The article is developed in partnership with BetterHelp.

Sexual health can be a crucial aspect of overall well-being. It can contribute to our quality of life, relationship satisfaction, mental health, and personal fulfillment. However, despite its importance, discussions surrounding sexual wellness often remain taboo. 

In this article, we’re clearing the shroud of mystery and sharing 10 practical ways to nurture and improve your sexual health and wellness. 

No. 1

The Role of Sexual Wellness in Overall Health

Sexual wellness encompasses everything from avoiding and treating STIs to boosting intimacy and libido. Ultimately, sexual wellness is about having safe and pleasurable sexual experiences and how you achieve that. 

Sexual wellness can be crucial to an individual’s health and well-being. In fact, research shows that sexual wellness is associated with higher levels of happiness. However, it’s worth noting that sexual interest varies from person to person. Some people identify as asexual, and sexual activities aren’t important or necessary for them.  

According to the World Health Organization, sexual well-being depends on several factors, including: 

• Access to information about sexuality and sex 

• Knowledge about the risks of sex 

• Access to sexual health care 

• Being in an environment that promotes and affirms sexual health 

Most experts agree that sexual wellness also depends on things like sexual satisfaction, intimacy levels, self-esteem, and more. 

No. 2

10 Ways to Improve Your Sexual Health 

Sexual health and wellness is a broad area that covers a lot of ground, and each individual must determine what sexual wellness means to them. However, there are some common ways experts suggest achieving positive sexual health. Here are 10 of them: 

1. Communicate Openly – Open communication is the key to a healthy sexual relationship. It involves discussing your desires, boundaries, and concerns with your partner. Effective communication can enhance intimacy, reduce anxiety, and improve sexual satisfaction. 

2. Prioritize Self-Care – Self-care practices can have a profound impact on sexual health. For example, regular physical activity, a balanced diet, adequate sleep, and stress management can all boost libido, improve sexual function, increase self-esteem, and enhance overall well-being. 

3. Educate Yourself – Knowledge is power when it comes to sexual wellness. Educating yourself about sexual autonomy, sexual rights, safe sex practices, and the spectrum of sexual orientations and identities can empower you to make informed decisions about your sexual health. 

4. Manage Stress – Chronic stress can negatively affect many aspects of your life, including sexual desire and performance. Techniques like mindfulness, meditation, and yoga are some avenues to consider for managing stress levels. 

5. Explore Desires – Understanding and exploring your sexual desires and fantasies can improve your sexual wellness. It’s essential to approach this exploration with an open mind. 

6. Practice Safe Sex – Practicing safe sex by utilizing condoms can be critical for preventing STIs and unplanned pregnancies – especially if you aren’t in a committed, monogamous relationship. It’s also important to get regular STI screenings to ensure you aren’t unknowingly living with or spreading STIs to your sexual partners. 

7. Use Lubrication – Lubricants can enhance sexual pleasure, reduce discomfort during intercourse, and reduce the risk of condoms breaking. Choosing the right type of lubricant and incorporating hormone-balancing supplements for you and your partner can significantly improve your sexual experience. 

8. Maintain Physical Health – Physical health can directly impact you and your partner’s sexual function. For example, conditions like low estrogen, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease can affect your sexual health. Regular check-ups and managing health conditions are essential for maintaining sexual wellness. 

9. Consider Sex Therapy – Whether you’re an individual or a couple, getting insight from a professional about how to improve your sexual well-being can be a game-changer. There are several types of sex therapy out there, including sensate focus therapy, which aims to help you pay attention to sensory perception and sensuality. For more information on the benefits of sensate therapy and sex therapy in general, check out this resource from BetterHelp.

10. Consult a Healthcare Provider – If you have lasting symptoms and concerns about your sexual health, including low sex drive, pain during sexual activities, erectile dysfunction, or sexual anxiety, consider visiting your healthcare provider. There could be underlying issues at play that need to be addressed. 

