Adopting a Healthy Lifestyle - Essay Example

Adopting a healthy lifestyle It is increasingly becoming difficult for people to adopt a healthy lifestyle because of their hectic schedules and unhealthy habits like eating fast food, lack of physical exercise and stress. A healthy lifestyle does not demand that we denounce our existing lifestyles. In fact it can be adopted by making slight changes in our habits and preferences related to our food and activities and the ways we handle stressful situations. “… the adoption of a healthy lifestyle will facilitate overcoming stress. The healthy lifestyle includes: good feeding practices by eating a balanced diet, avoiding junk food… doing regular exercise…” (Landow, 76) Thus, adopting a healthy lifestyle is important to resist different kinds of health problems and it is only possible if we eat balanced diet, exercise and avoid stress. A balanced diet is essential for adopting a healthy lifestyle. Everyone has certain food preferences and perhaps this is one of the reasons why our diets are mostly comprised of a certain type of food. We tend to omit a lot of healthy foods just because we do not like their taste. For instance, people who like meat-based dishes are prone to consume lesser amounts of fresh foods like vegetables and fruits. Similarly, there are a lot of people who do not like dairy products. These are typical examples of imbalanced diets. Our meals should ideally comprise of healthy amounts of proteins, carbohydrates, minerals, vitamins, good fats and water. Thus it is important to explore new tastes and foods in order to include all the essential components of a balanced diet. Fast food like deep fried chicken or fish or potatoes, are richer in calories but low in nutritional value. We need to adapt our bodies slowly to a healthy lifestyle because it is not easy to curb our cravings for our favorite fast food. Alternately, we can also make some healthy changes to the ways our food is normally cooked. Our recipes can be made healthier if we reduce the amount of fats and sugar in our everyday meals. Opting to grill or stir fry our meat and vegetables can greatly reduce our caloric intake and retain their nutrition. Eating fresh food is healthier than eating preserved, canned or processed food. This is because preserved food contains certain additives that may be unhealthy. Moreover, preserved foods are high in sugar or salt, which is also not healthy. It is indeed tempting to buy a can of peeled and diced fruits or vegetables rather than purchasing fresh fruit and vegetables and going through the trouble of washing and peeling them. But the effort is worthwhile because nothing can beat the nutritional value of fresh fruits/vegetables. Eating on time is the key of getting the maximum benefit of food. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day and it should be packed with nutrition- not with calories or caffeine! Staying hungry for longer periods of time is one of the reasons why people turn to high caloric food or they end up eating more than the requirement of their bodies. If we take our meals on time then we would not be tempted to turn to unhealthy snacks between our meals. Eating late at night is utterly against the idea of healthy lifestyle because we must give our bodies some time to digest the food before going to bed. Although for many people, it is impossible to refrain completely from junk food, fizzy drinks, caffeine, alcohol, and smoking, yet they can slowly limit and reduce its intake for the betterment of their health. Drinking clean water, free of sugar and additives, can improve our health and prevent our bodies from getting dehydrated. When buying groceries, we can avoid shopping impulsively because we end up with a lot of high caloric food. Therefore, before going to buy groceries, one should make a list of the things one wants and stick to it. This is not to suggest that we deprive ourselves of our favorite foods but one must limit the intake of sugar and plan one’s meals by including healthy foods. Our sedentary lifestyles are one of the primary causes of many health ailments but this can be managed if we understand the importance of physical activities, which is an integral part of a healthy lifestyle. Exercise increases metabolism and burns calories, thus making us more energetic. Physical activities like brisk walk or playing your favorite sport or joining a health club can set you on the track of a healthy lifestyle. Many people are unable to take out time for physical exercise due to their busy schedules. However, there are ways to incorporate physical exercise in our daily lives by opting to walk even while going to our offices or shopping malls. One can also start using the stairs instead of elevators at workplace and elsewhere. It would be greatly helpful if you have a friend with whom you can plan some sort of physical exercise on weekly basis. This will motivate you to stay on track and keep a record of your physical activities. People working in offices are usually sitting for longer periods of time while working on their laptops or computers. Though a healthy lifestyle is primarily comprised of eating balanced diet and indulging in physical exercise, however, sleep and rest are also critical to maintain it. We all know how good it feels when we get proper sleep and rest, and how lethargic we feel when our bodies are over worked or exhausted. Rest, sleep and positive outlook towards life help in dealing with stress in our day to day lives. People tend to eat more when under stress, ultimately leading to weight gain. We cannot avoid stressful situations but we can definitely try to handle stress. Some people are gifted with the ability of handling stress naturally; but there are many others that may need counseling to learn the techniques of handling stress. Hanging out with likeminded people or groups that work for a social or charitable cause can be greatly helpful because it takes off one’s mind from personal worries. There are no hard and fast rules of managing stress because each individual responds differently when under stress. Thus it is important to understand what relaxes you so that you can turn towards it whenever you had a stressful day- even if it is lying down on a couch and watch your favorite TV show or reading a book or spending time with your friends or families. Thus, we can adopt a healthy lifestyle even with our hectic schedules by paying attention to our diet, physical exercise and techniques of handling stress. A healthy lifestyle will enable us to enjoy our lives to its fullest and avoid various health problems that arise due to eating unhealthy food, weight gain and stress. We need to bring balance in our lives and this would only be possible if we sit back and review our eating habits, sleep patterns, and the different kinds of activities we indulge ourselves in. Work Cited Landow, Mery (e.d). Stress and Mental Health of College Students. New York: Nova science pubishers, 2006. Read More