10 Ways To Kickstart Your Health TODAY!
Happy Friday!
I’ve been posting on Friday’s lately, but I’ll do my best to change it up next week. Laptops should be SHUT Friday-Sunday, in my opinion. Anyway… let’s dig in to 10 things that you can do TODAY to kickstart your health and move it into a more positive direction.
First things first: I want you to envision what direction you desire to move in and eventually settle in. Without knowing this specifically, you won’t know what you need to do to get there. Check out my post on setting SMARTER GOALS to help.
Now that you have your direction, decide which tips will be the most sustainable. You don’t have to do ALL of this at once. Recipe for disaster! And remember, it takes practice and consistency to form habits. Have some discipline without restricting. Replace vs. take away!
10 Ways To Kickstart Your Health TODAY!
1. Water FIRST!
If the very first thing you ingest in the morning is coffee: PAUSE. Don’t panic, you can still turn the pot on, but I highly encourage you to drink water first. You don’t have to guzzle a liter upon waking like “the gurus”, but if you just spent 8 hours without hydration, coffee’s not gonna cut it! Having water and even some food in your system BEFORE the coffee can prevent (in some) those dang jitters while also giving you the boost and taste you desire in the morning. Here’s to more focus and less scatter brained energy upon waking!
2. Strive for 7,000-10,000 (or more) steps a day!
The research is in, and there are so many studies on the benefits of getting in those steps. You can get your steps in however you wish. Wear a pedometer, fitness ring or watch, or use your phone to track. You can also consult the internets for conversion calculators if you want to guesstimate and track. Anything is better than sitting around UNLESS you’re unable to move in this way. Do what you can. If you find that your steps in the beginning are around 3,000, jumping straight into 10,000 might be too taxing to keep up with consistently. Build yourself up into a solid routine that you can sustain.
If your job is sedentary, or you live in a temperamental climate, this can be hard to do. Some tips:
-Invest in a mini-indoor trampoline (that’s my trick!) or desk treadmill.
-Take mini breaks for walks. Schedule these little walks (or dance parties in your room/office) around other tasks for some habitual stacking. Ex: Walk after every meal, daily walking meetings, etc. Set alarms on your phone for added accountability.
3. More SLEEP! (and rest/breaks)
When you’re too tired it can really set you back. With hormones out of whack from no sleep (ghrelin for example, that fiesty hunger + growth hormone) and no zest for any activity, prioritizing sleep is a must for pretty much any health related goal, or any goal for that matter. Here are a few ways to work on better sleep:
-Have a set bedtime and wake up time to work towards. Get your body used to the rhythm you want it to have.
-Keep your bedroom cool (65-70 degrees) and clutter free. Perimenopause be damned in my bed! Those night sweats, WTF?! (Removing my comforter helped a lot.) If you run cold, just wear warmer pjs. It will even out, but not if your bedroom is a sauna.
-Limit screen time a few hours before bed, and leave the phone off or in another room. (Obviously, if you need your phone for emergencies or you’re on call, it is what it is.)
-Limit liquids a few hours before bed. Yes, that glass of water (or bottle of pinot) right before bed might be doing more harm than good. Not to contradict the issue of being too dehydrated, but having to pee all night doesn’t solve things either. Drink more during the day to make up for it, and have a few sips if you’re parched before bed.
-Eat dinner/dessert/snacks at least 2-3 hours BEFORE bedtime. Give your body time to do as much digesting as possible before you hit the sack. Digesting while sleeping is not it. Our bodies work hard to digest nutrients and get them to the places they need to go. If you’re doing all of that while sleeping, you’re not sleeping. Digesting food actually burns calories. Believe it or not, 10% of our daily calorie burn comes from just digesting food! Protein burns the most while digesting so eat up!
-Avoid over-training. How do you know if you’re overtraining? You’ll know if you can’t sleep and are irritable and ravenous all day no matter what you do. If you’re hyperactive, I get it. I am too and it’s almost impossible for cheetahs like us to slow our rolls. Try training earlier in the day, and do some breath work and calming yoga poses/stretches before bed. Things like child’s pose, back stretches, and box breathing are great options.
-See tip #10!
4. Take a bath!
Taking a nice hot bath before bed can really turn everything down a notch. It’s calming and makes you feel like you’re pampering yourself. If bath salts don’t bother you, I love Dr. Teal’s Melatonin Sleep Soak for some extra zzz’s. Please be careful when it comes to soaking in bath salts, especially if you have kidney or heart disease, diabetes, are pregnant, or a child.
