A few of my highlights!
Over the past year, I have mainly focused on my physical and mental health. It doesn’t matter how busy I get, my physical and mental health have become my priority.
Along the way, I have come across different lifestyle tips that have either helped me or didn’t make much of a difference.
This blog post is about my favorite lifestyle tips that have improved my life. This blog post is for anyone who is looking to improve their lifestyle too!
Let’s dive in.
1 – Drinking a Gallon of Water a Day
When people see my gallon water bottle, they are so surprised at how I can drink that much water in one day.
Honestly, drinking a gallon of water has helped me in a couple of ways.
First, I am always drinking just enough water. Even if I end up just finishing it halfway, that’s still enough water for me.
Second, unsurprisingly it makes me need to use the bathroom all the time. The reason why that is a good this is because it makes me stand up, walk to the bathroom, and not sit down at my desk all day (because I’ve always had sitting-down jobs).
Personally, for me, I have seen the benefits to my skin and also my appetite. I find that my skin has kept getting clearer, and I don’t get overly hungry.
RELATED: Essential Habits for Personal Development
2 – Daily Movement
Another important non-negotiable daily habit is daily movement.
Of course, it is a typical lifestyle tip, however, the ones who say to choose your favorite activity are my faves.
Truthfully, if you don’t enjoy the physical activity you’re doing, it’s going to be hard to motivate yourself to do it.
So that’s why, finding a physical activity that you enjoy and feel motivated to do, ensures that you get your daily movement in.
Also, daily movement is not always just intentional exercise (e.g. going to the gym or going for a run). It is also when you do other activities where you are on your feet for a while. Examples include cleaning the house for 30 minutes, or walking around the mall for 30 minutes. Sometimes, a good starting point for doing daily movement is doing those activities that don’t feel like exercise.
3 – Meal planning & Meal prepping
I’ll admit, sometimes I get lazy with this. However, every time I do it, I don’t regret it because it makes my life so much easier during the week.
First, having lunch prepped and ready to go saves me time and energy in the evenings to cook. It also saves me money from buying lunch. Also, after a whole day of work or whatever I am doing, the last thing I want to do is cook. That’s why having something meal prepped ahead of time saves me that energy from cooking. All I have to do is heat it up which is an absolute lifesaver.
So yeah, even though this is also a typical lifestyle tip, it is an extremely helpful one.
RELATED: Time Management Tips To Manage Your Time Better
4 – Having a good morning and night routine over having a strict wake-up time
Don’t get me wrong, having a strict wakeup time can be helpful as well for your body clock.
Personally, for me, I find myself beating myself up when I don’t wake up at the usual time, even if the reasons for it are beyond my control. For example, an event ran late beyond my control and that’s why I had to sleep late, and hence, sleep a little extra time.
However, what was more important for me was to just have good “bookends” aka your morning and night routine. This is where no matter what time you wake up, at least you have a routine to bookend your days.
Yeah, maybe I didn’t wake up at my usual time, but I still stick with my morning routine and I feel great to start the day. And maybe I couldn’t sleep at my normal time, but I still stick with my night routine and I feel like I have winded down.
As long as I don’t do the things that ruin my morning or night routine, I can still have a good morning and night regardless of what time I wake up.
5 – Trying out a new recipe every week
I’ve never been a big cooker until I moved into my own place where I had to learn how to cook for myself.
I usually find recipe ideas on TikTok and Instagram, and my saved folder has so many recipes.
That’s why I challenge myself to try one new recipe every week so I can enhance my cooking skills.
This is a great way to keep the “making food at home” journey exciting because sometimes it can get boring having the same thing over and over again.
Also, trying new things is the best way to learn and discover more about yourself.
RELATED: 8 Hobbies To Make Life More Interesting
6 – Mindful Eating Over Dieting
I just want to note that these are MY favorite lifestyle tips that improved my life, rather than giving you tips. This is because this particular tip is something that has worked specifically for me.
*honesty hour* I have struggled with my relationship with food and my body because of diet culture.
I beat myself up if I didn’t stick with my diet.
I deprived myself of so many foods because I didn’t believe that they were “healthy”.
That’s why, over time, mindful eating over dieting is something that has worked for me to improve my relationship with food and my body.
This is not to say that I just eat whatever I want. By being mindful of what I eat, I’m actually mindful and more intentional with what I put in my body. I listen to my body’s cues and its cravings. If it’s craving something, I’m not going to deprive myself of it. For example, I used to not let myself eat a bag of chips. However, now, if I am craving chips and I have them, I will eat them. I will feel satisfied and I’m not beating myself up for it.
This is where great tips such as meal prepping and trying new recipes have been helpful. By expanding my creativity and improving my preparation, I can still mindfully watch what I eat, while still enjoying the foods I enjoy.
Sometimes, it’s not always about sticking with what is popular.
Take a SMALL STEP
Here is a small step on how you can implement some of these tips into your lifestyle if you’d like:
- Find out your best water intake, and stick with it.
- List down at least 3 physical activities you enjoy, and know you can stick with (so you can do your daily movement).
- List down at least 3 meals that you know you can meal prep and cook. If you want to take it a step further, have a crack at meal planning.
- Write down your current morning and night routine, are there changes you want to make?
- List down at least 3 new recipes you’d like to try.
To Wrap Up
Hopefully, reading about 6 of my favorite lifestyle tips that have improved my life gave you some ideas on what you can do to improve your lifestyle. Drinking a gallon of water, having my daily movement, doing meal planning and trying new recipes, sticking with my morning and night routines, and also practicing strategies that helped me improve my relationship with myself have significantly helped me.
If you’d like to read more content like this, I’ve actually got a free book called Small Steps to Progression which you can download here in the Free Resources Library.
In the meantime, here’s to finding ways to improve ourselves every single day.
-Lauren 😊
P.S I reccomend you read these blog posts next:
- How to Get Your Life Together for 2024
- 5 Mistakes You’re Making in Your Lifestyle Routines
- 5 Little But Effective Ways You’re Improving Your Habits
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hi, this is Lauren! I’m a law grad from Melbourne, Australia. On laurenbarri.com, I create content on all things personal development, productivity, self-care, and habits! I am super passionate about these topics because of how they helped me in all areas of my life, and I want to share it with others!
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