Physical & Mental Health Essay.
PHYSICAL AND MENTAL HEALTH
SCI/163
January 20th, 2018
Explain your current fitness and nutritional habits
The current fitness and nutritional habit that I follow is to perform yoga daily and take time to rethink my activities through meditation and eat fresh fruits and vegetables in each of my daily meals.
Identify and describe 3 goals you can set to improve your physical and/or mental health.
To achieve and enjoy quality life both physical and mental health are important. For improving my physical and mental health following three goals could be crucial:
1. Engage in healthy and nutritious diet
2. Pursue active Lifestyle
3. Be engaged with surrounding/people for mental stimulation and avoid stress
1. Engage in healthy and nutritious diet
Our body and mind is the reflection of the food that we consume and thus it is very important that one engages in the food components which are beneficial to the body and mind. Food is the source of energy which helps in growing a healthy body and mind. Therefore, it influences every aspect in our body and mind. Engaging in a healthy diet and developing healthy eating habits will lead to positive effects on my body and body.
2. Pursue active Lifestyle
By choosing an active lifestyle, one can get rid of many harmful diseases and internal stresses. An active lifestyle increases one’s physical activity leading to positive effects on one’s mental health by releasing endorphins which help stave off depression and anxiety.
3. Engage with people for mental stimulation and to help avoid stress and depression and to enhance a mental state of healthy well-being. Engagement with people is very important as it helps in mental stimulation. Another key element to achieve quality of life is to avoid and manage the stress efficiently. This could be done at multiple levels like talking with people, taking nature walks and indulging in hobbies etc.
Explain some of the health risks associated with poor physical health.
Physical activity is very important for better functioning of the mind and body as well as one’s metal and emotional wellbeing. It has been shown that there are direct evidences in lack of physical activity and increase in morbidity and mortality. With physical activity one can increase physical fitness, exercise capacity and reduce chances of many pathological and clinical diseases due to the “disuse syndrome” like premature aging, obesity, cardiovascular vulnerability, musculoskeletal fragility, and depression. Physical activity helps in protecting against the chronic diseases like heart disease, osteoporosis, colon cancer, diabetes and cancers (Kruk, 2007). It helps in protecting against these diseases through change molecular level i.e. in hormone levels, immune system, DNA repair and others. Therefore, physical activity improves overall quality of life by improving the balance, flexibility and mental health.
Explain some of the health risks associated with excess stress.
Stress has both the positive and negative influences. The positive influence of stress is that it motivates individual to perform better. However, when the level of stress exceeds the limit the individual can handle, it leads to disbalance in body, mind and overall health. Continuous exposure to the stress could be more harmful and could result in illness but this relationship between stress and illness is complex since the effect of stress varies from person to person. It may cause illness in one person and may not cause any illness in other. Some of the effect of stress are on the regulation of inflammatory and immune system and thus on individual by vulnerability for infections, autoimmune disease, coronary artery disease, cardiovascular disease, cancer and depression (Salleh, 2008). It is therefore crucial to manage the stress as it is one of the causative factor for disease onset and progression.
Explain the mind-body connection.
Mind-body connection refers to the link between our thoughts and emotions on the all aspects of our body and therefore our health. It has been shown that psychological well-being can prevent and often help in recovery of body from medical illness. Human mind and body are closely connected and their relationship is one of the crucial factor for quality life (3). Various emotions and thoughts like anxiety, fear, happiness, and others trigger reaction in the body which influences at many level like effecting blood chemistry, heart rate, effecting on digestive and immune system. Thus, the body effects the mind and the mind in-turn effects affects the body.
What are some ways that you can improve your mind-body connection?
There are many ways to improve the mind-body connection like involving in daily physical activity, performing yoga, destressing oneself by changing the lifestyle, attitude and taking care of oneself. In totality it is improved through improvement of both the emotional and physical aspects. It includes that one take care of stress and worry, outlook and moods.
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References
2. Salleh, R. (2008). Life Event, Stress and Illness. Malaysian Journal of Medical Sciences. 15(4), 9-18.
3. EMBO reports (2006). Mind–body research moves towards the mainstream. European Molecular Biology Organization. 7(4). 358-361.