Having a good mood has, in the past, been an informal piece of advice if you want to stay healthy. Recent studies by medical researchers, however, have verified that this is much more than an old wives’ tale. In fact, your good mood can be both a trigger for good health, and a sign that you’re not as healthy as you
The fact is, our moods can be governed, in part, by biochemical reactions in our brains, and the state of our body’s metabolic reactions. That’s the reason why, in essence, we feel good when we are in peak condition, and why sickness gives us the blues.
Apparently, it’s not only in the obvious stuff that this is true, because if we become affected by stress or emotional issues, even if we are perfectly healthy, our health will somehow deteriorate to match our emotional and mental state.
The lithium connection
Lithium has been used historically for treating mental illness. It is found as a trace element in virtually all rocks. It is a highly reactive element, being of the alkali family. As such, it reacts and synergizes with different elements, drugs, and enzymes in the body, in many different ways.
In high doses, lithium is used for treating bipolar disorder, depression, schizophrenia, and other mental illnesses. It has also been prescribed for anorexia, bulimia, and, surprisingly, anemia.
Lithium’s ability to ease headaches, alcoholic addiction, and epilepsy made it a “fashionable” medicine of choice in the past centuries, and it is now known to affect liver, kidney, and pancreatic disorders (i.e., diabetes).
How does it work?
It’s not known precisely how it works, but it is known to trigger increased activity for the chemical messengers in our brains. This increased efficiency for thinking processes enhances memory, thinking processes, and certain neural linkages that probably minimize certain mental disorders (think of these disorders as being the product of weak or incomplete neural connections or