6 Simple Steps to Improve Your Health and Wellness

ways to improve your health and wellness
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If you are trying to get healthy, you can easily get overwhelmed.  There is so much information out there, and most of it is conflicting.  There are so many ways to improve your health and wellness, so how do you know where to start?

If getting healthy is a priority for you, you need to keep things simple.  You need to create simple habits that you know you can follow through with.  In most cases, making radical changes is not a sustainable way to get healthy.

Let’s start with some basics.

breathing for wellness

Breathe for Better Health and Wellness

It doesn’t get any more basic than that!  You breathe all day every day, no matter what.  So, why not make it more effective?

The trick here is to PAY ATTENTION to your breathing.  Take a few moments to notice your breathing.  Is it rapid?  Is it shallow?  Is it forced?

You will be amazed by how good you feel after a few minutes of concentrated breathing.  Concentrate on taking long, slow, deep breaths.  This is the art of mindfulness.  Mindfulness is a catchy buzzword in the health industry.  Don’t be fooled by it.  It’s not new-age-y or crunchy or granola-y.  It’s pretty simple.

If you do this every day and build a habit of it, you will find yourself more relaxed, less anxious, more calm, less emotional and less reactive.

Breathing Tips

  • Find a quiet space and breathe.
  • Put your hands over your heart and take deep breaths.
  • Breathe in for a count of 4.  Hold for a count of 4.  Breathe out for a count of 4.
  • When you’re about to lose your temper, stop and take 10 deep breaths.
  • When you’re about to indulge in some really bad for you food, stop and take 10 deep breaths.  You might change how you feel about your food choices.

Book Recommendations

The Compound Effect

This is a book about building habits with small, simple actionable steps.

When Breath Becomes Air

So, this really isn’t about breathing or how to breathe.  Instead, it is a mesmerizing book about a neurosurgeon who loses his battle to metastatic lung cancer.  It will make you think more about making every breath count.

how sleep affects your health

 

Sleep for Improved Health and Wellness

Again, pretty basic.  You sleep every day, so let’s figure out how to make the best of this daily activity.  You need to consider both the quantity and quality of your sleep.

When you are well-rested, everything falls into place.  You naturally have more energy.  Your mood is better.  Your immune system is stronger and better able to fight off invading germs.  Your skin looks better and you age slower.

When you don’t get enough sleep, you are grumpy, tired, forgetful, edgy, you look bad and you pack on more weight.

So, why NOT try to sleep better?

Sleeping Tips

Book Recommendations

Sleep Smarter 

Learn how to sleep so that you shed fat for good, disease-proof yourself, stay productive, and improve pretty much every function of your mind and body.

drink water for good health

Get Appropriately Hydrated for Optimal Health and Wellness

Again, you drink something every single day.  Let’s make those liquid calories count!

You probably already know this, but let’s cover the basics here.  Coffee, soda, tea, and wine do NOT count toward your daily hydration needs.  In fact, they subtract from it.  The more you enjoy caffeinated, sugar-filled drinks and alcohol, the MORE water you need to drink.

You need pure, clean water to keep your body energized and to help it detoxify.  Water flushes toxins from your organs and helps move them out of your body.

If you suffer from chronic headaches, you really need to up your hydration.

If you want prettier skin that is plump and glowing, you need to drink more water.

If you want to support your weight loss efforts, you need to drink more water.

Get the picture?

Hydration Tips

  • Make your water taste good.  Start with a basic squeeze of lemon. If that doesn’t do the trick for you, try lime, cucumber, mint, frozen berries, or pure essential oils.
  • Keep a water bottle filled and close by at ALL times.  Use a stainless steel container that will keep it cold and prevent any toxins from leaching into your water.  This is especially important if you put essential oils in your water.
  • Use a planner that tracks your water drinking.
  • Try herbal teas.

Book Recommendations

Your Body’s Many Cries for Water

This book will seriously make you rethink how important drinking water really is.  The next time you reach for an over the counter medicine, you might just reach for a glass of water instead.

