Dan Buettner: How to Live to be 100

So, I was surfing around the Web today when I found a very interesting video on the TED.com homepage. “How to Live to be 100“. Basically, we have a speaker that’s explored several ‘blue zones’, and noticed patterns for longevity in healthy human living.

Dan Buettner (born 1960 in St. Paul, Minnesota) is an American explorer, educator, author, public speaker and co-producer of an Emmy Award-winning documentary who also holds three world records for endurance bicycling.^[1][2][3] He is the founder of the online Quest Network, Inc., which provides opportunities for students to interactively engage with explorers on expedition.^[3] In February 2007, an expedition led by Buettner to Nicoya, Costa Rica uncovered the longest-lived people known in the Western Hemisphere

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Buettner

There are a couple of ideas that jumped out at me:

A vegetable-based diet.

One of my best friends is a vegetarian, so I notice the differences in diet — and I can’t imagine myself going through it! Giving up chicken, and beef (I’ve generally given up pork) seems to be a huge step. With that said, if there were progress made in vegetarian substitutes for traditional food, and if this progress were widely available and convenient, then I might consider trying it. “Easy vegetarianism.” For now, this is my train of thought.

A close group of friends.

The Japanese woman that Buettner mentions has a ring of five women that she’s known for 97 years. That’s a long time — with bonds so tight, it’s like an amplified family — when one gets rich, the bounty is shared, and when one gets poor, the poor is helped out. I really like this idea, but I find it hard to imagine, especially in the modern world. Not to say I don’t have close friends, but to the extent where we share our fortunes and misfortunes? Can this even be applied to the developed world?

A reason to wake up.

The most prominent characteristic of these golden-aged people was the reason to wake up in the mornings. I don’t think I have one yet. But I think that it’s important for me to find one, real soon. This is, in many ways, similar to a ‘purpose of life’, which I believe to be very important to a human being.

Check the video out, if you haven’t already. 20 minutes well spent.

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_buettner_how_to_live_to_be_100.html

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