We are what we believe! I just turned sixty-three and if I believed what I read in magazines and the news about getting older, I would stop making plans, start knitting doilies and sadly await the setting sun. All the medical experts tell me that it is all downhill now as my body and mind slowly turn into mush. Then why do I feel so darn good, better than I did in my thirties, with more energy, more drive and ambition than I have ever had in my life. Maybe I am just stubborn: I refuse to believe the propaganda that I am deteriorating and my physical and mental decline are inevitable. More and more research and evidence is showing that these negative assumptions about aging are just plain wrong. As with all else in my life, I tend to believe my own experience, what I observe going on around me and the facts in front of my eyes. They all tell me that there are no hard rules and that aging can be a process of getting better, stronger and healthier.
My friend Ralph Newton-White is eighty-seven and, despite physical limitations, goes to Myanmar every year to support and help families and children living in wretched poverty. He founded a non-profit called “OrphanAsia” which does extraordinary humanitarian work overseas. Growing old has never slowed Ralph down. His golden years are spent making his dent in this world. Many people in their senior years are still going for the gold. In December 2011, “Forerunners” Magazine posted the following entry about an amazing runner who beats the odds and seriously challenges our conventional “wisdom” about what older are able to accomplish:
“Betty Jean “BJ” McHugh challenges today’s concept of aging and the elderly. The 84-year-old North Vancouver running legend, dubbed the fastest senior in the world, has just finished the James Cunningham Seawall 9.5-kilometre road race clocking in at 62 minutes.
But as she runs – with other elite senior runners such as the 100-year-old Fauja Singh, who holds world records for his age category in eight different distances, including the Toronto Marathon, and Vancouver’s 74-year-old Rod Waterlow who ran the Vancouver 2011 Fall Classic half-marathon in one hour and 46 minutes – BJ makes society question seniors’ capabilities. And, opens new horizons. At age 80, she set a new world record at the 29th Royal Victoria Marathon.”
Maybe it is time to start questioning the status quo. Are cognitive and physical decline the inevitable result of an aging brain and body? Or is that another myth perpetuated by people who stand to benefit the most from it? A new study published August 16, 2012 in the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society certainly is enough to make us rethink our beliefs about aging and the brain. It found a small group of eighty –year old “SuperAgers” within the sample who could perform complex mental tasks at the same level as those up to thirty years younger. In fact, MRI scans showed that the cortical parts of their brains involved in higher intellectual functions were actually the same thickness as an average 50 to 65 year old brain.
One study does not prove anything conclusively but it certainly raises serious doubts and questions about our preconceptions regarding aging and raises the very real possibility that people can remain mentally sharp well into their golden years.
In the book, “Biomarkers – The 10 Keys to Prolonging Vitality”, William Evans debunks the assumed link between aging and decline and he takes a positive hopeful perspective with options for change – where we can actually have some control over the aging process and be proactive in controlling whether we deteriorate or not:
The myth of aging = deterioration
‘Advanced age is not a static, irreversible biological condition of unwavering decreptitude.
Rather, it is a dynamic state that, in most people, can be changed for the better, no matter how many years they have lived or neglected their body in the past – yes, you do have a second chance to right the wrongs you have committed against your body.
Your body can be rejuvenated. You can regain vigor, vitality, muscular strength, and aerobic endurance you thought were gone forever. This is possible, whether you are middle aged or pushing 80.
The ‘markers’ of biological aging can be more than altered: in the case of specific physiological functions, they can actually be reversed.’
Chronological age means nothing and does not define the true experience of getting older. A seventy year old can be younger in their thinking than a twenty-something. And it goes both ways: My friends in their twenties are “wiser” than most people I know in my age group. We can be as young or as old as we want.
Aging may be all in our minds. If we assume that we are on a downhill slide into a black hole, we may just speed our passage. But if we believe that anything is possible, that we have some control over our minds and bodies, then options and alternatives start to surface. And if we believe that there are still sunrises to enjoy and personal mountains to climb with new strength and refuelled health – we may just revel in a longer hike into that final sunset.
By Doreen Marion Gee