Momentum can make you nearly unstoppable. One healthy decision can pave the way for more smart choices. But rolling through your wellness goals requires you to set the ball in motion.
You have to start something healthy.
The particular healthy habit you choose to start with isn’t as important as the commitment of energy used when making a choice and taking action. You’ve probably experienced how one healthy choice can blossom into a full day of wellness. It’s the morning yoga that leads to the spinach salad for lunch, a post-work gym visit, and a good night of restorative sleep.
Nobody can make that first decision for you. But you aren’t alone. What follows are stories to help you learn how to start building habits, start eating better, start practicing self-care, and ultimately start living healthy.
Clicking one of the interesting links below is a choice. Reading what follows is an action. And words are powerful enough to help dislodge even the most stubborn boulder of stagnation and start it rolling towards a healthier you. Once you act on the information, you can count on momentum to help you keep thriving.
Start a Healthy Lifestyle
Habits help answer the question “how do I live a good life,” and there’s a bounty of actionable advice on healthy lifestyle changes in the following stories:
Pick from a plentiful menu of articles to help instill healthy eating habits. And remember, this is an all-you-can-consume buffet of info on how to start eating healthy, so there’s no reason to save room for later.
The number on the scale isn’t the ultimate measure of health. But maintaining a healthy weight that’s right for you remains on the minds of many. Here are the stories that can help with that:
Seeing the money seep out of your bank for that unused gym membership might still not be enough motivation. But maybe some reading will resonate and help you start working out—again or for the first time.
Sometimes starting to be healthier actually means stopping. That’s especially true of learning how to take care of yourself. These stories about self-care are a great first pit stop on your way to slowing down and managing stress.
Only you know what your body and life require for living in health and happiness. Pick and choose other targeted approaches to starting something healthy.
If asked, most people will say they’d like to live a healthier lifestyle. But when it comes to actually changing—well, that’s another story. So why do so many of people’s health goals go unrealized? One of the most common answers: “I want to be healthier, but I just don’t have time.”
If you’ve ever had a similar thought, you may need to reframe the way you think about healthy living. Being “healthier” doesn’t necessarily mean adding more to your already crammed calendar. Instead of further bloating your busy schedule, try integrating healthier habits into your established routines. It’s all about adjusting and substituting (more on that later).
So what exactly does this look like? As with many lifestyle questions, there’s no single, right answer—it all depends on you, your existing habits, and the changes you’d like to make. Fortunately, you don’t have to dive in without guidance. Whether you’re looking for ways to incorporate exercise into your workday, eat more nutritious meals, or simple health and wellness tips, you’ve come to the right place.
Since healthy living is highly personal, remember that what follows isn’t an exhaustive list, nor a set of steps to follow exactly. Think of it as a tasting menu—you can try different approaches out to see what fits with your schedule and helps you feel your best.
What is Healthy Living?
Most people are familiar with the basics of health and wellness: eat nutritious foods, exercise regularly, and get enough sleep. These are great starting points, but there’s just one problem—these practices are all rather vague. How much should you exercise? What foods should you eat? And how much sleep is “enough”? There’s a good chance you’ve asked yourself (and the internet) similar questions.
Internet searches have probably returned some general guidelines. The CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States), for instance, recommends adults get at least an hour and a half of exercise each week. And there are plenty of articles on nutritious eating that can help you out.
There’s so much available information that it can be intimidating. It can also prove difficult to distill these general guidelines and suggestions into specific, actionable steps for your life. If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed as you navigate your health and wellness journey, refocus on the most important factor: you.
Health and Wellness Tips for the Workplace
The main culprit responsible for people’s busy schedules is work. Most can agree on one thing: too much time is spent working. This can make it difficult to incorporate wellness practices—especially exercise—into daily life. People typically try to exercise in one of two blocks of time: before or after work.
A pre-work exercise routine is a great way to start the day, but it’s not for everyone. And the same can be said for evening workouts. Fortunately, there are other options—you’ve just got to be a little creative. Here are a few ways you can sneak some exercise at work.
Try a treadmill desk: You’ve probably seen, or at least heard about, standing desks. If not, the concept is simple: it’s a desk you stand at rather than sit behind. Standing desks have been all the rage in recent years, in part because of their perceived health benefits. And while there may be slight benefits to sitting less and standing more, recent studies suggest the difference in calories burned is minimal.
Enter the treadmill desk. Rather than simply standing at your desk, you have the option to walk in place. This simple change can drastically increase the number of calories you burn each day, and, if you walk at a brisk pace, help amp up your heartrate during the workday.
Cycle during meetings: Treadmill desks are expensive, but workplace exercise doesn’t have to break the bank. For a cheaper—and often more discrete—exercise option, try cycling at your desk. Obviously, you’re not going to actually ride a bicycle in the office, but there are under-desk cycles that have become increasingly popular.
Basically, these cycles are a set of bicycle pedals on a small stand that can sit under your desk. As you sit in your office chair, you can pedal away to get the blood flowing. Most machines have variable intensities, allowing you to customize your workout each day. And the best part? You can still sit at your desk for virtual meetings.
Change up your commute: Not everyone has the benefit of living close to their work. And many of the people who do live within walking or cycling distance of their office still opt to drive. It’s just the default mode of transit—especially in the U.S. where, as of 2019, roughly three out of four American commuters drove their car to work.
If you’re looking to add a little exercise to your day, however, your commute is a great place to start. Sure, it might take a bit longer than driving, but a brisk walk or bicycle ride in the morning can help clear your mind, wake you up, and prepare you for a day at the office. Plus, it’s built-in workout time. You must be at work one way or another. Would you rather spend that time in traffic or promoting your physical and mental wellbeing?
You are What You Eat: Make the Most of Your Food When You’re Busy
After you drag yourself out of bed in the morning, making a lunch to bring to work is probably the last thing you want to do. Especially when you’re running late. And in this, you’re not alone. Whether it’s the convenience of eating out, lack of groceries in the house, or a dislike of cooking, many people go out for lunch during the workday—if they eat lunch at all.
If you’re looking to improve your nutrition at work, look at the list below. Chances are you’ll find a tip or two that you can use to eat more nutritious foods on a busy schedule.
Know your food groups: If you can’t find the time to prepare your lunches, you still have a lot of control over what you eat. You can choose where to go and what to order. And, naturally, some options are better for you than others. In some cases, nutrition is a no-brainer: obviously a salad is a more nutritious choice than a milkshake and fries.
Sometimes, however, it can be more difficult to identify the most nutritious meals on a menu. This is where knowing the food groups comes in. While nutrition is a complex and nuanced subject, ensuring you eat a variety of foods—dairy, whole grains, proteins, fruits, and vegetables—will give your diet a solid foundation. When ordering at restaurants, choose dishes with several food groups represented.
Meal prep on the weekends: Naturally, cooking your own food gives you the most control over your diet and nutrition. But cooking takes time. And when you’re busy, preparing meals is often the first task on the chopping block (pun intended). So why not take care of the cooking on your day off?
If you have a free day—or even a free evening—during the week, use that time to prepare healthy meals for the week. There are a few different approaches to meal prep. Some people cook a whole bunch of the same meal and portion it out for each day. This is great if you don’t mind eating the same lunch every day for a week.
If you prefer a little more variety, you can try prepping different foods that can be combined in various ways, giving you a few options for your on-the-go lunches. For example, if you cook enough chicken, rice, and broccoli for the week, you can easily make a rice bowl to take to work. If that’s not speaking to you, you have cooked chicken you can use in a sandwich and have the broccoli on the side. It’s all about mixing and matching ingredients and getting the time-consuming work of cooking done beforehand.
