Speaker 1: Although we're not consciously thinking about how old we are
Speaker 1: and how much time we have left, we realize that
Speaker 1: time is finite, and that's not something younger people think about.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the one you feed throughout time. Great thinkers
Speaker 1: have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes
Speaker 1: like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you
Speaker 1: think ring true, and yet for many of us, our
Speaker 1: thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity,
Speaker 1: self pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't
Speaker 1: have instead of what we do. We think things that
Speaker 1: hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not
Speaker 1: just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent,
Speaker 1: and creative effort to make a life worth living. This
Speaker 1: podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in
Speaker 1: the right direction, how they feed their good Wolfe Thanks
Speaker 1: for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Alan Castel,
Speaker 1: a professor in the Department of Psychology at the University
Speaker 1: of California, Los Angeles. His research focuses on how cognition
Speaker 1: changes with age and how people selectively remember important events.
Speaker 1: His work has been supported by the National Institute on
Speaker 1: aging and has been featured in The New York Times
Speaker 1: and Time magazine. Hi Allen, welcome to the show. It's
Speaker 1: great to be here. You have a book called Better
Speaker 1: with Age, The Psychology of Successful Aging, which we are
Speaker 1: going to jump into in a minute. But let's start
Speaker 1: like we always do, with the parable. There is a
Speaker 1: grandmother who's talking with her granddaughter and she says, in life,
Speaker 1: there are two wolves inside of his that are always
Speaker 1: at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things
Speaker 1: like kindness and bravery and love, and the other is
Speaker 1: a bad wolf, which represents things like creed and hatred
Speaker 1: and fear. And the granddaughter stops and thinks about it
Speaker 1: for a second and looks up at her grandmother and
Speaker 1: she says, well, grandmother, which one wins? And the grandmother
Speaker 1: says that the one you feed. So I'd like to
Speaker 1: start off by asking you what that parable means to
Speaker 1: you in your life and in the work that you do.
Speaker 1: It's a great question, And as a cognitive psychologist, I
Speaker 1: think mindset really matters. So when we think about how
Speaker 1: we age or how we live, our focus on life
Speaker 1: is very important. Do we focus on the good things?
Speaker 1: Do we focus on the bad? Things, and I think
Speaker 1: many people think about aging in negative ways, and there's
Speaker 1: certainly challenges as we get older, but in many ways,
Speaker 1: life can be very satisfying as we get older, especially
Speaker 1: when we reflect on our lives, what we've done, our
Speaker 1: family connections. So the book focuses on successful aging because
Speaker 1: we can do this in many different ways, and so
Speaker 1: getting back of the parable, we might need role models
Speaker 1: to show us how good life can be after sixty,
Speaker 1: seventy or eighties. So in this book, I focus on
Speaker 1: the science of successful aging, but also interviewed many interesting
Speaker 1: older adults such as Jack Lane, Bob Newhart, My Angelou,
Speaker 1: and John Wooden, the u c l A basketball coach
Speaker 1: many years ago, and they all had really important insights
Speaker 1: and mindsets about what it means to age well. Yeah.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I think is very interesting
Speaker 1: that you reference a couple of studies in the book
Speaker 1: that find that people who hold a negative belief about
Speaker 1: aging earlier in life actually have poorer memory in old age. Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: And I think that shows that our perspective really does matter,
Speaker 1: and if we think aging is downhill, then we might
Speaker 1: not do healthy behaviors that can allow us to age well,
Speaker 1: so it's not all about our biology or our genes.
Speaker 1: It's about what we do with our time to give us.
Speaker 1: It's We had a guest on not too long ago,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Rout, who wrote a book called The Happiness Curve,
Speaker 1: and it talks about how, you know, we we tend
Speaker 1: to be happier earlier in life, and then we have
Speaker 1: a little bit of a middle aged sort of you know,
Speaker 1: you shape curve, and then we get happier later in life.
