Daily habits that left me feeling exhausted and how I overcame them

There was a time when I lived on energy drinks just to get through the day. I used to feel exhausted all time. So much so that doing something as simple as refilling my water bottle felt like an enormous task. At first, I didn’t pay attention to these signs, taking them as a symptom of lack of sleep or exercise. But it wasn’t until I started noticing my daily activities that I realised this was not the case. Turns out, most of the things I did daily were behind my exhaustion. They were sapping all my energy, leaving me drained both physically and mentally.

Feeling tired every day affected my ability to manage my day-to-day activities. I often found myself yawning in meetings, short on ideas, and working extra hours because I couldn’t finish my tasks on time. My productivity had hit the rock bottom. My personal life was in shambles too as I would often wake up late, skip meals, and cancel my plans just so I could stay at home and rest.

I was a product of my daily habits, and I knew I had to change my ways before things get worse. It was time to press the reset button. But bad habits die hard, right? It took strong dedication and conviction to break the spell of bad habits. By being more mindful and regularly doing what’s necessary to boost my energy, I was able to let go of these small yet harmful habits.

If you want to know about the everyday habits that can silently drain your energy and how you can overcome them, read on.

Working in a cluttered environment

My desk used to be filled with all kinds of stuff like books, mobile, wires, and sticky notes. My room was equally bad. Clothes were scattered all over the place, books were left on the bed, and sheets were crusty. I didn’t think it mattered much until my mind began to feel cluttered as well. All the things that were out of place would pile up in my mental to-do list and leave me feeling exhausted. I felt tired and low on energy. I even read up about it. A psychologist and author of the book High-Octane Women: How Superachievers Can Avoid Burnout, Sherrie Bourg Carter told Psychology Today that “clutter makes it more difficult to relax, both physically and mentally.”

That’s when I decided to bring this change into my life. I started cleaning my desk in the morning and keeping things organised. It didn’t take long or too much effort either. Ironically, I felt more relaxed after decluttering my space. As I cleared the clutter from my life, I felt renewed and energised, which also helped me feel better for the rest of the day.

Opening up too many tabs

I, like many others, keep multiple tabs open on my browser. Needless to say, it makes the job difficult. You can’t focus on your work. And when you want some information, you have to switch back and forth constantly between tabs. This steals away both your attention and energy. Rana Mafee, a neurologist at Case Integrative Health told HuffPost that, “Bouncing from tab to tab gives your ego the misconception you’re getting an incredible amount of work done. In reality, you’re not fully processing anything you’re trying to efficiently consume.”

I used to do this all the time while doing my work. But it didn’t do me any good. In fact, after a while, I felt mentally exhausted just by the look of so many tabs. So, I decided to follow this age-old advice—do one thing at a time. I would close the tabs I wasn’t using and focus solely on the ones that I needed at that time. This one little change helped me preserve my energy, and feel more relaxed.

Worrying about the things that are beyond your control

I have wasted a lot of time worrying about what will people think if I do this or that. It didn’t do me any good. You think about something over and over until you’re trapped in the loop of overthinking. It does nothing but drains you emotionally. The truth is—which I learned the hard way—one can never know what the other person is thinking. Instead of worrying whether or not someone will like you or respect you, you can just focus on improving yourself. That’s how we grow in life. Don’t sweat over what others think of you. It’s beyond your control anyway.

Staying glued to your screen

If you stay glued to your screens all day long, be it your laptop, mobile or TV, you are not doing yourself any favour. You are just exhausting yourself. Remember, your eyes need rest too. I used to do this a lot earlier. The moment I finished my work, I would open a streaming app to binge-watch one episode after another. Though the shows were interesting, they didn’t do me any good. As I would often stay up late watching the series the blue light emitted from the screen impacted my sleep quality. This resulted in fatigue. But now I make sure to give my eyes adequate rest. As soon as I finish my work, I go out for a walk or talk to my friends and family, or simply rest. The shows can wait.

Skipping your exercise

I’ll be honest. Although I had a gym membership for a whole year, I seldom used to go. Eventually, lack of exercise became one of the main reasons why I ran low on energy all the time. Exercise can help increase blood flow and improve circulation, which leaves you feeling energised. It is fine if you have missed exercising for a day or two. But when days turn into weeks, then it becomes a problem. The longer you miss your work routines, the more difficult it becomes to find the motivation to get back in there.

Whenever I lacked the motivation to exercise, I added variety into my routine like Zumba or yoga to infuse some excitement back into the regimen. Yes, it was difficult at first, but with discipline, I became consistent. As a result, I felt more positive and confident about myself.

Letting small tasks pile up

Whether it is sending a text message to your friend, emailing a peer or updating an excel sheet, most of us have this habit of putting off small tasks to the last minute. But what we don’t realise is that these tiny tasks, if not finished in time, can become a huge burden later. At the end of the day, we may have to burn the midnight oil to complete them. It can be distracting and mentally draining because we keep thinking about them throughout the day.

I used to do this every now and then. Often, I had to work extra hours to finish what I had kept for later. This impacted both my personal and professional life. I couldn’t make time for my friends and family, and my performance at work suffered. I had to get rid of this habit. And so I started creating to-do lists. The idea was to note down all the tasks and allocate time to each of them. This approach enabled me to finish more in less time. I was finally at peace, knowing what I have to do at what time.