It was a great writing opportunity. But one until now I had somehow failed to see.

Is that because I’m one of those sanctimonious souls who gives advice he doesn’t follow? Or did the oversight occur from simply being too single-minded — or maybe even too simple-minded?

Regardless, now’s no time for further self-reflection or an IQ test. Just an explanation that doubles as a confession.

For I’m the guy, you see, who’s quoted Marcus Aurelius a time or two to stress to you that you should always do what he tells himself to do in a personal journal later published under the title of Meditations.

“Keep reminding yourself of the ways things are related, of their connectedness.”

Yet until now I had missed the connection between last week’s article and the one before. That the discovery of tiny pieces of plastic being found virtually everywhere inside our bodies as a result of our ubiquitous use of plastics is an obvious example that every action creates a reaction that either helps or hurts your health.

Adding a bit more egg to my already sullied face: The reason I gave for often writing about the reactions caused by your actions. Because they are often found in details you might overlook.

Needless to say, I’m feeling a bit foolish right now, though still steadfast.

Steadfast in the belief that all actions do indeed create reactions that, whether they be large or small, affect your health and fitness. So I will continue to keep reminding you of the ways in which things are related, especially when the connection between them could easily be overlooked.

Like the connection between global warming, climate change, or whatever else you choose to call it and the rate at which your body ages. New research has found there’s a really good chance the former is causing the latter to accelerate.

That’s what Eunyoung Choi, a Postdoctoral Associate in Gerontology, University of Southern California, explains in “Extreme heat silently accelerates aging on a molecular level — new research,” an article she penned for The Conversation. That new research published in the February 2025 issue of Science Advances, she explains, found that older adults “living in areas that experienced at least 140 extreme heat days per year — classified as days when the heat index exceeded 90 degrees — experienced up to 14 months of additional biological aging compared to those in areas with fewer than 10 days annually.”

And while summers in Carbon County will never be mistaken for those in Ecuador, they may not need to be to take a toll on you. Among medical professionals, it’s generally accepted that even 80-degree days can pose health risks as you age, and the toll can be considerable. For the aforementioned study also determined that the rate at which extreme heat accelerates the aging process is “comparable” to the rates at which smoking and heavy alcohol consumption do, something Choi calls “even more surprising” than anything else the research uncovered.

Far less surprising is the conclusion of a paper published in the February 2025 issue of Clinical Nutrition. In fact, Suvi Ravi, PhD, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Jyväskylä in Finland who helped write it called it “no surprise at all” in an article written by Tim Newman for Medical News Today.

In the study, Ravi and colleagues studied the diets of 826 young adults, placed them in one of six categories and found those whose diets were high in processed meats, soda, and fast food while being low in fruits in vegetables aged faster biologically than those whose diets were categorized as plant-based, health-conscious, or average. Ravi expected such results because they “are consistent” with those conducted previously about bad diet and biological aging using primarily older participants.

What’s also no surprise is the surfeit of those under 30 who think it’s too early to worry about aging. But this study finds the contrary — and also notes that diet quality generally decreases as people move from adolescence to young adulthood.

Today’s article began with how I missed a great writing opportunity, and I don’t want that to happen again. So it’ll end with a quick surmise of a study chocked full of ways that actions create the sorts of reactions that either increase or decrease the rate at which you age.

In short, the study published in the February 2025 issue of Nature Medicine found 25 lifestyle and environmental factors affect aging, many of which you’d expect — like whether or not you smoke, how much time you spend sleeping and exercising, and the type of job you do.

A few, though, you would probably not, such as the type of housing you choose, how often you feel tired, and how easily your skin tans. Even the amount of cheese you consume.

But all prove that even when you might not think so, your actions affect your health and fitness.