Heart health and a Japanese lifestyle

In a perfect world, coronary heart disease — which kills almost 75,000 Canadian men and women each year — would not cut lives short at 45, 55 or 65 years. Instead, hearts would pump bravely and reliably on to help many of us survive well past our 80th, 90th and 100th birthdays. But this scenario isn't pure fantasy, following a heart healthy Japanese lifestyle could help keep you healthy for longer.

Clinical experiments, together with research into the health and lifestyle of the world's oldest living people, concur on one indisputable point: your heart wasn't built to fail in the prime of life. It was designed to last at least three score years and ten — though perhaps not until you've reached the very old age of 120, as some longevity experts suggest.

But, all too often everyday temptations, like tobacco, the triple cheeseburger, hours of TV viewing and a stressful world that rushes by faster than we ever thought possible destroy this ingenious, fist-size pump — an amazing, non-stop machine made of muscle, nerves, blood vessels and electrical transmitters.

If you want proof of your heart's untapped potential, consider the people of Okinawa, a Japanese island-state in the East China Sea. This island has the world's highest proportion of people over the age of 100.

Okinawa has an incredible 35 centenarians for every 100,000 residents; Canada has only 12.

A traditional lifestyle that values serenity and spirituality, daily exercise and a diet low in saturated fats and high in fruit, vegetables, soya protein and fish, has meant that Okinawa's death rates from coronary heart disease are 18 per 100,000; Canada's are 233.

Carved into a stone slab facing the sea in one tiny fishing village in Okinawa is an ancient local saying. It reads: "At 70, you are still a child, at 80, a young man or woman. And if at 90, someone from Heaven invites you over, then say, 'Oh go away, and come back when I am 100.'"

Western journalists flocked to Okinawa once researchers had alerted the world to its incredibly heart-healthy lifestyle. They found fit, healthy people leading full lives without drugs, nursing homes or life-support systems. A 100-year-old villager outdrank a film crew member half her age; a 96-year-old who practised martial arts beat a 30-something boxing champion on national television; a 105-year-old woman who killed a poisonous snake with a fly swatter became a local legend.

Meanwhile, medical tests revealed how such feats were possible. The Okinawan centenarians had remarkably healthy hearts, apparently youthful arteries, low cholesterol and little of the oxidative stress that triggers atherosclerosis, the dangerous plaque build-up that can cause heart-stopping blood clots.

Even more surprisingly, researchers who studied 600 of Okinawa's oldest residents concluded that a healthy lifestyle accounted for 80 percent of the extraordinary health that their hearts demonstrate, while genetic disposition was responsible for just 20 percent. After making these observations, the researchers went so far as to suggest that if we in the West lived more like the Okinawan people, many coronary care units could be permanently shut down.

To achieve this, we'd have to learn the art of living Okinawa-style — including a slow, lower-calorie eating practice called hara hachi bu, which means eating until you're just 80 percent full; a relaxed outlook on life known as taygay; and deep, meditative spirituality.

And, dark as it is, further proof that following this kind of lifestyle helps people live healthier and longer came out in the past few decades. Unfortunately during this time younger residents of Okinawa (under the age of 50) became the group with the highest heart disease rates in Japan. What caused this change? It seems to be the result of increasingly Western diets and lifestyles.

So centenarian residents of Okinawa weren't just living long and well thanks to lucky genes. Slow eating, a relaxed perspective, and meditation all helped them live well into their 90s and beyond. So keep those three things in mind to help you along your way to living a healthy and long life.