By Becky La Plante, L.Ac., Granby CT
Feeling grumpy? Worried about your finances, the state of the world, your health? It is time for our society to start taking responsibility for our health in a free natural way!
Research has found that making your self smile, by engaging the facial muscles, while and thinking about something that makes you happy will send a message to your brain that you are actually happy. The process of mimicking the facial expressions of an emotion can fool your self into feeling the actual emotion. This then eventually can improve your mood causing the many health benefits such as improved immune function and reduced blood pressure and more listed below.
Another positive effect of smiling is that it will up lift the mood of the people around your through a process called emotional contagon. Emotional contagon is the tendency for humans and animals to mimic facial expressions, emotions, postures and movements of the people they are around. That means feeling good and smiling is just as infectious as feeling grumpy and negative.
Frowning and negative thinking causes actual physical responses such as the production ofcortisol (the stress hormone) and while smiling and laughing stimulates the production of serotonin (the "feel good" hormone.)
LAUGHING
Humor therapy or laugh therapy -the use of humor for the relief of physical or emotional pain and stress. It is used as a complementary method to promote health and cope with illness. Humor therapy helps reduce the negative effects of feeling unhealthy, out of control, afraid, or helpless, which are common problems for those with cancer or chronic diseases.
Humor therapy is used regularly along with conventional medicine at hospitals and cancer treatment centers and involves methods such as movies, audio recordings, books, games, and puzzles to induce laughter and joy of which had many befefits of which are listed below.
BENEFITS OF SMILING AND LAUGHING
Diabetes Care May 2003;26:1651-1652
Anahad O'Conner, The Claim: A Fake Smile Can be Bad for Your Health
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/health/22really.html
Martin H Brutsche, Paul Grossman, Rebekka E Müller, Jan Wiegand, Pello, Florent Baty, and Willibald Ruch. "Impact of Laughter on Air Trapping in Severe Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease."2008
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2528214/?tool=pmcentrez
Emiliya Zhivotovskaya, "Smile and Others Smile with You: Health Benefits, Emotional Contagion, and Mimicry," September 27, 2008.
http://positivepsychologynews.com/news/emiliya-zhivotovskaya/200809271036
Joni Holderman, "A Geniune Found Smile Improve Health, Happiness," June 15, 2010.
http://mentalhealthnews.org/a-genuine-smile-found-to-improve-health-happiness/84834/
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Use Your Amuse System to Boost Your Immune System
Humor Your Tumor"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Laughter Using Humor to Cope Part 1: Laughing in the Midst of Stress"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Prescription for Pain Reduction"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Using Humor to Cope Part 2: Humor in Concentration/POW Camps"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Emotion: The Key to the Mind's Influence on Health"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Impact of Negative Emotion on Survival"
www.LaughterRemedy.com
http://www.cancer.org/Treatment/TreatmentsandSideEffects/ComplementaryandAlternativeMedicine/MindBodyandSpirit/humor-therapy
Feeling grumpy? Worried about your finances, the state of the world, your health? It is time for our society to start taking responsibility for our health in a free natural way!
Research has found that making your self smile, by engaging the facial muscles, while and thinking about something that makes you happy will send a message to your brain that you are actually happy. The process of mimicking the facial expressions of an emotion can fool your self into feeling the actual emotion. This then eventually can improve your mood causing the many health benefits such as improved immune function and reduced blood pressure and more listed below.
Another positive effect of smiling is that it will up lift the mood of the people around your through a process called emotional contagon. Emotional contagon is the tendency for humans and animals to mimic facial expressions, emotions, postures and movements of the people they are around. That means feeling good and smiling is just as infectious as feeling grumpy and negative.
Frowning and negative thinking causes actual physical responses such as the production ofcortisol (the stress hormone) and while smiling and laughing stimulates the production of serotonin (the "feel good" hormone.)
LAUGHING
Humor therapy or laugh therapy -the use of humor for the relief of physical or emotional pain and stress. It is used as a complementary method to promote health and cope with illness. Humor therapy helps reduce the negative effects of feeling unhealthy, out of control, afraid, or helpless, which are common problems for those with cancer or chronic diseases.
Humor therapy is used regularly along with conventional medicine at hospitals and cancer treatment centers and involves methods such as movies, audio recordings, books, games, and puzzles to induce laughter and joy of which had many befefits of which are listed below.
BENEFITS OF SMILING AND LAUGHING
- Lowered production of stress hormones.
- Relaxation and reduction in muscle tension
- Improved immune system function.
- Reduction in blood pressure.
- Reduction of blood sugar
- Clearing the lungs by dislodging mucous plugs.
- Increasing the production of salivary immunoglobulin A, which defends against infectious organisms that enter through the respiratory tract.
- Aerobic effects that increased the body's ability to utilize oxygen.
- A rapid ability to disregard aches and pains or to perceive them as less severe, increasing pain tolerance by stimulating the release of endorphins.
- Makes you look and feel younger and more attractive causing others to respond to you in a positive way.
Diabetes Care May 2003;26:1651-1652
Anahad O'Conner, The Claim: A Fake Smile Can be Bad for Your Health
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/health/22really.html
Martin H Brutsche, Paul Grossman, Rebekka E Müller, Jan Wiegand, Pello, Florent Baty, and Willibald Ruch. "Impact of Laughter on Air Trapping in Severe Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease."2008
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2528214/?tool=pmcentrez
Emiliya Zhivotovskaya, "Smile and Others Smile with You: Health Benefits, Emotional Contagion, and Mimicry," September 27, 2008.
http://positivepsychologynews.com/news/emiliya-zhivotovskaya/200809271036
Joni Holderman, "A Geniune Found Smile Improve Health, Happiness," June 15, 2010.
http://mentalhealthnews.org/a-genuine-smile-found-to-improve-health-happiness/84834/
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Use Your Amuse System to Boost Your Immune System
Humor Your Tumor"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Laughter Using Humor to Cope Part 1: Laughing in the Midst of Stress"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Prescription for Pain Reduction"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Using Humor to Cope Part 2: Humor in Concentration/POW Camps"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Emotion: The Key to the Mind's Influence on Health"
Paul E. McGhee, PhD. "Impact of Negative Emotion on Survival"
www.LaughterRemedy.com
http://www.cancer.org/Treatment/TreatmentsandSideEffects/ComplementaryandAlternativeMedicine/MindBodyandSpirit/humor-therapy
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