What's my age again?
There is a constant that we ALL can't avoid. We will all get older. BAM - there it is! Sorry to say, no amount of ancient Tibetan anti-ageing, chakra cleansing, raw shea milk baths or organic gogi berry, wheat grass or metabolic blast juice shakes will change this fact. But if it feels good, and you feel good, then knock yourselves out. I might join you.
But let's face it some WILL age better than others for lots of different reasons. Some people are genetically blessed to age gracefully with little to no major health problems. Is this strictly due to the genes they were born with? Or are they doing something different to the rest of us, to EXPRESS better function of their genes?
Gene expression refers to a complex series of processes in which the information encoded in a gene is used to produce a functional product such as a protein that's required for optimal cell function (1). Gene expression is constantly being regulated by multiple metabolic, environmental and physiological factors.
I recently a saw BBC One TV show entitled "How to Stay Young". There was an interesting piece on how your general strength and mobility can be a predictor for long term health. Watch it here.
I had a go (and so should you so if you haven't watched it yet). I didn't do too badly, but my hip mobility is clearly a bigger issue than I first thought. If I'm going to age gracefully then I'll need to start working harder. Eating better, sleeping more, drinking less, seeing friends and of course moving better. We can't stop working hard at any of it and we might be able to prevent as many "age related" diseases as we possibly can.
Because I'm an Osteopath, the structure of every part of the human body and if they function well has always been my bag. But even more important is how all those body parts move and function when we walk, sit, swing, sing, poop, and breathe. Let alone when we want to lift a heavy weight over our head or sit for the majority of our life.
Our genes express themselves a lot better if we give them a good grease and oil change everyday. Katy Bowman from Nutritious Movement has pieced together some excellent information about why we need to move to keep our cells healthy and our genes expressing themselves optimally, which hopefully results in our bodies ageing the best they possibly can.
There is a lot of information around optimal human movement and over the next few BLOGs I will try to draw out some of the movements we need to work on getting better at, and because it's my BLOG let's start with my hips.
So What's Your Age Again? Do you plan on being young of mind, body and heart?
We are are all as old as we feel. Lucky we can all feel younger.
1. http://www.news-medical.net/life-sciences/Gene-Expression-An-Overview.aspx