Image Credit - boncherry.com
As a Therapist I am a big believer in the power of human touch. We all benefit when someone reaches out to us with a hug, a kiss, or even a stroke of our arm. Yet love or kindness in any form is actually good for our health!
Love and kindness generate oxytocin in the body, which is also known as the ‘love hormone’ or ‘cuddle chemical’, as it is present in higher levels when you are feeling love, and flows through the body when you hug. As a serial hugger, I am happy to discover that I am receiving large doses of oxytocin!
Aine Belton of Doses of Love writes -
Oxytocin is associated with generosity, increased levels of trust, reduced fear and anxiety and seeing people in a more positive light (finding them more ‘attractive’). It encourages social bonding and greater empathy for others.
Anytime you feel a sense of love and connection with a person, pet or spiritual deity even, oxytocin is produced. It is also generated during physical intimacy and when we touch and stroke each other.
Shortly before her death Mother Theresa said that loneliness and isolation in the West was the most significant "disease" she had encountered during her lifetime. It turns out, she just may be right.
And yet oxytocin is not just a feel-good chemical!
It also has a number of significant physical health-promoting attributes, such as mopping up damaging free radicals, reducing inflammation, lowering blood pressure, aiding heart health and repair, and growing new blood vessels!
There are a number of ways you can NATURALLY increase oxytocin levels in the body.
Acts of kindness has been found in scientific research to be one of them! :)
The young girl in the ADORABLE video below is very wise when she advises to "Be Kind!"
Go to: www.doseoflove.com/bekind (Video)
In Dr. David Hamilton’s book "Why Kindness is Good For You", he sites, alongside various scientific research findings that correlate love and kindness with health benefits, a number of ways you can NATURALLY produce oxytocin in the body.
These are listed, in short, below:
1. Being inspired (such as through an elevating, heart-warming film, poem, movie, song, clip, etc.)
2. Emotional expression
3. Receiving a massage
4. Supporting a loved one
5. Giving hugs
6. Stroking a pet
To increase your levels of oxytocin I personally recommend spending time each day, such as in a meditation or a quiet time of relaxation, to connect feelings of love and compassion.
Get in touch with and feel the love you have for yourself, for others in your life, and for the world itself.
You can then even extend that love and compassion to people you dislike, feel in conflict or disagreement with, or despise even, to heal that resonance.
Blessing others, including your enemies, will help YOU as much as them, and transform denser energies into love and light.
And remember, random acts of kindness are also a scientifically proven way, benefiting others as well as you!
These can include relatively small acts, like letting someone through in traffic, giving someone your seat on a train, offering sincere compliments, opening a door, taking the time to really listen, buying someone a book, feeding ducks in a pond, baking someone a cake, writing someone a thank-you card, volunteering, treating someone to lunch, writing a poem for someone, etc.
Here are some more general ways to give of yourself:
Give appreciation and acknowledgement
Give encouragement and support
Give love and care
Give time and attention
Give information
Give touch
Give understanding
Give giftsGive joy
Give compliments
Give of your talents
Give positive thoughts, blessings or prayers
So sending you out a huge hug and heaps of love!
Jean Fisher-Taylor x
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