How to live longer

TED, which is a great compendium of speakers from around the world, has a speech up on line that discusses longevity and how it is achieved.

The speaker and researchers decided to investigate pockets of long life that were found in particular communities around the world.  Their question was why were more healthy elderly found in these areas and what circumstances, be it diet, lifestyle, climate, proximity to cities and pollution were common to all.

The researchers picked half a dozen localities ranging from Asia to California where more than one person was living to over 100 years.  Their idea was to find some kind of common thread that might explain why these places had more healthy elderly.

What they found was that it wasn’t location, it wasn’t a particular diet or exercise plan, and it wasn’t even proximity to pollution or stress full environments.  The overriding commonality was interpersonal relationships.

All members of the over 100 group were heavily involved with family first, friends, their church’s or some other aspect of their communities that had them interacting on a daily basis.

One thing i noticed that the study didn’t mention was that except for two places’ all were on islands, i wonder if that had any significance?

Anyway it appears from this study that seclusion tended to kill you off. 

All of these elderly had stayed in one place for a very long time.  They had developed social structures that included other women or men that they had aged with.  One group in particular was a group of Asian women in their late 90’s and early 100’s that had met regularly since their twenties.  They claimed to have met to discuss everything in their village and their personal lives.  They argued, fought, hated and got over it.  They loved and continued it.  They involved themselves in all aspects of the emotions and communal spirit and found ways to thrive and prosper from all the interaction.  They claimed that without this support and their families they wouldn’t be where they are today.

The group of men that aged well lived on an island and did the same thing.  Only they drank, fought, got involved in physical activities, some even smoked, and they spent a lot of time with their friends and family.  All of the elderly men and women lived with some family members, whether they were in the states or some other country.

And that’s where i’m going today.  In the US we have created a market that caters strictly to the elderly.  We have built retirement homes that warehouse our most treasured seniors, keeping them away from daily interactions with their children and grandchildren. We have separated them from society.  We can’t farm their wisdom the way we used to and our children aren’t learning from them because we don’t have ready access to them.

We have made it a goal to prove that each one of us can live independently and take care of ourselves, not be a “burden” and this may be killing us off sooner than necessary.

i just wanted to throw that out there today as food for thought.  Why don’t we keep more of our elderly close by, would it help them to live longer, and would it help us to live longer too?

It is pelting and lashing here, thundering and lightning and has been for weeks it seems.  Of course its still in the high 70’s and low 80’s, but we are getting waterlogged. The ocean has had beautiful swells which the surfers love but the rain has muddied up things. i didn’t get out to make new photos this week so i’m putting up some from this morning.

Paradise in the rain.

See ya next week.