Keeping Up with Life (Part 2): Practicing the Everyday Abilities That Help You Age Well
We often think about healthy aging in terms of exercise, nutrition, or medical tests. Yet some of the most revealing indicators of long-term health are remarkably ordinary: getting down to the floor and back up, standing on one leg, carrying what life asks us to carry, and walking at a pace that allows us to fully participate in the world around us.
In Part 2 of this series, Dr. Wendy Bazilian moves beyond the research to explore what these four everyday measures mean in practice. Rather than treating them as pass-or-fail tests, she reframes them as abilities that can be observed, practiced, strengthened, and preserved throughout life.
Drawing on research in functional fitness, mobility, balance, musculoskeletal health, and healthy aging, Dr. Bazilian explains how these seemingly simple abilities reveal far more than physical performance alone. Together, they reflect confidence, coordination, strength reserve, independence, and our capacity to keep participating in the experiences that matter most.
But research is only valuable if it changes what we do next.
Throughout the episode, Wendy offers practical ideas for bringing these abilities into everyday life, with simple ways to practice them safely, adapt them to your own starting point, and gradually build confidence over time. Whether it's getting down to the floor with a grandchild, carrying groceries from the car, recovering from a stumble before it becomes a fall, navigating an airport, or crossing the street before the light changes, these are the moments where strength, balance, mobility, and walking speed quietly shape our independence and quality of life.
One of the ideas that stayed with Wendy long after reading this research was that these aren't really four separate tests at all. They're four different windows into the same question: Can we keep up with the lives we want to live?
And another equally important question may be this: What do we do with that information once we have it? The answer doesn't have to be dramatic. It may be as simple as paying attention, practicing these everyday abilities, and preserving the strength, balance, mobility, and confidence that help us keep up with life.
WE DISCUSS
(00:00) Keeping Up with Life: Part 2
(4:00) From Measuring Ability to Putting It Into Practice
(6:07) Begin with Curiosity, Confidence, and Safety
(7:11) Getting Down to the Floor and Back Up Again
(8:26) The Chair Stand as a Practical Starting Place
(13:50) Practicing the 10-Second One-Leg Balance
(18:19) Grip Strength and the Reserve We Call On in Daily Life
(25:21) Walking Speed, Confidence, and Keeping Pace with the World
(31:24) Four Trainable Abilities That Help Us Participate in Life
CONNECT WITH WENDY
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Thank you for tuning in to 1,000 Waking Minutes and being part of this journey together. A huge thank you to our amazing collaborators including our production and marketing teams and Gabriela Escalante in particular. To the ultra-talented Beza for my theme music, my lifelong friend and artist Pearl Preis Photography and Design, to Danielle Ballantyne, Jen Nguyen, Joanna Powell, and of course, my family and everyone working tirelessly behind the scenes.
HEALTH DISCLAIMER
The information shared in this podcast is for educational purposes only and should not be considered individual medical or health advice. Always consult with your trusted healthcare provider before making any changes to your diet, exercise, or medical treatment.
Transcript
Last time, we explored four surprisingly simple measures
Speaker:that researchers have linked to health, function, and longevity.
Speaker:But knowing what they are is only half the story.
Speaker:The more important question may be this.
Speaker:What do we do with that information once we have it?
Speaker:We experience 1,000 waking minutes on average every day.
Speaker:How are you spending yours?
Speaker:I'm Dr. Wendy Bazilian, and you're listening to 1,000 Waking Minutes.
Speaker:I can't wait to connect with you here with practical ways
Speaker:to eat well, move daily, and be healthy
Speaker:to optimize every waking minute you live for a happier, healthier life.
Speaker:Thank you for sharing some of your waking minutes with me today.
Speaker:Let's get started.
Speaker:I'm saying yes to better days, yes.
Speaker:I'm on my way, yes.
Speaker:It's gonna be okay, yeah.
Speaker:Hello, I'm Dr. Wendy Bazilian,
Speaker:and thank you for joining me here on 1,000 Waking Minutes.
Speaker:In our last episode, we explored four surprisingly simple measures
Speaker:that researchers have linked to health, function, and longevity.
Speaker:We talked about getting off the floor, standing on one leg,
Speaker:grip strength, and walking speed.
Speaker:We also discovered that each of these measures
Speaker:seem to be reflecting something larger about our health
Speaker:and about how we interact with our space.
Speaker:They represent and reflect participation, confidence, and reserve.
Speaker:How can that be?
Speaker:Well, the ability to keep moving through the world
Speaker:and engaging in things we care about
Speaker:requires us to call on different abilities within our body
Speaker:that come to act outside of the gym, outside of the fitness class.
