In my fifth blog post as a Thought Leader for Crowne Plaza® Hotels & Resorts LinkedIn, I take a look at the best ways to energise yourself before important meetings.

Hands up if you’ve ever lost sleep over an anticipated meeting?! Have you ever been fearful of going blank or worried that you’re tired, addled brain might make you sound like an underprepared amateur rather than a polished professional?

If you have a major meeting with an important client, a potential boss or the delivery of a key presentation you’ve been working on for months, we need you at your sharpest for the day ahead. So here are my top tips for energizing for important meetings.

Have some chocolate.

This is one especially for the girls because we are prone to indulging anyway! I personally love the study out of the University of Nottingham which found that chocolate gives a short term blood flow boost to the brain! Now before you break open the nearest chocolatey treat, the study used chocolate high in cocoa and its powerful flavonoids and not a lot of sugar. The study authors pointed out they had the chocolate specially formulated for their study. But I think a few pieces of 70% or higher cocoa chocolate may be the nearest thing!

Squeeze in a work out

We have known for a while that people who do regular exercise have better brain health overall but more recently the immediate effects of a workout on brain functioning have been studied. And guess what? Looks like heading to the gym for any sort of work out will give your brain a boost, help your memory and boost your creativity for the rest of the day.

Grab some coffee

Coffee actually gives you 24 hours of serious brain boosting. The effect is most likely to be coming from the caffeine itself, according to American researchers from John Hopkins University. Caffeine seems to give your brain an instant lift in clarity and energy that lasts through to the next day. But before you tell me you are not a fan of the piccolo latte and prefer an energy drink, a word of caution; these drinks are full of sugar, which will do the exact opposite of caffeine. Well not at first, of course. You get that much promised zing that gives you wings, only it is followed within the hour with a post sugar slump. Not wanted at a meeting!!

Say OMMM

Ever tried meditation? Lots of my patients insist they’ve tried and failed but I insist they haven’t given it a decent shot. You see, you don’t need to channel a chakra and assume the lotus position to actively empty your mind and completely relax. There is a growing body of evidence that meditation helps sharpen the mind, lower your blood pressure, slow your heart rate and bust your stress. It certainly works for me!

The usual doctor blah blah advice

You can drink an extra espresso shot and chomp on Lindt chocolate on the way home from your spin class but it won’t be enough to combat a week of punishment for your brain. If you want to reap the best rewards from your brain, feed it well; eat good food, exercise regularly, avoid stress as much as possible and ditch the cigarettes and extra grog. And get enough sleep the night before so you’re not too dopey. The effects of sleep deprivation are certainly not universal and some people handle a bad night better than others, but most studies find your mind is sharper the day after catching adequate ZZZZs.

I’m always looking for other great tips so please share with me your tricks of the trade on how to energise for those all-important meetings.

Go get ‘em Tiger!