Takeaways

Improving sexual health is a multifaceted endeavor encompassing open communication, self-care, education, and sometimes professional assistance. By adopting these practices, you can make strides to improve your overall sexual wellness and, ultimately, your health as a whole. 

Trying to find a perfect venue to hold a special event for family and friends or stage a corporate event can be complicated. There are so many options—many of which are very common and quite predictable. Therefore, finding a venue that captivates all who attend so guests talk about it for years to come is bound to be memorable for all the right reasons.

Consider Sydney, a stunning city blessed with so many remarkable natural features, most notably its location by the ocean. In this article, we help you consider the decision to choose some of the best luxury boat hire Sydney can provide. It is guaranteed to be a total success. Read on for 6 reasons why hiring a luxury boat in Sydney creates a memorable occasion.

No. 1

Luxury & Location

The high-end allure of a luxury boat rental is assured to make a remarkable impression as soon as your guests set sight on the vessel. With a wide range of vessels available to suit all requirements, offering a tailor-made and unrivaled experience is within arms reach. Why go looking for traditional venues, which many people have attended functions at in the past when there are stunning views and backdrops waiting to be added to an event?

No. 2

First-class service & Hospitality

The state-of-the-art amenities that are provided on the finest and most prestigious vessels available go perfectly with the highest standard of furnishings. The first-class service offered by the crew ensures that guests are fully attended to with the finest hospitality. Whether using a vessel for business or pleasure, it is guaranteed to create a fantastic environment.

No. 3

Unrivaled Comfort & Setting

The unparalleled level of luxury and comfort creates an unmatched winning formula, whether guests enjoy the indoor air-conditioning or outdoor deck views while soaking up the sun. The spacious outdoor views set the backdrop for exceptional experiences. Guests can also enjoy the cornucopia of indulgent luxury that is provided along with state-of-the-art audio and visual equipment and comfortable seating.

No. 4

Customizable Packages

All specific event requirements can be met through a range of customizable packages. Maybe it’s the launch of a new product, or to announce a new signing for a sports team. Perhaps there are major sponsors and investors of a corporation who will be enticed to renew contracts while onboard and enjoying the incredible ambiance. Or perhaps a special wedding anniversary or significant birthday will be the occasion for such enjoyment.

No. 5

Premium Dining & ambiance

No need is left unmet onboard a luxury yacht, and the highest quality standards are met with great importance. Premium beverages are available from the licensed onboard bar. Throughout your stay, chef-cooked menus using the freshest and highest-quality ingredients are prepared. This ensures that all guests are fully catered for leaving them only to enjoy the stunning views of the oceanscape through panoramic windows.

No. 6

Once In A Lifetime Memories

Those with a romantic streak might just hit the jackpot when deciding to hire an overnight luxury charter. You may choose to head to a port city, or quiet cove, or just enjoy all the magnificence that Sydney Harbour offers. This might even be the perfect opportunity to pop a question or even head off to enjoy a special anniversary with your significant other.

Takeaways

If you want to stand out from the crowd, choosing to hire a luxury yacht in Sydney is a versatile option for many types of occasions and is guaranteed to create wonderful memories for all those in attendance. With so many memorable experiences to gain, there is no question that an adventure onboard a luxury vessel will set the tone for an extravagant outcome.

Life is meant to be an amazing time. While it will still have its ups and downs, life is intended to generally be a positive, even amazing experience. Realistically, however, this is not the case for everyone, and you could find yourself wanting to have a better life. Though this feels isolating, it is a far more common feeling than you think.

People from all around the world face the same sentiment in wanting to create a better life for themselves. It is innate within us to want to have the best experience in this life. Thankfully, with so much information opening up to us, and awareness being gained, we are now learning various ways to create a better life through intention. 

In this article, we will discuss ten ways that many others have applied to create a better life and have found to be successful. While you may need to adapt them to where you are in your personal development journey, they are highly beneficial nonetheless, as they can be used as a guide to fall back on.

