wellness trends

5 ways to skip over the latest wellness trends

Emmanuelle Bonham is a Dubai-based personal trainer and nutritionist with a passion for optimal female health and wellness. Not one for for just following wellness trends and fashions, the Adidas brand ambassador is passionate about advocating for animal welfare, and championing plant-based health and sustainability.
Below are her top tips for navigating a real wellness journey amid the minefield of conflicting nutrition news and social media trends.

Be wary of the next best supplement

Rather than listening to the latest influencer on IG or that podcaster who has their own ideas on which supplements everyone should be taking, take responsibility and autonomy of your own body that has individual needs. Get your blood work done and understand where the areas of improvement are for you and your individual lifestyle.
Don’t take every single new supplement you hear about, because your body can only digest so much and some minerals compete with each other for absorption, so while you’re thinking the more the better, that’s not always the case. Remember that the vast majority of people giving health advice aren’t qualified in any health, nutrition and fitness-related field, let alone have studied in a medical capacity.

The best movement is what you enjoy doing

There’s negativity about all types of movement in the media. Running’s bad for your joints, HIIT’s bad for your cortisol levels, weight training’s bad for injuries.

Unless you have injuries that prevent you moving in a certain way, any movement is beneficial for you, you don’t need someone to tell you what movement is healthy or unhealthy.  The best movement for you is the one that keeps you consistent. Pick a style of movement you enjoy & that you will be able to continue for the foreseeable future.

Don’t compare

Society and media is always telling us to do increasingly more with the same amount of hours in the day: Wake up at 5am, have a full morning routine to meditate, exercise, prep food, hustle 12 hours a day, then get home and cook nutritious meals, be there for your family, but also take time off for you.

No-one has has it together 100 percent of the time, and just know that someone’s day does not have to look like yours. Most importantly, establish a routine for the long term that is sustainable and allows you enough rest.

Joining the 5am club is optional; some people are wired for early morning and some aren’t, it’s a genetically pre-determined chronotype. Sleep is the number one recovery and health-boosting medicine we have available to us. The shorter your sleep, the shorter your life.

Low intensity for long-term results

It’s a total myth that only a high intensity workout is an effective workout– activities such as yoga, walking, stretching, pilates and barre can all be challenging and very effective.

Not every workout has to be a sweaty, high-calorie burner in order to bring benefits. Plus, you need low-intensity to compliment medium and high intensity. If you only ever did high-intensity and never any lower intensity, you’d be setting yourself up for injuries, pain and lots of bodily tension, not to mention problems with back pain and suboptimal posture.

Personal trainers are not necessary

Unless you have a really specific performance goal, you do not need a personal trainer. Now that’s not to say that if you struggle with consistency and exercising regularly, you won’t benefit from having someone to keep you accountable, but a personal trainer does not have all magic powers to get you to your goals super fast.

If you’re trying to lose some body fat, hormonally you’re balanced — check with an endocrinologist if you’re not sure — and your stress levels are okay, you need frequent movement, time, patience, balanced macronutrients in your diet and a slight calorie deficit, definitely not a starvation diet.

Your body needs enough calories to function and to perform day to day activities, if you diet so low you dip into the calories your body needs to function, you’ll won’t lose fat because your body’s first priority is to survive over fat loss.

Livehealthymag.com is for every body and mind in the UAE. This magazine is all about moderation, making small changes, little additions and the odd subtraction.

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