Better Health Habits – 5 Simple Steps to Start

Posted on January 17, 2007
Filed Under Fitness, Nutrition, Weight Management | Leave a Comment

Everyone wants to stay healthy, and most know they need to develop healthier habits if they want to maintain their health and vitality throughout a long life. But as is often the case, the urgent things in life get in the way of the important, and getting started is once more pushed to the bottom of the list.

So what’s the best way to get a move on? By taking only a few small steps, and making those steps as easy as possible. That way there’s a much greater likelihood of success, and success builds on itself.

Here are 5 super easy steps that anyone can begin with, and the great thing is they are at the top of the list of what will make the biggest improvements.

Take Vitamin C and E everyday. These are the top anti-oxidants for benefiting your immune system. Take 400IU Vitamin E in the morning, and 1000mg Vitamin C spaced out with 500mg morning and evening.
Eat breakfast daily. Surprisingly enough this one step can make a real difference in weight management. By eating breakfast, you take your body out of fasting mode and kick-start your metabolism into burning calories. Not eating breakfast actually tricks the body into conserving calories and can lower metabolism as much as 40% as it starts reacting to starvation.
Eat fish a couple days a week. Provides great heart-health benefits. Besides being a good source of protein and low in saturated fat, fish has omega-3 fatty acids which reduce the risk of heart disease. Also, if you’re eating fish at meals, you’re consuming less red meat which should be kept down to only once a week anyway.
Walk 30 minutes more every day. Don’t make it exercise, and don’t try to carve out extra time for it. Just do it at every opportunity. Use the stairs, park further away, visit that co-worker instead of emailing, etc. Every 20 steps burns approximately 1 calorie. Just do the math to see the difference.
Get more sleep. Your body needs it for both physical and emotional health. Most American adults suffer from too little sleep and many are sleep deprived. You need 8 to 9 hours every night. Turn off the TV and go to bed.

These steps are so simple, but can make an amazing difference health-wise. It takes only about 30 days to create a habit and reinforce it. Do these 5 for that period and then start on the next 5. Over time the habits become ingrained and so much a part of your life, you won’t even think about them, but you’ll definitely like the results!

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