No. 1

Face Your Emotions

You will experience a wide range of emotions countless times during your life. Some of these will be positive, while others will be negative. It is relatively natural to embrace the positive emotions while trying to ignore the negative ones. That is not exactly the right thing to do, however, and it could have negative effects on your life.

Negative emotions do not go away just because you choose to ignore them. Instead, they build over time, and this can lead to quite a few negative outcomes for your health. As with your mental health, you could be affected greatly by suppressing your emotions more than you would expect as symptoms manifest in various ways. Instead, take the time to acknowledge how you are feeling and address your emotions in a healthy way instead of avoiding them.

No. 2

Develop Healthy Attitudes

There are many people who believe they are owed a better life, and that it should just be handed to them. This can be observed in quite a few ways, such as believing they are owed a promotion even when it has not been earned. We all know that this is just not how the world works. A life with rewards is earned, not just given.

Those with this approach to life find themselves privileged and taking more than they are giving out, which they soon find has long-term ill consequences. By not making diligent progress toward contributing to a better life, people like this find themselves in a bitter cycle that does not seem to progress. 

Anything in life must be built, so an attitude like this will work against anyone trying to build a better life. No one is owed anything in life, and everyone must put the work into getting what they want. By understanding this and putting the time and effort into earning what you desire, you will not have a problem achieving your goals as they are set with intention and within your control.

No. 3

Overcome Any Addictions

Addictions of any kind can be actively harmful to you and your life. If you truly want to have a better life, it is important to overcome any addictions you have. Even something as seemingly minor as a soda addiction can have a greater impact on your health and life than you might think.

Then there are the more obviously harmful addictions, which you could need a drug and alcohol treatment program for adults to overcome. If you are struggling with addiction, there is no shame in asking for help, and it will get you on a path to a better life than you ever knew possible.

No. 4

Develop Self-awareness

Everyone has faked it every once in a while. Whether that is pretending you are feeling better than you are, or that you like something that you really do not, it is something we have all experienced. Unwittingly, in these scenarios, we end up in an inauthentic position that does not have a positive effect on our lives, as it means putting up with quite a few things we do not like in the first place.

Sure, there will always be times when you must compromise within relationships where your needs are not always going to be the priority. However, by knowing who you are and staying true to that, you will take better care of yourself while also creating a more authentic life in alignment with your desires. Stay true to your personal values and strive toward making yourself happy. You will be much happier because of it.

No. 5

Discern And Avoid Negative Thinking

It is easy to have negative thoughts every once in a while, especially when something bad happens. That does not mean you should dwell on them for too long, however. If you do, you could fall into a pattern of negative thinking, which could have a significant impact on your life and mental health.

By being intentional about your thought life and staying focused on positivity, you will be on track to having a better life. Counteract your negative thoughts with positive ones to make sure you are in an elevated mental state and leading a better, happier, life because of it.

Meditation is a healthy way to learn how to observe your thoughts from a place of awareness. By being an observer of the mind, you will be able to discern the thoughts that you have and either allow or disallow them from receiving your attention. This helps in letting go of negative thoughts and focusing on those that are healthy.

No. 6

Create Enjoyment In Your Day

Not all days will be amazing. There will be ones that you do not particularly enjoy. You could even end up having days that are absolutely terrible. Thankfully, that does not mean the entire day should be a write-off. You could easily find something to enjoy for the rest of your day. It is simply a matter of perspective, as nothing is either good or bad other than the definition we assign to it. Look for the positive in any given situation to reframe your thoughts back to a healthier place.

Likewise, there could be brighter parts of your day if you look for them or try to put effort into making every day enjoyable. Assigning a small part of each day that is enjoyable could be more than enough to have something to look forward to. It could be anything at all, and in doing so, you will show yourself that you are committed to enjoyment as part of your everyday experience.

No. 7

Let Go Of Resentments

Everyone experiences times when they feel resentful. This is natural, and it can be caused by quite a few things that are not any less deserving of your attention. While it is okay to feel bad when something negative happens or someone does something you do not like, it should not be something you carry with you for quite a while.

