Is the Fountain of Youth for You?
Most people long for the good old days when they were young. Presumably this was when they were in high school, or possibly in college. They refer to this a s "the day", when there were proms, new adventures, boy friends and girl friends. This was the time of life that seemed forever "younger than spring."
Who would not want to return to those days or to prolong some approximation of them? This question is merely rhetorical for those who are already fit, but is often ponderously asked by those who are not. They think that staying youthful is philosophically immature. Why? Because it is supposedly counter to the realistic parameters of human life. According to them, we are all supposed to age right on schedule and die at our appointed times. As a result, they do their best to discourage the desires of the allegedly less seasoned (immature) others who are eager take ten, twenty or more years off their lives.
Possibly the reason for their aversion is that they may not have ever known how great it feels to be athletically fit and vibrantly healthy. Unfortunately, there is an overwhelming number like this--ones who have sadly believed from early on that nothing natural can be done to prolong youthfulness. Moreover, they understand all of human life to be solely a process of dying, each year getting us one step closer to our inevitable ends.
Perhaps they are right to some degree. After all, no one is getting younger, from a chronological standpoint. That is, next year we will all be one year older than we are right now.Therefore, so the thinking goes, everyone should expect and accept energy declines, body fat increases and postural difficulties as the decades go on.
For further thought on the life-enhancing benefits of a fitness lifestyle order my book "Think and Grow Fit."
Who would not want to return to those days or to prolong some approximation of them? This question is merely rhetorical for those who are already fit, but is often ponderously asked by those who are not. They think that staying youthful is philosophically immature. Why? Because it is supposedly counter to the realistic parameters of human life. According to them, we are all supposed to age right on schedule and die at our appointed times. As a result, they do their best to discourage the desires of the allegedly less seasoned (immature) others who are eager take ten, twenty or more years off their lives.
Possibly the reason for their aversion is that they may not have ever known how great it feels to be athletically fit and vibrantly healthy. Unfortunately, there is an overwhelming number like this--ones who have sadly believed from early on that nothing natural can be done to prolong youthfulness. Moreover, they understand all of human life to be solely a process of dying, each year getting us one step closer to our inevitable ends.
Perhaps they are right to some degree. After all, no one is getting younger, from a chronological standpoint. That is, next year we will all be one year older than we are right now.Therefore, so the thinking goes, everyone should expect and accept energy declines, body fat increases and postural difficulties as the decades go on.
Those are the things which happen when we do nothing to increase our fitness levels. They happen to most everyone and can be witnessed in the life courses of others. They can also be seen in the standard aging projections on the latest crime shows. (This is when the caricature expert starts with a high school picture and then makes the appropriate adjustments to give the police a realistic likeness for finding a present day criminal.)
However, these sad changes do not have to occur. They can be drastically minimized, if not eliminated, by a fitness lifestyle. That assumes it is started early, and religiously adhered to as the years go on. It can even have dramatic power in those who start very late, possibly in their sixties or even seventies. Older people too can take years off their appearance and add years to their life expectancy. University studies support this, referring to the process as biological de-aging.
This should be good news for everyone, but not everyone is enthusiastic. Why?
One objection is that if everyone stayed youthful, there would soon be too many inhabitants on an already overcrowded planet. It is hard to believe that any happy, healthy person (especially one who is also aware of natural disasters, deadly viruses, car crashes and the like) would ever espouse a position such as this. But people do, out of a supposed concern for the good of all of life. Presumably, they feel that giving up their space on earth to someone younger is the greatest gift that can given to posterity.
Another objection is over the use of new scientific advancements to prolong healthiness beyond a point that is already envisioned by the Creator. In other words, they feel that humanly induced life extension is counter to the length of days ordained by God. One cannot really argue with these folks. That is because no one, not even them, can really know the designs of God ( assuming God exists and cares.) But It is difficult to want to argue with them, even if one could. That is because most of these folks would be the first to accept or even demand help in the an intensive care unit after being in a car crash, exposed to a deadly virus or coming into contact with some other near death experience.
