The Most Important Secret to Longevity.
I Think We Found The Fountain of Youth.
The powdery snow that rampaged last night built itself an impressive white fortress all around our parked cars in the driveway. The cold sunlight reflecting all the snow made the white world even paler. I imagined the childish, giggles and handclaps that all avid skiers and snowboarders must’ve felt this morning as they rushed out to ride the powdery pixie dust. But a blessing to one always seems to be a curse to another. For me and Pat, all this powdery miracle just meant hours spent tossing snow with our shovels. When God said we will now eat bread by the sweat of our faces, he forgot to mention that we also have to remove snow in the winter and mow grass in the summer.
But the numbing, infinitesimal labor somehow felt refreshing this Sunday morning. While sipping coffee and watching Greg Everrett’s movie sounded cozier, something about the shared misery of clearing out the white stuff until you hit the black stuff underneath had its own pleasure. We were two tiny soldiers making puny dents on the massive, pale fortress. Then, I suddenly thought about longevity. The thought came as fast as the neighbor’s snowblower, removing snow next to us. Would doing this, make us live longer? What does make us live longer? Is it exercise? Food? Drugs? All of the above? I considered the possibility of there being a fountain of youth somewhere, tucked inside an Amazonian forest. I mean if Eve was able to find the Tree of Knowledge, there must be more than one cool stuff like that in the world, right?
Maybe not. Maybe it’s more scientific and holistic and complicated than that. From countless Quora threads, clickbait YouTube videos, and well, Joe Rogan, I know that the key to longevity is probably a jumble of keys on an infinitely large keychain like the ones cartoon prison guards carry. I’ve been trying to pick up reading again before I sleep for at least 15 minutes. The most recent book, Ikigai, talks about how these “centenarians” (a sexy term for people over 100) just seem to never die. They interviewed many of the seasoned life-livers and realized that there might actually be a fountain of youth after all! Ready for it? It’s called Ikigai.
Ikigai is a Japanese term for passion. But it’s a bit more than that. Ikigai is like a 93 octane super-premium fuel that seems to give you approximately 1 million miles to the gallon. Ikigai is what gets you out of bed at 4 AM and keeps you up till 3:59 AM. Ikigai is the juice that pumps your heart and the obsession that makes you to say, “you wouldn’t get it.” Basically, ikigai is your life’s obsession. You hear about Bill Gates sleeping over at his office desk to get Microsoft to deliver a personal computer to every household. You hear about Elon Musk ditching dinner dates and yacht parties to try to get humanity onto the moon. You hear about Miyazaki coming into the office to draw, the day after he retired. These folks are not haunted. They are driven. Driven by something we cannot see or fathom. It’s their ikigai.
It’s important to notice that there are many forms of ikigai. There are healthy ones, as well as unhealthy ones. There are financially great ones and ones that drive others to bankruptcy. Otakus are raging fans that enveloped their entire lives to anime. In America, we see similar crowds in Comic Con dressed up as C3P0. However, these types of people often do not succeed financially, because being obsessed with the characters in manga, TV shows, movies, etc, usually doesn’t translate well to their vocation/profession. The world does not benefit as a whole when you walk around looking like Goku in Super Saiyan Stage 4. You also probably don’t get paid for perfecting the blonde hair with 7 tons of hairspray.
In a nutshell, ikigai forms a healthy balance when your vocation, profession, passion, and mission all connect harmoniously. As a business school graduate, it was obvious to find disguised financial zealots that pretended to love, love, love, accounting. Or consulting. Or investment banking. It was quite refreshing in a way to see most of these recent graduates ready to unplug from the financial world for good. Although they were getting paid much more than what I make, their passion was simply hollow from the start.
The short espresso break away from the icy world was heaven. I wondered if this is what construction workers felt like every evening after a long and hard laborious day. The ghostly storm clouds were hurrying away, revealing the jubilant sun. The bright rays flooded our home, amplified by the white snow outside. The world is in peace.
I wondered about my ikigai. What keeps me up at night. What keeps me shoveling through life, like the snow. I am still young and life probably have plenty of snowstorms ready to toss at me. But right now, God has paved a way for me to become an athlete and a coach. Every grueling training session that leaves me clawing for air in a pool of sweat is returned with gratitude, elation, and love. Every step forward seems to reward me with sponsorships, opportunities, and personal bests. It is as if the road was carefully peppered with metaphorical cheerios like James P. Sullivan laid out for Boo in Monsters Inc.
Despite the eyerolls from my parents and the bank account that never grows, I am convinced that I am on the right path. The celestial whispers years before now sound like shouts of encouragement with big red lights that flash “THIS WAY.” As all men and women with a clear ikigai, I can’t explain the rationale behind my obsession with fitness. The why is simply, because I fking love it. The world will always be full of boo-hoos and “you’re crazys.” But all those cold responses are nothing but reason to keep shoveling them away and keep moving forward. “A man with a why is never concerned with the how.”
The fountain of youth does exist. It is as real as the pile of snow outside. But the secret to longevity sprouts from within. We all have our own purpose, our own quest, our own ikigai. Unfortunately most people will leave this world unaware of their calling. It’s a combination of dumb luck, blinded opportunities, lack of humility and empathy, fear, stubbornness, and a lot of other things that shape our paths called life. You can blame me, them, her, God, or that. But like a perfect boomerang, the responsibility will always come back to you. If you think you’re too late, too weak, too tired, too broke, too sad, too pissed, too scared, good. That means the universe still cares for you and the awareness of your excuses is the first sign of hope to get you back on your feet to explore. You just have to trust it. Why? Because your life depends on it. Your ikigai is calling.
