Emotional Stability

Emotional stability is often simpler to achieve than most people's expectations. However, it is almost impossible to have a consistent, positive mental health if any one of the following is not well regulated: sleep, food, exercise and sexual activity. The impact of these four is so massive on our mechanism, that they need be in balance for us to have any hope for a better mental health. Once these four are well-regulated, other interventions get a fair shot for being effective.

Also, body and mind are intricately connected. Happier people live longer, fall sick less and are more productive at work. A better mind allows to use our body to function in a higher gear. On the other hand, people who eat well, sleep soundly and move sufficiently have fewer mental health problems, all else being equal. Both of these are well documented scientific facts.

Why our bodies and mind are connected? No one fully understands this one. However, we do see that the complexity and fuzziness increases as we move from the gross to subtle. Physical body is the grossest part of a human mechanism and is the least complex since its actions are visible. A walking person is a walking person. Mind is more subtle than the body. We have thoughts, feelings and emotions in our mind which are more nuanced and less clear than the physical actions such as running or climbing. We don't fully understand what exactly is an angry person - it is a label for a certain inner experience. Our spirit is the most subtle and least understood. Hence, so may people shy away from spiritual matters.

It is not surprising that the scientific understanding of our minds is less pronounced than the body. For instance, we can transplant a faulty kidney with a good one but we have not been able to transplant an anxious mind with a calm one yet.

All this discussion above is to drive home the point: to alter our negative emotions, out best bet is use the body.

Why so?

First, the actions of the body are clearly observable and we feel that it is under our control. We know when we are taking actions and when we are off the mark. People who sleep better have fewer episodes of anxiety and depression. Others have changed their diet alone to come out of very serious psychiatric illnesses. Often my first question to most of my clients: Where are you in terms of your sleep, food, exercise and sexual activity? Anything extreme is rarely a good sign but a very effective starting point.

Second, using mental tools to conquer mind can be a very long term process. The issues which take months, if not years, to clear and process in a talk therapy can be done in a few weeks with mind-body tools such as EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique). Although it may take a while for these methods to become mainstream, for me this is a continuous living reality.

I wish everyone a happy and healthy day.