I have known ever since I came of age that I am a low energy guy. I have never had a lot of oomph to run my body. For a long time I didn’t care. At some point though it began to affect my career so I began looking at various strategies to help improve my performance. I remember the day it happened. My boss told me I was perceived as a low energy person (which was not a good thing at all). I went directly to the cafeteria in our office complex and got the biggest cup of coffee I could. I think it was like 24 oz. The difference it made was immediate and dramatic. I was hooked. This worked until it didn’t. Eventually I developed some kind of tolerance to coffee and I didn’t know what to do to keep things going.
I had perspective though. I knew how I operated with no caffeine and I knew how I operated with. The difference was significant and it was important to my performance and to my career to have a strategy to address this. I couldn’t ignore the issue.
I came to understand paying attention to your body is important. Since then I have been diagnosed with Parkinsons and this has made me a bit hyper sensitive to my energy level. I have cycled through a few Parkinsons medications and that with the nature of the disease itself has had a dramatic effect on my energy levels. The last months of my career (I am now retired) I would get up and go lay on the couch until it was time to leave for work because I let energy management slide. I just didn’t care. Energy management is now an important part of my routine and I take it seriously. It can make the difference between laying on the couch fatigued or having a nice workout at the gym.
At some point I came to the conclusion that cycling is important in one’s energy management strategy. I went off of coffee and went on energy drinks. I combined energy drinks with pre workout supplements. As my body develops a tolerance for one thing I switch to or add in a different component. I do this because my quality of life is at stake. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life on the couch. I want to be active so I will do whatever I can (that’s legal, lol) to have enough energy to live my life.
Ridgewalker's Notebook 