Amanda: Hey guys, welcome back to the podcast. I am Amanda.
Laura: I'm Laura.
Kendra: And I'm Kendra.
Amanda: And we have taken you now, after this podcast, through the entire Blue Zones book. This is the final part nine, where we are going to talk about designing your surroundings. We read the books, so you don't have to.
Kendra: Yeah. So blue zones, once again, reminding you that they are pockets throughout the world where greater than expected percentages of people live to 100 and they live to 100.
Well. They're not walking with walkers. They're not in nursing homes, and they have all their teeth, and they're eating well. We're using the book by Dan Buettner called The Blue Zone: Secrets for Living Longer, Lessons from the Healthiest Places on Earth. We'll have the link to the book, or you can also binge the Netflix series and get through the whole thing.
The original idea behind Blue Zones was, in a way, to reverse engineer longevity. The Danish twin study in 1996 showed only 20 to 25 percent- ish of how long we live is actually heritable. So the rest is related to lifestyle and environment. So pay attention. Admittedly, this book is observational. Beuttner went to these places and these are all observations that he made when he visited and studied these people. But, even though we think maybe a lot of it's correlation rather than causation, there's still a trend of habits that these blue zone people did, and they lived well to a hundred.
So it's worth mentioning and quite interesting. But one thing he mentions is that these centenarians aren't trying to live that long. It just happens. And maybe it's because their surroundings subtly and unconsciously help them make the right choices.
And avoid the wrong ones, for decades. For example, in blue zones, the roads are set up for humans, not cars. They aren't lonely because it isn't an option. So what if we started to make our own lives set up to make healthier choices easier instead of harder? The Mayo Clinic suggests if we just stood and walked more, we'd burn an extra 350 calories per day.
And optimizing our homes, we could burn an extra 150 calories per day. Over time that would really add up. So, here are some of the suggestions Dan Buettner recounts in his book, and they're, like I said, just suggestions. Don't come after us. We're just reporting what we read.
Laura: Yeah, so, I'm thinking this first one might be triggering. So, if it's triggering, then it's not for you. But, this is one of the suggestions he offers. Is to place your scale in a visible place and use it daily. Now, I will say that does not work for everyone. He is reporting that people who weigh themselves daily for two years, weighed as much as 17 pounds less than those who never weighed themselves. However, if it creates psychological turmoil, that then you have to self medicate with food, then don't use the scale. I know a woman who sees a weight loss practitioner and she doesn't weigh herself. She goes there, they weigh her, and they don't tell her a number. They just say whether she's up or down. He says have a scale.
Have only one TV in your home. And he says the goal is to get away from screen time, especially since we tend to munch on snacks and aren't moving much while watching. Allegedly the happiest people only watch 30 to 60 minutes of TV per day. I can believe that.
Replace power tools with hand tools. Yeah,
Amanda: Yeah, a lot of these are not.
Laura: I don't know.
Amanda: But you could see how that would be.
Laura: You could see. And I also think he's extrapolating a little bit, but okay. Yeah. So shoveling, raking, pushing a mower are a good workout. Definitely can see that. It says to grow and maintain your own garden or plants. I will say plants are very healing. Like they just, they have an energy about them. Does it make you feel good? I don't know. For sure, doesn't seem like there's an actual longitudinal randomized controlled trial about whether having a garden helps you live longer, but it does seem to be a pattern.
Amanda: Well, no one would make money if they did that. So there's no incentive to do that.
Laura: That's true. No pharmaceutical company is going to sponsor that puppy. But in blue zones, people do tend to garden until they're 90 to a hundred. And if you think about it, when you plant seeds, so you have to go out and water and care for them. You get some vitamin D from the sun.
So the next one is welcome a dog into your family. Yes, I do 100 percent go get behind this because In my opinion, dogs are angels come to help people have a better life. But he says that they're great companions and encourage you to get out and walk or play. Researchers have found that dog walkers naturally get over five hours of exercise per week and pets tend to help with our stress levels. They help you reduce your blood pressure too. And they're amazing. They show you what unconditional love looks like.
He says to own a bike. Even owning a bike nudges you to use it and wear a helmet. Yes, please wear your helmet. So that was number six.
Now we're on number seven. Own at least four of the following. This is where I do think he's kind of extrapolating because I don't know that these blue zone people have all this stuff.
Amanda: True. Yes.
Laura: . He's trying to create visual cues, I think, to help you be more active. Walking shoes, jump rope, yoga mat, weights, basketball, football, golf clubs, rollerblades, camping supplies, running shoes. If you're in my family, they would add frisbees and pickleball equipment. Again, we're just trying to have nudges to move all around.
Eight, create an indoor exercise area. Make exercise more convenient by having a designated area, especially if it's easily accessible and visible.
