How to Add Ten Years to your Life and to Double Its Satisfactions - S. S. Curry (free children's ebooks online .TXT) 📗

more easily from the arteries, where the pressure is strongest, through the veins back to the heart and circulation is equalized and stimulated.

The beneficial effects of the stretch can be felt by anyone who will take the pains on waking up in the morning to stretch easily, for a few minutes, then rest a few moments and note the effect. He will feel a great exhilaration all through the body. He will feel a sense of harmony. Thanksgiving seems to arise from every cell at the fresh blood and life.

The yawn is similar to the stretch. The yawn is a stretch of the lungs as the stretch is a yawn of the muscles. Both of these exercises express a hunger for oxygen. Whenever anyone is sitting in a cramped position or even in one position for a long time, the stretch or yawn is instinctive. The extension of the muscles of the body as illustrated in the stretch is one of the most necessary steps in normal adjustment. To speak of only one point: when a man sits his knees are bent, and the muscles in front of the leg are elongated and the muscles back of the knee are shortened. A stretch means simply the extension of these shortened muscles.

All over the body we find a tendency to elongate certain muscles too much. This is true in the chest; true also of the face, at the corners of the mouth. The active use of the too elongated muscles will produce extension in those that are too much shortened. By doing this we bring about certain normal conditions and relations of parts.

Again we find that the stretch is activity of the extensor muscles. It is the action of the extensor muscles upon which health especially depends. At any rate, the extensor muscles are much more important to bring about the right relation of all parts and the right balance of sensitive muscles and the equalization of circulation than the activity of the flexor muscles. Normal emotions, as we shall find later, are expressed through activity of the extensor muscles. Abnormal emotions, such as anger, affect the flexor muscles of the body more.

Since nature has provided the stretch seemingly as the antidote for abnormal position, and especially abnormal position during sleep, in the programme of exercises it would seem most necessary to centre around some careful and scientific use of stretches.

Have you ever noticed a dog or cat wake up? Observe their instinctive movements: the gradual but vigorous stretch in every direction, the deep breathing, the sympathetic extension and staying of the limbs at the climax, then the gradual giving up of the activity and the moment of restful satisfaction.

Stretching in this way is one of the primitive instincts in all animals. He who will observe the animals will feel that the time for practicing the exercises is on awakening, and the primary exercise to be taken is the stretch.

How can we best occupy a part at least of the half hour or more that is usually wasted in worrying and fretting or in sluggish indifference, between the time when we first awake and the time we begin to dress? With all the knowledge of the human organism which has been revealed to us by modern science, with our truer understanding of the nature of men, of the effect of the mind upon the body, with our observation of the instinctive actions of the animals at such an hour, why can we not so occupy a few of these most precious moments of the day as to add to our vitality and enjoyment?

At this moment of awakening, when your mind is free, you can so direct your attention as to receive joy instead of gloom, love instead of hate. You can exclude the thought of evil or you can yield and allow the tempter to desecrate your shrine. Whichever choice you make, these first moments of your day's living will color the whole course of the coming hours. The feeling first accepted and welcomed will more or less continue and form a background to all your ideas and determine your point of view toward human events.

The chief aim of this book is to present a simple programme giving, not only some exercises for this hour, but certain explanations which will inspire a sense of the importance of this hour and these movements.

Most people have no conception of the possibilities of human nature, of the fact that progress is the highest characteristic of a human being. No matter how old we are, we can always begin to climb upward; the main thing is our willingness to climb. Do we understand how to use the least actions and the most neglected movements for the development of character and the satisfactions of life?

The principles and exercises advocated in this book are not extravagant. Again and again their benefits have been proven and many thereby have doubled life's satisfactions and its length.

II SUPPOSED SECRETS OF HEALTH AND LONG LIFE

Before laying down a simple programme which will give one a common sense method of keeping well, living long, and making the very most of life, it may be well to study some of the innumerable theories regarding long life.

If all the discussions upon health and long life, from the earliest time to the present, could be adequately chronicled they would form an interesting, if not an amusing history. In many of these, however, we should find the same serious thoughts which we may well consider and find by comparison a few points in which all agree as to what is necessary to health, happiness and length of days. Note the theories that have been seriously advocated and which have had vogue among certain classes for a time,—such as the use of cold water every day as a remedy for all diseases. The cold water cure advocated wet sheet packs for fevers, and water, in some form, for all ailments. To live long some physicians have advised sleeping on the right side, others have advocated the use of raw food or food that has been cooked very slightly. Some have contended that scientific food is the complete food found in Nature, such as nuts; still others have advocated whole wheat bread!

