How you can create your own ‘blue zone’ at home

By MiNDFOOD

How you can create your own ‘blue zone’ at home
Unlocking the secrets to longevity and well-being doesn't necessarily require a passport or a radical lifestyle change.

In fact, you can cultivate your own “blue zone” right in the comfort of your home. Discover the simple yet effective strategies that can transform your living space into a sanctuary of health, happiness, and longevity.

Easy steps to create your own ‘blue zone’ at home: 

  1. Gardening: Tending the garden can help to lower your centre of gravity and improve fitness and balance.
  2. Walking up hills: Residents of Blue Zones often live in areas where they are required to walk up steep inclines in their daily routine.
  3. Lose the chair: Avoid always sitting on a chair and try sitting or squatting on the floor more often.
  4. Use your hands: Elders in Blue Zones still do a lot of manual work. So the next time you reach for a machine for a job, think about using your hands instead: for example, chopping wood and kneading bread. 
  5. Leave the car at home: Instead of defaulting to cars as your method of transport, why not switch it up with walking or biking.
  6. Learn how to manage stress: Everyone experiences stress – even people in the Blue Zones experience stress. But what the world’s longest-lived people have that many people don’t are routines to manage stress. Okinawans take a few moments each day to remember their ancestors, Ikarians take a nap and Sardinians do happy hour.
  7. Watch what you eat: Reduce how much you eat, but make sure you are eating plenty of plants. ‘Hara hachi bu’ is the Okinawan, 2500-year old Confucian mantra said before meals that reminds them to stop eating when their stomachs are 80 per cent full.
  8. Reach out for connection: Join a community that supports healthy behaviours. In Okinawa elders often belong to ‘moais’– a group of friends that are committed to each other for life.

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