Healthy Lifestyle Tips for Busy Students

Written by: Maliha Asad ('Alimah)

Living a healthy lifestyle while being a student is something that definitely should be a priority – but is often overlooked because of how intensive and demanding the student lifestyle can be. While we are nourishing our spirits with the studies of Din, we often neglect our physical body and mental health. With some careful planning and prioritizing, it definitely can be done. Here are 5 tips to help you get started: (these can definitely be applied to anyone and everyone, not just students!)

1. Pick one or two days in the week where you can allocate some time for meal planning and prepping. You don’t have to have containers for each meal time ready, but just having components of meals ready to go make it a lot easier to make healthy choices during the week. Example: having ripe fruit cut up and ready to take, baked potato fries, bone broth, soups, meat/chicken cooked in healthy cooking fats, etc.

2. Plan ahead for your snacks and the times where you just need some energy – this goes hand in hand with the tip above, but planning ahead for these times are crucial. We all know the hunger and fatigue that hits after a long day of classes – which most of us try to combat with an iced capp, some sugary treat, a slice of pizza – all the convenience food which seem like they’re giving us an instant energy boost. We all know though, that these foods are not nourishing us in the short term, nor going to be beneficial for us in the long term. Instead – planning nourishing convenience foods for these times will do us a lot more good – it will nourish our bodies, and give some much needed energy. Stock up on raw milk for the week, make baked goods with organic ingredients + honey/maple syrup/organic cane sugar, keep some raw cheese and fruit handy, fresh pressed orange juice with some sea salt for minerals, sourdough bread and butter, etc.

3. Get in some morning sunlight – sun exposure first thing in the morning (for min 3 minutes) is crucial for resetting our bodies circadian rhythms. This in turn, affects all processes of our body (hormonal balance, mood, energy, digestion). If you find yourself getting tired often during the day, struggling with low moods, etc. you may find this simple, free step to be very beneficial. Even if we don’t have any of these issues, getting sunlight in the morning to our bare naked eyes is still crucial. Take your after Fajr adhkar and do them outside for at least 5-10 minutes.

4. Move/exercise for at least 20 min a day  – sitting all day can definitely take a toll on our bodies. We are meant to move around, walk plentifully, lift things, etc. Even if we are busy with our books all day, taking out at least 20 minutes to get in some exercise is so important to keep our body and mind fresh. We can make intentions to get reward for taking care of our body, and hopefully keeping our body stronger for more ʿibadah, and keeping us healthy to serve the Din for longer, InShaAllah.

5. Take care to supplement magnesium and other crucial minerals – your body needs magnesium, sodium and potassium for over 300 functions in our body. Previously, these minerals used to be present in our soil – but now, with our depleted soils, we don’t get nearly enough. When we don’t have enough of these minerals, (which most of us don’t – especially magnesium), these functions don’t work as efficiently. This shows up in things like hormonal imbalance, slow metabolism, skin issues, poor sleep, fat storage where we don’t want excess fat. Some examples: Add some sea salt to your water, certain herbs such as nettles, the adrenal cocktail by Morley Robbins, adding in a good quality magnesium supplement (magnesium bicarbonate is the easiest for our body to absorb – look into the brand Lifeblud for Canadians).

May Allah Taʿala grant us the ability to take care of our bodies, minds and souls for His sake and accept our efforts.