Your relationship with diet and exercise can be a bit like your favorite sweater. You could wear it for months on end and show it a lot of attention, but then you forget about it entirely, leaving it to gather dust. By the time you return to it, it’s out of shape and worn, leaving you needing to start all over again with a brand-new sweater.
But just as you should take care of your clothes, you need to take care of yourself too. A healthy lifestyle isn’t something you should revisit when it suits you, it should be a lifelong goal that helps to keep you fit and strong, leaving you feeling great in yourself.
So how can you go from an ad-hoc approach to fitness to making it a regular habit? Here are some tips for making healthy living a part of your lifestyle, for good.
Changing your mindset
To help you live a healthier lifestyle, you’re going to need to change your mindset. Forget your past approaches to diet and exercise and get ready to embrace some healthier habits.
Face up to your bad habits
Everyone is guilty of bad habits, although some are worse for your health than others. If you have a tendency to overeat, drink too much, sleep too little, or generally neglect your health – it’s time to make some changes.
Think critically about your lifestyle and the habits you know are bad for you, ready to change your behavior and embrace healthier living.
Make a list of your goals
After confronting your bad habits, it’s time to think about the things you want to achieve. Setting goals can help give you some direction and motivation, ready to make some changes. Whether it’s to lose weight, give up smoking or simply to feel better in yourself, you’ll have something to work from if you put it in writing and think of a plan for how you’ll get there.
Start by making some small changes
A healthy lifestyle isn’t built overnight. It can take a long time for new habits to set in, but you can start by making some small changes. Making an effort to walk more or get up an hour earlier are small ways you can make changes to your lifestyle without feeling as though you’re making a drastic change.
Improve your approach to diet
A healthy diet is important for living a healthy life. Instead of trying fad diets, again and again, your aim should be to find balance and eating foods that fuel your body.
Learn what healthy eating really looks like
Do you know what healthy eating really looks like? Educating yourself on nutrition can help you learn a lot about what our bodies need to be healthy.
One of the first things you can do is work out how many calories your body needs each day. This can help you make smarter choices about the food you eat, to stop you overeating.
Making healthier food choices can help you get the right balance of protein, fat, and carbohydrates in your diet to give your body what it needs to make it through the day.
Get into home cooking
Take outs and eating out are a wonderful treat, but if you rely on them too much, you might be doing your body a disservice. Learning how to cook from scratch can help you eat a much healthier diet, using fresh ingredients that can help you enjoy lighter, more nutritious foods. Being able to rustle something up with minimal ingredients is a great skill to have, and means you’ll rely less and less on eating out.
It’s ok to have some of what you want, in moderation
A typical diet usually restricts eating certain types of food. But when you take a long-term approach to healthy eating, you can eat the things you enjoy – just in moderation.
It’s important to treat yourself now and then, but recognizing that you can’t indulge every day will make those treats extra special.
Work on your fitness
Exercise is important for keeping your body strong and healthy. 30 minutes of activity a day is recommended to protect your heart health and boost your fitness.
Ease into fitness slowly
If you’re new to fitness, you need to take time to ease yourself in. Easing into exercise can mean doing some low-impact exercise, like walking or swimming, to help you build your fitness up. If you go too hard, too fast, you’ll admit defeat quickly and lose motivation to keep going.
Create a realistic workout schedule
Creating a workout schedule is a great way to help you stick to your goals. If you schedule in exercise like you would your other appointments, you’re likely to make more time for it.
The good news is that there are all kinds of ways you can exercise. From working out at the gym, to your home or even while you’re traveling, there are different ways of fitting in exercise to fit around your schedule.
Keep it manageable and review it regularly to make sure it remains the right fit for you.
Don’t be afraid of using weights
A lot of people are afraid of using weights, either through inexperience or the myth that they’ll make you bulky. Weight training can be a great way to build strength and boost your metabolism and should form a core part of your fitness routine.
Proper form is important when using weights to make sure you avoid injury. A PT can help you learn the basics, or you can teach yourself moves such as proper dumbbell row form. With practice, you can move onto heavier weights and challenge yourself with new exercises. Once you start using weights in your training, you’ll wonder why you never started sooner!
Listen to your body
Finding your way with exercise is great, but it’s important not to push yourself too hard. Listen to your body and if you show any signs of injury, rest and seek advice.
Mix things up to keep it interesting
If you stick to the same fitness routine, you can guarantee things will become boring. Keep up your passion for fitness by switching up your workout routine so that you can keep challenging yourself.
Focus on self-care and wellbeing
A healthy lifestyle isn’t just about diet and exercise, there are other things you need to do to keep your wellbeing in check.
Don’t neglect health checks
From going to the dentist to getting niggles and symptoms checked out, be more in tune with your body and don’t neglect your health checks. The earlier something is detected, the better the chance you have of stopping it from getting worse.
Keep stress at bay
Stress affects people in many ways, but the way you respond to stress can change how it impacts your life. Learn what your triggers are and what you can do to manage stress so that you can keep your mental health in check.
Make time for yourself
Some people thrive on being busy, but if you overdo it, you risk burning out. Making more time for yourself and finding a healthy work/life balance is important. Make time in your week to do things you enjoy, and be sure to take some time each day to recharge.
Improve your sleep habits
Do you get enough sleep? Perhaps it’s time you focused on creating a better sleep routine. Avoid too many late nights and try to stick to a regular bed/wake time – it will make the world of difference to your energy levels and allow you to get a more restful sleep.
Stay motivated
How can you stop old habits creeping in and make sure you stick to your healthy lifestyle? It’s not easy, but there are things you can do to keep yourself motivated.
Check-in on your goals
Revisit your goals regularly to help make sure they’re still relevant for you. If they’re no longer realistic, or you’re finding it hard to stick to them – adjust and try again. Setting smaller goals can help you work towards the bigger ones, keeping you on track as you complete them.
Find a supportive community
If you need a little boost, finding some support from others can help. It could be from your friends and family, people at your workplace or gym, or even an online community. Connect with people who share similar values and mindsets to help you stay on track, even when you’re feeling lost.
Pick yourself up if you fall down
Remember that what you’re trying to do is build a healthier lifestyle – it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Everyone has their ups and downs, but it’s important not to beat yourself up if you fall down or things don’t go as planned for a while. Pick yourself up again and learn lessons from what went wrong, you’ll come back stronger than ever.
By choosing to build a healthier lifestyle, you can look forward to a healthy and fit future. The only thing holding you back is you, so start making those changes today and see the difference it can make to your wellbeing.
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