Beginner’s Guide to a Healthy Lifestyle: 15+ Tips!

What is a Healthy Lifestyle? 

First, let’s define healthy. Second, we would define a lifestyle. WHO defines health as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” On the other hand, a lifestyle is simply a way of living. I think it would be fitting to then define a healthy lifestyle as a way of living healthily, aka, healthy living. In other words, a healthy lifestyle is a way of living a healthy physical, mental, social, and emotional life.

A healthy lifestyle encompasses all aspects of our life. I would even argue that it includes the spiritual, intellectual, environmental, and financial factors. To me, a healthy lifestyle means living a quality life! This includes doing the things that will make me happy, loving, and grateful for where I am—having a healthy mind and body.

Understandably, the concept of a healthy lifestyle can become overwhelming and confusing to the point that we don’t know where and how to start. Well, that’s about to end. I am excited to share a beginner’s guide to a healthy lifestyle with you. If you have wanted to kick-start a healthy lifestyle journey, you are in the right place. These beginner’s guide for healthy living tips will help you start, stay motivated, and as well as stay on track!

15+ Tips to Start A Healthy Lifestyle for Beginners:

1. Believe You are Worth a Quality Healthy Lifestyle.

Yes, you heard me. Everything starts with believing because it helps you understand that it is possible. To put it differently, have FAITH that you can change your life! 

You are more likely to make an effort to accomplish a goal when you believe in that goal. Factually, if you do not believe, you may not be willing to put in the work that this process may require.

To BELIEVE is the first step to starting a healthy lifestyle journey (in my opinion). No matter what health obstacles and challenges you may currently be going through. Please begin to convince yourself that you deserve better and that quality life is within reach. This includes a healthy physical, mental, emotional, social, and psychological well-being. 

Typically, my trick to believing in something is to write it down on a sticky note and place it on a visible area such as the fridge, dressing mirror, etc. You can also turn this into a mantra and say it aloud often. Now say it with me, “I AM WORTHY OF A QUALITY LIFE!

2. Access Where You Are.

It is only fundamental to access where you are when trying to begin a healthier lifestyle! Refrain from jumping on the New Year New Me bandwagon. Or the new summer body bandwagon. Even the Nutrisystem, South Beach, Jenny Craig, Noom bandwagons may not necessarily be the answer you need right now. How about the keto, gluten-free, low-carb, paleo, Mediterranean diet plans? Several choices, right?

The best way to possibly be successful in starting and implementing a healthier lifestyle may be to first access where you are and then go from there! This helps you identify your need, resources and have a high chance of success. Do you need to revamp a whole of things, or do you need to change a few things and maintain? When it comes to a healthy lifestyle, we are all in different stages of our journey. Where in this journey are you? Feel free to share in the comment.

3. Identify What Needs To Change.

To start a healthy lifestyle means realizing the need for a change! While it is crucial to identify what needs to change in your current lifestyle, try not to get overwhelmed. If you did access where you are in step #2, write the things that need to change with paper and pen. To be honest, you necessarily don’t have to write this down, but you should know what needs to change before changing them.

This step is major; keep away from vaguely wanting to change your life without knowing what to change. 

4. Give Yourself Some Grace (Don’t Beat Yourself Up)!

Listen, friend, please give yourself some grace. Appreciate your current mind and body that brought you so far while understanding the need to grow. Undoubtedly, people can beat themselves up after realizing they may have a long way ahead as they embark on a healthy lifestyle.

Please don’t beat yourself up; it won’t make you successful or make the challenges disappear. Unfortunately, it might cause you to doubt and increase anxiety. In reality, you need every support you can get from yourself as you start a healthy lifestyle.

5. Create a Realistic Healthy Lifestyle Goal.

Make a plan that incorporates both good nutrition and achievable physical activity. While it is okay to be optimistic, it is imperative to be realistic at the same time. Two things can be true, in this case, optimism and reality! When it comes to creating a healthy lifestyle goal, I suggest you implement a SMART goal. 

Also, start small. For example, small changes you can easily make in nutrition may be substituting a sugary drink for water! Instead of grabbing a croissant sandwich, opt for a lighter, healthier alternative like a yogurt bowl, healthy blueberry smoothie, avocado smoothie, or beet smoothie. Furthermore, as a beginner, I highly suggest you cook most of your meals instead of take-outs. Cooking is cost and calorie effective. Overall, your goal as a beginner in nutrition should be to learn how to eat healthy.

The same goes with creating a physical activity plan; a good fitness plan doesn’t necessarily have to be 2 hours of heavy lifting every day of the week. This is because fitness is not a one-size-fits-all. What works for you may not work for me. And you must be realistic about what you can do as well. Let’s say you have not walked a mile in the last five years. It may be irresponsible to create a fitness goal that includes 5 miles run every day for 5 days a week. The bottom line is that the body loves movement, and the most critical aspect of this is to stay consistent. 

NOTE: If you are struggling with creating a nutrition plan, please send me a message on my social media. I can help you, but it will cost you. 

6. Follow A Plan of Action.

If you created a goal in #5 above, follow it. Despite having a strong will, you can rarely commit to healthy living without a plan of action. It is vital to have a list of what to do and how to do them!

Follow a routine; know what days of the week to work out or take a walk and for how long. Have a grocery list/recipe, know when to shop for groceries and when to meal prep/cook them. If possible, use a physical journal or an app to follow your plans. 

7. Sleep Can Improve A Healthy Lifestyle.

Get more sleep. Sleep is equally as important as nutrition and physical activity. It is essential to prioritize sleep, especially when trying to live healthy. Please do not go to sleep at 1.30 am and wake up at 7.00 am!

A night of good sleep is necessary for a healthy life. Listen, my friend, sleep can improve mood, reduce stress and help maintain a healthy weight.  

