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Gratitude can bring substantial health benefits

Gratitude has become synonymous with the holidays, as we often take time to step back and acknowledge the things that we are grateful for during the past year. However, have you ever thought what would happen if we extended the tradition of giving thanks throughout the entire year instead of a short season during holiday cheer?

Medical researchers are now asking, could gratitude be rewarded with better health? No pills? No strict diets or exercise regimens? Could a positive emotion – such as gratitude – guarantee better health by itself? It may be a dramatic departure from what we’ve been taught about how to get healthier, but the connection between gratitude and health has actually been around for centuries.

The study of happiness and emotional well-being has long been popular in the fields of religion and philosophy, but, recently, scientists have now begun to chart a course of research aimed at understanding the causes of gratitude and its potential benefits on health and mental/emotional well-being. Studies at the National Institute of Health are reporting data that supports feelings of gratitude increases brain activity in the hypothalamus, promoting better sleep, nutrition and decreased depression.

Researchers from the University of California, Davis are also turning their attention to the study of gratitude and its relationship to health and emotional well-being. They’re finding that people who practice gratitude consistently report a host of benefits:

People who keep gratitude journals on a weekly basis exercise more regularly, have fewer physical symptoms, feel better about their lives as a whole and feel more optimistic about their future.

Daily discussions of gratitude with others results in higher reported levels of alertness, enthusiasm, determination, attentiveness, energy and better sleep.

Grateful people also report lower levels of depression, although they do not deny or ignore the negative aspects of life.

It’s no secret that stress can make us sick, particularly when we can’t cope with it. Stress has also been linked to several leading causes of death, including heart disease and cancer. Gratitude, it turns out, can help us better manage our stress.

People with a disposition toward gratitude are found to place less importance on material goods are less likely to judge their own or others success in terms of possessions accumulated, are less envious of wealthy people and are more likely to share their possessions with others.

Emerging research also suggests that daily gratitude practices may have some preventive benefits in warding off coronary artery disease and may also provide a boost to our immune systems.

Now, you might be asking yourself how this all works. There is a complex relationship between thoughts, moods, brain chemistry, endocrine function and functioning of other physiological systems in our bodies. While an in-depth discussion of this relationship is beyond the scope of this article, it’s suffice to say that our thoughts can actually trigger physiological changes in our body that affect our mental and physical health. In a nutshell – what we think affects how we feel both emotionally and physically.

In essence, gratitude is not about “looking at the bright side” or denying the realities of life; it’s about learning from a situation, taking the good to help us deal with other challenges in our future. It’s about finding out that we have more influence over our life than previously imagined through the power of being thankful and positive thought. Regardless of our inherent or current level of gratitude we exhibit today, this is a quality that we can all successfully nurture to benefit our health and emotional well-being each day.

Liza Fischer is the Patient Support manager for Axis Health System. She can be reached at lfischer@axishealthsystem.org or 335-2206.



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