Regularly use the antiseptic, exercise in the morning and take 10,000 steps a day. Yikigai talks about five healthy and useful habits, which many people consider necessary – but it is possible to live without them.

Use hand sanitizer

If you do it too often, you’ll only hurt your health. There are harmful and useful bacteria on your hands. By killing the latter, you disrupt their natural balance. Scientists can’t tell you what the consequences are, but it’s already understood that the total elimination of germs is not a good idea. Try to disinfect your hands only when it is necessary: when in contact with food, dirt, garbage or animals.

Antiseptics have many drawbacks:

– They do not kill all kinds of dangerous bacteria – cryptosporidia and clostridia survive. To get rid of them, you need more antiseptic doses;

– The antiseptic does not help if your hands are dirty and greasy. The substance simply will not reach the microorganisms through the dirt layer;

– The antiseptic does not remove harmful chemicals such as heavy metals and pesticides.

Try to wash your hands with soap and water. If only antiseptic is available, make sure it contains at least 60% of the alcohol, otherwise, it will slow down the growth of bacteria, not kill them.

Stretching

Stretching is often understood as an easy exercise. But in English literature morning exercises are any physical exercises: anaerobic (push-ups, pull-ups) or aerobic (running, swimming). Be careful with stretching: numerous studies show that stretching exercises can be traumatic and do little good.

The World Health Organization recommends that you spend 150 minutes (or 75 minutes of high intensity) per week on medium intensity physical activity. The same goes for the American Heart Association. But nowhere is it specified that you should do exercises in the morning. You can exercise at any convenient time, and the lack of training in the morning will not affect your health.

Walking 10,000 steps a day

This myth appeared in 1965 when the Japanese brand Yamasa Toki released a new pedometer for athletes. They called it Manpo-Kei (“10,000 steps counter”) and launched an advertising campaign under the slogan “Let’s walk 10,000 steps a day”. Japanese marketers did not substantiate their call, but it quickly spread around the world.

Meanwhile, it’s not the number of steps that counts, it’s the fact that you’re walking more.

Canadian researchers have asked a group of diabetic patients to walk 1,200 more steps a day – not 5,000, but 6,200 more. Despite this small increase, blood sugar levels improved in the participants. In another study, a group of women had increased the number of steps to 9000 per day. After 24 weeks, their blood pressure dropped by 11 points.

Scientists recommend 150 minutes per week for moderate physical activity. This is 22 minutes of fast walking per day, approximately two kilometers or about 4000 steps. However, nobody forbids walking more. The main thing is to increase the current figure. Fast walking is when you walk so fast that it’s hard for you to talk to someone walking nearby.

Drinking eight glasses of water

This recommendation appeared for the first time in the book of the American nutrition expert Frederick Staré. He did not provide any scientific evidence to support his advice. But everyone believed the scientist’s authority.

You can drink as much as you want. The brain is a thirsty center, and as soon as the amount of fluid in the body decreases, it activates, and you instantly want to drink. The body itself maintains a water balance and tells you when to refill.

The need for water varies depending on many factors:

– Physical activity. If you do sports – drink more;

– The environment. In hot weather and high in the mountains, your body needs more water;

– Health condition. Drink more if you have a fever, vomiting or diarrhea;

– Pregnancy and breastfeeding. In this condition, the mother’s body works on two fronts, so you need more water.

If you don’t drink enough, you will get dehydrated. If there is a lot of water, it is sometimes useful, for example, if you are going to lose weight. But don’t overdo it: if you drink 10-20 liters in a few hours, you can die.

Have hot meals and soup every day

In ancient times, people were afraid to eat cold food: refrigerators had not yet been invented, and the food quickly spoiled. Therefore, they ate it as soon as possible – while it is hot, and therefore not harmful. And also the temperature changes the taste of the dish, it tastes more pleasant. But it does not become more beneficial this way.

Neither American nor European nutritional recommendations say anything about the fact that you should eat hot food every day. The stomach itself heats or cools down the food to the right temperature. If you are allergic to milk or eggs, try to heat them up.

Another habit is to eat soup every day. But you will not find any recommendations from nutritionists in this regard.

The stomach does a great job with solid foods. He does not need liquid food for normal digestion.

Soups can really be useful. They are low in calories and cause a feeling of satiety because of the full stomach. Soup lovers are therefore less likely to be obese.

In the past, chicken soup was thought to help with colds. However, later scientists debunked this myth. It’s not about the soup, but about the fact that you just need to drink a lot of liquid in a cold.