Learning How to Live a Healthier Lifestyle

When you have been engaging in the same lifestyle habits for several years it may look easy to just change over to living a more positive lifestyle. The truth is that it’s not as easy as you think. Taking small steps towards changing your lifestyle habits is the only way to be successful, especially when you’re changing your eating habits at the same time.

Some of the most harmful lifestyle habits are ones you may not even realize you are engaging in. These habits may include the following:

• Drinking in excess
• Smoking
• Using recreational drugs
• Engaging in risky sexual behavior
• Allowing stress into your life
• Poor time management and balance between work, family and recreation

It is has been proven that living a healthier lifestyle promotes a strong immune system, a longer life expectancy, a decreased risk of getting life-threatening illnesses, and an overall sound body and mind. Here are some of the most important ways to start changing your poor lifestyle habits into positive lifestyle changes.

Exercise

Physical activity is a staple in living a healthier lifestyle. Many people have no desire to exercise or engage in any type of physical activity. Not only does exercising increase the production of endorphins which promotes happiness and satisfaction, it makes you feel better mentally and increases your confidence level. If this is true, why has every excuse in the book been used to get out of exercising? Some of the biggest complaints or concerns about not exercising include:

1. No time
2. No energy
3. Too much work to do
4. Too many family commitments
5. Too expensive to join a gym
6. Don’t feel comfortable exercising in front of people in better shape than them
7. Don’t feel comfortable using the equipment

Well, these may all be valid reasons but if lack of confidence or not having money to pay for a membership then there is no problem. There are many simple exercises that you do every day that can help you lose weight and battle fat. Exercising doesn’t have to be a full blow-out gym workout. Smaller activities can provide just as much of a benefit as busting your rear in the gym. Some examples include:

1. Taking a walk at a slower pace
2. Walking your pet or a neighbor’s pet
3. Riding your bike instead of driving
4. Doing chores around the house such as gardening, cleaning the house and mowing the lawn.

These are all a great start to jump starting your system and springing into action. Start off slow rather than going full force at a gym. If you are significantly overweight or considered obese it is best to start off slow and work yourself up to going to the gym. In order to maximize your results, you should engage in a gym workout 2 to 3 times a week or do some type of physical exercise for at least 30 minutes every day.

Keep yourself Active

An active lifestyle usually results in a healthy lifestyle. Regular physical activity is extremely important to maintain our fitness levels although it can easily be ignored. The great thing is that exercising doesn’t necessary mean joining a gym or hiring a personal trainer. Instead of hitting the gym think about other ways you can introduce more physical activity into your regular routine. Walk up the stairs instead of taking the escalator or an elevator. Instead of driving to work, walk to work. Even something as simple as keeping up on daily chores can give you enough exercise to help improve your overall health. It only takes 30 minutes a day to maintain a healthy lifestyle.

Some easy tips for keeping active include:

• Joining sports teams
• Turning the television off and find more physical things that you enjoy doing such as gardening
• Take a walk during your lunch break
• Keep up on your daily chores such as cleaning and scrubbing the house

These small changes to your daily routine can make a world of difference towards a healthier and more fulfilling lifestyle. One very important thing to remember is to not make these changes all at once. Make a long term plan with short term goals that you know you can easily meet and introduce into your daily routine over time.

Take a Break from the Internet

Make a point of getting away from every type of technology you can several times a week. Sitting around browsing the Internet keeps you from getting up and moving around. Instead of chatting with people online, playing games or engaging in social media, change it up 2 to 3 times a week by going out and doing something fun with your family and/or friends. Take a walk, play games with your children, have a cookout, take a spa day, or do anything else that is enjoyable to you where you won’t be involved with using modern technology. This will not only keep you active but it will improve your social skills.

Change to a Healthier Lifestyle

The word “lifestyle” means way of life or routine. Living a healthier lifestyle doesn’t just end at changing your diet, exercising or adopting positive social skills. Your habits and hobbies should be healthy, too. Some of the ways you can do this include:

• Avoid drinking in excess
• Stop taking recreational drugs
• Quite smoking
• Get enough sleep
• Start thinking more positive
• Avoid stress and anything that will cause anxiety

Dieting and exercising are not the sole answer in living a healthier lifestyle. Avoid smoking cigarettes and avoid using drugs and alcohol. Stress levels differ from one person to another. These stressors can come from a variety of factors:

1. Family
2. Financial
3. Personal
4. Issues with peers
5. Work-related stress

The most important step in combating stress is identifying these stressors and then take steps to delete them from your life. Once you have identified these stressors you can begin to work on the underlying causes. One of the most beneficial ways to help you identify these stressors is by writing in a stress journal. The things to keep track of in your journal should include:

• What caused your stress
• How you felt emotionally and physically
• A detailed description of the environment you were in and who you were with
• Your personal reactions to the situation
• What you did to make yourself feel better

Once you have clearly identified the triggers to your stress you should attempt to change your situation by alteration or avoidance. Once you’ve done this, starting working on changing your reactions by accepting and adapting. Be sure to make time for fun and relaxation.

