Energy levels

It seems as though it doesn’t matter what time I go to bed, I invariably wake up tired. Whether it’s to do with the current cold weather or some other environmental factor, or due to my current state of health, or due to some other influence on my life, I’m not entirely sure.

I find that going to bed at 10pm and getting up at 6am or 5.45am, whichever is necessary, results in me being quite tired by the time 2pm rolls around. I eat breakfast, typically toast (wheat, carbohydrates, fibre) and a cold milo (energy, fats) or milo cereal (all of the above). I have fruit for morning tea: an apple, orange, kiwi fruit or passionfruit and some yoghurt. For lunch, two sandwhiches (four slices of wholegrain/multitrain/high-fibre bread) with ham (filler and flavour – probably no nutritional value), cheese (calcium, fats), spinach (iron), and tomato (good stuff?).

I don’t usually have afternoon tea, but that’s because there’s no time for it. Dinner sees me eating steak or chicken, pasta or baked vegetables.

I rarely snack. I never buy soft drinks, chocolates or other food tidbits. I have my three meals per day, and that’s all I eat. Yet I find my sleeping patterns unsatisfactory, and my levels of energy low. As I was saying, I can go to bed at 10pm or 11pm or 12pm, and the only difference it makes to my day is just how hard it is to wake up in the morning. The earlier I go to bed, the easier it is to wake — but only ever so slightly. I’m always still tired in the afternoon.

I do have a theory however. I believe it’s stress related. Days where nothing much happens at work see me not expending much energy, but I still feel drained. I’m stressed about having nothing to do. Days where I’m full on and doing stuff all day see me drained, but for similar reasons: I’m stressed about not having done enough. I can’t seem to find a happy medium where I am satisfied with myself, for the sake of myself and my employer. I thought that my new job was going to save me somewhat from this, but I was wrong. Today, I didn’t achieve what I wanted to achieve, and I came home tired and stressed.

I get to the point where, after I’ve driven all the way home, I park my car in my driveway, turn it off, turn off the headlights, and sit in silence. I sigh a big, drawn-out sigh, and I think about all the things I still have to get done, and how it all seems so never-ending. I’ve only just started my working life, and I’m already tired of it. Apparently.

I think I’m just whinging, but I know I have a point. It’s not the amount of work I have to do that’s large or particularly stressful, I think it’s simply the fact that I don’t have any adequate mechanisms for dealing with such stress. The parallel I draw between this and my last post is that the burden of choice is huge. I no longer have hard-set deadlines like I did in university with assignments, but now that my task completion is more open-ended and up to my determination and responsibility, I find myself extremely lacking. I expect more of myself; perhaps too much. My employers seem pleased, so why can’t I be too?

I just don’t know. I think I’m worried I’m not “good enough” at all the things I’ve been studying these last few years. I think maybe I’m worried about having wasted too much time, and I think maybe I’m worried about having fallen behind all the other examples of students of my age. I think this is partly why I used to (and once again are) occupy my spare time with so many personal projects.

Matter of fact, remove all the uncertainty from the previous paragraph, and you have the exact reason I’m under so much (self-imposed) stress.

Well, this post helped me figure that out. This is what my blog is for, and I’m sure I’ve mentioned that before, but perhaps not so blatantly.