Fitness to me is being physically and mentally able to work through life’s challenges. It takes work to make it through this life and it doesn’t get easier as you age.  I don’t recall who said it but growing old is not for sissies.
There are definitely lots of challenges.

What it means to be physically fit, and I’ll focus on physical fitness for the next few posts, is different at different stages of life. Let’s face it. No matter what we do it is evident that fitness declines with age. You’re not as speedy and you lose some aerobic capacity. You can’t open the olive jars you once did because your muscular strength decreases. What’s more bones are less dense and metabolism slows.

The good news is that exercise can minimize most of these losses. However, and it’s the same old story, you have to work at it.

There is even new proof that you’re never too old to exercise. A recent Israeli study found that people over age 70 live longer and better if they’re physically active at least four hours a week. Active senior were 31 percent to 58 percent less likely to die during the study than their sedentary peers. The other good news was that if you were among those who didn’t die and you exercised, you were 72 percent to 92 percent more likely to retain your independent lifestyle.

Recommendations encouraging physical activity set no upper age limit, says Jochanan Stessman, MD, of Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Center writing in Archives of Internal Medicine.