Winter Blues?
We are well and truly into the middle of winter here in Australia... I, for one, am looking forward to some sunshine and longer daylight hours and we are only halfway through! For most of us, we are getting up in the dark and coming home in the dark, after a full day on the job. How can we move our bodies with little daylight and cold air, especially if you're in the southern parts of Aus? It's difficult... even the dog seems to get neglected, without their walks every day. If you have an office job, you spend a good part of 8 hours at a computer, sitting fairly stationary. Combining this with the winter blues, we don't get as active as we would like to be. We start to crave those dense warm meals, eg. a hot pie with a slice of banana bread, washed down with a hot chocolate and before we know it, we have eaten over 1400 calories. And that's just one meal! It is easy to see the winter spread catch up with us all. True?
If you do have a 1 hour lunch break, try to get up out of your office and lunchroom and go for a 30 minute walk, even if it is in your shopping centre or CBD. If you want to step it up a notch, go for a 15 min run on your local oval or gardens. You may have the flexibility of eating lunch when you return from your "lunch" (activity) break! You might even see some valuable sunshine during these hours. To allow yourself the extra minutes, make sure you meal-prep the night before so you have lunch ready to take to work. Doing the meal prep may seem too hard but you can always just cook that little bit extra when you're doing dinner and serve it up into containers when serving up your plate. It will save you money to eat from home and also allow you to have a decent, healthy lunch without impulse-buying from the local food court or takeaway shop. Post-exercise, you will be craving something nutritious as you have been raising the heart rate and moving the body for the best.
Let's face it... by the time we get home, it's cold and dark and all we want is to pop our slippers on and enjoy another warm meal (don't forget to meal-prep for tomorrow), while watching television for the evening. This small piece of advice can help the winter bulge and go a long way towards getting into or staying in a healthy lifestyle through the dreaded winter blues.
