This is our first extract from Dean Edward L. Schneider's new book, "AgeLess". It introduces Dean Ed's reasons for writing the book, his measure of individual longevity - the Longevity Quotient (LQ), and the basis for his New Rules for improving one's LQ. Robert Griffith, Editor.

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Take Control of Your Age

We all age differently. If you've ever been to a high school or college reunion, you've seen the proof up close. The prom king might look decades older than the calendar says, while the formerly mousy math whiz radiates youthful vitality and dances the night away. Though the chronological clock ticks at the same rate for all of us, everyone's biological clock has its own speed. To a great extent, you can control that rate. Though you can't stop aging, as some people and products might claim, you can age less.

The essential part of ourselves, whether you call it soul, self, or spirit, is ageless. This ageless self enables us to identify with the youthful protagonists in coming-of-age films and books because, internally, we feel eternally young. This book offers you tools to minimize the toll of time and maximize the correspondence between your ageless self and the face that meets the world. By adopting AgeLess principles, you can increase your vitality today, prevent or postpone the diseases of aging, and add healthy years to your time on earth.

Live Well to Age Well

My own grandparents were AgeLess role models for me. Though I knew them for 40 years, I never saw these two dynamos grow old. Their joie de vivre communicated an agelessness that would one day become the elixir that I now offer to all of you. My grandmother lived life to the fullest throughout her eighties, doing her own housekeeping and shopping, cooking for her grandchildren, running out to have fun with her friends at the senior center, and still having time left over to volunteer at the local nursing home. My grandfather was equally active, managing his apartment building and playing vigorously with his grandchildren. He never lost his energy or gusto for life.

During my medical training, I didn't understand what the doctors meant when they discussed old age in a negative way. These vital, engaged, and energetic people were proof to me that aging didn't mean the inevitable decline that my medical teachers described. My grandparents inspired me to make the study of aging my life's work.

We live at a time of unprecedented opportunity to maximize our AgeLess potential. In the United States, average life expectancy at birth has increased from 49 years in 1900 to over 77 today. Most readers of this book will make it to age 85, and many of you have a good shot at celebrating your 100th birthday. But with current trends, half of our future 85-year-olds will need help with simple daily tasks due to age-related infirmities acquired along the way. Which will you be - independent, vigorous, and active, or needy, disabled, and sick? Now is the time to decide.

Discover Your Longevity Quotient - and Change It

Will you be playing tennis on your 85th birthday or struggling to get out of a chair at 60? Should you expect your energy and sex drive to fizzle by age 45 or will you hit middle age with body and mind in their prime?

To help you measure your healthspan - and change it - I've developed a measurement I call the longevity quotient (LQ). You're probably already familiar with this sort of assessment in the form of the intelligence quotient (IQ) test, which was introduced by Dr. William Louis Stern in 1912 to predict how an individual will perform in comparison to the population on various cognitive tasks. Likewise, I've developed my LQ quizzes to size up your habits to help assess the length and quality of your healthspan in six key areas.

The six habits that can help you age less fall into six categories:

• Nutrition
• Exercise
• Weight management
• Sleep
• Engagement with life
• Hormone replacement

The LQ quizzes provided in the upcoming chapters can help you to see where you're on track for a long, vigorous life and where you have room to improve. If you score 100 percent on all the quizzes, congratulations! Hand this book to someone who can use it. For the rest of you (and that's most of us), a true assessment of your current situation is critical to prioritizing your personal longevity plan, so be honest with yourself: Stick with what is, rather than what you wish would be.

As they say on the radio when they try out the emergency broadcast system, the LQ is "only a test." The results don't cast your future in stone, in fact, quite the opposite. With these tests and the six-point LQ plan, you can take control of your future - perhaps for the first time - and decide for yourself how to increase your healthspan. Seeing is believing, and your LQ score can provide the framework you need to start aging less today. And remember, whether the number you see on the page is high, low, or in between, the key fact is that your longevity quotient can change for the better, if you begin implementing the LQ plan. You are investing in your present and future - so the sooner you start, the higher your lifelong LQ will be.

The Old Rules

The majority of people I meet are following old, outdated rules that no longer apply.In many cases, factors that we thought were important for successful aging have been proven wrong by newer and often better-controlled studies. Sometimes there was no solid scientific basis to begin with - the federal government's Food Guide Pyramid, for example. Many of the old rules were based on what are called observational studies, in which researchers look at such health behaviors as eating habits or exercise in groups of individuals and correlate them with specific diseases they may acquire over time. While the findings from observational studies can seem remarkable, some of those termed breakthroughs have not stood up to the next level of scientific scrutiny.

And the old rules were hard to follow. I remember exhorting people seeking the keys to aging less to work hard at their goals. Run 5 miles a day! Peel off those extra pounds! Slash the fat in your diet! Avoid stress whenever you can! Giving this advice was easy. What was hard was finding anyone who could stick with the program. We'd set the bar too high.

It was a great relief when scientific studies started to show that we could relax these rigid rules. In this book, I lay out the New Rules - cutting-edge knowledge based on the newest, most credible research that will help you maximize your LQ.

The New Rules

So where do the findings behind the New Rules come from? They came from thousands of studies published in the top peer-reviewed journals. I've traced the science of each rule back through its history and accounted for the full balance of evidence - not the latest "breakthrough." The New Rules are exciting because they break the old rules and make extending your healthspan easier than ever before. And because I take the long view, the New Rules will also serve you well far into the future.

As much as possible, the New Rules are based on the gold standard for research: randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled studies. Obviously, this design works best for pills. The best behavior-based studies compare the behavior - for example, taking exercise - with another health behavior like taking supplements or participating in an educational group.

I've based each New Rule on the preponderance of evidence from the strongest, best-designed studies conducted by leading experts on the issue. The references in the back of the book give you just a sampling of this work. If you take an interest, by all means head for the library or to the Internet to see the data at its source. If not, don't worry. I've done the hard work for you, and the New Rules translate complex research into simple lifestyle measures.

It's important to note that while the New Rules are based on the very best science, many anti-aging claims don't meet even minimal scientific standards. I've attended plenty of talks in which the speaker claims "I know it works and so do those people who've used it", effectively dismissing the need for rigorous scientific studies. No matter how many glowing testimonials you hear, even from sources you respect, don't be taken in by anecdotal evidence! Even the most intelligent individual can experience a short-term placebo effect from any given treatment; the novelty and heightened expectation of trying something new can buoy your feeling of well-being.

The above is just a sampling of Dean Ed's introductory chapter. In our next article, we'll extract some of his views on Nutrition - fueling youth with great food and a few smart supplements.

Source

Schneider EL. AgeLess. Take Control of Your Age and Stay Youthful for life. Rodale, CA, USA. 2003 http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1579546218/healthandagecom/

Links

• AgeLess: Dean Ed Schneider's Guide to Successful Aging
• LongevityQuotient.com