Recipe of healthy life for programmers

Being healthy should be the first and foremost goal of any human being. As a programmer, it is even more crucial. Keep aside all of those tasks like building a hobby app, learning new technology, and all. If you are not healthy at all, nothing is going to matter. If you don't have time to invest in your health now, be prepared to waste a huge amount of time and money in the hospital in near future.

I am also still developing this habit of following a healthy lifestyle. After eating frequently in restaurants and processed foods, I feel like lot of money is being invested in making myself unhealthy. It is quite hard to cut yourself away from the processed foods but you can still try to minimize as much you can. Sometimes during hangouts or parties we consume some food that are really unhealthy for our body and brain. There are few solutions I generally recommend programmers or any professional who work from home to follow. Here are some of the tips I find are useful for me and hope it will be useful for someone else:

1. (30mins-1hr) long workout,
2. Try something like yoga,
3. Practice gratitude (for mental health),
4. Cut off negative people,
5. Work in chunks - 60mins followed by 10-15min break (but don't use social media on those breaks),
6. 6 days healthy food,
7. Intermittent fasting,
8. Drink enough water,
9. Protective glasses for screen,
10. Some push ups after long time sitting in chair,
11. Some back exercises to prevent back pain,
12. To avoid burnout you can try something that is different from what you generally do for example learning music,
13. Try to cut off sugar if you can,
14. Avoid screen 1hr before going to bed,
15. No phone after waking up (you can use if after you are done working for sometime on the most important goal of your life)
16. Do something quick and easy in the morning to keep you motivated
17. Practice katas everyday. It can be programming kata, guitar kata or anything to be more dexterous.

There must be more than these that I would love you hear from you guys. Let me know what you do to keep yourself healthy and motivated. Thanks for reading this post.

Comments

[ferceg]

I started programming (professionally) in '99. What worked for me: height adjustable desk, good quality chair, vertical mouse, biking if not in HO, practicing tai chi since 2004, playing the piano, go hiking, etc.

[poudyal_rabin]

sounds you are having a healthy living. cheers :)

[Peter Brown]

Thank you for the great article. It's always good to have have a reminder. Sometimes we get so tunneled in our vision that we forget to take care of ourselves.

[poudyal_rabin]

glad that gave you a remainder. hope you are having a healthy living as well :)

[MitchAloha]

Thank you very much for your advices, I will try to integrate with the habits I am already trying to follow. I would like to make just a few suggestions from my side too:

1. In addition to workout I walk for about an hour every other day
2. Walking in nature is my meditation :)
3. Very good advice! I recently discovered the Pomodoro Technique and built a small app to apply it: pomodoro-technique.io, really cool technique, I highly recommend it
4. I fast from 6pm to 9am every day and for 24 hours straight once a week. I was skeptical at first but I found it to be very beneficiary…
5. Very hard for me, I suggest preparing the amount of water needed through the day as first thing in the morning or to keep track of what you drink
6. I suggest also buying a good desk chair, it helps a lot, try not to be too stingy XD
7. I always try to read for 1h before going to bed, it helps to relax, better a “real” book but a kindle would do the job too

Don't know what you think, hope it helps :)
P.S. I like your articles a lot, keep going with the amazing work!

[poudyal_rabin]

wow. Thanks @mitchaloha for your comment. Thanks for highlighting those points as well. I love your idea of walking in nature. Happy coding! cheers

[Alexis Suarez]

I try to cook my own healthy food and most times it is hard, mainly because I have to make time in my schedule to go for the groceries and vegetables and of course cooking. But what has been the hardest is to think what to cook every single day, and that's why I started developing a hobby app to schedule my menu for each day XD

[poudyal_rabin]

wow that sounds interesting :)

[Rishav Jadon]

What are katas?

[Auke Geerts]

Katas, in coding at least, are programming exercises to train your problem solving skills. Take a look at codewars.org if you're interested.

[OnomeVera]

Thanks for this article. It's very helpful

[poudyal_rabin]

glad that helped :)

[Emma Brown]

Some supplements contain harmful substances, so they will negatively affect your health. So it is best to consult a doctor before buying muscle mass gain products. I have been practicing sports for a long time, but I could not gain muscle mass in any way because of my genetics.