“It is very difficult to be a dynamic success if you don’t feel well.”
Famous quote by me…Patricia Fripp
My friends have always been great supporters and encouragers. They also keep me up with what I should be reading or aware of in the news. Or at least best selling author and in-demand keynote speaker Susan RoAne does! Five newspapers a day!
As a woman who has always been single by choice, one how has a strong emotional connection with my male and female friends, and my brother Robert Fripp I enjoyed these comments sent to me by buddy Susan RoAne.
In an evening class at Stanford the last lecture was on the mind-body connection – the relationship between stress & disease. The speaker (head of psychiatry at Stanford) said, among other things, that one of the best things that a man could do for his health is to be married to a woman, whereas for a woman, one of the best things she could do for her health was to nurture her relationships with her girlfriends.
At first everyone laughed, but he was serious.
Women connect with each other differently & provide support systems that help each other to deal with stress & difficult life experiences.
Physically this quality “girlfriend time” helps us to create more serotonin
– a neurotransmitter that helps combat depression & can create a general feeling of well being. Women share feelings, whereas men often form relationships around activities. They rarely sit down with a buddy & talk about how they feel about certain things or how their personal lives are going.
Jobs? Yes. Sports? Yes. Cars? Yes. Fishing, hunting, golf? Yes. But their feelings? Rarely.
Women do it all the time. We share from our souls with our sisters/mothers & evidently that’s very good for our health. He said that spending time with a friend is just as important to our general health, as jogging or working out at a gym.
There’s a tendency to think that when we are “exercising” we are doing something good for our bodies, but when we are hanging out with friends, we are wasting our time & should be more productively engaged-not true. In fact, he said that failure to create & maintain quality personal relationships with other humans is as dangerous to our physical health as smoking!
So every time you hang out to visit with a gal pal, just pat yourself on the back & congratulate yourself for doing something good for your health!
We are indeed very, lucky. Sooooo – let’s toast to our friendship with our girlfriends. Evidently it’s very good for our health.
One of my great male friends who is macho and sensitive is Darren LaCroix. We are teaming up again for our Story and Structure Seminar and Speech Coaching Camp in Las Vegas, June 15-17, 2012. The ONLY place to be to up the impact of your presentation skills!
It is our tendency to push through all the hard stuff in life, and if we have lots of complaining women in our realm, we try not to be like them and keep things to ourselves. At some point, when i take off my happy mask, talk to a good friend, maybe even cry a little, and then listen to her. I feel better. I actually take it a step further and go on a long walk three days a week with an old friend. Sometimes we talk, sometimes we complain, and sometimes we just look at the scenery and say a silent prayer of thanks for all we have. No matter what it makes me feel better, and when I miss a walk day, I can feel it in my body and my soul…