6 Reasons You’re Always Tired & How to Boost Energy Naturally

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And if your brain feels foggy, if you're wired at night but Dragging all day, that's not normal. And it's not just stress or lack of caffeine. Something deeper is going on. And today I'm going to walk you through the real reasons you're tired and what you can do starting today to get your energy, clarity, and motivation back. Welcome to the Dr. Josh Axe Show.

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So a few years ago, I went through something that completely changed how I think about fatigue. You know, I had a spinal infection. I had to go through rounds of antibiotics, and eventually I was completely healed. However, I felt completely drained and exhausted afterwards. And even once I regained my health, my workouts felt impossible. I wasn't recovering very well.

I had some brain fog issues, and overall, I just felt— here's the thing, I'll explain. I felt wired but tired no matter what I did. Now, here's how I discovered the root of my issue is I finally did some different advanced blood work and functional medicine testing, and something showed up.

Actually, 2 things in particular showed up on my blood work when everything else was pretty much in complete alignment, but it showed that I had low levels of vitamin B2. And I also had mitochondrial dysfunction. My mitochondria were not functioning properly.

And so those 2 things, vitamin B2, which is called riboflavin, which is actually a really critical part of the methylation pathway and mitochondrial pathway, was often deficient severely. And then I had mitochondrial dysfunction, which might've been because of just the vitamin B2 levels.

And so I went and I started looking up what are the foods that are richest in vitamin B2, started eating those foods, started taking higher Doses of riboflavin. And you know what happened for me? Within days, all of a sudden my energy came back online and everything changed. And my energy went from being tired constantly all the time to completely normal to where I felt like I had energy all day.

And think about how crazy this is. There's all these different nutritional deficiencies, but because I did the right blood work and I found this one nutrient, again, every other nutrient I had. Was normal and optimal range, but one nutrient was off. And when I started supplementing with it, everything got fixed.

And so most people don't realize how if you just have one single nutritional deficiency, how that can affect every cell in your body. It can affect all of your different pathways for methylation, for mitochondrial function, your Krebs cycle, which is producing cellular energy and ATP to run all your organ systems. And this is true for a lot of things, by the way.

If you're struggling with depression, if you're off by one nutrient, It can be causing your depression. You can take certain other supplements, but if it doesn't have the right amounts of one nutrient, you might be off. You might be having serious inflammation. It might be an issue like PCOS or insulin resistance or one of those issues.

And by missing one nutrient, your body can't function properly. This is also true with detoxification. If you don't have enough glutathione because you have a deficiency in something like selenium, Well, now your entire— you have a bottleneck in this detoxification pathway. And even though everything else is imperfect, if one thing is off, now you can't detoxify properly.

So you feel sluggish, you feel tired, you struggle with constipation, or it could be headaches, but you stay sick. And so getting to the root cause of your issue and discovering what that is is so critical to healing. And this is true with fatigue as well.

Now listen, I'm going to walk through some of the bigger things that help Everybody with fatigue, but also there's such great value in being able to pinpoint what is that one thing that's really causing you to have lack of energy and addressing that. And sometimes you can do it by taking certain supplements, as we'll get into in a minute.

But for me, in my case— and by the way, this isn't true in probably 80% of cases— I found that about 80% of the time, if I have somebody take certain supplements, certain dietary changes and lifestyle modifications, their energy will—.

Boost.

Will completely normalize. But for some people, and let's say you have long COVID as an example, or a very specific nutrient deficiency, if you don't discover what that one thing is, via maybe doing some sort of blood work or testing, or knowing what your diagnosis is, then oftentimes you're trying things, but never actually getting to the root of the problem.

And if you're constantly tired, here's the thing you need to know, your body isn't broken. It's sending you a message that you shouldn't ignore. And the root cause of fatigue Can include dozens of things, not one, often dozens of things. And sometimes there's 2 or 3 things contributing, but many of these things do come down to poor cellular health.

And so I want to walk you through exactly what this means and how to fix it. Number one thing is this: cellular and mitochondrial dysfunction is the single greatest factor of people having low energy today. Every cell in your body makes energy through tiny powerhouses called mitochondria. These are the powerhouses in the engines of your cells.

And And when those mitochondria slow down, you feel it everywhere. Your brain doesn't function as well, so you get brain fog. You have mood swings, body aches, exhaustion, of course, is the biggest warning sign. And mitochondrial damage also raises oxidative stress, creating a vicious cycle that accelerates fatigue and inflammation. And there was a study that showed this.

Those with chronic fatigue have been shown to have lower mitochondrial ATP output. Output in the range of 25% less or more than healthy people. And 25% less ATP, that sort of energy to run all of your organs, that is a major, major deficiency. So the number one warning sign you have mitochondrial dysfunction is chronic fatigue syndrome or general fatigue.

Here are some of the biggest causes of cellular dysfunction and mitochondrial damage. One is toxin exposure. If you've been exposed to heavy metals or mold, pathogens like parasites or viruses like Epstein-Barr, these can start to bombard your cells, wearing out your ATP. Also, nutrient deficiencies, that is probably the single biggest one, followed by inflammation, poor sleep, and chronic stress.

Poor sleep and chronic stress are big, big factors when it comes to wearing out your mitochondrial energy. Now, I want to walk you through something called the methylation cycle and how this actually impacts your energy production. And so for many of us, in order to create energy, One of the things we need functioning properly in our body is our methylation cycle.

