Wellness Archives - Healthy Smart Living

Dealing With Mental Health: Sometimes Laughter is the Best Medicine

September 28, 2022

Dealing with mental health doesn't have to be complicated. Sometimes, just taking a few minutes to laugh at social media posts is enough to boost your mood. There's lots of advice out there about how to deal with mental health struggles, but sometimes, just taking a minute to laugh is enough to shake off the blues and make it through the day. To help with this, here's a roundup of some funny social media accounts to follow next time you need some low-effort serotonin. Social Media Accounts We Love to Deal With Mental Health: Katie Florence's #TheKouncil Jonny Devaney's dog breed humor Nathan W Pyle's Strange Planet comics MoonPie's ongoing social media beef with the sun 1. Katie Florence (@katieflorence on TikTok; @the.kouncil on Instagram) Katie Florence makes funny,...

mental health

Skincare Ingredients You Need By Age

Nicole Hopkins

August 17, 2022

Body, Wellness

No matter how old you are, it's never too late to take better care of your skin. After all, it’s better to start somewhere than to never start at all! Whether you're 21 and looking for new self-care strategies or 57 and hoping to reverse sun damage from tanning, you're in the right place! Below, I've laid out a "skincare roadmap" highlighting one vital thing to add to your routine for every decade. You’ll be amazed by how one ingredient can change the course of your skin. Of course, you can start anywhere, but feel free to skip around to see how your current beauty routine stacks up against my recommendations! Skincare Ingredients By the Decade 20s - Sunscreen 30s – Vitamin C 40s – Retinol 50s...

skincare

Women-Owned Businesses to Support

Nicole Hopkins

March 30, 2022

Top Picks, Wellness

March is Women's History Month, so it's the perfect time to celebrate the bold and strong female entrepreneurs who have taken the risk to live their dreams! Below, I've listed a few businesses owned by women from all walks of life who have turned their passion into a successful business. Check them out and show them your support! Buff Chick Supplements Strong women build each other up, both physically and mentally. This is the mission behind fitness trainer and powerlifter Meg Gallagher's supplement brand. The company tagline is, "insecurity isn't for sale," and she makes it clear that her products aren't meant to be gimmicky "skinny teas" or detox regimens. Gallagher's passion for empowering women extends to sharing her own ever-changing strength journey and being real about her...

shopping

The Meditation Hack Nobody Mentions

Nicole Hopkins

September 1, 2021

Wellness

Meditation and mindfulness are trendy buzzwords right now, so I'm sure that most of you have at least tried to meditate once or twice. Meditating is supposed to help you feel calm, cool and collected, but if you're like most people, it's probably leaving you frazzled and frustrated. Everyone tells you that you should meditate more, but nobody tells you what to expect or how to get the most benefit from it. Meditation isn't easy. It's the kind of thing that you can spend a lifetime getting better at. The good news is that it doesn't have to be hard! I'm here to share one small secret that can help you look forward to meditation practice instead of dreading it. Ready? The Meditation Hack Nobody Mentions My advice is simple:...

meditation

Getting Back to a Healthy Routine

Casey Crowell

August 11, 2021

Wellness

Listen- it’s been a tough year and a half. People across the globe have had to completely change up their routines and, at times, kick into ‘survival mode’. You are most certainly not alone if your body does not look or feel the same as it did in March of 2020. But, as we are slowly beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel, you may be ready to ease back into your pre-covid routine and re-adopt some of your old habits. Or, you may be ready to see this as the start of a new beginning and make some healthy lifestyle changes. Either way, you’ve already taken the first step; the hardest part is making the decision to make a change, and...

healthy habits

Do You Recharge Yourself As Much As You Recharge Your Phone?

Laura Jones

June 16, 2021

Wellness

Let me guess, you charge your phone every day, at least once a day, and you always check that you have enough battery on it to make it through… I would say that we are all probably quite good at keeping on top of this. However, how often are you paying attention to your own personal battery levels? What if we thought about ourselves and our own energy levels as much as we think about our phones? Our own energy levels are so important to how we experience things, how we feel day-to-day, and how we cope with and manage our lives. I would suggest, however, that many of us are not giving ourselves the time to recharge our batteries or take stock when we are...

low energy

How Can You Tell If You Are Stressed (And What To Do About It)

Julia Ebbens

June 2, 2021

Wellness

Stress is something of a buzzword these days. We hear it banded around in different contexts every day. But what does it really mean to be stressed, and more importantly, how can we tell if we are stressed? Here we delve into how you might be feeling mentally and physically if under stress, as well as some easy strategies to help you to regain control of the beast that is chronic stress. How Do I Know If I Am Stressed? Good question. Firstly, let’s focus on how it feels to be chronically stressed, after all, it is this type of ongoing, pervasive stress which has the biggest negative impact on our overall health and wellbeing. Chronic stress can show up in a number of ways. You may feel: Edgy, and...

stress

How to Identify Poor Gut Health, and How to Fix it

Julia Zakrzewski

May 19, 2021

Top Picks, Wellness

Recent studies have indicated that the gut contributes to our health and well-being in more ways than we ever thought possible. If you are experiencing a decrease in mood, nutrient deficiencies, bloating, and irregular bathroom habits, you may be suffering from poor gut health. Stress The most important thing to recognize is the gut is a stress-depleting system. This means that when we are stressed, the gut suffers! This can result in a variety of symptoms such as gas, bloating, and acid reflux. Probiotics can help support your gut during times of high-stress. If you know there will be a turbulent period ahead, consider taking a probiotic supplement. On top of probiotics, managing stress levels should also be a priority. Bloating Feeling bloated is uncomfortable, and can impact appetite. There...

gut health

Guide to Tarot Reading for Mental Health

Nicole Hopkins

March 17, 2021

Wellness

As someone who has had her fair share of mental health struggles, I know how hard it can be to feel like you can't get in touch with your own emotions, thoughts, or intuition when you have a problem that needs solving. Feeling stuck and helpless in the face of a problem is so discouraging, and it can take an even greater toll on your life than the problem itself would otherwise. This mind-body disconnect can happen to anyone, so if it's happening to you, just know that you're not "weird," and you're not alone. For most people, it's something that ebbs and flows as we go through stages in life, and it's understandably most noticeable when we're facing stressful situations or serious life choices. One unconventional...

mental wellness tarot