Speaker:And one of the themes I shared in the last episode
Speaker:that had emerged from the research
Speaker:was how often these measures involve abilities
Speaker:that aren't typically the focus of our attention.
Speaker:We spend a lot of time talking about aerobic fitness,
Speaker:about resistance exercise, increasingly about flexibility,
Speaker:about heart health, exercise, all the things that matter tremendously.
Speaker:But many of the researchers that we discussed,
Speaker:and one in particular, have been interested in what,
Speaker:and this was Dr. Araujo (Dr. Claudio Gil Araújo) from Brazil,
Speaker:interested in what he called non-aerobic aspects of fitness,
Speaker:things like strength and balance, mobility, flexibility, coordination,
Speaker:and the ability, again, to move our bodies through space and react,
Speaker:interacting all together,
Speaker:not uniquely focusing on only one, but how they interact.
Speaker:And those abilities show up everywhere.
Speaker:They show up when a child asks you to sit on the floor
Speaker:and play a game or read a book.
Speaker:They show up when you're carrying groceries to or from the car
Speaker:or navigating a crowded airport between gates with a tight connection,
Speaker:when you're working in the garden,
Speaker:when you're stepping off a curb we talked about,
Speaker:even when you're climbing stairs in your own home
Speaker:or just exploring a town or an area
Speaker:when you're out on an adventure in your town or somewhere else.
Speaker:Last time, I encouraged you to pay attention
Speaker:where these abilities show up in your life,
Speaker:to see those occasions when those would come in handy maybe to train
Speaker:or how good you maybe already are
Speaker:because it's a good marker of health by testing these.
Speaker:Today, I'd like to take it just a step further.
Speaker:I'm going to talk about how we practice these,
Speaker:how we preserve them,
Speaker:and maybe, and maybe most importantly,
Speaker:talking about how to approach them with curiosity and confidence,
Speaker:not like you're being ranked and graded or scored
Speaker:like they did in the research,
Speaker:but giving yourself a bit of grace along the way
Speaker:that these are things that you can check yourself on,
Speaker:establish like where you're at today,
Speaker:and if there's room for improvement, work to improve them.
Speaker:And you can do this on your own
Speaker:or you can work with a physical therapist,
Speaker:a certified exercise trainer,
Speaker:someone who can work with you.
Speaker:You can work with a partner as well.
Speaker:So let's put it into practice.
Speaker:We talked about the science in the last episode at some length
Speaker:and all the places it shows up,
Speaker:and I want to put it into real life.
Speaker:I mentioned last time about my grandmother
Speaker:who could still get down on the floor
Speaker:and get right back up into her 80s,
Speaker:and I bring this up again
Speaker:because the moment people hear a story like that,
Speaker:they're sort of like, wow,
Speaker:and they often start comparing themselves internally.
Speaker:Can I do that?
Speaker:And I encourage you not to do that.
Speaker:I encourage you to be in awe, certainly,
Speaker:because she had a very active,
Speaker:and she was very nimble,
Speaker:and she practiced it, frankly.
Speaker:As I look back, I realize that it was through her practice,
Speaker:not in a fitness kind of way,
Speaker:but how she lived her life made her,
Speaker:almost required her to be able to do that on a daily basis.
Speaker:But we're all arriving at this conversation from a different place.
Speaker:We all have different histories, different bodies,
Speaker:different injuries and limitations, of course,
Speaker:and different experiences.
Speaker:So what matters today is not to compare yourself with someone else.
Speaker:It matters understanding where you are today
Speaker:and thinking where you might like to be in a month, in a year, in five years,
Speaker:10, maybe 20 years from now on this front.
Speaker:So before trying these,
Speaker:I want you to look around your environment in every case.
Speaker:Give yourself some room.
Speaker:Move coffee tables if you need to.
Speaker:Roll up a rug.
Speaker:Make sure that a dog isn't going to jump in
Speaker:because you want to set yourself up for success for these.
Speaker:You don't want to absolutely challenge yourself right out the gate.
Speaker:You want to train yourself on some of these.
Speaker:So having a wall or a countertop or a sturdy chair
Speaker:or your spouse to lean onto if you're practicing balance.
Speaker:Finding, like I said, a physical therapist or a friend or trainer
Speaker:who can be nearby or show you the proper moves.
Speaker:I'll go through some of them, but certainly verbally.
Speaker:And if you're watching, I'm not going to be doing them today,
Speaker:although maybe I should do that for some clips and videos to show.
Speaker:But something that makes you feel comfortable and safe,
Speaker:that's a good decision.
