Health tips for the screen addicted
Nowadays, everyone uses smartphone as if it were our 33rd organ. We use them since waking up until bedtime to read online news, keep in touch with our friends, update everyone’s life, and watch movies and series. Such practices are useful and convenient for our daily life, but too much screen time can post negative effect on our health. Here are 3 simple tips for the screen addicted to stay healthy with 3Es – E-Eating, E-Exercise, and E-Emotion.
Health tips for the screen addicted with 3Es
1. E-Eating: Healthy nutrition from your favorite series
If you have binge-watching habit, it must be fixed now for your own health. Online series usually come with many episodes and seasons, and the addiction to the series may have gone so far that you spend all day watching it. You may even skip a meal or have an erratic eating schedule, which can cause tiredness and declining health. This kind of behavior is not good for your health. Set a schedule to watch one episode at a time, and try making your own food from the menus you see in each episode of the series. For example, if you are watching Korean series, you may try cooking Bibimbap or tofu salad, or if you are watching western series, you may try cooking mushroom soup.
Cooking food from your favorite series lets you explore new ingredients and learn about different culinary cultures from international series. While doing so, you can still eat these 4 nutrients to boost your eye health.
• Lutein in leafy green vegetables like water spinach, green amaranth, Chinese broccoli, and spinach helps slow down macular degeneration and filter blue light.
• Beta-carotene in rainbow vegetables like pumpkin, carrot, papaya, and bell pepper helps improve night vision and reduce macular degeneration.
• Anthocyanin in purple fruits and berries like goji berry, blueberry, prune, and taro helps slow down macular degeneration and improve night vision. These fruits and vegetables are high in antioxidants which protect eyes cells from the damage.
• Omega-3 in sea fish and grains like almond, peanut, salmon, and tuna helps slow down macular degeneration.
Late-night binge-watching increases hunger frequency, resulting in irregular timing of eating or snacking on high-calories snacks at night which may lead to obesity.
2. E-Exercise while you are on the phone
Spending the whole day on your phone with incorrect postures can be a cause of office syndrome such as wrist pain, trigger finger, neck and shoulder pain from muscle contraction, and spinal and pelvic problems. Lack of physical movement and inactiveness lead to lower metabolization of energy consumed, and hence excess fat storage within the body. But you can solve these problems if you do the following exercises while on the phone.
• Lying down with your phone while doing 90° leg raise, starting with one leg then switch to the other leg, 10 repetitions per set. 3 sets can help firm up your thigh and improve muscle strength.
• Standing texting: stay fit with standing and chatting. Stand with your feet as wide as your shoulders, then crouch slowly for 20 repetitions per set. 4 sets of this exercise can help burn excess fat to firm up your thigh, strengthen your calf muscle, and exercise your knee joints and ankles.
• Sitting watching series: twist your waist, 10 repetitions per set. 4 sets of this can help firm up your waistline.
• Jumping Jack after each episode: get up and do 20 repetitions of jumping jack per set so that you can get some physical activities to burn calories and increase your heartbeat. Doing this can give yourself a break from the screen.
We can incorporate calories-burning activities in our daily routine to burn extra calories. Find yourself a chance to get some physical activities throughout the day like walking, stairs climbing, or doing some housework to burn more calories.
3. E-Emotion: maintain healthy emotion and give your eyes a break
This is a checklist to see if you have become too addicted to the screens or social media.
1. Feeling the smartphone separation anxiety
2. Having strong urge to keep up with every drama on social media
3. Keep using your phone even when there is no notification
4. Addicted to talking to someone when you are free
5. Watch series or video clip while eating
6. Feeling low-battery anxiety
Having one of these habits is the first sign that you have become screen-addicted. And if you are emotionally attached the storyline of series you are watching like crying on a sad scene, feeling stressed during an investigation, or getting upset with the villain in the series, it affects the stability of your emotion. Here are some ways to fix it.
• Take a break and let the green heal: give your eyes a break from screens by looking at something green like trees and grass to help relax your eyes because green is a cool color. When your body relaxes, your mind feels the relaxation as well. You may get in the garden to breath in fresh air.
• Stop using all kinds of screen 1 hour before bed: Create a good sleeping hygiene by keeping your phone away from your bed. Avoid texting, watching series or movie at least 1 hour before going to bed to avoid binge-watching which will cause sleeping problems as you can be hooked by the story of the series. If you can set up a sleep routine to have 6-8 hours of sleep a day, you will wake up feeling rested and fresh, having healthy emotion.
Having screen addiction is not a bad thing, but knowing your limit can help bring the joy and happiness to your life. Gradually incorporating 3Es health tips into your screen habit can help enhance your quality of life. Whatever your lifestyle is, you can do 3Es in your own way. Click
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