Do These 8 Things For A Healthier & Fitter 2025

Getting healthy and fit is simple, but that doesn't mean it's easy. For many of us, life likes to do its thing and that can make these simple tasks even more difficult.

But let's start with things you can start doing in 2025 to get yourself to a healthier, fitter you. Now this list can ( and probably will) change and vary for all of us, but these are all great places to start. Pick a couple or pick them all and see if you can improve these over 2025.

Sleep 7-8+ hours per night

Sleep is our greatest recovery tool. If you're training hard, you should be sleeping just as hard. Not to mention, adequate sleep helps hormone balance, can improve your mental health, and also supports your immune system.

Reverse engineer your day to help you get to bed on time. Think about when you need to wake up and subtract those hours from there. Remember, that's the time you need to be asleep so give yourself some time ahead of that for your bedtime routine and to fall asleep.

Eat a whole food, nutrient-dense diet

When our diet is rich in nutrient-dense, whole foods we are helping to ensure our body gets what it needs through balanced macro and micronutrients. Each of these help our bodies function the way it needs to. This can lead to improved body composition, better energy, and even improvements in mental clarity and mood as well.

Try to aim for 3 different sources of proteins, fruits, and vegetables a day. This can help ensure you are consuming a diverse array of micronutrients throughout your day and generally help in keeping a balanced intake.

Walk 7500+ steps each day

Daily movement like steps can help with mental clarity, stress management, cardiovascular health, and even weight management. For those able, take advantage of a simple way to keep your body moving.

Now, I'll be honest, I made up the 7,500 steps number just like the marketers did the 10,000 steps number. However, I like to use this as a goal for me as a bare minimum. Check out this fascinating meta-analysis on step count that makes me like 7,500 minimum even more.

Take a look at your phone/smartwatch/other fitness wearable to see roughly where you're at currently and just aim to work your way up. For quick math, a 10 minute walk is roughly 1000 steps.

Strength train twice each week

This is the recommended amount of strength training by the American Heart Association. Strength training has tremendous benefits that carry over to many different aspects of our health and fitness including increased muscle mass and strength, improved coordination and function, improvements in bone density, and metabolic improvements. Not to mention the many mental benefits many of us feel just being at the gym or after a workout.

Strength training doesn't have to be anything intense or crazy. Start small and focus on consistently exposing yourself to load. If you have a hard time getting to the gym or need help figuring out where to start, consider hiring a trainer!

Do your cardio

Some people have very specific cardio-based performance goals, but for most other people we do cardio for the health of our cardiovascular system - our heart, our lungs, and our blood vessels. On top of these benefits (and reasons not to skip your cardio) we can also improve our mental resilience and even notice improvements in our energy when we actually do our cardio.

Walking is a great place to start, but eventually the intensity will need to increase as you get healthier and fitter. Try to find a couple modalities that you enjoy and continue doing them.

Stay hydrated

Staying hydrated can help us optimize our physical and cognitive performance, support our digestion and nutrient absorption, and keep our joints and cells healthy (which means functioning better). In short, staying hydrated helps keep us feeling good day to day.

A good rule of thumb to start is to aim to drink about half of your bodyweight (in pounds) in ounces of water per day. So, a 150 pound person should aim for at least 75 ounces of water each day.

Get outside

Spending time outside in nature can help aid in our stress management, improve our mental health, can lead to increased activity levels, can improve our immune system function. Plus it can also be a great source of inspiration. Get outside, go for a walk, ground yourself.

Expose yourself to sunlight daily

A separate but related benefit to being outside is exposure to sunlight. Sunlight exposure assists in Vitamin D production which can help regulate our mood, improves immune function, and supports our bone health. Additionally, sunlight can help regulate our circadian rhythm which can lead to better sleep quality and energy. So, if anything, get outside for sunlight. If you're in an area where light is limited in the winter, consider Vitamin D supplementation to help.

Like I said at the beginning, simple doesn't always mean easy. Take an audit of where you are currently and where you might need some work and start there. Health and fitness comes down to continual effort. Don't aim for perfection, just practice trying consistently. There will be better and worse days but if you never stop trying, you'll always make some type of progress.