Do you want to live a long and healthy life? How can we do it? What can we learn from people who have reached 100 years old? Where are these people living to even have the peace and tranquility to achieve a long life? There is a Book called Blue Zones Solution by Dan Buettner Eating and Living Like The World’s Healthiest People  that can answer many of these questions and I bet you will make some extreme changes in your lifestyle to try to reach a long and satisfying life and why not? What we have in the here and now is all we have guaranteed. Why not make a few changes and hope for a better life?

This is a follow up to a book he wrote 5 years ago. If you don’t know, Blue Zones is the term used to describe the areas in the world where   people live well into their 90’s and 100’s. The oldest living humans on earth. They live about a decade longer than most old people. In a Blue Zone area there could be as many as 10 times the amount of old people living in that area. The author visited 5 places.  They are Icaria in Greece, Costa Rica, Sardinia in Italy, Okinawa in Japan and   Lama Linda   in California. The one group that is in our country are Seventh Day Adventists a highly restricted religious group.

They all eat a Biblical diet meaning traditional home grown foods. They take their guidance right out of Genesis Chapter One Verse 29 in the Bible that talks about every plant that bears seeds and every plant that bears fruit can be eaten. Have a mostly vegetarian diet. Eat nuts and beans for protein.  The author took 100 years of dietary research from all 5 of these places and concluded that a person there eats about on average a cup of beans per day. That alone can add 3 to 4 more years to your life.   Are   you doing that now? It makes a mulch for the good bacteria in your system. Move naturally. Walk whenever possible. Do not necessarily go to a gym and set aside time just to exercise. Do every movement in moderation but move your body.

Exercise   as an event has become a public failure in America. In Blue Zones the people move about every 20 minutes. They tend to their gardens at any age and eat their own produce. They live in walkable communities.  They will burn more calories in the course of a week than you would even if you did show up three times a week in a gym. If you live in a walkable community you would probably be 30% more active than if you lived in a suburb somewhere. To relieve stress in Japan they meditate. In Greece they take a nap   and something like that will lower your chance of heart disease by 30%.

Drinkers as a whole live longer than non-drinkers.  So, happy hour is OK or consuming some alcoholic drink during the day is fine. Up to 3 drinks per day is OK. Saving up all your drinks for the weekend during a football game and having 21 beers is NOT OK.

Do NOT eat much meat. On the average the author saw Blue Zone people eating meat only about 5 times per month. So put that hamburger down you have every day for lunch. Who knows what the exact formula is from drinking to beans to meat but we do know they all led very simple lives. So don’t bend down in the smelly gym. Bend down to smell the roses you tended to in your flourishing garden. Almost all of the people were faith based. They did not believe in the same faith but they prayed to something somewhere.  People who believe in a faith strive for a future with their God in a better place and are less risky with their lives here. They want to be on their best behavior and in the best condition for their God. They strive for the future always.

In his 10 years of research he noticed that the people never tried to live a long life. They just did.  It was all organic to their way of life. How are we going to pay for all of us older people? We can expand Social Security by lifting the cap. Any Congressman makes $175,000 per year. They only pay into Social Security up to $118,000. Let’s have them pay their share of the extra $56,000 they earn into Social Security for each member and there would be enough money for all of us in the future.