Rest and Recovery

The top principles to master and build consistent habits and routines around for a healthy lifestyle are exercise, nutrition, rest and recovery. Exercise is good for the body, as well as mentally and emotionally. Nutrition influences your exercise, as well as your mental and emotional management, and rest and recovery. Our exercise influences rest and recovery, and vice versa. One aspect of a healthy lifestyle that people neglect to build habits around is a balance. Rest and recovery are just as important as exercise and nutrition. Our bodies and our brains need rest for optimal performance. Both need that downtime to make lasting connections, repair and rebuild. The Brain Always Wins by John Sullivan and Chris Parker offers that rest is our number one performance enhancer! I know personally, I feel best when I get adequate sleep so things ring true for me! Balance is key because balance is sustainable. If you are full throttle all the time, at some point your body and mind are going to make you rest, it will lead to burnout. Balance, is work plus rest, for success.

Rest and recovery can be included in your life in multiple ways. Letting your body recover from a tough workout, via nutrition, stretching, and foam rolling is one. You can also balance your workout routine and body by taking rest days from the gym. You can also complement your weight training with yoga or other movement activities like hiking, swimming, paddle boarding.

Recovery also involves work-life balance! Spending time at work is great, working in your purpose and mission while also devoting time to family and what matters, your relationships.

You can also take recovery breaks by taking small breathing, meditation or walk breaks to clear and reset your mind through the day.

Rest, as in enough quality sleep is also vital! Our bodies and our brains repair and rebuild when we sleep at night. Things we learned during the day are finalized and neural pathways connected and created when we sleep at night. Getting adequate sleep is vital to balance in our lives as well as vital to feeling our best and performing our best in training, at work, and for our relationships!

Lack of sleep also drains our energy, and causes us to both want and actually, eat more, leading to weight gain or lack of progress in the gym or in our nutrition efforts. Lack of sleep also increases cortisol, the stress hormone.

Adequate sleep is very important, prioritizing sleep improves your recovery physically, mentally, emotionally and physiologically. The recommended amount of SLEEP is 7-9 hours of SLEEP, not being in bed on our phones :P

Some of the trouble with sleep is falling asleep and staying asleep. Some things we can do to help us are when we go to bed, actually, go to bed, put our phones away and TVs away when we head to bed. Also, darkness and temperature in the room contribute to quality sleep. Another way is taking a sleep supplement, if you often feel tired, drained and lacking in the sleep department, try Flyte Sport REST! This is a great supplement that can help you fall asleep quickly, as well as stay asleep throughout the night. REST provides an amazing balance of natural ingredients to help relax your brain, lower cortisol levels, and help you fall and stay asleep naturally while promoting uninterrupted and quality night sleep. Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions on this or any of our products. As always, we appreciate the love and support over the years!

Blessings,

Charissa

Charissa Sutliff is an Online Fitness & Nutrition Development Coach, a Competition Prep Coach, Certified Personal Trainer, and holds a B.S. in Kinesiology. She also holds an M.A. in Higher Education Administration. She is enthusiastic about faith, working out, healthy nutrition, meditating, learning, growing and coffee!