Swap soda out for water: Most people don’t drink enough water. So don’t be like most people. The National Academy of Sciences recommends that men consume 15.5 cups (or 3.7 liters) of liquid every day (this total includes water, other beverages, and foods like soup or celery), and women take in 11.5 cups (or 2.7 liters). If you find yourself falling short of that number, try swapping water for other fluids. Instead of a soda in the afternoon, have a couple glasses of water. Not only will this help promote hydration, but it’ll cut down your sugar intake, too!
Finding Health and Wellness Tips That Work for You
Healthy living on a busy schedule doesn’t necessarily mean turning your life upside down. It’s all about finding ways to incorporate healthy practices into the things you are already doing.
Not all the tips mentioned above will work for everyone—and that’s OK! Try them out and see what works for you. Remember, it’s a process—you don’t have to make all the changes immediately. Take time to adjust to each change and be gentle with yourself. Changing routines is difficult, but it is worth it.
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/AdobeStock_88591094-e1660057808630.jpeg503835staffstaff2022-08-09 10:00:362022-08-09 09:41:00Healthy on a Hectic Schedule: Health and Wellness Tips for Busy People
Even instant rice takes five minutes to cook. If possible, push aside the considerable absurdity of that fact and think of it instead as a commentary on the time it takes to cook for yourself. That temporal investment is one of the few cons of making your meals. But if healthy eating on the go is your goal, you may have to toss out the more time-consuming components of cooking.
After all, busy schedules don’t pair well with building layers of flavor over hours of work on a succulent braise. That’s sad for your tastebuds and, possibly, your overall health.
Cooking really is great if you have time. You control the ingredients, level of salt, and tend to produce healthier fare. Not to mention all the other mental, emotional, and financial benefits you cook up by being your own chef.
But slowly steaming yourself for hours over a hot, humid array of pots and pans isn’t the only way to eat healthy. You can still enjoy meals that are easy, quick, and good for you. It just might mean holstering your wooden spoon and spatula in favor of foods you don’t need to cook. The good news is that tasty and healthful options abound.
Browse the menu laid out below to help you pick healthy on-the-go food options. Any one of them is a massive improvement over a trip to the vending machine, drive thru, or spin around your favorite delivery app.
On the Run: Grab-and-Go Healthy Meals and Snacks
Somedays, you’re in such a hurry that you’re basically a cartoon tornado. You’d be lucky to make it out of the house with two of the same shoes on, let alone any healthy on-the-go food. During these most hectic times, you can still take a few minutes (and that’s all it will take, promise) to grab a snack or nutritious meal replacement.
Here are your best options to snag as your whirlwind morning or afternoon slings you out into the world:
A high-quality shake with plenty of nutrients and designed for sustained energy
One or two snack bars for the day—ideally, packed with whole-food ingredients, a good source of fiber, and appropriate for your dietary goals
A protein-packed cheese stick
Whole fruits (apples, oranges, and bananas are very portable) or even single-serving applesauce or other no-sugar-added fruit cups
A bag of on-the-go veggies, like baby carrots, celery sticks, mini sweet peppers, sugar snap peas, or radishes
Healthy Eats Thrown Together Quickly
There are times you aren’t literally sprinting out of the house. It might not feel like it, but you actually do have time—especially if you cut out a few minutes of early morning doomscrolling on social media—to toss a few ingredients together.
A few of your quick, healthy meal options are as follows:
Celery sticks and your favorite nutritious nut butter
Carrots (baby or stick style) and hummus
A handful of nuts and fresh berries
Single-serve popcorn
Greek yogurt and a fresh fruit of your choice
Full Meals Done as Fast as Possible
Having a bunch of easy snacks to make is essential to eating healthy on the go. But sometimes your day requires more of a traditional meal to fuel the madness. You don’t need a five-course tasting menu, though.
Quick and easy healthy meal options can include:
Veggie or salad wraps
Pre-made or easily stirred up salads (go with the bagged kit and replace the dressing with oil and vinegar if the included option is too packed with sugar, fat, or calories)
Stuffing a sandwich with fresh veggies and some lean, low-sodium meat (if you want)
Skipping the bread and just roll up sliced tomatoes, peppers, or avocados in low-sodium lunch meat
Piling sliced or chopped veggies and canned beans into a bowl
Avocado toast or other enhancements to toasted bread (nut butter and pomegranate seeds, for one)
A Little Prep Pays Off for Healthy Eating on the Go
It may seem like cheating to count meal prep done by your past self. But that weekend or less-busy version of you could do present, in-a-rush you some favors. To pull this off, you’ll need to do a little bit of planning and commit to working ahead on healthy meals you just need to mix up, mash together, or microwave.
You can boil eggs, bake proteins, prepare produce, and make more than you can eat at your non-rushed meals to guarantee leftovers for the next day. Maybe you only want to—or have time to—cook once a week. Use that time to make batches of soup, grain bowls, or other easy, healthy meals.
Create a future that’s little less frantic food-wise and make healthy eating on the go possible with a little bit of prep work. Whether it’s more planning or a better understanding of healthy on-the-go food, you have the tools to eat smart without spending too much time sweating over the stove.
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/AdobeStock_222079014.jpeg539835David BakerDavid Baker2022-08-02 12:00:562022-08-02 10:55:17Your Menu for Healthy Eating on the Go
Healthy eating is the backbone of any healthy lifestyle. It provides the energy you need to focus throughout the day, helps keep your immune system operating at its best, and fuels your body for physical activity.
Of course, eating right is easier said than done—especially when life gets busy. When you have a lot on your metaphorical plate, it’s tempting to forego healthy, nutritious meals. That might mean replacing them with fast food, a snack from the vending machine, or simply skipping the meal.
In other words, when life gets busy, many people tend to deprive themselves of the key nutrients that will keep them operating at their best. But it doesn’t have to be this way. It’s time to learn which nutrients will help power your busy life and how to incorporate them into your daily meals.
Nutrition 101
If you’re completely new to the world of nutrition, don’t worry—this section provides a quick, crash course on the basics. And if you’re a seasoned expert (pun intended), a little review never hurts, right?
Nutrition—in the context of this article—refers to the process of providing your body with the food it needs to support normal growth and development, as well as maintain essential body functions. To do each of these tasks, your body requires a variety of nutrients. These nutrients range from amino acids, fats, and carbs to vitamins, minerals, and everything in between. So when people throw around phrases like healthy eating, nutritional food, or a good diet, they’re referring to eating habits that provide your body with the nutrients it needs to function. But also avoiding—or reducing—the intake of less nutritious options.
Though it can sound involved—and, frankly, intimidating—eating a well-balanced diet can be done easier than you think. In fact, simply eating a large variety of whole foods can provide the building blocks of a balanced diet. You can reach for a variety of different foods: fruits, vegetables, grains, proteins, and dairy.
Between these food groups, you can get most of the nutrients you need on a day-to-day basis. So if you’re eating the recommended daily amount of each food group, your diet likely has a strong foundation. From there, you can adjust your eating habits to focus on specific nutrients—but more on that later!
The Importance of Nutrition on the Go
The food you eat directly fuels your energy levels. Carbohydrates such as sugar, for instance, can provide quick, temporary bursts of energy. But the benefits of good nutrition go far beyond your energy levels.
Nutrition is the unsung hero (or villain) of your day-to-day experiences. Whether it’s the quality of your sleep or your ability to focus throughout the day, nearly every element of your day is affected, in part, by what you put in your body.
This makes nutrition especially important when you’re busy. An inability to focus can set you behind on the day’s tasks. Similarly, a poor night of sleep can throw off your entire day. But in both cases, you can set yourself up for success by focusing on your eating habits.
Naturally, the optimal meal plan looks a little bit different for everyone. It’ll take time and experimentation to figure out what works best for you. But there are some general guidelines to start you on the right path. The next section breaks down some of the nutrients you’ll likely need to fuel your busy life and why they are so important.
