Letter #41: Living with HEART and Integrity
Dear Friend
I would like to share with you a piece of writing I’ve just done elsewhere, and it’s a sort of revisit to past messages. That’s important: we need to remind ourselves consciously of important things in life which lead to and promote our wellbeing - mentally as well as physically.
Even though I live a conscious life, and am very quick to spot my ego up to its tricks, I find that getting reminders of important things is a big part of living with physical, psychological and spiritual wellbeing. I know from my work in education that this is the case with pretty much everybody... unless their ego acts up, that is!
We could think of such reminders as conscious interventions into the affairs of our subconscious world, which drives much of our actions, thoughts and feelings.
And this bears worth repeating too: once we take actions and undo harmful habits and create new, healthy, habits we then need to stay vigilant and keep practising. Wellness is a lifelong journey! So, let’s look at living with heart, definitely a technique well worth developing!
Would you like to live your life with HEART…?
John F Kennedy is well-known for many good things (which is why he was assassinated), not least when he inspired Americans to:
"Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country."
I like to swap human world for your country to involve us all:
"Ask not what the human world can do for you, but what you can do for the human world".
Everywhere I look in our conflicted and divided human world, and see horrible things being perpetrated by human on human, it's abundantly clear to me that at the time of their harmful words or actions they are without heart. Their heart is closed, for human heart is never violent.
I think with the devastating anti-human, anti-love, anti-education schooling that 99% of us are subjected to, so many amongst our human family struggle to feel connected to our heart.
And without heart we have no human essence. Human essence is our birthright and, when flowing, brings us the joy of being human.
I think for all who aspire to a healthy, enjoyable and rewarding life for themselves, while being active in building a new world based on mutual respect and love, it is our responsibility to our own self and to the whole human family, to be mindful of our own heart.
It is beholden upon each of us to make sure we have opened our own heart up, and to engage in life at all times with our heart as well as our head. Heart and head working in concert is super empowering!
Of course, we will still err and react too quickly at times, but then comes our conscious realisation of what we have said or done, and with that we feel indebted to offer a heartfelt apology.
After all, we usually react negatively to those we spend the most time with and love the most. But strangers, too, are most receptive to an apology that comes from somebody’s heart!
Living with an open heart gives us our humanity, our human essence, our spirit, our soul and our living loving cosmic consciousness. Sometimes the head takes over, but always we return to the heart.
But what, practically speaking, does living with heart actually mean?
Here is my answer, and what I teach in A Spiritual Revolution. It can serve as a guideline and a natty strategy for you:
Living with heart is living with integrity, and living with integrity is living with Honesty Empathy Awareness Responsibility and Trust.
This is how you live with HEART!
The more we consciously practise all five, the more they become routine for our subconscious mind, and the more we are able to:
enjoy our life with optimal health and happiness
be creative, productive, proactive and reflective
take on life with courage, clarity, curiosity, creativity, compassion and confidence
rise to life’s many challenges during testing times (like now!)
Now, you will find, love flows through you in a manner akin to the River Ganges in the middle of the monsoon. This is heart-centred living. We come home to ourselves, and finally we can LIVE in peace, not just RIP.
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Just to add something that I didn’t write in the original version… I think transforming our experience of life really is all about spending much more time consciously engaging with life. This is because most of us have come from societies and cultures which are not heart-supportive, and in reality they block our hearts from being influential in our life. This impacts on our subconscious mind.
We need to be able to see clearly when we ourselves say, feel, think negative things, and ask ourselves how this serves us. We all find it easy enough to see negative energy in others, but seeing it in ourselves is key to removing its pernicious effect on us. Having a mindset that you consciously choose to be based on honesty, empathy, awareness, responsibility and trust is the strongest foundation you can build for your life.
Then it’s just about practising them to become skilled, and noticing when we err.
Being mindful is our best learning tool!
