In psychology, expressive suppression is an aspect of emotion regulation. It is a concept “based on individuals’ emotion knowledge, which includes knowledge about the causes of emotion, about their bodily sensations and expressive behavior, and about the possible means of modifying them.” Individuals regulate their emotions in a wide variety of ways. In the present review it has been addressed the issue of whether some forms of emotion regulation are healthier than others by focusing on 2 commonly used emotion regulation strategies: cognitive reappraisal (changing the way one thinks about potentially emotion-eliciting events) and expressive suppression (changing the way one behaviorally responds to emotion-eliciting events). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4168764/
Given an inherent subjective nature, emotions have long been a nearly impenetrable topic for scientific research. Affective neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp explains a modern approach to emotions, and how taking seriously the emotions of other animals might soon improve the lives of millions. Jaak Panksepp introduced the concept of Affective Neuroscience in 1990, consisting of an overarching vision of how mammalian brains generate experienced affective states in animals, as effective models for fathoming the primal evolutionary sources of emotional feelings in human beings.
This work has implications for further developments in Biological Psychiatry, ranging from an understanding of the underlying brain disorders, to new therapeutic strategies. Panksepp is a Ph.D. Professor and Baily Endowed Chair of Animal Well-Being Science, College of Veterinary Medicine, Washington State University. His scientific contributions include more than 400 papers devoted to the study of basic emotional and motivational processes of the mammalian brain. He has conducted extensive research on brain and bodily mechanisms of feeding and energy-balance regulation, sleep physiology, and most importantly the study of emotional processes, also including associated feelings states, in other animals. https://www.youtube.com/watch?
The Psycho-Emotional Roots of Cancer
Few weeks ago I read an article on the German New Medicine system, and the five biological laws “discovered” by Dr. Hamer, the initiator of this new science. Although I don’t agree with some of his theories, he does mention one valuable thing in his laws: that any distress causes a malfunction to the human organism.
Whereas: This presentation by Caroline Markolin, Ph.D. will introduce you to the Five Biological Laws of German New Medicine (GNM). Caroline is not in agreement with the theory discovered by Dr. Ryke Geerd Hamer, which constitute the foundation of German New Medicine (GNM) and his five biological laws!!!
In other words, any stressful event can cause an impairment in the functioning of your body, even if the trauma is not physical. And this is pretty similar to what the positive thinking theory says – if you think positively, you’ll feel better, if you embrace negative and stressful thoughts, your physical health will be affected as well.
I’m sure lots of you are already familiar with these concepts, so we won’t discuss positive thinking today. Instead, we’ll focus on the emotional immune system and learn how to strengthen it, in order to feel better both mentally and physically.
What is the emotional immune system?
The emotional immune system (EIS) is a term used for defining the defense mechanisms your body uses for keeping toxic thoughts and their effects away.
When dealing with stressful periods for example, your body is more prone to ailments, as increased levels of stress are known to affect both the psychical and physical health. Still, if your EIS is well developed and healthy, you should be able to find a way to cope with the stressful thoughts and to manage them so as to minimize their negative impact on your body. https://adrenalfatiguesolution.com/stress-immune-system/
The role of the emotional immune system is to protect you from the unnecessary damage caused by negative thoughts and to help you build a positive self-image.
To better understand this, think about how your physiological immune system works: how does it identify toxins or pathogens in order to prevent ailments caused by them?
It compares the new substances that come in contact with your body with the older ones, which are already present inside the organism, and if it finds similarities, it’s likely to allow the new factors to pass inside the body.
How does the emotional immune system work?
It also compares what’s coming from the outside with what’s already inside: if someone looks at you and tells you you’re too fat, or too short, or not beautiful enough, your emotional immune system receives new information, which needs to be managed.
The protective mechanisms are then triggered and here’s what happens:
- First, your brain compares the received information with the beliefs already present in your mind. If you have a poor self-esteem, self-confidence level, and you think of yourself as “ugly and fat”, it’s quite likely for the EIS to allow the new information to pass, and to strengthen your belief that you are, in fact, ugly and fat.