Key Nutrients to Get You Through Busy Days (And Where to Find Them)
A well-balanced diet ensures you have a solid foundation, but you’ll still need to pay close attention to the foods you eat. Each day, you should strive to consume a variety of foods. This will help you maintain a baseline level of nutrition to keep you going.
Once you’ve established that baseline, you can focus on other key nutrients. The list below outlines some of the vitamins and minerals that especially power your busy lifestyle. This is not an exhaustive list of what your body needs, but rather a list of key nutrients involved in healthy energy production that you can use to help supplement an already balanced diet.
B vitamins: It’s been said many times, but it bears repeating—food is fuel. That being said, your body has to perform chemical processes to convert the food you eat into usable energy. This is where vitamins B1, B2, and B3—AKA thiamin, riboflavin, and niacin—come into play. These three B vitamins help support the ways your body breaks down and processes macronutrients. These processes, which spark electron transfers, also need support from B vitamins to produce one of the body’s main sources of energy.
When it comes to energy production, vitamins B5 and B7 (pantothenic acid and biotin) also play an important role. Similar to the other B vitamins, these two vitamins facilitate a number of chemical processes and reactions that help your body metabolize various substances and create usable energy.
B vitamins aren’t all about energy production, though it is one of their main functions. Vitamin B9, AKA folate, helps your body build DNA and RNA, supports tissue growth, and promotes the regeneration of red blood cells. Obviously, these are important bodily functions.
To metabolize—or break down and process—folate, your body needs vitamin B12, or cobalamin. So remember how folate helps your body perform a number of crucial functions? Well, your body also relies on vitamin B12 for those same processes.
At this point, hopefully one thing is clear: the B vitamins do a lot. So where can you find them? The B vitamins can be found in a variety of foods including pork (B1), brown rice (B1), leafy greens (B2, B3, and B9), dairy (B2 and B5), and fish (B3, B7, and B12). For an in-depth look at each of the B vitamins, check out this guide!
Electrolytes: Contrary to popular belief, electrolytes are more than just salt. Electrolytes are water-soluble substances that conduct electrical charges. Some of the most common electrolytes found in your body are calcium, sodium, potassium, and magnesium.
Your body uses electrolytes—and their conductive properties—to support healthy muscle contraction, chemical reactions, and fluid balance. Because your body is about two-thirds water, nearly every cell contains electrolytes.
Electrolytes exit the body through fluids—usually through urine and sweat. Those found in your urine are typically excess electrolytes, meaning your body doesn’t need them. If you’re sweating a lot, however, it may be necessary to deliberately replenish your body’s supply of these electrically charged minerals. So how do you do this?
It’s simple: just eat and drink electrolyte-rich foods and beverages. These include bananas, dairy products, coconut water, avocados, and watermelon. (It’s important to note that excessive amounts of electrolytes can also have detrimental effects on your health. If you suspect you have too many or too few in your diet, you can have a urine test done to measure your levels.)
Calcium: Calcium is mentioned twice in this list because it’s one of the body’s most important nutrients—crucial enough to merit its own section, too. You’ve probably heard that calcium helps maintain strong bones. While that’s true, calcium does a whole lot more, too.
That includes supporting:
healthy muscle function
nerve signals
a healthy heart beat
normal cell signaling
As you can see, calcium plays a vital role in your body’s daily function. Additionally, too little calcium in your diet can negatively impact cognition—which can be catastrophic during a busy day.
You can find calcium in dairy products, tofu, and cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, cabbage, kale).
Magnesium: Like calcium, magnesium is also an electrolyte. The essential mineral also plays a vital role in your body’s ability to produce energy. And it helps regulate your body’s levels of another key nutrient—calcium. Too little magnesium in your diet may result in muscle weakness and fatigue.
If you’re looking to add more magnesium to your diet, consider snacking on whole nuts or pack a salad of leafy greens for lunch.
Iron: As with most of the nutrients listed, iron plays a vital role in energy production. It also helps your red blood cells carry oxygen throughout the body. Iron deficiency can lead to fatigue—which can throw a wrench in your busy day.
Meat is one of the main sources of iron in many people’s diets. If you are vegetarian, focus on eating iron-rich foods, such as beans and nuts.
Vitamin C: Nothing interrupts a busy schedule like a cold. Not feeling your best makes it incredibly difficult to take on your daily tasks. Enter vitamin C, which supports the production of leukocytes—white blood cells that help maintain your health.
Most nutrients have many roles, and vitamin C is no different. In addition to supporting a healthy immune system, this vitamin also helps optimize your body’s creation of metabolic energy (energy extracted from nutrients.). Specifically, vitamin C supports the process your body uses to transport and process fatty acids.
So whether you’re looking to maintain a healthy immune system or support healthy energy levels, it’s crucial that your body gets enough vitamin C. You can load up on this vitamin by eating more citrus (or drinking orange juice), broccoli, or Brussels sprouts. Snacking on raw bell peppers is another good option.
Zinc: Like vitamin C, zinc plays a key role in the health of your immune system. (It also does a whole lot more, from supporting eye and kidney health to helping optimize DNA production.) Zinc is most commonly found in meat, seafood, and eggs. So vegetarians and vegans, take note: you might need additional sources of zinc in your diet. This could mean eating more legumes and nuts, or simply taking a dietary supplement.
Water: Good old H2O. Pretty much everyone knows they need to drink a lot of it, and yet many people don’t. Dehydration can cause headaches and fatigue. Fortunately, there’s a surefire way to avoid this: drink more water. If you struggle with proper hydration, consider investing in a large water bottle to carry with you throughout the day. There are even apps that can help you track your hydration!
Balancing Your Diet and Your Schedule
When it comes to healthy eating, it’s easy to let your schedule interfere. But eating a balanced diet doesn’t necessarily require a lot of time. It just means more planning and a little bit of prep.
If you find yourself munching on vending machine snacks throughout the day, consider stocking up on nutrient-rich snacks like nuts or fresh vegetables and hummus. Similarly, a homemade, vegetable-packed sandwich can make an excellent, nutritious lunch—you just have to set aside time to make it.
At the end of the day, balancing your diet might mean balancing your schedule. Nutrition doesn’t necessarily require hours and hours of planning and preparation—15 or 20 minutes of meal prep in the morning can make all the difference. In an hour or two on Sunday, you can knock out your meals for the week. Find what works with your schedule and stick with it.
Nutritious meals might seem time consuming, but they’ll supply the fuel you need to push through a busy day. And with optimal energy levels and focus, maybe you’ll find that nutrition saves you time after all.
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/AdobeStock_172080889.jpeg557835Austin WinegarAustin Winegar2022-07-07 11:00:042022-07-07 09:58:54Nutrition on the Go: Fuel Your Body with Key Nutrients to Power Your Busy Life
In the hustle and hurry of today’s world it can be difficult to prioritize yourself—especially when it comes to your mental health. Between career demands, family and relationship responsibilities, and everything else life throws at you, there’s probably a lot on your plate. And there’s nothing wrong with that if—and this is a big if—you’re taking the time to care for your mental health, too.
Many workplaces have started to notice over-stressed employees aren’t operating at their best. So they have incorporated “mental health” or “wellness” days into company leave policies and monthly schedules. While this is a great practice, there are usually only a handful of such days scattered throughout the year.
But mental health should be a daily priority.
Fortunately, you don’t have to choose between keeping up with the demands of your life or prioritizing your mental wellbeing. You can do both. All it takes is a little practice and proactive self-care. Read on for mental health tips you can use no matter how busy your schedule is!
Start at the Source: Identifying and Managing Stress
Ah, stress, that all-too-familiar feeling. Every person has experienced it at one time or another—probably many, many times. A small amount of day-to-day stress is inevitable, and, for most people, perfectly manageable. When stress piles up, however, it can start to take a toll on your mental—and physical—health. That’s why stress management is a crucial element of your mental wellness each day.
