Aging poorly is a universal fear. It certainly worries me.
You may not worry about wearing some wrinkles and a few extra strands of grey hair, or hearing from your knees a bit more frequently, just so long as you’re still able to do the things you enjoy.
While some things like hereditary illness are out of our control, there are lifestyle choices we can make to increase the chances of our bodies remaining mobile and our minds sharp for years to come.
Dr Jamie Bovay is the founder of and lead physical therapist at KinetikChain Denver. He believes that you can engineer a body that doesn’t just survive, but thrives.
I asked him to share what he thinks are the five worst habits for promoting poor aging and how best to tackle them.
Here’s what he had to say.
1. Never experiencing a mildly uncomfortable temperature
“Avoiding physical discomfort by staying in perfectly climate-controlled rooms can age us because our cells evolved to handle hormetic stress,” says Bovay. Hormetic stress is a small dose of controlled stress applied to promote growth and development.
“When we never get too hot or too cold, our mitochondria (cellular engines) get lazy,” says Bovay. “This leads to poor metabolic flexibility and cellular waste buildup.”
He suggests fixing this by adding small doses of hormetic stress to your routine every day.
“End your shower with 30 seconds of cold water or use a sauna two to three (or more) times a week,” he says.
“This shocks your cells into a cleaning cycle called mitophagy that cleans up damaged and underperforming cells, which helps your metabolic efficiency and helps protect you against premature age-related degeneration.”
Remember to speak to your doctor about any lifestyle changes like sauna use or cold showers before you implement them. This is particularly important if you have an underlying heart condition.
2. Chronic mouth breathing
Many of us know that mouth breathing is something to watch out for in children, but it impacts adults, too.
“Breathing through your mouth during the day or while sleeping keeps your nervous system in fight or flight mode, which spikes [the stress hormone] cortisol and keeps your body in a state of high tension,” says Bovay.
He suggests that on your next walk, practice breathing only through your nose.
3. Neglecting strength training
Don’t skip your weight-lifting sessions in favor of cardio.
“Muscle loss (sarcopenia) is a primary driver of aging,” explains Bovay. “Muscle is your ‘biological 401(k)’—it manages your blood sugar and protects your joints. Without it, your physical architecture collapses, leading to frailty and metabolic decline.”
He suggests adding strength training to your routine two or three times a week, and ensuring the weights you choose are appropriately challenging.
4. Exercising in the cardio gray zone
Bovay says that for your cardio to contribute to longevity, you want to mix very easy exercise with the occasional hard workout, and that too many people spend all their time in the middle.
The way to know how much effort you’re putting in is to familiarize yourself with the five heart rate zones, which are tracked and displayed on every fitness tracker and smartwatch nowadays.
Here’s a brief rundown of the most common definition of heart rate zones:
- Zone 1: 50-60% of your maximum heart rate
- Zone 2: 60-70% of your maximum heart rate
- Zone 3: 70-80% of your maximum heart rate
- Zone 4: 80-90% of your maximum heart rate
- Zone 5: 90-100% of your maximum heart rate
“Longevity requires a balance of zone 2 (steady-state aerobic) and zone 5 (high-intensity) work,” says Bovay.
“Zone 2 builds mitochondrial density and metabolic health, while zone 5 increases your VO2 max cardiovascular ceiling,” he says.
Your VO2 Max is the maximum rate at which your body can use oxygen during intense exercise, making it a good indicator of your cardiovascular health.
If you aren’t spending enough time in zone 2, Bovay says your cells lose metabolic efficiency. “But if you skip the hard intervals, your heart loses its peak pumping capacity,” he adds.
He suggests designing your cardio workouts with an 80/20 split.
“Spend 80% of your cardio time at a pace where you can still hold a conversation (zone 2) and 20% at short intervals of your absolute limit (zone 5).”
5. Accepting symptoms as aging
Many of us are guilty of putting off medical treatments because our symptoms are manageable and more of a nuisance than a problem. Unfortunately, this may be making you age faster.
Bovay says that minor aches and low energy are not just part of getting older. They may be common—particularly in sedentary adults—but they are not inevitable. Treating them as normal is a slippery slope towards loss of mobility, strength and independence as we get older.
“If you start to lose mobility, you start to lose your ability to easily exercise. This impacts your strength and VO2 max, which are the number one and two predictors of an early death,” explains Bovay.
“When you stop moving because of a nagging knee, you accelerate the decline of every other system.”
While this all sounds scary, Bovay says an attitude change is all that is required to fix it.
“Treat every injury as a structural flaw to be engineered, not an inevitability to be accepted,” he says.
“Even when one area of your body isn’t moving perfectly, you can use others while rehabbing your achy areas.”
He suggests swapping out your regular workouts for low-impact alternatives when recovering from an injury. Try swimming, using the elliptical or doing Pilates.
“Try to maintain your mobility, strength and cardiovascular capacity at all costs in any way you can,” he adds.
Dr Jamie Bovay is a Denver-based physical therapist, longevity specialist and human performance expert. He is the author of the bestselling book Adding Insight to Injury, and frequently speaks publicly about the intersection of physical therapy, strength and rehabilitation, technology, and healthspan.