Staying Fit

Staying fit doesn’t only mean being thin or having washboard abs. It is a broad concept, which includes several elements, from exercising, eating healthy to having proper sleep and socialising. Staying fit ensures you a long and quality life while being unfit has a negative impact on various aspects of life. Here is why it is important to stay healthy.

Importance Of Staying Fit

For Longer Life

We all know that a healthy body and mind can help you live longer. Not only that, it considerably improves the quality of life.

To Avoid Diseases

Staying healthy prevents you from developing serious and chronic conditions, such as cardiovascular issues, diabetes, high blood pressure, kidney ailments, etc. These not only pose a risk to longer life, but they also deteriorate the quality of life.

To Minimise Your Risk Of Injury

Strong muscles, high bone density, flexibility, and proper balance are all signs of good health. All these prevent you from getting hurt and injured, if you incur an accident, especially as you age. If your muscles are strong, you are strong, and have proper balance, it will minimise the risk of you slipping and getting hurt. Similarly, stronger bones mean that even if you fall, they are resilient enough to not get fractured. 

For Better Mental Health

Staying fit not just comprises physical fitness, but mental fitness too. As we are seeing that more and more people are suffering from mental health ailments, depression, anxiety, and stress, being the common ones, it is crucial to take care of our mental health. Also, do you know that mental health can have a significant impact on your physical fitness? Stress is one of the factors behind weight gain, sound mental health is good for heart health, eating disorders can deprive your body of vital nutrients, and depression can have an impact on every aspect of your life. Hence, take care of your mental health for physical fitness. Yoga, meditation, and deep breathing are some of the ways you can do that.

For Happiness

Just exercise for a few minutes and you’ll feel good about yourself. This is because while doing any physical activity, your body releases ‘feel-good chemicals’ known as endorphins. Also, having a balanced diet boosts your energy level and improves your mood. Also when you are happy, you feel good about the way you look, which can boost your confidence and self-esteem. Overall, having a healthy lifestyle, where you eat right, exercise enough, sleep well and do what you love doing, improves both the quality of life and the way you look at it.

How To Stay Healthy?

Knowing the importance of staying healthy is easy, but knowing how to actually do it can be challenging. Gladly, there are ways to do it, which require you to make certain changes in your daily life and incorporating certain things and activities that will ensure you a healthy body, mind, and life.

Exercise

• Experts say that every adult should do at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise every week. This can be anything, walking, jogging, playing a sport, dancing, sweating it out in the gym, doing yoga, pilates, or simply mowing the lawn. At times, it might get hard to take the time out. In that case, you can break the 30 minutes into 10-minute sessions. Also, you should set aside a time when it is the most convenient for you to exercise, such as after work, in the morning, etc. And make it a point to work out at that time daily, so as to make it a habit. This will motivate you to both get and stay consistent.
• Not just these 150 minutes per week, try to add more movement in your daily life. This will not only improve your physical fitness but help bring your focus to your body. And this is easier than you think. Just stand up frequently from your desk and move around. You can do some arm and leg stretches too. Say no to elevators, and instead take the stairs. Park your car a little farther away so that you can walk a few more steps. Also, take up a hobby that makes you move more, such as dancing, gardening, etc.

Balanced Diet

• For staying fit, it is extremely important to have a balanced diet. It should include lots of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, healthy fats, complex carbohydrates, protein, and fiber.
• Experts recommend that half of your plate in any meal should be filled with fruits and vegetables. However, it is equally important to know that a single fruit or vegetable, although healthy, cannot provide all the nutrients. Hence, you should mix it well and include fruits and vegetables of various colours in your diet.
• Just as it is important to have healthy food, it is equally important to avoid highly processed junk food that is high in trans-fat, refined carbs, salt, sugar, and unhealthy oils. If you cannot scrap that completely, limit its intake as little as possible. 

Limit Sugar

• Refined sugar is extremely bad for your health. Not only can it make you obese, it increases your risk of getting diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases. Hence, quit sugar, and if not possible, limit its intake as much as you can.
• Not only does it feel good on the palette, but sugar can also be highly addictive too, making it extremely difficult to quit. A tip: You can replace refined sugar with other items, such as fruits, jaggery, or honey, which are healthy sugar options.

Quit Smoking

• We all know what havoc can smoking cigarettes unleash on your body. It not only damages your lungs, but it also makes you prone to cancer, cardiovascular issues, and other diseases.
• Not only that, secondhand smoke is injurious too. So, not only do you put your health at a risk, but that of your family members too.
• The ideal thing to do is to quit smoking altogether. If it feels challenging, then get help. A medical expert can help you. There are several rehabilitation centres that work on the sole purpose to make people quit smoking.

Limit Alcohol Consumption

• A moderate amount of alcohol has been linked to good health. However, it has a negative impact too, as it can make you prone to getting cancer, and can be damaging to your liver.
• Hence, limit your alcohol intake as much as you can.
• Also, avoid drinking before or while driving and when you are pregnant.

Stay Hydrated

• You must drink at least 6-8 glasses of water daily.
• Water helps your organs to work normally and helps you maintain healthy body weight.
• It’s also a cleanser, as it flushes toxins out of your body in the form of urine and sweat. 

Get Proper Sleep

• When it comes to health, sleep features down on the list, or it doesn’t find a place on it at all. Also, with our fast-paced life, with so much to do, and so much to accomplish, sleep can often get neglected. However, the truth is that you cannot get anything done, or accomplish anything if you are not well-rested.
• In the short term, sleep deprivation can make you tired, grumpy, and often hungrier. This when gets chronic, increases your risk for weight gain, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and stroke.
• Experts recommend that you must get at least 7-9 hours of sound sleep daily, giving your body the time to unwind and relax.

Manage Stress

• Almost everyone experiences stress. However, the way you react to it matters. Whether you burst out in anger or practice deep breathing, whether you develop sleeping issues, or you meditate, your reaction matters.
• You must remember that it might be impossible to stay away from stress altogether. However, you developing some coping techniques that can help, such as doing Yoga, meditating, breathing deeply, singing, writing about what is bothering you, or simply pouring your heart out to a friend.

It is understandable that with the fast-paced life we live, you might not get the time to invest in good lifestyle habits. It might seem convenient to order junk food than cooking a healthy meal, or to serve yourself alcohol when stressed out, or having sugary soda instead of water, however, these are detrimental in the long term. On the other hand, developing good lifestyle habits might seem challenging at first, but taking smaller and consistent efforts can help you do it, and will ensure you a healthy body and quality life in the long term. 

https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/healthyliving/physical-activity-its-important

https://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/index.html

https://www.nhsinform.scot/healthy-living