7 Ways to Practice Wellness Daily

We all deserve a little self-care. These 7 Ways to Practice Wellness Daily only take a few minutes out of your day and leave you feeling refreshed + happy! This post is sponsored by The Well Summit. I hope you’ll join me there! Read through the bottom for more details and a coupon code to save on tickets!

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I admit it, I think the word ‘wellness’ is a little played out as we stand here in 2017. You might be sick of seeing girls fluttering around Instagram leaving $35 yoga classes, doing face masks and drinking green smoothies in the name of practicing wellness. I get it, me too. It’s extremely unfortunate, but I think that social media has become a place where health and wellness are being portrayed in an unrealistic way. Sometimes I get frustrated by this.

Wellness for me, and many other people isn’t what you see on those Instagram-stars’s pages. It isn’t eating at cafe’s everyday for lunch, and working out twice a day at high price boutique gyms. It isn’t buying only organic produce and free-range-grassfed meat or putting potions in smoothies. In fact – it’s none of that. My wellness routine takes about all of 10 minutes and costs about $0 a day to maintain, so I want you to see how simple it is! Here are 7 Ways to Practice Wellness Daily that anyone can do!

1. Eating Well – It’s no surprise that eating well is at the top of my list. This is a clean eating recipe site, after all! I do want to be clear in that eating well doesn’t need to mean that you spend a TON of money on food.. no no no. Eating well means that you are conscious of the food you eat + how it makes you feel. I follow a mostly paleo, gluten-free diet. That’s what makes ME feel good. Does it have to be the same for you? Nope. But I’d highly recommend trying to incorporate more whole foods and less processed ones into your diet… and eating a vegetable from time to time!

2. Meditation – For those that know me.. this might be surprising that I meditate. I’m go-go-going 24/7/365. My brain is constantly on, thinking about my friends, family, this website, my goals, what I’m going to eat tonight, which songs I’ll teach in my group fitness classes this week.. SO. MANY. THINGS. It’s really hard for me to turn my brain off. I try to take 5 minutes before bed and either listen to a meditation podcast, use the Headspace app, or just use a WhiteNoise app and listen to the waves as I practice breathing. It only takes a few minutes, it helps me fall asleep + it isn’t too woo-woo/pie in the sky for me like some other meditations are.

That brings me to number 3. Sleep. I can’t say enough how important it is to sleep. I’m not sure when we started glorifying people who can work 17 hours a day and sleep for 3…but I’m over it. Your body NEEDS to sleep. It simply can’t function without it. Meditating helps me fall asleep, and being mindful to turn off my phone in advance of going to bed can also help. Diffusing essential oils is also helpful. I just put lavender or peaceful sleep blend in a diffuser and let it fill the room as I meditate. It instantly relaxes me + makes me drift off to catch some zzz’s in no time.

Know what also helps me sleep? 4. Moving. I make it a point to move in some way every single day. 4 days out of the week I teach BodyPump, a barbell based strength workout. The other days during the week I either do a spin class, create my own workout in the gym, or just go for a walk. I used to follow an extremely regimented strength based workout plan. Do this exercise 5x with this weight.. fasted cardio… then this exercise… etc. I felt great and got really strong, but it became a chore more than something enjoyable. Now I recognize that something as simple as a 10 minute walk is something that my body really enjoys. You don’t always have to be pushing yourself to fatigue to get a workout in. Try going for a walk outside for a few minutes a few days a week + see the difference in your mood. A little movement goes a long way! 

5. Do The Things You Enjoy. We all have things we don’t want to do. Do I really want to clean my bathroom on Sunday mornings? No, not at all. But unfortunately we can’t afford a cleaning person, so I suck it up and take 5 minutes out of my weekend to get it done. We all have these little things that we dislike doing that we have to do.. but there are often things out there that we DON’T have to do, that we say yes to. For example…if someone asks you to go somewhere or do something and you don’t want to do it.. don’t say yes because you feel bad. Just.Say. NO. Saying no isn’t the worst thing in the world. The world won’t stop spinning just because you didn’t go out to dinner what that person that you don’t really enjoy spending time with, or going to a birthday party for someone you barely even know. Start saying no to the things you don’t want to do and making more time for the things you enjoy.

6. Finding Joy in Little Things. I wear a bracelet that I never take off that says ‘choose joy’. I wear it as a daily reminder to find joy in each and every place that you can. Right now, I’m finding joy in the fact that I can sit here with my laptop in the dark at 5AM and write this. The coffee I just made is so delicious.. it has homemade vanilla almond milk in it that’s making it taste 100x better than regular coffee. I could over look these things and say.. well it’s just another weekday, and this is just another blog post… but I’m making a conscious effort to find the joy in it. Maybe for you that’s going for that 10 minute walk outside, or enjoying a square of your favorite dark chocolate. Whatever it may be – find that joy throughout your day, and savor it!

7. Surrounding Yourself with Good People There’s nothing that can suck your mood away or make you feel not-so-well like negative people. We all have them in your life. It might be a coworker, it might be a friend, it might even be family. You gotta step away from it. If you want to be well, you have to surround yourself with good people. So sometimes that means you say ‘ So sorry, have to run to a meeting’ when that person tries to grab your ear to talk about how terrible their night was. Or maybe it’s declining getting dinner with your negative friend from years ago. It doesn’t mean you have to be mean, just politely decline. Your mind will thank you for it. No time for negativity here!