Have you ever wondered what was the biggest breakthroughs of modern science? Do you think that was the discovery of planets from outside the solar system, dark energy, nanocircuits, or maybe quantum machine? There are certainly many impressive findings we have heard of. But what about the discovery, which not everyone has heard, but which turned our world upside down a little? Because the revelation of neuronal cells in the heart certainly mixed up a little on our approach to us as a human species. Wanna know why? Keep reading, but I’m warning you – it might blow up your mind.
Neurocardiology and the brain-heart connection
Not so long ago, in 1991, dr J. Andrew Armour published Neurocardiology. In this book, he proved that the heart has a complex nervous system consist of 40 000 nerve cells. Four years later dr Ming He-Huang discovered that these cells are identical to those found in the brain. What does it mean? This is the point that all of this start to be very interesting. Simply, the heart and brain have electromagnetic communication and send information to each other. And the heart has its own memory! But this is not everything. The heart sends much more information to the brain than the brain to the heart, also can ignore some information flowing from the brain and make its own decision. It looks like the heart has its own intelligence.
Heart is the organ that receives, sends and processes information received by brain
Many cases have documented people who started behaving differently after heart transplantation. It turns out that heart is a ‚storage’ for some information, and they can affect a person who received a new heart.
There are many amazing stories associated with the change in some aspects of the human personality after transplantation. There was a case of a homosexual woman, carnivore, who suddenly started date man and stopped eat meat. I don’t have to tell you that transplanted heart belonged to heterosexual vegetarian girl? Same happens to a man who received a heart of a man who committed suicide. Not only he married a widow (they felt in love right after they’ve met) but similarly ended his life. There was also an astounding case of a teenager whose new heart belonged to the murdered girl. The new heart owner began to have nightmares – based on a memory portrait the murderer of the heart donor was captured. It was a face from the teenager’s dreams.
Where does the soul live? Neuroscience confirms what the ancients believed
We have always been looking for the soul habitat, the immaterial element or, in other words, divine energy in the human body. Lucretius, ancient Roman philosopher and poet, as one of the first, put a soul in the heart. Also, the ancient Greeks believed that the soul lives in the heart. In Ancient Egypt, heart was not only the home of the soul but also a habitat of emotions and will. According to Hindu beliefs, the heart enabled contact with Brahman (Absolute) and was the seat of his opposition to Atman (self/ego). Ancient Buddhists and Aztecs also placed feelings and intellect the hearts.
How did they know what we had learned relatively recently? (And for what we needed complicated tools and vast knowledge, which we reached for centuries).
It’s amazing how much wisdom lies in ancient beliefs. Today we use science to discover the same things that were explained to the ancients through the prism of spirituality. Maybe it’s worth drawing from both sources?
Hearth-brain coherence
As research shows our health and life is affected by whether there is harmony between the heart and the brain. A coherence, state of optimal functioning. The heart generates the largest in the human body rhythmic magnetic field and this field can be measured. Coherence is a smooth, sine-wave-like pattern in the heart rate variability trace. All comes down to the emotions we experience – they directly affect our heart rhythm pattern. Every emotion sends a very different signal throughout our body and this is why it’s so important to learn control what we feel. Stress, anger, sadness, jealousy destroy harmony and lead to disturbances in the functioning of the body. Positive emotions strengthen coherence, lead us on the path of harmony.
Does this remind you of some Buddhist truths? After all, the right emotions are part of the Noble Eightfold Path.
An emotional shift is a key element of the techniques which allow us to create harmony between mind and body. And since we know about this amazing, electromagnetic ‚messenger’ that our brain and heart use, we can understand it on a deeper level. For the starter, we need to learn how to generate positive emotions within ourselves. Even if it seems impossible for some, we can trigger our emotional state whenever we want. All comes down to practice.
So how to shift emotional state?
Meditation and practising gratitude will be helpful here. First, you need to find that peaceful place within yourself. If you cannot find it, create it. Visualize, let imagination and good memories help. Once you have that safe place you can always back to it whenever you feel endangered.
Keep in mind all things you are grateful for. Do you think you have too little? I can tell you that there is someone out there who is happy having less than you have.
Practice awareness. Whenever you start to feel negative emotions, press the ‚cancel key’. Correct any unpleasant thoughts with positive thoughts. Keep doing this until you feel better.
To change your emotional state you can also adjust your body posture. As you know everything is connected, hence your body posture affects how you feel in the same way how your feeling affects your body posture. Not bad at all.
Once you master these basics, you will be able to evoke positive emotions on demand. And all because we are such great machine that we can program ourselves! All you need is already inside you.
More about emotions and energy they create you can find in one of my earlier pieces here https://wholeworldinmyhead.com/2020/06/04/can-understanding-quantum-physics-help-you-create-your-dream-life/.
Photos by Aziz Acharki on Unsplash , David Matos on Unsplash
