Taking care of our health should be our priority all year round, especially now in the height of a global health crisis. Being healthy and taking care of your fitness and diet shouldn’t be something you only do in May to get your body into beach-ready form, but a lifestyle which should be practiced from January to December. It is also important to note that being healthy is not only being physically fit, but it also encompasses mental and emotional health which is unfortunately really tough to come by in these trying times. If you’d like to improve your overall well being, here are some great tips for you.
1. Drink a lot of water
Being properly hydrated is something not many people can brag about. Most of us forget to drink our water or get our daily recommended H2O intake from soda and coffee which may hydrate us, but is definitely not healthy. You should drink two litres of water a day or more. An easy way to achieve this is to buy a trendy water bottle, maybe one with a witty line on it. The logic behind it is that if you like the container you’re drinking out of, it is more likely that you’ll actually have it on you, not forget about it and also enjoy the hydration experience. Additionally, if you’re someone who likes soda more than you like water, try adding some lemon or lime juice into your water. Cucumber or frozen berries are also amazing choices.
2. Eat more balanced meals
Most of us are guilty of eating junk more often than we’d like to admit and actually taking care of your diet is something that takes time and dedication. However, changing your habits one step at a time can prove to be a sustainable option. Every week try adding one healthy habit to your to do list and in turn take one unhealthy habit off your schedule. In two months you’ll be an entirely different person and you won’t even notice that you were doing something drastic! For example, switch out your “taco tuesdays” for a nice tuna bowl tuesday. Alternatively, take out M&Ms you adore mindlessly chomping on and introduce something more healthy, like the famous superfood – baruka nuts.
3. Introduce exercise
Although most of us will agree that what we choose to fuel ourselves with is one of the main aspects of being a healthy person, how we choose to spend that energy can also impact our well being. This is why you should introduce some exercise to your weekly planner. By exercise, we don’t mean doing the dreaded HIIT (high intensity interval training) every day, nor do we think you should go and get a gym membership right this second. By exercise we mean healthy movement. Go on longer walks or hikes. Play with your children or pets. Do some low impact yoga at home a couple of times a week. If you’re someone who is generally more sedentary, introducing a half an hour walk to your daily routine can be extremely beneficial to your health and well being.
4. Get more sleep
Getting some needed shut eye can truly be a hard task for some of us, a task which even gets harder when we start stressing in bed about how many errands we have to run tomorrow and how hard it’s going to be doing it on two hours of sleep. If you ever fall into this tiring circle of not getting much sleep but not being able to actually enter the REM phase, you should maybe start looking into some natural cures such as lavender extract tea or melatonin drops. Another great tip is to turn off all of the electronics in the house before you go to sleep. Try getting sleepier by reading a book or cuddling with your pets or loved ones.
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