Blog post about this podcast available at: https://www.wondermedicine.com/wonder-medicine-blog
Three Things to improve your longevity today.
1. Exercise
- Stop pretending to care about longevity or health if you are not exercising
- Bodies in motion stay in motion, bodies that stop, soon stop forever
- Plus the best way to keep your brain health and prevent dementia is to exercise regularly.
- Build your bank account of muscle and movement reserve
- Your job is not exercise. Walking is not enough unless your are elderly. But even then you should be strength training as well
- Dynamic movements through big ranges of motion always better. Don’t limit yourself
- Be results driven. Measure strength, VO2 max, and other objective metrics.
- Avoid injury by starting slow and progressing slow, injuries are killers as we get older.
- Learn how to fall
- Focus on Eccentric strength as well as concentric, stop dropping the weights.
- You will only be is strong as your weakest component and this will be your Achilles heal when you age, so stop ignoring it and fix it. Stop skipping leg day
- If you would talk to our exercise physiologist, Callie, ditch the chair
2. Sleep
- Give yourself 8 protected every night. Don’t stress if you cant sleep the whole 8 hours
- Living a healthy lifestyle will improve sleep. Do more during the day. Think and move more, vigorous exercise and light exposure early in the day can really help
- Give your kids more time, particularly in the morning
- Avoid z drugs, benzos, alcohol
- Cannabis, makes you wake up more groggy, less REM sleep, people often require more sleep to feel the same amount rested
3. Perseverance with positivity
- I have asked every person above 90 I have taken care of their secret to longevity. I am over 300 people at this point. 90+ percent of the time they either say “keep moving” or “stay positive.
- Toughen up, life is hard
- Work, retirement is a killer, work gives people meaning and keeps the brain active.
- Force yourself to do hard things that are uncomfortable, cold plunge.
- Lean into all your weakness always
- Don’t give up.