What, Me Happy? Today?

"No mud, no lotus." Popular Buddhist saying

Why am I happy today?  There's the awful news out of Minnesota…I’ve gotten accounts from friends sending me info from both sides of our polarized society.  But then I did read an account which seemed somewhat objective and even-handed until more is known. No, my joy is not linked to any of that for sure!

I did move my body.  That always helps my mood. Did yoga with John in the a.m. and then SAIL (Stay Active and Independent for Life) which is a social occasion as well as class in physical and cognitive fitness (particularly balance) and includes two people in their mid-nineties who are awesome as they lift their ten-pound leg weights and five-pound arm weights. But it’s their attitude that inspires me the most.

At the end of the session, Gina, the physical therapist who was leading the group, asked every one of the 20 participants, who had all circled up to finish the class, to end with an encouragement to each other in the form of "stay ____."  

I began with my encouragement, “Stay strong". Some said, “Stay safe". One said, “Stay warm".  The ninety-year-olds were at the end of the circle.  I leaned in to listen carefully to what they offered because they were clearly doing something right!

“Stay positive".  “Stay peaceful".

Thank you, wise elders!

Later many helped set up the tables for tonight’s community dinner. After that I ran home to read some of Stephen Post’s new book, Pure Unlimited Love.

I’ve talked about Post before, he’s the director of the center for Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care, and Bioethics at Stony Brook University. He cofounded the Institute for Research on Unlimited Love.  He’s written over 400 peer-reviewed journal articles, several books including Why Good Things Happen to Good People, and is an elected member of the Philadelphia College of Medicine…look him up if you want to know more about his credentials, they are numerous and impressive.

How I got interested in Post's work some years ago was through his friendship with Sir John Templeton.  Templeton was called the Tennessee mystic.  I'm a Tennessee raised girl. Templeton amassed a fortune and left most of it to fund research in subjects academics could never touch because of being considered unscientific. Subjects like the study of altruism, happiness, forgiveness, faith, spirituality, prayer, and compassion. Finally, the scientists had funding if they dared to research the topics.

Anyway, Templeton and Post hit it off.  Post was able to bring together the best thinkers in neuroscience, spirituality, physics, psychology to scientifically explore these topics that Templeton cared about and funded.

In Post's new book, the forward begins by pointing out our excessive focus on materialism and neglect of spiritual values such as love, compassion, and generosity which may have prevented us from realizing our potential as a human society.

Then in chapter one the book shifts to how Post begins his day. He says he “meditates prayerfully” after doing some deep slow breathing.  He envisions the people he will meet during the day and thinks about what expression of love he can offer which would most benefit them. 

He has ten ways of expressing love (which he does not consider exhaustive). Compassion, listening, showing respect, providing mirth, offering loyalty, creativity, helpfulness, forgiveness, and also what he calls “carefrontation” – a term he borrows from The Road Less Traveled author, psychiatrist M. Scott Peck.  

Post thinks of pure unlimited love as an energy so divine and powerful it can move mountains.  In our daily lives we experience it in both profound and simple forms.  It’s when the security and well-being of another is as real or meaningful to us as our own, sometimes even more so.

He also says that according to his physician and mystic friend, Pure Unlimited Love is the first thing we meet after we close our eyes for the last time.  He goes on to talk about his image of God being Love.

He then offers seven researched paths that people can take to experience this type of Pure Unlimited Love. Each chapter discusses how to walk these different seven paths.  I’ll save more on that for a later date. But they include giving, kindness, following your calling, raising kind children, cherishing nature.

Here’s what Post said that helped me today, “These are times of social change and crisis, and they are stressful.  Such times come and go in every era and are not usually all negative because they allow new expression of love to burst forth from the mud.”

What he’s talking about is the Buddhist thinking about mud providing the opportunity for the lotus to blossom. Lotus being a symbol of resilience and creative love. No mud, no lotus.

Post goes on to say that many feel disoriented, confused, and stressed when the new day arrives and feel that “the center cannot hold.” That our common culture is about to “fall apart".

In our hyperpolarized world many have stopped listening to each other, grown short tempered, and lost community according to Post. This is the perfect time for learning how to practice Pure Unlimited Love. Watch the lotuses bloom.

Well, that helped me…like hearing those people in their nineties remind us to “Stay positive". “Stay peaceful".  

