Dr. Adam Perlman argues that believing you can live a long, healthy life matters as much as the habits themselves. He breaks down what actually works: diet, exercise, social connection, and purpose. Small daily choices compound into the difference between a long life and a short one.
Hi, I'm Dr. Adam Perlman. You know, there's a saying now that 100 is the new 80, right? That people are interested in living and expecting to live to a hundred years of age. And of course, I think we want to live a long life, but we want to live a life of health. We want to be healthy physically, we want to be healthy mentally, emotionally. We want to be healthy spiritually and have a strong sense of purpose and meaning in our lives. And I think a couple of things are important to remember. One is that to get that life, to have that life, the first step is to believe that your life can be that way, right? You need to believe. And if you can believe that, then you can begin to plan for that healthy life one day at a time. There's no guarantees how long we're going to live. For some people, they've already developed certain conditions. Others are concerned about preventing the development of conditions in the future. But whether you have diabetes or heart disease or are overweight, or you're concerned about developing those conditions, it's never too late. It's not too late to begin to try to reverse some of the conditions that you may be suffering from. And it's certainly never too late to begin to put into place the habits, the lifestyle needed to both prevent or treat many of the chronic diseases that have become epidemics in our society and that keep people not necessarily from living longer, although often that's the case, but living longer, often with those chronic diseases that zap our quality of life, that zap our energy, that zap our ability to connect with people and have the meaning and fulfillment in our lives that we want. So what does that look like? Well, again, it looks like making choices one day at a time. And you can start with little choices. Choices around the foods you may eat, choices around how or when you might exercise or be physically active, choices around how you might choose to connect with others in your life. When you look at some of the research on longevity, and you look at, let's say, the research around the blue zones, these areas in the world where people tend to live the longest, there's some commonalities there. They don't necessarily go to gyms, they don't use a lot of medications. What they do in general is eat a healthy diet. Sometimes there's a little more meat than others, but it's typically vegetable based, fresh vegetables and fruit. They remain physically active throughout their entire lives and they connect on a regular basis with their community and their loved ones. Often mealtime is a time for connection with others. And they also have a sense of purpose in their lives that they maintain throughout their lives. That purpose often revolves not only around their work at that phase of their lives, but their family and family life. So this idea of relationships and social connection is so critical to having the life that we want for ourselves. And. But again, it need not feel overwhelming. Sometimes the things that hold us back from the life that we want can be subtle. Things we never even recognize. I was talking to someone the other day and overall they were feeling pretty good really. They were exercising and they were eating well and felt well mentally. The one issue they were having was a lot of stomach upset and they couldn't quite figure it out. And they had spoken to their physician and, and after talking it through, it turned out one of the habits they had was chewing a lot of gum. Well, guess what? Gum can have sorbitol in it. That sorbitol can affect the stomach. You can just look at the label and see if you're chewing a gum, affect the stomach in a way that it can cause stomach upset. So this little thing, stopping to chew gum, or actually in this case they switched to a gum that had xylitol in it, which is just a different type of additive but a sugar free gum that had xylitol and, and the gi. The stomach problems got better. So it's such a small thing with such a profound impact for them. So again, we don't have to think in terms of what kind of overwhelming life shift do I need to make, but what are some small new or evolved habits I can make that can begin to make sure the trajectory of my life is heading the direction that I want it to head and the quality of my life is what I want it to be today. And also that I'm doing what I need to to assure the quality of my life will be what I want it to be tomorrow.
Intentional Action:Mindfulness, Knowledge, and Action in Pursuit of Your Highest Potential