5. Eat When You’re Hungry!
I don’t know about you, but I can’t think cohesive thoughts when I’m hungry. My brains needs carbs, and so does yours. Permission to eat when you’re hungry folks. Finished dinner and still starving? Eat more! Don’t worry about “going over your calories” if you’re still hungry. When you ignore this signal, you’ll crave even more food than you actually need. Eating another 100-200 calories of an extra portion at meal time is a lot different than going on a bender at midnight because you used your “willpower” to not listen to your body.
6. Stay Disciplined!
Whether your goals are health related, career related, relationship related, etc, doing the work every damn day is KEY. It doesn’t matter how long you spend working on your practice and projects, what matters is that you’re prioritizing working on it every day in some way. Please don’t wait for motivation to start. It doesn’t work like that. Motivate YOURSELF by taking action. The great secret is: YOUR ACTIONS are the motivation. Only you can make that magic happen.
7. Find your hidden time to get it all done!
Everyone says that they don’t have the time. That may be true in a lot of cases. Especially if you’re in extreme circumstances. No judgement there. If things are just mundane adult drama bullsh!t, here’s the trick to finding 30 minutes for anything: Go into the settings in your phone. Find your “screen time” usage. Have a few hours in Social Media/Game apps and other things unrelated to your goals? There’s your time! Found it. No excuses. Set time limits on the apps that you spend the most time in and hold yourself accountable. Most people these days can find the 30 minutes to workout, meal prep, or work on a project right in the palm of their own hands.
8. Find nutritional balance in every meal!
Ever eat the biggest salad in the world and find yourself hungry an hour later? Well, wtf was in that bowl? Just vegetables? No wonder! Think of your plate like a pie chart (mmmm pie) and make sure every macro is accounted for - to the best of your ability. Your body knows when it wasn’t given the fat, carbs, protein, fiber, etc that it craves and uses for different reasons. It then lets YOU know by setting off the dinner bells in your brain and stomach.
A balanced plate looks like this:
1/2 plate veggies/fruits
1/4 plate proteins
1/4 plates carbs
Top it all off with the fat (figure your thumb as the amount for 1 serving)
Here’s what an unbalanced salad could be:
Just veggies with lemon juice squeezed on top.
Here’s what a balanced salad could be:
Veggies, tofu (or salmon), croutons (or beans), avocado (or nuts and seeds), squeeze lemon.
An unbalanced snack:
Handful nuts (nothing wrong with that if it’s what you want and works though, these are just examples)
A more balanced snack:
Handful nuts with greek yogurt and berries.
The graphic below is just an example. You can always listen to your cravings and adjust where necessary (ie: more protein than carbs, etc).
9. Love your workouts!
Fun fact, if you have weight loss goals, the type of workout you do doesn’t really matter. (Don’t tell Peloton, Crossfit, or Soul Cycle because I don’t think they can handle the truth yet). Fat loss comes from a calorie deficit. End of story. You can even lose weight without exercising. However, I think we all know that exercising has more benefits than just a number on the scale. I encourage you to find reasons to workout other than “scale goals”. Could be heart health, strength, agility, body composition, etc. Do what you enjoy. I hate running for a number reasons. So I usually don’t. If you love it, but hate Pilates: RUN, FORREST, RUN! Exercise only burns off less than 10 to 30 percent of your daily energy (calories). No need to overtrain for the sake of weight loss. It’s counterintuitive!
10. Limit the Booze!
I know, I’m not very fun at parties. But let’s get real: Alcohol is NOT good for you. It’s not essential. It’s a social thing. A drug. Takes the edge off. The “antioxidants” in red wine don’t count as a health food if you drink more than the recommended amount, and even then, alcohol can be a big problem whether you drink the recommended amount or not. Alcohol can mess with your goals. Poor sleep (peeing, hallucinations, nightmares, disrupted rhythm), triggers binging, hangovers, illness, cancer, hormone imbalance, inappropriate behavior, and the list goes ON! No judgement if you indulge at times, but please consider your intake, especially if you’re in a situation where you’re not living your best life and checking off those boxes. If you need a refresher on the “recommended” amount:
(from the CDC)
2 drinks or less in a day for men
1 drink or less in a day for women
BINGE DRINKING = 5 or more drinks on a single occasion for men, or 4 or more drinks on a single occasion for women, generally within about 2 hours.
Which tip do you think you’ll try today? Let me know!
Have a great weekend!
Kristen
DISCLAIMER: Please consult with your DR before starting any general fitness, nutrition, or wellness program or tip. This newsletter is NOT a substitution for professional, medical, therapeutic, or mental health consultation, diagnosis, and/or treatment. This newsletter is for informational, educational, and entertainment purposes only. It includes science-based/general guidelines, and is NOT personalized advice or training. These are just suggestions and if you try anything, you do so at your own risk.