Move to Live
In the previous article about living diet, I highlighted the dietary habits of Japanese who have the highest life expectancy in the world.
The Japanese city of Okinawa serves as home to people with the longest life expectancy in the world.
It is not uncommon to see seniors in their 80s and 90 roaming the streets.
Centenarian birthday celebration is as common as any other birthday celebration in Okinawa.
In addition to diet, another secret of the longevity of the Japanese is their hyper activity.
Japan as a nation moves more than any other nation. Japanese are legendary for their long work hours.
It’s not uncommon to find a treadmill under the desk of a Japanese office worker. In fact, the absence of one would be quite startling.
Hyper activity is one of the best kept secrets of the Okinawans longevity. Okinawa is the only Japanese city without a train.
The only means of transportation in the city are cars, but most people walk or cycle everywhere.
Being mobile does not necessarily mean running a marathon or sweating for an hour in the gym.
Simply walking around your block for fifteen minutes or doing what Dr. James Levine calls NEAT (non-exercise activities thermogenesis) contain the same health benefits as sweating for an hour in the gym.
In fact, spending an hour at the gym daily and proceeding to sit for eight hours has a similar health effect to not exercising.
In the late 40s and early 60s, research were conducted in the UK to ascertain the impact of sitting on bus drivers. In those days, buses had conductors who collected the fares.
The aim of the research was to investigate the cause of the rise in heart disease. The research found that bus drivers were twice as likely to die from heart disease than their conductor colleagues who climbed up to 750 steps a day.
The research was the clearest evidence of the negative impact of a sedentary lifestyle on health.
So, if the extent of your exercise is walking to your living room to watch TV, you might want to rethink that.
Long sitting, without movement, kills.
You can prevent early death by simply moving around for fifteen minutes each day.
