The Mental Emotional Health Blog

Have you ever heard of the Ripple Effect? Jacob Kounin wrote a book in the area of education, Discipline and Group Management in Classrooms (1970), discussing the idea that when one student in a class is reprimanded or disciplined, other students may tend to comply even if they were not addressed directly. According to Wikipedia, The Ripple Effect is a term also used in sociology, economics, and spiritual activism.

For people that use systems-thinking, which views individual problems (or components) as part of a larger system, The Ripple Effect makes sense. For any direct intervention there are other effects because one person or situation is also part of, and therefore interacts with, a larger system or situation.

So today, I want to use the Ripple Effect angle as a way to emphasize how important it can be to be positive and healthy. Whether you say that laughter is contagious or smiles are contagious, you’re absolutely right. Positivity affects other people positively, just as negativity tends to affect people negatively. When a positive and negative person meet and influence each other, whoever has more patience will have the greater influence. That is where health becomes part of the equation.

A healthy person will tend have positive energy and generally will have the patience to stay positive. But the thing about positive people is that they also tend to share their positive energy with others, and that promotes health in a workplace, classroom, or community. If enough people buy into positivity and health frequently enough, a healthy culture is established. People are more productive, more supported, more supportive, and less stressed.

And that is why genuine smiles and compliments are so important. They ripple out to people beyond the people you shared your positive energy with.

Although this site is devoted to mental and emotional health, it is important to recognize that physical and spiritual health play a part in you as well. Physical health is what I’d like to talk about today.

Your physical health is directly connected to the other types of health listed above. Here a common example (hopefully not too common for you): you have a headache that developed after an emotional event that made it difficult for you to concentrate. <Physical> developed after <emotional> affecting <mental>. That’s one reason it is essential to maintain and improve your physical health. That’s why going for daily walks, getting regular physicals with your doctor, staying hydrated (with water), decent nutrition, and getting enough rest are mentioned so often by health providers, including therapists and psychiatrists.   

Everything is connected when it comes to your health.  It is ideal to cope with emotional and mental stress directly before you develop physical effects (headaches, stomach discomfort, digestive concerns, chronic muscle tension, heart concerns, etc.). But you can often improve your emotional and mental health through appropriate physical activities.