A third objection has to do with the complaint that growing too old only brings about boredom and ill health. That is sadly true if nothing has been done to maintain youthfulness. But this objection fails when one realizes that fitness not only makes us healthy, vibrant, open to new experiences, but also makes us receptive to new challenges and intellectual pursuits. In other words, the urge to learn more and be more positively influential becomes increasingly greater with the passage of years, assuming they are lived under fitness auspices. Experience with a fitness lifestyle, engaged in for at least a decade, will bear this out far more convincingly than any university study.
A third objection has to do with the complaint that growing too old only brings about boredom and ill health. That is sadly true if nothing has been done to maintain youthfulness. But this objection fails when one realizes that fitness not only makes us healthy, vibrant, open to new experiences, but also makes us receptive to new challenges and intellectual pursuits. In other words, the urge to learn more and be more positively influential becomes increasingly greater with the passage of years, assuming they are lived under fitness auspices. Experience with a fitness lifestyle, engaged in for at least a decade, will bear this out far more convincingly than any university study.
A fourth objection is that fitness seems like too weak of a solution to aging. This complaint arises straight out of our drug culture--one in which we impatiently wait for a brand new pill from Merck or Pfizer Labs for our ailments. Surely a longevity capsule will come one day soon, so it is believed, After all, why not? There is plastic surgery right now, along with GH injections. But these are both very expensive. That is why the new pill from the laboratories will be the only realistic cure for most everyone. (Yet, what these critics are really saying is that a fitness lifestyle will have to be so ardently maintained that one will die of exhaustion long before he or she would would be just living normally. Or else they would invest their energy now in fitness as opposed to waiting for what even they know may never come to be.)
As if these four objections are not already too much, there is yet a fifth. That is, one is supposed to be contemplative about the end of his or her life, instead of feverishly trying to turn back the clock This objection is the most dignified, having the most intellectually powerful roots. These go back to Socrates, when all of philosophy centered on a preparation for death. Therefore, that may well make it something even pro-fitness people should take more seriously (while maintaining their fitness lifestyles, of course.) But, is death really the only reality worth contemplating? What about the will to to live with ever increasing abundance long before the expected end of our days? What about the good that can be done by having ten or twenty more productive years?
As if these four objections are not already too much, there is yet a fifth. That is, one is supposed to be contemplative about the end of his or her life, instead of feverishly trying to turn back the clock This objection is the most dignified, having the most intellectually powerful roots. These go back to Socrates, when all of philosophy centered on a preparation for death. Therefore, that may well make it something even pro-fitness people should take more seriously (while maintaining their fitness lifestyles, of course.) But, is death really the only reality worth contemplating? What about the will to to live with ever increasing abundance long before the expected end of our days? What about the good that can be done by having ten or twenty more productive years?
Not everyone is quite this intellectually perplexed about anti-aging. Some may even be a little amused by the aforementioned objections. To those folks, it should be said that fitness will truly will work : it will enable us to turn back the clock and keep it there for a relatively long period of time. And, when it works, it will, not may, increase the quality of life for what will be a much longer period than was previously anticipated.
For further thought on the life-enhancing benefits of a fitness lifestyle order my book "Think and Grow Fit."
Posted by mark clemens at 4/27/2011 11:54 AM 
Categories: antiaging, begining training, diet, fitness, anti-aging.weightloss, exercise. diet, Fountain of Youth, battle of the bulge, baby boomer, anti-aging, Foreverfitness, Better with age, HEALTH
Tags: markclemens foreverfitness jack lalanne janefonda barbarawalters slystallonethink and grow fiit
Categories: antiaging, begining training, diet, fitness, anti-aging.weightloss, exercise. diet, Fountain of Youth, battle of the bulge, baby boomer, anti-aging, Foreverfitness, Better with age, HEALTH
Tags: markclemens foreverfitness jack lalanne janefonda barbarawalters slystallonethink and grow fiit
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