After some study and careful thought, I’ve come to a few conclusions about the best lifestyle to follow as an older person. Here are my recommendations. Perhaps they will be useful to you:
- Give up red meat, poultry, fish and dairy, or at least cut down on them drastically. There are numerous studies linking these products to a plethora of ills that beset older people. If you need more guidance, I recommend the Physicians Committee channel on YouTube, or the NutritionFacts.org channel. I managed to lower my LDL cholesterol dramatically by following a vegan diet. My doctor was so impressed that she started following the same diet.
- Daily exercise for minimum 30 minutes. Walking is ideal, also cycling, swimming etc.
- Maintain mass close to your recommended BMI for your sex, height and age. If losing weight is too hard, get help from GLP-1 drugs if you can afford them, with Mounjaro the most effective. These drugs also have other effects besides weight control, with studies showing benefits for people with cardiovascular, kidney, liver, arthritis, and sleep apnea disorders.
- Stop accumulating stuff, and start getting rid of stuff. I’ve been selling my accumulated possessions for years now, with the aim of ending up with as little as possible, only what I really need. This shows consideration for those who have to sell off or discard your crap when you’ve passed on.
- Buy experiences, not things, in this last part of life.
- The one exception is an electric car: if you have the opportunity, replace your oil burner with an EV. Climate change is very real, and it’s an emergency. EVs have 20 moving parts unlike the 2000 moving parts in an internal combustion engined vehicle. No or minimal servicing, so you save heaps of money. EVs are much more environmentally friendly over the life of the vehicle, especially if you power them with solar panels. EVs are wonderfully quiet, much less tiring to drive, and they accelerate much more quickly than oil burners, so they’re real fun to drive. The US is being very slow to get on board with EVs, but it’s going to keep happening despite the anti-EV propaganda. EV adoption will happen slowly, then all at once.
- Beware the stock market once you are over 55. A major crash, which is now quite likely given the enormous AI bubble, could wipe you out and you won’t have the years of life left to recover. Put your cash into less volatile investments.
- Maintain at least a few close friendships with people your own age. Having people to relate to, people with a similar background and history, is one of life’s great pleasures. In studies on people who live the longest, one of the main factors cited is having a sense of community.
I’ll update this periodically with any other pointers that come to mind.
