The Fountain of Youth
When I was a student at McGill University, I took a course about insurance. Our teacher worked in the life insurance industry. He had us fill out a lifestyle risk assessment.
I was surprised that my risk was off-the-charts.
Of course it was.
It's adaptive for young men to be clueless.
As I tell my wife...
Men under 30 lack the capacity to access risk
Some of us grow out of it.
Some don't.
To make it easy for the guys, the teacher gave us three things:
Don't speed
Wear a seat belt
Don't smoke
All three became life-long habits.
What's that have to do with aging?
My professor was recommending that we eliminate choices that kill students early. He was speaking to lifespan (don't smoke), and what kills teenage men (speed and seat belts). He knew that telling us to drink less would have been futile.
I have been reading about healthspan (links to Washington Post article).
Healthspan means optimizing my choices for independent living and being able to share experiences with the people I love.
If you're smoking and/or speeding without a seatbelt, then focus on those first.
How do we extend, and protect, our healthspan?
Treat being mortal like heart disease
Via diet, stress and exercise
My recipe
Identify and jettison stress
Move my body in nature
Sleep enough that I often wake up before my alarm
Keep it simple.