The Promise of Heartfulness

Introduction – The invitation

Journal entry – March 1997

I have this vague gnawing in my gut. Intuitively I know that the gnawing must be the key to reclaiming my life, but I have a part of me that is terribly frightened to listen to it, or even acknowledge its presence. Maybe it is afraid of the unknown, comfortable in every day existence, or wondering why my life, as it is, is not enough. Or perhaps it is just too paralyzed to entertain a different way of being.

I have this other part that is so entrenched in its reactive ways of being and seeing the world, it is doing everything it can to make me believe its version of reality, and act accordingly. It is got me convinced that all my skewed perceptions are true, and the best I can do is just react to the outside world and all it throws at me. And it seems to be throwing a lot.

Maybe the gnawing is yearning. I know there is something more, and I long for it to be reflected in my outside world. I long for heartful connection to others, and for engagement with life itself; and I long for the feeling of expansiveness and flourishing that go along with it. I long to live in a larger way, where there is energy flow from my vital Inner Being to my external existence, and I want to engage with life in a different way. I want to engage with life to its fullest potential.

Mostly, deep down, there is a profound stirring in my heart waiting to be released, and waiting for a guide to help me do so.

We may have an occasional glimpse of it. We may know there is a deeper way to be connected to life, and we recognize it when we feel it. We know those times when the life force within us is thriving; we feel it in our internal world and we live it in our external existence. We feel it in our hearts, our souls, our brains and, indeed, every cell in our body. Our body reflects it back and it becomes the reality we live. It is truly an embodied phenomenon. It is filled with passion and purpose, calmness and clarity; being grounded in this life force is what gives us the experience of being fully alive. As we fully embody this life force within us, our external world adapts accordingly and there seems to be a flow of harmony from the life at our core to the life we live. We feel connected and engaged with both our Inner Being and our outer world.

And yet.

And yet most of us only get an occasional whisper of this existence. If we do at all. This divine flow from our inner heart to our outer world seems absent from our daily lives, or just experienced happenstance. We know there is another way to be, but we just cannot quite grasp it.

Many of us live our lives consumed with stress, chaos and anxiety, blame, shame and judgment. We live in constant reaction to the circumstances our external life provides, as if we have no choice in the matter. We may be our own worst enemy. Our perceptions and reactivities color the lens of our existence, and we behave and further react accordingly. We seem to be victims of our own reactions and emotional programming, and in a large sense we are. We might even try to force our outer life into attunement, when our inner life is still in chaos, and wonder why we are not happy. We long for the understanding and guidance to intentionally cultivate the life force deep within us, so it can flourish to its fullest potential.

This book offers a path to do just that.

It offers the promise of heartfulness.

In it, you will see that heartful awareness and engagement offers us a profoundly different way of being in the world. It offers us the opportunity to engage with life in a way that automatically reduces the stress and emotional chaos that so often consumes us, and allows a sense of expansiveness in connection with life itself to flourish. It offers the opportunity to truly embody a different way of being. When we look at human experience through the science of embodiment, we can see that the cultivation of heartfulness foundationally changes who we are, and who we are becoming.

We can see what blocks us from experiencing the life force deep within us, and how to calm, clear and heal those blocks. We can see that the intentional cultivation of, and true embodiment of heartful ways of being can potentially affect every cell in our body, and short-term changes become long-term operating patterns. This way of functioning in the world makes us more capable of connection to our own life force or Inner Being, as well as to others and our outside world. The way we see and behave in the world begins to transform in direct correlation to our own inner transformation, and we see tangible and specific ways to cultivate it in our everyday existence. In short, we can see, and intentionally embody, all that heartfulness has to offer.

The cultivation of heartfulness completely transforms our inner and outer lives to states of calm, clarity, connection, expansiveness, full inner potential, and a larger way of living. Heartfulness, embodied, profoundly changes who we are and how we function in the world. It gives us greater access to our Inner Being, or whatever life force lies deep within you, and greater, and more meaningful connections to others, and our outside world. It allows us a more expansive, larger way of being in the world. It changes the experience of being alive.

Using the science of our humanness, as reflected in the adaptive processes of our human body, we see that it is inner experience that profoundly determines who we are becoming at any given point in time. We see that life is indeed an embodied phenomenon, and, in fact, at this very moment we are the sum total of all of our life experience. We see how our past programming and perceptions were developed, and how and why we see the world in the way that we do. We see how we can begin to `re-program' ways of being that are no longer serving us, and how easy and `doable' it all is.

