Are there immortals among us?

If you Google "the oldest person to ever live," you'll come across many reports of people from around the world claiming to be the oldest. There's the 131-year-old father of three from Brazil, a farmer and community elder who's said to be 160 years old in Ethiopia, and many more. But none of them comes close to Li Ching-Yuen, a Chinese man who lived to be 256 years old, according to his obituary titled "A Tortoise-Pigeon-Dog" published in 1933 in the New York Times and Time magazine.

Li Ching-Yuen was born in 1677 in Shenyang, China. His records were founded by Professor Wang Chan of Minko University, showing that Lee was actually born in 1677 in Shenyang, CN in Citron Province China. There were even congratulatory letters from the Imperial Chinese government wishing him well on his 150th and 200th birthdays. Li was a doctor specializing in herbs, a Chico master, and a tactical consultant. There's not much information about the earlier years of his life, but reportedly, Li was a child prodigy and an avid traveler who had already trekked to Manchuria, Thailand, and Tibet in his search for herbs by the time he was 10 years old.

For the next 100 years of his life, Li worked with herbs, searched for them, and sold them. He had a career change at the age of 100 and still had more than half of his life left. In regards to his personal life, Li was said to have married 24 times and outlived 23 of his wives. Another report says that at the time of his death, Li had 180 living descendants spanning 11 generations.

What was Li's secret to a long life? He once told Lupe Foo, a Chinese warlord, that his secret of longevity is to keep a quiet heart, sit like a tortoise, walk sprightly like a pigeon, and sleep like a dog. Li's daily life was fairly simple; he did not drink hard liquor, did not smoke, and ate his meals at set times. He was a vegetarian and frequently drank goji berry tea. He went to bed early and got up early. He meditated daily, which is something he supposedly learned from Taoist priests he had once met.

Li was also a very kind and generous individual. It was said that in his spare time, he liked to play cards but would often lose on purpose, just enough to pay his opponents' meals for that day. Because of this, he was very well-liked.

The story of Li Ching-Yuen raises many questions. Did he really live to be 256 years old? If so, how did he do it? Was it his diet, his lifestyle, or his mindset? We may never know the answers for sure, but one thing is clear: Li's life was an extraordinary one.

In China, stories of Taoist priests, Buddhist monks, and other cultivators living for a long time while practicing deep in the mountains or woods are common. While these are not vampires or other mythical beings, many Chinese people who've lived a long time, hundreds of years, and maybe even over a thousand years, believe them to be true. That's why many Chinese people would actually go into the deep woods and mountains to seek out these people to become their disciples.

Li's story is a fascinating one that challenges our understanding of how long humans can live. While we may never know the secrets of his longevity, we can learn from his simple and disciplined way of life. Perhaps we can all take a lesson from Li and strive to live a long and healthy life by keeping a quiet heart, sitting like a tortoise, walking sprightly like a pigeon, and sleeping like a dog.