And some of you have heard of something called the MTHFR gene variant. And I have those methylation genes where I don't methylate very well. And so this is why I personally am very conscious of the vitamins and minerals I'm taking to support my methylation cycle. And in order for your body to methylate properly, there are very specific nutrients you need in specific forms to help run methylation.

And the first one is folate or methylfolate. That is the first nutrient you need in order to methylate properly. And this is where it goes wrong for most people is in folate or methylfolate. And there are certain foods that are high in folate. We knew green leafy vegetables, many others are high in folate, organ meats like liver. And so you do want to be getting folate in your body.

That's also known as vitamin B9, which is critical for— it's also very important for pregnancy and and a number of things. We saw this study where women who take acetaminophen or Tylenol start to get depleted in issues like folate and then also glutathione. And when glutathione gets depleted, that may increase the risk of autism in offspring.

So, there's issues there with having low folate, low selenium, low glutathione via taking things like Tylenol during Pregnancy, and maybe even before leading up to. So we have to be very careful with those sort of things. But part of that is also how this might impact the methylation cycle is very important. And so if you are low in vitamin B9, you can be doing all the other right things.

You can be exercising, getting proper sleep, and you're still going to wake up exhausted every single day. And I've noticed this when women are pregnant and then post-pregnancy, oftentimes they suffer with postpartum depression and low energy. Sometimes I believe part of that reason is their body has used up so many nutrients like B9 B12, iron, B6 during pregnancy that now they have a deficiency.

And so they're exhausted. And that's part of actually what causes some of that postpartum depression is just exhaustion, being so tired. And then you throw lack of sleep on top of it. Again, that can lead to those symptoms of depression and low energy you have post-pregnancy. But when we look at this methylation cycle as a whole, You must have folate. You also must have amino acids like serine.

You need vitamin B6. You also need vitamin B2 and vitamin B12, and then another vitamin that sort of falls in the B vitamin category called choline, which is found in egg yolks and organ meats and just meat in general. And if you're deficient in any one of those, your body is not methylating properly.

Well, for myself, I was taking a vitamin, a B complex that had vitamin B2, but actually the levels were very low. It was only like 2 milligrams. And I realized, well, I need a lot more than that. I started supplementing with around 60 milligrams a day, and all of a sudden my energy went through the roof.

And so for me, it made total sense to me when I'm looking at this methylation pathway, knowing I don't methylate well, but knowing on my blood work I had normal levels of B9, folate, normal levels of B12. In fact, they were a little bit high because they weren't recycling properly. Normal levels of B6, but B2, that one nutrient for myself was off.

And because of that, my entire methylation pathway was thrown off and I wasn't able to create enough cellular energy and ATP for my mitochondria because my vitamin B2 was off. I simply supplemented with that one nutrient and bam, all of a sudden now My energy levels became normalized. And for many people, it's that simple.

If we can discover what is that nutritional deficiency that you're suffering with and then go and address it, now your energy can come roaring back. Okay, now I want to take some time and walk you through what some of the ideal dietary changes are if you're struggling with low energy and how to fix this.

The first thing that you need to know if you are going to support your body in producing more cellular energy is we need to keep insulin levels balanced, right? If you're suffering with insulin sensitivity issues, insulin resistance issues, you're going to have low energy. So we need to make sure that you are getting foods that keep your blood sugar balanced.

That primarily comes from protein, fiber, healthy fats, and certain nutrients. Those are going to keep your blood sugar levels balanced.

So you want to make sure you're getting plenty of protein, maybe around 30 grams per meal, organic Chicken and turkey, grass-fed beef, wild-caught fish, those sort of things, eggs, healthy protein powders, bone broth, but you want to get a lot of healthy quality protein in your diet. The next thing you want to focus in on is eating foods that are very rich in nutrients like antioxidants.

So pomegranates, berries, green apples, green leafy vegetables, steamed cruciferous vegetables, those sort of foods. So those antioxidant and nutrient-rich foods. You want to get a lot of those. The next thing I would say is you want to focus on high-fiber foods. That's going to be that similar category.

It's going to be berries, it's going to be greens, it's going to be nuts like walnuts and flax and chia seeds. And then you want to get some healthy fats. Extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil are going to be the 2 best for you to consume for cellular energy in terms of some of those fats, along with the omega-3s you're going to find in things like salmon and walnuts.

And if you focus on those foods, high protein foods, high fiber foods, foods high in nutrients, and foods that have good fatty acids. That's going to help your energy levels tremendously. And staying away from processed sugars, refined grains, even those healthier carbs like oatmeal and rice, if you have them, have small servings, not large servings. And I'm not talking about going low carb.

I'm talking about normal carb to where your diet is full of meat and vegetables. And then you're supplementing with some berries, some apples, some sweet potato, those sort of things. That's sort of the ideal diet for supporting energy.

And then you want to make sure your mitochondria has what it needs to create cellular energy, like B vitamins that we talked about, coenzyme Q10, magnesium, and L-carnitine are critical. The other thing you want to do is get daily movement, 30 minutes a day at least of walking.

Ideally though, you're exercising at least 3 days a week, you're walking at least 30 30 minutes to an hour a day around your meals is the best. That's going to help cellular energy as well. And then limiting your alcohol intake and other forms of toxins that are going to build up in your body. All of these are dietary strategies to improve your cellular energy.

