You may laugh off the liking of the psychiatry community in the USA for coining names such as dance or walk therapies which are based, on pure common sense or on practices that have always been around in various cultures. But then you may feel like giving them a hug. For by calling it a therapy, giving it a name, and ardently promoting it, they often manage to create awareness about a healthy and wholesome habit that is endangered by the bustle of modern life. Hug therapy is a typical example.

Big deal, you say, when you hear the term for the first time. But try to recollect the last time you hugged somebody or somebody hugged you. In all likelihood, it was too long ago. Worse, the answer may be 'never' if you are the kind who begins from physical contact. Touch has come full circle in the West this century. Time was when parents and hospitals were advised to leave a crying baby alone. Today the pediatricians and psychologists tell us to pick up and cuddle our children. Toys, even teddy bears, whose use has been increasing in the recent decades, are a poor substitute for the human contact needed by children.

In psychoanalysis, developed early this century, the couch symbolized the distance from the patient that the therapist had to maintain. The taboo against touch was broken in the heady 1960s and '70s by the hippies' love-ins and professionally by some therapists who introduced it in the encounter groups. Since then many psychological counsellors are expanding the definition of "hug" by even patting and massaging their clients in the course of normal therapy. The idea is to add touch to the powers of speech, listening and observation. The argument goes that the client's skin can observe care and comfort.

Hugging is being used even as an aid in treating some physical illnesses, following research that it leads to certain positive physiological changes. For example, touch stimulates nerve endings, thereby helping in relieving pain. It is thus not uncommon for a chronic pain patient to be prescribed "Therapeutic touch” which involves placing the hands on or just above the troubled area in the patient's body for half-an-hour (shades of reek). This pushes up the haemoglobin levels in the blood, increasing the delivery of blood to tissues, a study at the nursing department of New York University showed. Some nurses' associations in the USA have since endorsed therapeutic touch.

Any health problem makes the sufferer feel vulnerable, frightened, angry, frustrated and helpless. The patient usually needs to educate himself to make certain life changes. Hugging can give him the positive emotional state necessary to make these changes. In one study, pet ownership was seen to contribute to the survival of heart patients. The inference: the cuddling of pets has a soothing effect that reduces the stress levels in heart attack victims.

When some one hugs me i feel very relax and happy after that. The act of hugging presses and pumps our lungs so they work more efficiently. Touch gives you imotional strength and make you normal with someone even you dont know. Touch of a kid make you feel belongingness and the touch of your father ensure you for reliability.

You may feel the touch of thoughts also. When a good thought touches you then you can change so many things in right manner but you should feel the same. In our daily life we feel the thought of our dearest like your mother, siblings, friends, spouce or even your pet.
So it depends on you, what you want to feel and what you want to do. Becouse..........

We need 4 hugs a day for survival. We need 8 hugs a day for maintenance. We need 12 hugs a day for growth.