Kindness is Healthy
Kindness is Healthy
I promise this will end on a good note.
But. Let’s start with the bad news, get that out of the way. Valentine’s is really unhealthy for a lot of people. Rates for depression and reported feelings of loneliness are on the rise everywhere these days. But spring and summer are worse than fall and winter (contrary to a popular misconception), with the high (and sometimes false, crazy) expectations of Valentine’s Day sort of ushering it all in. The most hardcore, evidence-gorging scientists agree that “Valentine’s Blues” is not just a pop culture turn of phrase, it is a real thing. It is even dubbed by some experts as the holiday that ushers in “the suicide season”.
This is an exclusionary holiday, and we all know it. It is time for that to end. Full stop.
But. Let’s start with the bad news, get that out of the way. Valentine’s is really unhealthy for a lot of people. Rates for depression and reported feelings of loneliness are on the rise everywhere these days. But spring and summer are worse than fall and winter (contrary to a popular misconception), with the high (and sometimes false, crazy) expectations of Valentine’s Day sort of ushering it all in. The most hardcore, evidence-gorging scientists agree that “Valentine’s Blues” is not just a pop culture turn of phrase, it is a real thing. It is even dubbed by some experts as the holiday that ushers in “the suicide season”.
This is an exclusionary holiday, and we all know it. It is time for that to end. Full stop.
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"Never love anyone who treats you like you're ordinary." -Oscar Wilde
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Now for the good news. The fabulous news. The call to action.
Acts of Kindness are good for your health. For your mental health, yes, and even your physical health. Three categories have been studied: Volunteering, Gift Giving, and Random Acts of Kindness, and ALL of them have been found to improve both physical and mental health.
And I am not talking about some small handful of findings here, I am talking about STUDY after STUDY after STUDY. (In fact, the scientific data that something as simple as petting an animal can lower your blood pressure and improve health in a variety of ways is so strong, so established, and so ubiquitous that it runs the risk of being tossed off as an old wive’s tale.)
In the extremely learned Journal of Psychoneuroendocrinology we learn that acts of kindness are actually good for your immune system–think of it, your immume system!
Only one hitch here . . . if the data says that Volunteering, Gift Giving, and Random Acts of Kindness are all good for your health, then why do this just one day a year, on Valentine’s? Why not practice kindness all year ‘round? Like a gym membership or daily meditation or a weekly round of golf–it’s good for your health!
