Clearly, your body changes as you age. I learned this lesson years ago when my son was three years old. We started him skiing, and he loved every minute of it. When he fell, he tumbled onto his behind, jumped right back up, and skied down the hill like nothing had happened. He was pure rubber and resilience.

However, I was 53 years his senior that year. I did an inadvertent 360-degree twirl on the slopes myself. His mother saw me and immediately asked if I had broken my wrist, wondering when I could return to surgery. The difference between a flexible young body and an older body is critical. Consequently, I retired from skiing that season and now enjoy the lodge, where I write and make them great dinners.

Indeed, your older body desperately needs work to stay flexible, strong, and balanced as time goes on. I have seen too many independent seniors lose everything after a simple fall in their own home. They go from living on their own to spending their last days in a care center, sometimes never leaving bed. This outcome is not healthspan. Instead, you want a fall to be like my son’s—just on your butt and back up. Sadly, too many fall and cannot get up. This isn't a commercial for a safety pendant, but a sincere plea for you to start working your muscles.

Specifically, we talk frequently about heart health and clear arteries in longevity. Those things are unquestionably crucial. Nevertheless, the biggest threat to functional independence as we age is a condition called sarcopenia. This is the medical term for age-related muscle loss.

Unfortunately, we start losing about 3 to 8 percent of our muscle mass every decade after age 30. That loss accelerates quickly once you hit 70. This problem is not just about looking less toned; fundamentally, it is about losing the ability to stand up from a chair, carry groceries, or, most importantly, catch yourself when you trip. The falls that result are often catastrophic.

Amazingly, resistance training is effective at the microscopic level, too. We have talked extensively about the tiny, complex mechanisms of the cell, but here is the key takeaway: small things benefit from big things.

In fact, increasing muscle mass through training has direct, positive effects on two major microscopic drivers of aging: mitochondrial function and telomere health.

To elaborate, when you challenge your muscles, you signal your cells to create more energy. This signal forces your mitochondria—the cellular powerhouses—to become both more numerous and more efficient. Better mitochondrial function equals more energy and less cellular stress.

Moreover, studies show that resistance training actually increases the activity of the enzyme telomerase in some cells. Telomerase helps maintain the protective caps on your DNA called telomeres.

Therefore, you don’t need to buy fancy, expensive supplements like NAD or telomere boosters. Picking up a dumbbell costs less money but yields more results. You gain muscular strength, better metabolism, stronger bones, and the cellular benefits all at once.

Let's consider how muscle mass influences your diet. Your muscle is actually your body’s largest organ for glucose disposal. Think of it like this: when you eat, your body releases glucose (sugar) into your bloodstream....

The lowest hemoglobin I’ve ever seen belonged to a young woman who was still standing. Her blood count was one-fourth of normal. She was pale, short of breath, and strong enough to walk into the clinic.

Doctors soon learned her bone marrow had stopped making new blood cells. The diagnosis was aplastic anemia — a true telomere disease.

She survived thanks to her fitness, modern science, and a bone marrow transplant from a generous donor in Germany. Two years later, she’s in law school, healthy, and full of life.

Each cell in your body carries chromosomes — long strands of DNA. At the ends of those chromosomes sit telomeres, tiny caps that keep the DNA from unraveling, like plastic tips on shoelaces.

Every time a cell divides, its telomeres shorten a little. When they get too short, the cell can no longer divide. Scientists call that stage cellular senescence — cellular retirement.

In 2009, researchers Elizabeth Blackburn and Carol Greider won the Nobel Prize for discovering telomerase, an enzyme that can rebuild telomeres. Their discovery sparked dreams of reversing aging. But there’s a catch: cancer cells also use telomerase to live forever. Turning that enzyme on everywhere might turn back time — or turn on tumors.

Telomeres became the poster child for longevity marketing.

Social media ads promise to “measure your biological age.” Supplement companies claim to “lengthen your telomeres” for hundreds of dollars a bottle.

The problem? Telomere tests vary between labs. Results can change by 20 percent depending on the method. They show trends, not destiny.

Real scientists are studying how telomeres behave under different conditions.

