Your 100 Year Lifestyle

One of my chiropractic mentors over the years is Dr. Eric Plasker, founder of the 100 Year Lifestyle movement. He taught me many things about being the best chiropractor I could be and the importance of making every opportunity with patients count, never taking for granted the awesome responsibility to help guide people to a lifestyle to bring them closer to realizing their true health potential.

Over the years I would ask patients how they would like to see themselves age. Most reply they don’t want to live too long! They would then explain how this was because they saw how their parents or grandparents aged and struggled in their later years. But the part that is almost always overlooked is that the best science in genetics suggests we have great blueprints---95% of people have such great genetic potential that they could live vitally from 80 to 120 years of age! The problem is most of us blame our genetics for our ills and fail to realize our lifestyle is the problem. To live the 100-year lifestyle means making better choices. It doesn’t mean sacrificing everything you enjoy. In fact, most patients tell me that once they adapt to the better choices, they don’t miss their ‘old-self’.

Consider that humans are the only animals on earth with chronic disease. You don’t see giraffes or lions or hippos or flamingos in the wild with cancer, diabetes or heart disease. We do it to ourselves by living with the wrong lifestyle. Cumulative destructive survival values eventually catch up with us---the symptoms coming last. To avoid the disease, we must first address removing the causes. The good news is it’s simple. It might not always be easy but it’s simple. Dialing in to our daily choices and paying attention to the Four Essentials of Life, Food, Water, Oxygen and Nerve Supply will allow us the necessary quality and quantity to live our best lives!