According to a recent poll conducted by the American Psychological Association, stress is on the rise among adults in the United States. And the problem is a global one, too. But many adults can’t point to an exact cause of their stress. Usually, however, stress can be traced to one common denominator: time. More specifically, not having enough of it. After all, who hasn’t felt like their responsibilities pull them in a thousand different directions?
One study suggests this feeling doesn’t actually stem from running out of hours in a day. Rather, the stress many people feel from their daily responsibilities arises from “emotional conflicts” between the various tasks.
Imagine, for instance, you take some “me time”—an hour to pursue a hobby, read a book, or take a nap. There’s a good chance that a small amount of guilt will accompany that activity—guilt over not being “productive” or about putting off other tasks. The guilt creates an emotional conflict, which can lead you to experience higher levels of stress than you otherwise would experience. In other words, even if you have the time for self-care, you may feel like you don’t.
How can you eliminate some of that guilt surrounding self-care, and, in turn, the stress that comes from it? As is so often the case, it’s all about mindfulness.
Slow down and take a moment between each task to remind yourself why you’re doing it. Whether it’s a work project, decompression time, or cooking dinner, it’s important to acknowledge why the task is worth your time. So before launching into that next to-do list item, take a few deep breaths and think about the why.
10 Mental Health Tips for Prioritizing and Practicing Self-Care on a Busy Schedule
You’ve learned to avoid the guilt—and stress—that can arise as you try to fit self-care into your schedule. Now discover what self-care looks like on the go. Most of these mental health tips take 30 minutes or less and can be integrated into a workday. Because, let’s face it, you might not always have the time (or funds) for a 90-minute deep-tissue massage.
Establish routines and stick to them: Good sleep, full and nutritious meals, as well as exercise are just a few lifestyle elements that can elevate your mental health and mood on a day-to-day basis. So what’s the catch? To really see the benefits of these practices, you need consistency. And consistency requires a routine.
Whether it’s cycling to work each morning or a strict bedtime, try to incorporate habits into your daily routine that promote consistent sleep (at least seven hours a night), some form of exercise, and nutritious eating. That means if you decide to meal prep for the week on Sundays, stick to it! These daily and weekly routines will give your life structure you can lean on for support when life gets busy.
Find time for exercise: The benefits of exercise sometimes seem too good to be true, but it really is great for both physical and mental health. You’re probably familiar with the physical benefits of daily exercise, but did you know that 30 minutes of exercise each day can also elevate your mood, reduce stress, and decrease anxiety levels?
And this doesn’t necessarily mean 30 minutes of hard, sweat-inducing cardio. Daily exercise can be as simple as walking or cycling to work in the morning or using a treadmill desk. There are even office-friendly exercise bikes if you want to be really creative with it!
Practice mindfulness: If you’ve ever thought about trying meditation but written it off as too involved or time-intensive, mindfulness might be just the thing for you. Mindfulness—the practice of being mindful— means creating awareness of the present moment. The best part? It doesn’t matter which moment you choose—you can bring mindfulness to any activity or task.
The first step is controlling your breathing. Close your eyes and start breathing in a slow, controlled cadence. Try to focus on the sensation of the air filling your lungs. When you open your eyes, bring that awareness to whatever you are doing. If you’re eating, pay attention to the sensations and flavors each bite brings. If you’re putting the final touches on your presentation for tomorrow, make every additional note or slide intentional.
Try progressive relaxation: There’s a common misconception that meditation requires large chunks of uninterrupted time and a designated space. Enter progressive relaxation, also known as progressive muscle relaxation (or PMR). All you need for PMR is 10-15 minutes and a place to lie down. (If you can turn the lights out, that’s an added bonus.)
During progressive muscle relaxation, you’ll do exactly as the name suggests: relax each muscle group in turn. Starting with your feet, clench the muscles as tight as you can, hold it, and then release. As you release, exhale. To complete the process, you will repeat this cycle for each muscle group, moving gradually up your body. The practice can be used to rest the body and relieve stress and anxiety.
Focus on the positive: You’ve probably heard the phrase ‘You are what you eat.’ But when it comes to mental health, often you are what you think. So try to keep your thoughts positive! If there’s a conversation you’re dreading, focus on the sense of accomplishment you’ll feel afterwards. Stuck on a frustrating work task? Look at it as an opportunity to learn and develop a new skill.
Keep a journal: Journaling feels like one of the best kept secrets of adulthood. Which is to say it’s shocking more people aren’t keeping a journal. Your journal can be whatever you want it to be. If you’re trying to keep your thoughts positive, a gratitude diary could be just what you need to help you focus on the good. Or maybe you need a space to vent, work through your thoughts, or ramble about your day. A journal is good for all of it. The act of writing can be cathartic and help you release negative thoughts and emotions you have accumulated during the day.
Take advantage of telehealth: When it comes to managing your mental health, there’s nobody more qualified to help than a licensed professional. Unfortunately, not everyone has time for therapy. Here’s the good news: telehealth and virtual therapy options are widely available, so it’s never been easier to find a therapist to fit your schedule. If you feel like you could benefit from the help of a professional, don’t let the thought of adding another commute to your workweek deter you. We live in a digital world—you might as well take advantage of it.
Put the phone (or laptop) away: If you’re old enough to remember a time when you didn’t always have a phone and computer in your pocket, you probably wax nostalgic for those days occasionally. While smartphones, laptops, and other devices are incredibly useful and convenient, they have drawbacks. Whether it’s fighting off the temptation to tune into your work email or Slack channel at the dinner table or browsing social media in bed, there’s a good chance your devices have worked their way into nearly every part of your life. This can increase the stress you feel from work, generate FOMO (fear of missing out), and generally affect your mental health for the worse. So consider unplugging for a bit. Turn the devices off at bedtime. Or leave them at home for your evening walk. A little bit of time away from the virtual world might be the break you didn’t know you needed.
Make “me time” non-negotiable: No matter your age or occupation, it’s important that you make time in your schedule for yourself every day. This doesn’t have to be an elaborate activity. “Me time” could be simply cooking dinner. Or going for a fifteen-minute walk. Or painting a model airplane. It doesn’t matter what you’re doing if you want to be doing it.
Take a day off: This last one isn’t always possible, but if you have the opportunity or option, consider taking a day off. Many employers offer mental health days, but if yours doesn’t, consider calling in sick or taking a vacation day. Gift yourself the time to go for a hike, catch up with a friend, or work through the stacks of dishes that have been piling up. Whatever you end up doing, a break from work can provide a much-needed breath of fresh air—literally and figuratively.
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/AdobeStock_409733754.jpeg557835staffstaff2022-06-16 10:00:112022-06-21 13:41:44The Art of Me Time: Mental Health Tips that Fit Your Busy Schedule
Spring’s new growth and beautiful flowers brighten the world after long months of colder, wetter weather. But with that flourishing flora comes something else—pollen and seasonal allergies.
For many people, they can feel the moment the world around them shifts from winter into spring. Their eyes become watery and itchy. Their nose runs or stuffs up. Sneezing becomes just as common as laughing. When these symptoms pop up, it’s time to reach for the allergy medication so you can get through the day in one piece. But have you ever been told to reach for local honey for seasonal allergies instead?
Honey, particularly products harvested locally, is often suggested as a natural way to help you deal with allergies when spring comes around.
But does honey actually help with seasonal allergies? To answer that question and separate myth from fact, let’s look at how allergies work, how honey is made, and where the two might intersect.
What are Seasonal Allergies?
First, you have to understand what happens in your body when spring comes around. You can go in depth about seasonal allergies with this helpful story. But here’s a brief overview:
Imagine your body is a thriving 24/7 office building. All the busy workers inside the building are your cells. Some cells are in the department responsible for moving your muscles. Others are in departments that make sure you have the energy to go about your day.
