For some of us the reality of our own, inescapable mortality doesn’t strike home until we look in the mirror and really examine our reflection.  It was a bit of a revelation for me when I happened to look in the mirror this summer after cataract surgery had been completed on both of my eyes.

NOTE: Click on images to enlarge. Photographs have been added to serve as visual breaks.

Wearing corrective lenses for the past 7 decades, especially when they were housed in glasses, obscured some of my obvious facial aging. Things like Crow’s Feet, and the bags under my eyes. Likely caused by weakening muscles around my eyes, and leading to an accumulation of fat and fluid.

I also made some adjustments to my facial hair this summer which revealed some sagging neck skin under my chin. I had not seen this area of my neck for quite some time. At least it produced a chuckle as I said “Gobble. Gobble.” to myself.

Noticing these physical signs of aging was not a traumatic experience for me. And… it certainly wouldn’t cause me to rush out for cosmetic surgery.

But… it did give me pause as I pondered my own mortality. None of us knows how much time we have left on this spinning orb. When asked about how they would choose to die, many folks would reply by saying “From old age. Peacefully in my sleep.” Of course dying of “old age” is nothing more than a hopeful fantasy.

The Institute of Forensic Medicine in Vienna did autopsies on 42,398 centenarians over an 18 year period. Not one of those centenarians died of “old age”. This even included those who were judged to be in very good health by their doctors just shortly before their deaths… they died from disease. Obviously there are other causes of death… but “old age” is not one of them.

So… like many other things that we experience in life… how we die involves a good degree of choice on our part. Of course genetics can play a part. But, our lifestyle choices typically are far more determinative than our genes when it comes to some of the most common diseases that will eventually claim our lives. And, how soon those diseases will find us.

Our level of physical activity. The strength of the social bonds we have with others. How we handle the stresses in our lives. And, our daily choices of what we eat… can all impact how we age. And, ultimately how we die.

While estimates vary depending by information source, up to 70% of all premature deaths attributed to chronic diseases in Western countries, are caused by modifiable lifestyle choices. Those chronic diseases include coronary heart disease, stroke, adult onset diabetes, and cancer to name a few.

There is no intention in this article to get up on a soapbox and tell others what lifestyle choices that they should make. Life choices are intensely personal… and quite frankly are no one else’s business but our own.

The point of this article is simply to encourage those reading it to make informed decisions about how they choose to live their lives everyday. The lifestyle choices we make come at a cost. At some point those costs will be added up and counted when we die.

Like the flower images in this article, most of us want to stay bright, alive and vibrant for as long as we can. Realizing that none of us will die from “old age” is a very sobering reality. It can also serve to put our daily lifestyle choices into sharp focus as we ponder the inevitable mortality we all face.

Technical Note

Photographs were captured handheld with the camera equipment  noted in the EXIF data. All images were created from out-of-camera jpegs or RAW files using my standard process in post. This is the 1,406 article published on this website since its original inception in 2015.

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