as planned, and you’ve probably had days where you feel like pulling the covers over your head and taking a break from the world. If you’re feeling a little down, or you’re lacking energy and all you want to do is hide away, it might be due to a nutritional deficiency.
Before you consider using pharmaceuticals to bring yourself back up, here are 5 practical tips you can use to upgrade your mood and feel immediate results:
- Go for a walk or exercise
There’s no better way to beat the blues than to go for a brisk walk in nature. Whether you walk by the beach, on a cliff, through the forest, or even in a park, you’re going to feel good. Being in nature provides you with fresh air and clean scenery, but it also does wonders for your body.
Getting your body moving through cardiovascular exercises release endorphins, epinephrine, serotonin, and dopamine – the chemicals that make you feel great. The harder you exercise, the more your body will release these feel-good chemicals.
You know that feeling of accomplishment you get after a good workout, where your muscles are fatigued but you feel really great? You can get that feeling just by going for a walk.
- Get a vitamin B12 injection
You might be used to taking your vitamins in the form of capsules, which requires your body time to process before they take effect. If you pop into your local clinic for a quick vitamin B12 or B-complex shot, you’ll feel the effects within minutes.
There are eight B vitamins, and each play a special role in maintaining your health and well-being including improving immune function, increasing energy, and helping DNA repair. While some B vitamins can be found readily in most foods, others can’t.
Getting a B12 shot is a great way to give yourself a quick boost of energy. Plenty of clinics offer drop-in days for B12 and B-complex shots, so call around and see what you can find.
- Get a nutritional IV “Meyers’ Cocktail”
No matter how many vitamins and minerals you take orally, they’re going to pass through your digestive system and you will lose a majority of those nutrients before they’re passed to the blood stream. This isn’t a problem for everyone, but if you don’t absorb nutrients properly, it can be.
To remedy this, nutrients can be given directly to the bloodstream through an IV, bypassing the digestive system entirely. The Myers’ Cocktail is the name for a standard blend of several essential nutrients provided through an IV in order to increase the blood concentration of those nutrients far beyond what’s possible by taking them orally.
The benefits can be felt quickly, and some people notice a huge boost in energy right away or even just an hour after completing the therapy session.
- Eat raw foods
Raw food contains more nutrients than cooked food because the more you cook or process food, the more nutrients and enzymes are lost.
Only raw, living foods contain their own enzymes to aid in digestion. This is important because our bodies don’t naturally produce all of the enzymes needed to digest the food we eat, so we need those enzymes intact. Cooking food destroys those enzymes, causing all kinds of health problems.
When your body has the energy it needs to function, it won’t let you down or run out of steam so quickly. Eating raw foods is another great way to restore proper nutrition to your body and therefore boost your mood.
- Spend time away from electronics before bed
There was a time when people would spend their evenings in the dark after the sun went down, and their bodies were allowed to follow their natural circadian rhythm. Some people even went to bed before midnight. Thanks to smartphones and tablets that emit blue light, those days are over.
Although blue light has a positive effect on us during the day, it has a disruptive effect on us at night. Blue lights stimulate our brains and keep us awake longer, cutting in on our precious sleep time, but it’s not just the blue lights that can do you in. Exposure to any wavelength of light at night can alter your circadian rhythm and deprive you of sleep; not getting enough sleep is a surefire way to develop a bad mood.
If you find yourself waking up in a bad mood, try ditching your electronics for a couple of hours prior to bedtime. You’ll notice a difference the first night. Your body repairs itself during sleep, so make sure you’re getting enough of it to stay healthy.