How to keep yourself young and healthy

The aging process is for the greater part no mystery anymore. It consists for a great part of daily damages done on the macroscopic, tissue, cellular and genetic levels. These add up as the years are passing. These damages have specific causes like oxidating agents, sun beams, mechanical wear and tear, psychological stress, lack of some nutritional components and too much of others, like fat.

Another component of aging is the reduction of the telomere chains at the chromosome ends, as each cell division occurs. When these are shortened enough, cells stop dividing. However, the body has means to repair these ends again, with an enzyme called telomerase. The rapidity of the aging process depends on lack of efficiency in this repair process. The above mention aging causes also slow down this repair process.

The factors causing aging, also causes other diseases like cancer and coronary heart disease. Both aging and these diseases can in great extend be prevented with the knowledge possessed today, and the damages can in great extend be reversed. The components to achieve this are:

-Adequate daily food containing whole cereals, peas, beans, vegetables, fruit, fish, mushrooms, fouls and seafood, and with just a moderate amount of red meat.

-Just a moderate amount of fat.

-Ideally most fat one eats, should be of the type mono-unsaturated. One also needs some poly-unsaturated fat of the types omega-3, and omega 6, but not too much of omega-6. The consumption of saturated fat should be very little.

- In order to achieve right fat balance, most of the fat supply should come from sources like olive, peanuts, canola, fish, nuts, sun- flower, etc. Then you will get a good balance between mono- unsaturated fat (olive, canola, peanuts), poly-unsaturated fat of the omaga-3-type (fish) and poly-unsaturated fat of the omega-6-type (sunflower).

-Just a very moderate amount of butter, soy oil, margarine, corn oil and palm oil. A high consumption of these fat sources gives you too much saturated fat and poly-unsaturated omega-6-fat.

-Just a very moderate amount of sugar, refined flour or refined cereals.

-Do not add more salt to the food than you need. Most people consume too much salt. However, some salt is needed. If the weather is warm and you are in high activity, you need more salt than by cold weather and low activity. Prefer sea-salt, because of its content of valuable minerals.

-Just a moderate consumption of tranquilizers/stimulants as alcohol and caffeine, but in moderate amounts these contribute to slow down the aging process.

-No smoking or tobacco usage.

-Supplements of specific nutritional components like vitamins, minerals, lecithin and some essential fatty acids.

-Adequate training that both gives a muscular load, work up your condition and stretches out your body. To stretch out, yoga-exercises are ideal.

-Adequate rest and stress-reduction. Daily meditation is a method of achieving this. Natural relaxing agents or specific tools for meditation or relaxation may also be useful.

-Supplements of specific anti-aging agents like anti-oxidants or human growth hormone.

-Use of specific anti-aging agents to apply upon the skin surface.

-To protect the skin against excessive sun exposure.

The amount one needs of nutritional supplements, like vitamins and minerals, differs very much according to a person’s health condition, work load and exposure to environmental stress. A person having a poor digestion, doing high performance sport or being exposed to a high amount of environmental stressors, may need more than a person in an average situation.