10 Habits to Support a Healthier Mind and Body: Small Choices for Better Health
When we think about being healthy, it’s easy to focus on how long we might live. But I think there’s a more useful question: How well do we want to live during that time? That’s the idea behind healthspan—the portion of our lives spent in reasonably good health and able to participate in those things that matter most to us.
There is no single supplement, diet, medication, morning routine, or wellness trend that guarantees a long and healthy life. And you certainly don’t need to do everything perfectly.
What we do know is that the seemingly ordinary choices we make again and again—how we sleep, eat, move, manage stress, connect with other people, and care for our mental and physical health—can add up over time.
The good news is that you don’t need to completely reinvent your life to begin.
Here are ten places I think are worth starting.
1. Practice gratitude, but don't force positivity.
Gratitude can be a useful practice, but I don't believe it means pretending everything is wonderful when it isn't. Life can be difficult. You can be grieving, anxious, exhausted, angry, or overwhelmed and still notice something good.
Sometimes gratitude is as simple as recognizing a beautiful morning, a good cup of coffee, a conversation with someone you love, your dog greeting you at the door, or the fact that you made it through a difficult day.
Try taking a few minutes before bed to identify three things you appreciated that day. They don't have to be profound. They might include simple things such as a good cup of coffee, a delicious meal, a smile or pleasant interaction with someone, a moment of laughter, a beautiful sunrise or sunset, or something that reminded you of a special memory.
The point isn't to convince yourself that everything is good. It's to remind your brain that what's difficult isn't necessarily all that exists.
2. Take your mental health seriously
We sometimes treat mental health as though it is separate from "real" health. It isn't.
Depression, anxiety, ADHD, bipolar disorder, trauma, chronic stress, and sleep problems can affect far more than how you feel emotionally. They can influence sleep, energy, concentration, motivation, relationships, eating habits, physical activity, substance use, and your ability to care for yourself.
And here's something I think is especially important:
If you're struggling to maintain healthy habits, the problem isn't always a lack of discipline.
Sometimes depression makes getting out of bed difficult. ADHD can make routines surprisingly hard to maintain. Anxiety can interfere with sleep. Chronic stress can leave you exhausted and depleted.
In those situations, reaching out for professional help in treating the underlying problem may be an important part of helping you make the changes you already know you want to make.
3. Protect your sleep
Sleep is one of the foundations of both physical and mental health.
But instead of obsessing over achieving a perfect eight hours every night, pay attention to the bigger picture.
Are you getting enough sleep for you? Is your sleep reasonably consistent? Do you wake feeling restored—or exhausted despite spending plenty of time in bed?
Good sleep habits can help. Keeping a fairly regular schedule, reducing late-night screen use, limiting caffeine later in the day, getting morning light, and creating some separation between the activity of your day and bedtime are reasonable places to start.
Sometimes poor sleep is a symptom of something else—depression, anxiety, ADHD, hormonal changes, medication effects, sleep apnea, restless legs, or another medical condition.
Persistent insomnia, excessive daytime sleepiness, snoring, or waking repeatedly during the night deserve attention rather than simply being accepted as normal.
The goal isn't just more sleep. It's better, restorative sleep.
4. Know your numbers—but measure what matters
I'm a believer in looking at the whole person. Mental health symptoms don't occur in isolation from the rest of the body. Fatigue, poor concentration, anxiety, low mood, sleep changes, and cognitive complaints can sometimes overlap with medical issues.
That's one reason thoughtful psychiatric care may occasionally include laboratory testing or coordinate care with your primary care physician. But more testing isn't automatically better. The goal should be to order tests when there's a good clinical reason to believe the results could help us understand what is happening or change what we do next.
Outside the psychiatrist's office, there are also some decidedly unglamorous numbers worth knowing: blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar, and other routine health measures recommended by your medical clinician.
Taking care of your brain includes taking care of the body that carries it around.
5. Move your body
You just need to move.
You don't have to become a runner.
You don't need an expensive gym membership.
You don’t need to climb a mountain.
And there isn't anything magical about reaching exactly 10,000 steps.
Choose something you don't hate, because the best form of exercise is often the one you'll actually continue doing. Walk the dog. Work in the garden. Walk around a favorite local park. Take the stairs. Dance in your kitchen. Hike. Swim. Ride a bicycle. Lift weights. Take a yoga class.
If you've been sedentary, start small. A ten-minute walk is considerably better than the hour-long workout you keep planning to start next Monday.
Movement benefits far more than physical fitness. Regular physical activity is associated with better sleep and brain health and a lower risk of depression, while even a single bout of activity can reduce short-term feelings of anxiety.
The goal isn't athletic performance. It's building movement into your life.
6. Eat mostly real food
Nutrition can become unnecessarily complicated. While one expert tells you carbohydrates are the problem, another blames fat. Someone online is eliminating an entire food group, and somebody else is selling a supplement or “magic solution” that's supposed to fix everything. For most people, healthy eating doesn't need to be quite so dramatic.
For many of us our nutritional sources have become overly processed foods. Instead, try to build most of your meals around foods that are relatively close to their original form: vegetables, fruits, beans and legumes, whole grains, nuts and seeds, healthy fats, and appropriate sources of protein.
