Create Your Space for Wellbeing

Create Your Space for Wellbeing

Teresa Anne Palmer

Do acts of gratitude promote good health and well-being?  It would seem so; saying “thank you” and the acknowledgement of other people’s contributions leads to new opportunities to form relationships, and relationships strengthen the immune system. Grateful people experience less “aches and pains” and overall take better care of them. Below are some facts about Gratitude:

Being grateful promotes increase in happiness and decrease in sadness and/or depression  (Robert Emmons)

The 2012 Kentucky study showed an increase in empathy and a decrease in aggressive tendencies. A daily practice of gratitude improves sleep (hypothalamus activation brain).

Gratitude allows us to appreciate others’ accomplishments, which improves self-esteem.

Gratitude decreases stress and increases one`s ability to be resilient.

The daily practice of gratitude has been shown to decrease pain, secondary to the release of dopamine).

The practice of gratitude has been shown to promote optimism, increase energy and vitality levels, and boost the immune system.

In 2012 the National Institute of Health (NIH) research showed that being in a state of gratitude activated the hypothalamus –the area of the brain that controls sleep. Additionally, when we are in a grateful state, dopamine, the feel good hormone is released.