Your past can really have a tangible effect on your physical health. In this week’s health talk, The Pioneer’s Shikha Duggal explores unprocessed feelings and their effect on one’s physical health with inputs from a few experts in the field.
Emotional baggage is not just a figurative burden. Your past can really have a tangible effect on your physical health, too! To an extent, that is who you become in the future. Hence, in this week’s health talk, it got really important for us to discuss unprocessed feelings and their effect on our physical. A number of therapists helped us recognise the signs of emotional baggage and, in fact, address these issues to develop healthier, more fulfilling relationships.
Rohini Rajeev, the senior psychotherapist at The Able Mind, proposed, “When our mind is preoccupied with more than a few things, the constant feeling of busyness is suggesting you take a step back and breathe! Mental clutter prevents us from focusing on what’s important and results in extreme mental fatigue, emotional instability, brain fog, and poor judgement, to name a few.” Our bodies can react to unresolved emotions like festered anger or sadness and accumulate stress by producing higher amounts of the stress hormone cortisol. Prolonged elevation of the same has been linked to several health problems, such as high blood pressure, decreased immunity, inflammation, insulin resistance, etc. There is a strong mind-body link, and physical symptoms of emotional stress are not uncommon! “Intense headaches, tense muscles, and digestive issues can result from prolonged stress. Furthermore, it may play a role in the onset or aggravation of illnesses such as autoimmune disorders and cardiovascular disease. Proactive and preventive mental health support and learning to cope with everyday problems effectively can prove to be extremely helpful to lead a life of better quality and good health,” adds the keeper.
Another psychologist, Dr. Vidya, who is also a life coach, put forward, “All emotional experiences have an energy attached to them; this may or may not be yours; they may be attracted by your surroundings and environment. These emotions need a flow, and every such emotion takes around 20–50 seconds to pass through our body. If during this time we just passively allow this emotion to pass through our body, it won’t get stored, and its effects will be negligible. However, because we have already stored past blockages in our body, these emotions get stuck into those blockages and create even denser patterns.” Extending a far-down conversation, the doctor continued, “Our body has its own intelligence, and the communication between the brain, our body, and our gut creates a neurological pattern. This pattern, over a period of time, becomes bolder and heavier, which results in forming intelligence patterns! Any new experiences then pass through the same patterns, giving us similar results or a temporary feeling of good results. So our lives form a loop, and everything new is sucked into these loops, giving us familiar relationships and stagnancy in our overall lives.”
Her patient had a heart blockage, and the doctors asked him to put a stent in his heart. Scared of the entire procedure, he somehow got attracted to her work. After learning that his heart was going through grief, lack of connection, depression, lack of vitality, and loneliness, she tried a lot of emotional shedding through various consciousness techniques that include access bars, somatic therapies, breathwork, TFT, Ho’oponopono, gratitude journaling, and present awareness! After just a few months of all this conscious work, he was off blood-thinning medicines and had no requirement for heart surgery. He is happy and joyful, and his heart has been happy and kicking for the past two years. Many such cases with kidney stones, hair fall, liver anxiety, cholesterol, and gut issues have been relaxed.
