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Emotional Health - The Key to Healing the Impossible
publication date: Nov 6, 2009
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author/source: By Dr. Alexander Schuster
By Dr. Alexander Schuster
If you believe that “ignorance is bliss”, don’t read this article. Here you will get the truth, that is, if you can handle it. What follows in the next few paragraphs has the potential to radically change your life. The CDC states that 85% of all [physical] diseases have an emotional component; other experts claim that this number may be as high as 100%!
It is no longer a secret that our physical health is deeply connected to our mental projections and beliefs. While this may scare many who are not ready to take responsibility for how they feel, what they think, and their beliefs about their world, it is also hugely powerful, putting the power back in our hands. Through our choices of how we deal with our thoughts and emotions, we are responsible for and truly in control of our health and well-being.
This is not just the theorizing of a medical researcher. Simply consider the placebo effect – a positive healing due to the belief alone that the substance ingested (or the operation performed) will help. In other words, thinking that something will help actually helps with healing. That’s pretty profound. Similarly, with emotions, we are all too aware of a racing heart, clammy skin, and shallow breath when we are scared. We have all experienced “butterflies” in anxious anticipation. We have all experienced tears (a physiologic reaction) when sad (an emotion). Anxiety, distress and rage cause the autonomic nervous system to shift into a sympathetic dominance, thereby stopping all digestion, and leading to increased heart rate, faster breathing, etc. The list goes on and on. The point here is, ALL emotions have a physical effect.
Although it is still often overlooked, emotional health and well-being is absolutely essential to our physical health and healing – no matter how devoted we are to a proper diet and lifestyle, we will not be able to achieve our body’s ideal healing and preventative powers if emotional barriers stand in our way. Indeed, when everything else has failed, emotional healing is often the missing piece of the puzzle.
Emotions are meant to be felt – not just talked about, rationalized, but truly and completely felt. Unfortunately, in our Western society, we are not really taught how to deal with emotions, so rather than screaming or crying in a meeting, we tend to suppress our feelings, store them, and lock them up. The problem with this is that suppressed emotions are being stored in cellular memories, thereby altering cellular metabolism.
E-motion is energy in motion, and by stuffing emotions down, this energy gets “stuck”. In short, “negative” emotions tend to suffocate cells, diminishing exchange of nutrients and toxins, thereby causing an accumulation of toxins within the cells. Until these emotions are released, they can strangle the cells of an organ, thereby creating disease, for months or even many years after the emotion got stored, sometimes after we have completely forgotten or discounted the experience.
More recently, scientific evidence of the link between emotions and physiological effects comes to us from a field of study called psychoneuroimmunology. Study after study is being published that shows how our thoughts, feelings, and beliefs create the biochemistry of our body and shape our health and wellbeing. In 1985, research by neuropharmacologist Candace Pert revealed that neuropeptide-specific receptors are present on the cell walls of both the brain and the immune system. Neuropeptides are brain chemicals that are released in response to thoughts and emotions. This discovery by Pert that neuropeptides and neurotransmitters act directly upon the immune system shows their close association with emotions and suggests mechanisms through which emotions and immunology are deeply interdependent. Basically, happy people have a stronger immune system, and will be less susceptible to disease.
Negative emotions linked to depression have been shown to increase inflammation, pre-diabetes, and stress hormones, while decreasing omega-3 fatty acids and folic acid. These exact same changes also happen during heart disease, suggesting a link between a “broken heart” and heart disease. In one epidemiological study, for example, all-cause mortality increased in the month following the death of a spouse. It has been proposed that stressful events trigger cognitive and affective responses which, in turn, induce sympathetic nervous system and endocrine changes, and these ultimately impair immune function.
So, what can be done to heal those past emotions? For emotions to release their grip on us and allow us to heal fully, we need to learn how to deal with them and let them go.
There are various emotional release techniques that can help deal with past emotions, e.g. the Emotional Freedom Technique or EFT, The Journey, Guided Imagery, clinical Hypnosis, Neurolinguistic Programming or NLP, Thought Field therapy. All have their merits, and allow to bring stored emotions to the surface, so that they can be experienced and released along with their associated physical symptoms. It is only when an emotion is not expressed, when it is suppressed, that problems arise. In short, the key to true emotional healing is: feel the emotion fully, then let go.
