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At some point during nearly every fitness story I report, an exercise scientist tells me: “The best exercise is the one you’ll do.”
No matter which workout is trending or what the latest study has suggested, the takeaway almost always comes back to this guiding principle. Find an activity you enjoy, and do it as consistently as possible. The advice may not be sexy, but it’s steadfast.
I was reminded of this lesson recently while on a reporting trip to Léré, France, a village of about 1,000 people in the Loire region, where I met Charlotte Chopin, a 102-year-old yoga teacher. Ms. Chopin moves with the balance, flexibility, strength and steadiness of someone decades younger, and I recently profiled her for the Well section of The New York Times.
Ms. Chopin took her first yoga class at age 50 and loved the practice immediately. So she just kept going — for half a century. She started teaching at age 60, and today, her desire to continue showing up to class, both for herself and her students, is a driving force in her life.
After traveling the narrow streets of Léré, I arrived at Ms. Chopin’s yoga studio, a small, square room in a former police station, where she holds classes three times a week. The space is equipped with worn yoga mats, blocks and straps. Ms. Chopin, who teaches in simple cotton clothing, has taught in the same way — the same class format, the same series of postures — for forty years.
Ms. Chopin’s half-century-long streak helped me reflect on my own efforts to establish a lasting fitness routine, and the decision paralysis I’ve often faced when choosing the right balance of cardio, strength, mobility and flexibility — all components I know I could or should be incorporating into my regimen.
It’s the blessing and curse of living in a time and place with more options for working out than ever before. (And, perhaps, an occupational hazard of being a health and fitness reporter).
At times, I’ve been so concerned about finding the perfect fitness program that I’ve ended up doing almost nothing at all on a given day — or even for weeks. But my time with Ms. Chopin reminded me that movement doesn’t have to be complicated.
Ms. Chopin embodies other core principles of living long and well, too, including practicing gratitude, which research suggests is linked to a lower risk of mortality. A 2024 study found that older women who expressed the highest levels of gratitude were significantly less likely to die from any cause during the course of the study, including cardiovascular disease, cancer and neurodegenerative disease.
When I asked Ms. Chopin about her secrets to aging well, she answered, “I’m very lucky.”
She continued, “I have four nice children. I’m in good health. I don’t have too many problems. I don’t have too many material problems. I have an activity that I like.”
Ms. Chopin is also an example of the benefits of staying social in old age. “She loves people,” her son told me. And she credits her students — most of whom she has known for many years, and who typically range from their 30s to their 60s — with keeping her moving. She looks forward to seeing them each week as much as she looks forward to practicing yoga.
As I note in my article, research suggests that, for older people, staying social is strongly linked to health and life satisfaction. We also know that, for people of all ages, moving in sync with others can create feelings of trust, closeness and belonging.
I have never before felt that kind of communal closeness during a yoga class, possibly because I’ve never felt especially good at it. Self-consciousness is so often the enemy of fun in fitness.
But I enjoyed every moment of the class I took with Ms. Chopin. She was tough, correcting my alignment and pushing me past where I was willing to go on my own. By the end of class, I felt invigorated.
Ms. Chopin’s happiness just to be practicing was apparent — and gave me joy, too.
Danielle Friedman is a journalist in New York and the author of “Let’s Get Physical: How Women Discovered Exercise and Reshaped the World.”
The post What I Learned From a 102-Year-Old Yoga Master appeared first on New York Times.