It is a healthy practice to drop any resentments as soon as you are capable of doing so. They can take up too much mental energy and have a negative impact on how you feel. By letting resentments go and moving on, you can have a better life free from any negative feelings that are harmful to you. In time, this positive action could be the start of improving strained relationships and fostering a healthier resolution process in the future.

No. 8

Stick To A Routine

Humans are creatures of habit, and most people often find that sticking to a routine is a comforting experience. While this might not be possible for everyone, it could be worth trying if you do not already have a routine to rely on.

To make this practice effective, working positive and healthy habits into your new routine is recommended. You will end up having quite a better life simply because you will have intentionally planned it out that way. 

This, however, does not mean that you must make every day identical. Create a routine that you feel great about and that leaves you with the flexibility to be productive and spontaneous when you need it. Making progress is always about discipline, so as long as you are consistent in your daily efforts, you will see positive results in your life in due time.

No. 9

Prepare For Your Day The Night Before

Life can be a stressful experience, especially when you are pretty busy. Your mornings could be filled with frantic, rushed energy, which makes things worse because you are setting your day up on the wrong note. You will not want to be in a rush every morning, as it affects your mood and nervous system, so it is worth taking steps to avoid that as much as you can.

Starting your day the night before could be a great way of doing this. It lets you sort things out for the morning ahead, the night before. You can do this in quite a few ways, all of which are likely to help. Even something as simple as putting the following day’s outfit together could be enough to help you cultivate a better, more relaxed morning and life.

No. 10

Be mature in all situations

There is quite a lot involved in being an adult, and you will need to actually “act your age” at one point or another. While that is pretty easy to do when everything’s going your way, it is more difficult when things are going badly. It is natural to overreact and misbehave when you do not get what you want or when something negative happens.

The key to avoiding this is being ready to be mature to approach life’s challenges. You will need to behave accordingly, no matter what any given situation entails. This means taking the high road as much as you can, which you should not have a problem doing if you are dedicated to a better life.

While that means putting the effort in to make things right at any cost, it will have much more of a positive impact on your life than you imagine. At a minimum, it will help you avoid any negative repercussions caused by your reactions. You will simply be in more control of your outcomes by knowing that you can choose how to approach things for the greater good.

The List

Lifestyle

✔️

Top 5 Tips For Living A Better Life

As effective as each of the above ways to have a better life can be when applied to your life, there are so many other tips that you can utilize to become more intentional. Here are a few tips you can incorporate that will help you achieve this:

No. 1

✔️

Focus on quality over quantity when buying or doing anything

No. 2

✔️

Take steps to help you relax

No. 3

✔️

Feed your mind and stay mentally active

No. 4

✔️

Be serious about your sleep

No. 5

✔️

Learn when and how to say “no”

Combined with the above strategies, each of these tips can make living a better life much easier than you think. If it is something you already want, there should not be anything stopping you from reaching your goals. Consider them a guide on your path to a happier, healthier life.

Takeaways

Case in point: You find yourself wanting to have a better life, but you have resigned yourself to the one you already have. It often seems impossible to have something better. Thankfully, you need not have to settle for that. You can always choose to have a better life, one that you can create at any moment in time, knowing that you also deserve it.

As we have discussed, there are countless ways to have a better life—many of which you could never have known could have such a detrimental impact, and some of which are much more practical than others. Now with the tools in hand, with further application and discipline, you will not have a problem leading the life you deserve.

Sticking to a routine, letting go of resentments, being aware of negative thinking, and similar strategies are just the tip of the iceberg. There is nothing truly stopping you from having a better life, and the more you become aware of the interconnectedness of things, you more you will develop your own strategies toward conscious living.

Regular readers of this blog will understand that how you approach your business on a psychological level can make a huge difference in how successful it is likely to be, as well as how much you will enjoy running it.

Unfortunately, there are a few common and outdated ways of thinking that are both very likely to make things more challenging for any entrepreneur.

