Training for Old Age

If you are not training for old age, you really, really should be. Why? Because you’re getting older, whether you like it or not, and you can be sure of this: If you do nothing to take care of yourself, you will speed up the rate of your bodily aging, you will become much more susceptible to disease, and your quality of life will quite likely be decreased.

What Do You Mean, “Training for Old Age??”

To live literally means to get older. Every second that we are alive makes us one second older than the previous moment, and as time goes by, not only does it increment our age in years, but that passage of time also ages our bodies.

As much as we don’t like to embrace it in our society, our bodies change with age! As we get older, things don’t work quite the same as they used to. Skin may not be as elastic, sight may not be quite as sharp, and we might not be as quick as we used to be. It’s true, and we might as well embrace that.

BUT!

I really hope you pay attention to what I am about to say.

A lot of what we have viewed in our society as “natural aging” is not, in fact, natural aging. Some of the things we assume come with age are not the way aging is supposed to be. Yes, your body does become less efficient over time, but here’s the big question: How are you treating your body as it becomes less efficient?

What I’m saying is, a lot of what happens to you and I as we age is not natural aging, but rather, improper maintenance and care of our bodies as we age. Case in point, just because I have a 1964 Chevrolet Impala – I don’t, by the way – doesn’t mean that it’s a rust bucket. Yes, the car would be almost 60 years old at this point, but if I restored it and took care of it – keeping good tires on it, changing the oil, fixing rust spots as they appear, changing out parts that wear out, and so on – not only would the car continue to run well, but it might be in better shape than a car just built a few years ago!

Think about The White House, which has apparently housed every president since President John Adams in 1800 – over 220 years ago. And yet, it still stands and endures as one of the nicest historic buildings in this country because of how meticulously it is maintained. Think about that.

Unfortunately, sometimes what is intuitive to us about maintaining things is not so easily applied by us to our physical bodies. We eat whatever we get our hands on, whether it is real food or not, we don’t move our bodies, we stay busy and stressed, and do everything wrong with our bodies, then we say that aging is hard.

Maybe getting older doesn’t have to be as physically hard as we make it.

Realities of Aging: Senescence and Sarcopenia

As I said before, aging is inevitable and unavoidable. It just happens, and whether you like it or not, your body doesn’t run the same in the older years as it does in your younger years.

Senescence is a term that describes how the cells in our bodies start to lose their ability to grow and divide. Over our lives, our cells accumulate damage from the environment (radiation, toxins from food, stress, etc.), which can speed up senescence in our bodies. Our immune systems regularly get rid of senescent cells, but when damage is excessive, senescent cells develop at a faster rate, which means faster aging.

The thing is, even though senescence is inevitable and increases with age, if the damage from the environment is minimized, senescence can be delayed. We minimize such damage by…surprise, taking care of our bodies with proper nutrition, exercise, stress reduction, sleep, and so on.

Sarcopenia is muscle loss with age. According to this study, the rate of sarcopenia starts to increase linearly in the 4th decade of life – 30s up to 40 (gulp…that’s me right there) – and by the 8th decade of life – 70s to 80s – a person can have lost up to 50% of their total muscle mass. That’s crazy.

Since muscle mass is important for maintaining the metabolic rate, this involuntary loss of muscle accelerates fat gain, contributes to insulin resistance (think Type 2 Diabetes), contributes to overall frailty and susceptibility to falls, and an overall higher risk of straight-up death.

With that said, would you like to know a definite way slow or prevent sarcopenia? Physical exercise and proper nutrition. In other words, if you continue to exercise your muscles well and get decent amounts of proper nutrients, you hold onto your valuable muscle mass.

Examples of Aging Well

I’d better provide some proof of what I’m talking about so that this article is not merely a “philosophical exercise,” so consider these real life examples of people who have intentionally taken care of themselves as they’ve aged.

Mrs. Ernestine Shepherd won her first bodybuilding competition at the age of 71, and was given the title of the World’s Oldest Performing Female Bodybuilder in 2010. Today, she is 84 years old, she continues to train, and she easily looks decades younger. The crazy thing about it all is that she didn’t become serious about taking care of herself until her mid 50s.

