How to Think Yourself Younger: Mindset and Age

Study #1: You can Think Yourself Younger: Mindset and Age

Ellen Langer did a research study to prove that mindset and age have a direct correlation. In the study, wher team took 16 men between the ages of 76-81. They took them to a retreat area that was recreated to look, sound, and feel like 1959. Everything from cars, to movies, to music, to newspappers. She then split the groups into 2. One group was told to just reminisce and remember things from 1959. The other group was told to act like it was 1959. . . this group talked about current events, sports, and music all as if it were 1959.

What happened? In ONE WEEK the group that acted like it was 1959 got biologically younger! Langer took biochemical measurements in each man and recorded that their eyesight got better, their memory improved, their posture changed, their arthritis was reduced so much that their fingers got longer!

The purpose of this study is to prove that our minds are incredibly more powerful than we can imagine, and what we think about ourselfs, matters.

Getting Older Means Things Start Breaking Down?

The ultimate belief out there is that getting older means you begin to have problems, your body stops working, you lose your memory, and you cannot move as well. If you believe that, then it WILL happen. However, the opposite is completely possible.

Did you know that your memory, strength, and health can get better as you age? If we keep giving our body the building blocks it needs and avoiding what breaks it down- amazing results can happen.

How to Think Yourself Younger

The great news is, the number that we turn each year has very little to do with anything. New studies in neuroscience, psychoneuroimmunology and epigenetics are showing us how our mind controls our brain and our brain controls our body. These areas of science are also showing us that we have control over our genes based on the environment we give them through what we eat, and what we think.

The biggest obstacle for people to overcome to start seeing results is to get rid of false beliefs, and create new ones. As Bruce Lipton explains, “our beliefs control our biology”. So to change our body, we need to change our thoughts about what is actually possible.

More on changing beliefs here.

A few concepts to grasps.

1. Get rid of the belief that getting older means “xyz” is going to happen.
2. Get rid of the belief that you will not be able to lift, walk, climb, move as much as you age.
3. Stop blaming any problems you are having right now on age.
4. Know that any issue you are dealing with can become normal again through diet, exercise, sleep, and a rockstar mindset.

I love this article by Chris Kresser titled “how to not spend the last years of your life in a nursing home”

Here are a few concepts from that article:

1. Eat a healing anti-inflammatory diet
2. Drink 1/2 your body weight in ounces of water per day.
3. Move your body every day- strength train or do a HIIT exercise a few time a week, walk every day.
4. Detox your thought life <—— How to
5. Challenge your brain in different ways by eating with your nondominant hand, taking a new way to work, practicing memory games.
6. Learn something new every day.
7. Do the activities you love and get creative each day: dance, sing, write, paint, read, color.
8. Find your tribe and a community you meet with weekly.
9. Cleanse your body every year. (how to create a cleanse)

As far as your brain AND body go. . . if you do not use it, you lose it. The good news is, if you have ‘lost it’ ie memory, fitness, etc. it is never too late to get it back. Your brain has infinite capacity to change, all the way until death. If you keep using your brain and body, it will keep improving!

Role Playing and Priming

They have also done incredible studies proving how priming ourselves with words effects our behavior.

For example, one study took a group of Asiain American Woman. They told half of the woman stereotypical words around woman not being good at math, and the told the other group stereotypical words about Asians being good at math.

The group that was told that Asians were good at Math scored significantly higher than the group that were told that women are not good at math.

Take Away

What are you telling yourself? Are you telling yourself that you are smart, young, full of energy, and healthy? Or do you find most of your self-talk about how awful you feel, how you are losing your memory, and how your body is not like it used to be.

Be careful, your body is listening.

Similar Articles 

How prayer changes the brain and body 

Mind healing the body 

How thoughts control your body

References 

Chris Kresser: https://chriskresser.com/how-to-prevent-spending-the-last-10-years-of-your-life-in-a-diaper-and-a-wheelchair/

https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/publication/can-we-prevent-aging

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21988153

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1369276/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21175122