Healthy Living

What most people do not realize is that the diet you consume does have an impact on your brain and how you process information and regulate your emotions. With fast-food chains like McDonald’s and Taco Bell, we tend to miss out on important nutrition that our body needs to function optimally. Learning about how food impacts us means that we can make smarter, healthier choices to potentially avoid unnecessary mental anguish such as depression and anxiety.

Many people decide to complete an at-home detox or a “body cleanse” at home in attempt to remedy their “problem” of eating or drinking too much. Detoxification is a process by which the body naturally dispels any toxic or unhealthy substances. When it comes to healthy living, there are natural ways to ensure toxins are released. Dr. Edward Group tells the Global Healing Center several ways to detox the body in a natural and healthy way: eating the right foods, exercising and meditating, purifying the air you breathe, and drinking plenty of water. There are ways to detox that are completely bad for a person’s health, however. If you choose to detox, here is what NOT to do:

A well-known and perpetuated myth is that holidays are meant to be spent in a well-decorated home with a table filled with home-cooked meals and a large group of friends and family who all love and care about each other. This myth brings about much stress and anxiety, as people all over the world strive to make this mystical picture a reality and feel depressed when they cannot. The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) defines the feelings of fatigue, tension, frustration, loneliness or isolation, sadness, or sense of loss as “the holiday blues”. A NAMI survey found that 64% of people say they are affected by this, and 24% say the holidays affect them a lot. NAMI notes that the holiday blues are different from clinical anxiety or depression because the feelings are temporary – however, these feelings can lead to long-term mental health conditions if not taken care of properly. While some families can have some form of the mystical holiday picture, not everyone’s story is like that, and that’s okay. There are millions of people out there who, by societal standards, spend their holidays “alone” – but they’re not alone. Many choose to do other things that make the holidays special for them, even if it’s not specifically with friends or family. For example, many people volunteer by serving food at a homeless shelter or visiting the elderly in residential centers. Many senior citizens feel depressed during the holidays because they’ve lost a loved one or they do not have the health or finances to do something for the holidays. This provides them with wonderful company, they can support a cause, and their heart grows bigger by being with others. In the simplest form, treat the holiday as a typical day and have a detailed list of activity scheduled for the day. NAMI states that sticking to a routine is best because it allows you to stay focused on what you must do rather than wondering what you may be missing. Make the decision to get up, make breakfast, do some cleaning, exercise, do something creative, etc. Before you know it, a full day will go by and it will be time for bed – your day will not have been wasted, and you will feel pleasure in knowing that you had a good day without feeling upset. A few other activities you can do:

Along with the holidays comes planning, cooking, gift-buying, decorating, family-gathering, talking, driving, and much more. Many aspects of the holidays can be stressful; if you’ve recently lost a loved one or have disconnected from family, it can add even more stress. Mindfulness is a wonderful technique that can help you stay grounded, focused, and relaxed. Mindfulness is, “the process of bringing one’s attention to experiences occurring in the present moment.” The practice of mindfulness is important for day-to-day living, but can be very crucial throughout the holidays as well. The following are tips for practicing mindfulness this holiday season:

“Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly.”

Whether we like it or not, change is inevitable. From the time we are born, we are constantly changing, growing, learning. When we are younger, these changes don’t seem so scary because we are excited to try new things; we are ready to become adults and venture out into the world. But suddenly as we get older, we feel that we have grown all that we can. We try to hold onto who we are and what we have; we try to remain in our comfort zone because change could mean that we might fail, that things could go wrong, and that unknowing feeling is just too much for us. As scary as we let change seem to be, it’s imperative that we learn to accept it -even better if we can learn to love it. Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert further confirms this truth by stating, “We all know we will change. But we think fundamentally the people we’ve become…. will remain relatively stable in the future. And in that, we’re wrong.” To deny change is to try and deny the inevitable, which will make things even harder for us because we are resisting the very thing that will happen anyways. Ada Calhoun discusses this regarding marriage, as she explained earlier this year for the New York Times that she has essentially had 3 marriages with her husband, what she claims to be their “partying 20s, child-centric 30s and home-owning 40s”. Contributor Chrissy Scivicque explains change in the workplace as constant, because businesses are ever-growing and mergers, acquisitions, etc. are always taking place. Change is in everything – even in recovery. Alcohol Rehab notes that those entering recovery must be willing to accept the unknown – to gain courage and change their old habits into healthier, more positive ones. When we take the leap towards bettering ourselves, change must happen. There are many plausible reasons why change is good:

“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” – Albert Einstein Problems surround us every day – from small problems, such as managing an angry customer at work, to larger issues, such as managing a family dispute or dealing with a debilitating mental illness. No matter the size, problems are unavoidable and the best way to get through them, is to break them down. Here, we provide several techniques for solving your problems:

“Friends with benefits: on the positive consequences of pet ownership” published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology posits that pet owners fare better on self-esteem, exercise, greater conscientiousness, less fear, and feel less isolated. For someone who suffers from a mental illness, having a pet can greatly increase their chances of happiness and improve their overall well-being. Another study conducted by the Human Animal Bond Research Institute (HABRI) found that animal-assistance intervention (AAI), has even been shown to help people who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). If you’re considering getting a pet, there are several reasons why having a pet is beneficial for your mental health:

Yoga essentially means, “that which brings you to reality”. According to a study conducted in 2016, approximately 37 million Americans practice yoga. Yoga is a physical, mental, and spiritual practice that promotes health and relaxation through controlled breathing, meditation, and the implementation of certain postures. Thus, yoga can benefit mental health in several wonderful ways:

There is no “one size fits all” when it comes to recovery – each person has their own unique history, genetic makeup, preferences, support, feelings, circumstance, etc. Due to this, it’s incredibly important that a person construct a recovery plan that will serve to be most beneficial to their overall health and recovery goals. Oftentimes, individuals may feel that since someone they know is managing their lifestyle a certain way, they should do the same thing. This isn’t necessarily true, because what may work for one person doesn’t mean that it will work for another, and that doesn’t always mean that the person is making the best choices towards recovery. Here are some crucial steps to consider when developing a recovery lifestyle:

A growing amount of research is suggesting that mood and happiness could be linked to your stomach. Your gut produces bacteria to break down food. Bacteria can either be good or bad. Nobody is in a good mood when their stomach is upset. The science is similar. When the gut microbiome is upset because of trying to process unhealthy foods, it puts the brain in a bad mood. Good bacteria, on the other hand, which makes the tummy happy, makes the brain happy as well. Foods rich in probiotics are often fermented foods like kimchi and sauerkraut. Probiotics can also be found in yogurt or food that has had probiotics put into it.

Honesty is being free of insincerity and deceit. Sometimes, when we think we are really being honest with others, we are not being sincere with ourselves. Other times, when we think we are being clear with ourselves, we are deceiving others. What we consider to be honesty might be an exaggeration, elaboration, or total evasion of the truth. We want to give others the honest truth but we don’t want to be honest with ourselves. Before we can be honest with others in order to stick up for ourselves, set a boundary, or define our needs and wants, we have to be honest with ourselves. Where are we coming from? What are we triggered by? What do we honestly need? Are we honestly aware of what we need or what we want? We have to first get a gauge on what is going on within us before we can start responding to what is going on outside of us.