kindlybeautiful.comd-whysel.org

Author: Freddy Romero

  • Take Time to Travel and Get Packing!

    Taking time to travel with family, friends, or yourself is a way to depart from everyday life stress. Traveling allows us the opportunity to recharge and refresh our minds. And for many reasons, the opportunity to create wonderful memories, building bonds, and moments of joy.

    The previous post on “Spend Good Quality Time with A Destination to San Diego, California”, where I talked about this destination (specifically Balboa Park) for a family vacation over the summer and the endless explorations of activities for families or with friends. Of course, especially yourself if you are planning a solo trip. Anyone can appreciate the fun of this popular tourist destination. 

    Now moving forward, today’s post will be about packing for our visit to San Diego. Probably the first thing to consider is the weather. Is the weather warm or cool? Therefore, depending on the season you are planning your trip. My family and I are planning to travel this summer. While reading online, San Diego’s climate varies during the summer as it can get both warm and cool. 

    So, packing light clothes such as shorts, t-shirts, tanks, tank tops, short sleeve tops, sundresses, swimsuits/swimwear are good choices for warm climates. For cool climates (seems to occur throughout the evenings) packing long sleeve shirts, sweatshirts, light cardigans, comfortable hoodies, jeans/pants are good options in keeping comfy. Moreover, packing a comfortable walking pair of shoes, sandals, flip flops, and sneakers based on the occasion. By the way, bringing sunscreen is essential to protect your skin from the UV rays, in which sunglasses and a wide brimmed hat are recommended too! Additionally, packing toiletries like toothpaste, toothbrush, razors, tweezers, along with electronics like chargers, backup chargers, and cameras. More importantly, pack necessary medications, for instance my sisters and mother often have motion sickness, so we’ll pack over the counter dimenhydrinate (Dramamine) and allergy medications, including a first aid kit.

    Quite a packing I’ll say, ha-ha. But it’s worth it, when it’s about having fun and creating memorable experiences with family! Makes life happier with your loved ones, indeed.

  • Spend Good Quality Time with A Destination to San Diego, California

    I have several places in mind for future destinations, in which I have yet to experience. However, one of the places on my bucket list is visiting San Diego, California. San Diego, California is a city known for top attractions in the arts, activities, food, beautiful nature surroundings, and more. It’s a great destination to plan for a summer vacation as the weather is terrific and the peak of the season for travelers to have a good time.

    A tourist attraction to look forward to, while in San Diego, California is Balboa Park! Oh my, just looking at the photographs online makes me excited! Truly remarkable architecture, and green space. And filled with a myriad of activities for families or with friends. It’s like a WOW! Almost as if you can spend your whole vacation in Balboa Park.

    Are you in your wonders? Because I am! Things to experience in this marvelous place, is the endless of explorations ranging from museums (18 museums!), well-known San Diego Zoo (home to rare and endangered animals), activities such as hiking, carousel, going for a walk around the gardens (such as Botanical Buildings and Lily Pond or Japanese Friendship Garden), and last but not least a pleasant time of entertainment of performing arts. It’s a dream vacation my family and I are planning for a summer vacation.

    Traveling is a wonderful way to give yourself, family, or friends a relaxing, explorative, enjoyable, or connect with each other experience. Traveling is all about happiness and having fun, indeed. And definitely place a positive impact on your wellbeing, especially your health. Planning a vacation destination varies from person to person and depends on personal preferences and interest. If you are planning a vacation with your loved ones or with friends, it’s best to plan and decide together.

    Is there a dream destination you have yet to experience?

  • Get Yourself A Good Night Sleep For Better Skin & Health

    Getting enough sleep is essential for your health. Without a good night’s rest, you won’t have the ability to function throughout your day. You’ll just feel too tired. Not well focused. And probably not in your best mood. Well, besides these effects from lack of sleep – let’s bring you the bright side of good quality sleep. Did you know good quality sleep contributes to healthier skin?

    If not, here is why. 

    Get Seven to Nine Hours of Rest: 

    Try to at least get recommended seven to nine hours of sleep per night. You do your skin a favor, especially your health. There are times indeed when life makes it a challenge for whatever reasons but it’s important to set a routine you can stick to prevent mental and physical effects on your health. Being sleep deprived is not fun and common effects on physical appearance include dark circles, under-eye bags, swollen eyes, and puffiness to name a few. In addition, physical health includes the risk of obesity, heart disease, and high blood pressure. Therefore, mental health can worsen if you are not getting sufficient sleep and these include anxiety, depression, confusion, behavior changes, and stress. 