Now, I want to talk to you about maybe the single greatest reason, along with diet, of why people are tired all the time, and that has to do with poor sleep. Now, I can share with you, That I've experienced as a parent. We've got an almost 2-year-old, she's 1 still, and a 5-year-old.

And myself and Chelsea, even more my wife Chelsea, has got less sleep at night because our girls have not been good sleepers, especially our 1-year-old. She's constantly waking up still at night. And listen, it's gotten a lot better. Maybe it's only a couple times a night, but even a couple times at night where your sleep is disrupted.

Yeah.

That can really throw off your energy. And so, there are things we want to do to maximize our sleep as much as possible. Listen, and there are only certain things within your control, but you do want to maximize those things. And listen to this stat, the average night's sleep decreased from about 9 hours in 1910 to less than 7 hours in 2025.

Wow.

6 In 10 American adults do not get the recommended amount of sleep. Think about that. The average person now gets 2 hours less asleep at night than they might have over 100 years ago. That's crazy. And the biggest reason is we're not living in tune with God's creation, with nature. Listen, when the sun goes up, we should be getting up. When the sun goes down, we should be going down.

Now, somebody might say, well, what if you live in Alaska? In the summer. Okay, listen, there are exceptions to every rule, but generally, we at least use that as a sign of notifying us when we should be waking up, when we should be going to bed. But the ideal amount of sleep that most people should be getting a night is closer to 9 hours, but at the very least, 8.

Every study shows that 8 hours is the best. And if you get less than 7 hours, that's when your body really starts to tank. I wear an Oura Ring at night, and honestly, it's one of my favorite tests I've ever done, if not my favorite, because it's also testing something called HRV, heart rate variability, which is a really great indicator for longevity, stress, and how healthy I am in that moment.

And part of that is my sleep score. But I look at this regularly because I know that sleep is one of the single greatest factors for longevity and healing. And if I am not sleeping well, then I'm not well. I'm not healthy. And so being able to do everything you can to maximize your quality of sleep is what you want to be doing.

And sleep deprivation dampens the secretion of thyroid-stimulating hormone and increases blood levels of cortisol. And poor REM sleep and deep sleep also reduce mitochondrial repair. So if you are not sleeping enough, your mitochondrial energy goes down because—.

Yeah.

These engines start to break and they're not repaired. And so if you want to have energy, if you want to reverse hypothyroidism, if you want to reverse chronic fatigue syndrome, if you just want to have energy, generally speaking, you have to get good quality sleep.

Did you know cutting back from the standard 8 hours of sleep down to 4 hours of sleep each night produced striking changes in insulin sensitivity, like glucose tolerance and hormone function, changes that resemble the effects of advanced age or early stages of diabetes after less than 1 week? So do you hear that? That?

If you cut your sleep down to about 4 hours, if you did that for 1 week, the signs— you're aging yourself 20 to 30 years and throwing off every single hormone in your body. So it is critical that you get enough sleep at night. And the things that help sleep the most are, number one, having regular bedtimes.

Like for myself, I get my girls to bed and I'm getting myself in bed closer to— I mean, it's pretty close to 9:00 PM. Okay? And then I'm waking up around 6:00 AM. So I'm in bed for at least 9 hours. And then as soon as I wake up in the morning, I recommend you go and get outside. Okay? I get outside first in the morning. I tend to do a prayer walk.

I go outside, say everything I'm grateful for, but I do that gratitude walk while— and prayer walk while first thing in the morning to get the sunshine exposure that starts to get my cortisol up. And then I wear blue blockers later in the day to keep that blue light from affecting me. And then 1 hour before bed, No screens whatsoever.

Even with my blue blockers on, I'll read, I'll listen to an audiobook, something like that, where that's not disrupting my melatonin and cortisol production. And then exercise during the day is fantastic as well, movement. And then also, you want to make sure your room is dark. You want to make sure it's dark. You want to make sure it's cold, between 60 and 68 degrees.

Okay.

And don't drink caffeine after lunch. Really, you can do it mid-morning, but you really don't want to do it after lunch. And those things alone make a massive, massive difference in your sleep and your body's ability to create energy. Because think about this, your body is sort of plugging in. Imagine you're recharging your phone or an electric car or golf cart or something.

Your body's plugged in and re-energizing when you're sleeping. That's when it's doing it. Okay? And if you are not plugged in, it's going to lead to disease in your cells. Do you have unexplainable illness, hormone dysfunction, weight loss resistance, brain fog, and you're tired of being dismissed when you know something isn't right?

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Is related to stress overload, which then impacts your adrenal glands. There is a study published in the American Psychology Association. Here's what it said. 27% Of Americans report that most days they're so stressed they cannot function.

76% Of adults report they experienced at least one symptom in the last month as a result of stress, such as headaches, fatigue, feeling nervous or anxious, or feeling depressed or sad. So 76%, that's almost 80% of adults say, okay, stress this month. Negatively impacted my health. And when you are a go, go, go, nonstop person, your body overproduces cortisol.

That's your body's main stress hormone. And when cortisol gets up, that impacts your thyroid function. It impacts your sex hormones. It impacts insulin. So your blood sugar, and these are all drivers of low energy. And the symptoms of high cortisol include poor sleep, salt cravings, Brain fog, carb cravings, anxiety.

