all right so let's speak about caffeine and why it really may be the reason
you're feeling like crap feeling tired you know paradoxically caffeine actually
makes a lot of people tired and many people don't realize this many people in
fact don't realize how strong caffeine is because it is a drug it's a stimulant
it has profound effects on the brain but it's something that people underestimate
just because of how widespread its use is I think it's somewhere of upwards of
70 to 80 percent of Americans at least have at least one cup of coffee or some
sort of a beverage that contains caffeine a per day so it's extremely
widely used but misunderstood so basically how caffeine works is that
when you ingest it it blocks something called adenosine which naturally builds
up as you get more tired so basically it blocks this so it prevents you from
getting tired and increases things like cortisol the stress hormone and this
also leads to you being more alert as well as increasing things like
catecholamines like norepinephrine increasing ketone bodies caffeine
actually mobilizes fat too so you know caffeine is great it helps with your
physical performance it's been shown in studies to help with
the working memory but the problem is that these benefits are short-lived
after you become dependent on caffeine because once you're actually dependent
on caffeine and it only takes about a cup of coffee per day for this to occur
all you're doing by giving yourself that boost physically or mentally or both is
alleviating the withdrawal symptoms you experience so you go to bed you wake up
you feel tired you feel like crap because you're having withdrawals from
the caffeine you have your coffee and the cycle continues as you continuously
think that you're getting a benefit from caffeine but in fact if you were to go
off caffeine if you were to allow receptors in the brain to re sensitize
then over time you would feel just as good if not better without a dependency
on something like caffeine what caffeine is actually doing in the body isn't
creating energy right it's basically giving you an advanced on energy it's
giving you energy and then it's gonna take that away late
as you crash your ballroom energy and once you get in the cycle of
continuously borrowing energy and never using any of your own you're gonna feel
it with some negative side effects of caffeine there are some other negatives
of caffeine increased risk of anxiety especially if you're already prone to
that it's going to exacerbate that because of the increase in cortisol that
it causes and now let me be clear I'm not saying it's bad I'm not saying that
having a cup a day is as bad if you can manage with that and that's perfectly
okay even to I mean there are many correlation studies which link caffeine
to a decreased risk of degenerative brain disorder disorders like
Alzheimer's there's even a correlation with a longer life for those who consume
more coffee up to four cups a day generally teens tends to be optimal for
life expectancy when looking at correlation studies these are just
correlations but you know certainly caffeine isn't something that's
dangerous to the extent of other narcotics obviously but um what I am
saying is that we are in general drinking too much and I don't advise
that you drink it to the extent where it becomes something you're dependent on
that's never a good idea to be dependent on something it's always good to have
your baseline your normal self where you're not stimulating yourself with
caffeine or nicotine or alcohol and then use it as a boost when required for
example before a workout or on a day where you feel particularly tired
rather than utilizing it as a crutch everyday in order to get up and live
your life now again I'm not saying that that's a bad thing you can do that but
if you personally have been feeling tired and you're not sure why maybe even
anxious maybe even your performance in the gym isn't as you want it to be and
you've been consuming caffeine on a regular basis for a long time and
gradually building up the dose of it as you become more tolerant to it then I
would highly recommend decreasing it not permanently not I'm not saying that's
the best course of action but if you haven't and you've been doing it for
five years and you might as well give yourself a few weeks where you go off
the caffeine just to see how your body responds now do be warned that you will
experience withdrawal symptoms from stopping the use of caffeine especially
if you go cold turkey and you completely eliminate it you're probably going to be
bed bound if you've been reliant on several couple of coffee per day for
several years so you know a good idea it can be to slowly kill it cut it down by
drinking decaf mixing it with decaf you know reducing the cups of coffee from
three one week to two the next week to one the next week or you could just call
go cold turkey and brace through those first few days of feeling like crap but
you know through my own personal experience and other anecdotes I've read
online after you do quit caffeine you're going to have much more stable energy
instead of having that cup of coffee in the morning feeling that energy and then
crashing a few hours later the energy that you do have although it may not be
as intense and exciting and euphoric the moment you wake up will be much more
gradual and you'll be more productive overall paradoxically as you have more
stable energy to take you through from morning to night so that's definitely
something you want to consider the best part about reducing your caffeine intake
and you know ideally eliminating it almost completely is that when you do
use it when you want to use it for example if you're very tired and you
still want to go to the gym but you really need a boost when you do use it
in that circumstance you're actually going to feel the positive effects of it
and get a real benefit rather than just alleviating the withdrawal symptoms you
were experiencing so that's probably the best part so I
highly advise that you form a relationship with caffeine more similar
to the one most people have with alcohol you know wake up and have a drink you
know you have a drink on the weekend to have fun with your friends for example
if you do that if you don't it's fine and just like that it's good to have
that relationship with caffeine where you use it once in a while for a workout
once in a while when you need to do an all-nighter for a project you're working
on that's kind of the relationship I think you should have with any sort of
stimulating substance which does have profound impacts on the brain so that's
it for the video leave your thoughts down below on caffeine and I'll I'll see
you guys later
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