My friends at Healthways introduced me to a book and movement on adding healthy years to our lives. The book, The Blue Zones: Lessons for living longer from the people who've lived the longest, is by Dan Buettner. Dan is the founder of Blue Zones, an organization that helps Americans live longer, healthier lives. The book is an amazing journey with Dan and his team as they learn from Centenarians from areas of the world with concentrations of the longest living people. These areas, called Blue Zones, are found in Sardinia, Italy; Okinawa, Japan; Loma Linda, California; and the Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica.
The book concludes with the nine lessons of the Blue Zones - the world's best practices in health and longevity. The chapter is filled with practical strategies for applying these lessons. Applying just a few of them will certainly improve one's health.
The Blue Zones website contains a tool - the Vitality Compass - that calculates your potential life expectancy, your healthy life expectancy, the number of extra years you could gain if you optimize your lifestyle, and suggestions to help you with that plan.
I'd be interested in your thoughts about the book and website. I found the book an interesting read - one that is hard to put down. It was full of funny and heartwarming stories and of health and longevity information that I put to immediate use. Applying lessons from the Blue Zones definitely would improve the health of our communities - and who know, perhaps we could turn the tide and create a few more Blue Zones in America with future generations.
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