Mental Illness: Why Preserving Ancestral Balances Has a Protective Effect on the Psyche

The data we receive from institutions and professional associations of psychologists and psychiatrists speak clearly: we are facing a major emergency without precedent regarding the mental health conditions of the population, with particular reference to young people. The alarm raised by The Lancet at the end of May cannot go unheard. I have been dealing with primary prevention for 46 years, therefore studying everything we could do to create the breeding ground for chronic health, and I can count on a large group of psychiatrists and clinical psychologists who support me in the Healthy Habits project.

In recent decades, institutions and health professionals have focused heavily on identifying and perfecting treatments for this insidious and debilitating disease, but little has been done to anticipate the problem. We could do a lot instead, based on the most up-to-date scientific research. Mental illness, like almost all pathologies, has its own trajectory, and in most cases does not arise overnight. This knowledge, combined with new scientific findings on the close correlation between our mental health, the environment, our physiological conditions, our nutrition and the quality of psycho-social relationships (which we call the “4 evolutionary pillars”), offers the opportunity to intervene in that “gray area” that lies between full mental health and the onset of full-blown disease.

In this phase, the clinic tells us that we have clear signals that indicate a loss of balance and/or emotional dysregulation, and that these signals are gradually strengthening. Precisely thanks to the knowledge of the interactions set in motion by the "4 pillars" mentioned above, today we are able to analyze through personal habits, what could be the causes of this initial imbalance. In fact, we know from research and anthropology that the human being has evolved in symbiosis with nature respecting the same rules for hundreds of thousands of years. This long time span has formatted our biological clock and the consequent hormonal dosages, and this mechanism preparatory to survival cannot be modified in the short term.

In short, we have bio-physiological rules that we should respect to maintain within us the conditions of balance (homeostasis) capable of protecting physical and mental health. Today we know that everything inside us is connected, and that a profound alteration of habits even in just one of the "4 pillars" is capable of dysregulating other apparently distant functions. A typical example is the lack of sleep, capable of worsening the quality of our diet, our physiology and also making us less pleasant towards others. Ultimately, abandoning ancestral habits distances us from the sources of well-being, exposing us to great dangers.

Instead, using the body in the right way, in order to take advantage of the natural production of wellness hormones guaranteed by the practice of physical activity, being in direct contact with nature and sunlight, having a physical and not just virtual relational life, where you can share emotions with others also physically as in a hug, eating food produced by nature, fresh and predominantly vegetal, are all habits capable of exerting a powerful rebalancing action on our internal chemistry allowing us to counteract the excess of stress hormones such as cortisol, resulting in the hyperactivation of the sympathetic nervous system, a reactive system useful in times of danger.