For as long as there have been poets there have been voices telling us that the heart is a seat of consciousness. For as long as Anyone has received a message from the God that created them they have reported back to us to listen to your hearts. Each train of religious thought references the heart as a vehicle for discernment. Ever see what the Dalai Lama does when he replies I see. or, I understand!? Why, he looks you right in the eyes and places his hands over his heart. Does he know something we dont? How could he? Everybody and their Aunties have been telling us as long as weve had ears that the heart has a greater place in our consciousness than we allow ourselves to embrace. It hasnt always been like this. Somewhere along the line, though not exactly discredited, the thought of living within and using the consciousness of the heart took a major back seat to, well, the thought that the brain is the center of our ability to receive, process and assimilate information. Lyrically, all the information is there. In fact, the concept is a part of our shared human experience, regardless the language, custom or orientation. Whats exciting is that today, science is beginning to cut loose and reveal to us empirically what we have always known -- in our hearts, of course! Dr. Joseph Chilton Pearce, a pioneer in the distillation of scientific research as it is applied to human development (and especially childhood education) is the author of The Crack in the Cosmic Egg, Exploring the Crack in the Cosmic Egg, Magical Child, Magical Child Matures, Bond of Power and Evolution's End. He has been gathering information from scientific studies around the globe that provide strong evidence that heart-consciousness is much more than just a metaphor. There is more than enough data available to begin using what has been learned and to begin to apply it to real-life experience. Much of my own distillation process I owe to the work of Dr. Pearce, who has given me permission to share information based on his lecture materials. We hear of test-tube babies. In reality, thats only where they get their very first start. Unless the fertilized egg is implanted into the womb of a mother-host very soon, it will die. Why? Because this new organism cannot become viable until, literally, the spark of life is passed on to it from another living organism of its kind. Life itself, the spark of life of which we all share, has been received by the offspring as passed on through the mother back to humankinds first ancestor. The electromagnetic field, which lives inside the mother activates the pulse of the newborn. That pulse is taken on by a clump of cells in just about the center of the new organism. But do you know what these cells are? Science has named them atrial-neural cells: cells that have the capability of functioning as either heart (beating - atrial) cells, OR Brain (information processing neural) cells. This is no tiny concept, but theres a cute little visual that hammers it all home. After a period defined by phenomenally rapid cell-division within the developing organism, a number of beating atrial-neural cells "migrate" in two tiny streams (like horns growing out of a head) from that central clump to a position closer to the outer edge of the organism. There, they come together to grow to become the organ that we know as the brain. Think about this a moment: The brain actually comes from the heart. It is, in fact, an extension of it. Now feel this for a moment. If you cant differentiate between thinking about the concept and being able to feel the experience of it, dont worry, youll be getting some tools to help you sharpen your abilities. But the whole thing gets even juicier, because something more interesting develops. After a while, the cells that coalesce into what we call the brain stop streaming, stop beating and begin to differentiate into cells that specifically take on the function of information processing. But about 65% of the heart cells in your chest this very moment continue to function as neural (information processing) cells! In a nutshell, atrial-neural cells that migrate to form the brain forget about beating and go about the process of information assimilation. Their siblings, who stayed at home, continue to beat, but theyre also processing and assimilating information. Between now and the next part of this series, spend some time with this concept. Allow yourself to sense, if you can, the part of you that lies in the center of your chest that is, indeed, taking in information and distributing it. The next installment will offer you some clues and cues that will help you to become more familiar with the wonders of your heart, your most potent ally. |
