Today at work I reached into the small refrigerator in my office that has been sitting there for a pretty long time. How long? My mother gave this to me as a gift when I opened the office over 30 years ago. Wow…although there is frost build up near the freezer part, the frig has worked beautifully for decades. I guess the manufacturer of this refrigerator didn’t do the “planned obsolescence” thing, i.e. make a product that is doomed to break down in a finite period of time requiring the purchase of a new refrigerator. For those of us that own smart phones, laptops, tablets and other similar devices, we are all too familiar with the “planned obsolescence” concept: Apple and other companies make more bank selling us new stuff than having us keep the old stuff.
Let’s now turn our attention to the human body. At some point, we all experience some sort of “break down” of our various parts. Genetics and environmental factors play roles in when these happen. This is sort of an “obsolescence” concept, but not exactly planned on purpose. When we start naming organ systems such as the lungs, heart, brain, colon, musculoskeletal system and others, there is no doubt that there are many “break downs” that can occur. Some of these are preventable or can be delayed whereas others are not.
Weight control will play a very important role in delaying the “obsolescence” concept as this relates to a bunch of our body parts. As an example, the “one pound of weight loss causing four pounds of pressure off of weight bearing joints” concept results in the knees, hips, ankles and feet staying quite functional and not “obsolete”. Controlling weight will additionally add lots of longevity to a number of other body parts.
Let’s all be more like my 30-plus year energizer bunny refrigerator and not the Iphone 19 (or whatever the most recent upgrade is) that is planned for obsolescence even before the first app was installed. Keep the weight off and those body parts will be there for you.