How to Stay Fit as You Age

When is your age considered "old"? What three health-promoting characteristics make up the foundation of healthy old age? What is your "locus of control" - and why is it so important to have one? These and other questions are answered in this first step on a journey that can change your life.

Dr. Bonura discusses the secrets of motivation and illustrates the six stages of behavioral change - precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance, and termination. She also offers tips on conquering several common barriers to change, including procrastination, preconditioned beliefs, and a fear of discomfort.

Explore the fundamentals of self-care, which involves choosing behaviors that help balance the stress of modern life. As you look at sleep, nutrition, mental exercise, and stress management, you'll learn ways to promote self-care in your life through incorporating pre-sleep rituals, strengthening your long-term memory with puzzles, and more.

How can you use physical activity to take better care of yourself? Find out with this look at the components of physical fitness, including three that specifically support healthy aging. Then, learn the basics behind any successful fitness plan - and how to develop one that works for you.

You don't need the gym to build movement into your daily life. Here, discover how to stay active throughout your day. By making small, simple choices - such as walking with a colleague instead of e-mailing, taking a dance class, or cultivating better posture - you'll move better. And feel better, too.

Mindful fitness is an important part of aging healthfully and involves exercises that cultivate unity between your mind and your body. Among the many exercises you learn about here are basic yoga, tai chi, martial arts, and meditation - all of which combine physical exercise with deliberate breathing and mental training.

Take another look at why solid goals and environmental support are key to staying healthy as you age. You'll explore each of the five characteristics of a good goal and discover how your environment affects your health-promoting decisions and supports your willpower.

Whether you want them to or not, your friends and family have an effect on your overall fitness. Dr. Bonura shows you how to leverage your social circle at work and at home to support your well-being. How can your relationships inspire your health? And how can fitness cultivate stronger relationships?

Eating disorders such as bulimia and binge eating. Exercise addiction and overtraining. Explore these and other obsessive behaviors that occur when fitness doesn't support but consumes your life. Learn what causes them, find out how someone can get help, and lower your own risk by cultivating more realistic expectations.

How you respond to the illnesses and pain that come with advancing age can lead to drastically different outcomes in your ability to maintain or rebuild your physical health. This discussion includes exercises that can reduce pain and improve function.

The one activity that consistently promotes health: exercise. First, examine some of the many benefits of physical activity on your body (including its ability to reduce your risk for diseases). Then, turn to the psychological benefits, including higher self-esteem, a stronger sense of self, and improved body image.

Successful health goals have to be framed in a context that gives them greater purpose. Learn how to do this with a rewarding discussion of our three innate psychological needs (competence, autonomy, and relatedness) and Dr. Bonura's expert advice on the best approach for maintaining a healthy lifestyle in advancing age.

Who doesn't want to relax more? Find out how, in the first of several exercise sessions you can follow along with. Here, you'll practice simple breathing exercises, a full-body progressive relaxation exercise, alternate nostril breathing, and a Japanese energy-based exercise for helping you work through pain and discomfort.

Using only simple exercise tools and a yoga mat, discover how to get a well-balanced, 30-minute workout that incorporates both strength training and flexibility. Complete this workout session two to three times a week (along with gentle cardio) for a well-rounded exercise routine to keep you fit as you age.

Maintaining core strength and balance is essential for maintaining our physical independence as we age. In this session, focus on a series of yoga and Pilates exercises - performed both in a chair and on the floor - designed to improve your posture and strengthen the muscles in your core and back.

Think you have to wait until after the workday ends to exercise? Here, Dr. Bonura reveals some simple (and surprising) ways that you can stay active and energized at the office by taking short walks, practicing good posture in your chair, performing stretches to work your muscles, and more.

For those of us with limited mobility, yoga on a floor mat can seem like an activity that we're better off skipping. But in this fun exercise session, you'll discover how you can still perform basic yoga routines to work your whole body - all from the ease and accessibility of a chair.

Explore the world of qigong, an Eastern practice that focuses on slow, deliberate movement integrated with key breathing exercises to increase your mindfulness. With this session, you'll learn how to tap into the healthy flow of your internal energy - and encourage the balance of opposing forces within your body.