Number nine, place cushions on the floor. And this is hearkening back to the Okinawans and their habit of sitting on the floor, in particular for meals. Getting up and down off the floor to read fold laundry, chat on the phone, add extra bonus movement. And it does help strengthen your muscles. So it makes it easier for you to get up and down
10, create a family quote, pride shrine, end quote, area or wall. So this is like a wall of photos or mementos having something like this reminds us of how connected we are. And how we fit into the world. And I would say having a picture of your child self, like yourself as a little kid, is also a good thing up there to just remind you that you always want to be kind to yourself.
11 is create a destination room. This is a place for reading or family projects. Have plenty of light and keep out TVs, computers, and other distractions. So this might be, you know, your little family library or craft room or whatever, or art studio, where you do your thing to open your brain.
12. Disconnect your garage door opener. Yeah, this one is a flat. No. No. Absolutely not. What? Like, what?
Amanda: I mean, that would be a lot of work out. That would be a lot.
Laura: I don't even really use my garage that much, but this actually makes me a little. Yeah, I'm not. I don't know.
Amanda: Mine's super heavy. It's got wood on the outside like bolted. It would be exhausting. Of course. And I mean, I might be ripped if I did that. So.
Laura: Yeah, there you Dan this suggestion.
Amanda: Some of the yeah, these are just these are Dan's don't come for us. But like, like Laura was saying too, I don't want to we're not pushing diet mentality at all. No, nobody in blue zones is sitting around counting calories, or trying to get their steps in.
But the idea is they don't have to think about this stuff. They have, their surroundings make all of these things happen. How delightful would that be if you didn't have to ever think about your nutrition and your movement because it just naturally happened to you throughout the day. That's to me the goal is freedom around all of that, and these are suggestions for ways that you could build it. For sure I'm getting a lot of movement if I have to get out of my car and raise my garage door I just I can hear that.
Laura: I hear you gonna not
yeah. No,
Amanda: I will not be partaking in that one.
Okay, so that was setting up your home.
Now let's talk about your kitchen. Alright, so, here's the deal. Let's make it a delightful place, a place that you want to be in, a place that you want to use. Home cooked food, of course, isn't going to have all the added sugars that you aren't even aware of, that's pumped into some of the sauces and ketchups and all that kind of stuff from the grocery store.
So, number one, optimize your layout. There is a, if you have a triangle of this sink, stove, and refrigerator, that optimizes your efficiency. I, okay, that's. Great. The other, I could argue with Dan that if you had a non optimal triangle, you would be moving more, but maybe you, maybe it's not as fun. I know. These are Dan's, so whatever.
Invest in the right refrigerator. Okay. Let's see what he has to say. So he says a new smaller refrigerator might be the best because newer models keep fruit, veggies, and other food fresher and longer. And then you might want a smaller one, actually, because that would force you to go out to shop for fresh food more often.
I mean, truly, what I've learned from House Hunters International is that everywhere except the United States has tiny refrigerators. So, I mean Consider.
So, number three, clear plenty of counter space. Okay, Dan. But I guess the point is that you might as well enjoy your space and enjoy cooking by having a large inviting space in which to prepare. And he suggests to keep your TV and mail elsewhere so you're not contaminating your zen area.
Kendra: However, I mean, watching House Hunters while cooking is a favorite pastime of mine. So, it keeps me in the kitchen. I mean, it keeps me in the kitchen. Okay.
Amanda: Take it up with Dan.
Kendra: I know. Just saying. I need that TV. Especially Saturday mornings, now that college football's on. I have to have game day, and I prepare this enormous breakfast. And my family. Gives me five out of five stars, but I'm in there because now game day is an extra hour. So now I have to cook for two hours.
Amanda: All right. Well, he suggests good lighting. I think the goal here is to love going into your kitchen to cook with a bright, happy place. And if you have a dark kitchen, consider some undercounter lighting. These are all kind of random how they're attached to blue zones.
And then next to set up your kitchen keep the, keep a small pantry, which was a little like, what? But, think about this. Our grandparents, they had to have pantries for their canned goods and all the stuff that they were making and storing throughout the winter. And now we stuff these giant room filled pantries with things like Cheetos. And chips. And so maybe us not having so much space would be an advantage. So one study found that people who cooked using ingredients from large containers- we're talking like the the warehouse stores, the where you get things in bulk. When using ingredients from large containers, you tend to prepare 23 percent more food. So maybe you don't want that giant vat of whatever rice or whatever it is that you have.
Amanda: Okay so then, kitchen checklist number one, and again, the goal is to make it easier to make good decisions. So number one, keep fruits and vegetables at eye level in your refrigerator. That is where your eye tends to go when you open it up. So being reminded to consume fruits and veggies is ideal.
