Heroes Not Zombies

I’ve been thinking recently (again!) about two inter-related dimensions of being human – a creatureliness and a symbolic self, as Becker describes it, or as a visible and in invisible self, a body and a soul….an so on. Then yesterday I read in the superb “The Alchemy of Illness” by Kat Duff –

The Nahuatl peoples believed that we are born with a physical heart, but have to create a deified heart by finding a firm and enduring centre within ourselves from which to lead our lives, so that our hearts will shine through our faces, and our features will become reliable reflections of ourselves. Otherwise, they explained, we wander aimlessly through life, giving our hearts to everything and nothing, and so destroy them.

That set off my thought patterns down several roads…Heartmath and the intelligence of the heart – learning the ways to use our heart-thinking (yes, there is a neural network around the heart which we use to do a kind of thinking). Then I got to thinking, reflecting on a conversation my wife and I had on waking this morning, “imagine what it would be like if what was in your soul actually shaped your face so everyone could see it” – how would you appear to others if what was in your heart shaped your appearance?

Then that last line, “Otherwise, they explained, we wander aimlessly through life, giving our hearts to everything and nothing, and so destroy them.” brought me right back to heroes not zombies, and to Kierkegaard’s line about tranquillizing ourselves with the trivial.

Two hearts……..

So, what’s in your heart right now?

Are you in touch with your soul’s purpose?

How are you responding to what your heart has to tell you?