Check it out, though. The way she maintains this kind of health at an age at which many of us assume that we’ll be “done” is through a high level of discipline.

• She gets up early every day to run several miles, and she strength trains four days a week
• She eats a strict diet and plans her diet ahead (I had the opportunity of attending a luncheon where she was the keynote speaker, and she wouldn’t even eat the seemingly healthy meal that had been prepared because it did not meet her standards for what she decides to put in her body)
• She gets enough rest
• She lives with a high sense of purpose and motivates as many people as she can around her

Wendy Ida is a 68 year old fitness trainer who also started training later in life – her mid 40s – and is highly accomplished in the health and fitness realm. She has a couple of Guinness World Records of her own – including the most burpees in one minute for a female – and has won several bodybuilding competitions.

Again, her excellent health and fitness are no mistake, neither can they be attributed merely to “good genes.” She overcame an incredibly hard and depressing time in her life as a domestic violence survivor and committed to being very disciplined in taking really good care of herself.

There are other examples of people who might not have been fitness trainers, but who otherwise maintained a high level of activity into very old age. Think about Cicely Tyson, an iconic actor who remained a very active actor right up to her recent passing at 96. She was sharp, skilled, and she was passionate about what she was doing. That’s the way to be!

How You Can Train for Old Age

Let’s put a lot of this together now. You know now, if you didn’t previously know, that there’s nothing you can do about getting older, technically. You also learned that your body is affected by senescence and sarcopenia.

On the flip side, you learned that taking action to take care of your body is a definite way to slow the rate at which your body ages, and you saw examples of people who seem to have drastically slowed down their aging and have bodies that function perhaps as well, if not better than, people several decades younger than them.

To train for old age, here are some bullet points for you to summarize:

• Eat well. Consume a diet that is based on non-starchy vegetables, that also includes portions of starchy vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, legumes, and well-sourced animal products (meat, cheese, eggs, etc.).
• Move your body regularly and often. Note that I didn’t say join a gym or a fitness class. Yes, those are great if you enjoy them, but it’s really just important that you get lots of moderate physical activity in, regardless of what it is.
• Use strength training to maintain and increase muscle mass. You can do this with calisthenics (my favorite), weights, or by simply making sure you incorporate physical activity in your life that makes you have to push and pull weight (like cutting grass, for example).
• Stretch! A simple stretching routine will help you maintain your ability to do things you take for granted, such as bending over and standing up. Failing to keep your muscles limber can cause your mobility to greatly decrease with time, and you can develop, for example, a permanent hunched back and/or bent neck. A stretching routine can be a simple 5-minute daily routine.
• Decrease your stress levels. You do this by getting adequate sleep, not being too busy, taking rest days, not holding grudges, and generally taking it easier. Relax! Our society makes us feel like we always have to be ‘on,’ but that’s falsehood. Chill out, have ‘nothing’ days, and take it easier on yourself.
• Be consistent. Whatever you do, give it a chance to work. If you find yourself falling off all of the time, chances are that you’re not really improving your health. Don’t chase shiny objects – new diets and new workout routines.
• Live with purpose. Older people who are living well often have a very clear reason for living, so you should follow suit. Don’t just busy yourself with stuff, and as much as is possible, find ways to live your life in service to others. That’s a sure way to find purpose in your life. Also, living in community with others is a good way to help you find your purpose, too.
• Other things to consider include – drinking enough water, getting sunlight, and nurturing your immune system.

So now you’ve heard of how you can train yourself to age well. I really hope you take this to heart, but I can’t make you take steps to age gracefully. That part is up to you. But know this…to age well, you must be disciplined enough to consistently do what healthy people do. It’s not enough to want it. You must be disciplined to age well!

Does this article convince you to take steps to age well? If so, what is the first step you are going to take?

A healthy diet and a trim body are also very important for optimum immune health. Get your copy of my fat loss workbook which will help you develop eating habits that will result in weight loss and a healthier body.