Your Best Life is Now: Healthy Aging Isn’t About Turning Back the Clock

If you could turn back the clock, would you?

It’s tempting to say yes. We remember younger bodies that moved a little more easily, knees that didn’t complain about the stairs, and perhaps a time when the list of medications on the kitchen counter was considerably shorter.

But healthy aging isn’t about trying to be 40 again.

And “Your Best Life Is Now” doesn’t mean pretending that everything about right now is wonderful.

You may be living with a chronic illness. You may be recovering from surgery or adjusting to physical limitations you never expected. You may be caring for a spouse whose health is changing. You may even be facing a serious or life-threatening diagnosis.

Right now may be hard.

But it is still now. And there can still be something good, meaningful, comforting, funny, beautiful or deeply worthwhile within it.

That’s really what we mean when we say:

Your Best Life Is Now. 

Healthy Aging Is About the Life You Have Today

We tend to think about our “best years” as something we can identify only by looking backward.

Maybe it was when the kids were little. When your career was thriving. When you and your spouse traveled. When your body did what you asked it to do without much complaint.

But living that way can turn life into a rearview mirror.

Healthy aging asks a different question:

Given where I am today, what would make today as good as it can be?

The answer will be different for everyone.

For one person, it might mean building strength and balance so she can continue living independently. For another, it might mean getting a chronic condition under better control. Someone recovering from a joint replacement may be focused on walking comfortably again.

And for someone with a serious illness, “best” might mean something entirely different: controlling pain, conserving energy for the people and activities that matter, sitting outside on a beautiful afternoon, enjoying a favorite meal, or simply being comfortable at home with someone they love.

There is no single definition of living well.

Small Things Still Matter

Whatever your current state of health, there are things that can help you live more fully in the moment you’re in.

• Keep moving in whatever way you can. Walking, stretching, strength and balance exercises — or simply moving more throughout the day — can help preserve function and independence.
• Stay engaged in your health. Regular care, appropriate screenings and good management of chronic conditions can help you make informed decisions and often prevent small concerns from becoming larger ones.
• Nourish yourself. Food, hydration, sleep and rest all matter. And sometimes nourishment is also a cup of coffee with a friend or your favorite dessert with your grandchildren.
• Stay connected. Relationships matter enormously to quality of life. Make the phone call. Accept the invitation. Ask someone to visit. Tell the story again, even if everyone has heard it before.
• Keep doing things that feel like you. Read. Garden. Cook. Pray. Paint. Play cards. Listen to music. Watch terrible television. Cheer for your team. Learn something. Laugh whenever you get the chance. It’s Healthy Aging Month – learn more about how to live fully in the life you’re in now.

And perhaps most importantly:

Let people help you. 

Sometimes Help Makes More Life Possible

Needing help can feel like losing independence.

Often, the opposite is true.

The right support can preserve energy for the things that matter. It can make home safer. It can help someone recover after an illness or surgery. It can make a difficult medical condition more manageable. It can reduce pain and symptoms. It can help families spend more time being spouses, sons, daughters and grandchildren – and less time trying to manage care they weren’t trained to provide.

That’s what good health care should do. It shouldn’t take over your life.

It should help make more room for living it. 

Be Here Now

None of us knows exactly what the next chapter will bring.

That has always been true, whether we were 25 or 85. Aging simply has a way of making us more aware of it.

So perhaps one of the healthiest things we can do is stop waiting for some different version of life before allowing ourselves to fully inhabit this one.

Not when the knee feels better. Not when the treatment is over. Not when things settle down.

Not when life looks the way it used to.

Now.

At ALC Health Care Services, we care for people across many different stages of health and aging — from those who need a little help staying healthy and independent to those living with complex or serious illness.

The care may look different for each person.

The purpose behind it does not.

To help you live as fully as possible in the life you have today.

Because your best life doesn’t have to mean your easiest life. It doesn’t have to mean your healthiest life. And it certainly doesn’t have to mean your younger life.

It means being present for the life that is yours. Learn more about ALC.

Your Best Life Is Now.