Did you know that your heart has an incredible unique intelligence unto itself? Or that it has a significant influence on our perceptions, emotional experiences, and higher mental processes? And did you know that the heart can actually sense your emotional response to an event before the event has occurred?
You may have instinctively felt that the heart was so much more than a blood pump. But science has actually confirmed it. Researchers discovered that the heart has its own intrinsic nervous system that sends a lot of information to the brain, affecting the way we feel, think, and perceive. In fact, the heart actually sends more signals to the brain than the brain sends to the heart.
Scientists refer to this as the little brain in the heart. But don't let the diminutive name fool you. The heart-brain can act independently of the brain in your head.
Its neurons have long-term and short-term memory and extensive sensory capacities. The heart and brain communicate with each other in a complex dance. As we experience emotions through the day, our heart rhythm patterns tend to reflect how we're feeling. This information is monitored by the emotional centers in the brain. where they are then perceived as feelings of fear, anger, joy, appreciation, etc.
When we get bogged down with stress, worry, impatience, information overload or indecision, the heart's rhythm has a jagged and irregular pattern. The resulting disorder or incoherence in the nervous system creates noise or static that in essence causes the neurons in the brain to get out of sync, resulting in impaired mental functioning. or cortical inhibition. We can feel energy drained with more mental fog, making it difficult to focus, remember things, listen deeply, and make clear decisions. However, on the upside, when we experience feelings like love, kindness, appreciation, or compassion, it creates a smooth, coherent heart rhythm pattern.
This has a calming and balancing effect. and creates more harmonious cooperation between the heart, brain, and hormonal system. This not only improves how we feel, but also our ability to think clearly. We can see creative solutions to problems, and more easily discern intelligent choices and decisions. This is cortical facilitation.
The good news is we don't have to wait until we happen to feel good to experience this uplift. We can choose to create it ourselves. Research shows that when we practice activating positive heart qualities, it has a carryover effect that increases the overall baseline of coherence in our system.
So we have more resilience during stressful experiences and can more easily maintain our poise, confidence and self-security when challenges arise. This is the intelligence of a coherent heart. We offer many free tips and techniques to increase your heart coherence based on our 30 years of research on the subject.
Head to heartmath.org slash resources to learn more.