While many of us try to make healthy decisions in our everyday life, March is solely devoted to the topic of nutrition. This month focuses on “the importance of making informed food choices and developing sound eating and physical activity habits”.
It’s important for us to make choices through food and exercise that will benefit our minds and bodies. We’ve put together a list of five important practices for living a more health-conscious life!
Hydrate
It’s recommended that we drink eight 8-ounce glasses of water every day. Sounds easy, and yet many of us have an issue remembering to drink the right amount of water, or any water, throughout the day. How do we get ourselves to drink more water?
Leave a 16 oz glass of water on your bedside table and drink the full glass right when you wake up. You’ll be ¼ of the way through your recommended water.
Set a timer on your phone, watch, or computer to remind yourself to drink water.
fuse your water with fruit to give it some extra flavor.
Meal Planning and Prep
Cooking a meal every night can be overwhelming, especially after a long day of work or school. A great way to manage this time consuming task is to get it out of the way in just one day.
On Sunday night, cook a large amount of food to prepare a few days worth of meals. Put these meals in to-go containers, so you grab a meal before heading out to your plans for the day.
Simple Ingredient Swaps
One of the easiest ways to become more health conscious is to substitute a few unhealthy items while cooking and baking.
For Cooking:
Use fat-free non-dairy, plain yogurt instead of sour cream
Zucchini noodles instead of pasta noodles
Substitute white bread for whole grain
For Baking:
Replace half the recommended oil with applesauce
Substitute a mashed banana for butter for brownies
Use raw honey instead of sugar
For Cooking and/or Baking
Swap out salt with lemon juice
Buy reduced-fat peanut butter
Reduce Food Waste
It's estimated that 1.3 billion tons of food go to waste every year. We tend to overestimate the portions we need, causing us to buy more food than we can consume. Being more mindful of our food intake and how much we trash will help us to lessen this waste.
Try composting your food scraps! It’s easier than you might think, and you can add decomposed compost to your potted plants.
Take empty jars and containers to the grocery store with you. Not only will you help to cut down on plastic containers, but you’ll also only be able to take what fits in those containers!
Exercise
Many of us find exercising boring, hard, or too time-consuming. The good news is that there’s no right or wrong way to work out! The key is to find a routine that fits in your schedule, and that you actually enjoy doing.
Try to walk for at least 30 minutes every day. It doesn’t even need to be outside – take a few laps around your house, office, or even the mall!
Watch free workout videos on YouTube. You can find thousands of videos that cover a myriad of different genres and lengths of exercises.
Try more unconventional activities, such as rock climbing, yoga, and ballet.
Written by the fabulously talented Grace Chesko
Comments