And at first you feel wired, but later on you crash feeling even more tired and then you can't even sleep. And it starts, so it creates this vicious cycle in the body. Now I want to go through sort of what can help stress. Number 1, stop being so busy. Start saying no more. Stop saying yes to everything and trying to pack your schedule from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to bed.

That's what we do. If there's an open spot in our schedule, we just cram something into it. You want to have these blocks of margin in your day where you can have a level of self-care and just a level of just thinking and being and relaxing.

One of the other issues we run into today because social media, it used to be where, okay, you're standing in line at the bank and you just stand there and you're not doing something. That's good for you. One of the things we tell our kids sometimes is my daughter, when she'll say, I'm bored. And I'll say, that's good, honey. It's good to be bored.

You don't need to have something every moment of every day. Okay? So say no more. Have more margin in your schedule. Schedule things in that you love to do. Like, hey, I have 1 hour here where I'm just going to take a walk or read a book or do lunch with a best friend or go on a nature walk, something like that.

So, Even if you are plugging things in your schedule, allow it to be sort of, I don't have to do this, but if I want to, I can go on a walk. And you're not spending that time on social media. Social media, you know, one thing I know, I mentioned this to Chelsea the other day, like the battery on my phone went down really fast that day. It was because I was using my GPS a lot.

You notice when you use certain GPS apps when you're driving, your battery decreases more on your phone. And when you're spending time on social media, your battery in your body, your mitochondria, they deplete so much faster.

So just imagine every minute you're spending on your cell phone, looking, scrolling, doing something, Instagram, TikTok, anything like that, your energy is going down 5 to 10 times faster. It's absolutely just sucking the life out of your mitochondria, out of your engine.

And hey, maybe your body can handle doing it 30 minutes a day, but if you're doing it for 1 hour, 2 hours plus a day, you are absolutely destroying your cellular health and destroying your cellular energy. And so that is one of the single worst things you could do for your mitochondria and for your energy.

And so if you want to start to fix your cellular energy, first, remember, you got to say no more. You got to have some margin in your day. Number 2, social media detox. Okay? Maybe give yourself 30 minutes a day, no more. And then schedule things you love to do. And then here's some other things. You want to take some adaptogens. Adaptogenic herbs are really great for supporting cortisol.

Ashwagandha, rhodiola, holy basil are some of the absolute best in clinical studies for lowering cortisol. There's one study in particular on a type of ashwagandha called KSM-66, and it reduced cortisol by 27% and improved focus and energy over the course of 8 weeks in stressed adults.

You know, one of the reasons why ashwagandha is maybe the single greatest herb for hypothyroidism is because ashwagandha impacts cortisol, lowers cortisol. And when you lower cortisol, that actually improves all your thyroid hormones. So, it's not necessarily directly impacting on your thyroid hormones. It may do that a little bit, but way more than that is it helps lower cortisol.

When cortisol's lower, now your body can detoxify estrogen more. Your insulin is more balanced. Pretty much every hormone in your body becomes more balanced. When you take these correct adaptogenic herbs. And rhodiola in particular is maybe the greatest for mitochondrial function.

But again, ashwagandha, rhodiola, holy basil, medicinal mushrooms like reishi, cordyceps, these are really, really fantastic adaptogens for your cellular energy. Now, I want to go back to talking about this sort of excess busyness because it really is one of the greatest factors depriving us of cellular energy. And the average person checks their phone between 150 and 200 times per day.

43% Of Americans admit feeling addicted to their phones. 70% Of people check their phone within 5 minutes of waking up, a habit proven to lower morning focus and your mood. So a few simple things you can change. Number 1, wait about 30 minutes or an hour before you check your phone ideally. Don't spend time on your phone in the morning.

The first thing we should do is go and connect with God, go and connect with our family, go and just spend some time just being still, eating, relax. I mean, I mean, every— you shouldn't wake up in the morning with boom, rush, get, getting busy. You should focus every morning on the things that matter the most. Can I tell you one thing I did in college?

Um, I read this book by Tony Robbins and he's, he had this quote in there and it was something like, win the morning, win the day. And he had something in the morning called your hour of power. And so what I started doing every morning, rather than kind of jumping into busyness, is I would spend an hour in the morning in prayer, reading my Bible, reading a personal growth book, going on a walk.

Then I would get my exercise in. So my first hour to 2 hours every morning was spent on growth, growing, connecting with God, doing those sorts of things. And honestly, I would get to Let's say I'd wake up at 6 and I would get to when I would start school or whatever I'd have around 8 or 9 in the morning. I would feel like I'd already won my entire day. Win the morning, win the day.

I mean, literally, there were times where I felt like if I don't do anything else today, I spent time growing and connecting with God. I did personal growth time. I went and exercised, had a great breakfast. I feel like I've already won my day. Let me ask you this. Do you feel like you're winning your day?

Or you wake up in the morning and you're scrolling on your phone and it's busy and it's hectic because you didn't prepare the night before. And then you're out the door and you're to work or to, you know, take care of the kids or whatever it is, whatever you have going on in your life. Win the morning, win the day. Here's how you do it. Connect with God and focus on personal growth.

Eat a great breakfast, get some movement in. None of those involve your phone. Okay? If you can start your day like that, you will win the day and it sets you up to win the rest of the day. It sets you up for being energized.

I found that when I am doing things connected to personal growth that are connected to my life purpose, I believe that I'm called to love God, love people, make earth a heavenly place.