    Boost Brighter Appearance:

    Though a good skincare routine plays a vital role in maintaining a youthful complexion, not getting the sufficient hours of sleep (7-9 hours) reduces the results of healthier skin. Sleep is the best time for skin to repair, especially the body to heal itself. During sleep, blood flow is increased allowing skin to rejuvenate from day’s exposure to ultraviolet radiation, which damages DNA skin cells and the risk of skin cancer, for instance. What’s more? Good quality sleep boosts collagen production, reduces breakouts, improves clearer skin, moisturizes skin, and more.

    Do your best to get to bed early! Sleep well! 

    Sources:

    1. Kendra Cherry, Mse. (2023, January 23). How sleep affects mental health. Verywell Mind. https://www.verywellmind.com/how-sleep-affects-mental-health-4783067#:~:text=Mood%20Changes,-Not%20getting%20enough&text=We’re%20more%20likely%20to,don’t%20get%20enough%20sleep.

    2. Shens. (2022, July 22). Why does lack of sleep cause bags under eyes?. Shens Clinic. https://shensclinic.com/why-does-lack-of-sleep-cause-bags-under-eyes/

  • Don’t Ignore Sweat, It’s Good for You

    Ever wondered why sweating is important? And how sweating may be beneficial for your skin too? Well, today I’ll be discussing the benefits of sweating. 

    The Function of Sweating:

    Sweating is a natural response to cooling our bodies down, especially during exercise or physical activities. Sweat glands are essential in regulating the body’s temperature. When our bodies overheat, sweat begins to produce and without sweat it can potentially lead to a serious problem. What kind of problem, you ask? A common problem when there’s lack of sweat is the risk of heat exhaustion. Dangerous, indeed. For this reason, sweating plays a vital role in keeping us in check. 

    Exercise and Sweat: 

    Moreover, according to honehealth.com, an expert on sweat studies named Andrew Best, has talked about the benefits of sweat during exercise. He describes that sweating can be enhanced throughout daily exercise. The more you exercise, the more sweat is increased resulting in withstanding for longer periods and higher intensity because sweat glands are keeping you cooler. As he stated from a previous research study “subjects who participated in aerobic training four times a week for eight weeks, either on an exercise bike or running on a treadmill, improved their fitness by an average of 19 percent and their sweating capacity by an average of 38 percent.” (Best, 2022) 

    Healthier Immunity: 

    Research has shown that sweating is also beneficial for immunity health. Sweating provides the necessary objective of removing toxins from your body. By exercising or simply heading out on warmer summer days the influence of sweat is your protector in helping your body kill pathogens and therefore improve your immune cells. So, take a walk, do a little jog or a run and it will do the job in helping you maintain your immunity in shape!

    Sweat and Skin: 

    Sweating surprisingly has some benefits for your skin. Studies have shown that sweat can have a good impact on skin glow. By exercising or heading outdoors during a hot summer day and sweating it out can lead to positive results to anti-aging effects, moisturizes your skin, kills harmful bacteria from skin, cleanse skin, and much more. So why not, sweat it out and enjoy the benefits that sweat brings to you! 

    Sources:

    1. Frothingham, Scott. “Sweating Benefits: Beyond Body Temperature Regulation.” Healthline, Healthline Media, 25 Apr. 2019, www.healthline.com/health/sweating-benefits. 

    2. Middleton, Tracy. “9 Surprising Things Sweat Can Reveal about Your Health.” Hone Health, 18 July 2022, honehealth.com/edge/health/benefits-of-sweating/. 

    3. “Boost Your Immune System during COVID-19.” Iowa Specialty Hospital, Iowa Specialty Hospital, 20 Apr. 2020, www.iowaspecialtyhospital.com/news-and-events/news/boost-your-immune-system-during-covid-19. 

    4. Ford, Rosie. “Sweating Is Good for You, and These Are the 5 Biggest Benefits.” DMoose, 4 Apr. 2023, www.dmoose.com/blogs/health-lifestyle/is-sweating-good-for-you. 

    5. of Frisco, By Dermatology Consultants. “What Effects Does Sweating Have on Your Skin?” Dermatology Consultants of Frisco, 5 Dec. 2019, mydermconsult.com/blog/what-effects-does-sweating-have-on-your-skin. 

