You don’t need to be lonely because you live alone, or lacking in social interaction.

Take a lesson from the 2 guys in prison who, one night, looked outside of their cells through the prison bars.

One guy saw the beautiful full moon set against a dark sky, dwarfing the millions of twinkling little stars in the background.

The other guy saw the mud below.

Of course, it is never nice to be behind bars, but there is always a silver lining in every situation you are in. And you have a choice whether to fixate on the dark clouds or peer through its thickness to see the bright sunshine behind.

You can wallow in your loneliness until death, or shake it off and live a happy and fruitful life – like many other elderly people do.

Loneliness is not peculiar to you. A study done by the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), shows that 18% of elderly people in the U.S. live alone. Of this figure, 43% of them are chronically lonely.

That leaves more than half being able to shake off loneliness; more than half enjoying their golden years.

And it is not difficult to be one of them – just focus on the moon, not on the mud. It may take a lot of determined effort. But it is worth it. Besides, being alone has its own benefits not appreciated by seniors living with family.

Benefits of Living Alone

How to Banish Loneliness from Your Life

The post How to Banish Loneliness from You Life first appeared on Age With Charm.

Do you know that your habits can make or break you?

Your habits as a child earned you parental praises or a disciplinary smack on the butt.

Then you started going to school and developed new habits – habits that either made you the darling of the class or the class bully. Which was it?

High school passed swiftly and you entered college and a new set of habits. Can you remember them Did it help you make it to the Deans’ list or put you among those who were deemed least likely to succeed.

You finished college anyway and entered the workforce with yet another set of habits. This time they were more significant in your life. You were not playing for grades but of making a career. This time, too, your habits either made you breeze up the organizational ladder, or made you struggle, one rung at a time.

Looking back through the years can make you beam with pleasure or turn blue with embarrassment. They are nostalgic, yes, yet make you wish you did better.

But that’s water under the bridge, so to speak. Now you are old – with a new set of habits. How are you making out with them?

Yes, my dear John, at your age your habits can still make or break you. They can spell the difference between a bouncy and happy old you, or the grumpy type which society loves to stereotype us in.

Your habits can either take you places to explore or no farther than your doctor’s clinic.

They can either make you live longer or cut your retirement short.

You don’t know what they are?

Well, here’s a list of habits that can break you and tips to get out of their stranglehold.

1.  Loneliness:

Right now 18% of seniors are lonely and 43% reports feeling lonely on a regular basis.

Though loneliness is not a habit, it can develop into one if it comes regularly. And it can have dire consequences.

A study made by a psychology professor at Brigham Young University shows that loneliness can shorten a man’s life the same way as smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

This finding is very tragic at a time of instant messaging and the proliferation of social networking sites. These days being lonely is anachronistic.

So before loneliness breaks you, break free from it.

If you are a “loner” develop a hobby, travel, volunteer, or join a group in your locality. Get involved.

Learn how to use the Internet so you can get in touch with family and friends, exchange stories or old photos, or meet new friends online.

Anything to keep your mind off your loneliness is a step away from depression, or dementia.

Vivek Murthy, former US. Surgeon General has labeled loneliness as a worldwide epidemic.

Don’t be a  part of it.

2.  Sitting:

If you have the habit of spending hours on end in front of your TV, break it before it breaks you. That is like taking a slow boat to an early death.

Studies show that too much sitting increases your risk for colon cancer, endometrial and lung cancers.

In a worldwide study released last April 13, 2013, a sedentary lifestyle is responsible for 6% coronary heart disease cases, 7% type 2 diabetes, 10% breast cancer and 10% colon cancer cases. In fact, it further stated that inactivity causes more deaths than smoking.

If you want to break this habit, yet too lazy to exercise, don’t use the remote control so you will be forced to get up each time you want to change channels, and keep a bowl of popcorn on your lap. Walk to the ref if you have a replenishment.

These little acts of self-sacrifice may allow you to enjoy life a lot longer.

3.  Insufficient sleep:

Though aging affects a person’s sleep patterns there is no truth that seniors need less sleep than younger people. Regardless of age, healthy sleep should between seven to eight hours (depending on the person).

You can get by with occasional sleep insufficiency, but if it becomes a habit, you expose yourself to the risk of strokes and heart attacks, high blood pressure and diabetes.

I’ve learned how to sleep well a long time ago and you can learn it too if you want to sleep like a babe as I do.

4.  Tanning:

The next time you want to bask under a noonday sun or underneath artificial sunlight, be careful. Your desire to have that golden brown tan can become a nightmare.

A study published in 2014 showed that it causes more cases of skin cancer than lung cancer from smoking.

If you must, don’t stay under the sun from 10 am to 3 pm – that’s when the sun is at its hottest. And never forget to cover your body with a sunscreen lotion of no less than 30 SPF.

And don’t ever think that indoor tanning is safer than outdoors. Both emit the same amount of UV (ultraviolet rays) – the sun’s spectrum that gives you that beautiful tan can also result in skin cancer if you don’t curb this habit.

5.  Poor diet:

Another habit you must get out of concerns about your diet. Not that you want to go hungry, but age diminishes the sensitivity of the taste buds. If this goes together with cognitive decline, anxiety, depression, and lack of access to nutritious foods, the habit of eating just about anything or nothing is formed.

