We all experience fear and anxiety at some point in time. They are natural responses to stress in the environment and can be useful in moderate doses. We experience fear in response to a perceived threat. We experience anxiety when contemplating possibilities in the future and in fact, anxiety helps us take action to influence future outcomes.
As we focus on the worst cases scenarios, we lose the energy and the usefulness of these heightened states and begin to frustrate our abilities to successfully respond to whatever challenges we may need to face in the future. Fear and anxiety overload the body systems with stress hormones that decrease mental, emotional and physical functioning and stimulate disease and distress. Clearly, we cannot function at our best under these conditions.
Continue reading "Manage Fear and Anxiety So They Don't Get the Best of You" »
Recent research from the Institute of HeartMath presented on the Today Show this week, suggests if you want to live longer,
increase the amount of time you spend appreciating in your life. Appreciation, and other positive emotions
such as love and caring, improves the rhythm of the heart and flow of the
cardio vascular system. Stressful
emotions such as anger, frustration, and hatred do just the opposite.
This adds another dimension to mindfulness. In terms of our health, mindfulness is not
some luxury we can play with when it is convenient, but rather a means to
greater health and a longer life. We pay
for those negative emotions. Not that we
are not going to experience them, of course we are. The whole range of emotions is part of the
human experience and in fact, we want access to all of it.
Continue reading "Want to Live Longer? Improve Your AQ!" »
