As a psychiatry intern at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, years ago, I was asked to evaluate a woman admitted to the ICU due to chest pain. I asked the standard questions.

When I asked about the picture of a man displayed on her bedside table, she burst into tears and clutched the picture to her chest. She began sobbing about the recent loss of her husband. Nurses rushed into the room and asked what was going on. Her EKG monitors were showing signs of ischemia and risk of myocardial infarction. Grief was leading to heart-attack. Nurses gave her nitroglycerin and her heart recovered without injury.

The mind-body connection is real. It can promote health or lead to death. Our stress response system, mediated by the hypothalamus of the brain and the adrenal glands in the abdomen, needs to be regulated.

We can work toward a healthy balance of stress and relaxation by making smarter behavioral choices. Exercising five times per week has been shown to reduce mild depression, a stress-related injury of the brain. Practicing meditation has been proven to relieve unhealthy levels of anxiety, a gateway to physical illness. Even a walk through the woods has been studied and found to promote brain and cardiovascular health.

It’s a busy world out there, where taking time to relax or to focus on emotional health seems like a waste of time. Relaxing from a busy schedule is not a waste of time. Healthy levels of rest promote improved brain efficiency and a sense of emotional wholeness. Put that on your schedule and do it!

Donald Hall. A Widow’s Grief: Language of the heart, Journal of the American Medical Association, 1992. 268:871-872.