Emotions and their role in our health

The #1 missed cause of disease

If you guys have been around for a while you know how often I talk about how emotions and stress play a role in our health and healing. I actually can’t believe that it’s taken me this long to publish this article.

In applied kinesiology, we teach the concept of the triad of health. Meaning, if you think about your health like a triangle there are three different areas or categories of our health that ALL need to be addressed and balanced in order for us to be well and thrive. These ares are:

1. Our physical structure

2. Our biochemistry

3. Our emotional/mental health

These are all EQUALLY important! If you’re currently struggling with symptoms whether it be low back pain, chronic infections, anxiety/depression, or skin conditions if you haven’t addressed the emotional side of it - you’re missing at least 33% of the picture.

Stress and emotions absolutely affect our physiology. You’ve all experienced this. Ever been really nervous about a presentation, interview, or meeting and you have a pit in your stomach? Or have to go to the bathroom? Ever have a super stressful week and you end up in bed with a migraine? Stress changes our physiology.

Mental health wise, we are not doing well as a society. 19% of the US adult population suffers from anxiety (and that’s having a clinical diagnosis, likely the number is much higher). 7% of children have a diagnosed anxiety disorder. In 2020, 18.4% of US adults reported having ever been diagnosed with depression. In 2023 16% of youth surveyed reported having at least one major depressive episode in the past year.

Conventional medicine’s answer to this is…surprise surprise…medication. How well is this working? It’s not. We need to recognize that simply pushing pills is NOT working. Despite all the access to medication, these numbers keep RISING. More and more adults and children are medicated than before and still rates of anxiety and depression are skyrocketing. We have to have tools to help process and heal our emotions and regulate our nervous systems for true healing to occur.