The work your cells do is very important—it keeps you alive. But there are many threats inside and outside your body that can cause problems.
In a building, someone could break in, or internal issues, like a flood from a burst pipe, can pop up. In your body, you can cut your skin or breathe in foreign particles that can cause a variety of problems.
To protect you from potential threats, you have a natural security system—your immune system. This is like the security and on-site first responders in the office building. These immune cells are always on patrol. They keep an eye out for anything that they think might hurt you. When they find a potential threat, they mobilize quickly to contain and remove it.
However, they occasionally come across particles that are relatively harmless—like pollen from blooming trees and flowers—and your security system overreacts. Your immune cells trigger alarms throughout the entire building of your body, temporarily disrupting everyone’s work with sneezing, watery eyes, and a runny nose.
When the threat is taken care of, security posts pictures of the intruder so your cells can remember what it looks like for next time. And that’s why your seasonal allergies happen at predicable times.
This system works great for threats like viruses or bacteria. These threats don’t usually happen every day, so the immune system doesn’t become desensitized to seeing the same problem repeatedly.
But imagine if the same problem kept happening every day. Most likely, the immune cells would stop responding as aggressively. Eventually, they might even learn to just live with it like a busted ceiling tile in the break room or a tiny leak in the roof whenever it rains.
When this conditioning is done intentionally, it’s called immunotherapy. These techniques can be used to help train your body to grow comfortable with having particles like pollen around, so your immune system learns to live with its presence and ignore it.
This is how allergy shots work. By giving you a concentrated dose of particle pieces that you’re allergic to every few weeks or months, you can train your immune system to desensitize itself to the presence of that allergy-causing substance.
How the Properties of Honey Relate to Seasonal Allergies
Honeybees produce the sticky substance by gathering a liquid called nectar that is produced by flowering plants. The bees store nectar in an extra stomach in order to carry it back to their hive.
While the nectar is hanging out in the stomach, it mixes with other items the bee has eaten. This changes the chemical makeup of the nectar so it’ll last longer, like preserving fruits to make jam that can last longer on your shelf or in your fridge.
Once the bees return to their hives, they pass the preserved nectar from their stomach to another bee, who stores it in their extra stomach to pass on to another bee. The nectar passes from bee to bee until it reaches its final destination—a honeycomb.
After the last bee in the chain coughs up the nectar into the honeycomb, the bees in the hive use their wings to help any extra liquid in the nectar quickly evaporate so the honeycomb can be sealed up for storage. Now the bees have a sweet food storage to dig into during winter months, and humans have a sugary addition to their diet that may also help with seasonal allergies.
Now it’s time to circle back to the theory of using honey for seasonal allergies works. Basically, it goes like this:
When bees are gathering nectar from flowers they pick up pollen, which may end up mixed into the honey. So in theory, if you eat a lot of this pollen-containing honey, your immune system will start acclimating to seeing the pollen in your body. Once your immune system sees this once-alarming substance so many times, your immune cells stop responding to it.
With no immune cells sounding an alarm, your seasonal allergy symptoms aren’t triggered, and you can breathe easier.
But Does Local Honey Actually Help with Seasonal Allergies?
First, the bad news. There’s no guarantee the honey you eat has any pollen in it. Additionally, there are a lot of plants out there that produce pollen, and not all of them have flowers that are the preferred targets of honeybees.
In fact, honeybees usually prefer plants that aren’t commonly considered the main sources of pollen that commonly triggers seasonal allergies.
Other bad news: if someone has recommended you eat honey for allergies, they probably have told you that it needs to be local honey. That’s because different areas have different plants. If you eat honey with pollen from Alaska and you live in Arizona, the pollen in the honey will be very different from the particles hanging in the air around your house.
In many cases, local honey is also sold relatively unprocessed. That means there might be bee parts, bee venom, or bacteria. If you’re allergic to bees themselves, eating this type of honey might cause its own allergic reaction and make your allergy problem even worse.
There is Some Good News About Honey
Don’t toss your honey out just yet. Eating honey has many other benefits that can help you optimize your experience during the season. For instance, it can help soothe a cough, especially when used to sweeten tea instead of using sugar. Just don’t give it to kids younger than a year old, because it can cause a life-threatening illness called botulism.
There also might be some potential of using honey at high doses alongside normal allergy treatments to help manage the symptoms of seasonal allergies. There are few studies on this topic, and they often provide mixed results. But one small study found that large doses of unprocessed honey seemed to help sufferers of seasonal allergies deal with their symptoms, at least for a little while.
Of course, you’d probably need to eat a lot of honey. In that particular study, participants ate at least 50-60 grams (about two and a half tablespoons) of unprocessed raw honey every day for a couple of months.
What’s the Final Verdict?
With all that said, it’s time to answer the question—does eating honey help with seasonal allergies?
Well, it can certainly help you manage symptoms like a cough. And the theory about pollen in the honey makes sense. But, for now, it’s best to reach for the allergy medications and limit your time outdoors until pollen season has ended for the year.
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/AdobeStock_90990428.jpeg522835staffstaff2022-05-31 11:00:572022-06-21 13:46:33Explore the Facts About Eating Local Honey to Help with Allergies
Most people know the basics of staying healthy—at least in theory. Eat nutritious foods. Exercise regularly. Sleep enough. But putting these healthy habits into practice is where there’s room for improvement. This is natural. Nobody is perfect, after all, and change can be difficult, especially after years of forming certain lifestyle habits.
Here’s the good news: supporting health at any age is possible no matter how long you’ve been putting off healthy lifestyle changes. It’s never too late to start living your best life.
Many people—especially those in middle age and later—think they’ve passed a point of no return on their health journey. That is, they think it is too late to see the health benefits of certain lifestyle changes. But studies show you can enjoy the benefits of healthy lifestyle changes at any age.
In other words, it’s never too late to start caring about your health and learning how to take care of your body. The first step is learning about the supporting science, and then applying health tips for all ages to support physical and mental health throughout your life.
Neuroplasticity: Habits, Change, and the Aging Brain
Humans are creatures of habit. Daily life is built around routines—meals, work, sleep, and hobbies. And, as you’re probably aware, these habits can be hard to break or change.
There’s a neurological reason for this. As you repeat certain behaviors or activities, the neurons in your brain rewire and adjust the way they fire to code that behavior as a habit. So the behavior literally becomes wired into your brain.
Naturally, these wired habits are difficult to break—difficult, not impossible. Your ability to change habits has, in part, to do with neuroplasticity, which is simply your brain’s ability to change.
From infancy and childhood (even into early adulthood), the brain is incredibly plastic. This means it changes and develops easily. As you age, this process slows so much that scientists used to think neuroplasticity disappeared completely around age 25. In other words, they thought the brain’s wiring was fully set by your mid-twenties.
Recent studies, however, have shown this isn’t the case. Your brain can form new connections, create new neurons, and change its structure at any age. The process might look different as you age, but it is still possible.
So yes, you can teach an old dog new tricks. And, more importantly, you can form new habits to support health at any age.
Out With the Bad: The Benefits of Dropping Unhealthy Habits Today
When people confront lifelong habits—whether it’s smoking, drinking too much, or eating too many processed food—they often ask the same question: how much of a difference could it really make?
The answer is simple. Dropping unhealthy habits as soon as possible can have a huge positive impact on your health.
Take smoking for instance. For a pack-a-day smoker of 20 years, each additional day spent smoking might seem like drops in the river. But the health benefits of quitting smoking, such as decreased risk of heart disease, can be seen after just one day.
Remember, if your goal is to replace unhealthy habits in your lifestyle, you have to start somewhere. Each day that you stick to your goals, you work towards rewiring your brain. So even if you’re not seeing immediate health benefits, you are working to create new neural pathways that will help you maintain a healthier lifestyle going forward.
