Teens focus on developing healthy lifestyles

Nicole Wright
Staff Writer

Going into a new year, we all want to make changes for a healthier lifestyle.  Many benefits both mentally and physically can come from working out, eating healthy and setting daily routines.

Four big psychological benefits come from a healthy lifestyle, including decreased mental illness, better emotional processing, increased self-esteem and cognitive benefits. Physically, healthy life habits are shown to increase energy levels, benefit sleep, and increase the chance of a healthy weight. 

“When I started working out, I noticed it benefiting my mental and physical health. It became a passion that I found needed in my routine daily. The gym is its own community. It’s given me the opportunity to get close with a lot of people that I didn’t know much before,” sophomore Jacob Hamilton said.

Keeping active helps maintain overall health and wellness. Various outcomes can come from it, including growth aid, improvement in strength, preventing aging and more. Mentally, working out is also a great stress reliever. Whether you go to the gym, go on walks, play sports or just do at home workouts. They can all make a big difference.

Adequate sleep is another key part of a healthy lifestyle and maybe even the most critical. Not only does it just improve your mood for the day. More seriously, getting enough sleep benefits your heart, weight, mind, and metabolism to increase appetite.

“Eating specific foods and meal prepping has helped me feel more energized. It also has encouraged me to make sure I eat three meals a day since it’s already laid out. It helped a ton because sometimes I just didn’t know what to eat so I would skip meals. Now I’m more motivated and it keeps my body strong. It seems super daunting at first, but people make it look a lot more difficult than it really is. All it takes is 30 minutes to get started,” senior Brooklyn Starley said.

Making sure we are eating a balanced diet while still getting enough food is very important. Many people undereat or overeat. Meal prepping and tracking food can be a great way to fix that. Apps like MyfitnessPal, My Plate and Noom can be great tools for finding easy recipes and tracking. Fueling and hydrating your body helps stay energized, avoid body cramps and headaches. 

It’s never too late to make changes for a longer, healthier life. This new year is a great time to change that.