Optimists are quite healthy people

Healthier people have a unique approach to life than those who are not. They do things that unhealthy people don’t. Health includes both your physical and mental wellbeing.

There are 4 things that determine how healthy you are. These are your eating habits, your sleeping habits, your exercise habits and, the most difficult one of all, your thought processes.

Healthy people eat the right foods, known in the nutritional world as a balanced diet that contains the right fats, carbohydrates, proteins, minerals, vitamins and fibre. They also eat at the right time every day and exercise portion control. People who are less healthy tend to do the exact opposite. To become healthier, your eating habits can be corrected with a bit of guidance; in other words, it is doable. The others are not so easy to change.

Some people are night owls and their biorhythm has been that way for years. To change that sleeping cycle would require drastic measures, often with the need for intervention by a sleep specialist who will likely recommend drastic and unfamiliar changes to your lifestyle. This will not be easy to do if abnormal sleeping hours have been your way of life for many years.

The need to exercise might seem fairly straightforward but if you’re not used to exercising, even this will seem like a huge burden. If you’re already busy and tired from work and endless household chores, you might not have the energy or time to give yourself even half an hour to exercise three times a week. You might also be suffering from chronic aches and pains in your feet or joints that make it harder to even do everyday chores. If that is the case, then simply walking might be your solution.  Because it might be too hot out, walking indoors, even inside a shopping mall, might be an idea. Vigorous household chores and standing whenever you can will also help. You don’t even need to go to a gym to get yourself moving. I think the notion of ‘going to a gym’ is the biggest hindrance to people getting any exercise at all. They think that, because they’re not going to a gym, they’re not exercising properly. That’s simply not true.

When you’re watching TV, watch it standing up, if you are able to. Walk on the spot if you have no space in which to walk. Walk or run, if you are able to, up and down stairs. I found out that walking down a flight of stairs has a greater positive effect than climbing up them. But having done both, I am not convinced that this is actually the case. I seem to get more out of breath climbing up 8 flights than climbing down them. If you can’t get to a staircase then you can do stepups on a thick telephone directory or even a block of wood placed on the floor. Even when you’re seated you can move your arms and legs. Really, you don’t need special equipment to exercise if you build it into your daily routine.

Everything we’ve covered thus far is all physical; what you do, how you do it and where. For the most part, it can be achievable, even if it requires some coaxing. But the last part is not always doable and many people fail even after trying. This is because we’re dealing with the most complicated organ in the human body — the mind.

According to scientists, those who are optimistic by nature about everything are generally physically healthier. We know that negative thinking can lead to stress which, in turn, affects our head, stomach and heart. Stress can cause hypertension, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, loss of appetite, constipation or diarrhoea, headaches and a massively compromised immune system.

If you’re prone to negative thinking and it’s affecting your general health, people around you will often tell you ‘don’t worry’, ‘try not to think about it’ and ‘be positive’. It’s very annoying and, most irritating of all, it’s very difficult to do.

Your past determines how you think about your present and your future. If your past has been filled with disappointments, you will always assume that the worse, or at the very least, the same will happen in your present and your future. People who can’t help but worry, or have negative thoughts or feelings all the time, do not do it on purpose and I can assure you that they wish there could be an off switch to their brain so that they could think about — nothing.

I don’t think that it’s common for people being able to successfully alter their mindset, especially in advancing years. Some people go to bed worrying about something, some wake up worrying about something and some don’t sleep at all for the worrying. Some can’t stop worrying even when that worrying has so clearly affected their general health. That is what’s called worrying yourself sick or worrying yourself to death!