Have you ever felt like your energy levels dip a lot, or that your capacity for certain tasks change often throughout the day? If that’s you, which there’s a high probability it would be, cause it’s kind of like a human thing. Well, I’m here to show you how you can actually use that to your advantage. So you can actually plan out your day for optimum success, work smarter and not harder because we all have a lot of stuff to do. So might as well use our inner clock to our advantage with the Ayurvedic Clock.
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Okay, let’s jump right in.
Today I’m talking about something that honestly has changed A LOT for me. And that is Ayurveda. I’ve been “practicing” Ayurveda for like the last year and a half and I have done a crap ton of research on it. I’ve read so many books, so many articles, listened to so many podcasts because I find it absolutely freaking mind blowing.
By adopting a more Ayurvedic lifestyle, I found that I feel so much more balanced, healthier, more focused, more productive. So many good things. But let’s get back to todays topic becuase you might be wondering, okay, what does it have to do with planning out your day? What the heck is Ayurveda?
+ What is Ayurveda +
Ayurveda essentially is like a 5,000 year old science that originated in India. I mean, how freaking cool is it that human beings were able to come up with such an amazing system and science before Western science even came about?
And looking at how Western science has been able to back it up since, like seriously, it’s just amazing.
Ayurveda revolves around mind-body connection. So our mental health and our mind influence our body and physical health and vice versa. So, you know how when you’re stressed, you notice that your hair starts falling out or you start breaking out? That kind of thing.
So, Ayurveda teaches that it’s so much better to prevent these things with our day to day habits and our lifestyle based on our specific unbalances instead of slapping a bandaid over something.
It’s all about just finding ultimate balance and seeing where in life we have unbalance and bringing ourselves back to center. Realizing that our bodies are all different. By making these lifestyle changes we can be our most balanced, healthy, productive selves, which I mean, who doesn’t want that?
So again, like what does this have to do with productivity and planning our day?
Well, there’s this whole concept of the Ayurveda called the Ayurvedic Clock. Certain times are meant for certain kinds of tasks to help us use and maximize our energy, to find balance, to not be stressed, and not overexert ourselves.
So with the Ayurvedic Clock we can plan out your day for success. The Ayurvedic Clock is basically broken into different zones, which are corrilated to the 3 Doshas. Doshas, actually a huge concept in Ayurveda. I could do a whole other talk about that, honestly. But they’re basically three mind body types, and they are all represented by different elements and different attributes. So the three Doshas are Kapha, Pitta and Vata.
Kapha: is represented by earth and water. It’s slow, heavy and grounded.
Vata: is represented by air and ether. It’s all about movement, its creative and flows.
Pitta: is fire and water. It’s the stereotypical CEO, get stuff done energy.
We have a little bit of all of these energies but usually have 1 or 2 that are predominant for us. But these different zones in the Ayurvedic clock are associated with a different Dosha and this helps influence what kind of tasks, activities and energy we might experience.
+ Kapha Phase 1: 6am-10am +
We open our eyes in the morning and we are usually in the Kapha phase. It is slow. It’s very grounded. We’re usually groggy, we’re tired. We’re a little bit slower in the morning. Maybe we really don’t want to get out of bed, all that kind of stuff. This is Kapha, energy.
So essentially in this time zone, which lasts from about 6:00 AM to 10:00 AM is the time we want to be kind of slowly awake and prepare ourselves for our day. So I usually try to get up around like 6/6:30am, depending on when I go to bed the night before. And I’m doing slower tasks. I usually do my morning routine. This is why a lot of people recommend doing morning routines in the morning.
Our society, is very, go, go, go. And when we start rushing, and doing a million things first thing in the morning we’re spiking our cortisol (our stress hormone) yeah, not what we want.
This was SO me when I was still at my 9-5. You leap out of bed, you’re rushing, you’re going to a million places doing a million things, throwing on your makeup, swallowing your breakfast as you go out the door. Maybe you’re already starting to work answering emails or whatever. And when you do that, you notice that you already start to feel pretty stressed and axious. And that stress kind of lingers the entire day.
Not always the most ideal situation.
But that doesn’t mean that we necessarily do a morning routine from six to 10. I don’t do that. It’s not feasible, but it’s just about taking it a little bit slower. So usually during this time I do a little bit of light exercise, eat a light breakfast, and plan for the day.
