One easy way to improve your health is to drink more water. I say easy because to me, exercising is one of the most difficult things EVER.
Just the thought of having to change into exercise clothes makes me dread exercising. (Is that just me?) I know I could up my water intake though, if I just put a little more effort into it.
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. That means if you click & buy or sign up for a service through my link, I will receive a small compensation at no additional cost to you.
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. See my Disclosure page for details.
How Much Water Should You Drink?
There’s no one size fits all answer to this question, since everyone is different! Lifestyle, gender, how much you exercise, where you live, overall health, and more are all factors that impact how much water your body really needs.
This Mayo Clinic article gives some great advice if you are having a hard time determining how much to shoot for. I decided to aim for at least 64oz per day.
Related Post: An Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Getting in Shape
It’s Go Time!
A few weeks ago I decided it was time to “adult up” and just do it. It’s been working pretty well so far! Here are 6 super easy tips that have helped me:
-
Buy a reusable water bottle you actually like, and will use (and that will fit in your car’s cup holder).
I’m cheap, so it was hard to spend the money on this. I set an alert on Slickdeals.net for what I wanted, and was lucky to find one on sale before Christmas!
It’s 32oz, so I’ll need to refill it about 3 times each day. When shopping around, compare your daily intake goal to the water bottle’s size and determine how often you’ll refill it.
If your bottle is too small, you might not end up using it as much because it’s a hassle to refill 10 times a day!
-
Plan to bring your water with you, wherever you go.
If you have to, buy a second water bottle to keep at work, or post reminders to grab your bottle before you leave the house. Make it so you don’t have an excuse not to drink water. The water tastes horrible at my workplace, so I bring several gallons at the beginning of the week and refill them at home on the weekend.
-
Set a reminder.
I set alarms on my phone in the beginning that make my watch buzz, so that I would remember to drink each time the alarm went off. After a while I became more of a habit to drink without the alarms needing to be set. Yes, I basically trained myself like a pet, lol.
You could also say that every time you do X thing, you also drink some water, or set alarms to refill your water at certain times and focus on drinking a certain amount before then.
Need a visual? Put a note directly in your line of sight on your desk or someplace you know you’ll see it often.
-
Give your water some flavor.
If the “flavorlessness” of water is a turn-off, then try adding some flavor with fruit, “ice cubes” of juice or frozen fruit, or a liquid water enhancer. Just be careful of those enhancers with fake sugar, or high sugar content.
-
Don’t drink just water.
Mix it up a bit! You can drink herbal tea, sparkling water, skim milk, soups, and add in fruits and vegetables that have high water content like watermelon and strawberries. Check out this list of hydrating foods for more!
-
Use an app, because of course there’s an app for that.
An app that you may already use to track other health-related information might include a feature where you can record your water intake, like FitBit.
If not, there are several free and paid apps available for both iPhone and Android that you can pick from to try out. Check out this article reviewing several popular ones, or search for “water intake tracker” in your app store.
Let me know how your goal goes for drinking more water!