And part of the way I feel like God wired me to do this is by helping people heal naturally using Using God-given wisdom from the Bible and the things that we learn from modern medicine today, functional medicine, that align with the word of God and creation. And so, I'm spending time doing those things and also helping other doctors do the same.

So, you may not know this, but I train a lot of other doctors and help a lot of other doctors in becoming better practitioners and learning and growing themselves. So, for me, if I wake up in the morning, And I can spend time getting downloads from God, reading my Bible, just getting my mind right.

And then I can pass what I've learned along to my kids and to my peers and to my patients and, um, and do that.

Wow.

I'm, I'm full of purpose now. That's energizing. But a lot of us wake up without a sense of purpose and without spending that time focusing on growth. And so we kind of get off to a bad start of the day and that kind of feeds into the rest of the day. Okay. And we're just, we're just busy, busy, busy. And then, and then we're sort of numbing out, um, on, on social media and we feel unfulfilled.

And that actually causes a greater lack of energy because when you're unfulfilled and you don't have a purpose, it's depressing. And, and, and Chinese medicine, by the way, they believe that part of the way that you increase your cellular energy is by having a purpose and knowing what that purpose is and going after it. And so that's an important thing to consider as well.

You know, there was a study that was published at the University of South California, and adults now consume information equivalent of 174 newspapers every single day. So we have information overload. And now with ChatGPT and AI and all these things, we have so much information and our brain is on constant fight or flight mode. Because of this.

And this leads to dopamine burnout, decreased attention span. So ADHD is worse than ever and our energy starts to plummet. So this sort of mental fatigue causes this physiological fatigue in our body. Now, I also want to mention there are other causes of fatigue that are unrelated to these first 4 things I mentioned. Another big one is this: hidden infections and inflammation.

I can tell you, I've taken care of so many people with chronic fatigue that came from Lyme disease, Epstein-Barr, mold toxicity, gut dysbiosis like Candida or H. pylori that's then causing bloating and this kind of sluggishness all day. These infections drain mitochondria and keep the immune system switched on, which then causes systemic inflammation.

So again, mold and mycotoxins and these viruses also trigger an ongoing inflammatory response raising oxidative stress. Oxidative stress is like, imagine this sort of like constant stress on an area that eventually causes it to crumble and fall apart. That's what it's doing to your cells and mitochondria.

And there was a 2021 meta-analysis combination of studies that found that gut dysbiosis was discovered in 70% of people with chronic fatigue syndrome, And other related conditions like fibromyalgia. When gut inflammation rises due to parasites and mold or leaky gut syndrome, this causes an inflammatory cascade, which can lead to what we call leaky gut, leaky brain, or leaky gut autoimmune disease.

Okay? It causes autoimmune disease in the body and chronic inflammation. And Lyme disease now impacts nearly 500,000 Americans each year. That's more than breast cancer or HIV. Think about that. More people suffer with Lyme disease than breast cancer.

Celebrities like Justin Bieber, Justin Timberlake, even Chris Williamson have come out saying that they had Lyme-related exhaustion that was impacting them in a really major way. And so sometimes if you're struggling with fatigue, you know, you can be taking all the vitamin B12 in the world and prioritizing other things.

But if we don't get to the root of healing that hidden infection, you're going to stay tired. This is why I recommend sometimes getting blood work and testing done for different types of infections, mold, heavy metals, doing a GI map to see what's going on in your gut microbiome has great benefits. Also, for many people, again, there's blood work to look at.

Hey, what are your glutathione levels at? What is your level of oxidative stress? And then being able to incorporate things like sweating and hydration and infrared sauna And certain vitamins and minerals to support detoxification can help. And if you are struggling with a hidden infection, one of the first things you want to do is get tested and look at what is your toxicity profile. Do a GI map.

See what's going on in your body. And that will then let us know, do you need more glutathione? Do you need infrared sauna? What dietary protocol is the best?

For instance, if you have parasites, you want to be doing things like papaya and garlic and pumpkin seeds because those can help kill off A parasitic infection versus if you have Candida, there might be a slight variation there in diet for killing that type of infection.

But learning what's going on internally and then doing the right things for detoxification pathways can be very helpful for helping you kill those hidden infections that's absolutely zapping and draining your energy. And then the last root cause of fatigue for most people is related to nutritional deficiencies.

Even if you eat healthy, Modern soil depletion, processed foods, and your unique genetic makeup can really drain certain levels in your body. And I'll share for myself, I mentioned earlier, for me, it was vitamin B2. That's probably not for most people. There's way more people out there that probably have a B12 deficiency or some other nutrient that's causing their fatigue.

But that's why it was so valuable for me to do blood work and say, what nutrient was I deficient in? And when I saw it was vitamin B2, which was extremely low, which by the way, the reason why that probably happened was—.

Yeah.

By the way, I remember I did blood work back when I was— how old was I? 25 Years old. That was 19 years ago, actually. And I remember the number one thing I was deficient in then was vitamin B2. And I don't know exactly why I'm deficient in B2. Again, it's different for everybody in terms of what you might be deficient in. There's a number of things there.

It might be my level of strategic thinking and book writing and certain things, and maybe there's a level there of stress that depletes that one particular Or it might be my gut microbiome, some of the bacteria. I have a lot of good bacteria that are absorbing certain things well, others not absorbing things well. It could be my diet. There's a number of things.

