Energizing Plan: Suggested Lunch Menu

  • Start with a glass of Oxygen Juice.
  • Now choose from one of the following energizing vegetable bases, using as much of each vegetable as you like. Fluid Fuel: lettuce, cucumber, celery, chopped apple and a few slices of pear. Quick Cleanse: asparagus, cherry tomatoes and yellow peppers on a bed of alfalfa. Steamed and Simple: steamed green cabbage, carrot, mushrooms, asparagus and mangetout. Sunshine Salad: watercress, carrot, beetroot and pink grapefruit.
  • Add a 50g (2oz) portion of one (or a mix) of the following: salmon, anchovies, mackerel, herring, trout, sardines, sunflower, pumpkin or sesame seeds, walnuts or cashews, tahini. These protein foods create a slowly burned form of energy that your body can use throughout the afternoon, but also provide high levels of essential fatty acids, which the red blood cells need to travel through the body. If you're vegetarian, it can be hard to get enough essential fatty acids, so adding two teaspoons of flaxseed oil to your salad may help boost levels. it; research from the University of Bristol, UK, reveals that if you're used to having a morning cuppa - tea or coffee - skipping it will leave you more tired.

10am 'De-junk' your day. Energy isn't just sapped physically from our bodies, it's also sapped mentally by stress, worry and feelings of being overwhelmed. Whether you work in an office or are busy at home, clearing physical and mental clutter should be your first job. Tidy your desk, put away the kids' toys or first tackle the one task you really don't want to do. When this is finished, it will feel like a weight has been lifted and your energy will start to soar.

11am Time for a snack. Not only does eating little and often keep the blood-sugar levels of the body stable, but it also boosts energy in other ways. Digesting foods uses energy in the body (in fact 10 per cent of the calories the body uses throughout the day are used in digestion), and meals that are too large can actually fatigue the body. Snacks take the edge off your appetite and stop you over-eating at main meals. A good snack would be two or three citrus fruits; ingredients called flavonoids within these have been shown to thin the blood, which helps to prevent red blood cells clumping together and maximizes oxygen flow.

1pm Eat a good lunch. This meal should be used to boost oxygen and fluid levels in the body, giving you energy to face the afternoon when energy levels naturally dip. Oxygen-boosting foods are those that contain chlorophyll, which has been shown to help rebuild red blood cells. Try wheatgrass, watercress, spinach, dark cabbage, lettuce, alfalfa and other sprouts. You'll also want to fill up on fluid-heavy foods like celery, cucumber, fennel, apples, pears, watermelon, grapefruit and grapes. Finally, include some asparagus, since this (along with alfalfa) helps neutralize the natural toxin ammonia produced within your body, which is an extremely common cause of fatigue. 3pm Head outside. By now, the air in your office, or even at home, is likely to be low in oxygen, boosting your feelings of fatigue. Five minutes of fresh air now can stimulate you to finish the day, so go for a quick walk. If that's not possible, try the following yoga technique called 'Bellows Breath', which oxygenates the entire body.

Stand up straight and clench your fists. Breathe in quickly through your nose and out through your mouth. As you do this, pump your arms to get blood circulating around your body. Repeat this process for 1 minute, but listen to your body as you do this. The sudden flood of oxygen can make you feel light-headed and, if this happens, you should stop and breathe normally for a while. It's also good to have some more fruit at this time.

6pm Do some exercise. Toxins have the ability to sap our energy by acting negatively on the mitochondria within the body. However, if you build muscle through exercise you also build mitochondria. Take 30 minutes every other day on the plan to do some kind of aerobic or resistance training, and ideally do it between 4pm and 7pm. Studies at Liverpool John Moores University, UK, have shown that exercise feels easiest at this time of day.

8pm Eat your evening meal. Overnight the body regenerates and naturally detoxes, so the focus of your evening meal should be to provide detoxing foods to boost this process. You should combine these with carbohydrates; while these are primarily energy-givers, in closes of more than 75g (3oz) at one time they can calm the body, which will help boost sleep. 9pm Blend yourself a bedtime bath.

Getting a good night's sleep is vital to boosting energy: it's how the body recharges. It's been shown that bathing aids the sleep process by stimulating the natural cooling process the body uses to trigger sleep hormones. You'll add to sleep effects if you place some essential oils in your bath. One of the best to use here is marjoram. It's very sedative, but also fortifying to the body, which will help you create strength for the next day. Add three drops of marjoram and three drops of calming mandarin to your bath, sit back and relax. If you're pregnant, don't use the marjoram, but stick with the mandarin.