Speaker 1: And what I really liked about that was it reverses
Speaker 1: this idea that you know, it's kind of all downhill,
Speaker 1: you know, you get turned fifty or over the hill,
Speaker 1: and it's all bad from there. And I like that
Speaker 1: your book also sort of sheds light on the fact
Speaker 1: that that's not really the case. And then in a
Speaker 1: lot of ways, are older years can really be great years?
Speaker 1: I think it really depends on how you think about happiness.
Speaker 1: Life satisfaction can get better, and older age and older
Speaker 1: adults often report higher levels of day to day happiness
Speaker 1: compared to college age students, but it's likely a different
Speaker 1: kind of happiness and older age. Often older adults will
Speaker 1: focus more on positive things in their lives. Whereas younger
Speaker 1: people may worry more and fret over important life decisions.
Speaker 1: And like you mentioned, it's surprising that it's middle aged,
Speaker 1: which seems to be a low point in terms of happiness,
Speaker 1: which could be for a number of reasons, but I
Speaker 1: think it's nice to know that it can get better. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree. I think that's such a such an important thing,
Speaker 1: and particularly given what you said, which is our negative
Speaker 1: beliefs about aging can actually cause us to age in
Speaker 1: a less useful way. I want to talk about something
Speaker 1: that you call socio emotional selectivity theory, So talk to
Speaker 1: me about what that is and how that applies to aging. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this theory, socio emotional selectivity theory, it's a big term,
Speaker 1: was developed by Laura Carstenson at Stanford University, and her
Speaker 1: focus is that as we age, our goals change. And
Speaker 1: so when we're younger, we're focused on kind of getting
Speaker 1: a job, information acquisition, learning new skills. But as we're
Speaker 1: all there, we turn more to emotionally meaningful goals and
Speaker 1: that can still involve, you know, learning, but it can
Speaker 1: also involve focusing on family, focusing on what's important. So
Speaker 1: it's an interesting theory because it's not related to decline necessarily.
Speaker 1: It's related to how we change over time. And I
Speaker 1: think the mindset is important here because as we age,
Speaker 1: we've turned to different things. As we retire, we might
Speaker 1: focus on different things. It's not that simply as we
Speaker 1: get older we get slower or we can't remember as much,
Speaker 1: right you. You say that in this theory, it says
Speaker 1: that basically, in early adulthood, we're focused on gathering information
Speaker 1: achieving future goals, you know, the sort of classic family
Speaker 1: and career, and that when we get older, we focus
Speaker 1: more on being present and and really realizing more emotionally
Speaker 1: relevant goals. And you say, as a result, older adults
Speaker 1: tend to focus on and later remember positive emotional information
Speaker 1: more so than younger people. And then you go on
Speaker 1: to sort of point out that if an adult an
Speaker 1: older adult are distracted, their attention is divided, they act
Speaker 1: a lot more like younger adults and focus on the negative. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And that's the interesting finding is that it seems like
Speaker 1: it's a perspective or a goal that we have, and
Speaker 1: when we're distracted, we kind of lose that focus. So
Speaker 1: older adults might actually have a very healthy approach to
Speaker 1: how to spend their remaining years. And it's another aspect
Speaker 1: of this theory is that although we're not consciously thinking
Speaker 1: about how old we are and how much time we
Speaker 1: have left, we realize that time is finite, and that's
Speaker 1: not something younger people think about. So we want to
Speaker 1: spend our time doing the things we enjoy, the things
Speaker 1: that are emotionally meaningful, spending time with the people who
Speaker 1: are important to us. And that might mean, you know,
Speaker 1: focusing on things, but also you know, not spending time
Speaker 1: on the things that are negative or put us in
Speaker 1: a bad mood. Even though we're aware of those things
Speaker 1: and they exist in the world, we're better at using
Speaker 1: our time wisely. It's so interesting because there's such a
Speaker 1: stereotype of the grumpy old man, right or the grumpy
Speaker 1: old woman, you know, get off my lawn. But but
Speaker 1: what some of these studies are showing is that's really
Speaker 1: not the case. I mean, obviously, there's huge variation within
Speaker 1: a population, so we're talking about a group. One person
Speaker 1: could be very much that way, but as as a
Speaker 1: general trend, that is certainly not what we think of. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: You know, That's why I wrote this book because there's
Speaker 1: a lot of negative stereotypes about aging, and there's also
Speaker 1: a lot of myths about aging. And it's true there
Speaker 1: are grumpy older people, and there are people you know,
Speaker 1: you you, you might you know have these stereotypes of
Speaker 1: slower drivers or people who eat the early bread special
Speaker 1: of But there are also myths about aging, and these
Speaker 1: stereotypes are not always true. So many older adults, like
Speaker 1: we talked about, report high levels of life satisfaction, feel busy,
Speaker 1: stay active, feel more confident about oneself, and have greater
Speaker 1: self esteem and are less self conscious than than younger adults.
