Our Top 5 Tips For A Healthy & Happy New Year

December is always a fun, busy and sometimes slightly chaotic month. We’re massive fans of the festive season and love nothing better than decking the halls, donning our favourite sparkly dress and spending time with friends and family, but there is something so nice about January when it all comes to an end and a fresh, new chapter begins. It feels good to hit the reset button and get organised for the year ahead. At least that’s how we all feel at The Clean Beauty Edit. There’s no January blues here, just a team who look forward to all things new and hopeful.

So just how do we go about making the most of a new year (and a new decade!)? Well, for a start we forget about dieting, in the sense of food deprivation and counting calories, and look to filling our fridges and our tummies with plenty of healthy, delicious and nourishing food, we like to detox our bodies and our lives and start the year off with the best possible intentions. Here are our top 5 tips for a healthy, happy start to 2020:

1. Clean up your diet & your house.

There can be a lot of excesses in December. We can eat and drink things that we normally wouldn’t in the name of festive fun and indulgence, and that can leave us feeling less than our best when January comes around. We like to begin the year by clearing out any remaining temptations and embarking on a nutritious food splurge to help get us back on track in a way that makes us feel good. Alejandro Junger’s Clean book is packed with sensible and beneficial tips on balancing your body and regaining your sense of natural vitality. It outlines a 3-week detox programme that will reset your health and help you combat a variety of illnesses and body woes, but even if you don’t want to embark on a full-on detox this book still has plenty of top tips for healthy living and is our number one book recommendation for anyone looking to overhaul their health and find ways to holistically heal their body.

We also love cookbooks by Deliciously Ella, The Happy Pear, Gwyneth Paltrow, Holly White, Hemsley & Hemsley, The Hardihood and Roz Purcell to help us create mouth-watering recipes to indulge in all January long, so our health can get back on track without feeling like we’re missing out on anything at all. Plus, when it’s wet and grey outside it feels good to be in the kitchen putting together comforting meals and snacks to enjoy.

While we’re at it, it also feels fantastic to tidy up around the house in January. Sort your clothes, your books and your belongings so that you can donate or recycle things that you no longer need or want, and to give yourself a sense of order and achievement right from the beginning of the year.

2. Set your intentions.

We like to begin the year by writing down our intentions and goals and visualising how we’d like the year ahead to go. If you haven’t tried this already you will be amazed by how powerful your intentions can be, and how much of an effect our emotions and thoughts can have on our bodies and lives. We subscribe to the belief that what you focus on grows, so focus on the good, and know that it is mainly your choices and not luck that will shape most of your experiences in 2020. Start as you mean to go on! Forget restrictive resolutions that feel like a chore and instead set goals to achieve the things that you really want – like getting your dream job, or saving for a bucket list vacation.

3. Meditation. 

This is kind of more of what we are talking about in tip number 2. Meditation can help you become more mindful of your thoughts, emotions, health, body and actions. It can bring your calm and peace, and help you to navigate stress and anxiety in a healthy way. Whether you spend just a few minutes alone with your thoughts, or half an hour sat crossed legged on a meditation pillow, this is a practice that can have dramatic results on your outlook and how you perceive your life. We love the Headspace app for guided meditations that will bring you a daily dose of serenity and quiet a busy mind.

4. Indulgent Self-Care

January is a good time to take warm baths, light beautifully scented candles and cocoon your body in rich creams. Make the most of this slow, quiet month by treating yourself to some R&R (you deserve it!).

We love to start the day with dry body brushing and Detox Body Oil from The Organic Pharmacy. The Serenity Candle from Evolve Organic Beauty smells so comforting and encourages deep relaxation. We love to light it in the evening while sitting by the fire, relaxing in the bath or getting ready for bed.

If your skin is dull and suffering from the winter weather we love Nunaїa’s Nourishing Radiance Serum to bring skin back to life and revive it’s natural glow, and Olio E Osso’s balms are also fantastic for keeping lips in soft, tip-top shape throughout the colder months. 

For more gorgeous winter skincare heroes check out our Winter Skincare Collection and Detox Collection. 

5. Get Outdoors

Staying in is all too easy when it’s wet and grey outside and warm and cosy inside, but it’s also doubtful you’ll ever regret a walk in the woods or a stroll along a beach. It feels so good to wrap up warm and breath in the crisp winter air. You can invite friends and family to make it a (free) social event, it will boost your health and your mood, and is essential for calming little ones after a hectic Christmas season. Make it a goal to connect with nature as much as you can in January, and it will help the month seem so much more pleasant and enjoyable.

So there you have it! These are just some of the things we'll be doing here at TCBE to make our January wonderful and get the new year off to the best possible start. Happy New Year to all our customers and friends. We wish you good health and lots of joy for the year (and decade) ahead!