There are several healthy dietary patterns, and no single diet is right for everyone. Rather than searching for the "perfect" diet, ask: Can I eat this way most of the time and still enjoy my life? Sustainability matters. If you have health issues or are finding the right food choices for you are difficult, it might be useful to consult your one of your doctors and/or ask them for a referral to a nutritionist.
Food should support your health. It shouldn't become another source of fear, guilt, or perfectionism.
7. Invest in your relationships
We tend to talk about diet and exercise when discussing health, but relationships belong in that conversation too.
Strong social connections are associated with better mental and physical health, and people with stronger social bonds are more likely to live longer, healthier lives.
That doesn't mean you need dozens of friends. Quality matters.
Call someone you've been meaning to call. Have dinner together. Walk with a friend instead of walking alone. Join something. Take a class. Volunteer. Reconnect with someone you miss.
And make room for new relationships as your life changes.
Friendships require effort, particularly as we get older and life gets busier.
Relationships are worth the effort.
8. Stop treating rest as something you have to earn
Many of us have become remarkably good at being busy. Some even boastfully “brag” about how busy their lives are or how “crazy” things are.
We're answering emails while eating lunch, checking our phones while watching television, thinking about tomorrow while brushing our teeth, and carrying a seemingly endless list of things we haven't finished.
Eventually, even rest can begin to feel unproductive.
Your nervous system needs periods when nothing is being demanded of it. Here are some things that you can try:
Sit outside.
Eat lunch without working.
Leave your phone in another room.
Take a slow walk.
Take a short nap.
Meditate
Read something simply because you enjoy it.
Spend an afternoon doing something that has absolutely no measurable return on investment.
Rest isn't laziness. It's part of taking care of yourself.
9. Learn to be alone with yourself
There's an important difference between loneliness and solitude.
Loneliness hurts. And while meaningful relationships are essential, solitude gives us an opportunity to hear ourselves again.
We're surrounded by opportunities to avoid being alone with our thoughts: phones, podcasts, television, social media, work, email, and an endless supply of information.
Try occasionally turning down the noise. Try one of the following:
Take a walk without headphones.
Sit outside with your coffee.
Drive somewhere without immediately turning on a podcast.
Spend a few quiet minutes noticing what you're actually thinking and feeling.
You don't have to analyze every thought. You don't have to fix every emotion.
Sometimes you can simply notice, that this is what I'm feeling right now in this moment.
Learning that uncomfortable thoughts and feelings can be experienced without immediately escaping from them is an important emotional skill.
10. Make it small enough that you'll actually continue to do it
This may be the most important recommendation on the list.
Knowing what is good for us and actually doing it are two very different things. Most of us already know we're supposed to exercise, sleep, eat vegetables, manage stress, and stay connected to other people. Information usually isn't the biggest obstacle. Implementation is.
So don't start by trying to change ten things. Pick one.
If you aren't exercising, start with a ten-minute walk.
If you're sleeping poorly, begin by keeping your wake-up time consistent.
If you're lonely, text one person.
If you've been living on takeout, cook one simple meal.
If you're overwhelmed, give yourself ten minutes without your phone.
Small changes that you can repeat are far more useful than ambitious changes that disappear after two weeks.
If you repeatedly find that you want to make changes but simply can't seem to get yourself to do them, pay attention to that too. Sometimes the barrier isn't motivation. Depression, anxiety, ADHD, trauma, burnout, chronic stress, poor sleep, medical problems, and other factors can make ordinary self-care feel extraordinarily difficult. That's when asking for help can be another healthy behavior.
You Don't Need to Do All Ten
If you've reached the end of this list, thinking, "Great, ten more things I'm supposed to be doing”, then you’ve missed the point. You don't need a perfectly optimized life. You don't need to wake at 5 a.m., meditate for an hour, drink a green smoothie, run five miles, journal, take twelve supplements, and somehow still arrive at work cheerful and relaxed.
Health is built over time. Start where you are. Choose one thing that would make your life a little healthier, calmer, or more connected—and make it small enough that you can actually begin. Then keep it going.
A healthier life isn't usually created by one dramatic transformation. It's built through small ordinary choices, repeated over and over again.
Let us know if we can help
At Stillpoint Psychiatry, Dr Joanna Gratton provides thoughtful, personalized psychiatric care for adults who want more than a rushed appointment or a checklist approach.
Through a combination of traditional psychiatric care, therapy, lifestyle support, and a whole person approach, we help patients better understand their mental health concerns and the underlying causes. We then work with you to create a path forward that fits your individual life and goals.
So, whether you are in Arden, Asheville, Brevard, Etowah, Fletcher, Mills River, Saluda, or Tryon, we offer in-person appointments in our comfortable and convenient Hendersonville office. We also provide telehealth appointments for adults throughout North Carolina, Virginia, and Maine.
Learn more and schedule a free 15-minute consultation to take the first step towards being heard and regaining control of your mental health.
Learn more about Stillpoint Psychiatry and Dr Joanna Gratton
