RETURNING TO A HEALTHY BALANCE

It can be easy for healthy life-styles to go out the window on holidays. Particularly busy ones in new countries, running around, seeing new sights, sampling far too much of the local food. Not only that, but after escaping your daily grind for a while it’s common to get overwhelmed by reality on your return. So after a holiday, it’s pretty important to start returning to a healthy balance as soon as possible.

FIRSTLY, ACCEPTANCE IS KEY

You went on holiday, likely ate and drank more than normal, and you’ve put on a few pounds. Obviously this can be very disheartening. Especially if you were actively trying to manage your food and exercise to not gain weight. But there’s one thing you must do now that you’re back:

Accept it. You went on holidays. You enjoyed yourself. So you put on a bit of weight. It’s not the end of the world. Stressing about it will only make things worse. Your self-confidence will plummet and you’ll be too busy feeling sorry for yourself to fix it.

Accepting these things happen and moving forward is the first step to returning to a healthy balance.

GET BACK TO A NORMAL DAILY ROUTINE ASAP

It’s tempting to spend the first few days on your return lounging about recovering from jet-lag, but this is counterproductive. The best thing to do is try to return to normal quickly. It will take a few days for your body to adjust and you’ll feel terrible. But it’ll take longer — and you’ll feel worse — if you don’t.

More specifically, and perhaps more importantly, you should get back to a normal sleep schedule as fast as possible. Good sleep is one of the pillars of healthy living, and one of the fastest steps to returning to a healthy balance.

Fight the sleepiness. Fight the jet-lag. Try to get to sleep as close to your regular bedtime as possible. If you wake too early, lie in bed and rest. Stay down until as close to your regular waking time as you can manage. You’ll be back to your old sleeping habits in no time.

YOU MIGHT NEED TO CUT DOWN ON SOME FOODS

We don’t advocate fad diets or cutting out food groups. But if you got used to certain foods, your body starts craving them. If you found yourself overindulging in sweets, alcohol, or carb-heavy meals, for example, you’ll be well served from cutting right down for a week or so. Your body will naturally adjust and you’ll experience less cravings, making it easier to return to your previous eating habits.

It’ll be hard, at first, but it’ll be worth it.

This can be particularly prudent for alcohol consumption, which is obviously habit-forming. Alcohol is also disruptive to healthy sleep and will prevent you from getting back into a good sleep cycle quickly. While it’s true alcohol makes us drowsy, metabolising it is a different matter. If you’ve ever woken up wide awake early in the morning after a night of drinking, you can thank your liver. When you’re trying to return to a healthy balance, disruption to your sleep is the last thing you need.

TRY MEDITATING

It’s back to paying bills, doing work, and all the things you escaped for a few weeks. Very quickly, stress and anxiety can pile themselves back on.

This is where meditation becomes a very useful tool. Mindfulness meditation is a great way of putting yourself in the “now”. By concentrating on the present you can ease yourself away from the worries of obligations. This in turn makes them seem less imposing and easier to manage. Easier to manage, less stress.

Going for a walk and concentrating on the sights and sounds around you can be an excellent way not just to clear your mind, but to bring it back to home. Walk familiar streets. Visit a park. Touch a tree. Little sensations that bring you closer to the present moment will calm you and focus your thoughts.

So to wrap it all up:

• Don’t beat yourself up about slipping on your healthy living on your trip. It happens. Stressing will only make it worse.


• Get back to your normal daily and sleep patterns as quickly as possible.


• Lay off the alcohol and energy-dense foods for a little bit. Give your body time to recover from any cravings you’ve developed.


• Clear your head and stay on top of mounting tasks with a little bit of mindful meditation.

Within a week of your return you’ll be right back on top of life again, returning to a healthy balance and living to the fullest.

MEDITATING ON A BUSY DAY: 5 TIPS

You get up early and rush to work and worry about deadlines. Then you sit in traffic or crowded public transport to get home. There are meals to make, obligations to meet, bills to pay. We all know meditation can relieve stress and anxiety, but on these hectic days it’s hard to find the time. Yet this is when we need to find the time the most. Meditating on a busy day helps us shoulder the burdens of our lives and live fully and happily.

So how do we find the time? It's easier than you think. You don't need to lock yourself away from the world to meditate. Mindful meditation can fit into just about any part of your existing day. Read below to see our top five suggestions for when to squeeze some meditating into your day.

FIRST THING WHEN YOU WAKE UP

You don’t need to be stressed to benefit from meditation. Quite the opposite, as meditation can help prevent stress. Spending a few minutes first thing in the morning before you get out of bed can help prepare you for what the day has in store for you. However, many people may find this only makes it harder to wake up in the morning. That, in turn, will only lead to more stress, which is the opposite of what we want! So they’ll need to find some other time during the day. What about …

ON THE WAY TO OR FROM WORK

Whether you walk, drive, or take public transport, there will be time during your transit for meditating. Mindful meditation really is as simple as focusing your mind on yourself. Breathing is the most obvious and popular choice, something rhythmic and mechanical that can ease you into a sense of relaxation. If you’re walking, you can concentrate on the feeling of your feet pressing into the ground. On a bus or a train, you can focus your mind on the rocking of the vehicle, or the sensation of your back pressing against the seat.

Whether it's on the way to work or to home, a few moments of meditation will either help prepare for, or get over, your stressful day.

AT YOUR DESK

If you work in an office, you can usually find a few minutes throughout the day to just sit and concentrate. Even if it’s just five minutes before you start work, or after your lunch break. Putting on some headphones and being mindful of yourself in the present will destress you and alleviate deadline and performance-related anxieties. If you find your mind drifting back to work, gently bring it back. The goal is to focus on the present just for a few minutes, to clear and calm your mind.

You might think that if your day is busy then you won’t have five minutes spare, or that finding these fives minutes will cause stress. But taking that time for yourself to engage in a little meditating on a busy day, even the busiest days, will make you more productive. You lose five minutes, but you gain peace and clarity. Your focus will improve and you’ll achieve more than if you hadn’t taken the time. The rewards far outweigh the cost!

WHILE EATING

Everybody has to eat at some point during the day, and eating can be used as the perfect chance for a bit of mindful meditation. Eating is loaded with sensations that we can concentrate on. The look of the food, the feel of it or cutlery in our hands, the taste, the smell. You don’t have to be mindful through the whole meal, but even taking a moment during those first few bites to truly savour all the sensations can be enough. On those truly tumultuous days where you eat at your desk, you’ll find a few minutes for meditating on a busy day while you eat.

But if all this fails, there’s one last, best place:

BEFORE GOING TO BED

You’ve had a big day and it’s time to wind down. Right before bed is perhaps the best and most convenient time for people for meditating on a busy day. It helps you de-stress from the day’s worries, clear your head of your concerns, and prepare yourself for sleep. Few things keep people awake at night as much as overthinking the events of the day. Mindful meditation will help melt away these lingering concerns and clear your mind ready for a full, restful night’s sleep.

Whether it’s in transit, at your desk, or even grabbing an all-important meal, it is always possible to find time for meditating on a busy day. It doesn’t need to be a full 10-30 minute session: just a few quiet, mindful moments is all it takes to clear your thoughts and enrich your life. We hope you found this helpful and find time during your next stressful day to be at peace.