The start of a new season is a great opportunity to acquire new healthy habits. This is especially true of autumn, which is associated with the beginning of the school year and its clear schedule and schedule. We’ve picked ten actions that don’t hurt to get into a habit and explain why they are important.
Start saving money
We recently wrote about how to suspect yourself of squandering – and the beginning of a new season is great to start postponing something. It is difficult to save money if you do it on a leftover basis; it is best, on the contrary, to start with this on the day you receive your salary or any other income. Especially for savings, you can create a separate bank account (in euros or dollars), withdrawing and spending funds from which will be problematic – even if this account is not available on the card. It is worth fixing a certain percentage of the income that you will save; for example, if it is 10%, then after a year you will accumulate an amount that exceeds your monthly salary.
Leave your phone in another room overnight
Dependence on the Internet and gadgets is no longer material for jokes, but quite a reality . In severe form, it can lead to irritability, loss of sleep and appetite, and even a refusal to live with friends. However, even if you are far from a serious Internet addiction, sleeping next to your phone is not the most useful habit . Firstly, endless reading of Facebook or Twitter feeds prevents the brain from relaxing and tune in to rest – doctors recommend refraining from Internet surfing at least an hour before bedtime. Secondly, modern phones constantly vibrate, blink and glow, and all these signals degrade the quality of sleep, even if you do not notice it.
Give up the elevator and start the pedometer
Physical activity among residents of a large city is rarely sufficient: many spend eight working hours sitting, and the rest of their free time – sitting or lying down. For a healthy heart, WHO recommends 150-300 minutes of pure aerobic exercise per week – that’s at least forty minutes a day. It sounds modest, but in reality, going to the gym three times a week is usually not enough. You can add activities to your daily routine in simple ways: this fall, give up the elevator and install a pedometer, setting yourself a simple task to begin with – for example, walking at least five thousand steps a day.
Sign up for professional dental hygiene
White teeth and fresh breath are primarily a sign of health. Dentist treatment is often not covered by insurance – and this is exactly the case when preventing problems is much cheaper than solving them later. A great idea for the fall is to sign up for a professional teeth cleaning (and then do it every six months). During this procedure, various types of plaque are removed, including those invisible to the eye. This helps prevent tooth decay, periodontitis, and related complications – and the visual effect is sometimes as good as whitening .
Rest your eyes and try audiobooks
Most of us constantly work with a computer, telephone, and generally look at the screen all the time. Our parents walked more and looked less into luminous devices – but with us the opposite is true: we spend the day at the computer at work, and in our free time we watch TV shows or communicate on social networks.
Meanwhile, prolonged eye strain can lead to soreness, blurred vision, and headaches. Paper or e-books, of course, less strain on the eyes, but still do not give them a proper rest. Try to at least partially switch to audiobooks – by the way, they can be combined with long health walks from the previous paragraph.
Save the resource of decision making
In the Western scientific literature on psychology, the term ” decision fatigue ” has become quite familiar. The essence of this phenomenon is that a person has a certain limit on the number of decisions that can be made in a day. You may have heard about the study with the participation of judges: in the morning they were more inclined to make positive decisions on parole, and by the evening they were almost automatically denied all applications.
Ways to save your resource decision-making a lot , but the basic tips are as follows: plan your business and make the most important thing in the morning. Try to eliminate the need to make small decisions like choosing which jersey to wear to the gym or which cream to put on your hands. This can be helped by following the drawn up plan of action and limiting the items of choice to a minimum.
Have breakfast
A healthy and well-feeling person has more strength, ideas and enthusiasm. The secrets of a healthy lifestyle have long been no secret: move more, eat right, sleep well. Over the past decades, the world has come up with many new food models, from paleo diets to soylent drinks – but the old truth about the importance of breakfast has not gone anywhere. Skipping breakfast does not lead to overeating, according to new research – but there is a clear correlation between not eating breakfast and not being physically active. And nutritionists recommend not to forget to enrich breakfast with protein and fresh vegetables and fruits.
Take a course on Coursera
Learning new things is the best way to prevent Alzheimer’s disease . People who remain optimistic, energetic and intelligent in old age often learn something. Today, this is easier than ever before: you do not need money or time to get to school. The well-known Coursera platform offers hundreds of courses from the best universities in the world: in a couple of months, you can master the basics of linguistics without leaving your home, or understand the structure of your own digestive system. We wrote about the most interesting courses of this fall last week.
Limit your time on social media
According to a study by the University of Pittsburgh, there is an obvious link between using social media and depression: the more adults use Facebook and similar platforms, the more likely they are to develop depression. There are also separate concepts of Facebook depression – a feeling of loneliness and uselessness due to the fact that posts are not liked much – and Facebook envy , when your own life seems worthless compared to the life of friends. Procrastination and addiction are also on the list of negative effects of social media.
In general, no matter how you look at it, limiting the time you spend on social media is a great idea. Special applications or browser extensions can help you with this .
Go to psychotherapy
We all have a lot of problems: hypersensitivity to gossip, difficulty with nutrition, anxiety. In addition, not everyone grew up in ideal families – that is, childhood traumas and scars from unsuccessful relationships are often added to this list. We have compiled a detailed list of reasons to see a psychologist; In short, any feeling of discomfort, dissatisfaction or fatigue can be a sufficient stimulus. In an amicable way, every adult needs psychotherapy, and signing up for it this fall will be a healthy undertaking and a great gift for yourself.