Food choices improve our inner health in terms of mental, physical and emotional wellbeing. Here are ten tips to keep in mind:
Eat a good meal and try to eat without distraction
It is a good idea to include carbohydrates in your diet, especially in the form of whole grains, millets and legumes. Cut down simple carbohydrates like sugar, honey, sugary beverages. Have food on time and without any distraction.
Eat regular and control portion sizes
Do not skip your meals and not to dump more food on your plate.
Foregoing meals can actually lead to weight gain, because your metabolism slows down, making it harder to lose weight. Research also shows that controlling portion sizes can help prevent overindulging. Size of plates, spoons and glasses unconsciously influence how much food you eat. So beware.
Be Active
Regular physical exercise can improve your health in many ways. It can help to increase your life span, lowers your risk of diseases, develops higher bone density and lose weight. Walking is one of the simple and good exercises. Climbing the stairs instead of taking the elevator can be a clever way to incorporate exercising into your routine life. You can choose exercises that are easy to do at home or outside. When you enjoy the physical activities you pick the best exercise for yourself, which you most likely will enjoy and naturally want to do it every day. Exercising every day will make you healthy and gives you enjoyment at the same time.
Avoid processed junk food
Processed foods are not good for our body because most nutritional value is lost in making of these foods and the added preservatives are bad for our health. Reduce your intake of fast food such as French fries, chips and deep-fried foods. Deep fried food contains acrylamide, which is a potential cancer-causing chemical, apart from unhealthy fat.
Eat less salt
Too much consumption of salt leads to high blood pressure and heart disease. It has been stated by surveys that Indians mainly consume more than double the recommended amount of salt which leads to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and early death.
Get enough sleep
Good undisturbed sleep helps to maintain inner health.
Reduce stress, depression
Stress, depression are one of the major contributing factors for ill health. Meditation and good emotional wellbeing helps to reduce stress.
Maintain a healthy body weight
Healthy body weight will maintain overall health especially hormonal imbalances, obesity, heart disease and diabetes.
Drink plenty of fluids
Water is essential for our body to function. Water is needed to carry out body functions, remove waste, and carry nutrients and oxygen around our body. Since we lose water every day through urine, bowel movements, perspiration and breathing, we need to replenish our water intake. Since food intake contributes about 20 per cent of our fluid intake, we need to drink about 8-10 glasses a day to stay hydrated.
Think positive and maintain hygiene
Positive thinking makes hormone in balance and good hygienic practices prevents infections and diseases.
A healthy lifestyle is one which helps to keep and improve your health and well-being.
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Karthigaiselvi A is the Chief Dietitian and Head of the Department, Department of Clinical Nutrition and Dietetics, BGS Global Hospitals, Bangaluru