Speaker:That's not a sign of weakness.
Speaker:Safety first.
Speaker:The goal here is to learn something useful
Speaker:that research has shown has an impact on your long-term health.
Speaker:So let's start with the floor.
Speaker:I didn't say "let's start with the score!",
Speaker:even though the researchers scored the participants
Speaker:from a starting score of 10 on how many times they touched or moved
Speaker:or used an arm or a leg or a knee or something else to get down
Speaker:and then get back up.
Speaker:We're starting with the floor.
Speaker:If you decide to try this, you need to give yourself some room.
Speaker:Make sure that the space around you is safe and comfortable
Speaker:and that you actually are near enough something
Speaker:that you can push up or engage in.
Speaker:Make sure you're not stepping over extra shoes that are around,
Speaker:and maybe you do have your shoes on or you have comfortable socks.
Speaker:There's no charging cords that you could trip into.
Speaker:And make sure that something's nearby that you can,
Speaker:if you don't think you're going to be able to immediately do this
Speaker:or just because.
Speaker:Have a chair nearby, someone, a sofa, a cushion, something.
Speaker:That's totally reasonable.
Speaker:And simply pay attention and try to get yourself down to the ground.
Speaker:Now, the side note on this is if you do have limitations,
Speaker:you can do this into a chair because most of us are sitting into a chair,
Speaker:and you can use a chair as the first step.
Speaker:And the Centers for Disease Control actually have a really cool chair exercise
Speaker:that I'll mention briefly as well, and I mentioned in the last episode,
Speaker:where it's a Sit-Rise Test that you can do from a chair.
Speaker:But notice, how did you get down to the ground?
Speaker:And then notice, how do you get back up?
Speaker:So I would say the first attempt is just get down and get back up the way
Speaker:you normally do, if you normally do that.
Speaker:And just notice, you know, what parts of your body engage?
Speaker:How many things do you touch?
Speaker:Do you lean your elbow?
Speaker:Do you push off your knee?
Speaker:Do you naturally place your hand on a floor?
Speaker:Do you pause halfway and think through what your next move is going to be?
Speaker:Some people sort of operate, and they try one thing, and they try the next,
Speaker:but they get themselves back up.
Speaker:Did you move confidently, more confidently maybe than you expected,
Speaker:or were you hesitant?
Speaker:So use curiosity first and start conservatively.
Speaker:It's the best place to start when you're practicing something like your mobility
Speaker:that engages, again, like strength and balance and coordination,
Speaker:all these things.
Speaker:So you're in a place where you have room to move.
Speaker:If balance is a concern, be sure to consider having another person nearby as well.
Speaker:You might even begin by sitting on the edge of a sofa.
Speaker:So I'm giving a lot of setups so that it's in your mind and you consider this.
Speaker:You can sit on the edge of a sofa and maybe lower yourself to the floor under control
Speaker:and then see what it feels like to get back up onto the sofa.
Speaker:Again, noticing.
Speaker:This is all about noticing.
Speaker:Do you naturally roll to one side?
Speaker:Do you use a hand?
Speaker:Do you reach for support?
Speaker:None of these is wrong.
Speaker:They're simply part of the information gathering.
Speaker:As your confidence grows, you can try moving all the way from standing to sitting on the floor
Speaker:and then returning to standing and seeing if you can reduce the amount of reliance you might have
Speaker:on furniture or other supports.
Speaker:This is about taking your time.
Speaker:There's no winner for speed and noticing what feels easy and challenging along the way.
Speaker:So the goal is not to rush through this one.
Speaker:In fact, I'd encourage you to move slowly.
Speaker:Slowly enough that you can notice what's happening along the way.
Speaker:Most people learn something even before they start thinking about how well they're doing it.
Speaker:And we are not trying to become experts at sitting on the floor, by the way.
Speaker:We're preserving our ability to participate in life.
Speaker:Think about that.
Speaker:And the floor just happens to be the place where several of these important capacities show up
Speaker:at the same time.
Speaker:Think about the child who invites you down to the floor and you say,
Speaker:well, no, come up here on the sofa.
Speaker:Maybe you start at the sofa and you get to where you can come down on the floor
Speaker:or where your grandchild has the blocks spread out.
Speaker:And even before being invited, you're able to get yourself down on the floor
Speaker:because you're confident you can get back up and you can play blocks.
Speaker:Where stretching can become easier because the idea of getting down there
Speaker:to start your stretching routine is more comfortable.
