Women-In-Business suffer from fatigue and specifically “Adrenal Fatigue” and most do not know what is going on with their bodies. All they know for sure is that they are in overwhelm and totally exhausted and are trapped in the endless cycle of “Fatigue”.
Last time we talked about answering some questions. So how did you answer those questions? Your answers are the window into what is going on inside of your body. Let’s take a look at those answers in a “general” context and see if you can relate.
1. How do I spend the energy that is available to me each day? When I speak about this topic or when I am coaching a client on the “energy” piece we do a very specific exercise. I have the woman take out the lost few pages of her paper planner (if she is digital, I provide her with the pages) for one week. I place a pack of colored pencils in front of her and we start to color in her life as it truly is. I ask her to color in the hours (out of the 24 she has available to her) that she sleep each night. Remember here that for this “Adrenal Fatigued” woman this will not be a regular sleep pattern. Each night may be different. We take that color and make a “Legend” that let’s say “Blue” is “Sleep”.
Next we take the next “known”….”Work” and choose another color for work and add it to the “Legend”. She is then instructed to color in her work time every day of this week we are looking at.
Next we take the other “knowns” one at a time and choose a color from our box and add each to our “Legend”. She is instructed to color in each of those “knowns” every day of this week we are working with.
What happens is that this precious soul visually sees where she spends her available energy each day of any given week.
This is huge for most women. The reason is that they know they are really busy and when you ask them what have they done, they are fuzzy and it is all a big blur. That’s “fatigue”!
What are some of the things that are not visible on this “Energy Available” exercise? If I take this a step further and ask this woman: “OK, wow, your week is really full; when do you:
*rest?
*have relaxation?
*take a vacation?
*enjoy your own passionate activities?
*get out into the fresh air?
*have fun?
*become spiritually renewed?
*enjoy friends?
I usually get a blank stare and the trite comment: “….who has time for those?” My comment is that: “…Y-O-U….at this point cannot afford not to build in these moments in your life with your current state of “Fatigue”…!”
Today, I challenge you to do this exercise on your own and use your child’s crayons or colored pencils and see what you “Real Life” looks like on paper.
Next time we will look at “Conserving Energy.”
