An uncomfortable truth: shift work – if left unchecked can rapidly deteriorate ones mental & physical health.
How does one combat the negative affects?
Well when it comes to health and wellness there is such a ridiculous amount of information (and conjecture) out there today that it’s no wonder people experience sheer overwhelm and don’t make change happen – it’s way easier to crack another can of Coke and smash another dogs-eye (Australian for meat pie).
Let’s start with diet; the goal here is to give you a solid blueprint to work off so that when everyone else is dragging themselves to night shift, you’re there ready to kick it in the nuts.
Calories in, calories out + slow carbs – that’s it. Some people believe this to be a controversial opinion and some people will outright say that CICO is a myth – last time I checked it wasn’t a tapeworm that caused me to consciously shred 15kg when I decided enough was enough. A fasting routine of 16:8 I’ve personally found assists with weight control and promotes a general feeling of ‘alertness’
You don’t need fancy shakes, or a hectic 4-5 gym split (we’ll get to that). You truly just need to make a concerted effort to track calories and ensure that you’re maintaining a balanced input/output (again unless you have particular fitness goals, I’m getting there just wait). Consistency and discipline trumps fad diets and the best way to maintain that consistency is to mealprep and have those recipes dialed in and tracked.
My Go To Mealprep Favourites (Inserted Article)
My criteria for mealprep recipes are that they require minimal mental overhead, simple ingredients and are either set & forget or take an amount of time I consider reasonable within my wider routines. (include as a larger quoted font)
Dial some of these recipes into MyFitnessPal and you’re already one step closer to being better than everyone else. I jest, you’re one step closer to simplifying the day to day and reducing mental overhead by eliminating the need for superfluous decision making (We’ll cover more on life automation a bit later on).
A critical part of all of this – not just diet but overall is remember to treat yourself, there is nothing wrong with a cheat day as long as you can self regulate and not go overboard; I could get into the stoic philosophy of why both struggle and reward are the building blocks upon which man builds his life but you’re falling asleep already. Go out and have a couple beers with the boys on your off day, have bottomless brunch with the girlies, eat a pizza while you watch the footy. We’ll talk about looking after mental health a little later on.
Until next time.