About the Author
Alexander Schuster, Ph.D. is an internationally published author and speaker, with over 12 years experience of cutting-edge research in the medical field searching beyond the politically-correct half truths and deliberate mis-information. He meticulously researches safe, natural and effective paths to abundant health and shares them through newsletters, publications, and seminars. Contact: DrAlexanderSchuster@gmail.com, 888-MY-AHP-123, www.AbundantHealthPotential.com
If you believe that “ignorance is bliss”, don’t read this article. Here you will get the truth, that is, if you can handle it. What follows in the next few paragraphs has the potential to radically change your life. The CDC states that 85% of all [physical] diseases have an emotional component; other experts claim that this number may be as high as 100%!
It is no longer a secret that our physical health is deeply connected to our mental projections and beliefs. While this may scare many who are not ready to take responsibility for how they feel, what they think, and their beliefs about their world, it is also hugely powerful, putting the power back in our hands. Through our choices of how we deal with our thoughts and emotions, we are responsible for and truly in control of our health and well-being.
This is not just the theorizing of a medical researcher. Simply consider the placebo effect – a positive healing due to the belief alone that the substance ingested (or the operation performed) will help. In other words, thinking that something will help actually helps with healing. That’s pretty profound. Similarly, with emotions, we are all too aware of a racing heart, clammy skin, and shallow breath when we are scared. We have all experienced “butterflies” in anxious anticipation. We have all experienced tears (a physiologic reaction) when sad (an emotion). Anxiety, distress and rage cause the autonomic nervous system to shift into a sympathetic dominance, thereby stopping all digestion, and leading to increased heart rate, faster breathing, etc. The list goes on and on. The point here is, ALL emotions have a physical effect.
Although it is still often overlooked, emotional health and well-being is absolutely essential to our physical health and healing – no matter how devoted we are to a proper diet and lifestyle, we will not be able to achieve our body’s ideal healing and preventative powers if emotional barriers stand in our way. Indeed, when everything else has failed, emotional healing is often the missing piece of the puzzle.
Emotions are meant to be felt – not just talked about, rationalized, but truly and completely felt. Unfortunately, in our Western society, we are not really taught how to deal with emotions, so rather than screaming or crying in a meeting, we tend to suppress our feelings, store them, and lock them up. The problem with this is that suppressed emotions are being stored in cellular memories, thereby altering cellular metabolism.
E-motion is energy in motion, and by stuffing emotions down, this energy gets “stuck”. In short, “negative” emotions tend to suffocate cells, diminishing exchange of nutrients and toxins, thereby causing an accumulation of toxins within the cells. Until these emotions are released, they can strangle the cells of an organ, thereby creating disease, for months or even many years after the emotion got stored, sometimes after we have completely forgotten or discounted the experience.
More recently, scientific evidence of the link between emotions and physiological effects comes to us from a field of study called psychoneuroimmunology. Study after study is being published that shows how our thoughts, feelings, and beliefs create the biochemistry of our body and shape our health and wellbeing. In 1985, research by neuropharmacologist Candace Pert revealed that neuropeptide-specific receptors are present on the cell walls of both the brain and the immune system. Neuropeptides are brain chemicals that are released in response to thoughts and emotions. This discovery by Pert that neuropeptides and neurotransmitters act directly upon the immune system shows their close association with emotions and suggests mechanisms through which emotions and immunology are deeply interdependent. Basically, happy people have a stronger immune system, and will be less susceptible to disease.
Negative emotions linked to depression have been shown to increase inflammation, pre-diabetes, and stress hormones, while decreasing omega-3 fatty acids and folic acid. These exact same changes also happen during heart disease, suggesting a link between a “broken heart” and heart disease. In one epidemiological study, for example, all-cause mortality increased in the month following the death of a spouse. It has been proposed that stressful events trigger cognitive and affective responses which, in turn, induce sympathetic nervous system and endocrine changes, and these ultimately impair immune function.
So, what can be done to heal those past emotions? For emotions to release their grip on us and allow us to heal fully, we need to learn how to deal with them and let them go.
There are various emotional release techniques that can help deal with past emotions, e.g. the Emotional Freedom Technique or EFT, The Journey, Guided Imagery, clinical Hypnosis, Neurolinguistic Programming or NLP, Thought Field therapy. All have their merits, and allow to bring stored emotions to the surface, so that they can be experienced and released along with their associated physical symptoms. It is only when an emotion is not expressed, when it is suppressed, that problems arise. In short, the key to true emotional healing is: feel the emotion fully, then let go.
About the Author
Alexander Schuster, Ph.D. is an internationally published author and speaker, with over 12 years experience of cutting-edge research in the medical field searching beyond the politically-correct half truths and deliberate mis-information. He meticulously researches safe, natural and effective paths to abundant health and shares them through newsletters, publications, and seminars. Contact: DrAlexanderSchuster@gmail.com, 888-MY-AHP-123, www.AbundantHealthPotential.com