How To Live A Healthy Lifestyle
Are you ready to start living a healthy lifestyle and completely change your life? Healthy living starts with healthy habits! Keep reading to learn how to live a healthy lifestyle and develop healthy habits.

How to Live a Healthy Lifestyle
Many people want to live healthier lives but are unsure where or how to begin. Transitioning to a healthy lifestyle can definitely be overwhelming.
But it can also be completely life-changing!
I used to be sick, tired, and run down. For over ten years, I suffered from fatigue, insomnia, depression, joint pain, anxiety, and headaches.
After being misdiagnosed with depression by countless doctors, I was finally diagnosed with Hashimoto’s in 2018. Hashimoto’s is an autoimmune disease affecting the thyroid.
You can learn more about it here.
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After receiving the diagnosis, I knew I had to make some major changes in my life.
Up to that point, I had treated my body pretty badly. Good sleep and healthy eating were at the bottom of my priority list.
I was completely ignorant of how food affected the body. I knew nothing about environmental toxins and their effect on the endocrine system.
My doctor recommended medication, but I didn’t want just to suppress my symptoms—I wanted to heal my body.
So I spoke to different doctors, read books, and researched all about Hashimoto’s and began my healing journey shortly after my initial diagnosis.
Here I am, almost five years later, feeling better than I ever thought was possible.
And it’s all thanks to breaking bad habits, creating new healthy habits, and living a healthy lifestyle.
You can click here to learn more about my health journey.
In some ways, a healthy lifestyle can look different for different people. But I think for most people who want to begin a healthy lifestyle, it starts with addressing these five areas of your life—diet, sleep, fitness, stress, and environmental toxins.
When just one of these areas of your life is suffering, it can throw your whole life out of balance.
For example, insufficient sleep can raise cortisol, which can lead to poor diet and weight gain. Inadequate sleep can also cause fatigue and brain fog, hindering your ability to make good health choices throughout the day.
Excessive stress can also raise cortisol, which, once again, can lead to poor diet choices and weight gain. It can also cause insomnia.
A poor diet can cause fatigue, brain fog, headaches, anxiety, and all kinds of other issues.
Environmental toxins can wreak havoc on your endocrine system, which can cause issues like allergies, anxiety, depression, fatigue, headaches, and more.
Lack of exercise can cause weight gain, but that’s not why exercise is so important. Exercise is so important because it can help improve all four areas I just mentioned, which I’ll discuss more about below.
How to Create a Healthy Lifestyle
So, if you’re ready to start living a healthy lifestyle, you need to address these five areas of your life and figure out how to improve them.
Diet
If you want to live a healthy life, then you have to start with food. The food that you put into your body matters.
The quality of our food supply has significantly diminished.
From pesticides to synthetic fertilizers to GMOs—food just isn’t what it used to be. I believe that is one of the reasons more people are suffering from chronic illnesses, autoimmune diseases, and cancer than ever before.
Our bodies are not designed to process synthetic ingredients and genetically modified foods.
So, one of the first changes you should make when striving to live a healthy lifestyle is your diet.
I don’t believe there is a one-size-fits-all diet. Everyone’s body is different, and it reacts differently to different foods.
That said, I believe every human being can benefit from eating ancestral whole foods.
Eat whole foods that are vitamin and mineral-rich and that are easy to digest.
Some foods have little nutritional value and are difficult for the body to digest. These types of foods take more energy than they give, and these types of foods should be avoided, in my opinion.
I am a big fan of the pro-metabolic diet, but I can’t tell you what diet will work best for you. However, I will share a few tips that will be beneficial regardless of what diet you choose.
- Eat vegetables with every meal.
- Read ingredient labels and avoid foods with dyes and preservatives.
- Eat organic whenever possible.
- Avoid genetically modified foods.
You must determine what foods your body functions best on. This might involve a lot of trial and error.
A food diary is an excellent tool for determining what foods are best for your body.
I also highly recommend the Whole30. This clean-eating diet plan is designed to help you break bad eating habits and determine which foods you should permanently eliminate from your diet.
There are quite a few books on Amazon related to the Whole 30. If you’re unfamiliar with it, I recommend the Whole30 30-day guide. It’s perfect for beginners.
I also highly recommend the book It Starts With Food, which is written by the creators of the Whole30.
In addition to the Whole30, I recommend a Thrive Market membership if you’re really serious about living a healthy lifestyle.
Thrive Market is an online grocery store that sells natural and organic foods. I love Thrive Market because it has many healthier options than my local grocery store.
Get 30% off your first order plus a free gift when you join Thrive Market using this link!
You can read my full Thrive Market review to learn more about them.
I find it so much easier to stick to healthy eating when I have more options.
Sleep
Good sleep is absolutely crucial to your overall well-being.
Consistent good sleep can boost your mood, improve your focus, help you lose weight, and help prevent heart disease and stroke.
And if you are struggling with a chronic illness or an autoimmune disease, good sleep is even more important.
Sleep helps the body conserve energy and strengthens the immune system.
Unhealthy sleep habits can create a cycle of unhealthy living. As I mentioned before, lack of sleep can raise cortisol, leading to bad diet choices and weight gain.
Also, brain fog and inability to focus caused by a lack of sleep can hinder your ability to make good health choices throughout the rest of the day.
You should get between 7 and 8 hours of sleep every night. I have many resources if you struggle to get the sleep you need. I encourage you to read the posts below.
