When you first think about starting a healthy lifestyle, it might look like you have to do – a ton of things to stay healthy. Although to stay healthy you have to do certain things. But it’s less than what you initially thought.
Living a healthy life gets simpler – when you focus on adopting healthy lifestyle habits.
That’s why in this post, you will know about some daily healthy habits that will help you live a healthy lifestyle throughout the year.
Let’s begin.
Daily Healthy Habits To Live A Healthy Lifestyle Throughout The Year
1. Eat something healthy in your first two meals.
To live a healthy lifestyle, we must have a healthy body. And eating healthy is crucial if you want a healthy body.
But many people struggle to eat healthy consistently. It shouldn’t be that hard.
Well, I will tell you about a simple fix to this problem.
Every day your first two meals should be something healthy. Specifically – you must eat something healthy for your breakfast and lunch.
By doing this, you will naturally eat healthier food.
Also, in this method, you get to eat something tasty in your third meal. So every day you get to taste something fancy. And because it’s in your dinner time – you can enjoy it with your whole family or with some friends.
2. Get an adequate amount of sleep every night.
An adequate amount of sleep is necessary if you want your body to function properly.
“Sleep is important to a number of brain functions, including how nerve cells (neurons) communicate with each other.” – NINDS
To live a healthy lifestyle, make it a habit to sleep at a fixed time and have a good amount of sleep.
Having a proper amount of sleep can help you with the following things:
- Reduce stress and mood swings.
- Helps in maintaining a healthy body weight.
- Improves your focus and productivity.
- Helps in avoiding many diseases.
For adults 18-60 years, it’s recommended to sleep 7+ hours every night. Source – Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
3. Instead of sugary desserts, eat seasonal fruits.
When you have sugar cravings, instead of desserts eat fresh seasonal fruit.
Desserts mainly consist of sugar, starches and cooking fats like butter, lard, dairy products etc.
Where fruits contain fibre, antioxidants, vitamins, iron and many other key nutrients that our body needs.
Replacing desserts with seasonal fruits is a good idea if you want to live a healthy life.
Related: 7 Benefits of living a healthy lifestyle.
4. Keep your body moving.
Modern living brought us many time-saving gadgets. These gadgets make our life easy but make us live a sedentary lifestyle.
To live a healthy lifestyle throughout the year – it’s important that we live a physically active lifestyle.
An active lifestyle helps us burn more calories and keeps our body weight in check. Living an active lifestyle also helps in preventing many diseases.
Make it a habit to move your body throughout the day.
It’s a good idea to engage in some exercises in the morning or in the evening.
10-20 minutes of regular exercise can help you live a more active lifestyle and making this a daily habit will push you towards a healthy lifestyle.
5. The 10 + 10 rule.
After waking up and before going to sleep, you need to indulge yourself in at least 10 minutes of relaxing activities. It can be meditation, reading a book or journaling.
Practising this can help you start your day better. And practising meditation or reading a book can help you to fall asleep faster.
6. Drink enough fluid throughout the day.
To live a healthy lifestyle – you must develop healthy eating habits. It’s recommended for adults to drink 3.7 litres of fluid or water daily.
If you are not used to drinking 3.7 litres of water daily, you can spice it up.
Make fruit-infused water, smoothies and lemon water and drink them throughout the day to achieve your daily fluid intake.
7. Lower your caffeine intake.
400 milligrams of caffeine in a day is recommended for most adults. But most of us consume much more than that.
Drinking 4-5 cups of coffee alone equals 400 milligrams of caffeine.
Many of us depend on caffeine to start our day and to remove sleepiness during the day.
To lower your caffeine intake replace 1-2 cups of coffee with green tea or tea.
One cup of green tea contains 28-47 milligrams of caffeine.
Where one cup (8 fl oz or 237 grams) of normal tea contains 47.4 milligrams and one cup of coffee contains 94.8 milligrams of caffeine.
8. Consume less fast food.
Eating fast food or junk food makes it harder to have a healthy body.
Most fast food items are prepared using simple carbohydrates, sugar and fats. Thus eating fast food regularly can make you overweight.
It’s ok to eat some fast food every now and then. But if you are eating fast food every day, then you need to change. Also, while eating fast food – you should look after the portion size.
Eating fast food and practising healthy lifestyle practices can give poor results. As fast food contains more calories than whole foods. So, to burn those extra calories – you need to do more physical work or exercises.
Put simply – if you don’t eat fast food regularly, you can see better results by exercising for 20-30 minutes. Whereas if you eat fast food, you need to work out a lot more to see similar results.
Related: 10 Home workout secrets to get a fit body.
9. Spend some time out in nature.
Spending 30 minutes or more out in nature has many benefits.
“Scientists have found that spending time in natural surroundings with plenty of trees and natural flora and fauna – peoples experienced positive improvements in immune functions.
One big reason behind it is the presence of phytoncides which are airborne chemicals that plants emit themselves – to protect themselves from rooting and forest insects. Scientists have found that this phytoncide also benefits humans.” – Benefits of spending time in nature.
Make it a habit to spend some time in nature. Go for a quick walk at the park, read a book or do some gardening work.
Here are some of the benefits of spending time in nature:
- Refreshes your mood.
- Helps to boost immune functions.
- Reduces stress and anxiety.
- Resets your internal clock.
- Read 9 benefits of spending time in nature.
10. Get involved in cooking.
Getting involved in cooking can help you eat healthier dishes.
When you learn to cook, you know exactly how much sugar, butter, oil, and carbs are going in – to prepare the dish. Seeing all those ingredients in front of your eyes can help you make better food choices.
For example, let’s pick most people’s favourite drink – coffee. When someone prepares you coffee, you don’t see exactly how much sugar and cream is inside your cup.
But when you prepare your own coffee, you know exactly how much sugar and cream you are putting inside your cup. When you see you are putting in a hefty amount of sugar, automatically, you will reduce the amount of sugar you are putting in.
But if someone prepares that coffee for you, you only care about the taste.
It’s a fact that — popular restaurant coffee contains lots of sugar than recommended. It’s recommended to keep your daily sugar intake within 35-45 grams per day.
Where “Venti (extra large) white chocolate mocha with whipped cream — 73.8 grams of sugar (about 18 teaspoons)” – source cbsnews
11. Have a purpose in life.
In the book – “Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life” writers interviewed many people living in the islands of Okinawa (‘one of the world’s Blue Zones, areas renowned for long life). And found that – along with healthier food and healthy lifestyle practices people have a purpose in life.
Having a purpose in life makes it easy for you to work towards a goal and it stops you from participating in unfruitful activities.
Having a purpose in life and developing healthy lifestyle habits can help you live a healthy lifestyle throughout the year.
12. Have some relaxation time.
It’s important to have some relaxation time between our work schedules. Often we associate relaxation time with using our mobile. But we should try to go offline and participate in those activities that truly calm our mood and body.
It can be listening to relaxing music, meditation, walking, reading, painting etc.
To live a healthy lifestyle – it’s crucial to form a habit of getting some relaxation time between work hours.
Conclusion
If you want to live a healthy lifestyle throughout the year, you should make healthy living simple. Developing healthy habits makes it simple and easier to have a healthy life.
Develop some good habits around your food, daily activities and sleep to live a healthy lifestyle.
Following a balanced diet and eating mindfully can transform your life in no time.
Also, don’t forget the role of having a good sleep. Daily 7-8 hours of good sleep can help you with better decision-making and enables normal functioning of your body.
Read next: The benefits of living a physically active lifestyle.
