How about starting your day refreshed and rejuvenated? Sounds good! Isn’t it?
When you wake up in the morning, you look forward to start your day on a positive note, with lots of energy flowing through your mind and body.
For maintaining a healthy lifestyle, all it needs is some planning and motivation on your part and including healthy habits in your daily routine.
What is healthy lifestyle and why is it important
Healthy lifestyle is all about adopting a few healthy habits in your life, that can go a long way in benefiting your health. It also helps you in keeping yourself focused and enthusiastic to get the day going.
Unhealthy lifestyle patterns like stress, anxiety, irregular sleep, poor nutrition, sedentary lifestyle, and smoke addiction cause adverse effects to your health, and may lead to long term ailments.
So, it’s high time you understand the importance of healthy lifestyle, before the unhealthy choices takes a toll on your health. Know about the best free workout apps to track and achieve your fitness goals.
Tips for healthy lifestyle
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How To Live A Healthy Lifestyle
Here are some valuable tips for a healthy lifestyle. It may not be all inclusive, but includes major components that are considered to be vital for a healthier lifestyle. With little effort, the cumulative effect of these healthy habits will help last you throughout your day.
1. Start your day by getting hydrated
A majority of you don’t get enough fluids throughout the day and you end up feeling exhausted, with depleted energies. No, I am not talking about sodas, coffee or tea here as they have diuretic effects and can make you even more dehydrated.
Water is the healthiest of all the fluids
- It is often advised, that you must drink at least eight to ten glasses of water every day to flush out all the toxins and to help the digestive system to function properly.
- Most of the ailments begin with an unhealthy gut. Drinking plenty of water, is known to have a beneficial effect on the inner lining of your intestines and helps in maintaining the balance of good bacteria in the gut.
Japanese way of drinking water
According to the Japanese Water Therapy, water helps in cleaning your stomach and boosting your digestive system.
- It suggests that as soon as you wake up in the morning, you should drink four to six glasses of water, each of 160-200 ml, on an empty stomach.
- Water should ideally be consumed at room temperature or lukewarm. Brush your teeth after drinking water.
- Avoid eating or drinking anything for at least 45 minutes, after which you can continue with your daily routine.
Store Water in the Copper Vessel
Copper is considered an essential mineral for our body. Ayurveda recommends storing water overnight in a copper jug or a bottle and drinking it first thing in the morning for maintaining good health.
Copper is known to have antimicrobial, antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties.
It helps in fighting infection, aids digestion, fights hypertension, controls ageing, beats anaemia, regulates thyroid glands, and results in weight loss. So, start healthy!
2. Eat healthy- Add “super foods” to your diet
Needless to say, that a well-balanced diet consisting of all the six nutrients – Fats, carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins, minerals, roughage and water are vital for the functioning of your body and mind. However, it is emphasized that your balanced diet must also include some “superfoods” for a healthier life.
What are “Super foods”
“Super foods” are nothing but foods which are rich in vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Super foods are foods — mostly plant-based but also some fish and dairy — that are thought to be nutritionally dense and thus good for one’s health.
- Blueberries, salmon, dark leafy vegetables, apples, green tea, eggs, legumes, nuts and seeds, ginger, garlic, avocado are just a few examples of such foods.
- Avoid taking cruciferous vegetables, onions and garlic, milk products, and carbonated beverages during the night as it can cause you severe bloating. These foods can make you bloated.
- So, don’t forget to include any two of these foods in your diet every day. Also, stay away from processed foods, choose to eat whole grains, fresh fruits and vegetables.
- Avoid outside food. Instead, prefer to have a home cooked nutritional food. Have it with your family for the wholesome happiness.
3. Don’t compromise on your sleep
For healthy living taking a good sleep is an equally important part of our daily routine.
Sleep is essential for restoring energy and emotional well- being. We tend to think of sleep as a time when the mind and body is at rest and it completely shut down its functions.
But this is not the case; sleep is an active period in which a lot of important processing, restoration, and strengthening occurs.
Let us know the reasons why we should never compromise on our sleep.
Boosts memory
One of the vital roles of sleep is to help us strengthen and consolidate memories. When you are awake, you are exposed to lots of information throughout the day, both relevant and irrelevant which your mind acquires it consciously or subconsciously.
Overnight, during sleep, bits and pieces of information are transferred from more tentative, short-term memory to stronger, long-term memory—a process called “consolidation”. Thus, sleep helps in boosting the memory.
Increases concentration
Sleep deprivation leads to reduce alertness and concentration. You are more easily confused and find difficult to focus and pay attention. This hampers your ability to perform tasks that require logical reasoning or complex thought.
Elevates mood
Good sleep keeps you in a good mood throughout the day. It helps you to take the challenges of the day positively and behave more socially.
Another thing that your brain does while you sleep is process your emotions. Your mind needs this time in order to recognize and react the right way. A lack of sleep at night can make you cranky the next day.