• Danazol — a synthetic sex hormone that slows telomere loss in people with inherited marrow failure. It works but brings side effects, so it’s not an anti-aging trick.
• Henagliflozin — a diabetes drug that increased telomere length in one small study. Whether that helps humans live longer is still unknown.
• Aripiprazole — an antipsychotic that repaired telomeres in cells after oxidative stress. That’s a Petri dish result, not a prescription for youth.

These drugs show that we can nudge biology, but they’re for disease, not for vanity.

Nutrients influence telomere health, too.

• Vitamin D supports telomerase. Long-term studies show it slows telomere shortening.
• Vitamins C and E help reduce chemical stress that wears telomeres down.
• Gamma-tocotrienol, a form of vitamin E, may reverse telomere loss — so far only in lab work.
• TA-65, from the Astragalus plant, may activate telomerase but carries risk. Turning on telomerase could also fuel cancer.
• Telomir 1 is experimental and not available outside research.

None of these is proven to extend life. They’re promising ingredients, not miracles in a capsule.

Lifestyle matters more than any supplement.

A large study at UCSF showed that people who ate a Mediterranean diet, exercised, and managed stress boosted telomerase activity within months.

No powder required.

Telomeres respond to care. They’re markers of how you live, not the cause of how long you live.

Longer telomeres don’t guarantee longer life — they reflect how your body has handled time, inflammation, and stress.

Many people suddenly talk about mitochondria. You hear them in political speeches, on podcasts, and across social media. RFK Jr said he can “see” kids with weak mitochondria just by watching them walk through an airport. Others claim special diets or powders can “fix” aging by supercharging these organelles.

However, most of that chatter misses the actual science.

This post breaks down what mitochondria do, why they matter for aging, and how you can keep them healthy. No hype. No detox teas. Just biology you can use.

Every cell in your body contains tiny structures called mitochondria. They act like miniature cells living inside your larger cells. Each mitochondrion even has its own DNA.

Mitochondria divide independently from your regular cells.

They manage your energy, converting glucose to ATP

Finally, mitochondria keep your organs working.

You inherit all your mitochondria from your mother, which is why scientists use mitochondrial DNA to trace ancestry.

About 1.5 billion years ago, a simple cell swallowed a bacterium and refused to digest it. Instead, they formed a partnership.

The bacterium supplied energy.

The host cell provided safety.

That partnership became the mitochondrion. Every person alive today runs on that ancient deal.

Mitochondria take glucose from your food and convert it into ATP — the energy your body uses to move, think, heal, and grow. This process runs every second of your life.

You cannot swallow ATP and get more energy. ATP supplements don’t work. Only your mitochondria make the usable fuel your body needs.

Young mitochondria act like teenagers. They run fast, bounce back quickly, and handle stress with ease. Cells constantly recycle old mitochondria through a process called mitophagy. This system works beautifully in childhood.

Fresh mitochondria power:

• strong muscles
• sharp thinking
• fast recovery
• healthy metabolism

When mitophagy runs smoothly, you feel energetic and resilient.

Aging slows everything down. Mitochondria begin to leak more “exhaust,” build up mutations, and lose efficiency. Damaged ones don’t get removed as well, because mitophagy weakens with age.

Unfortunately, mitochondria do something worse than slow down:

They fuse with healthy mitochondria.

Imagine pouring spoiled milk into a fresh gallon. The whole jug goes bad. Aging mitochondria do the same thing inside your cells. They spread dysfunction to the healthy ones.

As mitochondria fail, they change how cells function. They send distress signals back to the nucleus that alter gene expression. These messages push cells toward inflammation, stress, and survival pathways that your body normally keeps quiet.

Even more concerning, changes in mitochondrial shape — too much splitting (fission) and not enough merging (fusion) — appear in both aging and cancer. These shifts support tumor growth, help cancer cells spread, and make some treatments less effective.

Aging mitochondria increase the risk of:

• brain fog
• muscle fatigue
• slower recovery
• heart strain
• metabolic slowdown
• cancer-friendly environments

Mitochondria sit at the center of how we age.