Although stress continues to be one of the biggest influences on our state of health, most people do not take it seriously enough, nor do they give it enough attention.
Stress not only kills our good moods, but sets off a cascade of hormonal reactions throughout our body. Cortisol, adrenaline and insulin, when released chronically, not only wear us down mentally, but raise our body fat percentage and set us up for diabetes and heart disease.
Leading a high-stress lifestyle will, without a doubt, take a major toll on our overall wellbeing, so don’t ignore the issue - it’s something which needs to be consistently monitored to make sure it does not get out of control.
Whenever we notice our stress level rising, we need to do one of two things.
1. Use proactive stress-controlling techniques to help bring our stress levels back down again.
2. Figure out what is causing that stress and then take steps to stop it or reduce it so it influences us less.
The first step of lowering stress levels might include mediation, yoga, a good movie with a friend or simply enjoying an interesting book.
The second part of the equation is where many fall short and invite the same stressors back in. When this happens, there is risk of overwhelm, shutting down, and allowing burnout or disease to strike.
An increase in personal awareness is key. Once we learn how our body responds to stress and begin recognising the signs that it may be getting out of control, it becomes much easier to put a stop to it as soon as it starts.
Unfortunately, many people don’t take stress seriously enough and never actually take the time to learn how to do this.
Lack of sleep
Sleep is a major factor driving good health and if we aren’t sleeping as well as we should, it impacts every aspect of our lives, including our level of success. Nothing ages us faster than a lack of quality sleep. Some consider it important enough to be called the “fountain of youth”.
Sleep impacts:
- Skin - just a few nights without enough sleep and our complexion looks lacklustre, and we sport bags under our eyes.
- Metabolic rate - even one night of insufficient sleep can slow down our metabolisms, making fat loss a greater challenge.
- Insulin sensitivity - too little sleep means our body is more likely to store carbohydrates as body fat rather than burn them up for energy or devote them towards building lean muscle mass tissue.
- Mental state - our mental state directly influences our ability to stick with our diet and workout protocol.
- Disease risk factor - those who don’t sleep for a long enough duration or have poor-quality sleep are at a higher risk of heart disease, diabetes and strokes.
- Motivation - feeling fatigued from lack of sleep is a fast way to crush any desire to get our workout in for the day ahead. Additionally, when we don’t devote enough time to sleep, we cannot recover as quickly from our workouts, and progress gets stifled there as well.
Lack of quality sleep weakens our immunity, and means we won’t have the full capability to fend off invading bacteria and viruses. Since our immune system plays a role in keeping oxidative damage down, a weakened one allows oxidation to take place, causing us to age far more quickly than we would otherwise.
Sleep allows our body to go into deep repair mode, fixing the damage that took place in our body over the course of the day. Without it, when can the body repair itself?
Our social life and daily activity also play a role in keeping us mentally, emotionally and physically healthy.
A social life is important for obvious reasons – those who have strong social connections tend to be broader in their mental state and viewpoint, while those constantly alone internalise a lot more and are more likely to get hung up on factors they may perceive to be negative, when really, they aren’t quite so.
Maintaining a strong social connection provides us someone to talk to and means we can discuss any negative feelings or emotions we may be struggling with. This goes a long way towards helping us move forward on a positive note.
The last lifestyle habit that needs mentioning is daily activity. We can’t overlook the importance of movement, even when we are not exercising. This includes all the other additional movements we do on a day-to-day basis - doing daily chores and activities such as walking to the mailbox, for example.
The more often we get out and get active, the more likely we are to maintain a healthy body and mind. As the saying goes, ‘a body in motion, stays in motion’.
In the end, it’s important to understand that the company we keep, the habits we honour and the choices we make on a day-to-day basis count, even our sleep habits, because all these factors have the power to impact our overall health and wellbeing.
Carolyn Hansen is a co-owner of Anytime Fitness.
