Sometimes you hear something that makes a penny drop.
You see, yesterday I was listening to an podcast about longevity and the point was made that a lot of us will live to well over 100. 120, 130…seriously. This factoid changed my day. I’m still carrying with me the tingle off the bouncing coin.
Three things:
1. Given I have, potentially, 90 years left to go, then WHAT’S THE BLOODY RUSH? Why not back off a little? Take my time. My God! Yes! I don’t have to achieve it all by 40. I’ll need to save some fun for when I’m 80. You can’t begin to understand what a load off my being this is. Or perhaps you can? Most of my pain and discord comes from rushing…and feeling time is slipping past me. There is another way to look at this. Quelle relief, hey!?
2. If the secret to living longer is to be well and to eliminate stress as much as possible (and it is – Dan Buettner’s work on centenarians proves this), then Point 1 applies doubly so…back the fork off!!! Let’s pace ourselves. It’s kind of perfectly ironic, isn’t it. To live longer so we can justify stressing less, we need to stress less.
The clear message: just choose to start stressing less. Be gentle. Choose wellness.
Because, of course, not everyone will live to 130. In fact, the world is likely to be quite starkly divided into those who die young (obesity, heart disease etc) and those who don’t.