No, you're not lazy. Genuine reasons why you might be feeling too sluggish and low in energy to start and maintain a new fitness program.

We’re so quick to judge and condemn ourselves when things don’t go according to plan, or when we seem to “fail” something. Some of my Strong With Amya clients have a hard time at the start committing to the workouts. There are often genuine reasons, and often it boils down to following through with what we set out to do, and not letting anything get in the way of that. It seems simple enough, but I understand the deeper nuances of the human mind, motivation, an overburdened nervous system, self-sabotage patterns, and feeling “too tired” and sluggish to get going.

One that last sentence, I will say that it is rare that you are always going to feel energised to workout. Some days you will really feel like it, and there will be many days where you really don’t. The way around that is to shift your energetic state and to quiet your mind. Your mind is what will give up before your body does. Or it may even be the very thing that is stopping you.

I wrote a whole post on this for my Strong With Amya community in their resource library about how sometimes our brain will actually make us feel physically tired — it’s that powerful. So sometimes we need to switch it off and move our bodies anyway.

One thing I like to do is to rebound (or bounce on the spot, on the balls of your feet with your knees bent). This helps to move your lymphatic fluid — a very important part of your immune system, fat absorption and feeling refreshed. This helps to move your energy, can provide a hit of dopamine from your mechanoreceptors being put to use, and the gentle shaking of your fluid can literally help you to snap out of whatever destructive thinking loop you were stuck in.

That aside, let’s dive into the reasons you might be feeling sluggish:

1. You're experiencing toxic overload. Your body, especially your liver, bears the burden of filtering and ridding of toxins that you are exposed to through your food, water, air supply, personal hygiene products, makeup, cleaning products, and more. If you get headaches often for "no reason", are sluggish and tired all the time, you likely need to take some measures to cleanse and detoxify your body. See point 2.

2. If you're ready for a full blown cleanse, I suggest HMI Wellness' Candida Cleanse. It will reset your gut microbiome, drastically improve your energy levels and focus, heal any hormonal imbalances, heal skin issues, fix any cravings for sweet and carby things, and so much more. If you're not ready for a full blown cleanse...

3. Consider introducing coffee enemas as a regular practice. See my other post for the how and why. And also...

4. Increase your fresh fruit and veg intake. The micronutrients and energy you get from these foods help you to stay youthful, vibrant, energetic, improve mood and keep you agile for longer. If you don’t love to eat fruit and vegetables just yet, that’s fine. As you introduce more of them, your palate and cells will change and adapt to preferring these foods over junky ones. The increased energy will also make you want to have more of these, and you’ll notice how sluggish you feel when you go for high fat and gluten foods. Sometimes, I prefer to juice my salads (using my cold-press juicer at home), especially using veggies that I don’t particular like to cook with, or typically eat. Juicing helps to extract the nutrients in a larger volume than if you were to eat them, and those nutrients are essentially carried to your cells more easily.

5. You need to drink more water. Pure, filtered water. Water is the medium for all your body’s chemical reactions to occur. No chemical reactions = no cellular activity = no energy.

6. You could be lacking in vitamins and minerals, even if you feel you eat "healthy." Sadly, modern soil that our fruits and vegetables are grown in are missing many minerals that add to the richness of their own nutritional value. Supplementation takes you from surviving to thriving. A good place to start if you're low on energy: B-complex vitamins and magnesium. I go in-depth on this kind of information in my guide.

7. You are under-eating. There are SO many dangers that come with under-eating. But not only are you ruining your metabolism, causing yourself to feel lethargic, negatively affecting your hormones, causing muscle wastage (which works against the “toned” look you might be wanting), and bringing on premature aging… you are setting your body up to retaliate when you eventually start to eat more. Your body will retaliate by putting on more weight. For any low-carbers who have found their way here. I’m about to rock your world by telling you that you can have the body of your dreams (inside and out) by eating LOTS of food, high carb, lower protein, and low fat. Check out my FREE 3-Day Meal Guide.

8. You are eating a diet high in processed foods, gluten, fat and dairy. These cause inflammation, contribute to toxic overload, and therefore fatigue.

9. You may be dealing with adrenal fatigue. This is something that I have personally recovered from, using my health coaching knowledge from HMI Wellness, getting some guidance from a friend and Health Coach/Nutritionist in the early days, and trial and error on my part, particularly when it came to working out.

10. You are coming from a place of "I'm not good enough” in relation to your health and fitness goals. Yes, we all want to improve ourselves, but if we view working out and changing our eating habits as punishment, it's not going to last long. This is something I can guide you through if you keep coming up against the negative voice in your head.

11. Your goals aren't meaningful enough to you. You need to pick what really matters to YOU, with zero influence from anyone else. Sure, your husband might love that you are energised, and might oggle you in your bikini, but it should never be about him, or anyone else’s reactions or opinions of you. You are worthy as you are right now.

12. You are trying to do too much at once — a tendency common in the go hard or go home ladies. This becomes overwhelming and you end up doing nothing, you become burnt out and the process becomes unenjoyable, or falling off the wagon too soon. Pick 1-2 habits to nail every 2-4 weeks (sometimes longer is needed) and then layer more in.

13. Your nervous system could be overloaded from chronic stress, and sometimes you might not even know it because you’ve been living with it for so long. But if you find you often just need a break from life, that is a sign you may be dealing with chronic stress or cPTSD. It is very real and something that can be healed. But while you’re experiencing it, it can make life and getting shit done harder. A good place to start, and something that really helped me was doing Liana Shanti’s core wound programs. I would start here.

If you're stuck in a loop, you need a coach. It may be the best investment you ever make for yourself — someone who guides you, assists self-accountability, problem-solves, and cheers you on! If you have any questions, I’m only an email or message away.

Love,
Amya