As my first post in the new year, I thought it only fitting to include in this post my two new years resolutions. I know a lot of people don’t believe in new years resolutions, especially skeptical college kids (which describes most of my peers currently), but it’s been shown that people who actually talk about their resolutions and ask for support are more likely to keep those resolutions! So here I am, hoping to keep my two little resolutions by writing about them.
I decided on two resolutions because I felt like just one wouldn’t be enough to help me improve both my mental and physical well-being, both of which I would like to work on in the new year. The first is that I’m going to focus on saying “no” more to things that I genuinely do not want to do. I’m hoping that being deliberate in the things I choose to do with other people versus the things I do for myself will help me feel more grounded and relaxed, as well as enjoy the people I do decide to hang out with. This one will probably be the more difficult resolution for me, and I’ll come back with an update eventually about how it ends up going for me!
The second is something more for my physical health, and definitely more within reach for me, personally. My second resolution is to drink more water and/or stay hydrated. This is something I am conscious that I am terrible at, since most of the time I just forget! And I know on this front I am certainly not alone. Here is my game-plan for staying hydrated in the new year, including creative ways to keep myself on-track and why hydration is important to me.
“Little Breaks” and Balance
Aside from simply not thinking about it, one of the reasons I’ve found I don’t usually drink enough water is because I simply don’t like having to get up to go to the bathroom every 15-20 minutes. It’s such a ridiculous reason to deprive yourself of the competent that makes up ~70% of our bodies, but it’s stopped me nonetheless. When you’re busy, when you’re on a roll, it’s hard to have to stop to get up to go to the bathroom constantly.
I brought this up to my roommate, who happens to be a hydration goddess. She’s been described as a “sponge” on more than one occasion based only on the amount of water she drinks. I asked her for advice about how to combat my dislike for water-based bathroom-breaks, and her reply was so priceless I had to share it.
Upon telling her that I found it annoying to get up to go to the bathroom often after drinking a lot of water, she said:
“Why?! Getting up to go to the bathroom is great! You know what that represents? You taking a few minutes to step away from your work, getting your daily steps in walking to the bathroom, and a reason to give yourself a mental break from whatever or whoever you’re dealing with! It’s a reason to take little breaks! So think about it like that: you’re not getting up in an annoying way. You’re getting up because you’re worthy of a little break!”
So, it’s not getting up to go to the bathroom for the 3rd time in an hour. It’s the third “little break” I’ve gotten to take for myself this hour. It’s amazing how just changing the phrasing in your head suddenly makes something that felt like a nuisance now a treat!
The funniest part about this mentality shift for me was also that I was getting irritated by the part of drinking water that is so wonderful for your body, the part that provides you with balance: water’s job is to flush your body out. It’s meant to help cleanse your body, and part of that is the getting up and going to the bathroom. Speaking of flushing-out and cleansing, it’s fitting that most of the easiest, quickest, and most natural detoxes out there are water-based.
Water’s health benefits, of course, don’t stop at balance. Water helps protect your vital organs, keep your body temperature constant, and just helps you feel better.
Fashion and Complexion
A wonderful thing about deciding to focus on drinking water now is that, I’ve found, it’s a fashionable thing to do. I mean this in two ways: people actually admire you for purposefully drinking water, and that it visibly looks cool.
It’s fashionable because it serves as a conversation starter. Drinking lots of water is a reason to ask where a water fountain is, or to ask if you can get your water bottle filled up. It’s also fun as someone who never usually drinks water to suddenly be a person who does, because people close to you will usually notice the change and congratulate you.
On a similar note, you start to notice how many people around you prioritize drinking water. It’s as though you’ve joined this secret club of people who care about taking care of their bodies enough to do things like carry around water bottles and constantly refill them. This club of people who are big on hydration are also great for moral support and keeping you on track with drinking enough water.
This leads me into the second part of the fashionability of hydration: the friends I have who have inducted me into their cool-kids-drink-water mentality first let me in because they noticed my shiny new water bottle. Mine happens to be a no-name that I bought on sale at Urban Outfitters because it had peaches on it and keeps my water very cold, but there are lots of other great brands out there like S’well (my sister swears by them), Contigo (which I use for coffee), and Nalgene (my hydration goddess roommate ONLY uses Nalgene!).
The glamour that comes with water-drinking also doesn’t stop there. Staying hydrated is probably one of the easiest ways to keep your complexion clear and gorgeous by doing things like reducing the size of pores and wrinkles. Your skin is an organ, and organs are made of cells, which require water to function at their very best. Water also helps these cells remove toxins and unnecessary compounds that can keep your skin from glowing as radiantly as it possibly can.
Water- Alternatives and Extra Benefits
A final challenge I’ve faced with trying to get myself to drink more water is simply that I’m not interested in the taste of water. Some people can tell the difference between different types of water, and I hope to get there someday. For now, though, it all just tastes like water to me.
To get myself to continue to be hydrated even when I can’t take the taste of water anymore, I’ve started using water-alternatives to stay on-track. Things like tea (pretty much every variety of Mountain Rose Herbs tea is wonderful!), aloe water, and Starbucks Refreshers are some of my favorite hydration-treats that give me a break from water without giving my body a break from hydration!
The nice thing about occasional alternatives is also that there are lots of benefits to be retained by drinking other hydrating beverages that aren’t water. For instance, the refreshers I mentioned earlier can have coconut milk in them, which provides your body with electrolytes that help combat dehydration even more than water does alone! Or different types of tea can have huge health benefits, from green tea boosting metabolism to raspberry tea calming mood swings to lavender tea helping you sleep.