Top Healthy Habits for Preppers
By nature, preppers are planners and thinkers, so it’s no surprise that they would prioritize having healthy habits in place.
But what exactly are healthy habits?
For some people, a healthy habit is going to the bar every evening with their buddies; for others, it’s getting up at the crack of dawn and going for a run.
In this post, we’ll break down the top healthy habits for preppers. We hope that by learning more about various healthy routines preppers thrive on, you can develop your own and figure out what works for you!
What Constitutes a Healthy Habit?
Defining a healthy habit can be tricky since it can be subjective based on your preferences and tastes. However, in general, a healthy habit is a tendency or practice that is life-giving, not life-taking.
What exactly do we mean when we say “life-giving”? We mean that whatever habit you partake in gives you joy and, better yet, improves your overall quality of life down to your physical and mental health.
It’s important to note that maintaining a healthy habit isn’t always easy.
For example, exercising doesn’t come naturally for everyone. Still, an exercise routine is an essential healthy habit, which we’ll discuss in more detail later in this post.
Having an exercise routine takes time, effort, and discipline. Sometimes you won’t see the benefits of a healthy habit right away. In fact, the joy you receive from it may come later down the road. Sticking with a healthy habit is important, even if it’s initially hard.
Top Healthy Habits for Preppers
Nutrition
One of the most essential healthy habits for a prepper is, without a doubt, nutrition. With this comes nourishing your body with healthy foods and staying hydrated.
A good diet makes up most of your health, which is why there’s the saying, “you can’t out-exercise a bad diet.” This is simply because the food we eat affects not only our weight but also how our overall body functions.
Food can affect everyone’s body differently, but focusing on a diet with ample amounts of protein, fruits, vegetables, and fiber is ideal. Knowing your body and what it needs to thrive is the first step in creating a healthy diet.
It goes without saying that some foods out there have little to no benefit for the body, including high amounts of refined sugar and inflammatory junk foods with preservatives, dyes, and fillers.
At the end of the day, cooking nourishing home-cooked meals and growing your own food is a lifestyle choice for many preppers and homesteaders. The more of this, the better when it comes to nutrition.
And, of course, let’s not forget about water intake. According to WebMD, adults should drink 50-100% of their body weight in water a day. A good rule of thumb is to take your body weight and drink half that amount of water in ounces.
For example, if you weigh 180 pounds, that would be 90 ounces of water per day. This may seem like a lot, but staying hydrated will help you feel your absolute best.
Exercise
Another critical priority for preppers is exercise.
Most preppers pride themselves on being able to survive whatever situation life throws at them. This means having your bug-out bag ready and being ready to hightail it to safety at any time!
With that being said, you’ll need to be physically fit in order to do that.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that physical exercise is anything that gets your body moving (around 150 minutes per week). You can break this down in whatever way makes sense for your schedule – for example, 30 minutes a day, five days a week.
Exercise doesn’t come easy for everyone, so finding something you enjoy can make it less daunting. Some people would rather participate in low-impact activities like walking, biking, or swimming, whereas others may enjoy more physically demanding exercises like running, hiking, or hunting.
Exercising takes discipline regardless of your choice, so it’s essential to make it a routine, even when you don’t feel like it.
So, turn on your tunes and get sweating!
Sleep
Another important priority for not only preppers but for everyone who wants to recover properly and function while performing daily tasks is sleep.
Everyone needs to sleep, but oversleeping or sleeping too little can have adverse effects on your health, such as:
Your overall growth and development
Your hormones
Your immune system
Your blood pressure
Your cardiovascular health
Some other tips to help you improve the overall quality of your sleep are:
Having a consistent sleep schedule
Avoiding large meals, caffeine, and alcohol before bed
Reducing electronic screen time/blue light before bed
Making sure your bedroom is quiet, comfortable, and set at an ideal temperature
Limiting daytime naps
Exercising daily
Mental Health
We’ve touched a lot on physical health, but the truth is mental health is equally just as important.
Being in your right mind is incredibly important as a prepper, especially since we’ve seen perfectly normal preppers turn into crazed zombie apocalypse-believing conspiracists eating canned food in their basement (... we kid!).
But in all seriousness, the state of our mental health is evident in how we handle stress and life in general. The CDC says that mental health includes our “emotional, psychological, and social well-being.” When left unchecked, mental health can cause severe psychological illnesses.
Thankfully, there are plenty of ways to improve our mental health, including the things we discussed, like getting enough exercise, sleeping, and eating healthy.
More than that, there’s counseling, self-help books, journaling, socializing with friends, and partaking in hobbies you love.
Create Healthy Habits for Life
We’ve discussed some of the basics regarding healthy habits for preppers, such as prioritizing nutrition, exercise, sleep, and mental health. Within each of those categories is where we encourage you to find out what works for you.
For each person, that may look different, but all in all, having these healthy habits in place will help you improve the overall quality of your life and get you into the best shape you can be as a prepper.