As we talked a lot about emotional intelligence, I want to move over to the physical side of emotional awareness. So often we just ignore our bodies and treat them as something that slows us down - but I've learned through experience, health problems, and researching the SCIENCE that listening to our bodies is vital. It helps us have a better awareness of ways we need to respond, more emotional freedom and it brings us out of living on the surface of our thoughts and into the experience of our lives. 

 

 

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What is your relationship to your body?

Do you ignore it, do you mistreat it, do you appreciate it, do you have anger towards it?

Many of us women experience a range of these sentiments over the decades. 

I really realized how I resented my body when I learned I had an autoimmune disease called Graves Disease. You can read about that thyroid condition here, and you can read about my faith and healing journey here. 

 

Ignoring our bodies is culturally acceptable

We power through, we push ourselves, we ignore our bodies. It is culturally acceptable. But why? Is it fear of wallowing and worsening? Is it fear of admitting our weaknesses? Is it because we are moms and we don't need ONE MORE THING to fix??

We ignore our bodies through food, drink, keeping busy and then we hit a wall and think we aren't strong enough, or we are doing it all wrong. 

 

Our bodies are WHERE we experience emotion

Our bodies are where we FEEL our feelings. When we have a thought about something (often a subconscious and automatic judgment about if we are safe/in danger, good/bad, etc). When we have this thought our brain tells our bodies to release chemicals (peptides/hormones) to prompt us to respond accordingly. 

So the emotions we feel from those chemicals flooding our bodies aren't actually to make life hard, but to indicate something is needed to address this situation. 

Our bodies learn this thought-emotion response and then we call it a 'trigger'. It isn't just for BIG T trauma, our bodies remember how to respond from our past experiences. 

 

We often ignore symptoms in our bodies up to the point they cause us problems

If we don't address what our body is telling us - and we keep having the same thoughts and emotions on something - our body will keep telling us this.

For instance, over the years I have noticed that stress makes me hold my breath and breathe shallowly. It makes me tense up my stomach and clench my teeth. But I learned this backward, from addressing the health outcomes of doing these things repeatedly over time. 

 

What about the science of mind and body?

I have read Heal Your Body by Louise Hay and it is a fascinating read as she connects ailments to emotional conflicts. I have started to view symptoms in a similar way because, as I have paid attention, I have seen connections to my own emotions and physical experience. 

But I am interested most in the science. Some great books on this are the Molecules of Emotion by Dr. Candace Pert and Cure by Jo Marchant. Some popular names for this field are 'mindbody medicine and 'psychoneuroimmunology'.

If you feel like this is a stretch - just think about the fascination of placebos - where our brain believes something and the body responds in accordance. And now they are researching nocebos - where, when a patient predicts a negative outcome their symptoms worsen from the placebo. 

 

Answering your questions about: 

Noticing the signs of stress (dig deeper with episode 113 on stress, surviving and thriving)

Using visualization to improve your health outcomes, particularly where you have experienced an eating disorder and worry you won't be healthy in the future (dig deeper with episode 37 on the science of visualization)

 

The simple pleasure of the week