S03E48 AT WHAT AGE SHOULD YOU START FEELING OLD?

Age is just a number - but does how old you feel make a difference? Some studies say yes.

Also, the start of a weekly thankful at the end of the podcast.

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S03E48 AT WHAT AGE SHOULD YOU START FEELING OLD

[00:00:00] Sam Rhee: At what age should you start feeling old? Have you ever told yourself, wow, I'm feeling old right now. You could be 18 years old, meeting the new freshmen in high school. You could be 70 years old and reaching over to pick your car keys that you just dropped.

Or any age in between doing something that suddenly reminds you that you may not be as young as you once were. And that happens on occasion to everyone. But is there a certain age when people start to notice that they are no young, where you start to feel slightly past your prime as they say?

Was it when you saw your first gray hair, or that knee stiffness in the morning that takes forever to go away?

Or when you realize the first Harry Potter book came out over 22 years ago and you realize calling yourself a Gryffindor didn't really seem appropriate anymore?

Hey, maybe you still feel totally young and have no idea what I'm talking about. Good for you for denying reality and more power to you.

For the rest of us. Well, scientists have studied this phenomenon pretty carefully, both in extensive scientific polls and surveys, as well as actually testing people about their capabilities as they age.

And there are definitely certain points in life where many of us start to feel , well, old.

Maybe these points correlate with how you're feeling, so let's talk about the state of mind and aging.

First of all, let's look how old you actually are compared to everyone else. Based on data from flowing data.com. If you were born today, basically a hundred percent of people would be older than you. Okay, that's obvious. And if you're 90 years old, 99% of the US population would be younger than you.

Okay. Also obvious.

What percentage of the population is older than you if you're 18 years old? It's about 75%. And how about the age when that's flipped, when 75% of the US population is younger than you? That's at age 56. So the exact middle where half the population is both older and younger than you, is age 37.

And maybe if you're around that age, you are starting to feel old, but maybe you're also thinking, Hey, I actually feel pretty young and physically speaking, there are a lot of studies which seem to suggest that athletic performance can be maintained up into the thirties, and only begins to decline in the late thirties or even forties depending on which performance metric is measured.

Another piece of good news is that physiologic decline can be slowed by constant and consistent training, particularly strength and weight training.

In competitive CrossFit, the age cutoff is at 34 years, with the masters athletes age groups starting after that. And looking at the 35 to 39 year old age division. The top athletic performances there are extremely competitive with those from younger athletes as well.

Okay, so the age midpoint in the United States is 37. But a lot of people actually still feel young at that age, and many of them can maintain their physical performance through intensive training and other appropriate health measures.

So when is the actual age that people no longer feel young? According to a Wall Street Journal article written by Claire Ansbury a couple weeks ago, one US poll stated that 42 years of age is when the average American no longer feels young.

Coincidentally, the first members of the millennial generation are about 42 years old. Unfortunately, the past three years during the pandemic may have accentuated conditions that make people feel old. Four of the biggest factors that were listed were stress, loneliness, fatigue, and disease.

For a lot of people, context also plays a role. If you're constantly around older individuals, you may feel like the youngest compared to them. Or if you work within a younger population, the cultural differences such as dress styles and slang may make you feel older.

It may also be your life situation, greater responsibilities, family, or other concerns that make you realize that activities you enjoyed in your twenties and early thirties are no longer a priority or maybe not even possible.

Based on this research cited in this Wall Street Journal article, there's actually also a physiologic difference between not feeling young, but actually feeling old. If the average person in the US no longer feels young at age 42, the age at which the average American starts actually feeling old is 52.

This is also the age where a lot of people also begin worrying not only about bodily changes, but they're increasingly concerned about brain health and mental ability decline, much more so than losing physical attractiveness or staying relevant culturally.

Okay, so obviously we can't do anything about our chronologic age. That will continue to progress. And so maybe we no longer feel young after the age of 42, or maybe we actually even start feeling old at age 52. Does it even matter how old we feel? Well, based on these studies, it actually matters a lot.

From a New York Times article in 2019 written by Emily Labor Warren, studies have shown repeatedly that people who feel younger than their chronologic age are healthier and more psychologically resilient than those who feel older. Objectively, they performed better at memory tasks and had less risk of cognitive decline, which was confirmed by brain scans.