Making the Change: How to Take Care of Your Body as You Age
The habits you set in early adulthood are factors that will shape your health profile later in life. Depending on your lifestyle, your risk for serious ailments will change. But those statistics aren’t set in stone.
Adults in their sixties, seventies, and beyond can still see the benefits of improving their diet, physical fitness, and mental health. Together, these positive lifestyle changes can set the stage for a happy and healthy life that extends well into old age. Whether you’re a teen, early adult, or pushing past middle age, look at the following tips for supporting health at any age:
Incorporate exercise into your routine: Whether it’s a daily walk, weight training, or high-intensity cardio, it’s important to stay active no matter your age. In young adults, high levels of physical activity improve cardiovascular health, respiratory health, and can help you maintain a high level of fitness later in life.
If you’re middle aged or older, physical activity is just as important, if not more so. Increased levels of physical activity can help support you overall cardiovascular health, and more. And for older adults, physical activity helps keep muscles strong, helping maintain mobility and ensuring you can continue performing day-to-day tasks.
Eat nutritious food: Your diet affects nearly every aspect of your life. Food is fuel, and you want to make sure you’re giving the body the nutrients it needs to run effectively throughout life. During childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood, your diet provides your body with the fuel it needs to grow and develop.
As you age, your diet can help you maintain a healthy weight—which looks a little different for everyone—and can help support total body health throughout your life. Additionally, healthy eating can just make you feel better. It’s hard to quantify, but people who eat nutritious foods often report feeling more satisfied and energized throughout the day. And this is a benefit you can take advantage of at all ages.
Keep your brain engaged: Scenic walks, reading, or learning a new skill are a few activities that can help keep your brain engaged throughout life. The brain loves a challenge—so why not give it one?
By striving to learn throughout life, you can keep your brain active. This promotes neuroplasticity and your brain’s ability to continue to learn and grow into old age. Staying mentally engaged and challenged can also help optimize mental health throughout life.
Stay Positive with a Growth Mindset to Stay Healthy as Your Age
No matter your age, caring about your health involves adopting a growth mindset. It means believing that your health and lifestyle can change for the better. It’ll just take time and effort.
Remember, these changes don’t have to occur all at once. Start small and work towards your larger goals. It’s natural to slip up, but it’s up to you how you respond to your mistakes. So what are you waiting for? Take the first step towards health—no matter how small.
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/AdobeStock_276487323.jpeg515835staffstaff2022-05-26 12:00:372022-06-21 13:52:07Follow These Health Tips for All Ages to Build the Right Habits Now
Everybody gets older—it’s just a fact of life. At different ages, however, aging can have different connotations. Throughout infancy, childhood, and adolescence, aging means growth—both physical and emotional.
But what does aging entail once you’re an adult? Early adulthood is typically when your body is in peak physical form. Naturally, this doesn’t last forever. So, as you move from early adulthood into middle age and on, you’ll likely notice gradual changes in how your body feels and what it can do.
Unfortunately, there’s no stopping these changes. But there are theories of aging that try to answer that difficult question: why do people age?
The answers you’ll read below can help provide background knowledge you can use to set yourself up to age as comfortably as possible. And a great place to start is the what, why, and how of aging. What should you expect as you age? Why do these changes occur? And how can you deal with them as they come?
Why Do People Age?
Aging is an incredibly complex process that scientists still do not fully understand. As such, there’s no easy answer as to why humans age. Here’s what is known: the cells in the body wear out over time. Their functionality decreases and their structure deteriorates. Scientists attribute this decline to a combination of factors sorted into two categories: intrinsic and extrinsic.
Extrinsic aging: There are numerous lifestyle and environmental factors that also affect aging. Smoking, heavy drinking, and air pollution can all age your cells. This is known as extrinsic aging because it is determined by factors outside of your body.
Although it rarely comes up in conversation, the distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic aging is something most people are already aware of—they just don’t realize it. A middle-aged smoker might remark that they “have the lungs of an 80-year-old.” People would understand that statement because most are already aware that external—or extrinsic—factors can influence the aging process.
This leads right into two more key terms related to aging: biological age and chronological age.
Chronological Age: This is the number you give when someone asks how old you are. In other words, chronological age is the amount of time that has elapsed from your birth to the present. There’s no speeding or slowing the progression of chronological age.
Biological Age: Aging occurs as the cells in the body are damaged and deteriorate. This process is inevitable and, in relatively healthy individuals, occurs at roughly the same rate. So if you look at the cells of a healthy, 30-year-old woman, her biological age is probably about 30. If an individual has been exposed to extrinsic factors of aging—say they’re a heavy smoker—their cells will “age” more rapidly. And their biological age might be closer to 50 while their chronological age is 30.
Think back to that first question: why do people age? You now know aging is the gradual breakdown or deterioration of the cells in the body. This process happens naturally but can be sped up through a variety of external factors.
That’s a pretty simple concept, but this explanation does bring up another question, though. Why do the cells in the body naturally deteriorate? It’s not a process that benefits individuals. Most detrimental processes are weeded out through thousands of years of natural selection. So why haven’t humans evolved to have endlessly healthy cells? This is where the different theories of aging come in.
Explaining the Theories of Aging
There’s no scientific consensus around how or why the cells in the human body gradually and inevitably deteriorate. There are factors known to speed the aging process up, but there aren’t any proven methods for slowing the aging process beyond its natural rate.
This leaves a big question: why?
Scientists’ answers to this enigma fall into one of three categories: program, damage, or combined theories of aging. As you read about each theory of aging, remember that they offer possible explanations for humans’ limited lifespan, but no conclusive answer.
Program Theories of Aging: Scientists in this school of thought believe aging is not an accident. They think humans have evolved to age and eventually die. That makes the whole process a deliberate, programmed part of human genetics.
From an evolutionary standpoint, this might feel a little bit backwards. Why would human evolution progress in a way that led to a fixed lifespan? The answer is altruism—not deliberate selflessness, but the development of evolutionary traits that benefit the species, not the individual.
There are finite resources in the world. If humans lived forever, there would be fierce competition for those resources. One explanation for aging is that humans have evolved to die once they reach a post-reproductive age, leaving less competition for the younger generations.
Damage Theories of Aging: As mentioned above, it’s widely accepted that certain environmental factors can speed the aging process. Damage theories of aging follow a similar line of logic. These theories of aging pin humans’ eventual death on the gradual accumulation of damage to the cells, not a predetermined or preprogrammed genetic feature. The source of this cellular damage, however, is up for debate.
One common theory is that natural processes of the body subject cells to small amounts of oxidative stress. That is, some body processes create byproducts that damage cells. Metabolism, for instance, creates reactive oxygen species (ROS) that cause tissue and cell damage over time.
Combined Theories of Aging: As the name suggests, combined theories of aging draw from program and damage approaches to create a comprehensive explanation.
During the 1970s, B.L. Strehler, a scientist who studied old age, introduced four postulates (or assumptions) about aging. First, aging is universal and occurs in all species. Second, aging is intrinsic. Third, aging occurs incrementally. And, finally, factors are only part of the aging process if they hold no evolutionary advantage.
Most modern combined theories of aging are based on these four postulates. They tend to focus on the specific ways cells deteriorate. (Is it the cell membrane? Or does aging have to do with the ability of cells to generate electricity?) But, again, despite the theories, there is no consensus on the central question: why do people age.
What to Expect as You Move Through the Stages of the Aging
A deep dive into the science of aging, though interesting, can sometimes shift the discussion too far from the effects of aging. Your cells deteriorate each day—that’s what aging is. But what impact does that have on your lived experience?
The effects of aging are perhaps best summed up by a common phrase. When describing an older relative or friend, you might say they are “slowing down.” And there’s a lot of truth in that statement. The aging process causes the body to operate less effectively and efficiently than before. This affects various body systems and processes. Whether it’s bouncing back from an injury, building muscle, or even moving around, everything gradually slows down.