Speaker 1: Older adults might also be better at regulating emotions um
Speaker 1: having a more balanced perspective in life, and are also
Speaker 1: curious to learn for the sake of learning or focusing
Speaker 1: on the things that really interest them. While some habits
Speaker 1: may be more pronounced and predictable, like wanting to go
Speaker 1: to the same restaurants or you know, do the same things,
Speaker 1: often as we age, we're interested in learning new things
Speaker 1: or traveling. So I think lifelong learning is an important
Speaker 1: part of successful aging, and we never stop learning just
Speaker 1: because we aren't in school. Yeah, I agree, I think
Speaker 1: it's important at any age to learn for the love
Speaker 1: of learning, But as we get older and we aren't
Speaker 1: driven by external goals as much. This being able to
Speaker 1: really learn what really interests this is such a gift absolutely,
Speaker 1: and a lot of older adults, you know, as you
Speaker 1: get older, you realize it's important to stay active. But
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean you need to learn Japanese or you know,
Speaker 1: learn how to crochet. You really need to focus on
Speaker 1: what is important to you. And I think the advice
Speaker 1: I was given by many older adults is stay busy.
Speaker 1: But you're not staying busy just for the state's sake
Speaker 1: of staying busy. You're staying active, you're trying new things,
Speaker 1: you're having some variety. Yeah, And I think we're going
Speaker 1: to get to in a minute what helps prevent cognitive
Speaker 1: decline and what doesn't. But I wanted to touch on
Speaker 1: another bit of research that you mentioned the book that
Speaker 1: I thought really interesting, which is that older adults often
Speaker 1: have less regret than younger adults, which seems completely counterintuitive.
Speaker 1: You think you're older, you have a lot more time
Speaker 1: to have build up regrets. Absolutely, and it's a little
Speaker 1: bit surprising, um if you talk to older adults, and
Speaker 1: I think that that's you know, I got interested in
Speaker 1: this by having several sets of grandparents around when I
Speaker 1: was younger and just seeing what their focus was on
Speaker 1: in life. And you know, I learned lots of things
Speaker 1: from them. And they also told me many stories that
Speaker 1: my parents didn't tell me about our family. They had
Speaker 1: access to a lot of things that were important. You know,
Speaker 1: those connections with family can be very important as we
Speaker 1: get older. What do you think it is that is
Speaker 1: driving less regret in older people. I think when we
Speaker 1: look back on our life, we realized, you know, the
Speaker 1: regrets that older adults will have are kind of interesting.
Speaker 1: They'll say, you know, I wish I didn't work so
Speaker 1: much or spend so much time obsessing over decisions or
Speaker 1: details that didn't end up mattering as much as you
Speaker 1: might think. And it's easy to say that in retrospect,
Speaker 1: but we spend a lot of our life worrying about
Speaker 1: things and wondering and trying to plan. And older adults
Speaker 1: will often and I think the reason there's not as
Speaker 1: much regret as they see the big picture a little
Speaker 1: bit better. Sure, they might have wished they bought this
Speaker 1: car instead of that car that was a lemon, but
Speaker 1: in the grand scheme of things that it works out,
Speaker 1: So you know, as long as you have good health
Speaker 1: and you're surrounded by people that you know who love you.
