Why clear the negative emotions?

A question my clients often ask me is why bother resolving particular negative emotions? They’ve been living with many of these feelings for years so why bother changing them. It’s not been a comfortable ride can’t they just carry on stuffing them away in the lockers and hidden compartments in their minds. What’s the harm in that?

Maybe similar reasoning was used by the Elizabethan nobles for their fortnightly bath. We now consider a daily shower to be a minimum requirement for our body’s health in sloughing off toxins, urea and sweat eliminated through our skin.

Here’s one reason why clearing yourself of negative emotions is equally essential for your health. It’s connected with the stress our body’s experience when we have fears, worries, frustration, resentment and the like.

Stress is known to have specific negative effects on our health. The body has a classic response to dealing with stress. It relates to a metabolic cascade which begins with a release of stress hormones and chemicals followed by cardiovascular changes. This short-term stress is often referred to as the fight or flight syndrome. Our cave men ancestors experienced this syndrome in short bursts in the face of adventure. Humans today live with the syndrome for stretches of time putting the body under extreme pressure.

During stress, neurotransmitters such as serotonin and dopamine, known as the "happy messengers," begin to malfunction and the body's nerve centres begin to receive more and more overstress messages. This state often leaves an individual with fatigue, anxiety, depression, sleep disorders and a general feeling of being overwhelmed. The elevated blood pressure damages blood vessels, leading to inflammation and plaque formation. The elevated blood pressure can also rupture plaque formation within arteries to form a clot, thus leading to a stroke or heart attack.

Elevated levels of stress chemicals and hormones increase abdominal fat deposits, insulin resistance and overeating by increasing the craving for sugary and fatty foods.

In addition, elevated levels of blood glucose and fatty acids alone can damage the arteries and veins. Another risk of the elevated blood pressure is related to irregular heart beats which occur as a result of a thickening of the tissue within the receiving heart chamber.

By flattening the emotional buttons that trigger us into feeling this way, we are supporting our physical health.

You may be thinking that there’s a mountain of rotten emotions ahead of you to clear that will take years to clear. But with Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) it can be much quicker than years of therapy that standard approaches require. I regularly suggest to my clients that they build 15 minutes of EFT into their daily routine - a bit like we make bathing part of our physical hygiene routine.

To help with the sense of feeling there’s too much to do and any accompanying apathy, try this month’s EFT Setups to start the work.

The Healthy in Mind viewpoint: Take effective steps in neutralising negative emotions as this is vital to your long term physical health.

Article Date: Fri, 05 Sep 2008