- On the other hand, if you have a strong self-esteem level and well-grounded personal opinions with regards to beauty and weight standards, your brain is less likely to find a match between the new and old pieces of information. So when someone tells you you’re too fat, your brain will analyze this idea and compare it with your previous belief: if you are happy with the way you look and inside your brain lies the belief that your weight suits you excellent, then the new thought will be rejected and won’t get to cause you any damage in the long run.
As I was saying in this article, any idea that reaches your ears can turn into a belief if it’s adopted without being analyzed, due to over generalization.
If your emotional immune system isn’t well developed and strong enough, you’re very likely to accept harmful and disempowering ideas coming from others, and these may end up causing you harm.
If you have a weak emotional immune system, you’re likely to believe that you’re fat and ugly, just because someone tells you so.
This is damaging for your body, as it affects your self-image, causes depression and moodiness, weakens your confidence, makes you insecure and so on.
The right thing to do when a new thing is projected upon you, is to filter the information and not adopt it instantly.
Yet, in order to do so, you need a powerful emotional immune system, so here’s how you can enhance your emotional immunity.
How to strengthen your emotional immune system
First step in building a healthier emotional immune system is to clean up the old stuff and throw the negative thoughts away. “If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change”, someone said.
Have you ever noticed how some plus-sized women look gorgeous in whatever they wear, and some models always look grumpy and unhappy, despite of having a physique that’s universally promoted as “ideal”? You can be any size and accept your body, or hate it.
You can have a near-perfect life and hate it, just like you can have a poorly paid job, but love it. You can be considered the most beautiful woman or man, and still be uncomfortable in your own skin, due to a dysfunctional emotional immune system.
So instead of allowing harmful ideas enter your brain, ask yourself “According whose standards am I too fat, or ugly, or not tall enough?”.
- Empty your mind from cultural stereotypes and start building healthier standards.
- Know yourself, objectively analyze your flaws and if you can’t change them, learn to accept your minuses, as nobody’s perfect.
- Do your best to improve yourself every day and be an activist, get involved in projects that empower you and adopt ideas and beliefs that help you progress.
- Bond with positive people and embrace your vulnerabilities, don’t allow someone else’s negative projection of yourself to enter your brain and hurt your feelings.
- Be open to new ideas, even if you don’t agree with them, and don’t take things personally when they aren’t.
- Practice letting go on a daily basis, as there’s really no point in storing all the negative thoughts and memories inside your brain.
What would happen if your body would suddenly stop flushing out toxins? Your health would be severely affected, and this applies to your emotional immune system as well. Unless you allow it to flush out all the damaging thoughts and beliefs, your emotional health will be affected and soon you’ll find yourself moody, depressed, feeling helpless and worthless.
Your emotional health is entwined with your physical well-being, so if you want to feel better, you need to start working not only on your physiological immune system, but on your emotional immune system as well. Reduce the amount of stress, fear and conflict in your life, allow love, laughter, harmony and positivity to be part of your life this year.
How Does Mood Affect Immunity?
We are slowly beginning to unravel the complex interactions between the mental and physical health. Researchers have found a wealth of evidence that positive emotions can enhance the immune system, while negative emotions can suppress it. For example, individuals can take up to a year to recover a healthy immune system following the death of their spouse, and long-term caregivers have suppressed immune systems compared with persons in the general population.
Studies on survivors of sexual abuse and those with post-traumatic stress disorder suggest they have elevated levels of stress hormones, as do students at exam time. In these groups of people and others experiencing loneliness, anger, trauma and relationship problems, infections last longer and wounds take longer to heal. However, having fun with friends and family seems to have the opposite effect on our immune systems. Social contact and laughter have a measurable effect for several hours. Relaxation through massage or listening to music also reduces stress hormones.
The reasons for this link remain unclear, but the brain appears to have a direct effect on stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, which have wide-ranging effects on the nervous and immune systems. In the short term, they benefit us with heightened awareness and increased energy, but when prolonged, the effects are less helpful. They lead to a profound change in the immune system, making us more likely to pick up a bug.
Stress also can overactivate the immune system, resulting in an increased risk of autoimmune diseases such as arthritis and multiple sclerosis. Skin conditions such as psoriasis, eczema, hives and acne also may worsen, and stress can trigger asthma attacks.
