The best way to avoid sickness is to practice healthy habits. Especially when colds and the flu are going around, you should wash your hands and avoid touching your face and sharing drinks. On top of these external precautions, you can also focus on your body’s internal defenses.
There are several simple steps you can take to improve your immune system naturally. The human body is built to protect itself and fight off illnesses. By taking proactive steps to boost your immune system, you can help keep your body healthy and happy.
Cut Harmful Habits
The first step to boosting your immune system is to cut harmful habits out of your life. These may be hard habits to break, but doing so will drastically improve your bodies health. Quitting smoking and drinking alcohol in moderation are two significant steps to improving your health and boosting your immune system.
Eat a Balanced Diet
Eating a balanced diet not only helps to improve your health overall, but when you focus on a diet high in fruits and vegetables, your body gets the nutrients it needs to keep your immune system running strong. Focusing on certain foods will help you get the nutrients you need to live a healthy life. For example:
- Citrus fruits and red bell peppers: High in vitamin C
- Broccoli: Packed with minerals and loaded with vitamins A, C, and E as well as fiber and antioxidants
- Garlic: Recognized as a way to prevent and heal infections and lower blood pressure thanks to compounds like allicin
- Ginger: Known to reduce inflammation, helping ease a sore throat. It can also decrease nausea.
- Yogurt: With probiotics, yogurt can help to stimulate your immune system. Yogurt is also an excellent source of vitamin D, a vitamin essential to regulating the body’s immune system.
- Shellfish: Certain types of shellfish, like crab, lobster, mussels, and clams, are high in zinc, an essential mineral to immune system function.
Stay Fit
Staying active is key to a healthy and balanced lifestyle. Because exercising is vital to maintaining a healthy body in general, staying fit is essential if you want to help naturally boost your immune system. Regularly working out promotes good circulation throughout the body. Having good blood circulation helps the cells of your immune system cycle through the body more efficiently. Adding some light cardio to your daily routine can help get your blood circulating and improve your overall wellness.
Sleep Well and Reduce Stress
A good night’s sleep is essential to keeping your immune system in check. Studies show that during sleep, your immune system works at its peak performance. So if you’re looking to boost your immune system naturally, you can start by improving your sleep patterns. Some ways to promote healthy sleep and low-stress levels are:
- Increasing light exposure throughout your day
- Limiting blue light exposure during the evening hours
- Limit caffeine intake later in the day
- Go to bed and wake up at the same time every day
By implementing these factors into your daily routine, you can get on a better, more efficient sleep schedule. Sleeping well also helps reduce stress, ultimately promoting a healthy immune system.
Supplement Your Body’s Collagen Levels
If you’re focusing on health and wellness as a way to boost your immune system, adding collagen to your diet is a great way to improve your collagen levels. Collagen is a protein that acts as the bond that holds your muscles, tendons, and tissue together. Collagen is also known to help support gut health. The many benefits of collagen four your gut help to support your body’s immune system. Collagen works in the gut by rebuilding the gut’s tissue with essential amino acids.
Along with helping to improve gut health and immunity, you will also see an improvement with skin, hair, and nail health. Collagen also works to increase energy levels and help the body stay active. All of these benefits can help keep your immune system strong and healthy.
Focus On A Healthy Life
When trying to boost your immune system naturally, the key is to make smart changes that improve your overall wellness. By actively working towards a healthy lifestyle, your immune system will benefit greatly. Along with a healthy immune system, you will be improving your body’s overall health, leading to better weight management, more energy, healthier hair, skin, and nails, and much more. With intentional habit changes, you can beat the flu this up-coming flu season.
