Crafting the Optimal Wellness Plan for Day and Night

Optimal health and wellness isn't a goal you can accomplish buy only occasionally focusing on your needs. If you want to maximize your body's ability to be well and healthy, it has to be a task which you dedicate yourself to 24 hours a day. This means paying very close attention to both your nightly sleep habits as well as your daily waking habits. Everything from when and how you eat to your exercise to your emotional coping skills and beyond can have a subtle yet profound impact on how good you feel. Hopefully, we can help you figure out here today which areas of your life could potentially be changed for the better. And we will attempt to do our best to offer sage advice which might just help you achieve your health and wellness goals.

A Daytime Optimal Wellness Plan

The daytime hours are the ones that feel the most important when trying to improve one's health and wellness. After all, that's when you're awake. That's when your conscious mind notices how healthy you feel (or suffers from how healthy you do not feel). It's also the portion of the day where you have the most control to change your health and wellness habits for the better.

The most important thing you should start doing today - if you aren't doing it already - is to find ways to incorporate more exercise into your daily life. For the past ten thousand years of human existence, we haven't been sitting around at work desks during the brightest, most beautiful hours of the day; we've been moving around and getting things done while staying active and social. Whether it's something as simple as taking the stairs instead of an elevator, walking around your neighborhood in the evening, or even bouncing on a yoga ball at work instead of sitting in a traditional chair, the more you can move your body during the day, the better you will feel.

Speaking of humans being social creatures, loneliness is one of the biggest - but often least talked about - causes of a shortened, less healthy life span. Even people who otherwise engage in unhealthy habits (such as smoking, drinking alcohol to excess, etc) will live a longer, healthier life than someone who abstains from such bad habits but doesn't have an active social life. Try calling someone who is important to you at least once a week just to talk and see how they're doing. Ask a friend if they have a minute to listen to you complain about your job; it'll help alleviate some of your own stress, and be sure to return the favor to them whenever they need it! Reaching out and making social connections is good for both your physical and your mental health. You can even combine exercise and socialization by joining a fitness class! You'll be killing two birds with one stone.

Last, obviously, has to do with diet. Are you eating healthy foods? There are all sorts of fad diets out there today, and it can be hard to figure out which one to follow. But the hard truth is: there is no one, silver bullet solution for a healthy diet. One person's body will react to certain foods in a completely different way than the person next to them. You just have to experiment and find out what works for you.

But there is one universal truism we can tell you: incorporate more whole foods into your diet. What does this mean? It means that the food on the tip of your fork which is inches away from your mouth should have come directly to you from wherever it was growing. Vegetables, fruits, eggs, and fish are all good examples of this.

A microwave pizza you bought in the frozen food section of your local grocery store, on the other hand, is a perfect example of the opposite of a whole food.

An Optimal Nighttime Wellness Plan

How are your sleeping habits? Do you know whether or not they are healthy, or if they are the reason you are having trouble sleeping at night? Well, there are some easy ways to tell. Below is a list of healthy sleep habits that most people follow when they want a good night's rest. They include:

Turning off electronic devices within a few hours of bedtime. The harsh blue light from electronics prevent your body from producing the melatonin it needs to get to sleep.
Waking up and going to bed at the same time each day. If you do this consistently enough, you won't even have to set an alarm anymore! Your body will instinctively rise and shine in the morning and wind down in the evening with very little effort.
Keep your environment cool, dark, and distraction-free. Distractions include pets, television, your cell phone, or even a computer.
Don't eat spicy foods, exercise, or over stimulate yourself too close to bedtime. Doing either of these activities within an hour or two of laying your head on the pillow can leave your brain frantically hyperactive when it should be relaxing into a slumber.
Mindful meditation can help soothe an anxious and/or restless mind if you find yourself tossing and turning at night. The simplest way to accomplish this is to focus on each breath; both breathing in, and breathing out. Pay close attention to how your body feels and moves with each breath. You can even focus on the counting your breaths if distracting thoughts still bother you. Learn more about Enhancing your Mindfulness.

Being your best, healthiest self isn't just a casual pastime - it's a lifelong dedication that you owe to yourself and the people you care about the most. The healthier and happier you are, the more successful you will be at work, in your personal life, and the more satisfied you will be with life in general. Even if you start slow and only practice a few of these tips over the next couple of days or weeks, it can dramatically impact your quality of life.