It’s easy to assume that someone’s education level has enabled them to develop certain professional skills and advance with their career. Of course, education, training, and continuous learning do play an important role in the process, but we are often surprised by other, equally relevant factors that shape up our ability to develop in life. Enter: your healthy habits. We have known for a long time that constant exposure to stress, long hours at work, and poor relationships at the office can have a negative impact on our wellbeing.
However, making healthy, body-positive choices outside the office can also bring perks to your career and your success. Most of all, the following behavioral patterns and healthy habits are the ones that have the greatest influence on your professional life.
Physical and mental resilience
When you take a look at a typical workplace in the US, you’ll find that competition is more prevalent than collaboration. Businesses thrive when their employees do their best to outperform one another, and this belief has largely created more stress than we need at the office. Stress leads to increased cortisol levels, a weaker immune system, and ultimately your employees taking more sick days. Even though we cannot root out stress entirely, how we approach our general wellbeing can help us get “thicker skin” when it comes to work-related stress and its many consequences.
Regular exercise, on the other hand, builds up our resilience, both physical and mental. Working out is a constructive way to vent negative energy, work through our issues, and become more productive. With less sickness to deal with, and more energy at your disposal, exercise has the power to enhance productivity even in that hectic office of yours.
Confidence and your self-awareness
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Hard-working Australians have realized a long time ago that appearance does matter. They’ve mastered the art of the business casual dress code, and they exude high levels of confidence – strongly linked to their healthy lifestyle. After all, they not only “dress for success”, but they eat, exercise, and practice other self-care habits with the same goal in mind.
That’s why you’ll find many successful Sydneysiders opting for treatments such as invisalign at Bondi Junction, in order to take care of their smile, their oral health, as much as they care for their overall wellbeing. The confidence that arises from such high levels of self-care makes you more assertive, allowing you to reach your goals and stand out in your professional environment.
Altering the workplace
The attitude a business together with its employees has towards health, wellbeing and lack of anxiety greatly affects how said business treats the needs of its teams. With the growth of health and fitness awareness across the world also comes a greater need for changing policies that empower healthy options at work. More employees nowadays will gladly work within a business that helps them stay on track with their health, and while this is a global trend, it has spread like wildfire through Europe in particular.
London’s own food delivery services have taken a healthy turn to accommodate this very trend, and the same is happening in Paris, as well as other major European cities. Healthy nutrition, in and outside of the office helps increase productivity, resilience, and it nurtures a better office culture, one that emphasizes work-life balance. As a result, healthier workers are happier, better workers that stay true to their professional aspirations.
Quality sleep
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The “no rest for the wicked” cliché has often been used by business folk around the world to depict their ever-growing rush to advance at work. However, while we all wish the day lasted longer for more than just keeping up with our work-related obligations, the simple truth is that sleep is vital for productivity as much as our health. The global phenomenon known as “burnout” is typically associated with people who continuously disregard their needs in favor of their professional goals – and sleep is the first to go.
On the other hand, sleep is essential for optimal brain functions such as memory, creative thinking, and problem solving. Can you see yourself coming up with the most brilliant solutions when you’re sleep-deprived? Hardly. While it may feel counterintuitive to devote less time to work in order to work better, sleep is one of those healthy habits that proves that you can do more in less time. Not to mention that you can do it better, too, since you’ll be less prone to mistakes and errors in judgement caused by improper sleep.
Health is still often perceived as a priority separate from work. However, all of our decisions in life are intertwined and have an impact on one another. Investing your time and effort to improve your health will inevitably help you become more productive and reach your professional goals while protecting that elusive work-life balance we all need.