May issue
Hello! My name is Chris, and I am delighted to be invited to contribute to this Newsletter. I am aged 89, retired from paid work, but busy with a number of voluntary activities, and determined to live for at least another decade. I live with my wife in Oxford, and (like you, I hope) seek to learn the secrets of enjoying a ‘healthy longevity’. So far, I have established the importance of SMELD, a formula which reminds me to avoid Stress, maintain a positive Mind-set, do my daily Exercises, foster Loving relationships with family and friends, and eat a vegan Diet with the minimum of shop- bought processed foods. This is working well for me, and I recommend it to others.
Today, I want to focus on goals. We all need them, to give purpose and meaning to our lives – and they are especially important in the Third Age of longevity. For example, I aim to live to at least the age of 100 (to get a birthday card from the King!), but we also need ‘the goal beyond the goal’: in my case the objective of living to the age of 111 (a special number, called ‘Nelson’ – guess why!) which is currently the age of the oldest man alive today! What are your goals in the next decade of your life? And now start thinking of the ‘goal beyond the goal’…
Another thing: I am sure we should all try to start and end the day well. I begin each day with what I call my ‘sauna-shower’, half a minute in the hottest shower I can take, followed immediately with half a minute of fully cold water, which is both invigorating and enlivening. Try it! And, as I turn the light off to lie down to sleep at night, I do my ‘gratitude exercise’: imagine an alphabetic list of things I am grateful for (e.g. air, babies, clouds, daylight, education…) before I fall asleep, smiling.
And finally (for this month) let me suggest you might study the Circadian Rhythm of our lives, the alternation of night and day, light and dark, which has gradually conditioned us through millions of years of evolution. We are creatures who thrive when we follow the simple rules of eating in the light and sleeping in the dark. So, don’t eat after sundown, or take long naps in the daytime. More on this, next time. Good wishes for May!
