The heart, we have learned, has its own brain. It is equipped with thousands of neurons and neurotransmitters that can feel, learn, and remember, just like the brain in our head. Due to its own electrical system, it can continue to beat after the brain and other organs have stopped. If we say that our heart is broken, we aren’t too far off because heartache and stress from grief can bring on a heart attack. When we are sad or depressed, the pain we feel is centered in our chest, near our heart. The connection between the heart and the brain allows for the negativity in the brain’s thought patterns to feed the pain felt in the heart, thereby increasing it.
A person who is unaware of her thought patterns and the power they wield, is caught in the trap of the thinking mind. Gloomy thoughts feed the emotions, which create still more melancholy, anger, and enmity. Many people spend their lives caught in such webs of negativity. A great philosopher, Ernest Holmes, said, ”Change your thinking and you change your life.” In essence, our lives are an outpicturing of the beliefs that reside within our heart “brains,” which is the center of our emotions.
Changing our thinking should be a relatively easy task. We only need to direct our thought processes from a calm place of love and acceptance. But, we get into trouble because our ego wants to be in control. Our ego is needed because it gives us our personal identity and our self-esteem; but like a toddler, it needs direction and boundaries. There are many ways to slow down our heart beat and to break free from the whirlwind of negativity. Meditation and yoga help to slow down both the heart rate and the incessant thinking mind. The most natural way; however, is to spend time in Nature. Unfortunately, the barrier that we have created between ourselves and the natural world has led to disease in the human psyche. The only way to heal the human spirit is to heal our planet. When we reconnect with Nature, we connect our broken hearts to their source. It is only in this way that our broken hearts can be healed. The pathways to compassion can then be opened and the means to heal our planet can be revealed.
