Living to 100 Means Building Health, Wealth and Bonds Early, Experts Say

 

Dr Narongchai Akrasanee and Benjaporn Karoonkornsakul urge Thais to build strong bodies, savings and friendships well before old age arrives.

 

Living longer is no longer the hard part. Living well for a century is, and it must be designed from an early age, two leading figures from finance and fitness told Nation Forum 2027: Thailand's Agenda on Tuesday (20 October 2026).

 

Speaking in the fifth panel, "The 100 Year Life", Dr Narongchai Akrasanee, chairman of MFC Asset Management PCL, and Benjaporn Karoonkornsakul, founder and CEO of The Absolute group, agreed that longevity is worth little without health, financial security, relationships and a sense of purpose. Both stressed self-reliance.

 

 

Health: build it before 50

Narongchai, 82, said medical advances mean a century-long life is increasingly realistic, but the years must be healthy ones. Anyone who waits until 50 to start building "healthspan" to match lifespan will struggle, he said.

 

He urged people to exercise every part of the body, from the heart and circulation to the eyes and back. He credited eye-muscle exercises with ending his recurrent vertigo about 30 years ago and said his back pain disappeared over the same period.

 

Walking is best, he said, and when he could not walk while travelling abroad, he skipped rope. To make the prospect of 100 years less daunting, he suggested dividing life into four 25-year quarters.

 

By that measure, he said, he is only seven years into the final quarter, and he encouraged the audience to treat age as a state of mind.

 

 

 

Benjaporn, whose studios have served members from their twenties to their eighties over two decades, said motivations shift with age. The young often exercise for appearance, while older people focus on staying strong 10, 20 or 30 years ahead.

 

Daytime sessions increasingly fill with people near or past retirement, she said. It is never too late to start, she added, provided the activity suits the person.

 

Her mother, who never exercised and could not swim, developed severe back problems and avoided surgery by taking up Pilates at 70. Now about 87, she is still walking.

 

The pain has not gone, Benjaporn said, but exercise has kept her mobile.

 

 

Wealth: earn, invest and insure

Narongchai said health alone is not enough. Having money, he said, is essential, and those with strength should earn as much as possible before 40 or 50 and invest wisely.

 

He advised younger people to treat time as a cost and weigh the hours spent on any activity against what it earns. He also urged them to learn to invest, take out life insurance if they have dependants, and hold health insurance, which he called better value than it appears.

 

He added that life cannot be left to fate. He said he earned enough early on to avoid burdening his children, who will have their own responsibilities if their parents live to 100.

 

"We must not be a liability," he said, adding that he aims never to be a burden on others.

 

He warned that risks are rising. He lost everything in a finance business during the 1997 financial crisis and said recent years have brought the pandemic, with floods, extreme heat, conflict and oil-price swings likely to follow. Managing income and managing the mind must go together, he said, as stress causes insomnia and ill health.

 

 

 

Thailand's high household debt, he added, makes ageing more precarious. He noted that the International Monetary Fund has repeatedly warned about government spending and said public handouts are ultimately funded by taxpayers, including through value-added tax.

 

Individuals should avoid debt and not rely on the state, he said. He also cautioned against newer financial hazards.

 

Private tokens and cryptocurrencies are spreading alongside faster AI-driven transactions, and fraudsters use AI as well. People who do not understand them can lose everything, he said, and older investors in particular should avoid taking big risks.

 

Benjaporn said her own rules came from a conservative upbringing: do not spend money you do not have and, where possible, avoid borrowing, even if that is somewhat extreme.

 

She expands her business cautiously. She described a career in finance across several countries that paid very well, but which she left for a job paying about a tenth as much because she did not enjoy it.

 

She called it the right decision, although she acknowledged that she was fortunate to have no family obligations at the time. Money does not solve everything, she said, but a lack of it brings stress, while wealth without happiness is equally stressful.

 

She said she disagrees with younger colleagues who see work-life balance as taking a three-month break to refresh, having never stopped working since graduating.

 

Discipline in earning and spending, she said, ensures assets outweigh liabilities.

 

 

Relationships: nurture them continuously

Both speakers said relationships are critical. Narongchai noted that screens are eroding human contact and that he encourages students to develop social skills.

 

Friends who exercise together support mental health, he said, but they inevitably drift away or pass on with age, so those who remain must be cherished.

 

Benjaporn said that since the pandemic, members come not only to exercise but also to chat about politics, food and travel. She sees smiles and better mental health as a result. She visits her own studio daily and meets school friends monthly.

 

Relationships with parents, children, spouses and friends should be maintained throughout life rather than neglected for 15 years of work, she said.

 

Ultimately, the panel left the audience with a stark reality: medical science may guarantee a longer life, but only personal discipline guarantees a good one.

 

While Narongchai’s pledge never to become a liability frames longevity as a duty to others, Benjaporn’s call to action reminds us that the groundwork must be laid today.

 

A century-long life is not a finish line to be crossed but a continuous design—one where health, wealth, and human connection must be cultivated long before time runs out.