Ep. 100: The Power and Potential of Purposeful Aging

Paul Irving currently serves as the chairman of the Milken Institute Center for the Future of Aging. He is also the chairman of Encore.org, and is a distinguished scholar-in-residence at the School of Gerontology at the University of California, Davis. Prior to his role as chairman, Paul served as the President at the Milken Institute, as well as a leadership fellow at Harvard. He is also the author of “The Upside of Aging: How Long Life is Changing the World of Health, Work, Innovation, Policy, and Purpose.” Today, Paul joins us to talk about the shift in the aging population, and the massive impact the aging population has on global markets with its enormous profit potential and the benefits of aging workers and entrepreneurs.

FOLLOW HEALTH GIG:

Learn more about BB&R and Achieving Optimal Health Conference by visiting BBRconsulting.us

Show Notes

[1:40] Paul talks to us today about the power and potential of purposeful aging.
[2:32] And then for some reason I decided that something was missing. This was in my late 50s. I decided I wanted to go back to school, so I was lucky enough to do a fellowship at Harvard.
[4:30] Tell us what role businesses have in human longevity and healthy aging.
[4:42] I think people know about in very general terms, but don't understand the urgency, the importance, the significance of the shift that we've gone through for almost all of human history.
[5:55] Just to put it in perspective, for Americans, at the time that Social Security was enacted in the United States, average longevity in the U.S. was something under 62 years. It's now we know about 80.
[6:30] Aging is very much a global phenomenon, happening much more rapidly.
[7:02] It's going to change the way we think about work and health and housing and education, lifelong learning and the way our cities are designed and the way our countertops look in our kitchens and the size of our doorways and lots of other things.
[7:50] This advent of a demographic shift of longer lives and population aging will, I think, need to change everything about the way businesses operate.
[9:03] What I've come to realize is that those who operate in my world feel in many ways that we're part of an early movement.
[10:14] The most valuable thing we have really isn't money. It's not possessions. It's time. It's time with our families. It's time to learn. It's time to become involved.
[11:32] I want to talk about the benefits of aging, positive characteristics of aging. Age is not a disease, but age is the principal risk factor for disease. We know the risks associated with aging and the coronavirus.
[14:39] We have kind of an age segregated society, understandably, right.
[18:07] I would challenge anybody who's listening to this to understand the potential for investment in prevention and wellness.
[20:23] we also know that COVID has more dramatically affected communities of color, particularly the African-American community, not because African-American people are more naturally susceptible to the disease, but because of these chronic conditions that so sadly infect these communities.
[21:09] I would say on every street corner in America and barbershops and pharmacies and every place else, add some health literacy to ensure compliance, maybe a little bit of information on nutrition and diet.
[25:07] But the truth of the matter is, whether it's digital health tools or products or home designs or fashion, travel, food, you name it, the longevity economy is compelling.
[28:10] Why shouldn't education and opportunity be available to all?
[32:18] one of the challenges of aging is a natural and very frequent loss of relationships.
[41:06] If we want support, if we want health, if we want dignity in our later years, if we want the opportunity to realize purpose, then I think we have an obligation now.
Thank you for joining us on Health Gig. We loved having you with us. We hope you'll tune in again next week. In the meantime, be sure to like and subscribe to this podcast, and follow us on healthgigpod.com.

“Just to put it in perspective, for Americans, at the time that Social Security was enacted in the United States, average longevity in the U.S. was something under 62 years. It’s now we know about 80.” - Paul Irving
“This advent of a demographic shift of longer lives and population aging will … need to change everything about the way businesses operate.” - Paul Irving
“The most valuable thing we have really isn’t money. It’s not possessions. It’s time. It’s time with our families. It’s time to learn. It’s time to become involved.” - Paul Irving

Keywords

#PaulIrving #Aging #Ageism #PublicHealth #TheUpsideofAging #Longevity #Author #Health #Connection #Relationships #Intimacy #Community #Technology #SocialMedia #Wellness #HealthGig #Pandemic #COVID19 #TriciaReillyKoch #DoroBushKoch #MentalHealth #BBRWellness #Businesses #purposefulliving #purposefulaging #agingaroundtheworld