The mechanisms behind this are complex and still only partially understood, what we do know is that our reactions to life events can have far-reaching effects on our health. This can work to our advantage — feelings of relaxation reduce cortisol, together with other beneficial bodily responses. In turn, these changes feed into the immune system, making it function well. This happens spontaneously in our daily lives, but we also can encourage it by choosing to look after ourselves.
Insights from the ‘placebo effect’
A mind-body link also is found in experiments where people with infections are given placebo (inactive) treatments, which they think are the real thing. Even though the treatment has no medicinal effect, these volunteers report milder symptoms than those given no treatment.
The link also can work the other way once we have developed an infection. Volunteers who are given a symptomless infection feel more anxious and depressed for the next few hours than healthy volunteers. The infection has a detrimental effect on their memory, lasting several hours.
It’s also been found that happier people may be less likely to come down with colds.
Dr. Sheldon Cohen, professor of psychology at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, suggests in his research that our susceptibility to infection can easily be altered by our lifestyle choices.
“Don’t smoke, exercise regularly, eat a healthy diet, try to reduce the stress in your life, and strengthen your interpersonal relationships,” he advises.
Being depressed or anxious is linked to catching more infections and experiencing the symptoms more strongly. Of course, it’s possible that happier people might have a tendency to play down how bad they are actually feeling.
Helping Ourselves
While no one knows for sure how our feelings can affect the immune system, doctors agree that reducing stress is a good idea. Many stresses cannot be avoided altogether, but we can minimize our ‘background’ stress and our reactions to stressful events.
This is easier said than done. The modern world almost is set up to produce anxiety and frustration. But we can manage stress by reducing the demands upon us, increasing our ability to cope with them, or both.
Creative thinking may lead you to ways — such as delegating work or deleting less important items from your to-do lists — to help reduce stress. Then you can look for ways to improve your coping ability, such as learning a new, useful skill or spending more time unwinding each day. If you are anxiety-prone, consider meditation, yoga, or tai chi classes.
Although it takes effort to stand back and assess how things are going, it’s more than worth it for your happiness as well as your health.
“Mind over matter” is not simply a catchphrase. It is a truth based on what we know to be fact: that the brain, given the right set of directions, the right environment, and the proper stimuli, will always choose healing over disease.
The ability to fend off illness and disease depends on several factors, some of which are beyond our control, but the way we react to stress and the general health of our immune system are things we can influence. If we’re not able to change our response to stressors, we’ll find ourselves in a constant hormonal battle that will lead to serious health issues like hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease. The brain and the immune system are in constant communication in this delicate balance that can be disrupted by any kind of physical or emotional stress.
Ongoing stress makes us susceptible to illness and disease because the brain sends defense signals to the endocrine system, which then releases an array of hormones that not only gets us ready for emergency situations but severely depresses our immunity at the same time. Some experts claim that stress is responsible for as much as 90% of all illnesses and diseases, including cancer and heart disease.
The way it does this is by triggering chemical reactions and flooding the body with cortisol that, among other things, decreases inflammation, decreases white blood cells and NK cells (special cells that kill cancer), increases tumor development and growth, and increases the rate of infection and tissue damage.
Because the effects of stress are cumulative, even ordinary, day-to-day activities can eventually lead to more serious health issues. So it’s important to be aware of the simple daily stress in our lives. Some of the mind-body therapies that help reverse that are:
• Relaxation exercises. The link between the mind and body can be strengthened by specific relaxation exercises such as meditation and guided imagery. By making them a normal part of our lives, they become a buffer that guards against the breakdown of organ systems.
• Positive thinking. Evidence also shows that people who believe they are doing better actually do better than those who have the same physical condition but aren’t as positive. Research also suggests that anxiety, hostility, and other negative states affect the immune system.
• Behavior modification techniques. Changing how we act can often break habits that trigger stress reactions.
• Social support. According to researchers, people with strong social support have better overall health and are more resistant to infection and disease.
The relationship between stress and illness is not a simple one, but there is a connection. Because the endocrine and immune systems are so interrelated, disruption to one due to physical or emotional stress typically causes damage to the other. In the book Mind-Body Health & Healing (link is external), its explain how stress management techniques are an effective way to keep the immune system healthy and functioning the way it’s meant to.
