10 Ideas To Increase Your Longevity
- Know what healthy weight is for yourself, and stay within those bounds. Too much weight increases the risk of diabetes, cancer, and heart disease. Excess weight can clip 12 years off your life, according to Obesity Magazine. On the other hand, being too thin may lead to osteoporosis and poor immune function. Stay within a reasonable weight for yourself.
- Be cognizant of alcohol intake. Drinking every single day can damage organs, and weaken the immune system, according to Health Magazine. Skip a day here and there.
- Reduce your stress. Work related tension can reduce the shortening of telomeres, which protects the ends of chromosomes, and may indicate life expectancy.
- Keep learning. A learning brain leads to longer life, and more educated people have better access to health care and good insurance.
- Develop friendships. They reduce stress, and friends will encourage friends to seek medical help when needed.
- Exercise regularly, both cardio and strength training. Build muscle to protect against falls, strengthen the heart and lungs to cope with stress.
- Fabulous news for coffee drinkers. Harvard research suggests that 3 1/2 cups a day of coffee may lower risk of heart disease. There you go…
- Sleep more. This from the University of Surrey, in England: sleeping less than 6 hours a day alters genes in the body, specifically ones involved in metabolism, inflammation, and immunity. Plus, lack of sleep can lead to obesity, which we already know shortens your life.
- Lean towards a more Mediterranean diet. Eat more vegetables, fruits, fish, and whole grains. Eat less simple carbs, like pasta and sugar. I think donuts are Mediterranean…
- Learn your health history. Just because there’s a history of heart disease, or diabetes, or cancer doesn’t mean that you will succumb, but be informed. Knowing history is better than not knowing history.
Take care of yourself. More vegetables, more cardio. As we age, these are two things we tend to give up or slow down practicing. Don’t.
That’s Aging Intelligently