Living long and prospering by going ‘Blue’
Published 1:02 pm Tuesday, August 4, 2015
d vibrant in your 90s? I would.
In a few places in the world, people are healthier and live longer than the rest of us. These places are in Greece, Italy, Japan, Costa Rica, Finland and a Seventh Day Adventist community in California. In The Blue Zones Solution, Dan Buettner describes what these communities have in common and how communities in the United States have become more “Blue.”
Long-lived people have social circles that support their healthy lifestyle. Habits, good and bad, are contagious. People who smoke hang out with smokers, and vice versa, so the people we spend time with influence our health.
Okinawans create a group of five friends, called a moai, that commit to helping each other for life. Why not create “Life Circles” here — small groups to support each other’s health in mind, body and spirit?
Another key, Buettner says, is to change the environment so healthy behaviors are a natural part of daily life. Instead of going to the gym, people in Blue Zones work in their gardens and do things manually, like chopping vegetables instead of plugging in the Cuisinart. Keeping up with a garden can be hard, but why not start neighborhood gardens where people on Vashon can share the labor and socialize as well?
Blue Zone people walk and bicycle to shop and visit friends. Vashon is spread out, but we could make it easier to leave the car at home by having shoulders on main roads that lack them now. In some Blue Zones, adults volunteer to walk groups of children to and from school. They call it a “walking school bus.”
In all Blue Zones, people get 95 percent of their food from plants. Beans are a cornerstone of their diet — they eat an average of one-half cup of beans a day. Black beans, chickpeas, lentils, fava beans, are all great sources of complex carbohydrates and fiber that feed our “good” microbes. (See A healthy gut makes for a healthy body, Beachcomber, July 9, 2015). Many of us are not used to cooking beans, especially dried ones. We could have community dinners for people to share recipes.
Greens, sweet potatoes, and a couple handfuls of nuts each day are staples in Blue Zones. Oil comes from plants, particularly olive oil. When bread is eaten, it is made of coarsely ground whole grains.
Meat is eaten twice a week or less in Blue Zones, while fish is eaten almost daily. Meat is used to flavor dishes, rather than being an entrée. Larger portions are reserved for celebrations. Meat triggers our intestinal microbes to manufacture a chemical that causes heart disease, so it makes sense that long-lived people eat little of it. The meat they do eat comes from free range animals that are not fed grain with pesticides in it and are not fattened with antibiotics.
Products from cow’s milk are not eaten much in Blue Zones. About two-thirds of human adults are not able to fully digest lactose from cow’s milk, so this also makes sense.
People in Blue Zones eat fruit whole rather than drinking juice. Juice causes a surge of sugar in the bloodstream that can lead to diabetes. Sugary sweets are for celebrations in Blue Zone communities.
Fresh fruit is a “treat.” Why couldn’t the restaurants on Vashon always have a fresh fruit dessert option? Dark chocolate, at least 72 percent cacao, is healthy in small quantities. How about strawberries dipped in dark chocolate? Yum.
— Laura Wishik is the coordinator for Shape Up Vashon and teaches Food for Life, a class on developing a healthy relationship with food. She is also chair of Vashon’s school board, an attorney for the City of Seattle and mother of two.