Okay, so to play devil's advocate, you might say, people who feel younger than their age are probably healthier. They're probably healthier in the first place, which is why they feel younger. If you happen to be sick or you have significant mental or physical issues, you aren't going to feel young for your age.

You're going to feel old. So how useful are these studies?

Actually, several studies demonstrated that people actually perform better once they were told that they were stronger or smarter than most people their age. On a study on grip strength, if they were told that they were stronger than people their age, they actually did better.

It was the same for memory performance. Once people were actually told they were smarter than others their age, their memory performance was actually better.

So could it be that the mindset of actually believing you are more youthful than you actually are could impact your physical and mental performance?

It's definitely possible.

I think the biggest takeaway from these studies is that regardless of whether you feel younger because you focused on optimizing your health and wellness, or you just have a positive outlook in life and that's why you feel younger, both of these approaches can be important to fulfilling your potential at whatever age you are actually at.

Regularly accepting new challenges, appreciating our capabilities, and understanding that the aging process at any stage of life is something that while we can't fully control, it's certainly not completely out of our hands. And it's our responsibility to do what we can to make the most of our potential at any age.

So how do you answer when someone asks how old you feel? Your answer could actually dictate your own health.

So what makes you feel young or old?

Let me know. DM me @BotoxAndBurpeesPodcast on Instagram. Thank you.

Now, on a personal note, a new feature at the end of each Botox and Burpees episode will be a thankful for something I've seen, observed, or experienced that is meaningful or impactful. Listing thankfuls is a common daily practice that many people do to help us remember what we should be grateful about at the end of the day. It's something I do off and on, but I think doing this on the podcast will help me be more consistent about what's meaningful in my life and hopefully kick off some thoughts about what's important for others as well.

So for this week, my thankful was hero week at my gym CrossFit Bison. Like many CrossFit gyms, we do the hero workout Murph on Memorial Day. That workout is a one mile run, 100 pullups, 200 pushups, and 300 air squats, followed by another one mile run.

It's a longstanding tradition at many places. And briefly, hero workouts in CrossFit are workouts named after special people who have died in the line of duty, either serving in the military, law enforcement, or first responders such as firemen.

These workouts honor and pay tribute to those special people who sacrificed their lives for their country. The workout Murph is in honor of Navy Lieutenant Michael Murphy, age 29 of Patchogue, New York. A Navy Seal who was killed in Afghanistan June 28th, 2005.

Now, one tradition that my gym has is that in the week leading up to Memorial Day, we do a hero workout every day.

It's called Hero Week, and this week included the hero workouts, T.U.P., Maupin, Blake, Barraza, Randy, and Wittman.

The hero workout T.U.P. was a nickname for US Army Staff Sergeant Michael H. Simpson of San Antonio, Texas, who died on May 1st, 2013.

Maupin is a workout dedicated to US Army Staff. Sergeant Keith "Matt" Maupin, age 24 of Batavia, Ohio, who died on April 9th, 2004.

Blake is a workout dedicated to US Navy Senior Chief Cryptologic Technician David Blake McLendon, age 30 of Thomasville, Georgia.

And Barraza is a workout dedicated to US Army Staff Sergeant Ricardo Barraza, age 24 of Shafter, California, who was assigned to the Second Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment based in Fort Lewis, Washington, who died on March 18th, 2006.

The well known hero workout. Randy is named for Randy Simmons, age 51, a 27 year Los Angeles Police Department veteran and SWAT team member who was killed February 7th, 2008 in the line of duty.

And Wittman was named for US Army Sergeant Jeremiah Wittman, age 26 of Darby Montana, assigned to the First Battalion 12th Infantry Regiment, Fourth Brigade Combat Team, Fourth Infantry Division based out of Fort Carson, Colorado, who was killed on February 13th, 2010.

This week I was fortunate to be able to do all the workouts except one which I coached. And so I saw athletes all week who pushed themselves with a deeper sense of gratitude and humility, thinking about these courageous people who sacrificed their lives.

Many of these heroes who died were very young, no more than 24 years old. They were the children of parents who grieved for them. Some of them also had their own children who were left without a parent when they died. And this week I am so thankful that I was able to think about these heroes, pay tribute to them, and to appreciate what they've done for us and our country.

No matter how I was feeling this week, what my concerns or worries were, I knew that I was grateful and blessed to be able to do what I do every day.

What are your thankfuls? Please let me know. DM me again @BotoxAndBurpees on Instagram. Thank you.