Don Ardell’s tips for aging well are from his book Aging Beyond Belief, 69 tips for REAL Wellness. REAL wellness stands for Reason, Exuberance And Liberty. Don says you can’t buy pills or treatments for REAL wellness−it’s a mindset and lifestyle you control. It’s never to early to let Reason, Exuberance and Liberty be your guide…these tips are for folks of any age. Enjoy.

TIP 5
Nutrition – the Heart of the Matter
Adopt two simple nutritional goals and work to realize both

This tip is supported by research done at the Agriculture and Health and Human Services Departments. The two nutritional goals are: 1) Eat fruits and vegetables on at least three separate occasions spaced throughout the day; and 2) Consume at least two cups of fruit and three cups of vegetables daily.

Another study published in the journal Neurology (10/24/2006), based on a six-year research project involving 4000 seniors, hinted strongly that it’s never too late to gain a mental edge in this fashion. Two daily servings of vegetables—that’s all it takes. What a deal.

Veggies are much cheaper than drugs and doctor visits. Besides, nobody ever got smarter medicating or seeing doctors. The seniors study just mentioned, done at the Rush Center for Healthy Aging in Chicago, suggests the two-serving daily fix slows cognitive mental declines by as much as 40 percent. This is judged the equivalent of a five-year age discount! There are not many ways to drop five years of aging effects—don’t pass up such a deal!

This tip is offered despite the general rule that you should be suspicious of claims for one specific food or another. This tip is not for a single food, but two classes of food. Still, it is useful to note that it is wise to reserve judgments. Always allow time for your critical thinking talents to come into play. Let’s say someone insists that his product will increase your energy, shrink your derriere and/or grow hair on your head. What to do? My advice—be respectful and kind but don’t agree or buy anything. Be skeptical. Assuming you were even mildly interested, ask for evidence. Insist that it be from a disinterested third party—and take your time before deciding.

Donald B. Ardell was a pioneer in the Wellness movement. He wrote High Level Wellness: An Alternative to Doctors, Drugs, and Disease, first published in 1976 by Rodale Press, with editions over the years by Bantam Books and Ten-Speed Press. Since then Don has written a dozen additional wellness books, including Die Healthy (with Grant Donovan), 14 Days to Wellness and most recently, Aging Beyond Belief.

Howdy from Boulder!   Lots going on in the Universe these days, most of it happening right here on planet Earth!

I wanted to share with you a couple of things that might be of interest to you including my new book and this year’s incredible tours to Ireland and Italy:

• A Beautiful World: The Earth Songs Journals (hardcover, 266 pages)

First, I am delighted to announce the release of my newest book. A Beautiful World has just arrived (in my garage); 12.5 inches and 3.5 lbs. …It’s a limited edition (1,000 copies) coffee table photography book. Please check out the sample pages with the links below… including (shamelessly) a link to the Paypal page were you can place your order….

• For those in the Boulder/Denver area, you are cordially invited to a travelogue slide presentation and book signing February 23rd…7-9 pm at the Millennium Harvest House Hotel (28th and Arapaho), Boulder, CO. Hope you can come!

Thanks so much for your support. You are going to LOVE this book!

• Book description: http://www.brianlukeseaward.net/books.html
• Sample pages: http://brianlukeseaward.net/a_beautiful_world.pdf
• Paypal page: http://www.brianlukeseaward.net/Paypal/

Many of you have asked about this year’s trips to Ireland (10 spots left) and Tuscany (9 spots left). Here is all the information you will need.  Each trip will be a trip of a lifetime…and we would LOVE to have you join us.

Please call with any questions….

• 2012 Spirit of Ireland Journey Tour: Ruins, Runes and Tunes

Come join us for a trip of a lifetime as we travel once again to the Emerald Isle for the Spirit of Ireland Healing Journey to work with the healing energies of the sacred sites of Counties Donegal Mayo and Galway—exploring the Celtic culture, music (if you don’t hear the music, you don’t see Ireland) and spirituality with Brian Luke Seaward, Ph.D., June 15-25th, 2012. Call 303.678.9962 or click on http://www.brianlukeseaward.net/tripstoireland.html

PDF brochure: http://brianlukeseaward.net/2012_spirit_of_ireland_journey.pdf

• 2012 Spirit of Italy: Eat Walk Meditate Tour

Come join us in Italy; a land and culture where dreams are made of great food, stunning pastoral scenery, and a relaxed healthy lifestyle. These are the reasons why we have chosen the Tuscan region of Italy and Venice as our prime locations for a retreat for caregivers and working professionals; a time to renew mind, body and spirit. This tour theme (loosely based on Liz Gilbert’s best-selling book, Eat Pray Love) offers guided meditations, wonderful Italian meals, stress & personal management skills, and an unforgettable taste of the authentic Italian culture honoring the skills of self-care for nurses, caretakers and professionals on the front lines of the healthcare industry. Here is a link to the information for this trip (pdf brochure and photoblog).

http://www.brianlukeseaward.net/tripstoitaly.html

PDF brochure: http://brianlukeseaward.net/spirit_of_italy_2012.pdf

I hope that this email finds you well and in great spirits (and they will be in better spirits when you come to Ireland and Tuscany, believe me!). As always, thanks for making this a better world to live in and I hope to see you some soon.