Walking for optimal health

Walk to Get Healthier and Stronger

Once again, another basic activity you do every single day.  It’s health benefits are profound, so let’s rethink our walking habits.

Don’t make exercise complicated!  It can be as simple as going outside and going for a walk.  Now you can’t use the excuse, “I can’t afford a gym” or “I don’t have time to go to the gym”.

Building a consistent walking habit will help you lose weight, get stronger, improve your digestion, boost your mood, make you smarter, and make you prettier.

Need some motivation to get walking?  Check out Sweatcoin.  It pays you to walk!

Walking Tips

  • Walk the dog regularly.
  • Involve the family and go for walks around the neighborhood or nearby park.
  • Or don’t and unselfishly spend quality time with yourself.  (My true saving grace)
  • Kill two birds with one stone and listen to an audiobook during your walk.
  • Make it a morning or evening ritual.
  • Find an indoor walking track if you’re not a weather warrior.  ?‍♀️
  • If you have a treadmill, dust it off and USE it.

Book Recommendations

Walking for Good Health

Learn how the simple act of walking can be so powerful.

Cooking for wellness

Learn to Love Cooking for Lifelong Health and Wellness

This one might not be as simple as the rest.  Cooking is truly a lost art.  And for understandable reasons.  We are all so damn busy!  And tired!  And hungry!  And that is a dangerous combination.  When we’re tired and hungry, all bets are off.  Our brains are screaming at us for fuel and energy so we instinctively grab the quickest and easiest things we can find.

And when our kids are screaming at us for food, we’ll throw just about anything at them to quiet them down.  Because when we’re tired and hungry, we can’t even handle them being tired and hungry.  It’s a vicious cycle.

Unfortunately, this has detrimental effects on our health.  Processed and fast foods are not really foods.  They are really just chemical shit storms packaged up perfectly to meet our hunger needs.  They do NOT meet our health needs.

Cooking Tips

  • Make simple, small means.  This may not be the time for you to discover your inner Julia Child.
  • Use your crockpot.  It can be a lifesaver.
  • Plan ahead.  Try meal planning.
  • Keep your kitchen clean and organized and your pantry stocked with the basics.

Book Recommendations

Cooked

An interesting book on the history of cooking and the detriments to society if we completely lose the art of cooking.  It is also a Netflix series.

The Pollan Family Table

This book will teach you HOW to cook and is a recipe gold mine.

Essential oils to boost wellness

Essential Oils for Health and Wellness

Essential oils are a super fun, easy, and effective way to improve your overall health and wellness.  Essential oils are scientifically proven to interact at the cellular level.  Your cells are your most basic level of existence and essential oils get right into your cells and make them healthier.  Healthier cells= a healthier you.

Essential oils can support digestion, detoxification, cardiovascular health, brain health. immune system vitality, skin health, mental health, emotional health, and anti-aging, to name a few ?

So, what are you waiting for?  Go get yourself some essential oils.  I can help you decide what oils are best for you and your family based on your unique needs.  Let’s chat.

Essential Oil Tips

Book Recommendations

The Essential Life

This is my all time go-to guide for all things essential oils and wellness.

Essential Oils Ancient Medicine

This book is loaded with information on why and how to use essential oils.  And it has tons amazing recipes.

 

6 ways to improve your health

30 Comments

  1. Sarah on August 20, 2019 at 10:46 pm

    These are excellent tips. I think we could all use some help improving and maintaining our health and this article is great for that. I will have to apply these steps to my own life.

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 12:41 pm

      I hope you find some steps that work well in your routine ?

      • Denise Gardiner on August 23, 2019 at 2:52 pm

        Great tips Shellie! Yes, breathing is so helpful in relaxing your body and alleviating the stress or anger you are feeling. I know when I walk, especially in the morning with my dog, it puts the pep in my step that creates the energy I need for the day. Drinking lots of water and cooking and eating healthy food does wonders for how you look and feel!

        • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 4:38 pm

          ❤️

  2. Katie Grazer on August 23, 2019 at 7:29 am

    Incredible post, I am so much more conscious about my health since this year and this post has so much valuable input. I will have to go through it in depth over the weekend. Thank you for sharing!

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 12:37 pm

      Thank you for checking it out. Kudos to you for making changes that will impact the rest of your life.

  3. Trisha on August 23, 2019 at 11:57 am

    Awesome – thanks for sharing this! Love the book recommendations to each section!

  4. Emily Adams on August 23, 2019 at 12:09 pm

    Blue light blocking glasses are so key! They have helped me improve my sleep so much.

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 12:35 pm

      And they look really cute 🙂

  5. Annie on August 23, 2019 at 1:08 pm

    Love these tips! I’ve been trying to use more essential oils lately.

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 4:41 pm

      Warning: ⚠️ Once you get started, you might not stop ?

  6. Leah on August 23, 2019 at 2:41 pm

    Lots of good advice and tips in this post! Health and wellness is so important, I’ll be incorporating this into my life!

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 4:40 pm

      It’s the most important thing to incorporate if you want to live a long and healthy life ?

  7. Amy Harbottle on August 23, 2019 at 2:49 pm

    I love this! These are some really great and easy tips we can all add into our daily lives. Thanks for sharing!

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 4:39 pm

      Thank you! Sending you lots of happy vibes 🙂

  8. Mariam on August 23, 2019 at 3:51 pm

    Such great tips! I’ve been obsessed with essential oils lately. My diffuser is always on and I love it!

    • Shellie Lynn on August 23, 2019 at 4:37 pm

      That’s one great obsession! Essential oils work double duty when diffused. They clean the air and they help clean you out when you breathe them in 🙂

  9. Trent Peek on August 23, 2019 at 5:14 pm

    Great post! Thanks for the great read.

  10. eric tutunjian on September 4, 2019 at 11:54 am

    Great tips! It’s amazing how by creating a few basic habits that one can live a healthy life. Everyone is always looking for some secret or magic pill, but instead the answers are to just keep it simple and follow the basics.
    thanks for sharing!

    • Shellie Lynn on September 6, 2019 at 6:29 pm

      Yes, there is NO magic pill. Simple, slow and steady is the only way to go.

  11. Empower Your Wellness on September 4, 2019 at 12:22 pm

    Great tips. Little things here and there can go a long way to improving health and overall wellness.

    • Shellie Lynn on September 6, 2019 at 6:28 pm

      Small, consistent changes can be way more powerful than giant, scary changes.

  12. The Financial Freewill on September 4, 2019 at 1:39 pm

    Excellent tips Shellie! We all need to take care of ourselves no matter how busy it gets and so self care should always be a priority. I really enjoy walking (whenever I can) and I feel refreshed every time after the walk. Thanks!

  13. Kerry @ PartyPlanningSolutions.com on September 4, 2019 at 2:23 pm

    Great Reminders! I love me some essential oils and have multiple diffusers throughout my home 🙂

    • Shellie Lynn on September 6, 2019 at 6:27 pm

      Me too ?

  14. Rebecca | rebeccaspianokeys.com on September 4, 2019 at 2:57 pm

    I love the way you structured this post! it made it so easy to read and digest! I also appreciate that you went the extra mile and even included some books for recommended reading in each section!

    • Shellie Lynn on September 6, 2019 at 6:26 pm

      Thank you ?

  15. Sarah McLain on September 4, 2019 at 8:06 pm

    So much great information and I definitely need to work on the sleeping thing.

  16. Josephine on May 3, 2020 at 8:15 pm

    These are great tips! I really should get better about sleeping! I just have so much to do && once my toddler goes to sleep that’s the only time I have!

    I am drinking more water though! Which has helped!

    xo – Josephine Nychole @ Losing in Quarantine

    • Shellie Lynn on June 14, 2020 at 11:18 am

      Hi Josephine. That is an age-old dilemma! Toddlers are exhausting, and you’re right, there’s never a spare moment to get anything done. Staying hydrated and healthy snacking can help boost your energy and your mood. Good luck 😊

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