Speaker 1: I think those are the things that older adults will
Speaker 1: say are kind of the important things, and the rest
Speaker 1: are details. And so when you when you think about regret,
Speaker 1: certainly there can be things people might say, well, I
Speaker 1: wish I might have done this differently, or could give advice,
Speaker 1: But in the big picture, which older adults will often
Speaker 1: take when you ask that sort of question, they won't
Speaker 1: report as much regret as you might think. What do
Speaker 1: we know about cognitive decline, Well, it's the first concerned
Speaker 1: people have when you talk about aging, or when you
Speaker 1: notice gray hairs, or is forgetfulness really and people are
Speaker 1: very concerned. Um. And the truth is that's just kind
Speaker 1: of a natural product of getting older. Is that, especially
Speaker 1: for names, people have trouble remembering names. And there's a
Speaker 1: variety of theories, but one is that it's kind of
Speaker 1: an information overload, and as you age, you just have
Speaker 1: more information in the brain, so it's harder to access things,
Speaker 1: it takes a little bit longer. Um. And also things
Speaker 1: aren't as distinct. So if you meet someone named David,
Speaker 1: you've met you know hundreds of David's compared to you know,
Speaker 1: someone who's twenty who's met you know a handful of David's.
Speaker 1: So I think our memory becomes more selective as we
Speaker 1: get older, and we're capable of focusing on the things
Speaker 1: that are most important. And that's kind of a focus
Speaker 1: of my research is to examine how as we get
Speaker 1: older we're better at focusing on what's important. And sometimes
Speaker 1: that will be names. But sometimes you realize, well, if
Speaker 1: I can't remember that person's name, as long as I
Speaker 1: remember I met them at the bank, or I had
Speaker 1: a good conversation with them, they liked, you know, playing cards,
Speaker 1: these sorts of things, those things are more relevant. So
Speaker 1: having that focus can actually be useful and can compensate
Speaker 1: for not remembering as much. But in terms of the
Speaker 1: best ways to stay sharp, I think older all too
Speaker 1: often say staying active, trying new things. But the research
Speaker 1: really supports walking or getting physical exercise, and sometimes people
Speaker 1: are surprised by that. But the hippocampus, the part of
Speaker 1: the brain that is really involved in memory, tends to
Speaker 1: decline in volume by about one percent every year after
Speaker 1: the age of fifty. But research has shown that if
Speaker 1: you randomly assign people to walk for forty minutes three
Speaker 1: times a week or stretch for the same amount of time,
Speaker 1: and follow up with these people six months and a
Speaker 1: year later, the walking group has better memory, performs better
Speaker 1: on a variety of memory tests. And also when they
Speaker 1: did some brain imaging, they found that the hippocampus actually
Speaker 1: increased in volume by two percent after one year. So literally,
Speaker 1: your brain is growing and you're performing better on these
Speaker 1: memory tests. For the group that walked compared to the
Speaker 1: group that stretched. Is still doing some exercise, but it's
Speaker 1: that cardiovascular component. It's getting blood flow to the brain
Speaker 1: because the brain really needs oxygen, it needs to clean
Speaker 1: out things, and that can improve memory. And so when
Speaker 1: I tell people, you know, that's the best thing to do,
Speaker 1: people are sometimes surprised because they think, well, you know,
Speaker 1: it's you know, that's for the body, but how you know,
Speaker 1: my mind, my brain, all these they're intimately connected. And
Speaker 1: I think people are also surprised because people are waiting
Speaker 1: for the next drug or pill or kind of quick fix.
Speaker 1: And physical exercise can be great for your entire body,
Speaker 1: for your brain. UM, great to do with someone else.