Best wishes always,

Brian Luke Seaward

www.brianlukeseaward.net

Don Ardell’s tips for aging well are from his book Aging Beyond Belief, 69 tips for REAL Wellness. REAL wellness stands for Reason, Exuberance And Liberty. Don says you can’t buy pills or treatments for REAL wellness−it’s a mindset and lifestyle you control. It’s never to early to let Reason, Exuberance and Liberty be your guide…these tips are for folks of any age. Enjoy.

TIP 4
Understanding the Aging Brain
Learn as much as you can about your own CPU

Do you know what “central processing unit” (CPU) I’m talking about? I mean the one in your head containing 100 billion neurons, the one able to make about 1,000 trillion interconnections or so, according to R. Grant Steen in The Evolving Brain (Prometheus Books, Amherst, NY, 2007). Your brain, neurophysiologist Steen suggests, is “arguably the most complex object in the universe.”

The more you learn about consciousness and unconsciousness, learning, memory, the role of genes, motivation, aggression and even your brain’s evolution, the more you will look after it. That is, give it new data, use it wisely and take good care of the rest of the organism to which it is attached.

All this attention to the brain takes on added significance as the years accrue on the old CPU. The CPUs in computers can be replaced, but the one in your skull has to be upgraded, regularly if not automatically. There’s work involved, which is often the case when worthwhile returns are at issue. It’s just one more “cross to bear” (I prefer “responsibility to assume”) associated with “senior-hood.” While it tempting to conclude that there is not much (good) to be said for getting older, consider this before getting discouraged:

• We’re wiser than we were as youths.
• We have more money.
• We’re not as obsessed with sex. (This is a rumor.)
• We have time-tested ideas about the great existential questions. (They are most likely peculiar, twisted and irrational like mine, but if they help you make sense of things and live a good life, who cares?)
• We feel better about ourselves.
• We don’t have to support our children.

Want to have a “fit brain” with high-end neural circuitry when you’re old? Exercise—both your body AND your mind, daily—and don’t slack off in the later years.

Here is a summary of some of the latest findings:

• Even 70-year-olds produce new neurons as well as keeping the old ones needed for memory (hippocampus region) and planning and judgment (frontal cortex).
• While a rose is a rose is a rose, neurons are different in different older folks. A geezer who does not employ his/her brain with multiple new experiences, who does not stay physically fit, socially engaged and active in complex environments will NOT have the neuron health of a wellness enthusiast who meets all these standards.
• The epicenter of the brain for purposes of studying neural well-being is the prefrontal cortex region. If your neurons here are “firing on all cylinders,” so to speak, you will be able to pay attention to important stuff and ignore the rest.
• One study found that old brains could be trained to act like young ones by mental exercises that require the use of both hemispheres of the brain. (Results were described in the February 2006 journal Neurobiology of Aging.) This demonstrated that the brains of older adults could stay “relatively flexible, able to alter brain circuits in response to training.”

As Hans Selye once advised, there’s nothing wrong with retirement as long as it does not interfere with your work. By “work,” Selye meant keeping up the social and intellectual demands, avoiding routine and staying engaged in daily affairs.

I like all these requirements. I’ll end this now in order to go off looking for some daily affairs. There you have it—one more reason to live a wellness lifestyle with panache and verve.

Donald B. Ardell was a pioneer in the Wellness movement. He wrote High Level Wellness: An Alternative to Doctors, Drugs, and Disease, first published in 1976 by Rodale Press, with editions over the years by Bantam Books and Ten-Speed Press. Since then Don has written a dozen additional wellness books, including Die Healthy (with Grant Donovan), 14 Days to Wellness and most recently, Aging Beyond Belief.

“Wow, I thought, this is an interesting approach!” I leaned back in my chair…looking forward to the dance. I like the dance. I get to use all my best strategies and tactics to avoid facing my issues: I’m attentive, ask good questions, smile, nod, participate, share a personal story or two, fill out the work sheets, do the silly exercises (that seems to impress some presenters), write down the requisite social supports that give the impression I am sincerely interested in making lasting and permanent change and otherwise look for things to include in my next presentation. Then I go back to my old bad habits: working and eating too much, exercising and sleeping too little. You know the drill.