It is beneficial to identify these harmful thinking habits and to upgrade them in some way or another to create healthier internal dialogues, in effect creating more peace and abundance in your life and business.

Here are a few examples of the kinds of changes in thinking you might want to aim for and adopt to achieve this.

No. 1

Cultivate More Positivity

It can be all too easy to get overwhelmed by our thinking that there is a limit to what we feel we can accomplish. However, the truth is that if you would like to cultivate a better mindset, one of the elements that you will want to consider is to aim for creating more positivity in your thinking.

This is not something that you should force, but rather intentionally develop gently over time. It is quite essential and will prove to be very useful when it comes to growing your business, so ensure that you are developing this skill daily if you want your business to consistently succeed.

Our thoughts become tangible, so when we focus on positive outcomes and higher-frequency emotions, we are creating more of those very things in our life. The more intentional you become with your thoughts, the better you will get at creating more of the things you want to see manifest and come to reality in your life and business versus the ones you want to avoid.

No. 2

Avoiding All-Or-Nothing Thinking

Another very common way of thinking falls in classifying goals in terms of all-or-nothing results. For example, this is likely when you think that you must achieve a certain ideal number of sales results in any given timeframe, otherwise, you are feeling unaccomplished or that your business is going nowhere.

In this thought process, all you are accomplishing is putting a huge amount of pressure on yourself and setting yourself up for immediate failure in your mind. Over time this will have a profoundly damaging effect on you and your business itself simply because you are focused more on an exact outcome in determining your self-worth.

Instead of focusing on the how, you are focused on the when, and this creates stress and uncertainty that you will try to rectify regardless of how much productive effort you put out. You will feel burnt out and miss the opportunity to enjoy the process.

If you would like to learn more about this debilitating thought process, Joshua Shuman Psychologist understands this concept and can help you uproot some of these ideas if you do find yourself thinking in this way.

No. 3

Focus On Providing Value

Instead of focusing all of your energy on profit and loss, instead, try switching that around and focusing more on providing value to customers. This, in many ways, takes the pressure off of you to reach the numbers, and you will find that ironically, it will naturally lead to more profit simply as an effect of your providing value.

In fact, you will find that the profit and loss obsession is quite an outdated way of thinking which does not really serve your greater need to fulfill your purpose. We are learning that there are universal laws that govern our lives, and by being in tune with them, you can see the results flow rather than coming at the expense of something else.

By tuning into more of how you can provide unquestionable value to others that will in turn bless you and further drive you, you will naturally become more in alignment within a healthier heart space of giving. You will nurture that need and desire of wanting to give something to others, and you will naturally be rewarded for it—not having to force results that do not align with your output.

No. 4

Experimentation Above All

Finally, consider what it could be like if you approach your business–and each day working within it–in a mode of experimentation to discover and learn new things. This is the kind of approach that you might want to think about, something that can help you to really unlock the greater potential of your business, while also providing an enjoyable way to run it with less pressure and more grace.

After all, the process of running a business is all about learning, growing, and being open to all of the ups and downs that come with that process. If you detach yourself from the need to be perfect and to have everything all figured out, you can achieve a greater amount of freedom. In this newfound space, the answers will come to you naturally and without force.

By opening yourself up to the unlimited possibilities that exist and leaving the need to control everything behind, you will find that so much more opportunity opens up to you. It is in this place of the unknown where all new things are created and birthed.

This is something you might want to consider trying out at the very least, as it can help you get in tune with an abundant source that is unlimited and not bound by our often limited human constraints and understanding.

Takeaways

As we as a society learn more and more about the power of mindset and perspective, there is a greater urge to apply these concepts to begin to see the changes that take place in our lives for the greater good.

The old way of thinking in terms of capitalist and corporatist limitations will no longer work in the coming, more evolved world where we are in tune with our innate abilities, which make all things possible.

We no longer need to exist in a state of stress or illusion, and by simply changing our thinking, we can begin to walk in our purpose more authentically and aligned with our greater selves and natural gifts.