Speaker 1: Maybe you can walk with someone, um, it's really good
Speaker 1: for balance as well. Falls are often things that can
Speaker 1: hospitalize people after the age of fifty, and so balance
Speaker 1: training is also incredibly important to keep your brain sharp
Speaker 1: and to keep you on your feet. Um, you don't
Speaker 1: need to go to a yoga class to do balance training.
Speaker 1: I actually practice it every morning when I'm brushing my teeth.
Speaker 1: I stand on one leg for one minute and then
Speaker 1: switched and the other leg for one minute. And I
Speaker 1: probably shouldn't multitask, but it's a routine and I've started,
Speaker 1: and I noticed that my balance has improved. And most
Speaker 1: people don't notice poor balance until they've they've suffered a
Speaker 1: bad fall. So I think, you know, physical exercise and
Speaker 1: balance training are probably the two things that can really
Speaker 1: keep you your brain sharp and keep you on your feet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm in the middle of dealing with my mother fell.
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's been a week and a half
Speaker 1: ago or so, maybe two weeks. She's been in you know,
Speaker 1: she's in the hospital now, she's in a in a
Speaker 1: longer term rehab. So I'm familiar with the the dangers
Speaker 1: of falling and people who are older, and it's really
Speaker 1: concerning because you see it in other people, but you
Speaker 1: don't think of yourself as prone to falling because you
Speaker 1: haven't experienced to fall yet. But testing your balance can
Speaker 1: be really illuminating because you know, I thought, of course
Speaker 1: I had good balance, but it's very hard to balance.
Speaker 1: And then the falls typically will happen when you're getting
Speaker 1: out of bed at night because you're going in the
Speaker 1: bathroom and it's dark and you trip over a carpet
Speaker 1: or a pet um and so you know, those are
Speaker 1: really challenging things. Um and if you fall, like you said,
Speaker 1: you know, you fracture something, you're in the hospital. You're
Speaker 1: now you're not walking, so your memory might start to decline,
Speaker 1: and it's it's this kind of pathway that can really
Speaker 1: lead to a loss of independent dents and declines that
Speaker 1: are really quite serious. Exercise is one of those things
Speaker 1: that just seems to come up over and over and
Speaker 1: over as being so helpful. Obviously physically, we all know that,
Speaker 1: and then you know, I'm very aware of all the
Speaker 1: studies that talk about how useful exercises for our emotional
Speaker 1: health dealing with things like depression and anxiety. I wish
Speaker 1: there was a different answer, but boy, is it a
Speaker 1: good answer. Yeah, I think, you know, you don't want
Speaker 1: to think that modern medicine is going to create a pill.
Speaker 1: But walking is both good for your brain and your body.
Speaker 1: And so despite the belief that crossword puzzles or eating
Speaker 1: blueberries can help your brain stay healthy, exercise I think
Speaker 1: has the biggest effect and it's free. So um. I
Speaker 1: think that's why it's interesting to be a psychologist because
Speaker 1: then the question is how do you motivate people to exercise?
Speaker 1: And it doesn't have to be you know, strenuous exercises.
Speaker 1: You know, walking can be something you incorporate into your
Speaker 1: daily routines, like walking to the grocery store, or walking
Speaker 1: to the library, or you know, walking to the park
Speaker 1: even though you could drive there. Um. So those are
Speaker 1: things that you know, if we're if we're more aware
Speaker 1: of how we can set up a lifestyle that allows
Speaker 1: us to to walk, we might see brain benefits, right.
Speaker 1: I am also very interested in how you motivate people
Speaker 1: to to do something and how to get people to
Speaker 1: stick with things. I do behavioral coaching work with people,
Speaker 1: so that's something you know, I'm kind of always focused
Speaker 1: on how do we get people to create positive habits
Speaker 1: and to and to stick with them. Yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: it's always a challenge, but I think being around people
Speaker 1: who have similar habits, um who can motivate us, can
Speaker 1: be a good way to ensure that we're doing things
Speaker 1: that are positive. You know. Social connections, meeting friends professional
Speaker 1: colleagues can lead to cognitive stimulation that can be very important.
