Recession-Proof Your Health

Recession-Proof Your Health in '09
**below more healthy, economic choices...

FEAR, Doubt, Worry, Unbelief, Anger, Resentment, Hostility, Guilt, Shame, Anxiety, Unforgiveness & Bitterness are all emotions that are running rampant in the hearts of the people in our society today. With the current state of the economy, there leaves little room for POSITIVE thoughts and emotions…for MOST people, that is.

Did you know that fear of losing your job, worry about your 401K retirement plan, anger at the government, resentment about an investment that went sour, guilt over what you HAVEN’T done or accomplished with your life, anxiety over the future, & unforgiveness towards ANYONE in your life all lead to negative health consequences? In this rat race of life we may take the time to “eat right” and do our 30 minutes of cardio so we don’t “GAIN weight”, but we rarely consider the fact that EVERY MINUTE of everyday either builds health or disease just by what we are THINKING about!

Your thoughts & emotional state have an equally important impact on your health as your dietary habits and exercise routine.

Even while you are reading this article RIGHT NOW, you have thoughts in the back of your mind that are producing health, or sickness and disease in your body. You may not be able to control the next bailout plan, which company folds next, or the devaluation of our currency…but you CAN control HOW YOU respond to everything going on around us and come out HEALTHIER in ’09 than ever before.

Scientific research is proving more and more everyday what God’s Word already told us two thousand years ago in the arena of your health. If you are ready, commit to becoming an ACTIVE participant in building your health this year by DOING the Word, instead of merely hoping, thinking, or wishing things were different, then READ ON. You become accountable for what you KNOW, so STOP reading if you want to stay the same in 2009.

A critical foundation to our health that is often overlooked is our emotional state.

What we think about, what we say, how we choose to feel, what we are meditating on all produce chemicals in our body. These chemicals affect every body system, organ, and function in our bodies. Here’s a brief list of SOME of the diseases that these emotions produce that have been documented by medical research…Do you know anyone with these emotions OR diseases?

• ANGER & HOSTILITY lead to hypertension & coronary artery disease.
• RESENTMENT, BITTERNESS, UNFORGIVENESS & SELF-HATRED lead to autoimmune disorders, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, and multiple sclerosis.
• ANXIETY leads to irritable bowel syndrome, panic attacks, & heart palpitations.
• FEAR produces over 1500 chemical releases in the body which lead to TOO MANY diseases to list here.
• REPRESSED ANGER leads to tension & migraine headaches, chronic back pain, tmj & fibromyalgia.
• STRESS & DEPRESSION lead to weight gain, and almost every condition/disease listed above.
(*See Dr. Colbert’s book DEADLY EMOTIONS for a complete list and further study)

Without a foundational knowledge the emotion/disease connection, our health efforts will be in vain. Hosea 4:6 reminds us that “people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge.” I believe that “dis-ease” begins hidden in our hearts, slips into our thoughts, and manifests in our bodies. The mind-body connection literally has the power to heal you or destroy you.

Our bodies do not differentiate between actual stress and imagined stress.

What you feel emotionally becomes how you feel physically. Our minds are so powerful that it doesn’t even have to be an ACTUAL event. Our bodies respond & produce the same chemicals even if the event is imagined! If you’ve ever seen a scary movie, you know this to be true. During a frightful scene, your body reacts in fear as if the event was actually happening in real life…AND even produces the same chemical response in your body! (You may want to think TWICE before watching a scary movie!)

Did you know that between 75 - 90 percent of all visits to primary-care physicians result from stress-related disorders? Stress Researcher Doc Childre & Howard Martin define stress as, “The body and mind’s response to any pressure that disrupts the normal balance. It occurs when our perceptions of events don’t meet our expectations and we don’t manage our reaction to the disappointment. Stress, that unmanaged reaction, expresses itself as resistance, tension, strain, or frustration, throwing off our physiological and psychological equilibrium and keeping us out of sync. If our equilibrium is disturbed for long, the stress becomes disabling. We fade from overload, feel emotionally shut down, and eventually get sick.”

YES, there is always going to be stress in this life; however it doesn’t HAVE to affect us if we are living in God’s economy, by His plan, and focused on His Word. He wanted us to TRUST Him, cast our CARE on Him, FEAR NOT, live in PEACE and allow worry to rest on His shoulders. God KNEW there was a health benefit to these things and it was for OUR own protection. If you need help replacing some of your current mental programming, I HIGHLY recommend listening DAILY to Dr. Thompson’s confession CDs. He has a healing confession CD that is excellent, but I’ve also found that “Worry for Peace” and “Power over Fear” have JUST AS MANY healing benefits because they help eliminate the destructive chemicals released in our bodies as the result of harmful emotions. In fact, these two CDs play constantly in the rooms of our home almost at all times day & night because we understand the health benefits of positive emotions and are diligently working to program our thoughts to produce LIFE.

Dr. Colbert in his book, Deadly Emotions, states, “No person experiences an emotion just in his “heart” or in his “mind.” Rather, a person experiences an emotion in the form of chemical reactions in the body and brain. These chemical reactions occur at both the organ level-stomach, heart, large muscles, and so forth-AND at the cellular level.”

Studies SHOW a link between emotion & disease:

• The Harvard School of Public Health conducted a twenty year study that involved more than 1700 men…the study found that the men who worried about social conditions, health, and personal finances had a significantly increased risk of coronary heart disease.

• Mayo Clinic found that psychological stress was the strongest predictor of future cardiac events, including cardiac death, cardiac arrest, and heart attack.

• A study of 202 professional women found that tension between career and personal commitment to spouse, children and friends was a factor associated with heart disease in women

• An international study of 2,829 people between ages 55-85 found that those who reported the highest levels of personal “mastery” – feelings of control over life events – had nearly 60% lower risk of death compared with those who felt relatively helpless in the face of life’s challenges

Long term emotional stress can cause a steady flow of the hormones adrenaline and cortisol into your bloodstream that can have a very damaging effect on your body.

Take an “Emotional Inventory” this month! How do you react to your life’s situations, circumstances, and events? Is there any room to calm, alter or change negative emotions for a healthier life???

Article written by Emily Stanford. Emily is studying nutrition