4 Simple Focuses to Improve Your Wellness

You run into hundreds of viewpoints about health and wellness every day. Everybody has an opinion on what works best: acupuncture, yoga, running, meditation. While there are thousands of ways to practice wellness and health, it can easily get overwhelming. These 4, simple focuses to improve your wellness can assuredly be agreed upon by any health or fitness coach out there.

Simplicity, in most things, is key. That’s certainly true in terms of your health and well being. Adopting practices that invite happiness and simplicity into your life, rather than rules and stress, will help you build long term success.

Move Daily

Daily exercise is so important to your physical, mental and emotional health.

Falling into the habit of not moving is much easier than creating a habit of consistent movement, and it’s important to not let yourself get lost in the ease of being sedentary.

Focus on making movement part of your daily routine. Some days, that may mean a trip to the gym or a run in the park. Other days, that may mean a 20 minute walk with your dog or 15 minutes of yoga practice with an online coach.

It doesn’t take long to create a habit of movement and this is one of those simple focuses that can have long-lasting and deeply ingrained, positive effects on your well being.

Eat to Nourish Your Body

Nutrition and diets can easily become a complicated topic, but it doesn’t have to be. Keep it simple.

What does it mean to nourish your body?

Eat foods that make you feel good, from head to toe. Choose ingredients that are whole and unprocessed, full of nutrients that give your body what it needs to live and thrive.

Focus on balance and color. Fill your plate with lean proteins, vegetables and fruits in every color of the rainbow, heart healthy and belly-filling fats and fiber-rich whole grains and starches.

Rest, Relax and Recover

As important as movement is in your healthy routine, recovery is just as important.

Focus on getting 7-8 hours of sleep each night. Allow your body time to rest. Appreciate it for the life it gives you and the movement it allows you.

Rest and recovery is one of the best ways to manage stress, both acute and chronic.

One of the best practices I’ve adopted lately is putting my phone away by 9 pm. It’s the start of my nightly ritual, signalling to my brain that it’s time to settle down and get sleepy. It’s a simple, yet effective practice that’s increased my overall well being tremendously.

Connect

Of all of these simple focuses, this one is perhaps the most uncomplicated, yet most personal.

Connect with yourself.

What do I mean by that?

Spend 5 minutes every day bringing your thoughts inwards. Are you anxious? Do you need a break?

Start each day with a gratitude journal. Some days you may simply be thankful for the coffee sitting next to you, or the smell of freshly cut grass. Other days, you may feel more thankful for the friends you laughed with last night, or your awe of nature. There are no wrong gratitudes.

And connect with the people you love.

Focus on reaching out to one person every day. This action becomes so obvious to me, when I think about how easily a smile comes to my face when I get a text message from someone who is thinking of me out of the blue.

Be that smile for someone else.