We all accumulate bad habits, both within our diets and our everyday lives, which aren’t necessarily great for our health. Coupled with unhealthy food, some of which masquerades as healthy, we’re not always helping our bodies to be the best they can be. Winter is a great time to start reconsidering your choice of lifestyle so that changes can be implemented on the first day of the new year. Try quitting these four things and see how much you can improve your health. Your body will thank you.
Four Vices You Just Don’t Need
Staying up late
If you’re more of a night owl than a morning person, you’ll know how difficult it is to force yourself to go to bed at a reasonable hour. But it could be causing you serious harm.
People who stay up late are found to have a higher likelihood of obesity, high blood pressure, and even depression. They also lack energy. While good-quality supplements like Energy Renew by Gundry MD will help, it is also important that you get on a better sleeping schedule.
It’s a difficult cycle to kick, but if you start to follow a routine, and push yourself to sleep earlier and wake up earlier, your body will thank you.
Caffeine
Our couple of cups of coffee or energy drinks a day can seem harmless, but it’s actually having a huge effect on our bodies. Caffeine actually contributes to high blood pressure, feelings of stress and anxiety, and gives us headaches.
People who quit caffeine report that their quality of sleep is consequently improved, and they even lose weight. Tea, coffee, and energy drinks may seem innocuous, but they can actually be doing more harm than good.
Smoking
Cigarette smoking has become less and less fashionable and socially accepted in recent years in favor of electronic cigarettes and e-liquids. But some people find the habit harder to kick than others. It’s often the case that people don’t feel like they can relate to the long-term impacts we’re all made aware of due to their lack of immediacy.
It’s important to remember that the benefits of quitting smoking can be seen almost straight away, especially socially. We stop smelling like an ashtray, our sense of taste returns, we start to look better, and the financial savings become apparent very quickly. If you still smoke, maybe this new year you can kick the habit once and for all.
Sports drinks
Made and marketed for athletes and sports people, sports drinks claim to contain all the sugars and electrolytes your body loses after a workout. In actuality, they contain far more sugar than your body needs, and far more than it can burn off efficiently.
This means that the extra calories consumed after a workout are being deposited in your body as fat – surely this is the opposite effect to the one desired. We are better off drinking good old tap water, or even milk, instead of sports drinks after exercise.
Right now is the perfect time of year to start to think about new year’s resolutions and changes you want to make to your health. If you give these four things up, you’re off to a flying start on the journey to improve your health.