Steps To Follow for Aging Gracefully

If you want to age gracefully, you’ll need to make some changes. You cannot stop the changes of time, but accepting changes and finding meaningful activities are the keys to aging well. While aging is inevitable, yet, following several steps can lead to healthy, happy aging.

There is there is no reason why advancing years must be associated with misery, pain or mental decline.

Get Enough Sleep

Sleep is one of the critical keys to good health. Six to eight hours a night is the average for adults. A study has shown that if you have inadequate sleep for just one night, your ability to function the next day can be lessened by 30%.

Getting enough sleep benefits you by enabling healing of both body and mind as well as strengthening the immune system to enable it to cope with stresses of the day.

As well as making your life miserable, not getting enough sleep can have serious implications on your health.

Reducing effectiveness of your immune system will result in you being more susceptible to stress related disorders including more susceptibility to tumor growth as well as weakened physical performance and mental clarity.

There will be disruption to your endocrine system, reducing production of certain hormones such as Human Growth Hormone.

Human Growth Hormone helps you look and feel younger and deficiency of this hormone is related to faster aging, decrease of muscle mass, strength and increased fat absorption.

Maintain Social Connections

Connecting with other people whether it is friends, family or co-workers, can help give you stability and a balance in your life. It can remove some of the powerlessness that can arise from daily stresses.

When situations are encountered that are overwhelming or you are having difficulty making decisions, your connections are your support network which you can turn to.

Researchers suggest the support of friends may encourage people to look after their health, and help lessen feelings of depression and anxiety at difficult times. They also say that having good friends can enable a longer life.

Exercise Regularly

A varied exercise routine is one of the most important activities to benefit your health and without it, you cannot achieve optimal health. Exercising will help you look and feel better as well as giving you more energy. You will be more able to relax, have a clear head, have greater brainpower and to meet daily challenges with a positive outlook.

As well as being a key factor in weight control, regular exercise will also improve circulation, lower blood pressure, improve muscle tone.

It will also result in less fat deposits, slow down the aging and increase heart health, the strength of the lungs and other organs.

Physically active people are less likely to experience a heart attack or other forms of cardiovascular disease than sedentary people.  It has been found that more inactive people suffered more fatal heart attacks than active members.

Eat Healthy

A healthy balanced diet is beneficial in more ways than just for nutritional value. The food that you put in your body has a direct relationship to your general health and wellness. A healthy diet will provide you with energy. You will look more attractive, sleep better, feel better and your immune system will be strengthened to ward off illness.

A good diet should be free from processed foods that are low in nutritional value, laden with chemicals and that encourage obesity. Start with eating more natural, organic foods where possible.

Your day should begin with a big healthy breakfast as a general lifestyle practice. Your digestive system is at its most efficient in the early part of the day when it has more energy available for the digestive process than at any other part of the day.

Breakfast literally means “breaking the fast” and during the fasting process, the metabolism slows down.

With a big breakfast, your metabolism is once again kick-started, resulting in more calories being burned which also encourages a healthy body fat percentage.

Drink Water

Our bodies are made up of almost 80% water and most of us do not drink enough. As a result, we are chronically dehydrated. Water is a healing substance, without which, over time the body seriously deteriorates.

Think of the leaves of a freshly watered plant, which has a vibrant and green appearance, as opposed to a plant which has had no water for a long time looking shriveled and dried out. The same happens in our cells There is no substitute for clean fresh water to keep the body hydrated and functioning, no soft drinks, tea, coffee nor even fruit juice can stand in as a substitute.

In particular, you should avoid habitually using sodas and soft drinks as a means of providing your fluid needs. Their high sugar content and artificial flavors make them harmful to your health. Caffeinated tea and coffee also act as diuretics which flush more fluids out of your body, so you will need to counter that by drinking more fresh water.

You should drink daily, about half of your body weight in ounces. For example, if you weigh 200 pounds, that means 100 ounces water which is about 10-12 cups of water a day. Staying properly hydrated will enable you to remain much healthier and live longer. Even blood cholesterol gets lowered by drinking water.

Take up a Hobby

To actively engage in a pursuit that you enjoy and that is outside your regular occupation, will benefit your physical and mental health.

A study has shown that surgery patients who were involved in hobbies had a significantly better recovery time than those with no hobbies.

By setting aside time in your life for a hobby, you will find that your tension levels decrease. It will distract you from, for example, work or domestic issues help fend off stress and depression and enable you to think more clearly to deal more effectively with problems.

Detoxify the Body

All healing traditions on the planet apart from western medicine – whether it is Chinese, Native American, ayurvedic, homoeopathic or shamanic – regard detoxification as important for a healthy body and a strong immune system.

Toxins undermine your health and are one of the main contributing factors to most chronic illnesses. Removing them from the body is one way to preserve good overall health and energy for the rest of your life.

Detoxification has a beneficial effect on all the body systems, including the respiratory, digestive, urinary, nervous and cardiovascular systems.

It helps remove stress, strengthens the immune system and will help with weight loss if you are overweight.

There are many ways to detoxify the body that differ in their actions and intent, from juice or water fasts to detox diets. There are also herbal supplements available to help with safe and gentle inner body cleansing. These include natural colon cleanse products such as Psyllium Husks and Acai Berry detox supplements to give a deep cleanse on a cellular level.

The process of detoxification may incur temporary symptoms such as headaches, nausea, tiredness depending on how fast the toxins are being eliminated. Once this phase is over then you will start to feel much better.

Carrying out these seven key core strategies promoting balance of body and mind will lead to better health with greater capacity to deal with stressful situations. You will be more likely to live longer and illness free until the end of your life.