Living Longer with Lots of Carbs, No Exercise and Happy Hour

Health Wellness

Have you ever heard of Blue Zones? According to their website:

Dan Buettner, Blue Zones founder, is a National Geographic Fellow and multiple New York Times bestselling author. He has discovered five places in the world – dubbed blue zones – where people live the longest, and are healthiest: Okinawa, Japan; Sardinia, Italy; Nicoya, Costa Rica; Ikaria, Greece, and Loma Linda, California.

The concept of blue zones grew out of the demographic work done by Gianni Pes and Michel Poulain outlined in the Journal of Experimental Gerontology, identifying Sardinia as the region of the world with the highest concentration of male centenarians. Pes and Poulain drew concentric blue circles on the map highlighting these villages of extreme longevity and began to refer to this area inside the circle as the blue zone. Building on that demographic work, Dan pinpointed other longevity hotspots around the world and dubbed them blue zones. Blue Zones® is now a trademark of Blue Zones, LLC, and reflects the lifestyle and the environment of the world’s longest-lived people.

When Buettner analyzed the habits and lifestyles of the people living many years in the blue zones, he found something that basically defies everything that health and medical experts have been telling us. He identified 3 things that these long-lived people share that will shock you:

Exercise – No, these people don’t regularly exercise. Yes, that may be shocking, but he did point out that these people live such active lives that they don’t have time or need to exercise. Living in their communities, they walk most places instead of driving. Many of them work physically at their jobs or careers. Furthermore, they get their heart rates up on a regular basis but not from exercising, but from their routines and chores. Buettner commented:

They don’t have buttons to push for yard work, and housework, and kitchen work. They’re kneading dough by hand for bread or grinding corn.

Carbs – these people who live longer in the blue zones don’t cut back on carbs, but they consume lots of carbs. However, the bulk of the carbs they consume are plant-based carbs that make up 90% to 100% of their diets. Those carbs include grains, beans and tubers such as sweet potatoes. Buettner points out that here in the US, the word carbs has become one of the most forbidden words while these people in the blue zones embrace carbs. You need to realize that the carbs they consume are not the sugary carbs, they are grain based carbs like breads and other grain products.

Happy Hour – by happy hour, Buettner means that these people spend time with good friends. He commented:

Nobody thinks of longevity as adding friends, but really putting the effort into creating that group of four or five people who really nourish you is arguably the most powerful thing you can do to add years to your life.

And yes, the happy hour time spent by those seniors in blue zones do entail some drinking. This goes with some earlier studies I’ve seen in the past that identified areas in Italy and France as having some of the lowest incidence of heart disease in the world. The studies found that the common factors were the consumption of olive oil and wine along with active lifestyles. Yes, these people consumed between ½ cup to 1 cup of olive oil everyday in their high carb diets, along with consuming glasses of wine with at least 2 meals a day and socially (happy hour).

I’m not advising we ignore the advice of our doctors and medical world, but I’m certain we can learn from the experience of those living in blue zones. After all, reality often beats opinions and biased advise.

 

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