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The Importance Of Prioritizing Protection
Would you say that you tend to live quite consciously? If you answered yes to that, then you’re probably in the minority. Many of us tend to go about our days, without really paying much attention to how well we’re living, or trying to make choices that we know are best for us. Because it’s just not easy to. Life is hard. It’s busy, overwhelming, and exciting, yet it doesn’t leave all that room for getting things wrong – especially when it comes to your health. And this is the exact area of life that can benefit the most when we do try to live a little more consciously. So it can feel like a catch 22.
However, it is important to admit that we do need to make a little more time for health and fitness in our lives. Most importantly, we should be focusing on keeping our minds and bodies protected. Why? Because we only get one life. And as much as that usually leads us to believe that we should be living life to the full, we should also be protecting it too. So if you’re ready to consciously take more care of yourself, here’s how you can prioritize protection from five different angles when it comes to your health.
Working Out
First of all, you’re going to want to focus on some of the ways that you can try and protect yourself while working out. Mainly, you’re going to want to try and prevent injury.
Warming Up
Protecting yourself when you work out isn’t something that you need to be completely vigilant of; it would disrupt your workout if so. However, you do need to ensure that your body is as protected as possible throughout the workout. This really highlights how important it is to warm up properly. It’s often your best bet at avoiding injury and protecting yourself from harm as you work through your routine.
Supportive Clothing
Your protecting doesn’t always have to be a kind of preparation you take prior to your workout, however. Although warming up is one of the most important things you can do, it’s not the only thing. Because you should also look to be wearing supportive clothing when you’re exercising too. By wearing the right supportive footwear especially, you’ll be able to warrant off any injuries as you’re working out.
Take Extra Care
But if you are injured and you need to ease your way back in, or you feel you have a slight weakness that isn’t enough to stop you from working out, then you need to take extra care. Whether that’s to wear a knee brace or a similar support, or sticking to rehab work. It’s essential that you take further precautions to protect yourself as you workout.
Nailing Nutrition
Next, there are many ways that you can protect yourself from poor health with nutrition. Not only can you heal your body, by you can often prevent issues from arising too.
Strengthen Immune System
Although there are many ways that you can protect yourself with nutrition, one of the best ways to do it is to strengthen your immune system. After all, you need to be able to protect your body from getting sick. And you’re not going to be in any position to do that if your body cannot fight off illnesses. So, you need to work on feeding your body with the essential vitamins and minerals, especially vitamin C, to help you to do that.
Fuel Your Body
It’s easy to see food as an indulgence. It tastes good and makes us feel good too. But food’s primary function is to feed us – to help our bodies get the energy we need. And it’s not always easy to remember that. However, when you do start to see your food as the fuel it is, you can protect your body from burnout. This is especially the case when it comes to workouts, because you need to fuel your body sufficiently to avoid injury and to give you the energy you need to get through it.
Support Digestion
But food can also protect your body, in terms of your digestion too. Because what you eat can actually be tough on your system. So you’re going to want to protect your stomach and support your digestion by focusing on your gut bacteria. It’s not simple and it’s not sexy, but it’s something that will always keep you healthy.
Preventing Aging
You may also be interested in protecting your body from premature aging too. Although it’s impossible for you to stop aging, you can slow it down and delay the visible signs from showing.
Drinking Water
The very best thing you can do for your body is to keep it hydrated. Full stop. A dehydrated body will be low in energy, it won’t be able to heal itself well, and it will also age quicker. And that’s not what you want to happen. By simply drinking more water, you can fight that off. Water helps to keep your skin plump and radiant, and remove toxins from the skin and body too.
Promoting Collagen
The reason we start to see the visible signs of aging come through, is because the natural collagen in our skin tends to break down. So, if you want to protect your skin and ensure that you keep as much collagen as possible, you need to increase your collagen production. You can do this by working with the right foods and vitamins, but also by taking collagen supplements too.
Living Well
But you’re also going to want to focus on living well. Because nutrition is not always enough. If you tend to lead a busy and stressful life, you are going to bring on early aging. Cortisol, the stress hormone, breaks down collagen, which will allow the visible signs of aging to show. But by avoiding stress and choosing to live well, you will be able to slow down the aging process.
Avoiding Stress
Stress can not only age you, but it can also be a huge harm to your overall health levels. So, it’s essential for you to avoid stress if you want to protect your body. Here are some methods to consider.
Slowing Down
We briefly touched on this in the last point, but it’s essential that you can slow down if you want to look after your body and protect it from harm. But this isn’t just to do with aging. Of course, a slower pace of life will be better on your body, but it’s also easier on your mind too. Because the more stressed you are, you’re going to be harming your mental health.
Practicing Yoga
No matter what your preference of workout may be, yoga should be part of your line up if you want to help your health. Practicing yoga can be an incredible activity to help you destress. It calms your mind and relaxes your body. It can also teach you to master mindfulness; which, in turn, can help you calm your mind at many moments in life.
Me Time
And you’re always going to want to set some selfish time out for yourself. It’s not always easy to allow yourself this time, but it can be essential for times when you want to let your mind switch off. Whether you like to read or watch sports, hike or jump out of planes, your ‘me time’ is essential to help you stay away from stress and keep a healthy balance in life.
Everyday Life
And finally, you should also consider the ways that you can protect your body, mind, and overall health levels every single day. Because some of your daily habits could be harming you.
Sunscreen
Sunscreen is something that nobody should underestimate. No matter your skin type, you need to protect yourself. With a good sunscreen, you’re going to help your body to stay protected from premature aging and skin cancer. Although staying out of the sun altogether is the only way to be completely protected, we need sunlight for vitamin D, so you need to stay protected.
Walking
It’s so easy to just jump in your car and head off to wherever it is that you need to be. However, this isn’t always the best way to protect your body. Instead, you need to try and walk as much as you can. Walking will get your heart rate up, giving you a little extra exercise to help keep your heart healthy, and boost your energy levels and help clear your mind. It’s a win-win!
Toxins
Finally, you’re going to want to do what you can to keep away from toxins. Because choosing to smoke or drink to excess is choosing to harm your body. Instead, if you want to protect yourself from illness and premature aging, you need to want to quit smoking, to drink responsibly, and to generally keep harmful toxins away from your body as much as possible.