The aging process is often described in five chronological stages or phases:
Independence: During this period, most individuals may notice their body slowing down a bit, but everyday tasks are still manageable. This period is mostly a continuation of regular adult life, but it is a good time to start thinking about future plans and needs.
Interdependence: This is the stage of life when everyday tasks begin to grow more difficult. Adults in the interdependence stage of old age are often able to live independently, but may require additional help with cooking, driving, and similar tasks. In most instances, a full-time caretaker isn’t necessary.
Dependency: As the name suggests, the dependency stage is when adults begin to lose the ability to live on their own. This stage comes at a different time for everyone. Physical and mental health play the biggest role in determining when adults reach the dependency stage. This can be an incredibly difficult and frustrating time, as the transition to having a full-time caretaker (a family member or professional) can be a jarring, unwelcome change.
Crisis management: This stage is when an individual requires more care (whether it’s medical or day-to-day assistance) than family members and other loved ones can provide. At this point in life, many individuals may need to relocate to a full-time care facility.
End of life: The end result of aging is, naturally, death. This stage looks very different for everyone depending on their needs. Many individuals will reside in a hospital, care facility, or hospice center, while others may live with relatives. The focus should be on providing an individual as much comfort, love, and care as possible during this final stage of life.
How to Deal With Aging
If there’s one fact that you’ll need to get comfortable with, it’s that you’re going to age. There’s nothing you can do to stop it. You can, however, take steps to make aging as comfortable as possible.
To do this, go back to the basics of a healthy lifestyle:
These lifestyle habits will help you continue to maintain normal levels of oxidative stress on your cells. And, in turn, you’ll help keep your biological age in line with your chronological age.
Additionally, consider ways to support your cellular health. Since aging is the deterioration of your cells, taking care of your cells is just about the best way to optimize aging as much as possible.
Beyond practicing healthy lifestyle habits, take the time to be mindful of the present. Each stage of life has its joys and setbacks. Take them as they come and enjoy wherever you happen to find yourself in the aging process!
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/AdobeStock_351477052-e1652976062627.jpeg490835staffstaff2022-05-19 12:00:492022-06-21 14:07:29Analyzing Theories of Aging to Better Understand the Question ‘Why Do People Age’
You’re not getting any younger—though you probably don’t need to be reminded of that fact. Aging can be exciting, scary, sad, and just about every feeling in between. Needless to say, moving through the stages of life is a complex process—emotionally and physically.
Keep reading for the answers to these questions and more. By the end, you’ll have broken down adolescence, adulthood, and middle age. And you’ll be able to explain the characteristics and defining features of the stages of life.
What is Adolescence: It’s More Than Just the Teenage Years
This broadness is necessary because adolescence refers to the transition from childhood to adulthood—physically and mentally. This is a time of drastic physical, emotional, and social development. Because the adolescent stage of life spans over a decade, it is often broken into three phases: early, middle, and late adolescence. And each phase is characterized by its own set of changes and development:
Early adolescence (ages 10-13): This phase of adolescence is responsible for those oh-so-hated middle school years. Growth spurts typically begin during this time (especially for girls), as do other physical changes—like the growth of body hair and development of primary and secondary sex characteristics. These sudden, often drastic, changes can lead pre-teens to feel awkward or uncomfortable in their bodies.
While these physical changes are the scientific markers of early adolescence, there are also many mental changes and developments common in this stage of life. During early adolescence, preteens and teens often begin to develop a stronger sense of self. This often includes testing the limits of their independence and pushing for more privacy and self-determination.
In other words, during early adolescence, most individuals want to make choices for themselves. It could be what they wear, eat, or how their room looks. As early adolescents begin to form opinions, they often exhibit black-and-white thinking.
Middle adolescence (ages 14-17): There’s no clear line between early, middle, and late adolescence because everybody develops on a different timeline. But some developmental patterns hold true generally. Girls, for example, often hit their growth spurts in early adolescence, while many boys don’t have theirs until middle adolescence. And so much of middle adolescence, from a physical-development standpoint, can be described as “more of the same.”
During middle adolescence, teens experience rapid cognitive development. Though the brain won’t be fully developed for several more years, certain brain functions—such as logical reasoning—reach maturity by age 16. This means teens are just as capable of logical reasoning as adults. (Whether their ability to think logically translates into rational behavior or not is another story.)
Middle adolescence is also a time when many teens begin to explore romantic relationships. This often takes the form of dating. And teens may also begin to question and explore their sexuality to create and understand their own sexual identity.
All of these changes go hand-in-hand with teens’ desire for independence that typically grows stronger with age. And for teens in the United States, middle adolescence often brings the keys (pun intended) to that ultimate form of independence: a driver’s license.
Late adolescence (ages 18-21): If you’re surprised to see 21 included under adolescence, don’t worry—you’re probably not the only one! Teens legally become adults at age 18, so people tend to think this is when adolescence ends. In terms of development and growth, however, humans don’t reach adulthood until sometime in their twenties.
By late adolescence, most of your physical growth is out of the way, so the development that occurs during this stage is mostly cognitive. Teens are infamous for taking risks, but as they age, they improve at thinking ahead. This is all thanks to brain development.
The prefrontal cortex, which is the last part of the brain to develop, has just about reached its adult form by late adolescence. And the prefrontal cortex is responsible for decision making, among other key operations. (It’s important to note that the brain is still only mostly developed. It won’t reach full maturity until age 25 or 26.)
In this final stage of adolescence, the beliefs, identity, and values that began to develop in earlier years also become far more stable. They may change with experience, of course, but as you transition into adulthood these aspects of your identity are often what keep you rooted.
What is Adulthood and How to Tell When Adolescence Officially Ends
Kids and teens want more than anything to be a grown up. This raises a question without an easy answer: what exactly is a grown up? Ask any adult and they probably won’t give you a straight answer. Legally, anyone older than 18 is an adult in the U.S. But, as mentioned above, this cutoff doesn’t make much sense from a developmental standpoint.
So where can we draw the line between the adolescent and adulthood stages of life?
By age 22, the body is almost entirely done growing. Your bones (except for your collarbone, which won’t fully mature until your early-to-mid thirties) are the size they’ll be for the rest of your adult life. Your wisdom teeth have come in. And your brain is finishing up its final prefrontal cortex development.
From this time until middle age, your body operates at its peak physical performance. This doesn’t mean you’ll be in the best shape of your life. But it does mean your heart, lungs, muscles, and other organs will be operating at their most efficient and effective levels.
With these physical developments out of the way, adulthood brings a whole new set of developmental challenges: as a young adult, you will develop the social, emotional, and lifestyle habits that shape the rest of your life. No pressure, right?
Don’t worry, these changes don’t happen overnight. You’re not an adolescent one day and a full-fledged adult the next. It’s a gradual process. For this reason, many scientists have defined a new intermediary stage of life development: early or emerging adulthood.
What is emerging adulthood: Emerging adulthood is a term some researchers use to describe the transitional phase between adolescence and adulthood. It is not a developmental stage, per se, but rather a period of social and emotional exploration and growth. Emerging adulthood is a time when many young adults begin to explore various jobs, establish their first serious romantic relationships, and navigate the new set of challenges “adulthood” brings. (These challenges include living independently, finding a career, and, in some cases, becoming a parent or spouse.)
It is nearly impossible to pin down exact age boundaries for emerging adulthood because this stage varies widely from person to person. Some may settle into adulthood by 25, while others are still struggling to establish their adult identity well into their late twenties. Which is to say, describing adulthood isn’t an exact science.
Consider the question posed at the start of this section again: what exactly is a grown up? Or, in other words, what is adulthood? At this point, you’ve been given two ways to answer this question. You can approach it from a developmental standpoint or from a social and emotional standpoint.
