Peter was a health nut who was not very healthy.
His Spartan diet followed the latest nutritional science. The exercise routine he followed every morning was rigorous and addressed all the primary elements—strength, aerobic capacity, flexibility and balance. He practiced excellent oral hygiene. He consumed several well-researched nutritional supplements. Neither wine, nor nicotine, nor any other psychoactive drug entered his body.
“So, why do I keep getting sick?” he asked me.
While I’m a psychotherapist, not a physician, I’ve heard this question a time or two, so I inquired about his medical status. He suffered no chronic ailments, was very fit, and had undergone a comprehensive physical evaluation in search of the answer to his question. None proved forthcoming. Yet, he suffered from frequent ailments, like colds, earaches, sore throat and sinus infections, and when these maladies did occur, his recovery was slow and frustrating.
“How can someone this fit be so unhealthy?” he pondered. “What’s wrong with my immune system?”
“Your head,” I replied. “There’s a vital element to well-being that you have overlooked, and that’s the health of your brain.”
The influences of mind on matter are well-established. From the cryptic placebo effect, wherein one responds positively to a treatment devoid of biological impact (think sugar pill), to the capacity of a particular attitude to offset the deleterious impacts of stress, the psyche’s power to influence the body is immense. Fundamentally, the concept of mind as distinct from body is spurious.
A classic study from the University of Wisconsin made this clear. Researchers wanted to know if folks suffering high levels of stress were more likely to die prematurely. So, they obtained stress levels from more than 30,000 subjects and followed them for eight years to ascertain if being wigged out translated to being dead. Frequently, it did. Those subjects reporting high stress levels were 43 percent more likely to die before their time. However, that was only true for those subjects who also believed that stress was harmful to their health. Those who reported high stress but didn’t believe it would damage their health had the lowest rates of early death in the study. Belief proved the determining factor.
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“The only part of you that isn’t in shape is your mind,” I told Peter. “Sadly, that’s arguably the most important part.”
I’ve met more than a few health nuts (I am one) who did all the right things for their physiology while simultaneously ignoring their mental well-being. But the body is no fool. It knows. So, when things are amiss in the brain (depression, worry, anxiety, agitation, etc.), the body feels it, and, in its own fashion, makes that apparent, often through sickness.
As the master control center in the body, the brain lords over almost all physiological processes, including the immune response. One of Peter’s regrettable habits was his propensity for angry outbursts, which are known to damp down immunity for hours after the eruption subsides. Another was the chronic stress brought on by his distracted, helter-skelter thinking.
“If you fail to become more in charge of your feelings and thoughts, instead of the other way around, your body will pay the price,” I told him.
Over time and with a bit of coaching, Peter learned to exercise his brain as well as his brawn. Mindfulness meditation was his ticket, and true to his meticulous nature, he incorporated it into his routine religiously. I recommended starting with five minutes a day, and he did fifteen. Instead of once a day, he went for twice, sometimes thrice.
Regardless, the proven benefits arrived on schedule in about six weeks. His emotional reactivity diminished, the nattering self-talk inside his skull abated, he spent more time in the present, and sure enough, the pesky illnesses ebbed.
So, remember to “exercise” above your neck. Otherwise, an unhealthy mind begets an unhealthy body.
