I’ll be the first to say, it’s not always easy staying on the path of a healthy lifestyle. For many of us, if it wasn’t something that was engraved into our genetics from the time we are born we probably have neglected it for much of our lives. Now, my parents never ever fed us badly, or encouraged an unhealthy lifestyle. I always ate my vegetables, I was put into different sports which resulted in me moving my body at least three times a week. Had I known then what I know now, I would tell myself that a healthy lifestyle goes far beyond what you put in your body and what you do with your body. It has so much to do with your mental state, how you take care of yourself and who you surround yourself with.

So today, I wanted to share with you what I do to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Sometimes I can do all these things in a week, sometimes it’s only just one. I believe life is about balance, and if we were perfect all the time, well…there would be no point in learning anything at all, we were built to make mistakes and learn, and in turn stand up stronger. So let’s jump in!

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Okay team, before I begin I feel like it’s important for me to note that I am NOT a healthy lifestyle expert, I am not a health guru, or a fitness fiend. These are things that work for me and things I truly believe have changed my life for the better.

1. DRINK YO WATER

If I could sing this from the heavens, I would, on a mic, into a very loud speaker. Drinking your water is so so so important for you. I’m embarrassed to say that it literally took me landing in the hospital, being dehydrated for me to realize it, but hey – what doesn’t kill you, reminds you to drink at least 6 glasses of water a day? In all seriousness, drink your water. Your body is made up of 60% water, that’s more than half so instead of loading up on a second cup of coffee in the morning, drink a bottle of water. This might sound insane, but it will have the same effect, I promise you. I drink so much water now, that I know if I don’t have a full swell bottle before noon everyday, I start to feel really sluggish around 1pm. I never knew (again, I’m aware how silly this sounds), how beneficial water is, more water means more energy, more water means better skin, more water means yes, more trips to the bathroom, but imagine how much your system needs to be flushed everyday. So please, drink your water!

2. SLEEP

I can bet my life that my best friend is reading this right now and rolling her eyes, yes Meredith I mean you, she knows I don’t sleep nearly as much as I should be. I am a rare breed that can function off about 6 hours a night. I can do 4 hours if I have to. Honestly, It really isn’t something I should brag about, while yes it’s beneficial for the industry I work in, it’s not always beneficial for my mental health. If there’s anything that quarantine has taught me, it’s how important sleep is. At the beginning of quarantine I could hardly sleep, I think even my subconscious was anxious. As time has passed, I have kind of put myself on a schedule, I try and head to bed by around 11:30pm and fall asleep around midnight, with my alarm going off at 8:00am, that’s 8 full hours of sleep. Getting a good nights sleep is key starting any day off right, the better you sleep the more rested you are and the more prepared you are to take on the day!

3. HAVING A MORNING ROUTINE

I think by now we all know how much I love a good ol morning routine, and if you don’t know you can read about my morning routine here. I can’t stress enough how what you do in the first 30 mins of your day, completely sets the tone for how your day is going to go. Now, this next sentence is a made up statistic, I pulled right out my butt, but I dare any scientist to prove it’s accuracy becasue I think it’s 100% accurate. 75% of the motivation that you need for the day, comes from how quickly you can change your mindset. Take this for example, you wake up, you stub your toe on on one of the edges of your bed, you swear, as God why bad things happen to good people and carry on, get changed, go to the bathroom, brush your teeth and get toothpaste on your top, you get angry, huff and puff about it cry about how this outfit was the perfect Tuesday look and decide that this is going to be a horrible day. Well my friends, by mentally deciding that you are going to have a bad day, you are attracting more bad crappy things to happen to you, because now your brain is going to look for more bad. Instead, when you stub that toe, walk it off – swear if you have to, keep going, when you get toothpaste on your nice clean shirt that you were excited about wearing, get another-one and move on, there’s more important things to worry about. Stop letting little things effect your day, tune into your warrior mindset and go conquer the day.

4. MONITOR YOUR SCREEN TIME

Isn’t it funny how sometimes we think that a break from our computers is checking out phones? Or how you can scroll on Instagram, while watching TV every evening? We are surrounded by technology, all the time. It get’s worse when you realize that the first thing you do in the morning is check your phone, and most probably it’s the last thing you do when you go to bed at night. I’m actively trying to cut down my screen time, for sure during work days it’s harder, but on weekends I do my best to only go on my laptop if I absolutely have to. I like to keep it away in my room and would much rather spend time outside. In one of my recent posts I talked about how I read a crazy statistic that the average American consumes 11 hour of content in a day. I am still shocked by this number. If you’re like me and find it hard to turn off once in a while, start creating small habits that help you – for example, in the mornings by all means use the alarm on your phone, but don’t let yourself pick it up and scroll under the covers. Make it a habit to leave it on your bed side table, go get ready, only grab it when you’re ready for breakfast or ready to leave the house. Little steps lead to huge changes.

5. ENJOY WHAT YOU EAT

Now I would be lying to everyone if I said that I’ve always had a great relationship with food. That I have a wonderful metabolism and can crush 4 burgers and it just disappears into thin air. It is human to pick at parts of yourself that aren’t deemed acceptable but the world around us. While I can talk about the psychology of the media and how it effects our lives, all day. Right now, I want to talk about food. I love food, I truly will try anything at least once. Over the last 3 years, I noticed that my body had changed in the way that it stored food, I have always been super skinny and have had a relatively good metabolism, but suddenly I wasn’t fitting into jeans, I was always bloated. On top of that, I stopped sleeping full nights, I’d deem a solid 6 hour sleep as “well rested Xandria”, I was skipping meals, and forgetting to drink water. I never exercised, I thought walking to and from the go station was enough. Point is, the things I was putting in my body was not enough to carry me through the lifestyle I was living. Eating one meal can’t get you through a 14 hour day on set. When you can’t fit into your jeans it’s not that you’re eating junk and gaining weight, it can sometimes mean you’re not eating at all – so your body stores all it can because, it didn’t know when it would be fed next. That hurt to even write. It hurts knowing that I actively neglected my body. It wasn’t until last year around this time I realized I was the heaviest I’d ever been, I felt sluggish all the time, and quite honestly was fed up of feeling like this. So I made small changes. I started drinking water, I fed my body the second I felt even a little hungry, I didn’t wait till the feeling of starvation went away. I started moving my body, and really learned to appreciate the body I have and celebrating that I can move it! Most importantly I started enjoying what I ate again. I have always eaten healthy, but went through a phase of feeling guilty for eating anything sweet, or categorized as a junk food. That’s all different now. Life is about balance, so is your diet. Enjoy the foods you eat, and please give yourself grace.

6. MOVE YOUR BODY

If there was one thing I would yell at my university self for, it would be how I neglected to move and take care of my body. I actually don’t think I did any physical activity unless it was walking, for like 3 years. I know, it’s horrible. If there’s one really great thing that’s come out of quarantine, it’s that I’ve been working out more than I ever have in my life. You can check out my workout routine here. I even started training for a 5K, which I am planning on writing a whole post about in the future! I love feeling strong. If you can, anyway you can, please move your body for at least 30 minutes every single day.

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I know this wasn’t your typical list of tips to maintain a healthy lifestyle but I do hope that one or more of these things resonated with you. I want to know what you do to maintain a healthy lifestyle, what do you want to improve on? Let me know in the comments!

Until next time my sweet people, I hope you are all safe and healthy whenever on this earth you are. Sending love to each of you, always.

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