Speaker 1: Many people say they feel retirement allows them time to
Speaker 1: do what they really want to do without the stress
Speaker 1: of a packed schedule or things that they don't really do.
Speaker 1: But it's also a time where you need to build
Speaker 1: in these habits, otherwise you could end up, you know,
Speaker 1: laying on the couch or you know, drinking more alcohol.
Speaker 1: So I think those are the you know, those are
Speaker 1: the motivational challenges that present themselves as we get older.
Speaker 1: I think retirement is another version of a phenomenon that
Speaker 1: I see in people I work with a lot, which
Speaker 1: is that if you all of a sudden have all
Speaker 1: the time in the world, it can be really hard
Speaker 1: sometimes to do anything. Is it just that that complete
Speaker 1: lack of structure it can be so difficult to deal with. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think many people don't realize that when they
Speaker 1: retire or move, they leave behind a large social network,
Speaker 1: and even just occasional small talk at our workplace can
Speaker 1: be an important part of being socially connected. And there's
Speaker 1: certainly some stigma associated with saying you're lonely, so people
Speaker 1: might not talk about it, and it really makes it
Speaker 1: a silent issue. So having family, friends, even pets can help.
Speaker 1: But often people need to have regular social interactions that
Speaker 1: make them feel valued or understood. So sometimes just being
Speaker 1: a regular at a coffee shop, at a library, a
Speaker 1: volunteer group, or an exercise class can be a great
Speaker 1: way to stay connected and connected, not just to Facebook,
Speaker 1: you know, not just to the Internet, because we know,
Speaker 1: face to face contact, getting outside, um, you know, getting
Speaker 1: some exercise, walking, those are things that are really importan
Speaker 1: and especially as we get older. Yeah, yeah, social connection
Speaker 1: is so critical. And I I left um the full
Speaker 1: time job to do what I'm doing now full time.
Speaker 1: I don't know, it's been about nine months ago, and um,
Speaker 1: I've got a reasonable social life and I work with
Speaker 1: a lot of people, uh through my my coaching work.
Speaker 1: But I've been a little bit struck by how much
Speaker 1: I missed the sort of social aspect of going into
Speaker 1: an office every day. It just provides this sort of
Speaker 1: people kind of all around all the time, which there
Speaker 1: are times it's like, oh, I could use a little space,
Speaker 1: But I have noticed that's something I've had to actively
Speaker 1: work to overcome missing that and to find other ways
Speaker 1: to fill that. Yeah, I think the key when I've
Speaker 1: talked to many middle aged older adults is finding balance. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: you can't retire and just be at home all the time,
Speaker 1: and so a lot of older adults will go back
Speaker 1: to working part time or volunteering or doing something that
Speaker 1: gives them that sort of structure, but it also gives
Speaker 1: them some flexibility as well, and having more time to
Speaker 1: do what you really want and less of the things
Speaker 1: that you don't like when you're in an office or
Speaker 1: you know, filling out paperwork and forms. So I think
Speaker 1: achieving balance is probably the most important thing, and I
Speaker 1: think that's why in middle age people struggle. Because you
Speaker 1: have a family, Let's say you have a job, you
Speaker 1: have a lot going on, and you you're focused on
Speaker 1: these things. You don't have as much time for yourself,
Speaker 1: and so you're not doing the things that you might
Speaker 1: enjoy as much because you know time, there's never enough time.
Speaker 1: And then if and when you finally retire, you think, well,
Speaker 1: now I can travel and do all these things I
Speaker 1: wanted to do, But you need that structure. So I
Speaker 1: think it's very important to set specific goals when you
Speaker 1: retire of this is what I'm going to do. I'm
Speaker 1: going to travel to Italy with my friend next year.