Then later via email and text I discussed briefly an article written by Peter Diamandis with my friend and crazy generous, bright, beloved relative, Matt. I know of Peter Diamandis from fellow Good Life magazine author Dr. Jim Brown.  His son works with Peter and felt he was on the cutting edge of credible, incredible work which could help us all. Matt's background is a research scientist. He felt the article was pushing the timeframe, but here's what Peter thinks.

Some of the article:

The convergence of AI, genomics, CRISPR, and cellular medicine are transforming longevity science at a pace we’ve never witnessed. Companies like Insilico Medicine are now identifying longevity drug candidates 100x faster and 100x cheaper than traditional pharma. What once took 5,000 people now takes 50. What once took a decade now takes months. Billions are being invested into longevity therapies and AI is making unprecedented discoveries.

Your mission this year? Stay healthy enough to intercept these breakthroughs racing toward us. [In my view that includes learning to love our neighbors enough that we don't kill them at least...and they us and I hope the billionaires send some of their money in this direction like Sir John Templeton.]

Here are Peter’s 11 Longevity Resolutions for 2026 – what he’s personally doing to add decades to his healthspan: [5,6,7,8,9, 10, 11 are my favorites although I am on board with all of them]. If you would like to read the full article for yourself, click here.

1/ Prioritize Sleep.

2/ Muscle Mass: The Most Underrated Longevity Lever - Lift weights.

3/ Get a Full-Body Health Upload (Know Your Numbers).

4/ Sugar = Poison. Eliminate It.

5/ Fasting Isn’t Starvation, It’s Cellular Maintenance. At least don't eat for 12 hours after dinner.

6/ VO2 Max: The Metric That Predicts How Long You’ll Live. Add some short high intensity workouts.

7/ Your Community Is Your Blue Zone. Who you hang out with matters. "The people you spend time with shape who you are, what you think, and what you do."

8/ What You Let into Your Mind Shapes How Long You Live. Quit doom scrolling. Read and listen to healthy material that educate and inspire. Stop watching both CNN and Fox.

9/ Adopt a Longevity Mindset (Optimists Live 15% Longer)

One of the most important—and most underestimated—impacts on your healthspan is your mindset. [I am going to expand what he says about this.]

Here’s the data: In a study of 69,744 women and 1,429 men published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, optimistic people lived as much as 15% longer than pessimists. The study was conducted over three decades, controlling for health conditions, behaviors like diet and exercise, and other demographic information.

10/ The 70% Rule: Your Lifestyle Trumps Your Genes

Here’s the revolutionary truth most people don’t know.

Scientists analyzed a 54-million-person ancestry database and found that genetics account for only 7% - 30% of your longevity.

That means at minimum, 70% of your healthspan is determined by your choices.

Diet. Sleep. Exercise. Mindset. Community. Stress management.

You have far more control than you’ve been led to believe.

This is not wishful thinking, it’s data. Own it.

11/ Stay Healthy Long Enough to Intercept the Coming Breakthroughs.

We are approaching what Ray Kurzweil calls “Longevity Escape Velocity (LEV)”: the moment when science adds more than one year to your lifespan for every year that passes.

Kurzweil predicts we’ll reach LEV by 2033… in seven years.

Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, suggests that AI could lead to breakthroughs that could double the human lifespan in as little as a decade.

Billions of dollars are flowing into epigenetic reprogramming companies: Altos Labs ($3B from Jeff Bezos), NewLimit ($280M+ from Brian Armstrong), Retro Biosciences ($180M from Sam Altman).

The $101M XPRIZE Healthspan now has 730+ teams competing to add 20 healthy years to your life.

The breakthroughs are real. Your job is to be healthy enough to intercept them. Peter says 2026 is the most important year for healthspan in all of history!

Okay, there you have it, some of the good stuff that came my way today…and there were other personal things which made me smile as well.  More about that later.  I wanted to get this out to you because we need to share what is lifting us up in tough times.  Stay strong, stay positive, stay peaceful.

What can you offer as encouragement to yourself and the rest of us? Stay….?

ok, I'm on the run to get to the community meal, please forgive any mistakes or typos. I felt that we needed to urgently share what we can to inspire, education, and encourage each other. And be thinking what you might do with twenty or thirty extra (healthy fully functioning) years of life! Love, June