Speaker:Or going to the beach doesn't seem like a lot of extras on how to figure out
Speaker:if you're going to carry the chair or how you're going to get there
Speaker:or whether you're going to pass on it altogether because you worry about
Speaker:the sand being a little uneven and how will I get the towel down,
Speaker:me down to the towel and me back up off the towel.
Speaker:So this is really the reasoning behind why I don't think of this as a floor test,
Speaker:per se, but simply a place where strength and mobility and flexibility,
Speaker:balance, all those things, coordination, a big one,
Speaker:you get a chance to introduce them to yourself again all at once.
Speaker:So I want to reiterate that if the floor doesn't feel like the right place to start,
Speaker:we never want to create pain or force through this.
Speaker:And that's where the Centers for Disease Control, the CDC's,
Speaker:it's called a 30-second chair test.
Speaker:I mean, on its own, it's great. You should do this anyway.
Speaker:But if the floor is more than you want to bite off at the beginning,
Speaker:the 30-Second Chair Stand test is a good one.
Speaker:You sit in a sturdy chair and you see how many times you can stand up
Speaker:and sit back down in 30 seconds.
Speaker:Whether you're assisted or not,
Speaker:but the goal is to do it without using your hands ultimately.
Speaker:And it asks a slightly different question, but many of the same qualities show up.
Speaker:So it's another great one. And let's face it,
Speaker:a lot of us are getting into cars and getting back out,
Speaker:sitting down on chairs and getting back out.
Speaker:And certainly if we want to do more of that neat that I've talked about in
Speaker:another episode, non-exercise activity thermogenesis,
Speaker:I want you getting up out of that chair even more frequently just to do
Speaker:ordinary movement throughout.
Speaker:So that is the Floor-Rise Test (Sit-Rise Test) in short.
Speaker:There's more specifics on how to exactly do it.
Speaker:Or, you know,
Speaker:if you wanted to replicate the study and put your feet crossed and go down
Speaker:into a crisscross and rise back up, that is very challenging.
Speaker:I will, I will admit,
Speaker:but the point is practicing getting down and getting back up because
Speaker:sometimes life challenges us and puts us down and we still need to somehow get
Speaker:back up. So the next one that we talked about was balance.
Speaker:So let's talk about balance.
Speaker:And this is a really pretty cool and very simple test.
Speaker:Not always simple to do, but simple tests to try and engage.
Speaker:It seems really straightforward,
Speaker:but it often reveals more than people expect. So here for safety,
Speaker:what you want to do,
Speaker:and this is the One Leg Stand (Test) and you want to try to do it for 10 seconds.
Speaker:That's a,
Speaker:that's basically what we're going to do on both legs and see if you can balance
Speaker:unaided for 10 seconds. So first for safety,
Speaker:you want to stand near your kitchen counter next to a wall,
Speaker:the back of a sturdy chair that doesn't slide,
Speaker:that you can reach to if you need.
Speaker:You might start with your hands on those surfaces,
Speaker:and then you're going to lift one foot slightly off the floor and try to hold
Speaker:it for 10 seconds. Feel what 10 seconds feels like.
Speaker:Maybe you count out the one 1,000, two 1,000, or use a stopwatch,
Speaker:or just estimate. You can certainly count, but remember,
Speaker:this is a simple test that's generated a lot of interest among researchers.
Speaker:In the study I shared,
Speaker:the ability to stand on one leg for 10 seconds was associated with better
Speaker:long-term health outcomes. And 10 seconds may not seem very long. I mean,
Speaker:it isn't in the scheme of life certainly,
Speaker:but it appears to tell us something meaningful about future health.
Speaker:And just like getting off of the floor turned out to be much more than about
Speaker:the floor,
Speaker:balance appears to be much more than just about standing still or doing that
Speaker:well.
Speaker:And what makes this so valuable is how quickly it gives us feedback.
Speaker:It gives us information we can actually use.
Speaker:One side often feels different than the other.
Speaker:Some people are surprised how steady they feel. That's encouraging.
Speaker:Others notice a bit of instability that they weren't aware of.
Speaker:Maybe they thought that they were a little more steady on their feet than they
Speaker:are. But either way, you learn something that's useful right away.
Speaker:And again, before you start comparing yourself, you know,
Speaker:to the results of your spouse or, you know, if you play pickleball,
Speaker:your pickleball partner, you know, it's a good thing to do.
Speaker:It's sort of a good game warmup. Let's get our balance going.
Speaker:Or a teenager in your house that impresses you with their yoga poses.
Speaker:Remember, we're looking for your information. You know,
Speaker:there's no winner here. It's about you.
Speaker:So balance is one of the abilities that supports us everywhere throughout the
Speaker:day. It helps us step off a curb. It helps us move from, you know,
Speaker:the driveway to grass up to a step.