Keeps heart healthy
While you sleep, your blood pressure goes down, giving your heart and blood vessels a bit of a rest.
Keeps depression away
Sleep and mental health have been the subject of research for a long time. One conclusion is that there is a link between lack of sleep and depression. Sufficient and quality sleep helps in keeping depression at bay.
Increases metabolism and manages weight
Chronic sleep deprivation may cause weight gain by affecting the way our bodies process and store carbohydrates, and by altering levels of hormones that affect our appetite. So, to boost your body’s metabolism and to keep a check on your weight, sleep well.
Fights infection
Sleep helps the body repair, regenerate, and recover. The immune system is no exception to this relationship. Some research shows how better sleep quality can help the body fight off infection. Getting enough sleep will enable you to do your best work and help you handle daily challenges.
Simple healthy tips with regard to sleep routine can help you improve your overall health.
- Putting an alarm clock to remind to sleep may work for some people.
- For me, back counting of numbers works well.
- Try different ways of maintain sleep routine and see what works for you.
4. Exercise regularly for a healthy lifestyle
Physical activity involves moving the body. Being active and maintaining a healthy weight is needed for good health. Regular physical activity can help you relieve stress, anxiety, depression and anger.
Without regular activity, your body slowly loses its strength, stamina and ability to function properly. Too much sitting and other sedentary activities can increase your risk of heart disease and stroke.
Exercise increases muscle strength, which in turn increases your ability to do other physical activities.
Here are some tips in how you can plan your daily workout and stay healthy
- Aim to include 30 – 60 minutes of moderate physical activity most days of the week.
- Track your activity on fitness app to check how often and how long you are exercising. You can use it to keep a track of steps you walk daily and set your goals accordingly for the whole week.
- You need not go for rigorous exercise at once. Start with moderate exercises. I feel that taking a brisk walk for 40 -50 min is the best exercise to keep oneself fit. If you have a medical condition it is always advisable to discuss your goals with your health care provider or physician.
- Stick to some basic rules in your daily life – take the stairs instead of elevators, park away from buildings and walk in to reach the place.
- If you enjoy dancing, nothing like it. Join Zumba, Rumba, or Salsa classes to make your workout more enjoyable.
5. Quit Smoking
If you do not smoke, then you are already on the path to healthy living. But if you smoke, then you should be aware that smoking can affect your health severely and you should get rid of this addiction at the earliest.
However, quitting the habit of smoking requires a strong will and determination.
You need to work diligently to come out of this addiction.
- Decide a date for quitting. Pick a day within a month. Make sure you do not set it too early or too late.
- Setting a date too early, will not let your body to adjust and accommodate the major lifestyle change. Besides, you may need medical assistance too.
- Similarly, setting a date too late will weaken your will power and will give an opportunity to procrastinate and postpone your plans of quitting smoking.
- Try to find a practically applicable solution to this problem and with strong determination, stick to your plans.
Even after trying so hard, if you are unable to quit the habit of smoking, then don’t hesitate to join a rehabilitation program. This will help you to proceed towards a healthy lifestyle.
6. Get regular check-ups
Getting regular health check-ups done is as important as eating right and exercising regularly. It’s an important part of prevention routine and can help people keep a track on their health and make necessary changes to maintain it.
Health check-ups can help you maintain healthy lifestyle in the following ways:
Helps in early detection and reduces risk
Reduce your risk of getting sick. Limits the risk of complications by closely monitoring your existing conditions.
Detect potentially life-threatening health conditions or diseases early. Regular check-ups are a great way to help identify any ailments in its initial stage making treatment far easier. It increases chances for better treatment and cure.
Increases Life Span
By getting the correct health services, screenings, and treatment you are taking important steps toward living a longer, healthier life. It increases your lifespan by improving your overall health.
Reduces health care costs
Reduces healthcare costs over time by avoiding costly medical services. Regular check-ups ensure that you save money in the long run because regular health check-ups mitigate the risk of potential health ailments that can turn out to be very expensive at a later stage.
Keeps you aware about your psychological health.
We live in an extremely fast-moving world. Hectic work schedules and lifestyles can take toll on your physical as well as psychological health.
This can spark off a variety of diseases in the human body that are brought on by stress.
Increase in stress and anxiety have been found to be directly related to a number of different diseases which include hypertension, high blood pressure, weight gain, mental disorders, Alzheimer’s, depression, asthma, and even gastrointestinal problems.
Regular medical check-ups help in early detection and diagnose of these problems before they turn too severe.
Keeps You Abreast of Your Health
Your screening results will help the doctor all they need to know about your health. Any irregularity found in your test results can be identified at an early stage and can be handled with small changes in lifestyle.
Hope these tips on healthy lifestyle helped you in taking steps towards healthy living and continues to aspire you to be hale and hearty.
Value the blessings of life by being disciplined and motivated and cherish your health and wellness.
Krishna is a Management graduate in Human Resource. She is an avid reader, knowledge seeker, and an adoring mother of two lovely kids.