{"id":4531,"date":"2014-04-27T14:51:40","date_gmt":"2014-04-27T20:51:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/?p=4531"},"modified":"2014-04-27T14:52:16","modified_gmt":"2014-04-27T20:52:16","slug":"being-kind-is-a-scientifically-proven-way-to-improve-your-spirits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/being-kind-is-a-scientifically-proven-way-to-improve-your-spirits\/","title":{"rendered":"Being kind is a scientifically proven way to improve your spirits"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Being kind is a scientifically proven way to improve your spirits \u2013 kindness is a natural antidepressant. So if you want to feel instantly better about yourself and change any negative feelings to positive ones, all you need to do is be kind to another human being. In a scientific study they found that when you do a kind act for someone it increases the level of serotonin in your brain. Serotonin is the happy chemical that makes us feel good about ourselves. Not only does it elevate the serotonin of the person performing the act of kindness, but it does it for the receiver as well. And even more amazing, the serotonin level increases in anyone who happens to witnesses acts of kindness as well. It may not be something you can wrap with pretty paper and a big red bow, but consider giving the Gift of Serotonin to yourself and to others\u2026.<\/p>\n<p>You don\u2019t have to take my word for it, I researched the topic and so I could share some true medical facts with you that came from seriously legit (as my\u00a0teenage daughter says)\u00a0research on the matter so you can know that it really is a medically proven statement.\u00a0 Let me share some of the research I found (sources:\u00a0 Psychology Today, Harvard University, medical study on the Mother Theresa Effect) :<\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">The Benefits of Performing Acts of Kindness<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Research has shown that those who routinely engage in acts of kindness:<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Experience alleviation of stress<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Experience alleviation of chronic pain<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Experience alleviation of insomnia<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Experience fewer aches and pains<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have a lessened likelihood of experiencing diseases and disorders<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Overall health is protected twice as much as aspirin protects against heart disease<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have a significantly lower likelihood of dying of diseases<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have markedly increased levels of Immunoglobulin A (antibody which boosts immunity)<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have significant increase in Serotonin levels (chemical in brain that makes us feel good)<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have decreased feelings of depression<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have increased sense of happiness and optimism<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have an increased sense of self worth<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have enhanced feelings of joyfulness<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Have a boost in their sense of physical and emotional well being<\/p>\n<p>And my personal favorite benefit:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The effects of doing acts of kindness have a stronger effect than exercising four times a week!!!!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Can I tell you how happy this last one makes me, I mean really, unbelievably, happy!\u00a0 Because I can\u2019t stand exercising!\u00a0 I know I am supposed to tell you that I love it and it\u2019s great, but that would be a lie.\u00a0 I don\u2019t love it.\u00a0 My gosh, I will drive ten minutes around a parking lot just to find a stall that is within ten feet of the front door, just to avoid walking!\u00a0 I don\u2019t like to break a sweat.\u00a0 Not even a little one.\u00a0 And I know that not liking exercise makes me a terrible example, but no more!\u00a0 Now I can get my daily exercise by just being kind every day because according to the studies I read, kindness is the best exercise!\u00a0 Oh my goodness that makes me happy \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<p>This week do acts of kindness for everyone around you.\u00a0 It can be as small as smiling at your coworkers or smiling at a stranger, or writing a note to tell someone you love them or what you like about them, or giving a compliment to someone who deserves one, it can be any act of kindness.\u00a0 So based on the study if all of us perform acts of kindness for each other this week then all of our serotonin levels will rise, and if all of us are receiving kindness today then our serotonin levels will rise even more, and then if we all observe each other doing kind acts for others around us, our serotonin levels will go THROUGH THE ROOF!\u00a0 How cool will this be \u2013 we will have a KINDNESS HIGH!\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And it\u2019s totally legal \ud83d\ude42\u00a0\u00a0 This is awesome!\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0So I will start us off \u2013 I LOVE YOU ALL!\u00a0 Now spread the kindness and get those serotonin levels rising baby!!!!<\/p>\n<p>~Amy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Being kind is a scientifically proven way to improve your spirits \u2013 kindness is a natural antidepressant. So if you want to feel instantly better about yourself and change any negative feelings to positive ones, all you need to do is be kind to another human being. In a scientific study they found that when [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":80,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[4002,4008,4004,3997,1686,1151,3999,778,1951,30,1316,3747,940,246,2687,4001,464,4005,216,137,35,3998,176,1745,1772,4003,4007,3486,4009,496,4000,81,275,4006],"class_list":["post-4531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-aches","tag-acts-of-kindness","tag-alleviate","tag-being-kind","tag-brain","tag-charity","tag-chemical","tag-depression","tag-exercise","tag-gift","tag-give","tag-happy-happiness","tag-harvard-university","tag-health","tag-heart-disease","tag-insomnia","tag-joy","tag-joyfulness","tag-kind","tag-kindness","tag-love","tag-medical-fact","tag-mother-theresa","tag-optimism","tag-pain","tag-pains","tag-perform","tag-psychology-today","tag-receive","tag-self-worth","tag-seratonin","tag-smile","tag-stress","tag-well-being"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4531"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4531\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4532,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4531\/revisions\/4532"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amyreesanderson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}