Speaker:It helps us recover from a misstep.
Speaker:It keeps a misstep from being a misstep or a stumble and not a fall.
Speaker:Even without thinking about it, our body catches us.
Speaker:So set yourself up well, stand by something stable,
Speaker:keep your fingertip nearby or start with one on that surface.
Speaker:That may add confidence at the beginning.
Speaker:And remember this isn't about proving anything.
Speaker:It's about observing where you are today and encouraging yourself to practice
Speaker:your way up till you can, you can do it.
Speaker:Maybe you can do it more than 10 seconds, but the goal is 10 seconds.
Speaker:That's what the research showed is important. Balancing for 10 seconds,
Speaker:two seconds today. Terrific. Two seconds next week. Great.
Speaker:Three seconds, five seconds, you know, moving your way up,
Speaker:take your time, but train your balance.
Speaker:There are lots of ways you can do, you know, formal balance training today.
Speaker:We're talking about these simple four that you can take at home.
Speaker:You can work on it even while you're brushing your teeth in the in-between
Speaker:moments. It can be some, sometimes the beneficial ones,
Speaker:the ones where you align your behaviors together and the moments add up,
Speaker:they stack up more than people realize.
Speaker:And they help us build awareness, control and confidence in space.
Speaker:So if you feel unsteady today, this is not bad news.
Speaker:This is your starting place to get more balance in your life.
Speaker:And I mean physical balance because it does improve with repetition.
Speaker:You'll see your nervous system adapts. You have different balance centers.
Speaker:We tend to rely more and more on our eyes as we get older,
Speaker:but our ears and also our proprioception,
Speaker:which is the nervous system communication throughout.
Speaker:Those are parts of our balance centers.
Speaker:It's sort of a trio and with consistent,
Speaker:simple practice progress is something you genuinely feel and you can feel it
Speaker:pretty quickly. The next practice is about strength,
Speaker:but not at the gym and not how much, you know, dead-weight can you lift,
Speaker:but it's about grip strength of all things.
Speaker:And really what we talked about last episode and what it comes down to is sort
Speaker:of a measurement of our strength reserve in our body.
Speaker:Most of us don't spend our days wondering about our grip strength unless you,
Speaker:you know, actually work with, with your hands, you know,
Speaker:a mechanic or a musician drummer or a guitarist,
Speaker:but we definitely notice strength when life calls on it. You know,
Speaker:when we, when we are trying to lift a suitcase at the airport up onto the,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:- even up onto the scale when we're checking in let alone - up into the overhead
Speaker:compartment,
Speaker:when we're lifting our groceries or sort of like a bigger package load that
Speaker:came from the warehouse store, like Costco, you know,
Speaker:you're trying to carry something that's a little awkward,
Speaker:but also a little bit heavy when you're carrying things.
Speaker:I mentioned last time carrying like a bag of potting soil. We were,
Speaker:we were planting some things in some container gardens last weekend and
Speaker:potting soil is notoriously challenging to carry because that always is a big,
Speaker:but it sort of shifts as you're carrying it or maybe, you know,
Speaker:just grabbing your grandchild or your child,
Speaker:when they come running at you and being able to not like brace yourself for
Speaker:your life or go, no, no, no, but you know,
Speaker:receive them with joy and be able to lift them and carry them.
Speaker:That's all signs of strength, not all the grip strength, but remember,
Speaker:we're talking about reserve.
Speaker:The research we discussed last week was about how lower grip strength was
Speaker:associated with higher risk of death from all causes.
Speaker:So that when grip strength goes down,
Speaker:because it's one of the earlier signs of decline and earlier signs of overall
Speaker:musculoskeletal health, which I just found so interesting.
Speaker:And this wasn't one study.
Speaker:There's increasing research looking at this and it's sort of like a lowest
Speaker:hanging fruit.
Speaker:Like if you can measure one thing like grip strength as being sort of proxy
Speaker:for other things,
Speaker:and even relatively small differences between grip strength in one hand and
Speaker:the other,
Speaker:- between one person was associated with poorer long-term outcomes.
Speaker:And this is one reason why grip strength has become such an interesting area of
Speaker:study, but let's bring it into real life.
Speaker:You know, if you're curious about your own grip strength,
Speaker:there are hand grip dynamometers.
Speaker:They're called - where the YouTube version of the video version of this,
Speaker:I'm squeezing my hand -
Speaker:there's different tools that can like measure and you can see what your grip
Speaker:strength is.
Speaker:There are ways to do it at a fitness center to measure.
Speaker:And there are simple grip trainers as well.