Number two, keep unhealthy, in the opposite way, keep unhealthy snacks out of sight, either on the top shelf or bottom shelf or in a drawer or a cabinet that you don't often open. There is no reason to just set yourself up to have triggers to grab junk food all the time.
Number three, put a fresh fruit bowl on the kitchen table or in another prominent spot. And this actually we learned from Atomic Habits. What they did in one place of employment was all they did was put the less nutritious snacks in the back of the cafeteria. And they put the healthy stuff in bins, easy to grab at the front. And with no other effort other than that, people ate much more nutritious food.
Number next,use dinner plates, no larger than 10 inches across. And the idea it's psychologically more satisfying to have a full plate. So if you had a smaller plate that was full. You're still going to probably, in the United States at least, be consuming enough, and you still get that sensation of being satisfied.
Number five, drink beverages out of a tall, narrow glass, because psychologically we measure our drinks by height, not width.
So a narrow, tall glass, if you're going to have something like juice or something like that, you would end up consuming less if you had a tall glass instead of a wide glass.
And then six, plate your entire meal and put the leftovers away before you sit down to eat at the table, just to make it harder to go back for seconds and thirds.
Number seven, remove the TV. I would go back to that. We are not pushing diet mentality. So be loving with yourself. If you loved yourself more than anyone in the world, like I'm talking about be reasonable in that way.
Laura: Well, I also like to say there, like, be full, like, learn, like learning to recognize your hunger signals and like eating till you're not full, but till you've had enough till you're satisfied.
Then you don't need to go back and have more. Yeah.
Kendra: A table with a bunch of teenage boys would not be, would not go for the, put the leftovers away.
Laura: No.
Kendra: Like, where do, where'd it go? Where's the rest?
Laura: Right.
Amanda: Yeah. Well, I mean, for those of us who are doing it out of habit, going back the second and third times, maybe that would be a good idea to put it away.
Okay. So. In the same vein, remove the TV, cell phones, and computers from the kitchen and dining room because the whole point is to be mindful so that you can even recognize that you're satisfied. When you're distracted that really subtle cue blows right by you.
Number eight, this is a no go also, use hand operated kitchen tools. I am not getting out the manual egg beater, or whatever.This one's kind of random and he doesn't really expound on it. But by an electric pressure cooker. I'm guessing that because it will cook it quickly, you're more likely to go ahead and make the meal at home. Whereas if it were, if you hadn't thawed it yet and you had to thaw it, and then it was going to take another whatever, then you might be tempted to go out to eat. Or eat some junk food or something like that. So I'm guessing that's why he says buy an electric pressure cooker.
Laura: For the beans. It's for the beans.
Amanda: For the beans. Although, you know, you just so, beans can be super easy at my house anyway. We just set the beans out the night before, then you pop it in the crock pot the day of. And then Anasazi beans don't require as much cooking time.
Laura: Oh really? I don't think I've had, I don't think I've had this.
Amanda: Yeah, regarding beans, Oh, they're good. Here's the thing, a lot of times when we're trying to eat healthy and organic, it costs a whole lot of money. Except for you can't make that argument with beans. They're so incredibly healthy, and if you get a bunch of dried beans, I mean, for a buck.
Laura: Nothing cheaper.
Amanda: So, eat more beans. For lots of reasons. And then, number ten, for your kitchen, hang up the four always, four to avoid list in your kitchen. What am I talking about?
Well, here's his four always.
Number one. 100 percent whole grains. Consuming whole grains like oat, barley, brown rice, corn, farro, quinoa, bulgur, and others reduces your risk of life shortening diseases. The whole grain, not the bleach, nutrition stripped then added back stuff.
Number two, nuts. Two handfuls a day. He acts like you could just have unlimited amounts, but that can get in the danger zone, so let's go with about two handfuls a day.
Beans. More of them. Beans and legumes are the cornerstone of every longevity diet in the world. Shoot for a cup of cooked beans daily.
And number four of the always your favorite fruits and vegetables. People who eat five fruits and veggies a day live an extra three years and eating seven or more servings can lower your risk of premature death by 42%. So that was the four always.
What are the four to avoid?
Number one, sugar sweetened beverages. There's just literally nothing other than intoxicatingly dopamine releasing taste. There's no nutrition, there is no purpose for this in your life, and it causes so many problems. It's a great way to get fatty liver because it just is a, it just main lines it straight to your liver. So if there would be one thing that you could do is cut out sugar sweetened beverages, that would have a big impact on your life.
Number two, the problem with salty snacks is that it's one of the foods that's most associated with obesity. And it's not just because of the sodium. They also have to have, they also tend to be snacks that have a pretty high glycemic index. They're just. I mean, they're, and they're easy to munch on and be not very mindful with snacking on them.
Number three, packaged sweets. The added sugar in general is arguably the number one toxin in the American diet. Not natural sugar, added sugar is what we're talking about.
