How to Live Forever in Ten Easy Steps

Admittedly, immortality is a pretty broad and far-reaching subject for a mere cooking blog. But I think it can be safely said that one of the biggest determinants to your life expectancy is how you eat, what you eat, and how much you eat.

Today's post contains ten suggestions for how to dramatically increase your lifespan, mainly by focusing on food. Click on each link for an expanded discussion.

Here goes:

1) Eat More Antioxidant-Rich Foods:
In the long run you’ll dramatically reduce your risk of colon cancer (and other cancers as well), and you’ll lower your cholesterol, blood pressure and overall risk of cardiovascular ailments.

2) Go Only Partially Vegetarian:
Vegetarian cuisine is typically higher in fiber, lower in fat and sodium, and all around healthier than a typical meat-centered cuisine. But at the risk of annoying both vegetarians and meat-eaters, I strongly urge you to eat some meat (or dairy) on occasion too. Just not every day.

3) Avoid Processed Foods:
The worst kinds of foods for your health are highly refined and energy-dense foods like candy bars, Doritos, Oreos, and most breakfast cereals. Your body can transmute these refined foods into body fat unbelievably efficiently.

4) Learn to Cook Your Own Food:
Nothing will teach you appreciation for a healthy diet like learning how to cook.

5) Eat Less Than You Want:
Recognize that hunger (or better said, "fullness") is a misleading sensation. Satisfying it fully will cause you to consume more food than your body needs.

6) Don’t Smoke:
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for an individual’s right to choose to smoke. Just don't exhale near me.

7) Exercise. Break a Sweat Three Times a Week:
Exercise is like penance. It cancels out your eating and drinking sins by burning them off. Moreover, the more you exercise and the fitter you get, the less you want to bend or break these other rules.

8) Get More Sleep:
Your sleep patterns will drive
a) Your ability and desire to exercise,
b) How well, or how poorly, you metabolize your food,
c) The performance of your immune system and how your body can fight off disease, and
d) How you feel overall.

9) Cut Back on Your Alcohol Intake:
Alcohol may be one of the great analgesics in life, but it is also one of the worst sources of empty and fattening calories.

10) Indulge a Little:
Experience some guilty pleasures every so often. It’s part of being human, and sometimes a little gluttony is what makes life worth living.

Related Posts:
Why I'm a Part-Time Vegetarian
Using Salt = Cheating
Seven Ways to Get Faster at Cooking
Eight Tips to Make Cooking at Home Laughably Cheap
Ten Rules for the Modern Restaurant-Goer
Ten Strategies to Stop Mindless Eating