The Ultimate Guide to Health And Wellness And How to Get Started Today

The journey to attain ultimate health and wellness begins with building a lifestyle that supports them. A health and wellness-oriented lifestyle is made by creating healthy habits and choices as part of your everyday routines. You do not need to overhaul your entire life all at once. Just this thought alone causes overwhelm and inaction. Instead, these changes can be made gradually over a long period. Not only is this approach doable, but it is also sustainable. You will wake up one day to a leaner, fitter, energetic, and more vibrant version of yourself.

However, the ultimate health and wellness components are generally the same. The areas that need to be evaluated and improved are probably quite familiar to you: fitness, sleep, diet, emotional health, etc. 

What may have been lacking in the past is a simple plan to begin incorporating new behaviors into your lifestyle. As you read through these suggestions, remember that the goal is not perfection. The goal is to incorporate small lifestyle changes into your life over time that become your new normal.

Let’s Talk About Movement (Fitness)

The United States Department of Health and Human Services published the first Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans in 2008. It recommends 30 minutes of moderate aerobic activity daily or at least 2 hours and 30 minutes per week for adults ages 18 to 64. Strength training for all major body parts, legs, hips, arms, shoulders, abdomen, back, and chest, is recommended at least twice a week. 

I cringed when I first read this, but hold on; there is a way to get here, a little at a time. 🙂

If you are not already physically active, incorporating fitness activities into your life does not need to pose a jaw-dropping challenge. A wide range of physical activities meets the guidelines. Examples of moderate physical activity include dancing (this includes Zumba and hip hop, you all), brisk walking, bicycle riding, and more. 

Thank goodness!!

Remember, 30 minutes of moderate activity provides the minimum required to gain health benefits. More vigorous activities, jumping rope, rock climbing, and swimming provide even more significant health benefits for the overly zealous folk. 

To successfully integrate physical fitness activities into your life, make them part of your daily schedule. Set time in your daily planner and add a reminder to the event on your phone or watch. The most important things you can do are show up for the activity and perform some physical action. Even if it does not equal the full 30 minutes, you’re still building the habit of physical activity. 

Keys to Success: 

• Start with an activity you will enjoy.
• If you are a social butterfly, join an exercise group or workout with friends.
• Remember, every little bit counts. If you exercise for 20 minutes twice a day or in 10-minute increments throughout the day, you can meet the requirement of 2 hours and 30 minutes per week around your schedule. Or you can start with just 20 minutes a day and build up the 2 hours 30-minute per week goal. Just start somewhere.
• Block out your exercise time on your calendar. 

Let’s Talk About Food (Diet)

If you feel a little sensitive when someone talks to you about your food, join the crowd. Most people are. Remember that these suggestions will help you feel better and enjoy greater well-being over the years. Now with that being said, we have to talk about our food choices. 

Along with movement, ultimate health and wellness hinge on a healthy and balanced diet. As you know, those who eat well experience various health benefits, including but not limited to better weight management, lower chances of developing inflammatory diseases, and overall lower instances of illness. As recommended by the 2010 issue of Dietary Guidelines for Americans, a healthy diet includes significant amounts of fruits, vegetables, low-fat dairy, lean proteins, and unrefined grains. The recommendations also suggest lowering sodium, added sugar, trans fat, saturated fat, and cholesterol in the diet. 

This may be a great place to start, but as you journey into ultimate health and wellness, my most excellent advice would be to listen to your body. The body has a mind of its own, and it can send signals to tell you what foods are nourishing and which are poisonous. As you know, no two bodies are identical, so you have to learn through trial and error how you respond to different foods. 

Whether you go Paleo, Keto, Vegan, or Mediterranean is up to you. We can all probably agree that a diet based primarily on whole foods is best.

Before eliminating foods from your diet, add healthier choices to your meals and snacks. Take a proactive, positive approach as you change what you eat. Small changes over time add up to a complete transition to a more healthful lifestyle.

Keys to Success:

• Choose one or two small changes to incorporate into your diet each month. 
• Experiment. Eating healthy needs to be enjoyable for you to make it a part of your lifestyle. Try various whole foods and different ways to prepare them and enjoy the ones you like. 
• Keep your daily menu varied so you don’t get bored with your food choices and go off track. 

Let’s Talk About Your Emotions (Mind-Body Connection) 

This may be my favorite because it is so often overlooked, and yet it’s probably the most powerful because it indirectly affects our lifestyle choices. Our emotional state can affect our food choices, physical activity level, and ability to sleep well and maintain positive social engagement. 

For example, foods high in sugar and fat satisfy our brains’ pleasure and reward centers (dopamine). If we are stressed or unhappy, many of us reach for rich foods to make ourselves feel better. Sometimes this is a conscious decision; many times, it is not. Also, feeling angry, unhappy, or depressed saps energy, making exercising or pursuing other physical activities more difficult; we don’t feel like it. 🙁

There are many ways to combat this cycle. Physical activities like yoga, pilates, tai chi, and many others expressly cultivate a healthy mind-body connection for practitioners. Each activity uses movement tied to breath awareness to focus and calm the mind and the nervous system. 

Yoga includes breathing exercises and meditation as well. These activities build fitness and relieve stress. Some mind-body activities, breathing exercises, visualization, and meditation, do not involve whole-body movement; they concentrate on focusing your mental activity and reducing stress.

It is essential to keep the body healthy and the mind in equilibrium to experience a sense of well-being. Peace does not mean you become a robot. It means you do not constantly experience unrealistic or debilitating lows (depression). Being even-tempered makes dealing with stress easier, adapting to change, and maintaining a healthy lifestyle. 

Keys to Success: 

• Choose a mind-body activity that resonates with you to include in your schedule which suits your lifestyle and temperament.
• Practice it consistently for the best results. 

Let’s Talk About the Power of Habit (Sealing the Deal)

Have you ever noticed how you can read a thousand books on any topic and remain the same? You know better but can’t seem to change for some crazy reason. I will tell you the reason. Our good and bad habits are hard-wired into our subconscious minds. So our conscious mind reads the books while our subconscious mind eats the cookies. Sound familiar?

There are two main ways to reprogram this default behavior. One is hypnosis, hold on; the other is creating habits. They both yield the same result.

According to habit research, it takes up to 66 days or more of a consistent application to turn a simple action into a habit. More complex accomplishments like establishing an exercise routine, daily meditation, and dietary changes can take significantly longer. 

The accomplishment rate for more complex changes can be highly variable; do not end your quest for ultimate health and wellness if you do not see immediate results. Consistency and persistence are the keys to changing and acquiring new habits. 

You can reach your goal!

I believe in you!

Be well + prosper,

Elaine xx