Wellness advice seems to be everywhere these days, but change can be hard. How do you start a journey toward better health that you can stick with, and not be overwhelmed?
Among the experts’ advice: Start with a little and it can turn into something big. Be consistent. Try to find people who can help you stay the course.
Define ‘wellness’ and start small
Kristina Schuldt is a family medicine physician and wellness director for about 14,000 employees of the Mayo Clinic Health System.
“Wellness means different things to people. There’s fitness and physical wellness, but there’s also mental wellness, financial wellness, spiritual wellness,” she said. “A person should define what their wellness goal is.”
Don’t take on the entire wellness universe at once, she warned. Start with small steps.
Increase water intake, for example, using a bottle or jug big enough to hold a day’s worth, with markings on the side to let you see how much you drink. If quitting smoking is the goal, cut down by one cigarette until it feels comfortable, then do the same thing again and again.
That goes for getting your steps in, too. If you’re not used to long walks, start with a few blocks and increase by two every week.
In the kitchen, experiment with healthy foods to find out which ones you like. Will it be pumpkin but not kale? Flaxseed but not cranberries? Don’t force yourself to eat foods you don’t like. At the table, eat slowly. Savor each bite and try to recognize when you’re nearly full.
“Go with what we call the low-hanging fruit at first,” Schuldt said of first steps overall.
