SUPER BOWL XLV111
Super Bowl XLV111: Seattle Seahawks vs. Denver Broncos today!! We won!! Football is a love language of so many communities across cultures and across continents. The coming together of family and friends around mega sports events like today’s Super Bowl is the 6th Love Language in my opinion.
My husband Joe, my son Justin, and my step-son Pat have been holding the Canadian 12th Man flag in New York this week-end and I can only imagine the excitement tonight in New York! Woohoo! Mano et mano there is nothing that bonds more than cheering your face off at a football game in New York!! I’m sure they are heading for the New York bars right about now…I am living off their good vibrations vicariously here in Vancouver with everyone else who was tuned into this afternoon’s game. My daughter Ashley even made green and blue Seahawks cupcakes for the occasion!
I never really got the excitement of watching football before I met Joe. Growing up playing sports, our family was more about the do’ing of sports rather than the be’ing of sports. After 9 years with Joe, I have become a convert! Joe grew up in Thunder Bay where his parents would corral their five children and drive for hours to watch mega events in the neighbouring larger cities. Watching sports was a love language in their home that centred their Sundays like a religion.
Playing sports, attending sports events, or just tuning in through your television, the sharing of these special events is a great way to bring your family together no matter what stage of life you are at. When you are excited and cheering for your favourite sports team, your brain releases endorphin and dopamine, which are some of your body’s natural chemistry painkillers. These are key hormones, which contribute to feelings of well being. And guess what, when you hugged that person beside you today when the Seahawks made their first touch down, you were producing oxytocin, the attachment hormone! People who cheer together, stay together. Go Seahawks Go!
When you share deep emotional experiences with someone else, you are in ‘resonance’. It can be thought of as a mood contagion when you and another are in a feeling of empathic connection. Limbic resonance includes all feelings — love, anger, and fear. Being in resonance some of the time is a necessary state for healthy brain. The chemical release associated with it are what contribute to healthy body and mind, as well as long term relationships. As human beings we are meant to live in social connection. Depression can come from a lack of belonging.
What are your family rituals? It is the simple and shared moments in life that will last as your legacy. And as for my daughter Ashley, (with the green and blue hands… and tongue), heading into her EY offices tomorrow with very attractive blue and green hands, she is now her own legend! The Seahawks won.. could it have been the cupcakes?
Here are 5 great ways to keep your family close:
- Covet your Sunday as family day. Life can be busy but having one day you can count on, you will set up rituals that connect you and your family over time.
- Make sure your shared time together is something active and positive. Research shows over and over again that shared positive emotion, bonds relationships.
- Rehearse the positive memories through conversations in your week – at work and home. Every time you talk about positive things, you brain activates positive pathways that will change your brain and experience of life generally for the better.
- Start meetings at work with a quick check-in of everyone’s best moments of the week-end. These positive shares can go a long way to develop more positive working relationships. Remember to do that at family meals too!
- If you live alone, be intentional about joining the community you live in. And if you have a neighbor you know lives alone, why not give them a call to invite them over to watch the game with you today?
Life is waiting for you! Love up, Stress Down!
