Genetically,
our cells contain all our aging potential, forward and backward,
throughout our lifetime. This magic is what we call our
DNA. DNA has the capacity to express our bodies
as beautiful newborn babies, bright adolescents, and the infinite number
of possibilities of adulthood from 21 to 121 (and probably beyond).
DNA
can provide the pattern for a happy, fit, vibrant version of you at
any age as well as it can provide the pattern for a resentful, sedentary
and weak version of you at any age. Most have us have experienced
some version of this in our own lives. If you've ever gained and
subsequently lost weight; or if you've ever been in and out of various
levels of physical conditioning, you know that your body literally
changes shape according to the conditions it is working under. And
this in fact, is what is going on. Your genes are really better
thought of as genetic potential. And that potential is limitless.
Imagine
that your genes are the plants that grow on the bottom of a river
bed. The river waters flowing across them are the choices of your
life. The plants are effected dramatically by the quality of this
water in the river. If it is clean and pure and flowing at a
reasonable pace, the plants flourish and reach their optimal
potential. If it is dirty or polluted in some manner with
chemicals or dwindling down to barely a trickle or gushing in a raging
flood, the bottom plants have to cope with these conditions. They
may be able to produce some smaller or distorted version of themselves
or they may not grow at all during certain conditions or they may even
die, only to come back again when conditions are more favorable.
The
truth is that genetic potential expresses itself according to the
"river" of choices that we make every day. Food choices,
thought choices, exercise choices, music choices, friendship choices,
habitation choices, appreciation choices, water quality choices, on and
on. They all impact the way that our DNA expresses itself.
Believe it or not, this puts each of us in the driver's seat when it
comes to the quality of our physical experience.
In
other words, right now we all have all the cellular material necessary
to be 16 and also to be 85.
This concept is fascinating because it
suggests we could
“un-age.”
And this truly is what anti-aging medicine is all about. Through
the choices we make in the river of our daily life, we can essentially
ask our genes to express themselves differently.
This
does not change the fact that we would all do well to embrace our selves
exactly as we are this very minute. It does free us from any sense
of victim-hood regarding our genetic heritage.
