Seven big wellness trends: 2022's tips for a healthy lifestyle

Gyms are embracing exciting new workouts

The ability of gyms to integrate old favourites into new and invigorating classes is nothing short of mind blowing. Variety is key when it comes to exercise, so shake up your routine with these new fitness classes.

Manor, a fitness brand with spaces located across London (Victoria, Vauxhall, Shoreditch and Oxford Circus), offers a no-nonsense approach to fitness. Don’t expect lifestyle extras or luxury frills, but with former athletes and coaches at the helm, you will get a super effective, hard-core workout. Their notorious ‘Yardwork’ class, billed as the most challenging session in London, takes place in an underground carpark in Victoria and incorporates a mix of high intensity cardio, with hard core strength exercises – think sled pushes or D Ball (cumbersome heavyweight ball) throws.

Based in the heart of Notting Hill, Form Studios offers a low impact high intensity ‘pure core’ class that uses an interesting new tool called an MOTR — essentially a foam roller with cables attached — which assists the body in achieving fully functional, slow controlled movements, promising to double results in half the time!

Taking charge of gut health and boosting energy

As the window of unbridled summer indulgence – cheeky cocktails, al fresco lunches and beach barbeques – becomes a distant memory, and restrictions look set to make a comeback, we can expect ‘nutritional recalibration’ in 2022. This is all about taking in the right amount of nutrients to allow the body to achieve its best possible performance mentally and physically.

From the growing trend towards nutrition psychiatry (where practitioners prescribe dietary solutions to alleviate mental health issues) to new and improved probiotics and quick healthy meal solutions for busy lives, there are now many ways to achieve maximum nutrient intake with minimum fuss.

One of these is KROMA, a 5-day Lifestyle Reset, developed by Lisa Odenweller and backed by Gwyneth Paltrow, which aims to boost mood and energy levels. Best known for ‘making healthy taste amazing’, Kroma comprises superfood ingredients, dehydrated into the form of powders, which should be taken 10 times per day. The meals are tasty (in case you’re wondering) and range from porridge and exotic soups to smoothies and delicious drinks. Kroma is jammed with vitamins and minerals, as well as other super ingredients such as turmeric, ashwagandha and L-theanine, best known for their healing properties. For those who can’t imagine nutrition without a few solids, fish and chicken can be added at your discretion.

New advances in sleep pattern tracking

Despite how hard we try, a good night’s sleep can be elusive. So it’s no surprise that sleep hygiene will be a mainstay of 2022. Among our favourite new sleep products is the Somneo Sleep and Wake-Up Light by Philips, which changes its light gradually to mimic nature’s natural sunrise and sundown. It uses personalised light and sound settings, environmental sensors and a guided breathing programme to help you fall asleep like a baby and wake up feeling fresh as a daisy. Also worthy of note is the new Oura Ring Generation 3, a sleep and activity tracker that offers personalised health insights to ensure your activity-rest balance is in check.

At home training is here to stay

And this is the new tech we want:

VAHA’s mirror, a full body sized interactive home mirror that delivers personalised, immersive exercise sessions for mind, body and spiritual health. As you perform the sessions in front of the mirror, it uses AI to capture your movements to offer bespoke encouragement and motivation to improve your performance.

NOHrD Tria Trainer is a nifty three-in-one bench with an attractive and minimalist walnut finish. It is a functional bit of kit which can be set up in three different ways to help you with core strength, back and glute toning, and punchy workouts for the upper body.

The ‘shop slow’ movement is gathering pace

Slow shopping is an increasingly powerful concept that embraces thoughtful, intentional and sustainable shopping choices. The idea is to take time to think about what you buy and to decide on products that use natural, ethically sourced materials designed to last. It aims to replace the ethos of instant gratification and mindless consumption, which results in a large amount of wasted material ending up in landfills.

Among the brands turning heads in this space is Homework, which offers natural, botanical, toxin-free skincare products and perfumes inspired by traditional Chinese medicine.

The brand also offers brilliant workshops, including a delicious sounding natural perfume oil making course. During the two-hour workshop in February, you’ll learn about ‘top, middle and base notes’ and experiment with a large array of pure essential oils with which you can make your own perfume. At the end of the class, you can take away a 10ml roller bottle of your scented creation. Based in south-east London, the course includes a welcome drink and all materials – the cost is £45.

Striving for mind, body and spiritual balance

Yoga embraces health giving concepts that, if practised regularly, will lead to mind, body and spiritual balance. With both anxiety and depression growing national problems, why not make 2022 the year you incorporate yoga into your life?

If you’ve never practised yoga before, World Yoga Day on 22 February is a good place to start. Yoga teachers and studios all over the world take part in the 24-hour marathon, which was developed by Samira Radsi with the intention of harnessing the power of yogis’ time, energy and crucially money to help human rights causes. Sign up with a participating studio and start the journey.

Foraging is here to stay

There is nothing like a good forage in nature to banish the blues and enhance physical and mental health. It combines a blast of fresh air with a huge sense of achievement. January offers great foraging potential and is the season for nuts and interesting berries. Look out for chestnuts, which are great as a roasted nibble; crab apples, which are perfect for tasty jelly to accompany cheese, meat or to use in cake recipes; blackberries (if you are lucky you can probably still find them); beech nuts, which can be eaten raw; pine nuts, which can be toasted or eaten raw; and sloes for a seasonal sip of sloe gin. Believe it or not, you can also forage acorns, which can be leached in hot or cold water, and used to produce flour or toasted to produce a tasty snack.