I mean, if you’re like me, I’ll listen to a presentation like this and maybe I’ll agree with the ideas and maybe I’ll try it for a week or so. But, you know, after a week I’ll go back to my own patterns and really not follow the recommendations at all. So, accountability is a powerful tool that you can use your family and friends to help you stay on track with the lifestyle changes that you choose to make. And we’ll show you some accountability tricks in this as well. So let’s start with physical exercise now, too much. We’re finding is actually can be harmful too. But for most of us, that’s not the problem. It’s more a problem of too little and not enough. So start gradually, you know, for me, it was walking a little bit each day and then, and then for me, I set goals that would, that then I could be held accountable for my friends. So for example, what I did is I went to a local store like a Costco and I got an exercise bike there and then I started telling my friends about it. I’ve got this exercise bike and I’m gonna commit to riding a certain amount every day and I hooked it up to a free website and there, there are dozens of them out there. The one I have to use was Strava.com. But there are many others. And then I told my friends that I’m committing to riding, you know, so many miles a day. And furthermore, they could actually go to the website and check it out.
Then the next level I linked Strava to another free website which was a charity website that raises money for any charity you want. I happen to pick Alzheimer’s disease and I committed to raising money for Alzheimer’s disease by riding 3000 miles virtually on this exercise bike across America. And that’s what I did and my friends held me accountable and at the end of the year or so, I had ridden the 3000 miles, so I wanted to keep going. So I changed the website to make it a commitment to ride across America and back which is 6000 miles. And as of this morning, I am now at over 7000 miles. So I have to, I’m changing. I’m thinking about a charity ride around the earth for 24,000 miles. That should, that should last me for a while. So we’ll see how that goes. And I’ll put the links in here. You can check them out and you can add yours as well. So that’s physical exercise. Now, mental exercise is equally important, if not more. So, and it works by a mechanism of increasing neuroplasticity and certain compounds, which physical exercise also helps like BDNF, which is brain derived neurotropic factor. But all these things tend to lower inflammaging. So a couple of things with, with mental exercise, I mean, we’re using our brains all the time. So, aren’t we exercising? Well, actually it turns out that certain types of mental exercise are better. In other words, active mental exercise rather than watching a TV show, read a book or doing something like that. So rather than listening to music, sing along with the music or if you can play an instrument, actually get up and perform to it or dance to it. And then you combine some physical exercise as well.
And one of the gold standard approaches that I tried is learning a new language. And today with the internet, there are so many free applications for learning languages. All you have to do is just pick one and then make commitments so that your friends can hold you accountable. And the language I always wanted to learn was Mandarin Chinese. So I took a free app. This one’s called duolingo. But there, there are dozens of free ones out there. This is just the one I happened to do. And then I committed to my friends that I would study Chinese every single day for 5 to 10 minutes a day. But I would do it every day. That was the commitment and Duolingo kept track of it and it held me accountable and my friends held me accountable and today I’m, I’m over 1000 days and going on. So, you know, I’m not fluid, but at least I have a beginning to have an understanding of the language. Then the next level, what you do is you take your AI assistant, whether it’s Siri or Alexa or Google. Hey Google. And for me it’s Siri. So I switch Siri so that she only understands Mandarin Chinese.
So now that holds me accountable because I have to get my pronunciation at least vaguely close to what Siri can understand and it forces me to keep up with my Mandarin. So now if I want to set a timer for 20 minutes on my phone and I say, hey, Siri set a timer for 20 minutes, nothing happens because she doesn’t understand English anymore. So I have to say hey, and sure enough, the timer is set for 20 minutes. The next level step, which I haven’t done yet. But of course, is to set the operating system of your computer or your laptop to the language that you’re studying so that it only response to that. But I’m still getting to that point. The last one other lifestyle thing I’ll mention is something that I had completely misunderstood too. And that was sleep and it’s important and inflammaging. I mean, I thought I had sleep figured out as, as a medical doctor, I used to carry a pager and I was on call sometimes 24 hours a day or even seven days a week.
And I was proud to be called at all hours. I thought it made me strong and tough and, but now I realize that it actually was making me sick through mechanisms of inflammaging and other mechanisms as well. And I was putting my patients at risk when I was a resident, we routinely did 48 hour shifts in the intensive care unit. In 2011, though they changed the rules and first year, medical residents were limited to no more than 16 consecutive hours per day. Interestingly when they studied this medical errors resulting in patient deaths reversed by almost or declined by almost two thirds. Sadly, in 2017, this rule was overturned and now residents can be scheduled up to 24 hours straight. There’s increasing evidence that inflammaging in risk of chronic disease increases dramatically when you get either too much or too little sleep. And the question is, what is the sweet spot and how narrow is the window? Well, it actually the evidence is growing that it’s a fairly a window of eight or nine hours of sleep that you need to avoid these harmful effects and inflammation as well on the other side. So sorry, Elon you probably need more than four hours of sleep and are, and are we’re all the worst for it if we don’t get it. So, how do I know? I’m getting enough sleep.
Well, one thing I’ve started doing is if I require an alarm clock to wake up for me, it’s a sign I’m probably not getting enough sleep. So most nights I don’t have an alarm clock and I just wake up when I’ve had enough sleep and that certainly works. So quantity of sleep is important. There’s one other thing about sleep, we have to watch out and that is quality as well. Sleep quality matters. It’s like in this picture who is likely getting good quality sleep. Well, the dog obviously is, but the man not so much mouth breathing like he’s doing or snoring can be a sign of poor sleep hygiene. The mouth breathing can indicate obstructive airway disease or sleep apnea. And there, there are numerous fitness apps that can help track your sleep quality and alert you of these possible things all the way from fitbits to battery powered oxygenation devices. I’ll just leave you with one last thing. Sometimes falling asleep is the challenge. So it’s I find it very valuable to have sleep rituals. Go to sleep at the same time. I read a book every night before I go to sleep for a little bit, no electronic devices. And then the last thing I’ll share with you is the 478 rule, which changed my life. Basically, it’s a relaxation technique where you breathe in for your mouth for a count of four and then hold your breath for a count of 7, 1234567. Then relax and exhale slowly for a count of eight and repeat. And this, at least for me and for many, many people this is a very effective technique. Many people fall asleep in under 60 seconds when they start doing this. So please try it and let me know how it works. Anyway, that’s it. For today’s mini talk. Please enjoy the rest of uh today’s program and we’ll catch you later.
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