What is your EMOTIONAL Intelligence?
Hello everyone Dr. Shea Breneman here for our 3rd edition of Wellness Wisdom! I wanted to briefly talk about something that is so CRUCIAL to having a healthy and fulfilled life.Your EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE is so important and I would love to possibly introduce this skill to some of our readers or expand upon this idea for others.
Emotional intelligence is not only the ability to EXPRESS emotion... a problem that many men like me struggle with! It is ALSO the ability to perceive, understand and MANAGE emotions. Have you ever been stressed out and had a negative phrase or a feeling that you repeated (almost subconsciously) over and over in your head until finally you realized what you were doing to yourself!? That is an example of emotional intelligence and it's an incredible challenge sometimes but the more that we are mindful and analytical of the THOUGHTS that we have the more power we have over our EMOTIONS. They are chemical reactions and we literally get ADDICTED to them... for good or for bad! Every chemical that is released in the brain is literally a message that controls the physical body... and eventually our body begins to feel the way that we are thinking.
"The moment that you change your perception is the moment you rewrite the chemistry of your body." - Dr. James Lipton
It is very important to be mindful of YOUR thoughts and how they affect YOU but it is sometimes equally important to be mindful of how your thoughts and emotions affect your loved ones and friends! A big part of emotional intelligence is perceiving others emotions and EMPATHIZING with them. However, many times this valuable skill backfires and we end up internalizing others emotions and digesting them as our own. Sometimes you need to acknowledge and understand those feelings and be there to support those around you but you can't internalize everybody's pain and expect to be healthy yourself!
As Chiropractors we see an astounding amount of people suffering from pain and musculoskeletal disorders and one of the questions that we ask is "Was there any emotional, sad or distressing event that had occured around the time this pain started?" In a HUGE number of these cases the answer is YES! There is often a loss of a loved one, a change of jobs, a move or ANY other traumatic event tied to this physical reaction. These emotions that we can get tied to produce a chronic stress response... we get into a fight or flight mode which increases stress hormones and decreases our innate ability to heal and grow... which eventually breaks us down. So which emotions are you holding onto? Hopefully you take this opportunity to take an inventory of your thoughts and maybe make some positive changes in your health! Thanks for your time everyone, have a great weekend!!