Kindness is a Wellness Pill You Take with Each Kind Act
It makes sense that when someone kindly holds the door open for us, we benefit by not getting smacked in the face with the door. But research suggests that practicing kindness also significantly improves our own physical well-being. Even after researchers account for differences in factors like age, gender, education, personality and mental health, studies show that kinder behavior is linked to having fewer health problems—such as heart disease, sleep disorders and even hearing loss—and to greater longevity.
Studies have also found that being kind can help lower blood pressure and anxiety. Helping others even lessened symptoms of depression in people who had lost a spouse. Experiments show that doing something kind for someone is more likely to boost your mood and lower your stress than doing something for yourself. Plus, a recent sweeping review of data from nearly 200,000 research participants around the world found that prosocial behavior (things like donating money to charity, volunteering and spontaneously helping out) was linked to better physical and mental health.
What makes these acts of kindness so powerful? Think of life partly as a series of choices. “Each small daily choice we make either nurtures our emotional well-being or aggravates stress, and that helps or hinders our physical health,” Dr. Harding says. Practicing kindness is on the helping side of that equation.
Source: DIGIULIO, S. (2022). Why Being Kind is GOOD for your HEALTH. Good Housekeeping, 273(2), 41–44.