The first provides a much more clear-cut answer: adulthood begins around age 22, when the physical developments that characterize adolescence are complete. But, as outlined above, this approach doesn’t always give a satisfying answer. It seems to only capture part of the picture. Most of all, it doesn’t pin down what adulthood means.
To capture the full picture of adulthood, you also need to consider social factors. Is having a job part of adulthood? Living independently? Having stable romantic relationships? You’ll have to answer those questions for yourself.
So what is adulthood? Sometimes the best answer might be “I know it when I see it.”
Middle Age: It’s Not All Downhill From Here
Emerging adulthood may be a vague, loosely defined stage of life. But middle age has clearer boundaries. It begins at 40 and ends at 65—give or take a few years on either end.
During this period, most people’s lives have stabilized in comparison to their twenties and thirties. By middle age, you’ll likely have settled into a career or career field, become comfortable with your beliefs and values, and are maintaining long-term, stable friendships and relationships. If early adulthood is a time of exploration and discovery, middle age is a time of settling in.
As you approach and move through middle age, you might find yourself frequently thinking, “I’m not as young as I used to be”—especially while exercising. People tend to hit peak physical performance in early adulthood. From there on out, the wear and tear on your body will become more apparent. It’s a natural part of aging.
This manifests itself in several ways. You might find yourself bouncing back from injuries much more slowly or getting winded faster. Additionally, risk for certain health conditions becomes much higher in middle age. Screening for these conditions can help detect them early—and early detection is a crucial part of treatment. After the age of 40, you should start screening for high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease. You may also screen for breast and cervical cancer if you are a woman, and prostate cancer if you are a man.
This might sound like a drag, but life is not all downhill from here! Studies show that happiness and life satisfaction bottoms out somewhere between ages 45 and 50—right as you are hitting middle age. From there on out, the older you get, the happier and more satisfied you will probably be.
Take Care of Your Health at Every Stage of Life
Every stage of life comes with unique challenges and rewards. So whether you’re a teen eager to grow up or an adult wishing you could turn back the clock, remember to focus on the present. Take care of your health no matter your age. It’s never too early or too late to make your lifestyle a little bit healthier. And take time to appreciate the joys each stage of life has to offer!
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/AdobeStock_312928880.png7231147staffstaff2022-05-16 12:00:462022-06-21 14:21:23Walk Through the Differences That Define the Stages of Life
Aging is inevitable. Worrying about your brain health as the years start adding up doesn’t have to be.
It is true that getting older impacts your brain. Aging has some minor impact on memory as your brain and body change. But you have the power to protect your brain health as the years add up. The solution: developing healthy behaviors now to keep yourself mentally sharp and cementing good brain habits for the future.
Brain Health Behavior 1: Target the Right Food for Brain Health
When people hear “healthy nutrition,” fats are the last macronutrient many might think about. However, the right kind of fats are critical for your brain health! In fact, more than half your brain is made up of fat.
Healthy fats (those coming from plants and certain fish) are vital for the structure and function of your brain and its cells. The best source of these essential fats are omega-3 fatty acids found in foods like nuts, seeds, and fatty, oily fish—like salmon, mackerel, anchovies, and sardines.
In addition to the right fats, a brain-healthy diet also includes plenty green leafy vegetables (like spinach), veggies like broccoli, and berries.
A simple trick for supporting brain health is swapping foods like bread or mashed potatoes for healthier alternatives. A side of green vegetables or mashed cauliflower are good options. Also switch out your snacks by reaching for nuts and seeds instead of chips and cookies. Another tip when meal planning is to aim for two or three servings of fish for healthy proteins and the fats you read about above.
Brain Health Behavior 2: Exercise!
Your brain uses up more energy than any other organ in the body. To get that energy in the right place, your heart supplies your brain with nutrients and oxygen through lots of blood.
When you exercise, vary the type of physical activity and your routine from day to day. A combination of different types of exercises can help keep you interested and mentally stimulated.
For example, you could do aerobic exercises like jump rope, swimming, or walking one day. Then resistance training exercises—like weightlifting—are tackled another day. You can even switch it up within the same routine. Whatever gets your body moving and keeps your mind engaged!
Brain Health Behavior 3: Seek Quality Sleep
One of the best ways to support your brain health as you age is tucking in for six to eight hours of uninterrupted quality sleep every night. This healthy slumber gives your brain enough time to process the experiences of your day and perform natural repair functions.
Think of it like required daily maintenance for a sensitive and powerful machine. If you skip out on maintenance, you risk damaging the machine’s parts. Eventually, that means having a device that doesn’t work as well as it should.
Regularly skimping on quality sleep can have serious consequences later in life. One study found that people who consistently slept six hours or less every night were at a 30% higher chance of developing cognitive issues.
If you find yourself having trouble with sleep, your environment might be the culprit. Put away phones and other screens an hour or two before bed. The light from these devices can make it difficult for you to fall asleep.
Other factors in your environment can impact your ability to get some shut eye: the temperature, ambient light, sounds, or pets. You should also avoid using your bed for activities that don’t need to happen in a bed (like working from home), so your brain won’t associate being in bed with performing other tasks.
Your behaviors before bed can also affect your sleep cycle. Avoid drinking alcohol or caffeinated beverages in the evening and stick as close as possible to the same sleep-wake schedule every day.
Brain Health Behavior 4: Stimulate Your Mind Every Day
Your brain is always growing and adapting to every experience you go through. To keep your brain healthy, you must encourage it to continue learning and growing.
Urban life is incredibly busy. There’s traffic, other people, loud sounds, and myriad of sources of information for your brain to process nonstop.
While mental stimulation can be great, your brain needs breaks to process and relax. Besides adequate sleep, one of the best ways to give your brain a chance to breathe and optimize your mental performance is to spend time in nature. Whether you take a hike or just take time to smell the flowers around the neighborhood, nature can help maintain brain health.
If all you have is 10 minutes a day to take a walk, find somewhere to immerse yourself in nature. This could be a park or a pathway by your work or home. On days you can’t make it outside, listening to nature sounds can also optimize your mental function and stress responses.
Brain Health Behavior 6: Manage Stress in Healthy Ways
Stress is normal in life. A little bit keeps you alive and protected from potential threats.
Have multiple coping techniques in your arsenal in case you need them. Since everyone’s situation is different, it’ll take trial and error to find the right techniques that work for you.
Some healthy coping techniques for stress are the same healthy behaviors to support your brain health! For example, activities and skills you participate in to stimulate your mind can be great ways to relieve stress, and spending time in nature can give your mind time to reset and relax away from stressors.
You can also practice mindfulness techniques. Meditation, yoga, breathing exercises, or guided meditations are great options. Whatever techniques you choose, practice the techniques often, so you can stay on top stress management and make sure your coping methods of choice are available when you need them.
Healthy Behavior 7: Maintain Your Relationships
Humans are social creatures by nature. Societies are built on the foundation of communities—groups of people working together to survive and thrive.
Maintaining strong relationships with your friends, family, coworkers, or others around you supports brain health as you age. Regular social activities are an excellent method to stimulate your mind, and the support from relationships can help you find relief in times of stress.
To help maintain your relationships, set time every day to connect with others. This could be chatting briefly with someone at the grocery store or scheduling a time every day to eat a meal with your friends or family.
Healthy Aging Begins Now
Regardless of your age, healthy aging deserves your attention today. Healthy habits take time to develop and choosing to support your brain health now will prepare you to maintain its normal functioning as you age. You’re never too old—and it’s never too late—to take charge of your health!
https://askthescientists.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/AdobeStock_414066553.jpeg543835staffstaff2022-05-03 11:00:322022-06-21 14:33:24Healthy Aging: 7 Behaviors to Support Brain Health
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Momentum can make you nearly unstoppable. One healthy decision can pave the way for more smart choices. But rolling through your wellness goals requires you to set the ball in motion.
