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Summary
On episode 452 of 40+ Fitness, Coach Allan sits down with Sharkie Zartman, a former UCLA volleyball champion, USA Women's National Volleyball Team member, and California Beach Volleyball Hall of Famer who now teaches health and fitness at the community college level and hosts Sharkie's Pep Talk on Healthy Life Radio.
Sharkie argues that aging is a game with rules, and if you understand and play by them, you can win it, rather than just survive it.
The conversation covers her “rules of aging,” the power of RAP (resiliency, accountability, purpose), why you need both offense and defense, the five components of fitness, and three types of meditation.
Links
- https://sharkiezartman.com
Key Takeaways
- Aging is a game you can win or lose based on how you play it, not a fixed decline you're stuck with. Everyone ages, but the rate is tied to lifestyle, attitude, and genetics, and you control two of those three, so your physiological and psychological condition matters more than your chronological age.
- The “power of RAP,” resiliency, accountability, and purpose, is the mental framework that determines whether the body follows through on effort. Resiliency means getting back up after setbacks the way an athlete does after a loss; accountability means owning the choices that got you where you are instead of blaming circumstances; purpose means having something that gets you excited to get up in the morning, which many people never stop to define after 50.
- You have to play offense and defense at the same time to win at aging, and most people only think about defense. Offense is proactively pursuing a healthy lifestyle; defense is prevention, like the hygiene and distancing habits used against COVID-19; a team, and a person, needs both.
- Fitness has five components, and neglecting any one leaves you exposed as you age: cardiorespiratory endurance, muscle strength, muscle endurance, flexibility, and body composition. Cardio gets the most attention because it affects every system, but muscle mass loss is one of the most consequential and overlooked changes with age.
- Weight gain after starting a resistance training program can actually be a good sign, not a setback. The number on the scale doesn't distinguish muscle from fat, so a body composition test matters more than the scale itself, especially for women, who often misread muscle gain as failure.
- There are three distinct types of meditation, and each serves a different purpose. Exclusive meditation gives the mind one repetitive focus (like a breath-based mantra) so the rest of the body can relax; inclusive meditation means observing your thoughts without judgment, like watching logs float down a stream; mindfulness is present-moment awareness you can practice anytime, even while washing dishes.
- Genetics is the one factor in aging you can't change, but lifestyle and attitude are within your control. Sharkie argues that's enough to meaningfully shift your health trajectory regardless of your family's medical history.
- Sharkie Zartman's three strategies to get and stay well: physical wellness, exploring “bio-individuality” to find the foods that actually feel good in your body and favoring whole foods over processed ones; mental and emotional wellness, building a more positive mindset by looking for what's good and reframing “have to” as “get to”; and social wellness, deliberately building your own team of positive people, including your doctors and health providers.
“How we age is up to us. We need to get in the driver's seat.”
Sharkie Zartman