6 Simple Steps 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.

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.

 

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

• Develop an evening routine that promotes restful sleep.
• Avoid the news before going to bed.
• Limit screen time before bed.
• Use blue light blocking glasses in the evening.
• Try an all-natural supplement that is non-addicting and without side effects.
• Diffuse relaxing essential oils at nighttime.
• Keep electronics and WIFI out of your room.
• Keep your room dark and cool.
• Try a weighted blanket.

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.

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.

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.

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 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

• Use them regularly.  They get into your system quickly and they are metabolized quickly.  You need to use them frequently to experience their health benefits.
• Keep a diffuser in the rooms you use the most.  Keep your favorite oils diffusing when you’re home.
• Find some roller ball recipes and keep homemade remedies with you at all times.  Keep them in a fun, pretty pouch.
• Teach your kids how to use them safely and empower them to use them as needed.
• Add a few drops of pure, safe-for-consumption essential oils to your water or tea.

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.