- Sleep Better: 10 Tips To Help You Fall Asleep, Stay Asleep & Wake Up Feeling Awesome
- 8 Natural Sleep Supplements That Really Work
- The Best Essential Oils For Sleep
- Get A Better Night’s Sleep: 5 Of The Best Sleep Teas
- Essential Oil Sleep Rollerball Recipe
Once again, healthy sleep habits are essential to live a healthy lifestyle. Good sleep goes hand in hand with healthy eating and working out. So do whatever you can to make it happen!
Fitness
You probably know that working out is good for your body. However, you may not know how working out can completely change your life!
The benefits of a consistent workout routine reach far beyond just getting in shape.
Working out consistently can help you sleep better, improve your mood, increase your energy, reduce anxiety, help you sweat out toxins, and so much more!!!
To be honest, I hate working out. I absolutely hate it! But I cannot deny that every area of my life improves when I work out consistently.
You can click here to read all about the mind-blowing benefits of consistent exercise.
The best part is you don’t need a radical, extreme fitness routine to experience the positive benefits of working out.
In my experience, working out for 30 minutes a day / five days a week can change your life.
And you don’t need a gym membership, either.
I work out at home, and I love it.
Stress Management
Many people underestimate stress’s negative impact on their overall health and well-being.
Not only can stress cause high blood pressure, fatigue, depression, anxiety, and heart disease, but it can also weaken your immune system and make you more susceptible to illness and disease.
To live a healthy lifestyle, you must reduce stress and learn to manage stress in healthy ways.
If something in your life is causing excessive stress, do whatever you can to eliminate that thing.
If that isn’t possible, you need to work on ways to reduce your stress reaction and learn to deal with stress healthily.
Breathing exercises, stress-relieving essential oils, herbal teas, talking to friends, and taking walks are all great ways to reduce stress naturally.
Environmental Toxins
We are bombarded with toxic chemicals every day! They’re everywhere, from food to water to cleaning and beauty products.
And many people are entirely unaware of the harm these toxic chemicals are causing. So many people have chronic health issues or ailments that are being triggered by the things they are deliberately putting on or in their bodies.
There have actually been many studies confirming the connection between toxic chemicals and autoimmune diseases. I’ve listed a few below if you want to check them out.
- Toxicology of Autoimmune Diseases
- Environmental Chemicals and Autoimmune Disease
- Possible Environmental Triggers Associated With Autoimmune Diseases
Toxic chemicals in your home can disrupt your endocrine system, which can lead to issues like anxiety, depression, insomnia, and more.
This information can be extremely overwhelming, but remember, knowledge is power. Now that you have the information, it is up to you to make the change.
Use the EWG website to check the safety of the products you use most. Throw out harmful products and replace them with non-toxic alternatives.
You don’t have to do this all in one day. However, slowly eliminate the harmful products in your home week by week, month by month.
In my experience, essential oils are essential to living a toxin-free life. They make it easy to create homemade toxin-free products.
I highly recommend Simply Earth essential oils.
They have a monthly essential oil recipe box that you can subscribe to. The box costs $29.99 (new customers only) and contains four full-size, 100% pure essential oils, essential oil recipe cards, and extra items needed to make several essential oil DIYs.
Thanks to their super awesome monthly recipe box, I’ve built quite the essential oil collection and created many toxin-free DIYs, which have helped me eliminate many toxic products from my home.
You can click here to read my full Simply Earth essential oils review.
And I’ve also done many Simply Earth recipe box reviews which you can check out below.
- Simply Earth August 2024 Recipe Box
- Simply Earth July 2024 Recipe Box Review
- Simply Earth June 2024 Recipe Box Review
First-time customers can use the code HAPPYHEARTFREE to receive a big bonus box plus a $45 Simply Earth gift card with the purchase of their first recipe box, all for only $29.99!
Click here to check it out!
If you want to explore essential oils and natural living more deeply, I recommend reading the posts below and checking out my many essential oil recipes.
- What Are Essential Oils & How Do They Work?
- How To Choose An Essential Oil Brand: 7 Things You Need To Know
- 5 Ways To Spot Fake Essential Oils
- The Best Essential Oils For Beginners
- 5 Simple Ways to Eliminate Toxins in Your Home
- Ultimate Guide to Toxin-Free Cleaning
Final Thoughts
No magic pill or healthy living secret will change your life and make all your health problems disappear.
Healthy living starts with these five areas. Of course, there are other things you can do to improve your health, like drinking more water and taking vitamins, but if one of the five areas above is suffering, those types of changes won’t make much difference.
So, if you’re ready to begin living a healthy lifestyle, start eating healthy, sleeping more, stressing less, moving your body, and eliminating the toxic chemicals in your environment.
Other Posts You May Like:
- 5 Healthy Habits That Will Change Your Life
- How to Have More Energy & Feel Amazing
- 5 Easy Healthy Habits That Will Transform Your Health
- 5 Huge Health Mistakes I Made On My Healing Journey
Sources:
Why lack of sleep is bad for your health – https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/sleep-and-tiredness/why-lack-of-sleep-is-bad-for-your-health/
Is too little sleep a cause of weight gain? – https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/adult-health/expert-answers/sleep-and-weight-gain/faq-20058198
Stress symptoms: Effects on your body and behavior – https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/stress-management/in-depth/stress-symptoms/art-20050987
New data on harmful effects of trans-fatty acids –https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27215959/
These 5 foods and substances can cause anxiety and insomnia – https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/diagnosis-diet/201607/these-5-foods-and-substances-can-cause-anxiety-and-insomnia
Physical activity and feelings of energy and fatigue: epidemiological evidence – https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16937952/
Effects of exercise and physical activity on anxiety – https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23630504/
Endocrine disruptors and your health – https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/materials/endocrine_disruptors_508.pdf