What Keeps Us Alive Actually Kills Us: Secrets To Living Past 100 Years

If it’s true that wisdom comes with age (and I’m not sure that’s always true), then it would follow that the older someone is the wiser they should be.

source

For today’s book-of-the-day, I read “The Last of The Doughboys” by Richard Rubin. I've made this book a little side study after reading a few other biographies about people who live past 100 years -- their ideas, their perspectives, their outlook on life.

And it’s been fairly mind-altering.

One story is about a guy who is 106 years old. He says:

“I don't care anything about age. It doesn't give me a thought, I just live, and age is never in my mind. I don't know why people make so much of age... I take things as they are and I don't let problems bother me. I never have problems… Nothing has ever been hard for me, I just live.”

There was another guy in the book who was 105 years old who said something similar.

He said...

“No secret about it, if something bothers you, you better get rid of it if you can.”

What do these two wise old men have in common?

The idea that stress might be what gets most of us in the end.

I read one scientific study that says we all die because of oxidation.

Our cells have to breathe to take in oxygen but like Newton’s Third Law says:

“For every action, there is an opposite, equal reaction.”

So, breathing in oxygen, which is the very thing we need to live, is part of the process that kills us.

But we know you also die a lot younger and faster through bad living.

But stress is the silent killer.

(Not just of our physical health, but also of our hopes and dreams)...

When I moved from Rakai to Mbarara with my parents as a teenager, there was a next door neighbor, Mrs. Margret. I’ll never forget, she was over 100 years old. She still had a farm she worked every day, including milking her own goats.

But she told me...

“Davis, I hate vegetables. I haven’t eaten vegetables in over 50 years."

And she smoked and ate meat by the pound, everything you shouldn't.

credit

But she thrived.

Now, I know the Mrs. Margret's example is bad logic and that causation and correlation are complicated.

I’m not saying that it doesn’t matter what you eat because obviously, it does.

But maybe there’s some overarching, important principle of living a good life that we oftentimes overlook.

Let go of some of the stress.

Forget and let some things go.

credit

No matter the trauma you have been through.

Those two 106-year-old men had lived through World War I. They saw things no human should see.

A man’s face blown off in front of him...

A forest where there were pieces of peoples' bodies hung from the branches.

In one of the battles, ended with ONE MILLION casualties.

Yet those old, wise men were able to say, “If something bothers you, you better get rid of it if you can.”

And...

“I don’t care. I take things as they are and I don’t let problems bother me. I never have problems; nothing has ever been hard for me.”

They just lived. Lived right through it.

Let the stress roll off their back.

I think too often in my life, I forget to just live.

Something else that helps is to remember that problems, even the worst of them, can be flipped around.

You can see them as signs that you are alive and engaged in the world.

image

Problems prove that you are really alive. Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am.”

The fact that had thoughts running through his head proved to him his existence.

So you can say, “I stress, therefore I am.”

Seems accurate to me.

You are alive because of those things that most people perceive to be negative.

Forget about the average person who just wants everything easy. It's more important you find the good life.

They’re not the same.

Stay alive.

Keep moving forward.

Keep things in perspective.

Remember, if these two people could live so long and through the horrors of trench warfare and hand to hand combat, you and I can probably live though the things that are presented to us.

Don’t let stress rob you of living.

In short:

1. To live a good life, sometimes you have to just live.

2. You always keep your endgame in mind so that the thing that is stressful in the short term can be seen in the perspective of getting you what you want in the long term. Or at the minimum can give you a proof of your existence.

3. Make sure you make allies. By keeping connected to your allies, staying social, and not holding onto hurts when you’re in the midst of stress, you’ll be able to:

A). Keep things in their proper perspective

B). Persuade your allies to see your side of the story

C).* Make your enemies your friends*

5. Become persuasive not only towards others, but also towards yourself. Get good and closing/persuading yourself on the fact that in the end, most things work out ok.

Remember: “I never have any problems. I just live.”

Stay Blessed,

@sembozezade