  • Give Yourself Some Time for A Run

    Giving yourself some time to exercise is beneficial for a healthy mind, body, and health. Exercising is all about having fun and making yourself feel good. It’s a fun way to begin setting up fitness goals whether you want to be active, stay healthy, be in shape, or whatever it is you would like to achieve. Exercise doesn’t have to be boring and it’s more of finding interest in activities you enjoy doing. So, for today’s post I would be recommending running simply because anyone can benefit and start out if you are a beginner. 

    I started out running during my high school days as I was part of the school’s campus track and field team. In which, I participated in cross country and indoor track. Indeed, a marvelous experience filled with lots of good memories. Nowadays, I’ve been a casual runner. In terms of adding a little exercise into my routine whenever possible to stay active and healthy.

    Running for at least 10-15 minutes or more provides significant improvement to your health. These health benefits include the reduction of the risk of cancer, heart disease, boost your mood, relieve stress, improve sleep, strengthen legs and much more. Running is known to be a terrific cardio booster!

    For starters, it’s best to begin at a moderate pace. Try not to push yourself too hard and take it easy and light. But wait! How can I not mention warm-up for at least 5 minutes before running. Warm-ups are essential in order to prevent injuries and loosen up leg muscles. So, here is an informative article written by Watson on “How to Warm Up For Runners: Warm Up Exercises before Running.” I recommend checking it out. As you start running, I recommend starting out for 10 minutes and pace yourself comfortably. As the months go by, you can increase your minutes by 2-3. Within those months you will be able to increase your speed, distance and so forth. Stay healthy and happy running!

  • Make your Mornings Brighter with a Walk

    Have you ever thought about making your mornings brighter with walk? And did you know there’s quite a number of advantages in starting your day with a morning walk, outdoors? Well, let’s start discussing the benefits and make your mornings brighter!

    Here’s why: 

    A Routine Consistency:

    Walking is indeed a form of exercise. It’s a healthy habit to start your day with a morning walk and enjoy outdoor fresh air and nature surroundings. Studies have shown that those who often exercise early mornings have set a habit of daily exercise routine. But a change in exercise schedule may always occur under circumstances. Getting up from your bed and beginning your day with a walk, will not only keep you active or stress relieved but will help maintain a consistent routine.

    Eases Your Mood:

    Heading out for a morning walk will help with your wellbeing. A daily walk of at least 10-15 minutes or more could provide you with a variety of benefits. A morning walk helps reduce anxiety and depression, for instance. According to IRT, morning walks help one to feel content and think, reflect and clear their mind, improving their mental health. What’s even better is that if there’s a local park in your neighborhood – spending time with nature could ease and boost your mood. Just by hearing the sounds of nature will bring you peace and relaxation.

    Strengthen Your Muscles & Better Health:

    Why not, and take the opportunity of incorporating daily morning walks into your routine in order for a healthier and stronger you? Morning walks will keep you moving and reduce the risk of disease such as heart disease, stroke, diabetes, for instance. It may help with weight loss as you walk at a moderate to fast pace. Therefore, tone your legs and abdominal muscles, which increases a range of motion while strengthening your leg muscles. So, rise up and get walking! Stay healthy!

    Sources: 

    1. https://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/health-benefits-morning-walk
    2. https://www.irt.org.au/the-good-life/9-health-benefits-of-a-morning-walk/#:~:text=Lower%20blood%20pressure%2C%20improved%20blood,of%20heart%20disease%20by%2035%25.

  • Exercising For a Healthy Quality of Life

    Including exercising into your daily routine is essential for a healthy quality of life. Everyone benefits from a form of exercise, whether it’s endurance, strength, balance, and flexibility. It’s only a matter of choosing any or even better if you combine a couple of the following four types of exercises as mentioned above. However, keep in mind to always warm-up before/after doing any type of exercise, and ask advice from qualified fitness professionals, especially your doctor. 

    Now, I’ll be explaining the benefits of the four types of exercise. Let’s begin with,

    Endurance:

    Endurance exercise, also known as aerobic, primarily focuses on stamina. The goal of doing endurance exercise is to help you keep fit and healthy while increasing your heart rate and breathing. This allows you to do activities you would like to do for longer periods without getting tired. Therefore, it improves your heart, lungs, and your circulatory system. Some examples of the exercises include walking, running, jogging, cycling to name a few. 

