Tips for Heart-Centered Living

Emotions peak and ebb constantly amid a bombardment of choices. Uncertainty is growing about our direction and the future.

Despite the stress and chaos caused by climate change, economic instability and global insecurity, people are coming together. Hope and a positive momentum are building among the future caretakers of humanity and our planet.

Hope is driven by the qualities of the heart: appreciation, happiness, care, compassion, etc. These qualities are strengthened by:

• Spiritual practices like meditation, prayer and coherence-building techniques.
• Heart connections with others and caring relationships within and outside our families.
• Frequent gatherings:  religious, social, humanitarian causes and others.

These activities are all part of what the Institute of HeartMath calls heart-based living, which we are drawn to as stress, over stimulation, overload and stress-induced physical and mental problems increase. Heart-based living nurtures us mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually.

Following are a few tips we feel you will find helpful as you practice living from the heart:

5 Tips

• Practice genuine appreciation for everything and increase heartfelt positive emotions.
• Generate positive feelings before, during and after your activities and encounters to increase the texture and richness of your life experiences.
• Practice care, not overcare, for yourself and others.
• Guard against negative projections – the down slant: These are negative thoughts and feelings about you, someone else or the future.
• Be objective about issues that arise, as if they are someone else’s. Focus on your heart area and breathe in a positive feeling or attitude. Listen to your heart for solutions.

Practicing these tips does not guarantee that all your challenges will go away. What it does promise is that you will have a set of effective tools to deal with whatever day to day brings.

The activities also lead to coherence. Among the characteristics of psychophysiological coherence are smooth heart-rhythm patterns, greater heart-brain synchronization for improved cognitive ability, and efficient, harmonious functioning of cardiovascular, nervous, hormonal and immune systems.

Coherence – Feelings of genuine hope, appreciation, care and compassion signal your heart to send harmonious and coherent signals to the brain/mind, replacing feelings of separation with connection. The heart and brain align, and your electromagnetic field sends out a coherence wave, locally and globally. Higher cortical functions are enhanced, enabling greater objectivity and intuitive perception.
Incoherence – Stress, overwhelm, anxiety, uncertainty and fear send chaotic and incoherent signals to the brain/mind, inhibiting higher cortical functions and trigger stressful responses. The heart and brain are no longer in sync and solutions to personal and global problems elude us. Negative emotions register in your magnetic field, generating an incoherence wave.

Source:  Care2

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