Lesson One: Understanding the Mitochondria
To fight against aging, we must first understand how our body works and what exactly spurs aging. As we age, our habits and genetics can lead to four major killers: heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and cancer. Unfortunately, these do lead to death. So how exactly are these four killers produced? Basically, this surfaces due to the accumulated damage to our cells throughout our life. Aging is actually related to the degradation of the mitochondria, the tiny bacteria in our cells that get energy from the food we eat and help us function. As the mitochondria decline, it creates an increase in reactive oxygen species known as free radicals. These then lead to chronic inflammation, which leads to the four killers. Now that we know this, how do we reduce the number of free radicals in our bodies? The author suggests we start increasing the antioxidants we intake. Good sources are berries, dark chocolate, coffee, spices, tea, and herbs. Additionally, one could turn to antioxidant therapy via IV. By doing this, we can create new habits to stop aging from the inside out.
Lesson Two: Transform Your Diet
While consuming more antioxidants will surely help us stop aging, consuming healthier food will help us become superhuman. To do this, the author suggests that we avoid grains like wheat and gluten. This is because wheat produces gastrointestinal distress, which contributes to many autoimmune diseases. Another tip by the author is to avoid a vegan diet in the long run. These can become detrimental to our health.
Switching from animal fats to purely plant fats can affect our thyroid function and cause our metabolism to slow. Instead, we should be careful of the type of meat we intake. Deep-fried meats and industrially raised animals should be avoided. Additionally, we should consume grass-fed animals and more omega-3 fats, which can be found in mackerel, salmon, walnuts, and olive oil. Lastly, the author heavily advises against consuming toxic metals. Did you know metals like arsenic, cadmium, lead, and even mercury could be found in the food we eat? Thallium can be found in vegetables like kale and cabbage. Mercury is also found in ocean fish. Since we can’t fully avoid intaking these types of metals, the author suggests we implement detoxes. We can do this through consuming glutathione, the body’s most powerful antioxidant, taking activated charcoal, which allows our body to get rid of those metals, and sweating out all the heavy metals through high-intensity interval training.
Lesson Three: Produce Ketones
In a nutshell, ketones are naturally produced by our body at the end of our fasting cycle. By extending the daily fast, we can reduce our inflammation levels, triglyceride levels, and cancer risks. This is why people adopt intermittent fasting routines and restrict their eating to around six to eight hours per day. A benefit of this is increasing our brain’s neuroplasticity, which is the brain’s ability to grow and adapt. Plus, intermittent fasting can increase our metabolites, which help boost the antioxidant levels in our body. Although ketones burn glucose more efficiently, too much ketosis can lead to insulin resistance. Hence, it’s vital that we don’t go overboard. We should cycle in and out of ketosis periodically. The author also suggests that we pair this with a high-fat diet and limit low-sugar carbs to just 150 grams per day.
Lesson Four: Get Enough Sleep and Light
We always hear about the consequences of not getting enough sleep. All the advice we get to have enough sleep isn’t for naught. A lack of sleep can directly increase our risk of dying from one of the four killers. Additionally, quality sleep has a lot of benefits. It prevents cognitive decline, promotes skin health, and even controls insulin secretion, which lowers our risk of diabetes. According to the author, anything less than six hours can lead to hormonal imbalance and increase the likelihood of getting Alzheimer’s disease due to an increase in amyloid proteins in our brain. But not everyone has the privilege of sleeping soundly. So how do we get enough sleep? First, we should avoid blue lights. This can come from our smartphones, laptops, and television screens. This is because blue lights suppress our melatonin production, which is the hormone that tells our brain to go to sleep. Additionally, the author highlights the importance of infrared lights. We can get this through red light therapy. Basically, light therapy activates stem cells, which increases the amount of energy our mitochondria produce. It also helps treat muscle fatigue and injuries.
Lesson Five: Improve Hormone Levels
As we age, our body produces fewer pre-hormones, which turn into testosterone, estrogen, and progesterone. Our hormone production can be affected by our diet and aging. Additionally, hormonal imbalance leads to aging, weight gain, sexual dysfunction, and bad sleep. For instance, an estrogen drop can be seen in post-menopausal women. This could lead to cancer, bone loss, and heart disease. The presence of testosterone is also important since this helps burn fat, build muscle, and even maintain libido. Low levels of this hormone can lead to osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s, heart attacks, and even mild cognitive impairment. So how do we maintain our hormone levels? One way is to avail hormone replacement therapy. But since this isn’t really available for everyone, we can avoid low-fat, low-cholesterol diets. Testosterone can also be naturally boosted through eating the right fats and getting the right amount of vitamin D. Avoiding phthalates and parabens, which are harmful chemicals found in some shampoos, conditioners, lotions, and deodorants, should be avoided too. Finally, proper exercise should be done to maintain healthy hormone levels.
Lesson Six: Avail of Stem Cell Treatments
Stem cells have the ability to repair our tissues and maintain our bodies. For instance, whenever we get injured, stem cells help heal the damaged tissues. However, like the mitochondria, our stem cells start to deteriorate and deplete as we age. Thus, our body has a harder time healing itself and maintaining its current state. So if we would like to stop the aging process, then we should have stem cell treatments.
Of course, this treatment isn’t the cheapest; it may cost thousands of dollars. Basically, a stem cell treatment would have professionals harvest stem cells from our bone marrow and subcutaneous fat. These are then re-injected into our bodies to reduce inflammation and begin healing from the inside out. We should also be aware that there are different regulations regarding this treatment in various countries.
Lesson Seven: Let Your Skin and Hair Heal
Wrinkles and bad hair aren’t exactly seen as part of being young. Although not really a bad thing, if we want to look younger, then we should also work on our outward appearance. Suffering from gray hair, balding, and wrinkles are part of the aging process. However, there is a way to prevent these through proper treatment. As we age, collagen production slows down. Collagen is a protein that acts like a building block for our teeth, bones, muscles, skin, and even connective tissues. Therefore, it’s important to understand that collagen works from the inside. So all those creams and expensive skin products won’t be of much help if we keep ignoring the collagen inside our body. By intaking collagen through protein powders, we can help our skin look younger. Cryotherapy can also increase collagen production. Basically, we expose our skin to steep temperature drops to increase the production of antioxidants. For our hair, we can intake more antioxidants like catalase. The more catalase we have, the more melanin our hair has. We can eat more celery, cucumbers, radishes, and broccoli to improve our catalase consumption. Vitamin A and E also help. Additionally, balding can be attributed to stress or blockage of the DHT hormone. The best solution for this is to consult a doctor to check hair loss and balding.
In Conclusion
The secret to stopping the aging process is to understand our mitochondria and make lifestyle changes to help our mitochondria function better. Proper diet, exercise, and different therapies can help us stay younger for a longer time. Our bodies will thank us if we start practicing intermittent fasting, balancing our hormones, implementing healthy eating habits, and getting enough sleep. At the end of the day, the goal isn’t to only look younger but to also feel younger. Our bodies are really amazing, right? What are some changes you’d like to apply to start looking younger? Tell me in the comments section.