No matter how much we believe we are following some kind of health regimen, all of us could use an additional boost. Vitamins have long been used by a broad range of folks, from those seeking a shortcut to the rigors of proper nutrition and exercise to those who do everything right but need the extra vitamins and minerals these enhancers can provide. While those who fall into the former camp will really see any benefit in taking vitamins sans any other form of healthy living, those who do make an effort to clean up their diet and add a daily half an hour or so of physical movement can benefit enormously from the intake of the right sort of vitamin supplement.
In this post, we’re looking not just at how vitamin supplementation could help those struggling to receive the right amount of the right stuff but how the correct type of supplements can have an effect far and above that of ordinary vitamins you might find on the shelf in the drug section of Walmart.
Understanding The Importance Of Vitamins
You will never truly gain a proper answer to the question of whether or not you ought to supplement your diet with vitamins until you understand what they are and why they’re used so frequently by people all over the world. Whether you’ve opted for a vitamin subscription service where you receive a regular delivery of the type of vitamins you’ve requested or choose to grab them once in a while from your local pharmacy, the idea of taking vitamins is to boost the function of your body and provide it with all the good stuff it needs to not only function but to do so effectively.
The main issue with supplements is that most people believe they are some kind of panacea that they can take, and that will resolve all that is them. While this might be somewhat true for people suffering from vitamin and mineral deficiency or those who regularly work intently, it might not be worth it for most folks. To figure out if you need to take them, you ought to visit your doctor, who will advise you on whether you’re deficient in specific minerals, which you can then use to tailor your supplement choice based on this fact. Taking this approach will lead to a far better outcome than simply grabbing a tub of vitamins with the flashiest logo. If you do happen to need them, there is also another step to keep in mind…the quality of ingredients used to create them…
Clean Ingredients: What They Mean
As with plenty of things in life, not everything is created equally, and when it comes to something as critical as your health, you really ought to be choosing the products that not only talk the talk but also walk the walk. That’s a great thing to say, but what does this mean in reality? How do people who might only be casual users ever know what type of vitamin supplement is the best to purchase?
Well, you can think of it like the food you eat; the more natural and closer to the source you go, the better off you’ll be. Although not an entirely fair comparison, you can think of artificially manufactured supplements like a frozen, microwavable meal and those choosing only natural ingredients to make a home-cooked meal. Both will fill you up, but they are undoubtedly not comparable in terms of health.
To be fair, cheaper, more common supplements are as bad for your health as a ready meal per se, but the point is that anything made using natural ingredients will always win out over those that aren’t. Now the question arises: what does the term “natural ingredients” actually mean in this context:
- They come from real foods: The crux of the idea behind the term natural is that the compounds are similar to those that are found in real foods. This could mean Vitamin C derived from acerola cherries, Vitamin E extracted from plant oils, or any other number of vitamins that have originated from the natural environment.
- They’re not created in a lab: If the term natural means extracted from the real world, then it stands to reason that anything artificially developed in a lab would be the antithesis of this. While not all lab-developed vitamins are harmful to you, most agree that if you are able to get your daily intake of the good stuff from real foods, it’s beneficial.
- More bioavailable: The human body has evolved over millions of years to consume the very things that live and grow in the real world, and a century or so of synthetic development can’t change this, no matter what. Since the body has developed to absorb natural ingredients better, so too can it do so with natural vitamins.
Choosing Quality Over Quantity
Although plenty of people realize that choosing quality over quantity is usually the best course of action for many things in life, not many actually follow through on it. This can be especially prevalent in the non-prescription drug industry, where people believe that in order to gain the most benefits from their vitamins, they need to follow the label on the package that states they ought to take multiple pills per day. But it just so happens that the more you take, the more you have to buy their product, which is rather convenient for the manufacturer! Instead, you should focus on quality, particularly concerning what you put inside your body.
Consulting Professionals For Guidance
Even though it’s typically safe to begin a course of this kind of supplementation without prior consultation with your doctor, you might glean some interesting facts about your body you might otherwise have missed. Your physician will give you an idea of what vitamins and minerals you might be lacking, which, in turn, allows you to select the right supplements that will actually have an impact on your body. This will save you money in the long run as you won’t consume an excess of the vitamins you don’t need, which ultimately end up as waste that leaves your body.
If you choose to start a supplementation routine, your best bet is to select those that are developed using natural ingredients. Doing so helps your body in a myriad of ways, from better absorption to actually knowing what you’re putting into your body.
