February is American Heart Month and also the month of Valentine’s Day. The best Valentine’s Day gift we can receive is a healthy heart for ourselves and our love ones. According to the American Heart Association, cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death for persons living in the United States.

Our focus should be on our heart and making it strong and healthy. In order to do this, we need to exercise, eat healthy and manage our daily stress. Managing our stress is a big one, because if we eat healthy, which is good, and stress all the time, which is bad, this can lead to hypertension which puts a strain on our heart and can lead to heart attacks and strokes.

Here are some tips that we can follow to build our healthy heart:

Regular exercise: Engage in any type of regular exercise at least three to four times a week. It release and relaxes your body and controls your stress level.

Fruits and vegetable: Increase your intake of fruits and vegetables and limit things such as red meats. Visit your farmer’s markets or fruit stands and give your heart special treatment.

Meditate: Sit still for 30 minutes and give your brain a rest from all types of distraction, such as TV, smartphones, computers, iPods, etc. Sometimes our brains need be focus on our body and what’s going on in our bodies without the outside distraction. Try it, it works.

Physical: Visit your doctor at least once a year and have your heart and body checked out. It’s better to visit the doctor annually, then to wait until something happens and it’s too late. You and your body are worth it.

Eliminate bad habits: There are some bad habits that create heart problems such as smoking, red meats, STRESS, there goes that word again. Remember, you are priceless and you deserve to treat yourself like you are priceless. Other bad habits that we may have are anger, jealousy or hatred. Sometimes we have these and don’t realize it.

Forgive: Be the bigger person and forgive. It gives you peace and enjoyment in life. Your heart will say “Thank You”.

Express yourself: Release your emotional stress by expressing yourself in a respectable manner. Holding things in is not good.

Personal: Avoid taking things personal. We have no control of what others say or believe only over ourselves.

As stated earlier, let’s take a moment every day to appreciate, love and focus on us, we deserve it, our hearts deserve it.

Resources: American Heart Association
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