The healthier you in 2021
Every year, everyone has new goals to achieve. Be it set
up new goals to achieve or just simply carry forward the previous goals with
some modification or just carry forward the previous goals as it is since it is
not achieved yet or it has not becoming habit yet.
In this article we are going to share with you, three
areas of health for the healthier you in 2021. They are nutrition, physical
activity, and mental health. These three are really essential components of
health that you need to put an effort to maintain especially as you grow older.
World Health Organization (WHO) in its definition of ‘health’ as well emphasize
on these three factors when describing what health is.
‘Health is state of complete physical, mental, and
social well being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity’
Which also explain why individual who are disabled or
individual who is bedridden can also have the best state of health despite
their lack in certain things and individuals with complete physical well being
might also be not in their best state of health. Since health itself is more
than what can be seen outside.
Nutrition.
Ministry of Health has come up with Malaysian plate to
helps Malaysian to easily practice healthy eating habit. This makes it even
easier nowadays to follow the healthy eating regime, put more plant-based food
into your diet. The requirement is 3 servings of vegetables per day and it is
about 3 ladles of vegetables daily. The types of vegetables that should be consumed
more is the non-starchy vegetables such as green leafy vegetables. When we
consume plenty of plant-based food, it will reduce the intake of food from
carbohydrates, protein, and fats. Which our current scenario is vice versa, the
eating habit that most of us are currently is, we consumed too many
carbohydrates, fats, and protein which is the contributor to the obesity and
various diseases. It is no surprised that we are the fattest country in
Southeast Asia.
By saying this, also implying that weight monitoring and
be more mindful on what we put into our body such as the need to consume less
saturated fat, trans fat and interesterification fat in our daily diet is a
must. Being mindful of our ideal healthy weight helps us to be more cautious to
choose food not only because of its calorie but because of its overall
nutrition content, which is why apart from maintaining healthy body weight, it
is also essential to start monitor your body parameters every year! You may do
blood test, or simply go to the nearest pharmacy or clinic to check on you
blood pressure, blood glucose, blood cholesterol level, and uric acid level.
So, go and check your health parameters before end of this year so you may
start planning for the healthier you in 2021 better with your health
information.
Physical activity
Physical activity is one of the areas that is concerning
healthcare professional especially for Malaysian women since in the previous
years, we can see the gap in women who is exercise as compared to man, but not
anymore. Nowadays, we can see that many Malaysian women started to exercise, be
in the lady’s gym only or be it in the local cycling group in your
neighborhood, you will meet women joining such activities nowadays which is a
good sign. But still, more efforts need to be done to encourage women to
exercise especially those new moms who is still adjusting motherhood. It is
nice to see perhaps in the future gym with kids’ corner where mom can do their
exercise while their kids still can enjoy their own activities all in one
place.
Apart from this, if you are considering starting
exercise in the new year, you may start with something you like, it can be
cycling, jogging, Zumba, Pilates, dancing and many more. The interesting thing
with exercise is that you can try various of things before you will find what
suit you most, and when you have found that exercise that you like. You will
have no more feeling like it is a torture.
As for elderly, perhaps to start with vigorous exercise
is dangerous for your body, so simply stick to exercise that require simple
motion but still makes you move around. It is as simple as gardening, tai chi,
or any other house chores that makes you move your body and make sure you enjoy
that so that you can put that into your habit!
Mental health
Apart from exercise can make body healthier it can as
well improve mental health. Many people are becoming more stress and anxiety
with regards to pandemic COVID19. Staying at home, practicing social distance,
and wear mask has made people paranoid of going out and makes people have no
source of comfort.
There are certain practices which can improve this
according to World Health organization (WHO) such as take time daily for
spiritual renewal, where you can allocate some of your time daily for reading,
praying, meditate, and seek spiritual renewal. A heart primed with gratitude,
forgiveness, and service help you soar over life difficulties, and challenges.
Spend quality time with family and friends also helps in building strong heart
and healthy mind. Relationship teach love and acceptance which makes more room
for kindness which is as well a good fuel to content heart!
Lastly, manage stress and limit the use of tobacco,
alcohol consumption and illicit drugs also will tremendously help. Also, if you
think that the burden is too much to carry learn to let go, learn to share, and
learn to accept things at is.
In conclusion,
With all these tips, we hope that 2021, will be our year
to soar high, to achieve more things, to be magical and fill with lots more
positive vibes, kindness, compassion towards one another as we have gone
through a tough obstacle throughout 2020 from various sides, health, economy,
and politically. Thus, its about time for us to be more understanding of one
another and unite for the betterment of humankind!