Research has confirmed what many of us know by experience: Extremely close married couples - especially elderly ones - are statistically more likely to die within 6 months of each other. The key in the study seems to be whether or not the surviving partner has some sense of purpose beyond the relationship with the deceased. (You can read a report at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26980587/).
But the part of the story that really touched me was the detailed research on why this might be true. It's not merely psychological or emotional - there is a physical element involved. Specifically, research shows that long-time couples actually have a regulatory effect on each others' heartbeats. From the article:
In one such study, Rollin McCraty, research director at the Institute of HeartMath in Boulder Creek, Calif., looked at what happened to six longtime couples' hearts while they slept. Heart-rate monitors revealed that during the night, as the couple slept beside each other, their heart rhythms fell into sync, rising and falling at the same time. When the printouts of their EKGs were placed on top of each other, they looked virtually the same.
“When people are in a relationship for 20, 30, 40, 50 years, they create sort of a co-energetic resonance with each other,” says Lipsenthal, who is the past director of Dr. Dean Ornish’s Preventative Medicine Research Institute in Sausalito, Calif. “A simple analogy is two tuning forks, put next to each other. They create a co-resonant pitch. What happens when two people sleep together for 50 years? What happens when one goes away?”
"They looked virtually the same." They took on each others' heartbeat. Incredible.
Paul tells us that marriage is a picture of Christ and the church. Whose heartbeat are we reflecting - individually, in our local body, as the church in our nation or on the field? Can we say that our spiritual EKG would match His?
If not, there's only one way to get it - give Him our quality and quantity time. Draw close to Him, open His Word, and let Him start retuning our hearts.
1 comment:
When do you sleep or do you? You
keep coming up with such fascinating thoughts and articles.
Not complaining, just wondering.
I know of at least 2 couples who died within a day or two of each
other even tho supposedly healthy.
One was a friends parents who were
so close. Validates the research.
One would almost think that we are
'fearfully & wonderfully made" eh?
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