Day 1 Live Better, Longer
12 Days of Wellness: Live Better, Longer:
Precision Wellness by TACKL Health kicks off our 12 Days of Wellness Holiday Giveaway campaign with an introduction to Blue Zones. A Blue Zone is an area on Earth where residents enjoy an extraordinarily long, healthy lifespan. Residents of these unique locales often live to be over 100 years of age.
On the 12th Day of Wellness, we are giving away a 7 day vacation to one of the Blue Zones. Keep reading to find out which one and how to enter the contest.
The Blue Zones were first identified by Dan Buettner is a National Geographic Fellow and New York Times best selling author. His New York Times Sunday Magazine article, “The Island Where People Forget to Die” was the second most popular article of 2012. He founded Blue Zones to put the world’s best practices in longevity and well-being to work in people’s lives.
Since 2012, he has authored several more books, such as the Blue Zones Kitchens and the Blue Zone Challenge, in which he offers the challenge of a lifetime: Build a foundation for better nutrition, more exercise, and a stronger social life that will extend your lifetime by years.
Precision Wellness is here to help you do the same.
If you don’t live in one of the five Blue Zones: Okinawa, Japan; Sardinia, Italy; Nicoya, Costa Rica; Ikaria, Greece, and Loma Linda, California, there is still hope.
In studying the various factors shared by Blue Zones, the team of medical researchers, anthropologists, demographers, and epidemiologists found 9 common denominators.
Blue Zones Power 9: Lifestyle Habits of the World’s Healthiest, Longest-Lived People
1. Move Naturally
The world’s longest-lived people don’t pump iron, run marathons, join yoga studios. Instead, they live in environments that constantly nudge them into moving without thinking about it. They grow gardens and don’t have mechanical conveniences for house and yard work.
2. Purpose
The Okinawans call it “Ikigai” and the Nicoyans call it “plan de vida;” for both it translates to “why I wake up in the morning.” Knowing your sense of purpose is worth up to seven years of extra life expectancy.
3. Downshift
Even people in the Blue Zones experience stress. Stress leads to chronic inflammation, associated with every major age-related disease. What the world’s longest-lived people have that we don’t are routines to shed that stress. Okinawans take a few moments each day to remember their ancestors, Adventists pray, Ikarians take a nap and Sardinians do happy hour.
4. 80% Rule
“Hara hachi bu” – the Okinawan, 2500-year old Confucian mantra said before meals reminds them to stop eating when their stomachs are 80 percent full. The 20% gap between not being hungry and feeling full could be the difference between losing weight or gaining it. People in the blue zones eat their smallest meal in the late afternoon or early evening and then they don’t eat any more the rest of the day.
5. Plant Slant
Beans, including fava, black, soy and lentils, are the cornerstone of most centenarian diets. Meat—mostly pork—is eaten on average only five times per month. Serving sizes are 3-4 oz., about the size of a deck of cards.
6. Wine @ 5
People in all blue zones (except Adventists) drink alcohol moderately and regularly. Moderate drinkers outlive non-drinkers. The trick is to drink 1-2 glasses per day (preferably Sardinian Cannonau wine), with friends and/or with food. And no, you can’t save up all week and have 14 drinks on Saturday.
7. Belong and Believe
All but five of the 263 centenarians we interviewed belonged to some faith-based community. Denomination doesn’t seem to matter. Research shows that attending faith-based services four times per month will add 4-14 years of life expectancy.
8. Loved Ones First
Successful centenarians in the blue zones put their families first. This means keeping aging parents and grandparents nearby or in the home (It lowers disease and mortality rates of children in the home too.). They commit to a life partner (which can add up to 3 years of life expectancy) and invest in their children with time and love (They’ll be more likely to care for you when the time comes).
9. Right Tribe
The world’s longest lived people chose–or were born into–social circles that supported healthy behaviors, Okinawans created ”moais”–groups of five friends that committed to each other for life. Research from the Framingham Studies shows that smoking, obesity, happiness, and even loneliness are contagious. So the social networks of long-lived people have favorably shaped their health behaviors.
Studies are showing, most of us have the capacity to make it well into our early 90’s and largely without chronic disease. The average person’s life expectancy could increase by 10-12 years by adopting a Blue Zones lifestyle. We are here to support you toward that goal and to feel and look great along the way.
Prizes for the 12 Days of Wellness: Check our Socials (Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn) daily for the products and services in the daily giveaways. Register on our website at www.PrecisionByTACKL.com Grand Prize drawing takes place on Dec. 26, 2022: 7 Day Vacation for two in 1 of the 5 Blue Zones - Nosara, Costa Rica!
Details included on entry form.