Super Ager. Elise Marie Collins

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       Introduction

      How you age is based mostly on what you do on a daily basis, and this biological fact remains true all throughout life. No matter how many candles are on your birthday cake, it is always possible to change how you are aging. By conservative estimates, 75 percent of how we age depends on lifestyle, not genetics—and even this genetic component is not set in stone! Changing how you live changes the way your genes express themselves in your body, through an “on/off switch” phenomenon called “epigenetics.” Our genes can act differently, depending on the way we act and behave, the way think and believe, and even the way we view and handle our social and environmental circumstances. Epigenetics is still somewhat of a mystery, but some scientists believe that we will someday be able to influence over 90 percent of what our genes do! This optimism may be premature, but the emerging field of epigenetics promises to give us even greater control over our longevity and health. And since daily behavior already accounts for 75 percent or more of how you age, the opportunities are vast. You can Super Age.

      While it’s true that there is no exact formula on how to live to one hundred, your activities, the food you eat, how much you sleep, how you move, who you see, how you view your life, and more have massive impacts on how you age. To Super Age means to slow down your relationship with time, to grow younger, and to grow older more slowly. The good news is that Super Aging is more accessible than ever before. With the right tools and knowledge, you can Super Age with ease. And because each person is unique, the recipe for Super Aging is as individual as each human. Super Ager will teach you to tune in to your inner knowledge of what works for you. You will start with the simplest baby step, and then make small changes—changes that meet you where you are currently at—in order to Super Age. You will be inspired by Super Agers such as Tao Porchon-Lynch, a 99-year old-yoga teacher who once marched with Gandhi, or Whang-od Oggy, a 101-year-old traditional tattoo artist living in the Philippines, or Virginia McLaurin, a 109-year-old who spins basketballs with the Harlem Globetrotters and has danced with the Obamas. You will uncover doable steps to extend your life and create an even better life for yourself right now.

      These steps are not chemicals or pills, although your chemistry does go along with your behavior. The steps that you take to optimize your life and to use “slow-down time” will also enhance your life. Super Aging may not always cause you to live longer, because life holds no guarantees, but the steps you take will always cause you to live more fully. You will learn to get together more often with friends, eat more plants, take more classes, play more, dance more, see more sunrises, and feel more satisfaction with your life. The best-kept secret is that there are so many ways to slow down the paths to aging, many of which are lots of fun. This book presents simple, easy-to-follow tips and tricks taken from Ayurveda, the world’s oldest holistic healing modality. Each will give you tips and tricks to Super Age. Finally, this book enables you to build your Super Ager plan, a vision of organic growth through a plan of deliberate action and new habits. You will decide what you will do to Super Age. Use this book as your guide to change old habits and lifestyle choices into habits of Super Agers. Start by changing easier things first. As your confidence grows, you can say, “I got this.” Soon you may find yourself taking on more challenging routines to increase your lifespan and your health span. You may even change behaviors that you never dreamed you would reverse. It’s all up to you. In the end you will write your plan for life as a Super Ager, and you will think of your life as a beautiful garden that you will plant, prune, weed, and care for daily. Get ready: the time is now, so get set to Super Age!