    Strength: 

    Strength training exercises focus on building stronger muscles. It’s also recognized as weight training, resistance training, for instance. The benefits of doing strength exercises is to help you enhance your cardiovascular health. Furthermore, it improves mobility, balance, posture, strong bones, weight loss, prevents injury and reduces the risk of chronic diseases. Examples of strength training exercises include lifting weights, squats, bench press, deadlifts, push-ups, and more. It’s a great choice if you are looking forward to increasing muscular strength. 

    Balance: 

    Balance training exercises help maintain coordination and prevent injuries such as falls. This exercise is definitely beneficial for older adults. Having good balance is essential for mobility, stability and improves awareness of position. The benefit of this exercise is increasing muscular strength and improving joint stability. The common exercises include tai chi, yoga, heel-to-toe-walk, single-leg balance, weight shifts, are a few examples. 

    Flexibility: 

    Flexibility training is the focus of stretching your muscles. The goal of stretching exercises is to enhance your range of motion and to allow your muscles to stay strong. Therefore, help prevent injuries, pain tension or soreness, improve your posture and mobility. For this reason, flexibility training is crucial and shouldn’t be neglected. So, it’s recommended to make it part of your daily exercising activities. The following are examples of flexibility exercises: back stretch exercise, forward lunges, inner thigh stretch, ankle stretch, side lunges, pilates, and yoga are common ones.

    Sources: 

    1. https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/infographics/four-types-exercise-and-physical-activity#:~:text=Research%20has%20shown%20that%20it’s,strength%2C%20balance%2C%20and%20flexibility.
    2. https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/fitness/fitness-basics/endurance-exercise-aerobic
    3. https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/fitness/in-depth/strength-training/art-20046670
    4. https://www.healthline.com/health/fitness/benefits-of-strength-training 
    5. https://www.livescience.com/55321-balance-exercise.html
    6. https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/fitness/in-depth/balance-exercises/art-20546836#:~:text=Stand%20with%20your%20feet%20hip,repeat%20on%20the%20other%20side. 

  • The Fun of Claire Luvcat, Cats

    Recently I came across a YouTube channel called Claire Luvcat. The channel’s content is focused on the daily lives of 10 cats and its owner. And I have been enjoying my time watching them. The owner is named Claire as the channel name suggests who deeply cherishes her 10 wonderful furry companions. They are named DD, TT, Coco, Momo, Lala, Lulu, Chuchu, Toto and Dodo (siblings) and Nana (mother of Toto and Dodo.) Each one of them is unique with different personalities, which makes them precious. I find their videos comforting, hilarious and fun to watch. 

    Cat relaxing on top of the bed
    Cat on top of a pillow

    I’m both a dog and cat person. Not too long ago, my sibling and I adopted a Bombay cat from the shelter about a year ago. She’s a female cat who we named Angel Bella. A sweetheart, playful, friendly, and welcoming during our first interaction. She’s going to turn two in November. How time flies. And living alongside us happily and giving me and my family a warm loving companionship.

    Now to come back on track ha-ha, I would like to recommend you to one of Claire’s videos which is titled as “The Secret Relationships Between My 10 Cats” (ENG Sub). Forgot to mention that she’s from South Korea and includes English subtitles in her videos for those like me who cannot understand Korean. I may start picking up some words, hopefully. I’m terrible with learning languages.

    I recommend watching this video as it is certainly a fun one to watch. It is intriguing and adorable showing the strong bond and connection among the cats and its owner. You’ll see how every cat’s personality is diverse in their own ways. From affection, playful teasing, cuddling, grooming, and so forth. It’s comforting, heartwarming and entertaining seeing how happy these furry pals are with Claire and how they interact with one another. It puts a smile on your face as you watch. Claire’s laugh is contagious indeed! If interested, give them a try. It definitely will ease your mood! 

  • Dealing with Dry and Oily Skin

    Everyone’s skin type is different and a process of experimenting and finding the right skincare products. According to verywell health, it is said that there are 5 different skin types — which includes normal, dry, oily, sensitive and combination. To learn and find out more regarding skin types, I recommend reading their article as it is a good short read (by clicking on the link highlighted above).

    In my case I have a combination of both oily and dry skin. Possible factors may be due to my genetics, lack of hydration, weather conditions, etc. You may wonder and ask what is the difference between both oily and dry skin?

