3 Ways to Fight Fatigue

Sleep is only part of the answer. By adding the right things to your day, you'll have more energy (and more time, too)
Sleep is only part of the answer. By adding the right things to your day, you'll have more energy (and more time, too)

By Denise Foley

More than one-third of us nod off unintentionally during the day, says the CDC. The most obvious - and common - reason: We're not getting enough sleep. But our energy levels depend on factors beyond seven to eight hours of sweet dreams every night. We can be laid low by emotional fatigue, too - by being bored, by having too much or too little to do (or too many stupor-inducing chores to get through). Or we (you?) may be surrounded by vampires - and not of the sexy Twilight variety. "Fatigue often has more to do with the emotional than the physical," says Sherrie Bourg Carter, Psy.D., codirector of the Institute for Behavioral Sciences and the Law in Fort Lauderdale, FL, and author of High Octane Women.

Think about it. Even a bad night's sleep wouldn't keep you from meeting up with your BFFs for drinks after work or going to the banquet to accept your Volunteer of the Year award. Somehow, we always find the time - and the energy - to do the things that bring us pleasure. The trick is to build activities you love into your life, to chart a new course that keeps you energized. You'll be more productive and have more time. Here, from leading experts and research studies, how you can make it happen.

Related: How to Get More Energy


1) Shake it up, wake it up There's comfort in routine, but living a life in which you do the same thing day in and day out has a dulling and time-sapping effect. Your brain hates the same old, same old so much that it just turns off. This makes sense from an evolutionary point of view: The brain is wired to ignore the familiar and seek out the novel, giving you a kind of internal alarm that allows you to sense potential danger by tuning out the presumably safe ho-hum.

At the same time, novelty activates your pleasure system by churning out dopamine, one of the brain's "feel-good" chemicals. Dopamine is largely responsible for your brain lighting up on scans when you satisfy a major food craving (like when you "gotta have" that chocolate and you get it). But recent research suggests that dopamine is also the raw material of motivation - it gets you and your brain up and raring to go. And if you're deficient in it, you'll feel a kind of mental fatigue. Forget shopping or cooking - even making a grocery list will feel like too much work.

You don't have to push the novelty theme too far and take up skydiving (as my friend Sarah did) to get a dopamine hit. A hike in the woods or an afternoon combing art galleries will do it. Even small tweaks to your routine can be energizing, says Mira Kirshenbaum, Ph.D., cofounder and clinical director of The Chestnut Hill Institute in Boston. Take a different route to work, or download some Radiohead (though you may have no idea who they are) to your iPod. "It can help just to change the pictures in your cubicle," she says.

Related: You, Recharged!

2) Find your passion Or rediscover an old one. If you don't love what you're doing - work, your hobbies, causes you've taken on - you're likely dragging through your life as if you're always headed to intermediate algebra class. In this age of high unemployment, you may not be in a position to ditch your humdrum job, but maybe you could think about a new project that excites you and convince your supervisor to let you try it. Studies by Amy Wrzesniewski, Ph.D., associate professor of organizational behavior at Yale, suggest that crafting your job into a calling - something that feels meaningful and gives you a sense of fulfillment - can also help. Perhaps you could mentor younger staff members or develop a charitable project for your company.

If you can't rejigger your job, try changing other things in your life to find the spark you're looking for. Could you pursue painting or a course in local history? If you know that you have to leave the office exactly at 5 P.M. to get to class on time, you'll push through your day more efficiently. Ditto on weekends: Speed-clean the house before your aerobics class, and you'll get a double burn. If you're stumped about what will excite you, look at the bottom of your to-do list, the things you wistfully hope to get to after the laundry and calling the fridge repair service and dropping a prescription at the drugstore and...

Related: Stop Stress Now

3) Hang with the fun crowd
People who live each day with a sense of excitement and energy can pass that attitude on to you the way a kindergarten class shares a cold. In this case, though, it's social contagion at work - and it's a good thing. A friend who's enthusiastic about her job and her life can help you find your own joie de vivre again. Which also may make you more productive and better able to save your personal days for something other than recovering from the flu; one study found that people lacking a "zest for work" were more likely to take long spells of sick leave.

Next: Vanquish those vampires


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