Improve Your Quality of Life with These Healthy Living Tips

Improve Your Quality of Life with These Healthy Living Tips

Did you know that eating well, staying in shape, and feeling healthy are three keys to living a happy life?  Studies abound suggesting that healthy living equates to happy living.  If you are looking to boost your energy levels, improve your self-confidence, and feel better in general, then incorporate the following health tips into your lifestyle!

Increase Your Water Intake

While there is some truth to the old adage that people should drink eight glasses of water a day, a person’s optimal water intake is dependent on her age, weight, diet, exercise habits, and the climate in which she lives.  In warmer, dryer places, ten or twelve eight-ounce glasses are usually the recommended minimum.

Consume Fewer Processed Foods

Processed foods are anathema to health for a few reasons.

• In general, they lack nutritional value—even when they contain fruits and vegetables, most of the nutrients have been leeched out of them during the manufacturing or packaging process.
• Processed foods contain unhealthy, unnatural chemicals that are high in cholesterol and can increase one’s risk of heart disease.
• They are addictive! Once you start eating certain types of chips, crackers, and cookies, it truly can be hard to stop until the entire package is gone.

If your guilty pleasures are cheese-baked snack crackers or chips soaked in partially hydrogenated soybean oil, there is no reason to deprive yourself of the joy you derive from eating these foods entirely.  You should, however, educate yourself on the health effects associated with these snacks and exercise portion control when eating them.

Watch that Sweet Tooth

If you have a penchant for sugar-coated cookies, delectably sweet pastries, or sugar-infused beverages, curb your diet so that you consume less of these treats.  Instead of reaching for the cookie jar every time you step foot into the kitchen, treat sugar-packed foods and beverages as rewards.  If you make it through the morning and afternoon without eating something sweet, then allow yourself a little dessert after dinner—and truly enjoy it.  Over time, you may find that your sugar cravings decrease in both frequency and intensity.

Drink Less Alcohol

Are you the type that enjoys a glass of wine with dinner or a beer out with friends?  Good for you.  You deserve to have fun.  But even if you consume just five beverages a week, eliminating one of those drinks can provide you with several benefits.  It will cut a few calories from your diet, can lower high blood pressure, and improve the quality of your sleep (remember: drinking alcohol may help you fall asleep easily, but the sleep you get after drinking several beverages is not good sleep).

Cut Back on Coffee

Humans have been drinking coffee for more than 1,000 years.  You don’t need to cut it out of your diet, but try not to be dependent on coffee or other caffeinated beverages for energy.  One cup a day should be enough.

Train Your Thoughts

A person’s mentality can have a considerable impact on her well-being.  Maintain an awareness of your thoughts; and the next time your mind sets down on that dark road to Negativity City, divert immediately.  Remind yourself of the good things in your life, and try to stay as positive as possible.  Identifying negative triggers and eliminating them from your life can also help with this.

Bike to Work

If you work within five miles of your apartment community, you may find that cycling to work actually takes less time than driving, once you have factored in the hassles associated with parking and the time it takes you to walk to and from your car on either end.  Your daily commute will work a range of leg muscles and do wonders for your heart. It will probably impress your coworkers, and there are the obvious environmental benefits to consider as well.

Find Your Exercise Niche

Exercise is something that you should enjoy!  If you grudgingly force yourself to the gym three times a week to carry out that fitness routine you’ve had for years but don’t really like, try something new.  Give yoga a shot.  Join a softball league.  Try swimming laps in your apartment pool.

Work Different Muscle Groups

That being said, the exercises that fit into this niche should provide you with a range of fitness benefits.  Do a bit of research, and make sure that the physical activity you engage in works all your major muscle groups, in addition to improving your cardiovascular health.

Make Time for Yourself

Stress is one of health’s greatest enemies.  If you don’t feel like you have any time to do things you want to do, you probably have more than your fair share of stress in your life.  Rearrange your schedule so that you have at least one hour a day to do something you love, whether it be reading a book; watching TV; catching up with an old friend; wearing a chef’s hat in your apartment kitchen; or something else entirely.

Stay Calm

As soon as you find yourself in a situation that you just know is forcing your blood pressure upward, remember to breathe.  Deep, slow breaths can help you calm down.  So can a moment of reflection.  If possible, step back from the situation you are in and think deeply about it.  Remaining calm during turbulent times takes practice, but it is a virtue you can obtain.  Some people find that regular meditation helps them to quiet their overactive minds and keep calm when anxiety-inducing situations arise.

Get Enough Rest

It may not be possible to overemphasize the importance of regularly getting the sleep that your body and mind need.  And in this fast-paced modern world, not nearly enough of us get that.  Sleep is restorative.  It is healing.  And it is one of the major gateways to living a productive, healthy, and happy life.

Since a healthy diet and regular exercise have been linked to sleep quality, all of the advice in this article is interconnected.  Take the aforementioned tips to heart, and that high-quality life you have been pining after will soon be yours.  Share the secrets of your success with your family and friends, and the whole world will be a better place.  Equipped with well-appointed fitness centers, appliance-rich kitchens, spacious grounds, and comfortable furniture, AMLI’s apartments provide the perfect environment for staying in shape, eating well, and getting the rest you need.  Live the life you love.  And love the life you live.  In your AMLI apartment home.