My point is this, is that there with knowing that it was vitamin B2 for me was so valuable. So now I'm eating a lot of steamed spinach because that's high and certain other foods that are supportive of vitamin B2, and then I'm taking a B2 supplement.

Okay.

But knowing your root cause of what are those nutrients that you're deficient in is incredibly valuable. But generally speaking, most people can correct this even without blood work and just eating a diet that's very high in the right nutrients. Now, the number one nutrient that most people are deficient in and that causes fatigue is iron or ferritin.

And I can tell this with people sometimes without even looking at blood work. I have them Go to a mirror, stick their tongue out, and look to see, is their tongue pale? Your tongue should be a bright, vibrant pink color, really strong pink color, pinkish red.

If it is pale and it almost has a whiteness to the tongue, not the coating, because that's Candida, that's another issue, or yeast overgrowth, but if your tongue itself is a little pale, that tends to be what's called a blood deficiency in Chinese medicine, or your iron or ferritin level's low. You can also do this on blood work to see. Is your iron or ferritin levels low?

So that's one thing to look for. That causes energy, even in more— many more women than men have iron deficiency. But if you notice, again, around your cycle, if you're really tired afterwards, if you lose a lot of blood, then there's a good chance you're deficient in iron or ferritin. The next most common one is vitamin B12. This is a lot of people today.

And this causes low oxygen delivery and brain fog. So literally, your body does not have enough oxygen if you're low on iron and B12. So you're literally almost suffocating your cells. And by the way, the risk of getting other diseases, even like cancer, go up when you're not getting enough oxygen delivery in your cells. So iron and B12 are the most common.

Number 3 is vitamin D. Studies show that vitamin D increases the risk of depression. Low vitamin D increases the risk of Risk of depression, inflammation, oxidative stress, and of course, fatigue is a hallmark symptom of depression, but vitamin D is big. And then in addition to that, magnesium.

Up to 60% of Americans don't meet the daily magnesium requirements, and magnesium is critical for so many cellular functions in the body, including supporting your body in going to sleep at night. And a few others are coenzyme Q10. If that's low, that disrupts methylation. Omega-3 fatty acids can impact the cell membrane and inflammation. And then the other big ones are vitamin B2, B5, B6, and B9.

Now, there was a 2021 meta-analysis study that found that a B vitamin complex supplement improved energy and cognitive performance in adults with depression and fatigue. So there are studies saying, Even without blood work, most people that took a B complex vitamin experienced an improvement in their energy levels.

There's a supplement that I take that is focused on mitochondrial function and has these methylated B vitamins that I found really supports me, that that's something I take because I have the MTHFR gene that I knew was important for me to get those sort of nutrients as well.

And so again, if you are dealing with fatigue and you're getting good sleep at And your stress levels are optimized and you're eating a clean diet, well then it might be that you are just deficient in B12 or iron or another B vitamin or magnesium or some of these nutrients that we're talking about.

And generally speaking, if you have low energy, it is a good idea to take a B complex, would be one thing that would help most people. And also taking a probiotic. Because probiotics support the absorption of all those nutrients. There's a study out of Stanford that showed that if you take a probiotic supplement, a high-quality one, oftentimes your blood levels of B vitamins double.

It's that big of a deal. So I would also put a probiotic supplement at the very top of the list when it comes to supporting cellular energy and overall health.

Are you interested in functional nutrition tips to burn fat, reduce inflammation, improve your brain and energy levels and heal naturally, then I want to encourage you to listen to my friend, Dr. Dave Jockers' podcast, The Functional Nutrition Podcast.

This podcast is designed to help you with easy, actionable steps to improve your nutrition and lifestyle, understand your lab work, and address the root cause factors that may be driving up inflammation in your body. Now, I've been friends with Dr. David Jockers for 20 years, and he's truly a world expert and functional nutrition, cellular healing, and so much more.

If you want to learn the best nutrition and natural healing tips, tune into the Dr. Jockers Functional Nutrition Podcast on Apple iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, and wherever you can listen to podcasts worldwide. And as we talk about supplements, I want to talk about— just go a little bit more in depth on supplements for energy and the ones that move the needle the most.

Along with the B complex, which I think is really important because it has B12 and everything else, and if you have an iron deficiency, Of course, doing something to support building your blood. Those are 2 of the biggest that people really need for energy, those B complex and sometimes methylated B vitamins.

The blood-building supplement that might consider iron and also things that support iron absorption, like B12 and vitamin C and probiotics. In addition to that, NAD+ or NR or NMN.

Yeah.

These NAD+ precursors have many, many benefits for supporting ATP production and fueling your mitochondria. Today, you can do NAD+ as a sort of vitamin injection, or you can take an NR supplement, which supports it as well. This is something I took.

So if you ever do blood work and you have mitochondrial dysfunction, taking about 300 milligrams of an NR supplement, which is supporting NAD+ in the body— Okay. Which is critical for mitochondrial function and creating cellular energy, is also going to be at the top of the list. So if I'm thinking about ranking, okay, you have low energy, what should you take?

B complex, probably a methylated B complex, blood building, NAD+ supplement like NR. Those are probably going to be my top 3. And then after that, I would probably say, depending on the person, probiotics are going to be high on that list as well. And then certain nutrients are also important. Coenzyme Q10 improves cellular energy.

