WELLNESS ON FLYWESTAIR

Contagious emotions

Have you ever felt the emotional pain of your loved ones, friends, or even strangers? It’s not something we regularly pay attention to, but if you start to look for it, you’ll find that your own emotional state responds to the people around you. This is because emotions are contagious. We catch emotions, perhaps with a lot more ease than catching a common cold. Science explains this as the process in which either a person or a group affects the behaviour of another person or group, through conscious or unconscious emotions. It’s called the emotional contagion. It’s also something we are mostly unaware of, as we often don’t realise how much our own emotions are influenced by the emotional states of others. This phenomenon is also created through mirror neurons in our brains, which help us understand what someone else is experiencing. They work by comparing other people’s behaviour through the lens of our own past experiences. Mirror neurons are also responsible for helping us to learn new things when we have something new demonstrated to us, and they are the reason yawns and laughs are contagious. The concerning part of this knowledge is that science also shows us that negative emotions are a lot easier to catch than positive ones. It is thought that this has to do with adaptations to survival, where being attuned to other people’s negative emotions (pain or fear) was directly linked to our survival. So maybe by now you are taking stock of the people you spend most of your time with, and wondering if their bad mood is affecting you. If you are surrounded by negative emotions, these second-hand emotions can have significant, long-lasting effects on your health and well-being. Constant negativity around you has the same effect on the body as constant negativity within you. This may seem like bad news, but awareness is your emotional face mask to contagious emotions. Asking yourself “in what direction are my emotions being influenced” will help you to become aware of what type of emotions you are absorbing. When you notice a heavy emotion, label what it is that you feel. This labelling helps to bring us into a state of pause, which in turn can help us to gain a little distance from the emotional experience for a moment. If awareness is your emotional face mask, then self-care is your oxygen. There is a reason why self-care gets promoted endlessly. One of its many benefits includes emotional regulation. If we want to stop absorbing the emotional baggage of others, it all starts with taking care of our own physical, social, mental, emotional and spiritual needs. When our own immune system or energy is depleted, we become a sponge for other people’s emotions. Prioritising this selfcare is the first step in avoiding or overcoming emotional depletion or exhaustion. You have a right to care for yourself. In fact, you are the one person most perfectly positioned to care for yourself, and the one that knows most accurately what you yourself need. One more tip: If you find yourself surrounded by nasty, negative and also contagious emotions, close your eyes and take a deep breath, notice where in your body you feel the most calm and grounded, and stay in this space for a few breaths. Coming back to our centre is what reminds us that our stuff is ours, and other people’s is their own.

Kirsty Watermeyer Kirsty is a Yoga and Meditation Coach, a Transformation Facilitator and Writer. Contact her at kirsty@seednamibia.com We catch emotions, perhaps with a lot more ease than catching a common cold.