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Good morning. I was in my local gym on Tuesday and it was unusually full. Almost everyone there looked well over 60. One was on the floor, legs in the air, another was breathing heavily over the shoulder press. I won’t tell you exactly what I was doing except it involved me and my two replaced knees and a treadmill. We went through our routines in silence, generally avoiding eye-contact while the on-wall TV blared out above us.

I wondered whether the turnout was a response to the call to older people to exercise more. It obviously makes good sense to try to keep the body in order, not only for the body’s sake, but also, as we learned, for the mind and memory. The benefits of exercise in delaying the consequences of age are now well proven.

But though a well-regulated life-style improves our chances of a long and fruitful life, it is not infallible. In the last year I have lost several friends way before their time. I have felt grief at their loss and a sense of injustice. But I’ve also become worried about things which might seem minor – like have I consumed enough oily fish? Should I give up my regular glass of wine? Good health advice works for the majority but it can also induce guilt and even persecute those who suffer and die in spite of doing the right thing.

Getting older is a spur to attend to more than just exercise. The poet T.S. Eliot said that old men ought to be explorers. In the Hindu tradition the time comes when the householder gives up possessions and status and wanders off in search of enlightenment. While it seems right to me to strive to keep as physically healthy as we can; older people could also benefit from exploring new ways of being. This involves a constant readiness to move on, not to be imprisoned by our past, by unreal expectations or the desire to control things. A friend of mine who is now in a care home said to me recently that from the age of 70 she had been practising letting go of things, until, she said, there was nothing left but God. You can translate that in many ways. None of us can escape the ultimate death of the body and the erasure of our present sense of self. In spiritual terms this is not simply annihilation; we can see it as a transformation, either to a new life beyond this one; or that the memory of who we have been is set free to help those we leave behind. I am sad to have lost friends who died too young. But in another way I am grateful for them. They were, as it happens, all Christians, and as far as it was possible they died good deaths, aware, loved, at peace, trusting in God. In their different ways they showed me that there is life, important life, beyond the exercise regime.

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