HOW EMOTIONS GET STORED IN YOUR BODY & AFFECT YOUR HEALTH (TRADITIONAL CHINESE MEDICINE)
According to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), your emotions and your physical health are connected. Today we’ll look at how emotions get stored in your body & affect your health 🙏✨
According to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), your emotions and your physical health are connected. Sadness, nervous tension and anger, worry, fear, and overwork are each associated with a particular organ in the body. This aligns with the holistic philosophy, that mind-body-soul all affects your health and well-being.
I’m well aware that for some people this theory of emotions affecting your physical health might be “too weird”, but when giving it second thought, I personally think that it makes perfect sense. Just think about how we’re now finding scientific proof of how long-term stress damages our bodies and our overall health. If stress, a mental state of being, can do this to our body – then just imagine what all the other emotions can do to our health?
In Traditional Chinese Medicine they have seen the connection between emotions and physical health for many, many years – and there is a lot of wisdom to take from it, and things to learn to pay attention to.
If you have health problems and can identify where you’re hurting, and thereby can connect a specific emotion to it – then you can start to look at yourself and your life and become aware of if you’re holding on to certain feelings, that might become stored in your body and affect your health.
Then from here on, you can not only work on your health through the physical aspect (fx movement, food, supplement, herbs etc.), but you can also engage your mind and emotions and work through the problems on a much deeper layer.
“When there is no movement there is pain. When there is movement there is no pain”
– Traditional Chinese saying
Let’s look at where emotions are stored in the body according to TCM.
Spleen
Emotions:
Worry, dwelling or focusing too much on a specific topic, excessive mental work
Symptoms of Spleen imbalance:
Tired, loss of appetite, mucus discharge, poor digestion, abdominal distension, loose stools or diarrhea. Weak muscles, pale lips. Bruising, excess menstrual blood flow, and other bleeding disorders.
Lung
Emotions:
Grief, sadness, detached
Symptoms of Lung imbalance:
Shortness of breath and shallow breathing, sweating, fatigue, cough, frequent cold and flu, allergies, asthma, and other lung conditions. Dry skin. Depression and crying
Liver
Emotions:
Anger, resentment frustration, irritability, bitterness
Symptoms of Liver imbalance:
Breast distension, menstrual pain, headache, irritability, inappropriate anger, dizziness, dry, red eyes and other eye conditions, tendonitis.
Heart
Emotions:
Lack of enthusiasm and vitality, mental restlessness, depression, insomnia, despair, excessive joy
Symptoms of Heart imbalance:
Insomnia, heart palpitations and irregular heartbeat, excessive dreaming, poor long-term memory, psychological disorders.
Kidney
Emotions:
Fearful, weak willpower, insecure, isolated
Symptoms of Kidney imbalance:
Frequent urination, urinary incontinence, night sweats, dry mouth, poor short-term memory, low back pain, ringing in the ears, hearing loss, and other ear conditions. Premature gray hair, hair loss, and osteoporosis.
How can you then use this to improve your health and well-being? Work through your emotions. Really sit with yourself and feel if you have anger, frustration or if you’re feeling insecure or fearful.
Take out a journal and write freely about your emotions – or talk with someone. Feel the feelings, get them moving. Be very honest with yourself – perhaps you’ve been holding onto something that doesn’t make you happy? Or you’ve held onto anger or jealousy for years? Work with your mindset. Fx if you’ve felt hatred or jealousy towards someone for years, know that this feeling isn’t hurting them, it’s hurting you. Choose to forgive and let go for your own health and well-being 🙏✨
Read also: Forgiveness is Not for Others, it is for Yourself
Sources:
Book: Chinese Holistic Medicine - Steven Cardoza
Emotions in Traditional Chinese Medicine - Verywellmind
Five Major Organs - Traditional Chinese Medicine World Foundation