In Dr. Madhu Kotiya’s practice, a psychiatric counsellor has encountered many individuals burdened by past traumas. One patient, in particular, struggled with severe anxiety and chronic back pain! Through spiritual healing and energy work, she discovered that her physical pain was deeply connected to emotional trauma from her past. As she learned to process and release these emotions, her physical symptoms gradually improved. This case highlights the profound connection between our emotional and physical well-being. “Emotional baggage can manifest physically in various ways. Over time, this can weaken the immune system, making the body more susceptible to illnesses. From a spiritual perspective, emotional blockages can disrupt the flow of energy in the body, leading to physical ailments. It’s essential to recognise that our mental, emotional, and physical health are deeply interconnected,” explained the counsellor.Effective ways to respond to an overwhelming emotional experience, by Rohini:
Rohini Rajeev, the senior psychotherapist at The Able Mind, proposed, “When our mind is preoccupied with more than a few things, the constant feeling of busyness is suggesting you take a step back and breathe! Mental clutter prevents us from focusing on what’s important and results in extreme mental fatigue, emotional instability, brain fog, and poor judgement, to name a few.” Our bodies can react to unresolved emotions like festered anger or sadness and accumulate stress by producing higher amounts of the stress hormone cortisol. Prolonged elevation of the same has been linked to several health problems, such as high blood pressure, decreased immunity, inflammation, insulin resistance, etc. There is a strong mind-body link, and physical symptoms of emotional stress are not uncommon! “Intense headaches, tense muscles, and digestive issues can result from prolonged stress. Furthermore, it may play a role in the onset or aggravation of illnesses such as autoimmune disorders and cardiovascular disease. Proactive and preventive mental health support and learning to cope with everyday problems effectively can prove to be extremely helpful to lead a life of better quality and good health,” adds the keeper.
Another psychologist, Dr. Vidya, who is also a life coach, put forward, “All emotional experiences have an energy attached to them; this may or may not be yours; they may be attracted by your surroundings and environment. These emotions need a flow, and every such emotion takes around 20–50 seconds to pass through our body. If during this time we just passively allow this emotion to pass through our body, it won’t get stored, and its effects will be negligible. However, because we have already stored past blockages in our body, these emotions get stuck into those blockages and create even denser patterns.” Extending a far-down conversation, the doctor continued, “Our body has its own intelligence, and the communication between the brain, our body, and our gut creates a neurological pattern. This pattern, over a period of time, becomes bolder and heavier, which results in forming intelligence patterns! Any new experiences then pass through the same patterns, giving us similar results or a temporary feeling of good results. So our lives form a loop, and everything new is sucked into these loops, giving us familiar relationships and stagnancy in our overall lives.”
Her patient had a heart blockage, and the doctors asked him to put a stent in his heart. Scared of the entire procedure, he somehow got attracted to her work. After learning that his heart was going through grief, lack of connection, depression, lack of vitality, and loneliness, she tried a lot of emotional shedding through various consciousness techniques that include access bars, somatic therapies, breathwork, TFT, Ho’oponopono, gratitude journaling, and present awareness! After just a few months of all this conscious work, he was off blood-thinning medicines and had no requirement for heart surgery. He is happy and joyful, and his heart has been happy and kicking for the past two years. Many such cases with kidney stones, hair fall, liver anxiety, cholesterol, and gut issues have been relaxed.
In Dr. Madhu Kotiya’s practice, a psychiatric counsellor has encountered many individuals burdened by past traumas. One patient, in particular, struggled with severe anxiety and chronic back pain! Through spiritual healing and energy work, she discovered that her physical pain was deeply connected to emotional trauma from her past. As she learned to process and release these emotions, her physical symptoms gradually improved. This case highlights the profound connection between our emotional and physical well-being. “Emotional baggage can manifest physically in various ways. Over time, this can weaken the immune system, making the body more susceptible to illnesses. From a spiritual perspective, emotional blockages can disrupt the flow of energy in the body, leading to physical ailments. It’s essential to recognise that our mental, emotional, and physical health are deeply interconnected,” explained the counsellor.Effective ways to respond to an overwhelming emotional experience, by Rohini:
1 Journaling is a simple and effective way to manage mental clutter: Writing down our concerns, tasks, and things to do helps us prioritise, not catastrophize, and feel more in control of our activities. Journaling allows us to be more accepting of our mental experiences, resulting in fewer negative stress responses. Simply indulging in free-form writing helps us feel lighter. Journaling also helps us identify our triggers and process things more logically. It is an effective aid to therapy.
2 Forming and sticking to a routine: When we know that there are things in our lives that we can control, it helps us feel less overwhelmed by our ability to manage things.
3 Everyone needs someone
to talk to without feeling
judged: Choose your respondents wisely; it could be your partner, friend, or family member, or it could be a mental health professional!