8. Eliminate Things That No Longer Serve You.

Notably, in 2015, I realized that watching morning television no longer served me, so I stopped. Relatively, in 2016, I had to let some friendships go because it was unhealthy for my mental health. There was a time I had to stay on the phone for 2 – 4 hours literally all day, but I eventually realized that I was not doing myself any good.

Take a look at your current situation and let go of the things that no longer improve your life. Perhaps you may stop going to the All-You-Can-Eat every Sunday after church because you now prefer cooking healthier meals. It is called growth. 

9. Manage Your Time Wisely.

Henceforth manage your time wisely because you will need it! You will agree that everything on this entire 15+ tips require time. Time is consequential in achieving any healthy lifestyle goal you create. Even the bible warned us not to waste our time, so we don’t look back and regret it. It also reminded us that there is time for everything! Eccl. 3:1-8.

The truth of the matter is that time is scarce. Unfortunately, you won’t have time for everything, so be mindful of what you give your time to!

10. Do The Things That Will Give You Joy.

Feel free to call me the minister of joy! LOL, I love LOVE the things that bring me joy, laughter, and peace. I value my emotional well-being and love doing the things that bring me joy. Living in a clean space gives me joy. Writing on my blog gives me joy (for instance, I really loved sharing these tips today)! Also, it is refreshing not to be anxious about certain things I can’t control. I pretty much do my part, breath, and leave the rest to GOD. 

What are the things that will bring you joy? Journalling? Walking? Cooking? Do more of that. Emotional fulfillment is equally as important as physical health! Don’t allow anyone to steal your peace. It is okay to rearrange your life goal to make you happy right now. 

11. Healthy Social Environment Is Vital To A Healthy Lifestyle.

Maintain an environment that motivates and encourages you. Stay friends with people who want you to succeed and bring joy to your life. Anyone who brings you headaches or makes you anxious, and creates an unhealthy environment may need to break from your life.

On the other hand, this applies to the online world. You are free to take social media breaks as needed. I feel like this equally includes my space and where I live. An organized and clean environment makes me happy and inspires me to create.  

12. Journal Your Healthy Living Progress.

Some people like journaling, some don’t! Luckily there are plenty of journaling apps you can use to track your progress. With this in mind, do what suits you and stay healthy physically, mentally, socially, and emotionally. Even if you are not detailing a lot in your journal, just checking in with yourself at the end of the day is essential.

When I started on my healthy lifestyle journey a couple of years ago, I made sure to record my progress daily. Every day, I took a photo of something major that I did. It could be when I am drinking green juice or walking. Or perhaps a picture of my Fitbit data after a walk. Currently, I am using this physical journal pictured below!

13. Hold Yourself Accountable.

Find a way to hold yourself accountable. Listen, you are responsible for changing your life, and you are not going to magically become a new person. However, the little steps and actions will eventually become meaningful accomplishments. Just remember to put a check in place to ensure you are doing what you are supposed to do! Without accountability, there will be no responsibility.

Amazingly, holding yourself accountable helps you see and appreciate your progress and reward yourself. Another key point is to not beat down on yourself when you know that you have not made the required progress.

14. Healthy Lifestyle Is A Marathon Not A Sprint.

Understand that it will take time for you to begin to see the result healthy lifestyle you begin today. Be sure to enjoy the journey and love the process of improving yourself. The truth is that becoming the person you want to be will always be a work in progress. Though some goals, such as weight loss, may happen within a time frame. Most healthy lifestyle goals are what you should continue to do throughout your lifetime. For instance, eating healthy and exercising; you can’t eat healthy this week and not for the rest of the year.

In the same way, you can’t exercise this week and take off for the entire year. That is to say, you have to include these goals into your routine intentionally and stay consistent. A healthy lifestyle is a marathon and not a sprint. 

15. Do Not Give Up!

We are often tempted to give up if we don’t see the anticipated progress. I am here to encourage you not to give up. Please find a WHY and stay on track.

On the positive side, if you keep going, you will eventually reap the fruits of your labor. On the negative side, you will not see any result if you stop halfway!Like I mentioned earlier, healthy living is a marathon and not a sprint. 

16. Be your #1 Health Advocate! 

If you have not started on a healthy lifestyle yet, let this post remind you to do so. The time we live in calls for each person to really take care of themselves! Currently, the world is going through a lot, and honestly, it feels like nobody cares. 

In my 2021 reflections, I shared a little about being sick during the Christmas/New Year holidays! I felt the weakness in my muscles and bones the way I had never felt before. It was crazy, thankfully I have been on this healthier lifestyle journey, and I believe it paid off. Assuming I was extremely overweight with health complications, maybe my 10-day sickness would have turned into 30 days and become worse. Why am I telling you this?

Please take care of yourself. Be your greatest health advocate, and desire to become your healthiest self. Always look out for YOU! No matter how busy you are, incorporate salads, juicing, and most of the healthy lifestyle tips I shared today. Your health is in your hands, protect it, preserve it and enrich it! You got this!

Check Out Other Healthy Lifestyle Related Posts:

• 2022 Word(s) of the Year.
• Foods that Promote Healthy Breasts.
• How to Ease Arthritis Pain.
• How to Kick-start Your Fitness.

While you are still here, grab my FREE (5) spinach salad recipe bundle. It would be a great addition to your dinner table (if you like salads) or you are looking to incorporate more veggies. Get the recipes here.

THIS POST CONTAINS AFFILIATE LINKS, you are not charged more for using these links, but I make little coins when you do.

Finally, let’s connect on social media, am on Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube. Share this recipe post with family and friends!

HAPPY NEW YEAR, stay well, and safe!

Sharing is caring!