As we get older, we are more likely to eventually experience emotional upsets, losses, and changes. Many of us go from full-time busy workers or full-time parents to part-time workers, empty nesters and grandparents to full-time retirees, with or without a life partner, adequate financial resources, secure housing, or a network of close family and friends. We can move from a familiar neighborhood to a different retirement community. Friends, neighbors, close relatives, and even our beloved pets can get sick and die. Depending on whether we’ve developed the positive mental attitude, uplifting and life-affirming spiritual connections, healthy lifestyles, socializing, and sustained zest for life – which researchers describe as the formula for healthy aging – we’re more likely to suffer from disease, disability, and emotional instability in old age.
Complications of emotional upset and stress
Stress accelerates cell aging
Research is beginning to show the devastating effects of long-term stress on health and aging. Telomeres, the DNA-protein structures that seal the ends of chromosomes and promote genetic stability, appear to play important roles in cellular aging and disease. Elisa Epel and colleagues studied the effects of psychological stress on telomere maintenance in 58 healthy premenopausal women. The findings, published December 1, 2004 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, indicate that the psychologically stressed women had shorter telomeres and less telomerase, a telomere-producing enzyme that affects immune function cells in the blood.
Stressful jobs affect the health of older people.
For workers over the age of 60, problems at work increase blood pressure, although these older workers often claim to be less upset and less sad than younger workers when work problems arise. They seem to “feel” fewer emotions, but their bodies exhibit greater stressors. Older workers may be more prone to heart and circulatory problems if they remain in high-pressure jobs or situations.
Emotional stress can trigger heart problems
Emotional stress can trigger severe left ventricular valvular dysfunction in patients who do not appear to have coronary artery disease. This reversible condition, called myocardial stunning, cardiac stunning, or myocardial stress, is caused by intense emotional stress. Research confirms the phenomenon that severe emotional stress and heartbreak, such as the breakup, loss or death of a loved one, can unleash a rush of stress hormones that cause the heart muscle to contract and spasm, potentially leading to serious complications and even death Complications can result in loss of life.
Emotions affect blood cells
Photos of frozen water crystals imbued with various emotions appeared in the book “The Hidden Messages in Water” by Japanese researcher Masaru Emoto. Inspired by these photos, Rebecca Marina attempted to replicate the experiment by having her own blood samples photographed on slides while evoking certain emotions.
She focused on first sadness. In this photo, her blood cells actually appeared to be taking on the formation of tears and were moving rapidly (rather than slowly and sluggishly as we might expect), with many white blood cells predominating, more so than in a normal blood sample.
When she felt fearthe blood cells moved rapidly and frantically with an increased white blood cell count and then stopped moving quite abruptly, as if exhausted.
feelings of love created a slower, quieter movement and a glittering substance in the liquid. Interestingly, when she felt love, the blood cells on the “Sadness” slide that remained on screen began to change. In other words, even when her blood was no longer in her body, her feelings of love actually affected the movement, shape, and quality of her blood cells on the slide.
But the most amazing effect was when she focused on it Divine Mother or Spiritual Love and Peace. The liquid part of the blood became clear, the movement of the cells was smooth, and the cells just slid along. The white blood cells that showed up had a glowing white center and a pulsation in that center, almost like a heartbeat! And some of the cells actually took on a heart shape. (EFT – Emotional Freedom Technique Research)
Thanks to Erica Goodstone, Ph.D.
