If you’re new to this blog and you look around you may feel like I am contradicting myself sometimes. On the one hand, I have posts that are all about commitment, the 100% solution, and being hard-core about your health. Then on the other hand I have a few short little listicle posts like this one that break being healthy down into small, context-less steps. So what gives?
Well, this blog is meant to be a resource for everyone who is at all interested in learning about or implementing the elements of a nourished and healing lifestyle. Most of us didn’t just wake up one morning and arbitrarily decide to go from eating easy mac, low fat yogurt, and diet soda to eating on the autoimmune protocol. There was a process that got us to that point. We took smaller steps and experimented with things that helped us decided if fully committing was “worth it”. So, my goal in these short posts is to help that audience choose the steps that are going to make the biggest impact and show the biggest results as a means of encouraging them to further commit to themselves and their health.
If you have already made the commitment, then good for you, please go eat some liver and drink some bone broth and continue being committed, I am proud of you! While you are drinking your bone broth you can send this post to that person in your life who asks you, “ I am not ready to do full AIP, but what are a few things I can do to help my health like you have?” Hopefully, this will help get them off on the right foot!
5 Steps For a Healthier Life:
-
Eat Healthy Fats:
Yes, fat. Fat is not evil, the chemicals and sugar used to replace the fat in your fat free salad dressing is evil. Fat is required for every cell in your body to function properly and it is highly satiating which means it will help stabilize your blood sugar, keep you from over eating, and make you feel full faster and longer. Examples of healthy fat are avocados, coconut oil, animal fat from grass fed or pastured animals, olive oil, or fish oil. Eat a small amount of healthy fat with every meal and I guarantee you will notice a difference in how you feel.
-
Get Probiotics:
Whether your probiotics come from a high quality supplement like this or from fermented foods like kombucha or sauerkraut, start consuming some daily. Not only do probiotics help your digestion they also help your immune system and they play a crucial role in reducing inflammation.
-
Sleep:
Yeah yeah yeah we all know that sleep is important. You have probably been hearing that for ages, but for real though sleep is important. Sleep is what allows your body to regulate stress hormones, heal, and do all of the things that increase your quality of life. Without adequate sleep your body gets out of whack fast and you have a problem. Try to come up with a sleep schedule that gives you time to sleep for at least 8 hours each night and stick with it!
-
Take Walks Outside:
Taking walks outside achieves multiple purposes. First, it’s a good, manageable form of exercise. Low impact, moderate exercises, like walking has been shown to be hugely beneficial for health. Being outside, is a big stress reliever for a lot of people and allows you to get some sunshine which is good for vitamin D production and the immune system.
-
Take Intentional Down Time
Intentional down time whether it is for 2 hours each night or one day a week is probably the best give you can give yourself. By downtime I mean, time free of obligations that would keep you from taking care of yourself. By intentional, I mean schedule it. If you and your family agree that Friday night is a good night for intentional downtime that means Friday night is off limits to outside social events and free for you all to do whatever things you find fun and relaxing.
One Comment
Comments are closed.