In our own time a method has been emphasized which has been called "Fletcherizing." This, of course, is taken from the name of the gentleman, who has made it so illustrious by his books and his discussions of the subject. Mr. Fletcher's principle consists in holding or masticating the food until it is in a fluid form; even a liquid must be held in the mouth until it is of the same temperature as that of the body.

Many consider that the chief advantage of Fletcherizing is that it makes a person eat less. This may be a part of the advantage.

I once had the honor of sitting at dinner by the side of Mr. Fletcher and observed his methods. He did not eat more than one-third of the amount, for example, of ice-cream that the rest ate, but he stopped when the others did, and said, with a smile:—"I have had enough; what I have eaten will give me more nourishment than a larger amount would and it will not give me any trouble."

There is great truth in some of these theories. We should eat less meat and more grain. We should not bolt the best food elements out of wheat; we should not bleach rice and take out its nutritious element. Certainly, our lives are very unscientific. Most men live merely by accident. The shortness of life is not surprising to one who understands how irrationally most of us live.

Others say, breathe deeply, naturally and constantly.

Still others have urged active life out of doors or an active participation in business. It is a well-known fact that many men have not lived long after retiring from their occupations.

Andrew Carnegie said recently that he attributed his long life, health and strength to his activity. The story is told that he walked the floor of his room with deep anxiety and consternation the night after his offer was accepted to sell the Carnegie Steel Works. He had not thought it possible that his price would be accepted, and he kept speaking to his old friend about the amount of money paid and the greatness of the responsibility. Fortunately he did not retire, as most men do, but took an interest in every phase of modern life. He has used his money, as a sacred trust, according to his own best judgment, building libraries and giving organs, pensioning teachers who have given their lives for truth rather than for making money, and has furthered many other causes.

One of the most common opinions is that long life depends upon "our constitution,"—upon what we receive from our ancestors. That is, long life is a gift, not an attainment. And we are in the habit of blaming our ancestors, near and remote, for our lack of strength and vitality.

Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes once made the remark that if one wished to live a long life he should be afflicted with some incurable disease. This was thought to be merely a joke, but it has foundation in fact. Many men with poor constitutions live to a very advanced age. They study themselves and live simply. They realize that they are not strong and they do not indulge themselves, but reach out for health and strength in all ways.

Among all the practices which men have adopted through different ages for prolonging life we find many which are universally believed, though possibly not practiced. Some discussion of these may give us courage and enable us to realize how unscientifically, how carelessly, most men live, and how indifferent we really are to our well-being.

And yet we find wide-spread doubt as to the advisability of being too fastidious. Some of the extravagant ideas have naturally given rise to such scepticism.

On hardly any subject have men had such extreme views as they have regarding health or the prolongation of their own lives.

I know one lady who ate a raw carrot every morning because it was yellow, and, as yellow is a spiritual color, this practice, it was advocated, would free one from materiality and, consequently, from all disease.

I have known others who condemned all attention to proper food, exercise, and even to expression, because such attention would lead to faith in material means.

Webster said, "Truth is always congruous, and agrees with itself; every truth in the universe agrees with every other truth in the universe; whereas falsehoods not only disagree with truth but usually quarrel among themselves."

In accordance with this principle as a rule the untruthfulness of any view is seen in its failure to recognize anything else as true.

No one will advocate any extreme and irrational habit. Too much attention to food, too much attention to the care of the body and exercise will degrade even character. The morning exercises which are here recommended should be taken even as one washes his hands, as a matter of course. Man is spiritual, and character is developed spiritually, and mere attention to the body does not secure health and strength.

There is a great and easily demonstrated truth in the fact that people who believe in a spiritual life have endured untold hardships and have faced all kinds of conditions without injury. The power of mind over body, of spirit over matter, is too well attested to be doubted.

However, man is slow and progress must be made gradually. The first step must be taken before the last can be taken. Extravagant and wrong views prevent a great many people from doing anything.

If we examine all the rules for securing health and the leading secrets of long life, we find that