I listened as she went through the usual litany: good nutrition, good exercise, good sleep and a healthy spirituality (usually with a huge dose of mindfulness these days). And after the presentation was over I went for the coup de grace’.

I stood in line and asked her to sign her book. She scrutinized me and asked my name. “John”, I said. Her eyes bored through me like a diamond drill. She quickly scribbled a sentence inside the cover and then flipped the book over for me to read what she had written.  “Read it out loud,” she commanded.

I read, “John is your name and compliance is your game” signed Dr. Molly K

Then Ms. Smiley Face leaned forward and whispered way too loud, “You can’t fool me. I’ve got your number.  I’ve given up on giving care for the caregiver talks to the likes of you. I know you, and I eat your kind for breakfast. When it comes to self-care you are totally helpless, hopeless…pathetic.  It will never happen.”

“Wow”, I thought, “she is good!”

She kept the momentum, “ You get to choose one of only two options. You know about old school spiritual direction…obedience and all that.

“Oh no”,  I thought, but deftly parried by nodding compliantly. (but she had me on my heels and she knew it) She had seen through my non-verbals and before I could strike back she barked.

“No…I’m making the choice for you,” I literally jumped backwards! “It’s caregiver boot camp for you.”

I hadn’t heard about caregiver boot camp before, but it sounded kind of fun.

“Not fun!” she snapped, verbally jerking me back to reality and lifting me off the floor by the scruff of the neck at the same time.

“Not fun?” I queried in a strangely pleading voice.

John Sippola, MDiv, has served as a parish pastor for 20 years and as a hospital chaplain for 15 years. A LTC Retired from the Minnesota Army National Guard, John served as the Family Assistance Center chaplain in Duluth, MN during the first Persian Gulf War. During that time, he helped facilitate a support group for spouses and parents, and co-led a support group for the children of deployed service members. As a hospital chaplain, he worked extensively with veterans in chemical dependency and mental health settings. From 1997-2000 John served as the Family Assistance Chaplain for the State of Minnesota. John is convinced that churches have a strategic role in promoting relational and spiritual wellbeing of returning veterans and their families. John is currently pastor of Elim Lutheran Church of Blackhoof in Barnum, Minnesota.

Each year I take my journaling to another level – on the day of Mitch’s death and send an email out to everyone I know – this was my 2011 letter.

Dear family and friends,

Twenty five years ago today, November 22, 1986, at 30 years of age, our son died by suicide. We commemorate this day – we celebrate Mitchell’s life. Mitch was an exceptional son, grandson, brother and uncle.

For eight years we kept the promise Mitchell asked of us, from the time of his first suicide attempt, not to tell anyone he had a mental illness. He felt it was a ‘shonda’ – a shame, an embarrassment, people wouldn’t value him for who he was, only the see the mental illness. The moment Mitch died, we told anyone and everyone. We were not ashamed or embarrassed. He had a disease, a mental illness. Although Mitchell did not discuss it, we hope other people will as the stigma of mental illness slowly lifts.

To quote Glenn Close about her family members…

“The stigma is toxic. And, like millions of others who live with mental illness in their families, I’ve seen what they endure: the struggle of just getting through the day, and the hurt caused every time someone casually describes someone as “crazy,” “nuts,” or “psycho.”

Even as the medicine and therapy for mental health disorders have made remarkable progress, the ancient social stigma of psychological illness remains largely intact. Families are often unwilling to talk about it and, in movies and the media, stereotypes about the mentally ill still reign.

The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that by the year 2020 mental illness will be the second leading cause of death and disability. Every society will have to confront the issue. The question is, will we face it with open honesty or silence?”

I remember when my mother would whisper the word cancer. We’ve come a long way. Talking and dealing with mental illness should be no different from having cancer, diabetes or any other disease.

“We have to get the word out that mental illness can be diagnosed and treated, and almost everyone suffering from mental illness can live more normal lives.”
~ Rosalynn Carter

Twenty-five years is such a long time! We miss the hugs, conversations, laughter and even the tears. We miss the family time with him – he SO loved his family (especially his two nieces!) . Mitchell would have loved the 7 more nieces and nephews that were born after his death. He would have loved Tucson and would be so happy for us. At one point, a few years before he died, he visited Vermont and came home with plans to build homes for our entire family to vacation together.

We do know that Mitch looks after us. We feel his spirit and it warms us.

We think about him every day – with love – and with admiration for trying so hard to stay alive.

Ester and Jay Leutenberg

Ester A. Leutenberg has worked in the mental health profession for many years as an author, publisher and as an advocate for those suffering from loss.