Everyone wants to be healthy and free from various diseases. Because, with a healthy body and mind, welfare and quality of life can certainly increase. Maintaining health is in fact not as difficult as imagined, one of which is to adopt a healthy lifestyle every day.
A healthy lifestyle is a long-term commitment to maintain or do some things to be able to support body functions, so that it has a good impact on health. In order to make it happen, there are several efforts that can be made to implement a healthy lifestyle. Examples include maintaining healthy food intake with diet and nutrition, exercising, doing positive activities to avoid stress, and much more. Some of these things can certainly improve the quality of life as well as bring a positive impact on the environment.
How Important Is Living a Healthy Life?
Adopting a healthy lifestyle is also the most important thing, because according to the World Health Organization (WHO), unhealthy diet and lack of physical activity are major global health risk factors. Moreover, with advances in food technology, the production of processed food is also increasing. Not only that, because of the ease of technology, an unhealthy lifestyle makes the body vulnerable to various types of health problems, such as diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.
Steps You Can Take to Start a Healthy Lifestyle
Implementing a healthy lifestyle can not be arbitrary. This needs to be adjusted according to age, gender, level of physical activity, health conditions, and even eating habits. Well, here are steps that can be applied as an effort to live a healthy life:
1. Consumption of Healthy, Balanced Foods
This is a healthy way of life that is unfortunately quite difficult to implement, even though it is important to maintain the intake of nutrients that enter the body. This includes protein, carbohydrates, fiber, minerals and vitamins. This is very vital, so that the body can grow, develop, and carry out its functions optimally. Not only that, the way of processing food must also be considered so as not to damage the nutrients in it, so that the food consumed continues to provide benefits.
If you are still stuck in unhealthy eating habits, start by listing all the foods you eat every day. This note is useful as a reminder so you can limit or increase consumption. Not only that, you can also choose natural foods, or there are no chemicals in the manufacturing process.
This aims to avoid the negative effects that can be generated. To live a healthy life, you should at least eat fruits and vegetables in addition to meat and other sources of carbohydrates.
2. Exercise regularly
At least, do exercise for 30 minutes every day if you want to have a healthy body. You can also do moderate aerobic activity like walking for at least 150 minutes or vigorous aerobic activity like running for at least 75 minutes a week. Meanwhile, strength training for all muscle groups is recommended to be done at least twice a week.
The right exercise at the right time is also known to improve blood circulation and strengthen muscles and bones. If your activities are dominated by simple activities, consider getting active every day.
3. Manage Stress Well
It is undeniable, stress is also one of the things you should avoid to get maximum health. Indeed, the heavy burden of life can bring stress, but you have to be smart to process it. When stress hits, the physical symptoms that you can feel are headaches, stomach pains, increased high blood pressure, chest pain, and difficulty sleeping.
To overcome this, you can take time to relax and do things you enjoy. Some things, such as yoga or meditation, can also be done to avoid stress. In addition, it is also important to be grateful so that the mind and heart remain calm. Spiritual health will also affect overall physical health, so you can’t ignore the two.
4. Routine Health Checks
One of the steps to implementing a healthy lifestyle is to have regular health checks. Because, there are several benefits from this, including:
Detect current or emerging medical problems that have not been detected.
Assess the risk of future medical problems.
Encourages you to maintain a healthy lifestyle.
In addition, having a health check is also a good time to examine your lifestyle to see what improvements can be made.
5. Get Enough Rest
To get a healthy body and mind, you can also get it by getting enough rest. Make sure your sleep hours are always met and get used to sleeping and waking up at the same time. If you find it difficult to sleep, you can try taking a warm bath, reading a book, or listening to music to relax your body and make it easier to fall asleep.
Those are some healthy lifestyles that you can apply every day. It is important to remember that it is better to prevent disease by adopting a healthy lifestyle, rather than waiting for the body to get sick.
One of the steps to implementing a healthy lifestyle is to regularly check your health condition.
Reference:
World Health Organization. Accessed in 2022. Healthy Diet.
Healthline. Accessed 2022. The Benefits of Healthy Habits.
Healthline. Accessed 2022. New Exercise Guidelines are Out—Here is the Mix of Aerobics and Weight Training Experts Recommend.
Better Health Channel.gov. Accessed 2022. Regular health checks.
WebMD. Accessed in 2022. Healthy Living: 8 Steps to Take Today.