This science shows us that deep in our psyche there are embedded two very strong drives, or systems. One is a fear response drive that is hyper-reactive to any perception of threat, and is responsible for feelings of emotional chaos, stress and anxiety. The second is a calmer, much more stable drive; its desire is to bond and connect. Heartfulness stems from, and further cultivates this second drive.

These two drives are responsible for how we see the world at any given moment in time. Both were necessary for our species to survive, however physiologically it is impossible to be rooted in both drives at once. Both are continually being developed and perpetuated by our inner experience, and the one that we pay attention to is the one that dominates, and more strongly develops. At any given point in time we perceive our existence through the lens of the dominant drive. Through the `spiral of becoming' this perception becomes our inner experience, and our inner experience becomes who we are.

Although our fear response system is most often dominant, and is responsible for our all consuming stress, anxiety and emotional chaos, it is really our calm and connection system that allows our deepest sense of life to flourish. When we are rooted in our calm and connection system we are not only drawn into attachment and communion with others, and our outer world, we are also more capable of being in communion with our own Inner Being. However, since our fear response drive, physiologically, is hyperreactive and will override and hijack us when it gets a chance, it takes overt intentionality to nurture, sustain, and fully develop our calm and connection system. It takes active and heartful engagement. Heartful awareness is our path to do this. Living a life of heartful awareness matters immensely, and profoundly changes us.

The transformative powers of heartful awareness are evidenced, through the `science of embodiment', throughout this book. Through it we can see how we have become `who' we are, and how heartful awareness helps us to re-align ourselves to a life of thriving. We can see the importance of the nature of engagement we bring to every moment, and we can see how it helps us heal. We can see tangible and specific ways to incorporate it into our every day lives, and the transformations that occur when we do so. We can also see that when we define heartful awareness through the science of embodiment it requires truth and authenticity. Deep down our bodies and psyche's know. This requirement of truth necessitates greater depth in understanding and embracing our heartful experience.

When we look at heartful awareness through the lens of our human existence, that it is truly an embodied way of being, we can clearly see how it transforms us. All at once this `science of embodiment' shows us how our human bodies are not only evidence of, but are vehicles for, transformation. We can plainly see that being heartfully engaged with our world creates very specific and measurable changes in how we receive and perceive our existence. It affects the choices we make, the behaviors we exhibit, and the lens through which we see our world. As long as we are humanly alive, our bodies are the instruments through which we experience life; and they are constantly adapting to every moment of every day. These adaptations are taking place whether we know it or not, and whether we like it or not.

Looking at heartful awareness through the science of embodiment shows evidence of the transformative powers of our day-to-day choices. It shows the profound power of intentional heartful engagement, and the power of that engagement in every moment. It demonstrates the efficacy of specific and prescribed ways of being, practices, and choices we can cultivate in our day-to-day life, and a blueprint for overall change. The science of embodiment validates tangible and specific steps we can take, and the tone of intentionality we can bring to all of the moments of our lives. It not only shows us the `why', it shows us the `how'. The `why' and the `how' are conveyed throughout the journey of this book.

The embodiment of heartful engagement also offers us an alternative way to heal. When we heartfully engage our world, we are not only engaging others, we are engaging ourselves as well. Our bodies, including our brains, psyches, and spirit, are beautifully designed systems of adaptation. Our human systems, or bodies, are constantly adapting to any experience that we give them. Unfortunately, however, throughout our lives many of us have had traumatic or challenging life experiences that have had an impact on our ability to be grounded in our calm and connection system.

When we look at this dynamic from an embodied perspective, we can see how, even through trauma, our body's adaptive processes have always been there to protect us. As a response to trauma or other life challenges we may have adopted perceptions, behaviors, or choices, that were originally protective in some way. Quite often these adaptations have far outlived their purpose and we begin to blame, shame, or judge ourselves for feeling or behaving as we do. This blame, shame, or judgment only further cements our fear response system, and leads us further from the physiological state of healing.

Embracing this process from a posture of heartful awareness and engagement for our selves, and our adaptive processes, is the first step in being able to heal and reprogram a different experience. In other words, we can hold ourselves in a place of self-understanding, or self-compassion for our perceptions and behaviors without letting them consume us or perpetuate our inner experience. Once we can gain a little distance from the reactivity, we can hold our self in a state of heartful engagement, and offer an alternative, healing inner experience. Heartful engagement, directed internally, heals us at our core.

