Health & Nutrition Health and Nutrition - February 2018.edcoan.ir | Page 81

M
ost of what people call ageing, and most of what we all dread
about getting older, is actually decay. We are struck with real
ageing, but decay is optional. What do we mean? In the absence of
signals to grow, your body, including your brain, decays, and you
‘age’. The keys to over-riding the decay signals? Daily exercise, good
nutrition, emotional commitment and a real engagement with living.
But it starts with exercise. You have to exercise because it’s who
you are, where you came from, hundreds of thousands of years ago.
Humankind grew up, hunting and gathering, which required hours of
walking, with intervals of running and sprinting in between. Exercise,
then, is the single most powerful signal you can send your body that
it’s spring, and time to live and grow. It isn’t complicated, but you
have to do it every day. Aerobic, balance and strength training help
you age healthy...
INING
AEROBIC T bu R lle A t in this life, it’s aerobic
r
ys
If there’s a silve
es a day, four da
le: Do 45 minut
ru
e
exercise. Th
r. How come?
a week, foreve
ur blood
se changes yo
Aerobic exerci
mmatory. This
akes it anti-infla
chemistry – m
your risk of
ic that reduces
is the bit of mag
s by 50%, and
d some cancer
in medicine
heart disease an
40%. Nothing
by
e
as
se
di
’s
Alzheimer
.
t
can touch that
. Hike. It doesn’
Bike. Jog. Swim
?
do
What to
it.
u do – just do
matter what yo
BALANCE TRAINING
Balance, co-ordination and
proprioception (your sense of where
you are in space) are all run by your
brain’s signalling system. The brain
has 100 billion neurons, or signal
senders, each with connections to
10,000 other neurons. And one of
your brain’s big jobs is dictating – in
exquisite detail – how you move.
But there’s a problem: Everything
you don’t use rots! Especially the
signalling system that governs the
body’s fine motor movements.
Which means, of course, that your
balance and coordination go to hell
and you don’t know where you are.
Sounds like the very definition of old
age, doesn’t it.
Aerobic exercise is
the bit of magic that
reduces your risk of
heart disease and
some cancers by
50%, and Alzheimer’s
disease by 40%.
Nothing in medicine
can touch that.