And number four, processed meats. The World Health Organization has come out. Processed meats. We're talking like the encased hot dogs and lunch meats and those sorts of things. They are in the same carcinogenic category as smoking, which is shocking.
Laura: Yeah, bacon is not the fruit of life, huh?
Amanda: Dang it Again moderation, but like that should not be your go to for sure.
Kendra: So, in going from the kitchen to the bedroom, because we want to make sure we, you know, set up the entire house as a blue zone, right? So, I love sleep. I love to read everything and anything I can about sleep. So, this is great. And take these with a grain of salt too but I think I said this before on one of our posts on social media. The sleep industry and like the market for all sleep products is like a multi billion dollar industry. Everybody wants to put something out there to help you sleep, but really, I mean, sleep is important. We spend, what is it? A third of our life in the bed trying to sleep
And so it is worth- his first point here is to own a comfortable mattress and pillows. And that is worth it. And you know, they kind of harp on this, back sleeper,, side sleeper, all the things, really just find what works with you. You know, if you sleep hot, get the cool mattress, whatever. And, just figuring out what works for you. And then he says, on average, replacing it every 8 to 10 years.
This is actually a real thing that's been studied is the temperature of the room. And so he says, make your bedroom cool at night. One of the things the body does in response to their circadian rhythm is to lower your body temperature one degree to prepare for sleep. Somewhere in that, like, making the room temperature 67 to 68 degrees is kind of that target. Usually if it's any warmer than like, 74 to 75, that's going to wake you up. You're going to be sleeping pretty hot. So, the target there is somewhere like 67, 68 degrees.
Dim the lights an hour before bedtime. I've also read some stuff about this. Basically it's preparing, you know, your eye is sensing the cues from the environment. And so it's also giving your input to your brain that we're preparing for sleep. So, if you're dimming the lights, you're not in bright lights and bright rooms, it's going to help kind of mimic the data that we had when we didn't have a bunch of like, LED lights and everything, when we just lit stuff by candle. So, And you looked outside and you watched the horizon get dim. And so we're trying to a mimic that process.
The next one is remove digital alarm clocks with the lit up screens. And we've talked about Dr. Peter Attia's book on longevity called Outlive. And this is one of the things he says, that even just that small little LED light with the numbers on it. It is so bright. He said, turn that around, unplug it, do something else for an alarm clock because that, even just that much in a purely dark room is enough light to keep you up.
The next one is use shades, blinds or drapery. So, yeah, another word of advice is to get the blackout shades. And I know for physicians that work shifts, that we try to beat back the circadian rhythm by being up when we're supposed to be sleeping. This is the best thing that you can do to help with that shift work sleep disorder, is to get the room darkening shade. So whatever you need to do to really cut out all light, even when you're sleeping, you know, in the morning, when you get home from a night shift or whatever time you do have to go to sleep. I mean, you gotta get to sleep when you can, people, so, make that room dark and cold.
And then the last one is remove the TV, computer, cell phones from the bedroom. Basically the thought behind this is the bedroom is for sleep and sex. Some people say that are relationship experts, but really, it's creating that environment. It's training your brain to say the bedroom is for sleep. It's not for work. So don't bring your laptop in there. It's not for scrolling social media, numbing out, buffering, whatever you want to do. It's a subtle part of this is knowing that when you walk into the bedroom, your brain knows that environment, and it's for sleep and it will prepare for sleep.
It seems subtle, but actually makes a big difference. So just getting out all distractions, anything else that could like activate your brain, being on your phone or having even an conversation that's kind of, emotionally charging, can be something that will prevent you from winding down to go to sleep.
So just be mindful what you're doing right before sleep. Are you preparing to sleep? Are you preparing to keep yourself awake? And so these are just a few things to think about.
Okay, so we're wrapping up our Blue Zones, so hopefully you took a nugget or two, take it for what it's worth. Obviously, this is not randomized control trials. This is just purely observations from pockets of the world that are growing old truly gracefully and require less healthcare, even the longer they live. So if anything did help you, please leave us a review. Go down, scroll down, give us a rating- five out of five stars, would recommend- and give us a review because it helps make our ripple just a little bit bigger in this world.
And if you're going to be an ACEP. For all you EM physicians out there, if you're going to ACEP Scientific Assembly, it's coming up real soon in Las Vegas. We are hosting a networking event for everyone, anyone, everyone. So grab your EM colleagues, your residency buddies, and join us at the Libertine Social Lounge in the Mandalay Bay, which is where the conference is. We'll be there Monday, September 30th from 5 to 7 pm. We'll have the link so you can click on your tickets, buy them now because last year's event sold out. So go get them while you can. And until next time, you are whole, you are a gift to medicine, and the work you do matters.
