How social wellness and connection contribute to your health

Traditionally, health was often only associated with the absence of physical illness. Not so long ago we adopted the term wellness, or well-being. Personal wellness is now considered as a continuum, where freedom of disease isn’t the limit, but one of the steps to thriving. And also physical health today isn’t the only thing we look at. Over the past few decades, it has become the norm to also include mental health as part of overall well-being. And lately it became apparent that there is another component of overall well-being that was overlooked in the past and is now considered a missing piece in our wellness puzzle. I’m talking about social wellness.

Humans are social animals. The winning characteristic of Homo sapiens that allowed our species to conquer all other humans was our ability to gather and operate in larger groups. Humans lived in communities throughout our history and modern research now shows that having connections and close relationships is essential for our health. It is in our DNA to rely on others for survival. Loneliness became such a huge issue recently because our brains interpret this lack of connection as an acute danger, making us constantly stressed.

Recent studies demonstrate that connection is as important (if not more) to longevity as exercise, nutrition, sleep, and stress management. Even immune system can get improved when people are supported by loved ones. There was a study that showed that people who feel supported and get more hugs were less susceptible to catching a cold. So, the quality of our social life has direct impact on the overall health.

But there’s more. Our social circle affects our decisions and lifestyle choices in general. And when we are trying to build new habits our community could become a support system, thus indirectly influencing our health behaviors as well.