What Do Emotions Have to Do with Women Living Longer?

New studies suggest that women live longer than men because their immune systems age more slowly and their immune function remains higher for longer. My experience has shown me that it actually goes much deeper than that. We need to care for all the various parts of our being in order to have true health and longevity. While this may seem obvious, there is a part of our being that actually goes ignored much of the time. This is our energy body, otherwise known as the spirit, the chi or the prana.

The energy body is sort of the elephant in the room, because it’s so vital and important and yet the idea of keeping it healthy is often not truly embraced or understood. It is the energy body that provides the intelligence that allows our bodies to function and our minds to think. It is the energy body that helps us to experience emotions and connect with other people.

Imbalance in the energy body is, I believe, where the aging process and the breakdown of the physical body begins. For most people, the energy body becomes imbalanced years or even decades before the physical body begins to have problems. It’s just like a car or any other machine that requires maintenance – keep the energy body “tuned up” and balanced, and your physical body will be able to give you a longer, healthier, happier life than your peers.

So what is this big secret that women already know about keeping their energy bodies balanced? What is the piece of the puzzle that men are missing, leading to poorer health and shorter lives? It can be summed up in two words: Emotional communication. Stereotypes suggest that women love to talk about feelings and that men would rather do anything else! Think of the women and men you know and ask yourself if this may be true.

I saw hundreds of examples of this during my years as a holistic chiropractor. My male patients usually tended to keep conversation light and surface level. My female patients were the opposite! They would easily spill the beans about their difficult family relationships or stress at work, and communicated freely every tiny detail about their physical pains too. In fact, it was this kind of thing that helped me to initially understand how our feelings really affect our bodies and minds.

Suffice to say that how we deal with emotional stress means absolutely everything when it comes to our health. Emotions are vibrations of pure energy, just like everything else around us. Sound waves, microwaves, water, the chair you’re sitting in, and your body are all made of pure energy, vibrating at different frequencies, which make them appear unique. But we’re really made of the same stuff. Because of this, it is possible for our spirits and bodies to be severely affected by the vibrations of negative emotions.

When we experience an emotion, the energy of it is automatically processed and released by the body, so we can move past that feeling and onto the next. Sometimes however, this process gets interrupted and the emotional energy gets stuck in the body. These energies are called trapped emotions and they can cause all kinds of emotional, mental and physical problems. When it comes to the difference between the emotional experiences of men and women, you could say that women are better at identifying and talking about their feelings when they’re in the moment. Recognizing what you’re feeling and talking it out is one way of manually processing the emotional energy, so it doesn’t get stuck! Men are less likely to do this and more likely to “stuff” or “bottle up” their emotions, making them more likely to get trapped emotions in the first place.

Trapped emotions can also be released after the fact, using The Emotion Code, the technique I developed while in practice and also the name of my book. The Emotion Code is easy and can be used by anyone, with very little “talking about feelings” involved. Even so, an overwhelming percentage of my readers and students are women. This strongly suggests that men are simply not as comfortable dealing with their feelings; whether this is by nature or nurture is uncertain. In fact, men are only half as likely as women to reach out for professional mental and emotional help when it is needed.

Emotional communication or lack thereof may be the main determining factor in how long or short life is. When the body is free of the negativity of trapped emotions and is able to remain in a state of relative balance, the immune system remains strong and able to fight against pathogens and disease. Women have gained a greater handle on this and it only seems to be increasing as more and more of them learn energy techniques like The Emotion Code to stay healthy. Hopefully it won’t be long before men catch up!

By Dr. Bradley Nelson