I usually start work around 8:30 or 9 am. And when I am starting work, that kind of chunk before 10 is where I am doing any sort of planning. So it’s still very slow. I’m not doing anything like really mentally hardcore. And then I move into some learning. So again not spiking my cortisol first thing in the am. I’m slowly waking up and I am just kind of getting reconnected with myself and with my body.
So depending on your lifestyle, again this doesn’t mean that you should do a 4 hour morning routine lol but maybe kind of trying to implement, taking a little bit more slowly and not spike your cortisol.
+ Pitta Phase 1: 10am-2pm +
Have you ever heard of like the “eat that frog” concept? Well this is where you eat the freaking frog. Eating the frog is basically scheduling your hardest and most hardcore tasks first. Like the things that are going to take the most brain energy, the things that maybe you don’t want to do, but you absolutely have to do.
So this is go time.
This is when I am the most productive. I have my Pomodoro timer. I use the Forest app best thing ever. And I just do my hardcore work, focus, and pump it out.
This is also when I eat lunch and most people probably eat lunch and according to Ayurveda (there’s a lot to the health side of it that I’m not getting into but totally will if you guys are interested) but our metabolism is highest during this time of day.
So this is a great time to eat our largest meal of the day.
+ Vata Phase 1: 2pm-6pm +
So as I mentioned before, Vata is very creative, very flowy.
I always do my design or creative work after lunch. I get my laptop, pop in my air pods (listen to something like my Fall Playlist) and just get into a very creative zone.
This is a great time to schedule tasks that aren’t so heavily mind intensive. Anything creative, social, movement, visionary based like organizing a project, that kind of thing.
And it just really helpful because you’ve already gotten the majority of your hardcore stuff out of the way and you’re able to focus in this creative zone. So I do that until 6:00 PM and around 6:00 PM or is when I eat dinner, which according to Ayurveda should be the last meal of the day.
But this is where I should have done a disclaimer, I am not like the most strict. I try very hard, for the most part, to incorporate as many of these things as I can but I’m not crazy rigid about it.
+ Kapha Phase 2: 6pm-10pm +
This is the unwinding time. Relaxing and getting ready to sleep. So this is where, you know, a lot of people finish work and they go into any kind of self-care activities, watch movies, take bubble baths, or read a book.
Disconnecting from social media or any sort of electronic for like an hour or two before bed. So this is kind of the time where you kind of unwinding and according to Ayurveda, because you’re in line with your circadian rhythm, getting up with the sun at six and then going to bed with the sun, not the most feasible all the time though.
BUT Do you ever notice you kind of get like a second wind if you stay up past 10? Like if you get kind of tired, you’re ready for sleep around like 9 or 10 and then you keep on doing whatever you’re doing and the next time you look at the clock and it’s 2:00 AM and you’re like holy shit, I need to work tomorrow.
I’m totally guilty.
Well, that is because you pushed too far and are now into the next Pitta phase, which is the perfect explanation for why you got a second wind. So if you actually go to bed, like you’re supposed to, again, according to Ayurveda, this is the time of you should be having your deepest sleep and your brain is doing a lot of active work.
+ Vata Phase 2: 2am-6am +
This is your lightest sleep phase. And if you’re an early riser you might wake up during this time and it’s the perfect time to practice gratitude, meditate or visualize.
So that’s basically how I plan my day and how you can maybe take a couple of these things to plan your day so that you prioritize and set yourself up for success by best using your energy levels to your advantage.
So you might think this is interesting but feel like it’s a lot and don’t know how to really apply it to your life. Depending on your lifestyle you might be more in control over your schedule and you can go hard with this or you might have a 9-5 and you know, you can’t quite call in your boss and be like, um, you know, I can’t come into work until 10 for my Pitta phase.
Like not realistic.
So I created a little planner for you guys with the Ayurvedic clock so you guys can start to writing down plan what you can implement for your unique lifestyle.
So maybe you want to start getting up a little bit earlier or have a slower time in the morning. Maybe when you get to work, instead of doing the hardest tasks right at nine, you do some organization stuff or other light work and schedule more of your hardcore stuff between that 10 and that 2:00 PM timeframe.
Maybe it’s going to bed a little bit earlier, getting up a little bit earlier, exercising, eating your largest meal at lunchtime or whatever works for you (which is the biggest key to any success). If you do this, please comment or take a picture and tag me @nasyaacostasmith I love hearing from you guys!