Speaker:You know, there's therapy putty, there's stress balls,
Speaker:these hand grippers that sort of just have a coil with different difficulty
Speaker:levels, depending on what color the handles are.
Speaker:I need to squeeze, squeeze and release, squeeze and release.
Speaker:But I actually don't want to get too focused on the gadgets.
Speaker:That's not the first place to go.
Speaker:I'd rather have us pay attention to the places where strength shows up in our
Speaker:daily life.
Speaker:And we already have a few very simple gadgets at home that we can use.
Speaker:Think about the next time you're carrying groceries or lifting luggage or
Speaker:opening the jar or moving a box, hauling laundry upstairs.
Speaker:Notice what happens.
Speaker:Do the tasks feel comfortable?
Speaker:Are they challenging?
Speaker:How do your hand hands feel your arms, your, your muscles?
Speaker:Do you avoid some of them altogether that you used to do?
Speaker:Do you naturally ask for or look for help on some of them?
Speaker:None of those answers to those questions that you might have is like right or
Speaker:wrong.
Speaker:It's just information that I want you to pay attention to when you're engaging
Speaker:your strength and daily living.
Speaker:And the really encouraging side of this is that strength is remarkably
Speaker:trainable throughout life, even well into our eighties.
Speaker:We didn't necessarily think, I mean,
Speaker:it might take a little more work and more consistently,
Speaker:but you can train it and you can grow muscle used to be thought like use it
Speaker:or lose it. Or once you get to 30, it's all over.
Speaker:I mean, there were all these thoughts,
Speaker:but the matter of it really was that we weren't living long enough and people
Speaker:weren't researching, you know, can it really happen?
Speaker:So there were a lot of assumptions that were made in early science,
Speaker:just based on the reality of life expectancy and what we knew of people,
Speaker:you know, at that time,
Speaker:but you don't have to become any kind of power lifter to give your muscles a
Speaker:reason to stay engaged. So you might do resistance training.
Speaker:I highly encourage it topic for a whole nother day,
Speaker:but it might be for you the difference in doing some strength training that just
Speaker:helps you carry on groceries in one trip versus two,
Speaker:if you want to or doing the things like gardening or lifting or pushing or
Speaker:pulling or helping people in a way that you're not questioning whether or how
Speaker:much you can do. You just, you can do it again.
Speaker:So bringing curiosity into your everyday life,
Speaker:I think that that's something I constantly encourage,
Speaker:but I encourage it here as well for a tangible place to start though.
Speaker:And this is like gadget light. You know,
Speaker:we don't need big fitness gadgets unless you're into them and you want to buy
Speaker:one more thing, but you can grab a tennis ball.
Speaker:If you have some of those stress balls, sometimes you get them at, you know,
Speaker:if you go to conferences, you get a stress ball.
Speaker:You can even use a rolled up pair of socks this way or stuff,
Speaker:you know, some socks and give it a firm squeeze.
Speaker:What you do when you're, you know,
Speaker:sort of training your grip strength is you gradually tighten your grip.
Speaker:You hold for about five seconds.
Speaker:Sometimes I have you grip a little harder just for one or two seconds.
Speaker:Cause usually you can find a little more juice in there and then slowly
Speaker:release again, repeat that five times with each hand.
Speaker:Maybe you do a couple sets. You do it again a couple times,
Speaker:but even just five times, five times and go on your way.
Speaker:It's not a formal test.
Speaker:It's not a replacement for overall strength training,
Speaker:but it can help you become more aware of your grip.
Speaker:And you might be able to start like building up some of that strength.
Speaker:Sometimes it's the first step in getting toward a strength training routine is
Speaker:doing things that are simple and sort of prove their point to you and in
Speaker:noticing it and then engaging in small ways and seeing like benefits and
Speaker:things that actually matter to you. I mean, it matters to some people,
Speaker:you know, how much, you know, dead weight you can lift over your head,
Speaker:but is that a real life thing that matters to you every day?
Speaker:Sometimes when you see that your,
Speaker:your capacity has increased by doing some strength training,
Speaker:that's really where you're like, Oh, I see it. I get it.
Speaker:And strength becomes meaningful and showing up in your real life in that way.
Speaker:And it's what helps us continue doing the things we want and need to do in
Speaker:life with confidence and independence and maintain that reserve for when we need
Speaker:it, because sometimes we need it, especially, especially with age,
Speaker:but I would say anytime in life, we need reserve to call on when we need it.
Speaker:And the final one that I want to talk about of the four is walking.