In fact, there was a 2022 meta-analysis of 13 different studies, and they found that coenzyme Q10 supplementation significantly reduced fatigue scores compared to placebo groups. And this is really important if you have heart issues.

If you have low energy and if you've ever been on a statin drug or you've ever been on a drug like metformin, so any sort of blood sugar issues or heart issues, and if you've taken any drug for those, Coenzyme Q10 is going to be a nutrient you're going to want to absolutely take to support those cellular energy levels. And then the other thing I would say is taking the adaptogenic herbs.

Rhodiola and ashwagandha are probably the top 2 on my list for supporting mitochondrial function and boosting energy naturally. And there's other great ones like ginseng and dong quai.

Yeah.

Which is important, especially if you need to build your blood, and the mushrooms like reishi and cordyceps. But I would say that rhodiola and ashwagandha, if you're like, there's 2, those are probably my 2 favorites. And then for many people, what's just as important as supplements is having the right mind and spiritual health and nourishment when it comes to boosting your energy levels.

I really think actually it's just as important, if not more important, than diet. I'm going to come back around with just a few more really key dietary things for mitochondria. And foods here at the end. But I do want to mention, I want to dive into this because this is really critical for our overall energy levels. And I love this quote by John Ortberg.

He says this, if the enemy can't make you sin, he'll make you busy. Busyness is such a killer today of mitochondria. It's such a killer today of true productivity and doing and living a meaningful life and living a life that we love. Both sin and constant busyness can have the same detrimental effect. They cut off one's connection. To God, other people, and one's own values and our purpose.

I think about this. Those mornings when I wake up and go right to my phone first, somehow I'm sucked into my phone and computer and work the rest of the morning. If I can operate within my true priorities and I don't open my phone and I go right to my Bible first and right to prayer first, there's a sense of peace. There's a sense of calmness, meaning. My entire day is better.

And more purposeful, and my health is better. And I've found this, by the way, I've tracked this with my Oura Ring, looking at my HRV scores. It is radically better when I start my morning off Bible, prayer, growth than phone and computer. And so one of the things we want to be able to do is create space, especially in our mornings, create space from chaos and screens and practice stillness.

Sometimes it's just listening. Listen, sometimes it's 5 minutes. It's not 50, it's just 5. Okay? And you get there and you crack open your Bible, or you sit there and pray, and you just sit there and it's, God, thank you for this day. Be with me today. Thank you so much for my family. Thank you so much for my wife.

Thank you so much for just the blessings I have, that I have a purpose, that you gave your Son for me. Thank you so much. And just getting grounded and centered and then opening the Bible, reading a couple verses, And then meditating on one, put on the full armor of God.

Do not be anxious about anything, but with everything through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. That was one I was reading this morning. So just sitting there and just meditating on and thinking through, okay, I'm anxious.

God, what do I have that's heavy today? Okay, I've got this, I have this, I'm giving it to you. It might only be 5 minutes. But that 5 minutes of stillness or that 5 minutes of time with God rather than time with artificial intelligence, I mean, really in reality, here's what's happening so often.

We're taking God and we are literally having this god of technology, this AI, this other, it's a god, it's a spirit in a way. And we are spending time with that rather than Jesus. And so, uh, it makes such a big difference. So I wanna encourage you to rethink How you want to spend your time. Replace I'm busy with I'm focused on, okay, as well.

Focus on and block out time in your day to spend on the relationships that matter the most, on prayer, time outdoors, getting true rest. And let me say this as well, a Sabbath rest day is so beneficial. One day a week. Listen, God made all of creation and took one day off. Then it's the very least we should do is take one day.

Whether it's Saturday or Sunday, and just rest and not work the entire day. Spend time with family, spend time with God, just spend time recharging. That's what we want to focus on. And it's so beneficial in doing that. And as proof, there was a study that was done on prayer and meditation. And in the study, they focused mostly on gratitude and appreciation.

And the people in the study felt grateful People who felt grateful and practiced this showed a reduction in their levels of cortisol. They had stronger cardiac function and were more resilient to emotional setbacks and negative experiences. Over the years, the studies have established that practicing gratitude allows us to handle stress better and makes us more mentally and physically resilient.

And so that's such a powerful practice of starting off the morning and just for 1 Saying what you're grateful for. That's all it takes is one single minute. And that practice can change your entire life and your health. People who practice gratitude, by the way, also they sleep better. There's studies on that.

So there are numerous studies showing that living in a state of gratitude, not the— it's the exact opposite of entitlement. By the way, one of the worst character qualities a person can ever have is feeling entitled, like you owe me.

I can tell you, and, and, and, and and having a, um, uh, you know, a clinic and an organization where I have a lot of people that work on my team, um, that I look to work with people and partner with people only that have a level of very high level of gratitude. Working with entitled people, it's not fun. It's not the way we're wired.

It's the opposite of living in a state of absolute gratitude and thanksgiving. And so we all want to cultivate a spirit of thanksgiving, And praise and gratitude. And in addition, the greatest part of gratitude is living with a sense of purpose and meaning. There's a Harvard study that showed a 33% lower rate of fatigue and depression among those people with a strong sense of purpose.

I do want to mention one other thing diet-wise. One of the greatest things you can do to support mitochondrial function and energy is support blood and blood flow. And oxygenating your blood. So consuming foods that increase nitric oxide in your body are very good for blood flow. And some of those things include pomegranate, beetroot, or beetroot juice, and then things like rooibos tea.

