The Importance of Whole Body Health & Wellness
We’re just a few days from the New Year, and if you’re like us, you’ve already got your New Year’s Resolution (or Resolutions!) picked out for 2020. And if you don’t, well tune in because today we’re chatting about resolutions that are designed to help you achieve whole-body health and wellness.
At Tribe Family Chiropractic, whole-body health is incredibly important to us. Keeping your body at optimal health and alignment helps us fight off disease, sleep better, and prevent or recover from injuries.
But whole-body health and wellness aren’t just about exercising five times a week and having a six-pack; being healthy also means making sure your body is getting enough sleep, that you aren’t looking at screens 24/7, and that you give yourself time to relax and decompress on a regular basis.
Whether you’ve already got your resolutions picked out or are still deciding if you want to set a resolution for yourself, check out our Top 10 Healthy New Year’s Resolutions for 2020!
10 Healthy New Year’s Resolutions
1. Practice Mindful Eating
Unless we’re sitting down to a group or family dinner, odds are we’re staring at a TV screen or our phones while we enjoy our meal. When this happens, we usually overeat or chow down our food too quickly, which leads to poor digestion. Make a point to slow down, and take time to actually enjoy your food. Try not to look at the phone or TV, put your utensils down between each bite, and try to be mindful of the food you’re putting in your body.
2. Set Better Sleep Habits
While everyone’s sleep needs are different, it’s generally recommended that we get between 7 and 9 hours of sleep each night. But most of us don’t get the quantity or quality of sleep that we need to get through our day. To improve your sleep, try to decrease your blue light exposure during the day (i.e. screens!), avoid caffeine and alcohol, lay off the afternoon naps, and avoid late-night snacking.
3. Take a 30-Minute Walk Each Day
It’s generally recommended that we get half an hour of exercise each day, but many of us don’t reach this daily goal because we don’t want to make time to go to the gym during our busy days. So instead of trying to block off 30 minutes or an hour to exercise, take three 10-minute walks throughout your day, or two 15-minute walks after lunch and dinner. You’ll get your exercise for the day, and give yourself a break from work or improve your digestion after a meal!
4. Keep in Touch with Loved Ones
This might not seem important for your physical health, but staying in touch with friends and family on a regular basis is crucial for our whole body health and wellness. Without strong social connections, many people fill their time with unhealthy habits, such as alcohol abuse, overeating, and lack of exercise. Face-to-face interactions are ideal, but social media is also a great outlet to maintain contact with people who don’t live near you.
5. Take Time to De-stress Each Day
While many of us find that our productivity increases when there’s a time crunch or pressure on us to finish a task, chronic stress can be detrimental to our health. Many people who experience regular stress also suffer from insomnia, anxiety, depression, obesity, and heart disease. Even if it’s just 30 minutes a day, take the time to decompress from your day and turn the stress off. Maybe it’s doing a puzzle, reading a book, going to the gym, or socializing with friends - whatever it is, make it a part of your daily schedule!
6. Volunteer
When it comes to New Year’s Resolutions, we typically focus on how we can better ourselves, but focusing our efforts to help others has positive effects on our own health and wellness. It’s proven that helping others increases our own happiness, and studies have found that people with positive emotions have a 20% less chance of having a heart attack or developing heart disease.
7. Reduce Alcohol Intake
Research shows year after year that consuming too much alcohol has a significant number of negative effects on the body. In addition to the obvious ones like weight gain and liver problems, people with heavy drinking habits are at a greater risk for depression, heart disease, hypertension, stroke, mental deterioration, and different types of cancer like mouth, throat, liver, and breast. Even if you don’t cut out drinking entirely, taking small steps like only having one glass of wine a night or limiting your alcohol intake to the weekends can help you tremendously.
8. Take the Stairs
Many of us “fail” at our New Year’s Resolutions because we bite off more than we can chew and quit altogether once we’ve fallen off the wagon a few times. A simple New Year’s Resolution that can improve your health is to take the stairs instead of the elevator. This small change might seem insignificant, but doing this every day is great for your heart and whole-body health.
9. Travel
For many Americans, getting time off from work is tricky, if not impossible. But studies show that adults who vacation more than twice a year have a significantly lower risk of suffering from heart attacks. Physical health aside, travel also lets us better manage our stress levels, gives our creativity a boost, strengthens our relationships, and helps you become more productive at work.
10. Learn a New Language
Studies show that people who can speak another language besides their native one have a number of health benefits, including better decision-making skills, improved memory, increased attention span, improved multitasking abilities, better cognitive abilities, and increased critical thinking. So do your mental health a favor and get started picking up a new language!
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