Speaker:And we talked about this in the context of getting across the street before the
Speaker:light changes and walking is so deeply embedded in daily life that most of us
Speaker:barely notice walking unless something gets in our way, frankly.
Speaker:And by gets in our way, it can be small things,
Speaker:but it can also be bigger things like a twisted ankle that stops you or the curb
Speaker:that you go over that you missed and didn't see or that airport terminal.
Speaker:And I can name a few with such minimum time between connections or the gates
Speaker:are just so far that it says 15 minutes between this,
Speaker:this terminal and that one, or this gate and that one.
Speaker:It can also show up in how your feet feel after a day that you spent out
Speaker:exploring that maybe didn't feel the same if you had done it years before.
Speaker:And, or if you forgot to break in newest shoes, which on occasion, you know,
Speaker:you go for the trip, you get the new shoes.
Speaker:And maybe when you were younger, it didn't hurt so much, but if you try it,
Speaker:try it when you get a little bit older, boy, you know,
Speaker:you see the value of breaking in those shoes.
Speaker:I've certainly been there. I imagine some of you have been as well.
Speaker:Suddenly that thing that feels so automatic is,
Speaker:it shows up and it's really worth paying attention to.
Speaker:As you put that one into practice, you start somewhere safe and familiar.
Speaker:And that's really important.
Speaker:I don't want you to test yourself in the real live busy streets on how quickly
Speaker:you can get across a street while the light is flashing 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
Speaker:But choose like a long hallway.
Speaker:If you have a hallway somewhere you work or in your home,
Speaker:maybe there's a quiet sidewalk or a grassy area in a local park.
Speaker:A school track is a great place to do it because it's usually upkept,
Speaker:kept... the upkeep.
Speaker:It's kept up so that it's,
Speaker:it's level and it's not going to be potholes and, you know,
Speaker:little groundhog holes or anything that you might find yourself navigating into
Speaker:if you're not paying enough attention. But any level surface can work well.
Speaker:And this isn't about sprinting or racing, seeing how fast you can go,
Speaker:but paying attention to how walking feels itself,
Speaker:rather than worrying about the stopwatch,
Speaker:but also what your pace and gait feel like and look like.
Speaker:So I want you to notice your pace,
Speaker:notice your confidence going across that space,
Speaker:notice whether you move comfortably and continuously,
Speaker:or whether you're working harder than you expected.
Speaker:Sometimes as time goes by,
Speaker:it's a good baseline because then you can really like sort of register where
Speaker:you are now in time.
Speaker:But you expect that you're doing the same as you did before,
Speaker:because you've never really, you know, thought to pay attention to it.
Speaker:So you might even try this when walking with a friend,
Speaker:can you carry on a conversation comfortably with that friend while keeping a
Speaker:pace or keeping a pace that starts slightly faster than your normal pace?
Speaker:Can you walk farther than usual? Or can you pick up the pace briefly?
Speaker:A friend of mine who was training in her neighborhood and was in her 80s.
Speaker:I don't know if she still does this or not.
Speaker:She's a bit more senior than 80s now, but she used to train.
Speaker:She had a trainer and she would train between telephone poles and they would do
Speaker:literal training on pace and walking and gait speed between telephone poles.
Speaker:And so training your pace can be about like picking up a little for a duration
Speaker:and then settling back into normal rhythm as you're breathing.
Speaker:And what I find so interesting about walking speed is that it starts to then
Speaker:show up in places where you're not really thinking about fitness at all.
Speaker:You know, it really is.
Speaker:It comes down to the flight connections we're making or crossing the street
Speaker:when the light is flashing.
Speaker:It's last minute things that you have to get to.
Speaker:It's keeping up with friends, you know, when you're on a walk
Speaker:or when you're wandering around a museum maybe with a friend
Speaker:or strolling a farmer's market, you know,
Speaker:without constantly looking for maybe the place to sit down.
Speaker:It's things like that, that this training can really help you for.
Speaker:But it trains you even for far more.
Speaker:It really helps you keep up with life.
Speaker:And maybe that's why this research has really stayed with me.
Speaker:I shared in the last episode that I heard this once.
Speaker:I heard about this research about, you know, testing the speed
Speaker:where individuals over the age of 50 and into their 60s,
Speaker:different studies looked at whether they could get across the crosswalk
Speaker:in the time that was engineered on the sign.
Speaker:And it just, like, changed my thinking for some reason.
Speaker:It, like, woke me up to something I just really hadn't considered before.
Speaker:And now it's part of just what I think.
Speaker:You know, I see it everywhere.