Speaker 1: And those things are important to have, especially as we
Speaker 1: as we enter a retirement. Yeah, you talk about that
Speaker 1: in the book or amount about really thinking, you know,
Speaker 1: getting more specific about retirement. Now a lot of us
Speaker 1: get specific about how much money will need to retire,
Speaker 1: but but that you also recommend, like like you just said,
Speaker 1: sort of planning all right, what am I really going
Speaker 1: to do? And I think what are you going to do?
Speaker 1: And when are you going to do it? And realize
Speaker 1: you're not going to be traveling all the time, and
Speaker 1: you know, you maybe you're gonna help with grandchildren, but
Speaker 1: maybe you don't want to be around your grandchildren or
Speaker 1: children all the time, and maybe they don't want that either.
Speaker 1: So you need to kind of navigate these things even
Speaker 1: before you retire or make decisions. Some of them have
Speaker 1: financial implications, but again I think balance is really important
Speaker 1: to you know, one study I've found very interesting shows
Speaker 1: that people who spend about five hours a week with
Speaker 1: their grandchildren have better memory than people who are not
Speaker 1: spending time with their grandchildren. But it it's it's important
Speaker 1: to also show that people who spend more than ten
Speaker 1: or fifteen or a week with their grandchildren show worse memory.
Speaker 1: So there is a sweet spot, right, And you know,
Speaker 1: you want a little bit of things in your life,
Speaker 1: but maybe too much of anything can can be you know,
Speaker 1: too much family, too much travel. Things that we typically
Speaker 1: think are things that we really enjoy in large quantities,
Speaker 1: maybe that's not the way you know they're they're meant
Speaker 1: to be. Yeah, I'm a I'm a big fan of
Speaker 1: the Buddhist teaching of the middle way, right, which speaks
Speaker 1: to this, Like, I just think too much of anything
Speaker 1: becomes a problem, or too little of certain things is
Speaker 1: a problem. There's there's a right amount, and I think
Speaker 1: that's part of our goal is to find out what
Speaker 1: that right amount is. How much time do we want,
Speaker 1: how much money, how much You know, we have friends
Speaker 1: and family, but it doesn't mean we want to be
Speaker 1: near them or with them all the time. And so
Speaker 1: that was one theme from a lot of the people
Speaker 1: I interviewed was finding balance. But a lot of people
Speaker 1: couldn't retire. You know, they were very well known in
Speaker 1: their yield. It's kind of what kept them going. So
Speaker 1: it's hard to walk away from a job or a
Speaker 1: career where you feel very valued to then saying well,
Speaker 1: and now I'm just going to travel or play golf
Speaker 1: or spend time with the grandkids. People usually realize quite
Speaker 1: quickly that, um, you know, they're going to have to
Speaker 1: find a balance or a schedule that they can work
Speaker 1: well with, and sometimes that does involve taking part time job,
Speaker 1: even if you call it a job. Some people drive
Speaker 1: for uber or you know, start a podcast or tinker
Speaker 1: on a website, do the things they want to do,
Speaker 1: realizing that you know, they're making some sort of impact,
Speaker 1: but it's not a nine to five job. Yep. And
Speaker 1: you reference the famous U c. L A basketball coach
Speaker 1: John Wooden who said that the two most important things
Speaker 1: in life were love and balance. Yeah, he was an
Speaker 1: exceptional person both for his career, but he also did
Speaker 1: retire um at six five and then lived till the
Speaker 1: age of ninety nine, so he had a long period
Speaker 1: of time. Sadly, his wife passed away much earlier, where
Speaker 1: he you know, was giving back to the community, but
Speaker 1: also wanted to stay connected. He had a large social network,
Speaker 1: people stopping by his house, you know, he'd go out
Speaker 1: to his regular restaurant for breakfast. And when I asked
Speaker 1: him kind of what are the keys to successful aging,
Speaker 1: he really said the two most important things in life
Speaker 1: were love and balance. Find who and what you love
Speaker 1: and have balance in your life, both mentally and physically.