Sleep is one of the most crucial and most important things you can change to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Sleep is extremely crucial for many reasons.

1. Sleep regenerates, refuels and energizes your body and mind.
2. Sleep increases your ability to think more clearly and react in an appropriate manner when stressful situations arise.
3. Sleep helps give you the stamina and motivation to engage in the many aspects of your life that you enjoy.

Your Child and Mental Health

While many adults believe that children live a life of ease, this is certainly not necessarily always true. Your child and mental health is a dynamic world unto it’s own.Children are not without their own emotional, mental, and physical troubles. Just as with older humans, children are capable of feeling all types of feelings. These include feelings of sadness, hurt, mistrust, anxiety, and anger. In addition, the way that children deal with these feelings can have a huge effect on their emotional health. Children and mental health often reflects greatly on the parental mental health that a child has when he or she become a parent themselves. Kids that grow up in a positive environment are much more likely to be positive adults than those that experience negative emotional mental health during their childhood.Infant and child mental health establishes a foundation of self-esteem for life.Children as young as infants are aware of trust and mistrust in others and in self. After a child is only a few months old, their emotional health begins to develop. It is important during infancy that a baby learns he or she can trust the caregiver. The baby needs to know that his or her needs are taken care of when a diaper should be changed or a feeding needs to take place. Infants that go long periods of time without the attention of the caregiver are much more likely not to trust.Once the infant passes through the stage of placing trust in others, a toddler encounters a stage of emotional mental health called autonomy vs. shame and doubt. During this period, the child needs to feel that he or she is capable of independence. While an infant needed others, toddlers are looking for space to obtain good mental health. When a toddler is not given the opportunity to find independence, he or she often grows up having a lacking self-esteem, feeling ashamed as well as a whole assortment of other mental health issues. Much independence during this stage of life is found through potty training with the toddler taking care of his or her own bathroom needs.Your child and mental health goes hand in hand with the circumstance of the family environment while growing up.Initiative verse guilt follows the toddler stage when a child reaches preschool and kindergarten. During this stage, the child emotionally needs to explore others and the world around him or her and begins to become interested in belonging to a group and role-playing within that group. During this stage of life, a person develops much of their background for social interaction. Children who are allowed to explore and interact with others are much more likely to carry over positive social skills into adulthood than those that are secluded from group activities. These others can end up on the opposite side of the spectrum in regards to their social and mental health becoming withdrawn from others.It is quite apparent that child and adult mental health become synonymous throughout life.Part of creating a solid foundation in children to carry over into adulthood is allowing children the opportunity to learn how to make choices. Children need to experience the effects that their choices have on their lives. Instead of continually giving a child direction, it is better to give a child options.When allowed to take some actions into their own hands helps create an emotional mental health framework for the future, Setting boundaries and preparing children for disappointments help children prepare for good mental health and avoidance of mental health issues as an adult. In some cases, children can make choices for themselves. However, children also need to learn that not everything will always be controlled by them. They need to learn to accept the things that they cannot control. A child that learns to cope with disappointment through a caregiver that sets boundaries will grow into an adult with a foundation of more positive emotional mental health than those children that never experience hearing the word “no”. All of this is very critical for child and adolescent development.While all research indicates that the environment in which a child grows greatly affects his or her emotional mental health, not all parents that fail to properly foster their child’s stages of health are neglectful or bad parents. In fact, many parents struggle with the proper methods they should carry out to help their child grow into a prosperous adult.Interaction is a great way to help your child’s emotional mental health bloom. Children need to be cuddled and feel the touch of others. In addition, they need communication. Even as an infant, babies respond to parents and others through coos. Responding to these babbles is an important part of the infant and child mental health development process (both mentally and emotionally). As the child grows older, let him or her know what he or she has to say is important by listening and responding in conversation.In addition to talking, your child and mental health is dependent upon nonverbal responses also. Be certain to make eye contact with the child. Share gestures and facial expressions during daily routines such as dinner, story time, and bath time.Be certain that you have expectations for your child and that they are appropriate for the child’s age level. Placing too much pressure or high expectations on your child can be harmful to his or her emotional mental health. Do not place expectations on the child that he or she is not mature enough to handle.When your child reaches a charged emotional situation, try to help the child understand the feelings and work through the problem. Let your child know that it is okay to express emotions if they are expressed in a proper manner.Raising or working with a child can be a large responsibility when it is realized that the things the child experiences now affects how he or she will respond to the world as an adult. The positive or negative environment that a kid encounters through childhood affects the ways that he or she handles situations independently when grown.Carefully considering the emotional health needs that help a child feel secure about him or herself and about the environment are important to his or her success in the future.