Travel Tips To Help Keep You Stress-Free This Holiday Season
Holiday shopping, parties, packing, working out, trying to eat right, traveling…OH MY!! It’s definitely that time of year y’all! Although Christmas is hands down the most wonderful time of the year (que the music), but it can also be very stressful especially when traveling, and trying to keep up with your fitness goals. Now you all know I absolutely LOVEEEEE to travel but during the holidays it can be a bit of a pain!! I am off to Bali which I am soooo excited about (!!) but the 30 hours of travel is about to mess with my body for sure.
Apart from the emotional strain traveling can put on you, it can also take a toll on us physically. Your skin-care rituals go out the window (I can feel the breakouts coming now!)…you’re lucky if you get a workout in (props to those that can keep up with it but lets be honest traveling is
exhausting and can throw your routine off) and something that I think happens to all of us when we travel: bloating.
To help you have one less thing to stress about during the holiday season I thought I’d share some of my travel tips, that way you can tweak your daily routines to work with your travels and you can look forward to heading home or wherever your destination may be for the holidays!!
So before hittin’ the road, we first need to get our minds right by meditating!! Ease your mind by doing a few meditative exercises for about 10 to 20 minutes – this will also be useful for whenever you feel some stress about to arise. I can’t tell you how many times taking a few deep breaths has helped me to not lose my sh*t!!
Making a list is honestly a life saver when it comes to traveling! With the millions of things running through our minds it’s easy to forget a few items while packing so to help prevent you from forgetting your essentials, make a list and check off the items once you’ve packed each one!
Early Bird Gets The Worm. One of the main triggers of stress is TIME. Save yourself that unnecessary anxiety by giving yourself enough time to get to your destination. Like I said before, you never know what you’re going to be faced with once you head out so give yourself plenty of time to deal with the traffic, long lines and other bumps along the road! (Quick story side note: I live 5 miles from the airport, and it took me 1.5 hours to get there on Dec 21 last year. True story)
Pack Snacks! There’s nothing worse than being HANGRY, add the stress of travel and it’s a problem for EVERYONE! To help keep you feeling like yourself, make sure to pack some snacks to refuel along the way! At the airport there aren’t many healthy food options, and if you’re on the road the quickest thing to grab to satisfy your grumbling belly is fast food. Well if you want to prevent bloating and try to stick to at least a semi-healthy diet during the holidays I suggest packing some healthy snacks you can munch on until you’re able to eat/prepare
yourself a good, hearty meal! Check out my post on 10 Best Snacks for ideas on what you
could bring with you!
Hydrate Yo’Self!! Now I know I preach to y’all a lot about drinking water but hey it’s a necessity!! In order to combat dehydration associated with traveling it’s important to drink LOADS of water. Your body needs it even more when you fly so I suggest drinking an extra glass for every hour of your flight! Your body will thank you for all the H2O because it’ll help keep your digestive system in check so drink up!!
Don’t Forget About Your Skin! Following your normal skin care routine while traveling can be challenging, and lets face it with all the stress involved your beautiful canvas is just bound to breakout- which, guess what? Causes you to stress out even more!! To help keep your skin from totally freaking out, don’t fly with makeup on! If you’re rushing to a flight straight from work make sure to pack some makeup wipes with you!
Another DO NOT while traveling is touching your face. I repeat DO NOT touch your face or at
least try to touch it a little less! Planes, shaking peoples hands, grabbing those TSA bins, etc. come with soooo many germs, that is just a breakout waiting to happen! I suggest packing some hand sanitizer with you to help keep the bacteria you come in contact with to a minimum!
Finally, MOISTURIZE! Sure drinking water will help keep you hydrated but to help quench your skin’s thirst even more, bring a face mask with you! You might look a little scary on the plane with a sheet mask on but who is going to look fresh faced and glowing when they get off the plane? YOU ARE!
MOVE on the plane. My mom has always taught me to get up every hour of the flight (if I am not sleeping). Your plane mates might be annoyed hahah but I like to go to the bathroom, and stand in the open area for a bit to stretch. You need to get your blood flowing a few times during the flight. I do small squats, quad stretch, hamstring stretch, and side body stretches.
Wear Comfortable Clothes. A major key for a successful travel day? Being comfy!!! There’s nothing more comfortable than a pair of leggings, a cozy sweater and some dope sneakers. Show off your coziest athleisure look and have peace of mind knowing you won’t have to worry about being uncomfortable on the plane or a long drive. Plus, if you’re wearing your running shoes you won’t forget them and it’ll motivate you to exercise on your trip since you already have them. (hehe ..maybe)
Hopefully these tips help relieve some stress on your travels! And I’ll leave you guys with this final food for thought -if you’re feeling overwhelmed, just relax! (don’t we all hate hearing that) But the holidays are meant for LOVE and JOY! So remember to calm down, AND download your fav music/movies for the trip!
xx
Katie