    Well, dry skin lacks enough moisture in the skin and appears to be flaky, eczema prone, and itchy (AAD, 2014). Therefore, oily skin is prone to acne and breakouts — makes the appearance shiny and feel greasy (ADD, 2014).

    However, we can care for our skin to feel nourished, healthy and clean. One is to simply buy the right skin care products based on your skin type and test what works for you. 

    The products that I normally use are those from CeraVe. They are CeraVe Foaming Facial Cleanser For Normal to Dry Skin, in addition to For Normal to Oily Skin. Moreover, CeraVe Daily Moisturizing Lotion for Normal to Dry Skin.

    For dry skin it is essential to have a moisturizer as skin needs moisture to stay refreshed and hydrated. For this reason, CeraVe Moisturizing Lotion gets the job done. Who wouldn’t want their skin to be younger, clearer, and smoother?

    Furthermore, the benefits of CeraVe cleansers are due to its gentleness and Frangrance-free characteristics. It’s indeed suited for a variety of skin types as their products label suggest. It’s effective in removing excess oil, dirt, and more. I definitely recommend you try this product out and test whether it is suitable for you.

    It is possibly best to test a new product by only applying a short amount of the lotion/cream into an area of your face and if it’s a cleanser, keep the product in your skin for about 3-5 minutes for any reactions. 

    Sources:

    1. “What Are Skin Types?” Verywell Health, 7 Aug. 2023, www.verywellhealth.com/skin-types-5088964. Accessed 16 Oct. 2023.

    2. American Academy of Dermatology. Skin Type.

  • Adding These Two Vegetables to Your Diet Could Benefit Your Skin

    Fruits and Vegetables on a wooden table
    Photo by Engin Akyurt

    Eating a healthy diet indeed contributes to one’s wellbeing. It’s essential to keep in mind the food choices you make as good nutrition leads to a healthy lifestyle.

    With a proper well balanced diet that includes foods consisting of fruits and vegetables (which I will be focusing on two veggies) you’ll be able to maintain a healthy weight, necessary vitamins/minerals, and healthier skin.

    Consuming variety of fruits and vegetables could bring you good benefits to your health, especially if you’re interested in nourishing your skin!

    Without further ado, let’s begin:

    1. Sweet Potatoes

    Chopped sweet potatoes on a cloth
    Photo by Jess Loiterton

    Sweet potatoes are a good source of vitamin A with lots of varieties in texture and sizes.

    Vitamin A is essential for protecting skin from the sun and serves as a defensive barrier to prevent skin from sunburn and wrinkles. Therefore, helps strengthen your immune system against diseases/infections and maintain healthier vision.

    What’s more? Not only does it contain vitamin A, but vitamin C, fiber, potassium and the list continues.

    Shown below is an example of nutritional content of baked sweet potatoes with skin. (Gather from healthline.com)

    One cup, or 200 grams (g), of baked sweet potato with skin provides: 

    Calories: 180

    Carbs: 41 g

    Protein: 4 g 

    Fat: 0.3 g 

    Fiber: 6.6 g

    Vitamin A: 213% of the Daily Value (DV)

    Vitamin C: 44% of the DV

    Manganese: 43% of the DV 

    Copper: 36% of the DV

    Pantothenic Acid: 35% of the DV

    Vitamin B6: 34% of the DV

    Potassium: 20% of the DV 

    Niacin: 19% of the DV

    Sweet potatoes are an excellent choice if you’re looking for healthier skin in addition to the benefits it provides for your health.

    2. Kale

    Kale on a wooden chopping board
    Photo by Eva Bronzini

    Kale is a leafy green vegetable rich in vitamins A, B, C, and K and antioxidants. It is part of the Brassicaceae family (also known as Brassica oleracea).

    It’s another popular option with a myriad of health benefits, including nourishing your skin. For this reason, it promotes a healthier youthful skin, slows down aging, hydrates your skin, boosts collagen, and more.

    So, why not give kale a try? Perfect for your everyday salads, green juices, smoothies or your side dishes.

    To Wrap Up

    Vegetables are excellent for healthy eating. And if your goal is to brighten your appearance of your skin – why not add more vegetables into your daily meals? There’s a lot to choose from. You aren’t limited to kale or sweet potatoes. Moreover, it’s recommended that you include fruits to your diet such as oranges, cantaloupe, kiwi, berries, tomatoes and many more. Adding more fruits and vegetables into your diet will provide you with vitamins and minerals you’ll need for a healthier glowing skin and health.