Indian actress Pooja Batra is on the trip of a lifetime in Zanzibar and Tanzania. Batra, 46, shared a reel of herself wearing a cheetah-print bikini top and purple shorts, swimming in a natural pond. Her companions? Some very curious turtles. “Swimming with the turtles 🐢,” she captioned the post. “It was an incredible experience,” commented fellow actress Deepti Bhatnagar. How does she stay so fit? Read on to see 5 ways Batra stays in shape and the photos that prove they work.
1. MMA and Yoga
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Batra loves MMA and is a certified yoga instructor. “I trained three days a week for six years, and acquired a brown belt with two black stripes,” she says. “I find MMA good for your physical and mental health. When you learn a routine, and execute movements using both sides of your body, you are joining the dots in your brain, and keeping it active for a long period of time. In order to thrive as a human being, you need to have satva, the Sanskrit word for balance. Yoga and MMA lead you to live a balanced life… I am now a certified yoga teacher, and did my first yoga retreat in Nosara, Costa Rica.”
2. Hiking Mountains
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Batra loves hiking in challenging locations. “The body is an alchemy of all the things you put in it. If you put gold into your body, you become gold,” she says. “Knowing the dynamics of intake versus [expression] makes it simple to monitor the weight. Fitness is needed to stay happy. I’m also a hiker, and have hiked to the base camps of Mount Everest, Mont Blanc, Mount Baldy, and Yosemite.”
3. Vegetarian Diet
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Batra starts her day with a glass of water, and has scaled back on her coffee intake. Instead, she drinks black tea. She follows a vegetarian diet. “I like to eat but I don’t like to fill my stomach too much, because when I do I am very uncomfortable,” she says. “ I don’t do red meat, I don’t do chicken, I don’t do eggs. If I’m in the US, because I love sushi, I will have fish, but no shellfish.”
4. Intermittent Fasting
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Batra says intermittent fasting is something that works for her. “Can intermittent fasting improve your health? Losing weight and being physically active help lower your risk of obesity-related diseases, such as diabetes, sleep apnea and some types of cancer,” says
Manpreet Mundi, MD. “For these diseases, intermittent fasting seems to be about as beneficial as any other type of diet that reduces overall calories.”
5. World Travel
Batra enjoys the many mental and emotional health benefits of travel. “I love traveling, and I’m a peripatetic,” she says. “I love to learn when I’m traveling, and I think it’s the best thing to do right now. The world is changing, and you never know what might stay or not. Last year, I was lucky enough to go to Tahiti. It was amazing for me because people have not even heard of places like Tahiti. When I post all these things on social media, I’m also vicariously taking my fans on a travel spree with me.”