Speaker 1: And he did suffer a fall in his late eighties
Speaker 1: where he, you know, broke his hip and his collar
Speaker 1: bone and he lay on the floor for six or
Speaker 1: seven hours until help came, and he was lucky that
Speaker 1: he survived that fall. But I think, you know, those
Speaker 1: those words balance and love are are really some keys
Speaker 1: to lead a happy and healthy life and hopefully a
Speaker 1: long life. And again he lived till age. Yeah, let's
Speaker 1: talk about Alzheimer's for a second. I'm in the middle
Speaker 1: of dealing with that with one of the older adults
Speaker 1: in my life, and we're living caregivers half the time.
Speaker 1: So it's something I'm very interested in. And it's interesting
Speaker 1: that twice in the last week I heard this statistic
Speaker 1: that Alzheimer's diagnosis is are actually going down a little
Speaker 1: bit in our culture, which struck me as strange because
Speaker 1: you know, when obviously, once you see it in your life,
Speaker 1: it seems like it's everywhere. But so they're actually going down. Well,
Speaker 1: the number of people who have Alzheimer's disease is projected
Speaker 1: to rise, but that's simply because people are living longer,
Speaker 1: and then you know, those are the demographics as well.
Speaker 1: But as you say, some studies suggest there's actually a
Speaker 1: decline in the proportion of people who are getting the
Speaker 1: disease now compared to a few decades ago. And this
Speaker 1: decline could be because people now have higher levels of
Speaker 1: education and do things in their lives that can help
Speaker 1: prevent or delay that the disease, such as walking, eating
Speaker 1: a more balanced diet, and being socially connected. So, since
Speaker 1: there is no cure for Alzheimer's disease, what we do
Speaker 1: earlier in our lives and the habits that we develop
Speaker 1: can potentially protect us from dimensia and older age. And
Speaker 1: so I think that's kind of interesting because and some
Speaker 1: of these habits can be things like there's some research
Speaker 1: showing that reading, especially reading fiction, can be kind of
Speaker 1: good brain training, and that people who read, you know, fiction,
Speaker 1: we're more likely than not only live longer, but are
Speaker 1: less likely to develop dementia. So you know, some sort
Speaker 1: of cognitive stimulation is important. Being socially connected, walking, eating
Speaker 1: a balanced diet, those are the things that can prevent
Speaker 1: Alzheimer's disease, because there really is no cure right now,
Speaker 1: so prevention is the key, right And I saw an
Speaker 1: article earlier this week that I thought was very interesting,
Speaker 1: particularly you were talking about walking and why walking is
Speaker 1: so helpful because vascularly it helps. There are more and
Speaker 1: more scientists who start are starting to believe, or at
Speaker 1: least a school of scientists who believe, that Alzheimer's is
Speaker 1: very much a vascular disease. And so you know, walking
Speaker 1: would line ups is a good prevention tool, absolutely, and
Speaker 1: I think anything that you know, and a lot of
Speaker 1: the older adults I talked to you just basically said
Speaker 1: the key to staying active is just to keep moving.
Speaker 1: And whether it's walking, whether it's you know, taking breaks,
Speaker 1: standing and not sitting all the time, just move, uh,
Speaker 1: and that will give you good balance. And you know,
Speaker 1: the vascular component is incredibly important because the brain is
Speaker 1: kind of a big oxygen hog. It's constantly demanding your
Speaker 1: your you know, new blood and fresh blood, cleaning things out.
Speaker 1: So if you're not moving, then you're not going to
Speaker 1: sleep well. Um, and these things are very connected. Yep,
Speaker 1: they certainly are. Well. Alan, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: taking the time to come on the show. We're kind
Speaker 1: of at the end of our time here, but I've
Speaker 1: found this conversation to be really helpful and useful, and
Speaker 1: I hope the listeners have to It was great talking
Speaker 1: with you. Thank you so much. Bye. If what you
Speaker 1: just heard was helpful to you, please consider making a
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