41. About emotional wellbeing...

41.

Emotional health: The foundation of our physical wellbeing

Emotional health plays a crucial role in overall well-being. For quite a while we as humanity and the world of medicine and psychology kept these two rather separate. We knew there is a link, naturally, but we were not very convinced that emotions can actually have direct manifestation on our physical health.

The most common things we all know are data points like these:

• Chronic stress can increase the risk of heart disease by 40%.
• People with good emotional health recover from illness twice as fast.
• Anxiety and depression make us more vulnerable to infections.
  
  

But latest research goes even further, to explore possible causality:

• Stress directly impacts inflammation and autoimmune conditions
• Unresolved trauma and pain often can manifest as chronic pain conditions, such as headaches or muscle tension.
• Happiness and joy, on the other hand, improves heart health

While the impact of stress on our body is researched extensively, there is now also a growing body of evidence that all other emotional states such as anger, fear and guilt can also manifest in the body physically.

When we turn to eastern medicine approaches, this relationship between emotions - body health has been the center of what we call holistic health approach. Many eastern medicine paths look at the person as a whole - the body, the feelings, the thoughts, the social interactions, the words we use and the place we live. 

It is not surprising then that we are finally looking into health & wellbeing the same way.

Ok, does this mean that we should control our emotions?
         To some extent, but it is a little more nuanced than that.