A healthy lifestyle and 5 ways to live a healthier life with minimal effort
Everyone should make an effort to get better health. However, it can be overwhelming when you're trying to figure out how to do it. There is a lot of information on the Internet. What advice should you follow? What type of food should you eat? What exercises should you do?
Is healthy living hard and gentle? Can you never eat sugar? Do you need to do an hour of painful exercise every day to stay healthy?
Well, there are certain things we should do and certain things we should keep in mind, but that doesn't mean that healthy living has to feel like punishment. In fact, healthy living is more than just diet and exercise.
So, what exactly are the basics that you need to focus on?
1. Go back to your roots when it comes to diet. You don't need to follow a fancy diet to get healthy, and you don't need to skip meals or do extensive calorie counting to improve your eating habits.
What you need is homemade food.
It doesn't matter what culture or which part of the world you belong to - the common feature of all traditional foods is that they are usually very healthy in composition.
Traditional food includes a lot of locally sourced fruits and vegetables, hence they are rich in all essential nutrients and contain a lot of fibre, and for this reason, they do not cause a sugar spike and provide satiety for a long time without making them. You feel heavy or bloated.
Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables ensures good health. You don't have to worry about any nutritional deficiencies or where the antioxidants will come from.
Secondly, it is very difficult to overdo the sugar and salt in home cooked meals.
The recommended upper limit for salt intake is 5g per day (1 teaspoon per person) – this may seem lower, but you'll notice that when you prepare your food at home, you rarely go over this limit.
The recommended upper limit for sugar is 9 teaspoons for men and 6 teaspoons for women.
Of course, cooking at home may be difficult for some at first, depending on the culture/country they grew up in. But this simple shift can benefit you greatly in the long run. Another great thing about home cooking is that it saves you a lot of money.
So, how do we get started?
Home-cooked meals don't have to be too complicated. Start with simple recipes that don't require a lot of ingredients or spices. Experiment a little to see what food you like and how a particular food makes you feel after eating it.
You can also start with a few home-cooked meals a week and slowly build the habit of cooking every day at home. Over time, you will find ways to deal with it quickly.
I can almost guarantee one thing, if you can prepare food yourself at home, you will start losing weight without any additional exercise because I can tell you from experience that a healthy diet is the most important factor when it comes to weight. Loss.
The old saying, losing weight is 80% diet and 20% exercise, is true.
2. Do the recommended amount of exercise
You don't have to kill yourself while exercising. By this I do not mean that you do not need to do any exercise. Of course, we need some kind of movement every day, especially because we stay sedentary a lot - be it at school, college, work or at home. Therefore, we need to exercise regularly to move all major muscles and joints to maintain a healthy body.
Here's the recommendation for those who don't like to exercise too much: Do only the recommended amount of exercise each day - not too much.
The recommended minimum amount of exercise you should do weekly (not daily) is as follows. You can do more if your time, health, and endurance level allow. 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise (such as brisk walking) with two days of strength training per week. Or, 75 minutes of high-intensity aerobic exercise combined with two days of strength training per week. Or, you can do a mix of high- and moderate-intensity exercises with two days of strength training per week.
According to studies, 30-60 minutes of strength training per week is enough to maintain good health and prevent health problems. You can divide the recommended exercise minutes into days according to your schedule. You can start by exercising for just 15-20 minutes each day, with two days of 15-minute strength training each week (the minimum value).
Strength training also includes exercises based on your body weight, such as plank, squat, etc. There are plenty of HIIT workouts — low- and high-intensity versions — available for free on YouTube. They usually have a combination of cardio and strength exercises. Most of these exercises don't require a lot of space or equipment, and the best part is that you can do them at home. This is a great place to start.
Honestly, some exercise is better than no exercise. So, if you initially can't do a 15-minute workout, you can start with just 5-10 minutes, and then increase the time as your body gets stronger.
3. Prioritize sleep and de-stress.
It is known that lack of sleep and stress cause many health problems. They're actually related to each other: Lack of sleep will increase your stress levels and reduce your ability to deal with stress, and stress will make it harder to get good sleep.
Lack of sleep can have some short-term and some long-term health effects. Short-term effect includes lack of concentration, poor judgment, fatigue, increased risk of accidents, anxiety, etc. You will experience these short-term symptoms even with just one night of poor sleep.
Long-term effects of sleep deprivation include problems such as weight gain, depression, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and increased risk of cancer and dementia.
Chronic sleep deprivation can affect fertility. Studies have shown that men who sleep for 5-6 hours per night have similar testosterone levels to men who are 10 years older. Low testosterone levels can affect fertility, muscle mass, and bone strength.
Stress Likewise, constant stress can lead to sleep deprivation, weight gain, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cognitive decline, weakened immunity, and increased risk of cancer.
Some studies in animal models suggest that stress may cause cancer to return after treatment. Just like sleep, stress can also be a cause of infertility. So, as you can see, no organ system in our body is affected by lack of sleep and constant stress.
This makes prioritizing sleep and stress management even more important because just by sleeping well and relaxing, you can prevent many diseases – and it doesn't take a lot of effort to do so.
4. Mixing and socializing
I know that many of us either don't like to socialize as much or don't have enough time to socialize as much as we would like. But socializing with others is important to us.
You don't need a crowd of people. We just need a few trusted friends and family members with whom we can share moments of joy and laughter.
Socializing with others also does not include socializing on social media, which the more you avoid, the better. Well, according to studies, socializing with others has many health benefits.
According to research, the mortality rate among people with poor social connections is two times higher than among people with good social connections, in the presence or absence of an existing health problem.
People with good social relationships live longer and are more likely to adopt habits that promote good health, such as eating well, exercising, and complying with treatment for an underlying disease.
In addition, people with poor social relationships are more likely to develop diseases such as cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease.
Good social connections not only increase life expectancy, but also foster habits that help us stay healthy in the long term.
Now, most of us have some trusted family members or friends. All we have to do is continue to show up for each other to strengthen the foundation of our relationships and thus our health.
5. Take some time to do nothing.
Yes, doing nothing is one of the best things we can do for our mental health and creativity.
Sitting and doing nothing is often seen as boring, and it can have some great benefits, especially if we're overwhelmed by everything going on around us.
So, what do I mean when I say do nothing? It means sitting quietly without any distractions – no TV, cell phone, computer, book, or anything else we usually do when we have free time.
You have to sit and focus on what is going on inside you; Focus on your thoughts, or don't, either way is okay. It doesn't have to be meditation style, but if you prefer, you can do that too. Just sit and do nothing.
So, how can you improve your health with minimal effort?
- Cooking simple dishes at home, exercising 15-20 minutes a day, sleeping well, managing your stress levels, socializing more, and making time to sit and do nothing can lead to many health benefits.
- You don't need to do anything extra special to be healthy. If you can master these five things, you will be able to prevent many health problems.
- Remember to be patient with yourself, as change is often a slow process.
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