But those things that are sort of red in nature that move the blood, but pomegranate and beetroot juice, so you could do beetroot powder, eat pomegranates, those are also very good for that as well. Now, I want to touch on a few books that talk about energy.

These are books that I've read that I really enjoyed that really, I think, are great for naturally boosting energy levels and dealing with some of the things we talked about. The first book is by John Mark Comer.

It's called The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, and it teaches that constant busyness and distraction drain our spiritual, emotional, and physical health, and that true peace and purpose come from slowing down, Practicing Sabbath and living at the pace of Jesus. You know, I love the TV show The Chosen. You know, we had— I had Dallas Jenkins on the show.

If you didn't watch that episode, it's a great one. And Dallas shared a lot about the show and about— we talked about health, of course, but also more spiritual health. And one of the things I love about the show is just watching Jesus. He was never in a rush, and yet he was the most impactful person that ever lived. And you didn't see his apostles rushing around.

They were acting with just meaning and intention. And listen, when you're busy, it's hard to notice certain things. I was in church this Sunday and our pastor, Darren, was sharing some things about him and his wife were in an airport and there was a woman sitting next to them who was older, and his wife felt led spiritually by the Holy Spirit to pay for the woman's meal.

And she did it and picked up the check for the woman and paid for it. And the woman turned to them and said, thank you so much. And she said, you know, God always takes care of me. I'm a missionary. I don't have much money, but everywhere I go, God takes care of me.

And it was so moving the way he shared this is that his wife, because she wasn't rushing or busy and they were just, you know, they were taking their time, they were living with meaning, and they were just in constant communication with God. She was aware enough to hear the voice of God to be able to then take care of that woman.

But when you are living at a pace of constant busyness, it is incredibly hard to hear from God and to be able to hear that well enough to then be able to do that thing that is, that had eternal significance and meaning. Paying for that one meal for that person might've been more meaningful than what a business exec could accomplish an entire year in building a billion-dollar business.

That had eternal significance. And what she did. And so I, I say that all to say, I love this book. This would be a great one for energy because it really teaches you how to be still and how to live in a way to live with meaning and impact in alignment with the Bible. The second book is called Margin.

It's by Dr. Richard Swenson, and it's the prescription for sustainable living and creating a space for health and joy. A lot of times we're so packed out, we are not creating space for joy and happiness and deep connection. And so this book helps you reevaluate your priorities, determine the values in your life, and also see where your identity truly comes from.

And it's a really great book for physical health, financial stability, fulfilling relationships, and availability for God's purpose. It's, it's a great book. And he says this in the book, we do not rest because our work is done. We rest because God commanded it and created us to have a need for it. And the last book is by this, this is by another person we've had on the podcast, John Gordon.

He's a good friend of mine. Uh, it's called The Energy Bus. And energy isn't something you have, it's something you create through gratitude, faith in your mindset. And he has 10 rules for energy on The Energy Bus.

Yes.

And that's covered in the book, everything from how to fuel your vision, invite others into the journey, remove your energy vampires, and so much more. And so, that's a great book as well by Jon Gordon. And you can check out the podcast we did together as well.

But again, those are 3 books I would recommend if you are saying to yourself, I really want to take my energy to the next level and especially do that with mindset, spiritual awareness, and those things that are going to make that impact. Those are 3 books I would highly recommend you read and go through in that way. Here's the thing to know about fatigue. Fatigue is a signal.

It's not a life sentence of just being tired. It's not poor genetics or you're getting older. It's a signal. You were designed to have steady energy throughout work, connection, purpose, and joy throughout your day. But rest is also needed. And when you honor your body's need for nourishment, movement, and stillness, You align with how you were designed to function by God.

So remember, you want to focus on eating a really healthy diet, right? We talked about high protein, fiber, healthy fats, and a lot of nutrients from things like pomegranates and berries and steamed vegetables. You want to carve out time for sleep, that 9 hours. You want to go for a walk in the morning and around your meals. You want to schedule a Sabbath day.

You want to spend way less time on your phone. And way more time reading things for spiritual growth and connecting with people. And also you want to consider getting the right testing done to make sure there's no major nutritional deficiencies.

And if you can take care of those things, your energy will start to build and get better and better and better to where you have lifelong high energy constantly and consistently.

I want to say thanks so much for tuning in here to the Dr. Josh Axe Show, where each and every week we're diving deep into the science and principles of how you can heal, Physically, mentally, spiritually, and take your health and your life to the next level. Don't forget to subscribe. It's the number one thing you can do to support the show.

Don't forget as well that we've had some episodes here shadowbanned because we've talked about things that are really controversial, like cancer and certain remedies, like everything from peptides to stem cells. And sometimes, you know, the people at some of these social, you know, whether it's YouTube or others, don't love that. And so if you're subscribed, it will always show up in your feed.

If you're not subscribed, you might miss some of these really impactful episodes we have. So don't forget to subscribe. Also, thank you for liking and sharing this. Thanks for being on mission with me. There are so many people that don't know the truth about how to build good energy.

You know, there are people out there that are going to go and just take a drug or medication because they're tired and they don't know there are simple vitamins and practices that can help heal them. At a cellular level. Thanks so much for watching. I can't wait to see you on the next episode.

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