Hug therapy means healing! Hugging is one of the warmest human connections between two people. For good and hard, we need this manifestation that brings us comfort and relief. By embracing, we transmit to each other the most authentic emotions. Embrace is nourishment for the soul, a guarantee of the emotional health of any person. Virginia Satir, a worldwide known family psychotherapist, said: “We need four hugs a day for survival. For our balance, we need eight hugs a day. For our growth, we need 12 hugs a day.”
This means that embracing each other offers us, at the same time, a safe place, comfort, emotional exchange, and psychic and spiritual development. Also, hugging is a real therapy for the soul, and its benefits are countless. Research has shown that, like laughter, hugs are useful in healing diseases, fighting feelings of loneliness, depression, anxiety, and stress. Here are some of the most important benefits of hug therapy:
The benefits of the hug.
1. Nothing in the world gives you more relief than a hug if offered honestly and at the right time. The heart comes to life, self-esteem strengthens, and the body releases endorphins that give you well-being.
2. Hugs can stimulate the release of oxytocin, a hormone beneficial to the body that prevents feelings of loneliness, isolation, and anger.
3. A hug from the soul raises the level of serotonin, the hormone of happiness, producing optimism, and goodwill.
4. Hugs help strengthen the immune system. The gentle pressure on the sternum and the emotional load caused by the hug stimulates the thymus gland, which balances the production of white blood cells, helping in the fight against diseases.
5. Hugging increases self-esteem. From the moment we are born, the comforts of our parents show us that we are loved and special. The association between pleasant tactile sensations and the confidence we have acquired from the first years of life remains embedded in our adult nervous system. Therefore, embraces connect us to our capacity for self-love.
6. The hug relaxes the muscles and relieves tension in the body. Hugs can alleviate pain by increasing blood flow to tissues.
7. Hugs balance the nervous system. The galvanic response of the skin to someone who receives and offers a hug shows a change in the skin’s conductance. Changing moisture and electrical energy in the skin suggests a more balanced state of the parasympathetic nervous system.
“The best place in the world is inside a hug” – J Quest
8. Hugs teach us how to give and how to receive, it shows us that love flows in both directions.
9. Hug therapy have as beneficial effects as meditation and laughter. They teach us to abandon ourselves to the present moment, to let ourselves flow with the energy of life. Embraces take us out of our patterns of circular thinking and connect us with the heart, feelings and breath.
10. The exchange of energy between people who embrace each other it’s an investment in the relationship that encourages empathy and understanding. This is also synergistic, which means that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. This synergy has more chances to bring profit to both parties.
Hug therapy is a very effective way of healing. Embrace sincerely and with all your heart! You can give a hug for no reason. There is no bad hug; there are only good hugs and great hugs. Embrace someone at least once a day, and if it’s a wet or rainy day, then hug them twice! The effects of the hug occur even when the hug ceases. The physical and emotional improvements that the embrace brings to the body lasts longer than the embrace itself. Ask for a hug when you need it and accept a hug when it’s given to you. You can always give a hug without thinking about labels or biases.