November 3rd is World Day of Kindness. This virtue has many advantages over our life organization. Being kind is good for our physical and mental health. Kindness and positive attitudes are the guarantors of harmonious relationships with others along with enhanced professional success.
Being Kind is Good For the Heart:
We now know that our emotions influence our somatic state. It is also known that our heart contains about 40,000 neurons, so it is no longer considered a mere muscle, but a kind of the second brain.
Our heart is in close connection with our brain. Negative thoughts speed up the heartbeat and increase blood pressure, while positive thoughts and generous feelings soothe the heart, relieve tension, and reduce stress. A study published in 2001 in the journal of Psychological Science states that easily forgiving individuals have a better cardiovascular system than rancorous individuals.
Being Kind is Good for the Brain:
Being nice is beneficial for the overall health of the brain as well. Richard Davidson, a neuroscientist, was trained in empathy following a meeting with Dalai Lama. After 2 weeks, the brain seemed to have transformed. Connections made between the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and areas of the brain owed to kindness, making it more intuitive and empathic. In the United States, primary school children have been taught about human relations and emotions. It turned out that their reading and math scores were 10% better than average.
A little kindness would be welcome in the world of work, a place conducive to the devastating effects of stress. Communicating positively, in a peaceful environment leads to better productivity for employees and could even have a positive effect on their immune system. When we are stressed, we produce more cortisol, a stress hormone. It causes adverse effects on our health, including our immune defenses.
Read More: Practice Gratitude and Make Life Happier
Being Nice Makes Us Happier
Being kind would make us happier. People who do volunteer work are less prone to depressive states.
We discover that goodness or kindness would have a hormonal impact. Being generous decreases the secretion of the stress hormone, cortisol and increases the hormone of happiness, serotonin. This substance gives us a feeling of well-being and satisfaction.
Helping each other can help to counteract the risks of loneliness and the misbehavior that results from it. Generous social relationships lead to better self-esteem and benefit our well-being and happiness.
Kindness Would Be an Innate Virtue
Goodness is communicable and enters a virtuous circle. It is not necessary to demonstrate by means of studies that gentleness leads to kindness. When we see people doing good things, we want to do the same. Moreover, being kind is in our nature. The University of Buffalo conducted a study, published in 2012, that defines our ability to be good as genetic. We always notice that babies respond to the cries of their peers, from the first hours after birth. Solidarity is most natural, since it is observed even in animal and plant environments.
Let us be carried away in all simplicity by kindness since everything tends to prove to us that we are programmed to be kind and generous.
You can read also 12 Health Benefits of Gratitude