Speaker:And the bigger piece is whether we're able to move through the world
Speaker:at the pace that allows us to participate in it,
Speaker:in the experience that we want to, in what we call our well-lived life.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:I think of, you know, going to the zoo with my daughter
Speaker:or with your child or grandchildren or just others,
Speaker:keeping up with individuals at home that are running around,
Speaker:saying yes to the one more block or one more exhibit
Speaker:or one more thing into the day.
Speaker:So, in many ways, walking speed really is simply, like,
Speaker:mobility meeting up with opportunity.
Speaker:You know, sort of poetic there.
Speaker:Mobility meeting up with opportunity.
Speaker:Yeah, I think that's about right.
Speaker:And it reflects how comfortably we can move through the world
Speaker:and participate in the experiences available to us
Speaker:and that we want to participate in.
Speaker:So, with all that in mind, when I started preparing for this episode,
Speaker:these two episodes in tandem,
Speaker:I originally thought, like, I would like to talk about four separate measures.
Speaker:I thought they were all fascinating unto themselves
Speaker:and they were things that we could do in our daily life.
Speaker:And I knew they were trainable, so I'd read the research.
Speaker:You know, getting off the floor, you know, sitting and rising, both, really.
Speaker:Standing on one leg.
Speaker:Grip strength, which I thought was sort of an odd man out,
Speaker:but I came to really love what it represented.
Speaker:And walking speed.
Speaker:And I thought about that.
Speaker:But the more I sort of chewed on this,
Speaker:the more they seemed to be asking sort of the same question
Speaker:from different angles and different directions.
Speaker:You know, it's about participation in life, you know.
Speaker:I feel like it's about the things that are fitness, keep us fit,
Speaker:and it's about fitness beyond aerobic and resistance exercise.
Speaker:And getting off the floor turned out to be participation in life.
Speaker:You know, playing with your kids with the blocks
Speaker:or, you know, getting down to read
Speaker:or simply getting down and getting back up, period.
Speaker:Balance is about confidence.
Speaker:You know, walking across that sort of non-pliant (uneven), bumpy space
Speaker:and knowing you can do it
Speaker:and knowing that you can hold those 10 seconds eventually
Speaker:if you're not there yet.
Speaker:Strength is not just about strength in this moment, this one lift,
Speaker:but it's about the reserve that you have that you can call on when you need it.
Speaker:And walking is really about keeping up in life.
Speaker:And the encouraging part, again, is that none of these is a fixed ability.
Speaker:They're all trainable, and there's no evidence
Speaker:that you can't train them at any point in your life.
Speaker:They respond to practice.
Speaker:They respond to use.
Speaker:And they are the connectivity, the conversation,
Speaker:the relationship of our body internally to ourselves.
Speaker:They're our physical self.
Speaker:And lots of things going on, which is so cool.
Speaker:So I hope over the next week and months, years maybe,
Speaker:that you, you know, are paying attention to these things.
Speaker:You know, sit on the floor.
Speaker:These are things you do every day.
Speaker:Sit into a chair and get back up.
Speaker:Stand on one foot when your coffee is brewing in the morning.
Speaker:Grab the tennis ball or the sock, you know, after you fold it.
Speaker:Grab it, tighten it, and do some grip strength.
Speaker:And definitely, definitely get out there and take a walk.
Speaker:Noticing and doing.
Speaker:And that's what I think the real value of these measures.
Speaker:So I think that research is so cool.
Speaker:I love when scientists really dive into practical things.
Speaker:Sometimes they come out with findings that are revelations.
Speaker:Sometimes they're ordinary.
Speaker:Sometimes they're like, well, that just makes sense.
Speaker:So I think that these can teach us and help be part of the whole,
Speaker:the bigger picture, the relationship between our bodies
Speaker:and the lives that we're trying to live in here and live well.
Speaker:Thank you for sharing some of your waking minutes with me today.
Speaker:I'm Wendy Bazilian, your host and friend here at 1,000 Waking Minutes.
Speaker:And until next time, be well.
Speaker:Thank you for tuning in to 1,000 Waking Minutes.
Speaker:A huge thank you to our amazing collaborators,
Speaker:including our production and marketing teams,
Speaker:and Gabriela Escalante in particular.
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Speaker:To Danielle Ballantyne, Jen Nguyen, Joanna Powell, and of course my family.
Speaker:And everyone working tirelessly behind the scenes.
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Speaker:Until next time, find some simple opportunities
Speaker:to optimize those 1,000 Waking Minutes each day.
Speaker:I'm on my way, yes.
Speaker:It's gonna be okay, yeah.
Speaker:I'm saying yes to better days, yes.
Speaker:I'm on my way, yes.
Speaker:It's gonna be okay, yeah.