The way we engage every moment permeates our life. Because we are constantly adapting to every moment of every day, the words we speak, the stories we tell, about ourselves and others, the scripts we write and the willingness we bring to every moment profoundly determines who we are, and who we are becoming. When we look at these dynamics through the lens of heartful awareness, for our selves and others, we see how immensely they matter. Because every inner or outer feeling, thought, word and choice leads to more of the same, we can see the transformative powers of intentionally and heartfully engaging our selves, and these practices. The way we engage in, and the things we expose ourselves to on a daily basis powerfully impact who we are becoming at any moment in time.

Lastly, the science of embodiment is honest. Our bodies know and will reflect the truth even if we are not consciously aware of it, and somehow this truth will find its way into our existence. Heartful awareness and engagement must be authentic or it is not heartful engagement at all. Looking at the requirement of truth in heartful engagement invites us to a new level of depth in the heartful experience. The requirement of truth leaves no room for self-blame, shame, judgment or `shoulds' if we are feeling less than heartful. It merely offers the invitation, in the moments we can, to deeply engage in what that moment has to offer. And if we cannot, heartful awareness directed back at our self offers the opportunity to heal or clear what may be blocking us.

What does it really mean to be heartfully present with our self, others, and our Inner Being in this very moment?

Through this book I invite you on an embodied journey. I invite you on a journey to the truth and the transformative power of heartful awareness and engagement. We will look at what it means, and what blocks us from it. We will examine how to intentionally cultivate it, how to heal through it, and how to embody it in our day-to-day life. We will look at how it profoundly changes us, from the inside, out.

Our heartful path

The promise of heartfulness through the science of embodiment assures us that through its practice we can cultivate a more expansive, larger way to live in the world. We all at once have greater access to the inexhaustible source of wisdom, radiance and power at our core, and are more capable of having that power manifest in our external reality. Heartfulness is experienced as a deep FELT SENSE of engagement with that of which we are heartfully aware; it may be in communion with our own Inner Being, others, or our outside world. In a large sense it is ineffable, or beyond all words.

At its most profound sense it is experienced as a whole body knowing, a coherent integration of bodily systems where there is a felt sense of surety. This is, in fact, what is going on. When we heartfully engage in its profoundest sense, our bodily systems form a coherence where, working as an integrated whole, our mind, body and spirit become one and it feels like we become one with the universe. We may know and understand things we may not even be able to formulate words for.

Maybe you've experienced this phenomenon, in big or small ways. Maybe this is a typical way of being for you and you want to cultivate more. Maybe you've experienced it intermittently, you know it exists, but have no idea how to intentionally cultivate, or even begin to give it voice and let it guide you. Maybe you have a faint inkling that it might exist, but it certainly has never been your way of being in the world.

We all have the capacity to reap the foundational and transformative powers of heartfulness, and indeed, it is where our true power lies. Heartfulness offers us a path to live the lives we were meant to live.

So what is stopping us? If there is this perfect and ineffable heartful core built into every one of us, and intentionally cultivating it can profoundly change our lives, why are not we consistently living from this state? Why are heartful awareness, and its substantial benefits, not the operating forces in our lives?

Stress, anxiety and emotional chaos often so consume our existence that we are not capable of feeling or perceiving anything else. Our perceptions of stress and chaos in our every day reality color the lens of our existence, and we see our whole world through those states. We cannot seem to find solid ground from which to change. The effects of anxiety, worry, fear and other ungrounded emotions are in direct biochemical opposition to positive loving emotions and a sense of inner calm; it is physiologically impossible to feel both states at once. Too, these states of threat, anxiety and reactivity perpetuate themselves as we consistently and routinely expose ourselves to them. Our bodies and brains adapt and continue to worsen the cycle. We literally become more biologically capable of experiencing more stress, more anxiety, and more emotional chaos. This `feedback loop" of emotional states fosters more emotional chaos, and heartfulness seems an impossible ideal. Simply put, stress, anxiety, and emotional chaos counteract heartfulness, all its foundational benefits, and any ability for us to connect to others, our outer world, or the deepest parts of ourselves. Authenticity in heartful engagement, a prerequisite for its foundational benefits, seems completely elusive.