The result Poor diet.

Poor diet, or malnutrition, is a worldwide concern considering that the world is getting old every day. In the U.S., one in three elderly admitted to hospitals each year is due to malnutrition.

Malnutrition among seniors is plain bad news. It can lead to various health concerns such as weak immune system, muscle weakness which can lead to falls and fractures, and many more.

While poor diet is easy to address for healthier adults, the lack of resources, mobility problems and nutritious foods may be insurmountable for seniors.

Breaking out of this habit requires the help of family members and close friends. You cannot handle it alone. Many factors have gone into making you form this habit and tackling each one requires help. And you must reach out.

Breaking old habits and forming new ones is always difficult. But there is no truth to the saying that “old dogs can’t learn new tricks.” They can and so can you.

If given the choice between living a happy and vibrant old age, or being hobbled by countless medical problems, it is pretty obvious which to take.

Please share with other seniors to help them get out of habits that can break them.

~oOo~

The post Habits that can Break You – and How to Get out of Them first appeared on Age With Charm.

Are you a DIY (do it yourself) kind of guy I am. Though at my age, some things are more difficult to do than others – like changing a flat tire where I need to squat on bend my knees for long periods of time.

If not, then it is time to start being one. There are a lot of easy DIY things to do at home – if you care to look for them. Here are a few good reasons why…

Benefits of DIY things

DIY things are very fulfilling. The feeling of having done something worthwhile is astounding. They give a new dimension to your purpose and meaning of life. Aside from these “feel good” benefits, they also give the following benefits:

Save money:

You save money by doing it yourself instead of paying someone to do it for you.

It may not make you rich, but it can ease some pressure off your budget for groceries or utility bills.

Don’t mind if other people call you stingy. There’s nothing wrong with pinching a few bucks here and there.

earn Money

You can earn good money by selling your “DIY” expertise around the neighborhood. If some Moms sell their pastries or cookies to close friends, why can’t you do the same by doing minor car repairs, or fix a broken sofa or bed?

There are always a few people around the neighborhood who need your specific skills. They may not be much but they can help you ease your financial burden 

It keeps you busy:

There are always a lot of simple DIY projects at home to keep you occupied; keep you from being bored.

For example, you can mend torn socks, iron your clothes, fix a leaky faucet, or change a busted bulb.

These are a lot of things around the house to do if you look for them.

Slows down cognitive decline

DIY things may look simple on the surface, but they require close coordination between hands, legs, eyes, and brain. Simply put, they make you physically and mentally healthy.

DIY things help bolster your ego, your self-worth, and give you purpose.

connect with others:

There are thousands people out there happily doing DIY things. Check out Meet Up to see what groupd you may want to join.

Joining any of these groups is a good way of establishing a network of people with similar interest. It allows you to help each other grow, find solutions to common problems, and know the best suppliers of DIY things. Or, on the simplest level, get to know each other better.

learn something new:

Anthony J. D’Angelo said, “Develop a passion for learning. If you do, you will never cease to grow.”

Learning is a never-ending process – from birth until death.

Or take it from Henry Ford who said, “Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty…”

With the availability of the Internet, learning something new is just a mouse click away. Without any trace of hyperbole, I can say that I am smarter now at 72 than I was at 30.

It is liberating:

Doing things yourself when you want it, and however, you want it is liberating. It frees you from getting stressed out by a job done wrong by others. If don’t go out as expected, you have no one to berate but yourself.

Doing things yourself liberates you from these unproductive concerns and allows you to focus on what is at hand.

How to start your DIY adventure

It is not difficult to start DIY things around the house. Just look around and check what needs to be repaired, improve, or remove.

There is the leaky faucet that needs fixing, drainage that needs declogging, hanging roof eaves, creaking door hinges, the lawn that needs de-weeding, or hedges that need pruning.

What were you so passionate about in your youth but never got the chance to pursue it. Now is a perfect time.

If all these don’t ring a bell, Bored Panda has a chunky list of DIY things for elderly people, like you.

Whatever catches your fancy, the following tips can help you get on with it successfully – and without unfortunate incidents:

• Do something you love to do or have a passion for. It will keep you motivated; be on track. It’s so easy to lose steam or be sidetracked doing things that you have no natural inclination to.
• To keep things easy, do something you have had an experience of, or trained on.
• Should you lack Item 2, ask a friend who knows how to do it. Or consult YouTube. It has tutorials on practically everything.
• Most of the DIY things at home are easy. They require no college degree or years of experience. But they do require a lot of common sense. For example, changing a light bulb or repairing a flat iron can be done by a kid. But common sense tells never to handle electrical appliances with wet hands. Or stand on a platform that can’t take your weight, or out of balance.
• Be patient if can’t do it right the first time. Everything has a learning curve. Just keep at it. Practice makes perfect

At this point in our lives doing nothing at home is like putting a bullet into your head. It can cause anger, anxiety, indifference, substance abuse, and depression. Nobody dies from business, but many have died due to idleness. So lighten up and brighten up and start puttering around the house. You will be amazed to see how many things you can do and be astounded by the results of your labor.

~oOo~

The post Why are DIY Things Beneficial to Elderly People first appeared on Age With Charm.