Everyone knows that exercise and eating right is an integral part of being healthy, but how many people stop to consider all of the other factors that contribute to our overall health and well-being?
One of the most important things we can ever do for ourselves is have good stress management in our lives. Everyone has a certain amount of chaos in their everyday life, but it's those who choose to manage it well that are much better off. Whether it's through exercise, prayer, walking barefoot on the beach...whatever works for you. Stress management is essential to good health.
Eating while under stress, or in a stressful situation, impedes on the digestive process. So, for example, if you consume the most nutritious meal, while pacing back and forth across your kitchen and stressing about the days events, you will be missing out on much of your meal's nutritional value. Your body is basically in fight or flight mode at this point and simply isn't focused on or committed to good digestion, just quick digestion.
In addition to how stress negatively impacts digestion, it is also a contributing factor to essentially all major disease. Supressing negative emotions alone can cause major upset in the body. There are many stories readily available online to read about success stories of women who stayed positive throughout their battles with cancer, versus women, battling the same illness, who had a very negative outlook and aren't around to share their stories.
Stress management and a positive attitude will take you further in life and in health than the most healthy eating, negative, workaholic will ever get. Remember this next time you eat on the run or during a fight with your spouse. Sit down, take a deep breath, inhale the aroma of your meal, relax and enjoy! Your body will thank you.
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