While hundreds of millions of people choose to diet each year, there are actually far more effective ways to boost your body’s overall health. From finding a form of daily physical exercise that you enjoy to developing healthier eating habits, these lifestyle changes promise to do your body much more good than a diet ever could.
Daily Physical Exercise
While hitting the gym or pounding the pavements may not sound at all appealing to you, daily physical exercise will go a long way in keeping your body, and health, in shape. Around 30 minutes of moderate exercise a day should be sufficient, and this could include a wide range of activities. From the simple act of walking to work, or taking the stairs instead of the elevator, to learning a martial arts that has always appealed to you, to rocking to your favorite tunes at home every evening, it does not take too much effort to ensure that 30 minutes of each day are spent engaging in an activity that gets your heart pumping.
Healthy Eating Habits
Healthy eating habits consist of much more than just eating a balanced diet. In addition to consuming a large amount of fresh, plant-based, whole foods, there are many other small changes that you can make. No matter how hungry you may feel at each meal time, slow down the speed at which you eat, as eating fast is known to trick the brain into making you feel as though you are still hungry, even though you may have actually already eaten all that your body needs. You should also be practicing portion control, which can really help to cut back on unnecessary calories, but without you having to forgo your favorite treats. For those who find it difficult to change their eating habits, you may find it useful to keep a food diary, recording everything that you eat, along with when you eat it. This will help you to easily identify any unhealthy eating habits, and set about making the right changes.
Stress Control
Stress can have a huge impact on your eating, and exercising, habits, and it is much easier to implement new lifestyle changes when you are not suffering from huge amounts of stress in other areas of your life. Meditating is one of the best ways to relax your mind, and you would only need to set aside ten minutes a day for this. Likewise, yoga has been proven to be a great way to relieve stress, and brings with it plenty of other health benefits. For those who are just not keen on meditation and yoga, there are many other ways in which you can de-stress, from writing in a journal to treating yourself to a spa session to finding a new hobby or passion.
While dieting has always been considered to be the quickest way to get in shape, research has shown that more and more people are now recognizing that a few simple lifestyle changes can actually bring about far greater benefits. Whether this means working on portion control and keeping a food diary to help you with that, or motivating yourself to do some exercise each day, these lifestyle changes will soon have you looking and feeling better than ever.
