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Blood Pressure Affected by Stress and Anger

Connection Between Emotions and Hypertension

Nov 20, 2009 Jennifer Harshman

"He makes my blood boil," or "He makes my blood pressure go up" may be true. Emotions, including anger, may be the cause of cardiovascular and other medical problems.

According to Deb Shapiro, in her book Your Body Speaks Your Mind (published by Sounds True, 2006), blood pressure is just one of many medical conditions that are affected by the mind. Emotions affect the body.

Does Ms. Shapiro believe that every medical condition is psychological in origin, caused by the mind? She clearly says she does not believe that. She believes that some illnesses are caused by infections, and that some accidents really are just accidents.

The Mind-Body Connection The Mind and Body Cannot be Separated

During a training he gave at Carmi Baptist Children's Home and Family Services in October of 2009, Michael Trout, Director of the Infant-Parent Institute in Champaign, IL, USA, spoke of current psychiatric and brain research. He explained that researchers now understand that the construct of a separation between the mind and the body is "an artificial one. It is made up; it doesn’t exist.”

In Your Body Speaks Your Mind, Shapiro refers to this inability to separate the mind from the body by referring to our "bodymind." It is becoming more and more commonly known that there is no mind/body separation, that the emotions and thoughts do in fact affect the physical.

Evidence mounts, yet even so, conventional thinkers might find some of the examples Shapiro gives in her book to be eerie or even a bit far-fetched, such as the woman who broke her hip in the same place, on three different occasions – every time she lost someone she loved.

In his book Managing Stress (published by Jones and Bartlett, 2006), Brian Luke Seaward quoted Bernie Siegal, M.D. as saying, "Thoughts are chemicals. They can either kill or cure." Various researchers have demonstrated that thoughts are indeed chemicals. Numerous authors, including Seaward, Carnegie, Canfield, and Dispenza, have reported on the effects these chemicals can have on the human body.

In his book, Evolve Your Brain: The Science of Changing Your Mind, (published by Health Communications, Inc., 2007), Dr. Joe Dispenza explains that thoughts and emotions are nothing but chemicals, and that people can become addicted to them.

Clearly, brain chemicals such as neurotransmitters are physical matter. So, it appears to work like this: thinking and feeling create neurotransmitters, chemicals in the body. These chemicals are communicators and they affect every cell in the body. Is it so shocking, then, to say that thinking and feeling affect the health, the condition of the body?

Those in the fields of medicine and psychology already know that hormones and certain other bodily chemicals can exacerbate conditions that are caused by infection or other organic illness. Could certain body chemicals, in the wrong places, or at the wrong times, lead to illness or disease? Most pointedly, could certain thinking patterns cause cancer or heart disease? Could getting angry cause high blood pressure, heart attacks and strokes? Apparently so.

The question then remains, what can be done about it? How can people avoid harming their health with their emotions?

The Bible May Hold Some Keys to Health and Emotional Well Being

The Bible may not seem like a likely resource for health and wellness, because it is viewed as a source of spiritual or religious teaching. Spiritual books aren't often equated with medical information. In this case, something contained in it applies to mental, emotional and even physical health.

A command that is found in the Bible and other spiritual books addresses one of the key prescriptives for health. Violating it can lead to many health problems. The prescription? Forgiveness and letting go of anger. Perhaps people should forgive others and let go of anger not solely for their spiritual-emotional health, but also for their physical health. They are all connected.

The copyright of the article Blood Pressure Affected by Stress and Anger in General Medicine is owned by Jennifer Harshman. Permission to republish Blood Pressure Affected by Stress and Anger in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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