--- title: Diet, Exercise and What You Need To Know to Be Healthy description: Here are the laziest-possible ways to shine up your diet, improve your fitness, eat healthier and exercise more efficiently canonical: https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/ author: Alexandra Sifferlin article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-06-13T16:31:26.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:55:27.703Z article:section: Health og:title: How To Be a Basically Healthy Person og:description: Here are the laziest-possible ways to shine up your diet, improve your fitness, eat healthier and exercise more efficiently og:url: https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt43ed8a9e86f09a1f/698781538e060123a145a872/time-50-healthiest-foods-tomatoes.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: healthiest foods, health food, diet, nutrition, time.com stock, tomatoes, fruits og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How To Be a Basically Healthy Person twitter:description: Here are the laziest-possible ways to shine up your diet, improve your fitness, eat healthier and exercise more efficiently twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt43ed8a9e86f09a1f/698781538e060123a145a872/time-50-healthiest-foods-tomatoes.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How To Be a Basically Healthy Person > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=4e38a834-3060-4874-bd2b-5b74520fd200&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) ## Video: 10 Ways to Be More Active at Work [Watch (HLS stream): 10 Ways to Be More Active at Work](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/zdNUwr7I.m3u8) (1:02)  _Published 2016-01-27_ by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Jun 13, 2016 4:31 PM UTC  Danny Kim for TIME by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Jun 13, 2016 4:31 PM UTC Even if we have the best of intentions, the goals we set to get healthy (after this last slice of pizza, of course) sometimes fall by the wayside. It can be hard to stay motivated, or even properly informed, since the recommendations for what to eat and how long to exercise can be [confusing and conflicting.](http://time.com/4130043/lobbying-politics-dietary-guidelines/) (Fat, for example, was off the menu for years under official guidance that eating fat _makes_ you fat, and now that advice is getting [kicked to the curb](http://time.com/2863227/ending-the-war-on-fat/).) As a result, truly healthy behaviors can have a hard time cutting through the noise. Despite everything we know about the health benefits of exercise, a [recent study](http://time.com/4363219/exercise-how-often-by-profession/) found that 43% of employed adults do not exercise often. Yet getting healthier is still a worthy goal, and many experts in the fields of exercise, health and nutrition have clear ideas about how to get there. Here are some low-stress, bare-minimum ways to become a healthier person, even for those of us who love to eat and hit snooze. **How to eat** Eating healthy shouldn’t be a nutrient numbers game. And no: you don’t have to go [vegan](http://time.com/4346551/vegan-diet-vegetarian/) or adopt a [Paleo diet](http://time.com/3614394/paleo-diet/). Just make sure your plate contains more than two different colors, says Simin Nikbin Meydani, director of the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University. “If it’s not, it’s boring, and you won’t meet your nutrient requirements,” she says. “If it’s green and red and brown, you can.” After coloring your plate, make sure to consume it—and enjoy it—with someone else. “Sharing a meal with friends and family impacts our health and how we age and fare as we get older,” Meydani says. Some countries, like Brazil, [follow just that advice](http://www.vox.com/2015/2/20/8076961/brazil-food-guide). Their government recommends eating whole foods, avoiding processed ones and dining with other people. **How to exercise** The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) [recommends](https://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/basics/adults/) that American adults do two hours and 30 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity each week, plus some muscle-strengthening on the side. Many people don’t do any of that. A 2015 [study](http://time.com/3677063/exercise-recommendations-unrealistic/) published in the _The BMJ_ argued that older adults, especially, find it hard to meet that government advice. “Getting inactive people to do a little bit of physical activity, even if they don’t meet the recommendations, might provide greater population health gains,” wrote study author Philipe de Souto Barreto, a researcher at University Hospital of Toulouse, in the paper. Yet new evidence suggests they don’t need to. Barreto points out that a study of more than 250,000 older adults found that getting less than an hour of moderate physical activity each week was linked to a 15% drop in death, which means that people do benefit from even a small amount of exercise. Studies have also shown significant health benefits from [simple exercises like walking](http://time.com/3709816/moderate-exercise-is-best/). Some researchers are seeing how low people can go when it comes to time spent working out. Enter the [one-minute workout](http://time.com/3633639/one-minute-workout-exercise/), where you work out as hard as possible for 60 seconds, with some warm-up and cool-down exercises thrown in, too. Even though the time spent exercising is minimal, it’s meant to be hard, and is [shown to improve health and fitness](http://time.com/4311373/interval-training-benefits/). “There might be time-efficient ways to get fit,” says Martin Gibala, chair of kinesiology at McMaster University in Canada. “The notion of meeting people in the middle is positive—but there’s no free lunch.” **The takeaway** Stressing out over meeting government numbers—whether for nutrient values of the number of exercise minutes—may not be worth the headache. Getting some exercise every week and eating colorful meals with friends can be an enjoyable way to live a healthier life. Doing _something_, it seems, is what’s important. ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] [ BLANK_AUDIO ] [ MUSIC ] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/"},"headline":"How To Be a Basically Healthy Person","datePublished":"2016-06-13T16:31:26.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:55:27.703Z","description":"Here are the laziest-possible ways to shine up your diet and fitness","url":"https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/","keywords":["Diet & Nutrition","diet","Nutrition","Exercise","Weight loss","health","Working out","Workout","eating"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt43ed8a9e86f09a1f/698781538e060123a145a872/time-50-healthiest-foods-tomatoes.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alexandra Sifferlin","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt43ed8a9e86f09a1f/698781538e060123a145a872/time-50-healthiest-foods-tomatoes.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"healthiest foods, health food, diet, nutrition, time.com stock, tomatoes, fruits","caption":"healthiest foods, health food, diet, nutrition, time.com stock, tomatoes, fruits","creditText":"Danny Kim for TIME","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/dietnutrition/","name":"Diet & Nutrition"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/","name":"How To Be a Basically Healthy Person"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"10 Ways to Be More Active at Work","description":"","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/zdNUwr7I/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-01-27T15:44:44.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/zdNUwr7I.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/","duration":"PT1M2S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4366165/how-to-be-healthy/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```