In episode 61, I’m going to describe the personality traits that predispose to chronic illness. These include being a people-pleaser, caretaker, over-achiever, conflict-avoider, perfectionist, overly responsible, and other self-sacrificing and emotionally-repressive tendencies.

I will talk about my own understanding of habitual emotional, mental and behavioral responses, which is essentially what personality traits are, as well as the work of others who have published on this topic, including Dr. Gabor Maté, Lydia Temoshok, PhD, Lawrence LeShan, Dr. John Sarno, and Garry Flint, PhD.

In this episode I’ll discuss:

- The connections between early life trauma, the formation of the personality, and the impact on lifetime risk of chronic illness.

- The characteristics of the Type C personality and how it predisposes to chronic illness, including cancer, autoimmune diseases and ALS.

- How personality traits are formed, and the relationship between memory structures and habitual emotional coping styles.

- Why people learn to be compulsively self-sacrificing.

- The two primary human needs.

- The stress response (fight/flight/freeze) and how repressive emotional styles degrade our health by promoting the sympathetic dominant state.

- How emotional repression makes us more vulnerable to chronic infections, injuries and emotional stressors.

- How MAP can be helpful in changing patterns of emotional, mental and behavioral responses.

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t miss episode 52: MAP for Painful Memories which explains how resolving trauma memories lays the foundation for healing.

To learn more about the MAP Method and how it works, visit mapforhealth.us for our free courses. To schedule an Introductory MAP session please book online at MindReMAPforHealth.com