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Ways To Get Healthier In 2024 Without Trying Very Hard

Nine takeaways:

Being healthier can often feel like an exhausting, endless burden– but we often forget the extraordinary power of small life changes to have gargantuan benefits. Here are nine accessible wellness tips that will help 2024 be your healthiest year yet:

1. Get healthier without even going to the gym: Scientists now say you can get a lot of health benefits associated with the gym simply by being more active in your daily life. For instance, choose to walk places when you can, or do stationary exercises while seated for work.
2. Flip hunger into satisfaction with this cheap superfood: Eat more foods with fiber, which is found in inexpensive foods like oats, rye, whole wheat, and legumes. Fiber helps control blood sugar levels while lowering cholesterol and inflammation.
3. Little acts of joy can have a big payoff: Small moments add up, and small acts of happiness have a demonstrably positive effect on our wellness. Take a moment to notice the beauty of nature, or to make normal human interaction more meaningful with more thoughtful questions.
4. Outsmart dopamine and screens: We are so often glued to our screens because they cause dopamine releases. There are many ways to overcome a dependency on phones/devices for dopamine release, as per this article.
5. Learn from the Japanese way of life: Not only do the Japanese walk more than we do, but they also prioritize fresh rather than packaged foods which are far more healthy.
6. Combat loneliness through creativity: Research shows that making art or even viewing it reduces levels of the stress hormone cortisol and increases levels of the feel-good hormones, like endorphins and oxytocin. Any creative act will do, from painting or writing to gardening or cooking..
7. Find a therapist you can afford: As awareness of therapy’s benefits have become more destigmatized, its price has gone up. There are many new resources for finding accessibly-priced therapists, as per this article.
8. Cut back on the ultraprocessed foods in your diet: Ultraprocessed foods make up nearly 60% of what the typical U.S. adult eats and nearly 70% of what kids eat, and they’re linked to heart disease and diabetes, and so much more. Cut back and go fresh when shopping for groceries.
9. Manage back and neck pain: Short spurts of movement throughout the day can help relieve stress/pain by increasing blood flow. this article contains five exercises to prevent pain, developed by fitness specialists at NASA, an agency where people work in high-stress seated positions.

By Carmel Wroth and Andrea Muraskin for NPR:
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