Healthy habits start now

College students are notoriously unhealthy and lazy individuals.

Stereotypically, we are thought to dine on nothing but Ramen noodles laced with sodium and Pop-Tarts oozing with outrageous amounts of sugar. When it comes to physical activity, some consider their 15 minute walk to class sufficient movement for the day. To the typical college student, these examples might not seem too bad. To health-nuts like us, they are alarming.

Whether or not these unfavorable assumptions about college students are accurate when it comes to your own self care, the start of a new semester is the perfect time to reevaluate the way you take care of yourself.

Most college students are twenty-somethings with speedy metabolisms and naturally flawless skin. We can bounce back from a night of binge-drinking like it never happened, and our waistlines don’t bolster a centimeter when we finish an entire pizza by ourselves. While this is great for right now, we can’t live that way forever without reaping serious consequences.

A lot of young people don’t see a need to eat healthy or exercise regularly because their bodies don’t react to the effects of unhealthy living. Why waste time exercising if you’re already thin? Why pass up a chocolate cupcake when you know the sugar isn’t going to make you break out or leave you with unappealing cellulite on your legs? It’s easy to understand the reasoning behind the way a lot of college students take care of themselves.

Even though most of us don’t technically need to worry about our health at such a young age, we do need to think about our futures. Just like we are working hard in our classes to secure a good job in the future, we need to work hard to create healthy habits so we can continue them when we need to.

According to Psychology Today, habits you develop early in life are hard to change. This means if you grew up eating healthy and exercising regularly, you are likely to continue those trends as you age and less likely to pick up unhealthy habits like drinking soda or eating fried foods. It also means, however, that if you rarely engage in physical activity and often eat unhealthy foods, it will be harder for you to drop these bad habits and harder for you to pick up healthy ones.

Besides the effect it has on your physical appearance, unhealthy eating and a lack of exercise can lead to life threatening diseases like diabetes. You are also likely to develop negative health complications like high blood pressure and high blood sugar.

The scary reality of leading an unhealthy life is often not taken seriously by young people, and although it might not hurt them now, it will further down the road. This is why we want to encourage you, dear reader, to rethink your self-care habits this semester.

Try to eat your five fruits and vegetables a day and avoid fast food. Try to exercise every now and then or even just park your car a little farther from your destination so you can get in more movement. Try to actively consider your future when you eat a meal or take yet another “lazy day.”

It might seem far off, but the way we are going to live as adults starts now, and we need to start planning for it.