Marianne Schaefer Trench - The Cliché Is True: You Really Are as Young as You Feel

By Dilip -
Aging, it turns out, is nothing but a cosmic mistake. Why? Because if you feel you are younger than your chronological age, then you actually are. And there’s a flood of new science to prove it.
One study from the University of Virginia states that at least 70 percent of more than 30,000 subjects reported to feel significantly younger than their chronological age - a divergence so drastic that the scientists invoked the red planet: “Past age 25 or so, subjective aging appears to occur on Mars, where one Earth decade equals only 5.3 Martian years.”

The discrepancy becomes more pronounced the older we get. We look at our chronological age and know with absolute certainty that we’re not there yet. This cosmic wrongness causes ennui every time a birthday comes around. Friends offer platitudes -“Age is just a number”- that turn out to be the truth. We do suffer from a mass delusion. And it happens to be beneficial for us.

After analyzing the mental and physical health of test subjects who feel younger than their chronological age, scientists are in agreement that our chronological age is irrelevant and our subjective age is what matters. Our subjective age is not how old we wish to be, but how old we feel. It is a multidimensional construct marked by one or more of the following indicators: felt age; biological age (looks and physical health); societal age (how we act and what we do); and intellectual age (interests and pursuits). Consider yourself lucky if you feel young, look young, participate in youthful activities and have the curiosity of a child - because those are the indicators for how old you really are.

Feeling younger has many benefits. According to an article in the Journal of Personality by researchers from Florida State University and Montpelier University, it makes us into better people because it fosters “openness, conscientiousness and agreeableness.” It makes us healthier because it corresponds directly to fewer chronic conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, and depression. It makes us stronger and yields greater benefits from fitness regimens. The next time you think Cher might be just another lifted-to-the-limit, wrinkle-free septuagenarian freak, keep in mind that she claims to have a rigorous fitness routine and is able to hold a plank for five minutes.

Arguably the greatest benefit of a younger subjective age is how it affects the aging of the brain. When MRI scans were used to predict chronological age, it turned out that brain aging is much more closely related to the subjective age than the chronological age, and it’s an important marker for mental and cognitive health… read more:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-cliche-is-true-you-really-are-as-young-as-you-feel?ref=home

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